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hphm-etched-engraved-everlasting · 4 years

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29. Clara

It took a while to get a hold of Chester, and from a working standpoint it was understandable; I figured that it was a busy time for all employees at the Ministry. All hands on deck, so the saying went. But on Halloween, he was able to meet with me at Flourish and Blotts. Admittedly, Chester did not leave a very big impression on me--after all, he was Ravenclaw's Prefect in my younger years, and the only time we actually interacted was after he graduated when Tulip introduced me to him so we could talk about the Frog Choir. Somehow, though, he still remembered me. I suppose it came with being a prefect at all--you kind of have to commit everyone's faces and trouble-making streak to memory.

Initially, he was hesitant to help with my cause, and I probably should have been a bit more considerate with my response given that it was a huge risk to have a student sneak into the Ministry, but he eventually hinted at a lead that could potentially help--an Invisibility Cloak, perhaps not the fabled one, but a working one nonetheless.

Even if it was a knock-off, I knew it was better than nothing, and I knew Jae would help with getting one for me.

As I reached out to my good old detention buddy again later that day, I was a little downhearted to hear that the person who dealt with these items was not in the best mood with him. Just to make up for a small business flop, he proposed to gift him a few items. A Remembrall he already secured, but the other item he said he needed help from a "fashionable wizard".

There was only one friend I knew who fit that bill.

The Great Hall was packed with students preparing for the Halloween feast by the time we had arrived, some of them trying to finish their homework with their friends at the last minute before the feast began while others were just conversing with friends and passing sweets around. I glanced over at Jae tucking the Remembrall in his pocket with a pained expression over his face, and felt a wave of unease ripple through my nerves. Even if Jae and I did bond in detention last year, I wasn't always sure about his dabbling in mostly illegal trades. Perhaps it wasn't deemed to be as dangerous as dealing with the Cursed Vaults, but it was still dangerous nonetheless.

The frayed nerves eventually steeled as my eyes honed in on Andre, sitting at the Ravenclaw table now looking through a fashion catalogue. I couldn't help but let out a small chuckle at the sight.

"Andre Egwu, style wizard," I called out dramatically as I approached. "Just the man I wanted to see.”

“Cheers, Curse-Breaker!” Andre greeted me with a huge grin, though that faltered instantly when he saw Jae. “Huh, looks like you came to see me in time. Looks like your fashion crisis is much worse than I thought.”

“What? You mean me?” Jae’s face morphed into one of pure horrification, eyes widened at Andre. “What’s wrong with my look?”

“Noting, if you just got out of bed,” Andre quipped shortly.

“Hold up, Andre--I didn’t come to see you because Jae needs a makeover,” I tried to reason. “I came to see you because...well…”

My eyes shifted sideways towards Jae, who quickly caught on with my glance. “We need your help getting fashionable socks,” he explained to Andre. “Preferably clean, no holes would be nice…”

Now Andre’s interest seemed to pique with his raised eyebrows. “Fashionable socks, you say. Well, those are given, but do you want ankle or crew cut? Argyle or striped? Cashmere or lambswool?”

“Uh…” Jae glanced over at me with a puzzled expression. “Yes…?”

“What kind of shoes will they be worn with?” Andre pressed on.

“Uh...regular ones, I suppose?” Jae responded.

Andre shook his head, his piqued expression melted away. “You don’t shop much, do you,” he finally noted.

“Hey, if I could wear this hoodie forever, I would,” Jae remarked with a laugh.

“Seems like we’re more helpless than we thought,” I added with a chuckle of my own. “Will you help us, Andre?”

“Of course. You know me, I never turn down an opportunity to make the wizarding world a stylish place,” Andre replied with a nod. “If it’s not Jae, who is it that requests my expertise?”

“A back alley seller who is currently not my biggest fan,” Jae responded, his eyebrows narrowed in suspicion.

“We’re hoping that gifts would convince him to forgive Jae and secure me an invisibility cloak,” I explained further. “I need one to sneak into the Ministry of Magic. Rakepick’s Dark Artefacts are stored there--artefacts that she needs to get into the final Cursed Vault. If I can get my hands on them, I can draw her out and stop her.”

Andre glanced between me and Jae, potentially waiting for one of us to say that we were pulling his leg--but he didn’t question either of us when the catch didn’t come.

“So your ability to stop Rakepick from getting into the final Cursed Vault depends on my fashion sense?” Andre finally deduced. “Well, brilliant! I love a challenge. Now, tell me--why does this seller need fashionable socks?”

Jae did most of the explaining while I looked around at the decorated Great Hall, set with decorated pumpkins all aglow. I knew that any normal student would be looking forward to the fabled Halloween Feasts, especially given the incredible entertainment that Dumbledore arranges every year and the scrumptious food that the House-Elves prepare every year. I would be lying if I said I didn’t feel the same--especially now as I gazed at the giant pumpkin that had the castle carved on its face. Only one person I knew well could have brought this design to life--the one person I swore to protect.

Not that I doubted Badeea’s ability to replicate the castle’s design, but I’ve known little Em’s ability to make something wonderful out of something ordinary. The crafting talents she had never really went unnoticed between me and my brother, and now here it was, on display for all the other students to see. They should at least see that she was no Emily Tyler. She is nothing like the pink-clad gossiping sass that sashayed through the halls with her haughtiness.

“So let me get this straight,” Andre finally said, twiddling his index fingers at Jae. “The seller wants fashionable socks because he’s been losing all of his to baby dragon fire?”

“He had been smuggling in baby dragons recently,” Jae clarified with a nod. “I figured it would be risky business to bring in something dangerous and untamed.”

“Then why don’t you give him a pair of fireproof socks?” Andre suggested. “They’re used in dragon care, so they’re practical, but also very stylish as well.”

“Sounds perfect!” Jae agreed with a nod. “He’ll love them.”

“I’m all in for that, but where can we get a pair of fireproof socks?” I asked.

“I got a pair for Charlie’s last birthday,” Andre responded. “I think I may have a spare that I can lend...if you bring me along to see this merchant.”

Now Jae looked skeptical at Andre’s bargain, and he tilted his head in intrigue. “Are you sure you want to come with us? This merchant isn’t exactly the best company.”

“Of course I do! I want to see the look on his face when he sees we’ve got him the perfect gift,” Andre said with a nod. “Besides, I feel guilty going with Cedric instead of helping Clara find Sickleworth.”

“Don’t be, Andre. Everything worked out alright,” I said lightly, shaking my head. “I did manage to track down Sickleworth--he lead me to my brother again.”

“That’s fantastic!” Andre beamed. “But I’d still like to come, if it’s not too much trouble.”

“Well, who am I to turn down extra help?” I grinned and nodded. “The only thing we have to ensure is that we are back in time for the Halloween Feast, so everyone get a move on. We’ll reconvene in Knockturn Alley.”

---

Dust swirled around the ankle of my boots as I stepped into Knockturn Alley once more with Andre and Jae behind me, the both of them carrying the gifts we needed for the merchant. Hopefully they would be able to appease him. Whatever kind of dodgy deal gone wrong couldn’t be worth just a few more items to aid him personally.

“There he is,” Jae whispered, gesturing to a tall man with a hood that looked all too familiar. No, it wasn’t the anonymous messenger who kept threatening me back in fourth and fifth year about death coming to Hogwarts. This trader I met only once or twice, but it was enough to associate his name with his look and demeanour.

“Huh. I think I see why you asked for fashionable socks--for a dark wizard, he’s actually rather stylish,” Andre remarked with a thoughtful nod.

“Do you think these gifts will be enough?” I asked Jae then.

“Yeah, for sure. But stick close, just in case.”

Jae lead the way now, walking right up to the trader without a falter in his step. Andre and I glanced at each other before following him.

“Kim. You’ve got a lot of nerve showing your face in front of me,” the trader growled, eyes narrowed and mouth twisted in a snarl. “Don’t think I forgot about the fake love potion you sent me.”

“Alistair, I had no idea that potion was actually Butterbeer,” Jae insisted. “If I knew, would I have sold it to you?”

Alistair? So I was right. The name rang a bell in my mind, and I jumped into the conversation before I could back out.

“Hold up--Alistair Fidgen?” I confirmed, mouth dropping in shock. “You’re that dodgy wizard who sold me and Charlie a fake dragon egg just last year! You thought you could pass an Acromantula egg off as a dragon egg and get away with it!”

“Oh, you again,” Alistair said with a roll of his eyes. “Look, Lin, I said I could get you one, not that I would. It was your fault for not being smart enough to figure that out.”

Andre folded his arms and shook his head at me. “Talk about hypocritical,” he mouthed to me, and I nodded.

“Look, Alistair--we both did things that we probably shouldn’t have. At least I can come clean with that,” Jae started. “So why not put our pasts aside for Clara’s sake? See, Clara’s in the market for an Invisibility Cloak, and I know you’re in the market for mending our broken business relationship. And we brought gifts for you too!” He gestured to the Remembrall and fireproof socks. “What do you say, Alistair? My sincere apologies and our gifts for an Invisibility Cloak?”

“Oh, I’ll do better,” Alistair sneered. “I’ll take the gifts, keep the Invisibility Cloak, and get my revenge all at once!”

He raised his wand, and an unknown spell flew towards Jae, leaving him completely winded though still on his feet.

“Jae!” Andre rushed to his aid, and Jae leaned heavily on his shoulder.

“Guess...he was more...upset than I thought,” Jae muttered, shaking his head.

“Get back, Jae.” I stepped forward and shielded the two boys from view with an arm. “Avis!”

The flock of birds that shot out of my wand with a BANG whizzed past Alistair’s ear and out of sight, though that was enough to shift his focus towards me instead now that Jae was out of commission.

“That,” he growled, pointing his wand towards me, “was a mistake, Lin.”

I readied my wand as well, pointing it towards him with a hardened glare. “We’ll see.”

Alistair Fidgen did not hold anything back--in fact, he was much tougher to beat than I initially thought, for one who dealt with something so dirty. In the end, I fell down once from a powerful Flipendo, only to have Andre pull me back up for another round. It was not until I managed to push him back with a powerful Depulso that had him completely out of breath, signalling the end of that duel.

“You make...quite the convincing argument,” Alistair finally acknowledged, mopping the sweat off his brow. Some of his grey hair clung to his forehead, and I cringed as they gleamed in what remained of the light. “Tell you what, then. I’ll forgive Kim and get you your Invisibility Cloak for one last thing.”

I stowed my wand in my dress and put my hand on my hip, though the attempt to look intimidating must have been rather futile. “You just lost, Fidgen. Should you really be in a place to bargain?”

“That’s funny. I was under the impression that you wanted an Invisibility Cloak,” Alistair shot back.

For someone who handled dirty dealings, he definitely had a way with his words. I clenched my fists and took a deep breath, trying to steel my nerves yet again. “Okay, fine--what do you want then, Fidgen?”

“Bring me a real Love Potion--the one Kim was supposed to bring me before--and I can secure you an Invisibility Cloak,” Alistair finally proposed. “Bring it here, or don’t bother coming back.”

With that, he turned on his heel and left, snatching the items away and stowing them into his pocket. I turned to Andre and Jae, who looked positively defeated at how that interaction went.

“That just...went completely downhill,” Jae remarked in a low mutter.

“And you don’t have any Love Potions on hand, I assume?” I asked.

“Nope. I’ve run out--I’m not expecting my next batch for a while,” Jae responded.

“Maybe Penny might be willing to lend her potion brewing talents again for this cause?” Andre suggested. “After all, she did brew the Beautification Potion, the Wit Sharpening Potion…”

“A Sleeping Draught, a Draught of Peace, a Forgetfulness Potion, and a Polyjuice Potion,” I recalled with a nod. “Well, I just hope she’s up to it. My ability to stop Rakepick from finding the last Vault might depend on it.”

“We better head back to Hogwarts in the meanwhile,” Jae said. “The Halloween Feast should be starting soon.”

“Yes, let’s. We’ll talk this through with Penny when we can.”

So many things were riding on my ability to beat Rakepick to the last Cursed Vault. I just hoped against hope that my friends would not abandon me for this crucial mission once more.

#HERE WE ARE #CHAPTER 10 IS HERE AND DONE #some of these chapters I plan on breezing through so we get to the real hype as soon as we can #but I will try my best to milk the plot as much as I can #though some of this is filler in the game so idk if that'll be worth anything #eh well #the next chapter hopefully won't take too long #hphm year 6 #etched engraved everlasting #hphm clara lin #hphm jae kim #hphm andre egwu

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bibliocratic · 5 years

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soft domestic jonmartin

“Jon!” Martin is shouting with his head shoved in the under-stairs closet. Tone deadened to a loud mumble, and he's knocked something heavy over that sounds like the ironing board or the drying rack in his attempt to grab things that he always inconveniently shoves away right at the back. “You got your raincoat?”

“I won't need it,” comes the low response from the kitchen.

“The weather said it might rain.”

“It'll be fine,” Jon replies, only half listening really, with a willfully misplaced confidence in the weather.

(And it will rain when they get off the train, a spatter of showers that they get caught in, and the coat will be in the suitcase, inaccessible. Martin won't say anything as Jon huddles against him as they share the single umbrella, but the smugness will be in the tone of his voice as he comments on the laden clouds – looks like it might be a proper downpour, Jon, shame the weather man didn't predict anything like this – and Jon will run his hands through his thinning hair already dripping into his face and weather this with the appropriate amount of mild chagrin, knowing Martin will take pity and relent momentarily, fuss over the damp and the cold and Jon's endless ability to catch whatever bug is going round, and bundle him into a cafe to dry off.)

“I'll pack it anyway,” Martin calls back, kicking something else with his foot that sounds like the hoover. “In case.”

Jon sighs, but it is a long-worn gentle sound that did not expect to win this ground. He resumes his task, folding and rolling a weeks worth of their combined shirts, sweaters and trousers neatly and efficiently into their modest suitcase. He is very good at this, packing. Always has been good at finding room for things when he thought nothing else would fit. It brings him a self-satisfied pride, knowing each thing has its place, that there will be space for more.

(Martin will insist on buying a fridge magnet from the first tacky shop they see on the seafront, a few postcards to send to Basira, Daisy, Georgie and Melanie. Jon will find a way to sneak off as he always does and buy another souvenir spoon to add to his expansive collection, one for every place he's been with Martin, this one with a blue and silver crest adorning the top, and he'll play innocent when Martin comes across it cleaning a month later – I thought I told you I got another one / Jon, we don't have the room, you're going to have to start putting them in boxes up the loft / I will, fine, I will, tomorrow. )

Tucked subtly at the bottom of the case where Martin won't think to look, Jon's placed two smart dress shirts and matching ties. The dress shirt is the mint coloured one with the little embroidered flourishes on the collar tips, Martin's favourite, the one he always wears when he wants to impress; it's worn at the under-arms a little, the button right at the bottom lost somewhere and Jon knows Martin will look dashing in it. He'll need help with the tie because he always does but that's where Jon comes in. Martin doesn't know Jon's booked a table at a nice restaurant tomorrow, theatre tickets for the early evening, and Jon's giddy in his own way to reveal it like a bouquet of flowers from a magician's sleeve.

(Jon will touch the ring on Martin's right ring finger – with the tenderness of the joints in his hands, the way they sometimes swell in the cold, it's too small to be worn on the traditional place; but then again when has tradition ever really mattered – and Martin will call him soft, and Jon will know Martin is looking at him like that and Jon will not disagree).

“Socks?” he shouts out, wondering if Martin's left the closet yet or if he's found another umpteen things he's thought that they should bring. He has already argued Martin out of bringing an extra book (You won't have time to read it, it'll just take up room), walking boots (It's Dorset, Martin, not the Peak District), and his Polaroid camera (You're already bringing the digital one, and we've only got a few shots left, we should save them for Georgie's birthday party).

“I put them with the boxers. Next to the toaster.”

Jon huffs and moves away from the suitcase spread-eagle on the kitchen table to grab the messy, teetering pile of boxers and socks on the counter-top. He hums off-key and mindless as he brings them back to his workspace, refolding them to stuff them down the sides of the suitcase, smoothing over rucks and bumps, double checking on the ties stuffed into the spare pair of shoes Martin had won the argument for.

A flump in front of him and Martin is dropping things onto his carefully organised packing. Jon frowns, and touches at the wool. They're going to Bournemouth, he thinks with another internal eye-roll, not the Outer Hebrides.

“Really, we won't need all this.”

“Just in case.”

This is Martin's mantra. He's an 'everything-goes' sort of packer. There is a reason Jon is the one responsible for wielding an iron-fisted utilitarian hand over this aspect of the holiday.

Jon runs a hand over the fabric, bobbling in places, darned at the fraying edges of the sleeves. Well-loved and well-washed.

“Another jumper?” he says, ready to dismiss it with another lecture on saving space.

“It's to wear now. It'll be cool all morning, I checked. You'll be cold on the train.”

Jon concedes this battle as to his circulation like he does every time, and does as he's bid, shoving it over his head without complaint. Martin fixes his collar so it sticks out over the neckline, smooths down any hair that's been disrupted, making some comment about that barber down the road doing a nice job with the cut this time, before declaring with a cheeky smirk that 'he'll do'. Jon makes an affected moue, and cups his face, kisses his cheek, making a comment that he'll just have to try harder. These things are routine now. Beloved in their repetition.

“Have you got the tickets?” Martin asks. It's the third time he's checked, but Jon replies with steady patience.

“In the backpack, at the front.”

“Pills? There should be enough. I went to Boots to fill up your prescription this morning.”

“Same place. What about you? You have enough?”

“I've got enough for another week before I have to go back.”

“You taken yours for the journey?”

“I'll see how I go.”

“Martin,” Jon says. Not admonishing but with an echo of his old battle-axe charm he used to possess in his earlier days. “Come on.” He knows Martin won't have taken any, doesn't like to feel too dependent on them. But travelling is stressful at the best of times, never mind in London, what with the traffic and the noise and the people and the jostling, and the crowds can unsettle him.

Jon's pulling them out of his trouser pocket, a little packet still mostly full, and passing them over.

“They make my mouth dry,” Martin complains, but he goes and fills a glass of water from the tap and dutifully swallows one he pops out of the crackling foil.

“We can buy something nice to drink before we get onboard,” Jon promises, tucking the pills into the front pocket of the backpack next to Jon's.

“You spoil me,” Martin says dryly and Jon feels his face crinkle in a smile. He zips the suitcase shut and gives a little voila.

“Taxi should be here in ten,” he says. “Oh, remind me that we're going to need some more tea bags for when we get back.”

“Jon?”

“Hmm?”

“We're going to need more tea bags for when we get back.”

“Oh hahaha.”

Jon had made a checklist on his phone, mostly to appease Martin, and he hears him running down what's been noted as essential, muttering to himself to clarify – so we've got all the t-shirts, sandals for the beach, you've got the tickets and if not there's the email confirmation, checked the train line websites, all networks running as usual and on time.....

Jon puts his arms around Martin's back as he reads, letting his head rest against him. Martin's used his nice body wash this morning, sandalwood and citrus, the stuff he uses when he thinks the day's going to be a particularly good one. He's put on a little too much aftershave as usual.

“You should have a nap on the train,” he says, interrupting Martin's review. “Heard you moving around all night.”

“Just my leg giving me grief. I got a heat pack, it helped some. I'll be ok,” Martin hums in reply. Jon doesn't respond, but he is quietly confident in the knowledge that once they've found their seats, Martin will drop off like a cliff-edge, and Jon will get to listen to his audiobooks until he has to nudge him awake to say they're nearly there.

(Martin will fall asleep on him, head a solid weight on Jon's shoulder and not even out of London yet, and Jon will thread their hands together before he starts up his current Le Carre book, one headphone dangling out so he can both listen for the stops and to hear the staff with the drinks trolley in advance. Martin will wake up with a jolt and a snuffle and a 'wethereyetJon?' and Jon will say 'Only just passed Southampton' and press a mediocre, still cooling cup of tea into his hand.)

There's a chirp and a brush by Jon's trouser leg.

“Hello you,” he says to the Duchess.

You fed her?” he asks Martin.

There's a hopeful cry that implies that eons have passed since she was last given sustenance.

“She's been fed and she knows it.” Martin replies, sounding as though he is immune to the charms of their cat (he is not), and that he won't be tempted into giving her a few more treats before they leave (he will).

“I've given Tom house keys,” Martin says finally, checking that last one off the list. “He'll pop in tonight to feed her and change the litter tray, make sure no one robs us or anything.”

“All your books,” Jon replies without intonation. “How could they resist?”

Martin makes some snarky comment about how he hopes any hypothetical thief might help Jon slim down his spoon collection, and Jon snorts and gives his back a little headbutt to show he doesn't approve.

“We'll have to get him something to say thanks,” Martin continues, returning to their previous topic. “A stick of rock or something.”

“Hmm,” Jon says and doesn't move away from the heat of Martin's back, his arms still bracketing around Martin's stomach. He slept badly last night as well. Disturbed by Martin's restlessness and his own unforgiving dreams. Martin stands like a foundation stone before he turns around, the phone set next to the suitcase and fixes the situation to his liking, embracing Jon in a loose hug.

“You tired, love?”

“Hmm.”

“We can have a nap then, when we get to the hotel.”

“We aren't that old,” Jon grumbles, although his heart isn't really in it because honestly, a nap sounds great right about now.

Martin's hair, growing out on the long side now, scratches soft against Jon's face. It is still a vibrant carrot-top in Jon's head. He'll run his hands through springy curls still thick and knotted, or bestow sleep-slow kisses on it, and the recollection of that particular shade has never left him. Martin's hair hasn't been entirely ginger since the Watcher's Crown failed, to believe Martin, or Basira, who has always been entirely honest about the shipwrecks their life in the service of eldritch fear entities made of their youth, but Jon doesn't care. That's the memory he has, no matter how many laugh lines begin to grace and soften Martin's face, how often Martin wonders idly if he should dye his hair, get rid of the white. (He never will). Jon hasn't been able to see the mess of his own hair in a mirror for a long time now, but he doesn't need to know it's lost the war of attrition against the grey.

Two men who both look old before their time. Jon didn't even think they'd get this lucky.

There's a ping from Martin's phone.

“That'll be the taxi,” he says and grabs the suitcase, hefting it down off the table. “You got the tickets?”

“Yes, Martin,” Jon says, a little exasperated, but mostly fond, ever ever so fond. (He will say it like this for the rest of his life).

Jon grabs his stick, folded up and pockets it. Bends down, scratches the cat behind the ears, double-taps his own pockets to check on the theatre tickets.

“Let's go on holiday,” Jon says.

#jonmartin #tma #the magnus archives #fic #jon collects souvenir spoons prove me wrong #post-watchers crown #let them be happy

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babbushka · 5 years

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Blue Moon (8/10)

New York, 1987. The air was filled with smog and the streets were ridden with crime. Just another day in paradise. Your quiet life turns upside down when a striking man moves in across from you. You’re falling, fast, into a love that could never, ever, happen…or could it?

(Could be interpreted as modern!au Kylo Ren/Reader for those who don’t know who Pale is, but really this is Pale from Burn This!)

Word count: 5.6k

Warnings: Angst lol (i’m sorry this is the last one i promise)

—————

You were shocked. That was the only real word for all of it, shock.

Pale had collapsed in your arms, had fallen down and took you with him. You were both half on the couch, half on the floor, and you were shocked.

Your heart ached for Pale, ached for him and the way he had sobbed and cried and yelled. God he had screamed so loud, he was out of it, too far gone, too much to drink – who knows. You wish he had called you, had told you he needed you sooner.

It was moot, because he was here now, and he was blacked out, and you needed to figure out what to do with him.

The couch was too small for him, that was for sure. He was too tall, his legs too long. There wouldn’t be enough room for the both of yous, and you didn’t want to leave him alone, didn’t want to be so far away in the bedroom in case he woke up, scared and angry and confused.

“Okay Pale,” You said, mostly to yourself, “I’m gonna try and move you to the bed.”

He was out cold, smelled like shit – no, like booze. It made you wrinkle your nose as you tried to gather up this huge fuckin man in your arms.

“Okay – come on – ” You pushed and pulled him enough to get him somewhat into your arms, but you weren’t nearly strong enough to make it more than a few feet. “Shit!”

His dead weight was too much and you dropped him, wincing with the way he hit the floor.

“Shit, I’m sorry honey.” You whispered, waiting to see if he had woken up.

Thankfully it looked like he was still out.

“I don’t think I can make it all the way to the bed with you.” You sighed, running a hand down your face.

You were exhausted, working the double had really done a number on your patience. Your feet were aching and your back was all pinched up in knots, and you hadn’t even eaten yet. You were reheating soup when Pale had burst into the apartment like some great tornado of leather and tears.

You almost debated calling someone to help you bring him down to a doctor, who had he mentioned, Kenny? Maybe he could help. You didn’t know.

You checked the time, it was three in the morning. No one would be open, you thought with a sigh, and crossed your arms thoughtfully, trying to figure out what to do.

“If I can’t bring you to the bed, I’ll bring the bed to you.” You decided, leaving for your room for just a second, yanking all the shit off the mattress and carrying it in your arms to the living room.

You grabbed the sheet and the big comforter and all the pillows, even took the throw blanket and an extra one you had in the closet. You dumped it all onto the floor and began spreading out the sheets and blankets and pillows underneath him, arranging a makeshift bed that was more comfortable than the concrete floor.

You rolled him over onto his side in case he got sick and started peeling the clothes away from him. He had said he always ran hot, and you knew that from being next to him so long, you didn’t want him uncomfortable.

It was then that you noticed his bloodied hands sticking to everything as you tried to remove his shirt.

“Jesus, Pale.” You hissed with concern, immediately getting off the floor to go to your bathroom.

Your first aid kit wasn’t nearly as impressive as the one he had at his apartment, you knew that. You only had a couple normal sized bandaids and some alcohol wipes, but you knew he was going to need more than that, his knuckles were too busted. And he had just started to get them healed from when he was beating up Marty.

Sighing, you grabbed the kit and wet a soft washcloth with soap and water, and carried everything to the living room to tend to him.

“I might have to go to your apartment.” You told him, “Gotta go raid your medicine cabinet.”

You wiped up the blood off his hands, frowned at the way it kept slowly oozing out of the cuts from where he busted his fucking knuckles open. You wrapped the cloth around his hands, tied it tight so that it hopefully wouldn’t go anywhere, and started fishing around in his clothes for the keys to his apartment.

You found them in his back jeans pocket, and leaned down to kiss him real soft. He just snored.

“I’m gonna be right back, okay?” You got up again, tugged on your coat and slipped into your shoes, “Don’t move.” You told his sleeping form, before heading out the door.

—————

It was bitter cold outside, and still damp from the rain. You didn’t like it when it was this kind of rain, when the cold froze the water on the ground and you had to be careful not to slip on the ice. You were glad you only had to go across the street, gad you only slipped once on the way. Black ice was a bitch, you thought.

The elevator ride to Pale’s floor was quiet, far too quiet for your liking. You had grown so accustomed to his never-ending monologues, it was eerie almost to be without him and in such silence. Maybe the city did sleep after all.

You got to his door in no time at all, and made a bee-line for the bathroom.

You hadn’t been in there the one time you’d visited with him, and you were unsure of where he kept his shit. The bathroom was huge, way bigger than yours.

You started searching through the medicine cabinet, finding not very much aside from Aspirin, condoms and coke, which made you huff out a little laugh. There was a small closet in the bathroom, and when you opened that up you were faced with all sorts of boxes of bandages and gauze, antibacterials and the like.

“Bingo!” You smiled as you started shoveling packages of gauze and tape and ointment into your coat pockets.

Geez, it looked like he had raided a fucking doctor’s office or something, you thought. He must have grabbed everything from one of his visits to Kenny. You wondered if he went to the doctor often, if Kenny was just a friend or maybe family. Pale didn’t talk a lot about his family.

That was okay though, you knew he had his reasons.

Leaving the bathroom you almost went straight to the front door, but when you were about to pass his bedroom, you slowed.

“Might as well grab him fresh clothes.” You decided. He had been soaking wet and smelled of blood and alcohol when he burst into your apartment. You figured if you were already in his place, might as well pick up some clean and warm comfortable clothing.

You flipped the light switch, bypassed the bed – even though it did look stupidly comfortable – and went to the closet.

How was his closet even this big? Or maybe your apartment really was just that small, you couldn’t help but sigh to yourself.

“Do you own anything not overly expensive?” You hummed, trailing your hand over the fine silk shirts and pressed pants. Past the suits and looking through the drawers of ties, you were getting close to giving up. Didn’t he own comfortable Sunday clothes at the very least?

You found them finally, in another drawer in the closet. You grabbed one of his black tank tops and a pair of black sweatpants, some clean underwear and socks.

You had a bit of trouble closing the drawer, and were getting frustrated with it.

“God, come on, fucking close – ” You grunted, eventually just yanking the drawer open all the way to see what was caught.

Right in the back of the drawer was a small box, barely the size of a shoebox, stashed behind the socks.

You knew you shouldn’t look inside it. You knew that. You should shuffle it around so the drawer would close properly, leave his apartment, and go back to your own to tend to Pale. His knuckles were bleeding right that very moment, you should leave.

You took the box out, went to the bed and sat down on it.

You weren’t really sure what you were expecting to be inside, but this…was not it.

Letters in envelopes and old black and white photographs mostly.

It was Pale, that you could tell. A young Pale, but definitely Pale. You smiled at how his ears stuck out the way he did. He was with an even younger boy, the two of them were hugging in the front lawn of presumably their childhood home. You flipped the photograph over – Jimmy & Robbie 1966.

Your heart clenched, holding the photograph up to your face so you could get a better read on it. Pale had to be about fifteen here, Robbie only two or three. You weren’t entirely sure of the ages, you were never good at being able to tell that sort of thing. But they looked happy, like they were having a lot of fun.

You put it down, picked up the next one.

This one was of Pale and Robbie, but a few years older. They were outside some sort of building, but there weren’t any identifying marks on it. Robbie was wearing black tights and a black shirt, Pale was in a tank top and pants that were high on his hips. You smiled, his ears still stuck out. Flipping it over, Jimmy dropping off Robbie for dance! 1968

There were so many of them.

Pale sitting at the kitchen table surrounded by sheet music, his younger brother coloring on it with crayon – Robbie helping Jimmy write 1969

Pale and his younger brother at a stand on Coney Island, chocolate all over his face – Jimmy and Robbie getting milkshakes 1969

Pale giving his brother a piggy back ride, Pale and his brother playing tag, the two of them riding horses and cutting vegetables and laughing and smiling at one another.

1969 is where the photos all seemed to be taken place, you wondered if that was a particularly good year. You wondered what happened when 1970 rolled around.

Oh – that’s right, married.

You put the photographs down.

“Oh what the hell.” You sighed, picking up one of the envelopes. You had already invaded his privacy, might as well go for it.

Jim,

I can’t do this anymore. I’m tired of being here – tired of you. Things were great but I’m bored, and I’m afraid of you. I don’t like the way you get so angry, a temper like that is bound to be trouble. I wish I didn’t wait so long to realize it.

I need some time, some space I think. Don’t be mad at me. I’ve taken the kids down to Miami, we’re going to stay with my parents for a while. I don’t want them around you, I don’t want them thinking your behavior is okay.

You probably saw this coming. I didn’t want to say anything in person because I didn’t want a fight. I hope you understand.

Don’t bother calling, I’ll reach out when the time is right.

It wasn’t even signed.

You didn’t know what made you feel worse, the fact that she had left that for Pale, or the fact that the letter looked so worn and crumpled up, like he had thrown it away and then fished it out of the trash, read it over and over again before folding it up and putting it back in its envelope.

The other envelopes were just holiday cards from the kids.

For whatever reason you decided to open up another drawer, found nothing but stacks and stacks of sheet music. There were ink blotches all over them, some had notes scribbled on the ledger lines, others just had notes written in hand-writing you couldn’t read.

Nothing was labeled of course, why would it be?

The rain started up again outside.

—————

Back in your apartment, Pale was still out. The washcloth had turned pink, but it didn’t look like it was still bleeding, which made you sigh with relief.

You pulled the rest of his clothes off, shimmied the sweatpants up his long fucking legs, tugged the tank top over his head and gently pulled his arms through.

The knuckles were your first priority, and you tended to them quickly and efficiently, your hands only shaking a little.

He stirred just a bit when the alcohol pad swiped across the cuts, but you powered through it, applying the ointments and then carefully laying down gauze, wrapping the stuff around his hand and taping it securely. It wasn’t the best, but it would have to do.

Your stomach growled, you still hadn’t eaten. You weren’t entirely in the mood for soup, didn’t want to take the time to eat a whole bowl of it, so you just pulled off a piece of baguette that you had and smeared butter across it.

You brought your makeshift dinner back to the living room, pulled off all your clothes, turned off all the lights and ate the bread and butter on the floor. You didn’t even care about the crumbs, just pushed them away when they fell. You’d sweep them up in the morning, when things weren’t so raw. Right now all you wanted was to be back in his arms.

“(Y/N)?” It was like magic, like he could read minds, you thought as he groggily called your name.

You shoved the rest of the bread and butter into your mouth, and shuffled yourself to lay down on the floor in the big cocoon of blankets and pillows with him.

“Yeah Pale, I’m here.” You said, and like he didn’t have to think about it at all, he immediately wrapped his arms around you. He was sweating, overheated, not that that was something new.

“Where am I?” He mumbled, his eyes still closed but pinching shut tighter. You wondered if the moonlight was somehow too bright for him.

You pulled back enough just to look at him, his face that looked like it was filled with unease, with suffering. You couldn’t tell if it was emotional turmoil, or the physical suffering of being so fucked up. Nonetheless, you pushed the hair out of his face and away from his forehead, combed your fingers through the sweaty greasy waves.

“You’re at my apartment.” You explained, trying to keep your voice soft and steady. You couldn’t help the wobble in it, still too unsure and panicked to really be calm. “We’re on the floor.”

“Okay.” Pale said.

His arms tightened around you even more, crushing you to him a little bit. He still hadn’t opened his eyes, you were wondering if he even could, or if he was feeling so out of it that his eyelids were too heavy.

“You okay?” You asked, wiping the sweat away from his neck with your hand. The pulse there thumped wildly, despite him being relatively still. It made you nervous.

“No.” He shook his head, and you had that same chest clenching feeling as you did when you were in his apartment.

“Can I help?” You asked, tried to keep the lump out of your throat.

“Let me hold you?” He asked, and you laughed just a little despite all the nerves and fear – he didn’t even realize he had you in a vice grip.

“Always, honey.” You nodded, smoothed down his hair.

—————

He went back to sleep, or maybe you thought he did. You couldn’t tell. He was so sad, it hurt you. You couldn’t stop reading the letter over and over in your mind.

I’m afraid of you. I don’t like the way you get so angry, a temper like that is bound to be trouble.

Pale wasn’t dangerous. Sure he had a temper, but it was always justified. He ain’t never done anything to you that would make you afraid of him. Even that time he had yelled, all that time ago, he was scared that you were going to be hurt, that something could happen to you.

Even that time, it had been because he cared about you.

“I’m not afraid of you.” You whispered to him.

He didn’t respond, but that was okay. It was all okay.

—————

The rain really came down hard outside.

It clanged on the fire escape something fierce, sounded like someone was dropping rocks on the metal grates. You thought off-handedly that you were glad you didn’t have any plants outside, like some of your neighbors. One of the people on the fourth floor kept damn near a whole garden on her fire escape, you wondered how the plants were faring in this weather.

You thought about what life would be like with Pale in the Spring. You wondered how he would dress in the warmer weather. Smiling, you tried to imagine him in shorts, or a t-shirt. You didn’t really see it happening in real life, but it was fun to pretend.

Pale in his shorts and a t-shirt, maybe even loafers for once, instead of those fancy lizard-skin boots. Maybe he’d help put on sunscreen all over your back and shoulders before going for a walk in Central Park. Maybe he’d wear a baseball cap at a Spring Training game.

You wondered who he rooted for, Mets or Yankees? You hoped it was the Mets.

You could see that now, the two of you getting really good seats, Pale probably knew a guy. Didn’t he know a guy for everything? You smiled, thinking about the way you’d share a soft pretzel, maybe a hot-dog. He could sip a beer and you’d drink a soda, and you’d jump out of your seat when someone would hit a home-run.

Pale wouldn’t cheer, but he might whistle, stick his fingers in his mouth and whistle in the way you’ve always wanted to learn how to do but could never get the hang of.

You sighed, brought out of your daydream by an insistent tapping on your back.

Blinking at Pale, you smiled just a little.

“What are you doing?” You asked, thinking he needed something.

“I’m playin’ your song.” He mumbled instead, making your cheeks heat right away.

“I have a song?” You wished he would open his eyes, wish he were sober. Just so that he could make some sense, just a little more sense.

He did crack an eye open at that, looked mildly offended. You smiled a little bigger, that was the Pale you knew.

“O’course you have a fhuckin’ song. Don’t be ridiculous.” He scoffed, slurred his words. Still a little drunk then, drunk enough to not just wave off whatever…this was.

“How does it go?” You didn’t know if you were pushing your luck, if he’d shut down and get all closed off in the way he sometimes did. You knew not to pry, but this had you so curious.

“Like this.” He said, gong back to tapping on your back.

It was slow, but insistent. Like a build-up of intensity over time. You wished you knew which instruments, if it was just piano, or if there were other things too. You wondered which instruments he liked the best, which ones he knew how to play. You took piano lessons an eon ago, weren’t very good at it. But he already knew that.

He used both his hands, they were so big, splayed out across your back like the keys of that grand piano he kept in his apartment. He could probably reach half the keys all at once, you thought.

The tapping on your back moved faster and faster, up and down like he was chasing something, up and up and up your spine until finally his fingers flitted all the way back down, an impossible rhythm to figure out.

And then he slowed, and things felt softer in a way. His fingers like water over your shoulder blades, dancing notes onto the freckles on your skin.

“This part here, that’s when I finally got you back in my fucking arms again after Miami.” He whispered, and you were so taken aback by that, that you almost didn’t know what to say.

It was overwhelming in the best possible way. It was like he was pressing I missed you into your skin over and over again, fingertips digging into your flesh with a different kind of passion.

Part of you wondered if this was even real, or if he were just so out of his mind that he was making it up as he went.

But he kept going and going and going and you thought no, this had to be real. This was too filled with determination, he knew exactly which keys he was pressing, exactly which notes he was bringing to life as his hands slipped along your back.

You let yourself close your eyes for the first time in what must have been hours, what felt like days, enjoying the feeling of the playing. You tried to envision it in your head, what he might be thinking, what he might be playing. You wished you knew, had some frame of reference for what it might sound like. All it felt like was morse code to you.

“Is it a happy song?” You asked when he finished, when his hands finally stilled and your back tickled with the phantom feeling of all the little taps and pokes.

“I don’t know.” He replied right away, making you frown just a little, making your stomach do those nervous flips.

This wasn’t the part of your story where he told you he hated you…was it?

“What do you mean?” You had to know, but he shrugged, only making your stomach knot up tighter.

“Well, it don’t got any real meaning to it or anything. There’s no story. It’s just feeling, you know? How you make me feel.” He said.

“How do I make you feel?”

“Like I’m dyin’.”

You blinked at that, your heart sinking.

“That doesn’t sound very happy.” You whispered, and he must have started to sober up enough to realize, immediately shaking his head and shifting the both of yous around so that you were tucked so close to him, held so lovingly against him that all he could do was kiss your temple over and over again.

“No, that’s not – ” He started, cutting himself off and pausing for a moment to try and figure out what he wanted to say.

“I don’t know what to do with you. I keep fuckin’ waiting for something bad to happen and it never comes. I’m on the edge of my fuckin’ seat all the time, wonderin’ when you’re gonna finally have enough. I can’t take it sometimes, you’re too sweet to me, too good and nice. My heart feels like it’s gonna burst when I look at you, like I gotta rip it right out of my fuckin’ throat. I don’t got the words, you know? I don’t know the words to describe it other than that.”

“I love you, you know that?” You blurted out.

It felt like the rain stilled.

Like all the traffic outside stopped. There were no sirens, no barking dogs in small apartments, there were no death and disease and AIDs and boat crashes and shitty wives.

All there was, was you and Pale in your shitty apartment with the leaky tub and you loved him.

“How’s that?” He asked, sounding so sober that you wondered if shock had the power to do that, to dispel all the coke and the alcohol and the sadness and rage you knew was tucked into your lover.

Because that’s what he was. He was your man, your lover. He was the person you spent all your time thinking about, all your energy caring about. And he cared about you too. You knew he did. You had heard him.

He didn’t know, didn’t think that you did, but you did. You heard it every night, when you pretended to be asleep against his chest, when you pretended to snore just to maybe get a glimpse at the inside of his heart.

You didn’t blame him, for being so guarded with it. You didn’t blame him – how could you? How could you be mad or upset with him, considering the way he had been treated the last time? Been treated for so long?

“I love you.” You said it again. “I think I’ve loved you for a long time. I know I love you. You don’t have to say it back, if it’s hard. You don’t have to. I know.” You knew, you knew you knew you knew it was hard, it had to be hard for him.

“You do?” He asked, and you couldn’t tell if he was referring to the love, or the hardship, or all of it, or none of it.

“I do. I found the box, in your closet.” You said, apropos of nothing, like how he had dropped the information that he had kids out of nowhere. You couldn’t think of an organic way to work it into whatever this was – was it a conversation? Or was it an exchange of admissions?

“Oh.” He said, and you didn’t know.

“We don’t have to talk about it. I just didn’t feel right not telling you. ” You were honest, always wanted to be honest with him. You loved him, and he deserved honesty.

If nothing else, he deserved honesty.

—————

He was quiet for a long time.

The rain softened for a couple minutes, but revved back up again. Thunder and lightning cracked outside. You had never seen this much rain in your whole life, you thought. Not so soon after New Year’s, anyway. You wondered if it was all that smog, all the bullshit pollution being ferried up into the atmosphere. Maybe it was fucking with the weather.

Pale was quiet until he wasn’t, asking, “What did you think?”

“I thought you had the cutest ears I’ve ever seen.” You replied right away, making him laugh.

It was the first time he had ever laughed so unguarded.

“That’s funny.” He said, redundantly.

“I like the name Jimmy.” You smiled.

He shook his head, but thankfully he didn’t seem too mad, didn’t seem angry or anything. He kept smiling, just the slightest little thing, just the prick up of his lips in the corner of his mouth – but it was enough to show off those dimples of his, and your heart soared. You loved when he smiled.

You loved him.

“That’s what my wife calls me.” He grimaced, before laughing again. You wondered what was going on in his head.

“I wasn’t gonna change to it, I just thought you should know that I like it. I like Pale too.” You hummed, and he kissed your temple again.

“Y’know how I got that name?” He asked, his words fuzzy and slurred still.

“No.” You shook your head on his chest.

“Fifteen fucking years ago maybe, I’m sitting in this bar. Minding my own business, I ask the bartender if he’s got any brandy. He says, ‘of course I got fuckin’ brandy, what do I look like?’ So I says, ‘okay but do you got any top shelf shit?’ – Because you know me, I don’t drink nothin’ cheap. And I say, ‘any V.S.O.P?’ Very Special Old Pale. V.S.O.P. And the guy’s eyes fuckin’ light up. Guess he hadn’t had someone ask for something that nice in a long time. So he pours me some, and I pay the tab and I leave.”

“Mhm.” You encouraged, letting your eyes close again, letting the rumble of his chest lull you.

“Well he’s a real nice fuckin’ fella, so I go back the next night. Who do I got to go home to, my fucking wife who already hates me? A screaming two year old she won’t let me take care of? Nah. So I go back to the fuckin’ bar, and I do a couple lines with the bartender, and I ask for more of that V.S.O.P.”

Thunder cracked outside, lightning illuminating the room for a split second. You could see the light even with your eyes closed. Pale kinda felt like that, you thought.

Seeing even with your eyes closed.

“So after a week or two of pullin’ this shit, he don’t even ask anymore, just slides me a glass of Pale. And I get known as Pale. I ain’t ever introduced myself otherwise ever since.” He concluded his story.

“That’s a funny story.” You said with a smile.

“How’s that?” He asked, a smile in his own voice too.

“What if you had ordered something else?” You mused, propping your chin up on his chest to look at him.

He went all hazy cross-eyed to try and get a glimpse of you at the angle he was, lifted his head just a little. You smiled at the way he got a bunch of chins when he did that, you stretched your neck up to kiss them, press little smooches there, making him shy away from being too ticklish.

“Instead of brandy, what if you ordered a glass of wine? Then you might be known as Cabernet. Cab.” You laughed.

“Like a fuckin’ taxi cab?” Pale laughed too, and you laughed again.

Thunder cracked and the rain panged down, but you loved him and you laughed.

“Yeah. Pale’s much better.” You chuckled, winding down again but still humming, amused.

“You really love me?” He looked at you with real clear eyes, and you nodded.

“I really do.” You said.

He held his hand up, looked at it in the near pitch-black room.

“I chucked my ring, right off the fuckin’ pier. It’s at the bottom of the ocean. Hope no dolphin or nothing eats it. I ain’t ever felt so light, without it on like this.” He said, and ah, that’s where it had gone.

You thought he maybe would have kept it in a box, maybe stuck it along with the letter and photographs. Memories that might be too painful to deal with, but too important to throw out.

Something about the fact that he had really just tossed it in the ocean felt monumental to you. Like maybe he was yours, maybe he would stick around with you and you were his to keep too.

“You have a tan line there.” You held his hand right up to your face, squinted at the finger. Sure enough there was a little band of lighter skin. You kissed it, noticed the tremor that was running through his hands.

“Yeah, only took the fuckin’ thing off maybe twice the whole time I had it. You believe that? Twice. Once to get it polished on our ten year fuckin’ anniversary, and then to toss it. She wasn’t even wearing hers, when I saw her. I wonder if she pawned it off or just stuck it in a drawer somewhere. It was expensive, you know?” He sighed.

You kissed the palm of his hand, he smoothed it over your face, cupped your cheek with it. He liked to grab at your face, you noticed. Like to hold it in his hands, cradle it. You smiled.

“I wouldn’t expect anything less.” You pointed out.

“I’d buy you expensive shit, if you wanted it.” Pale pointed out too.

“I don’t need anything – ” You started, but he interrupted you real quick.

“I know you don’t. Boggles my fuckin’ mind. I want to spend money on you, you know? Who the fuck else am I gonna spend it on? I know you don’t need nothing. I want you to have nice shit. I already buy you nice shit. Got a whole fuckin’ closet filled with nice shit I’ve picked up for you over the past few fuckin’ months.” He sighed, his eyes closed again.

“Really?” You asked, frowning. How come he had never said anything? What the hell had he bought you?

“Really. I’m always too afraid to give it to you, too afraid you’re gonna say you don’t want it – that you don’t want me. I know you don’t need this shit, I know. I know you ain’t helpless. You’re a big girl, you can take care of yourself. But…I want to take care of you, you know? I want to make sure you ain’t got nothing to want for. I don’t give shit to you because I don’t want you thinkin’ I’m like a fuckin’ sugar daddy or nothing, that I only want you for sex or nothing. Not that the sex ain’t great, I fuckin’ love the sex, I’m just – I don’t know – I – ” He was losing it again, and you shushed him gently.

“I know.” You said, placing your hand over his, the one on your cheek. He was shaking, poor thing couldn’t stop shaking. “I know, me too.”

You closed your eyes and he closed his.

The rain went on and on, and you were exhausted, and he was still so drunk but you felt good.

It felt good to get it out in the open, that you loved him.

He didn’t need to say it back. You knew he did. You could tell, just by looking at him – just by virtue that he was there, that he called your place home.

He wasn’t going to say it, and that was okay, you loved him anyway.

—————

Tagging some pals, as always please let me know if you’d like to be added or taken off the tag list! @fullofbees@spinebarrel@dreamboatdriver@thecurlycaptain@bourbonboredom @driverficarchive@aweirdlookingtree@rosalynbair @redhairedfeistynerd@adamsnackdriver@glitzescape @adamsnacc-kler @kyloxfem @fallin-for-youreyes @kylo-renne@attorneyl

#reader insert #pale x reader #pale #burn this #burn this broadway #my writing #blue moon #chapter 8 #kylo ren x reader #kylo x reader

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srprincess · 5 years

Text

Fictober (day - who even knows? 8, 9 & 10? this one took a little bit)

Prompt 25 - “I could really eat something”

fandom - check please

The SpookydooAU continues, Chapter 5 now!

Will opened the door, leading his trespasser-turned-guest through to the mudroom.

“Mind you stick to the mats, don’t drip all over my floors,” Ugh. When had he turned into his Ma, God rest her? He wasn't some shade of a house proud homebody, really. It was only, well, the one thing worse than cleaning was all the messes that only got worse if you didn't keep up with it. He shook his head, who was he even trying to justify this to? Himself? He liked things just so, and it was his home. “Actually, leave the shoes here and follow me. I’ll find you something dry to wear.”

”You don't have to-”

Will looked pointedly down towards the, already growing, puddle at the guy’s feet. ”I really do.”

He took off his sopping wet sneakers and started to leave them beside the door on the wood before seeing Will’s look of near horror and moving them to the carpet runner with a nervous smile. ”Dry would be warmer, thanks. Lead the way.”

Will dug through his drawer chest looking for pair of sweats and a not too beat up t-shirt, grateful he had actually remembered to wash, dry and put away his clothes last week. For once. That was another one of those chores that always seemed to pile up. Pausing another moment to be grateful for Past Will, he pulled a pair of boxer briefs from a new package tucked away in the top drawer.

”Appreciate this. I’m Derek by the way, but you can call me Nursey. Everyone else does.”

”Nursey?” What was it with these guys and nicknames? He added a pair of socks to the clothing pile and handed it over.

”Yeah. Figured you should know my name since you're letting me into your pants and all.” Nursey said with a ridiculous wink.

”Oh. My. God.” He did not just day that. And that wink? Really?? ”That was awful! Is that what passes for a line these days?” Will heckled.

”’These days?’ Between that and the ’keep off my lawn’ act - What are you, geriatric?”

”Only on the inside.” If Nursey only knew the running commentary that had been going through Will’s head the last little while...maybe he aged a little earlier than scheduled. ”Still that line was bad, and you should feel bad.”

”Okay, so maybe not quite geriatric. Middle-aged?” Nurse shot back.

”I can and will take those back,” Will nodded down at the clothes, ”and put you back out on the porch.”

”Truce! Truce! Thanks for the clothes. And the shelter. Most of all for not running me off. So...Should I change here, or....” Nursey trailed off looking for a bathroom or somewhere else private to change in.

Oh yeah, privacy was a thing, Will thought to himself belatedly. Just as well he didn't really have guests, he’d clearly forgotten how to be a normal host ages ago.

”Here��s fine, or there's a bathroom straight across the hall if you want to try and dry off or whatever first? I'm just going to go, and, you know, grab some shit.”

Nurse gave him questioning look.

”The pie? It's still up on the walk. Not much left, but I'll be damned before I let those birds get it in the morning.”

”You know, I could really eat something too...” Nurse hinted.

”Don’t push it, I’ll share my home and my clothes but I will not be sharing that pie.”

”But I could be in shock! I think you're supposed to feed a shocked person.”

”Other than your obvious confusion, thinking I would share even one bite, you don't have any of the symptoms. And treatment involves no food or water, so even if you were...”

”You got me. I'm not in shock, but I am kind of hungry. I skipped out on dinner to be here.”

”And that's my fault how exactly?” Will wasn't sure if he was impressed or annoyed at the absolute gall of this guy.

Of course, Nursey chose that very moment to use his dripping pathetic condition to full advantage, even adding puppy dog eyes.

Damn those eyes.

”Fine. I'm not sharing the pie, but I might be able to dig a hot pocket or something out of the deep freeze for you.”

About 15 minutes later Nursey emerged from the bathroom, looking much more put together and, most importantly, dry.

Will had already hidden away the slice of pie for safe keeping and sat on a stool at the kitchen counter eating what remained in the tin. He handed Nursey a plastic sack to hold the wet clothes, and pointed to the microwave as it beeped, ”food.”

”Not pie, but much better than a hot pocket,” Nursey allowed as he smelled the plate of leftovers appreciatively. “I called and, as soon as he picks up Chowder and Farmer from the bar, Bitty will be here to pick me up. Hope I can leave before the ransom exchange? Doubt even he could get a pie made whole driving all over.”

“Sure, let him know I accept IOUs paid in the form of food quietly left on my doorstep. Now, tell the truth, is it just you lurking or should I expect some else to pop out from under my bed later tonight?” Will asked, only half joking.

”None of us is going to, but word is this place is haunted as hell, so I can't speak for any ghosts.”

”Oh yeah, ooooh spooky ghosts, ” Will waved his hands around mockingly. ”I am so afraid.”

”Legends can't all be lies,” Nursey said with a shrug as he sat on the other stool and dug into the food with a moan. “Okay, keep the pie. I need so much more of this.”

Blushing at the praise, Will mumbled “It’s just a roast. Dump it all together and leave it cook.” In an attempt to take a little attention off him, he changed the subject by nudging the duffel he had run out to bring in with his toe. ”So, do you actually believe in all this or...”

”I guess you could say that I don't not believe in it?”

”Oh, well with those convictions I can see why you take time and travel all over to do it every year. And why you paid who knows how much for all the shit in there.”

”We didn't start for me, I'm just...along for the ride? Mostly?” Nurses looked down with a frown as the fork scraped his empty plate.

”So it’s for who exactly?” Will asked, as he went and warmed up the remainder of the potatoes from the fridge. See? He could host. He had manners. Sort of.

”Jack, mostly.”

”Jack? Really? The quiet guy with the notebook? He's the gung-ho ghost hunter?” Will was surprised, he seemed the mostly normal of the whole group. Not really a ringleader sort, at least that was what he’d thought anyway.

”Not exactly,” Nursey replied after thanking him for the refill of his plate. ”I’m not even sure he believes in ghosts actually.”

”Well, now you have to explain.”

”You’re going to think it’s weird-”

”You guys? Weird? Oh yeah. That ship has sailed. Hours ago. Can barely see it from here. Lost over the horizon. No lighthouse guiding it back-”

”Okay, okay I get it. Haha we’re weird. Do you want to mock me oooor,”

”I have to choose?”

Nurse glared, but explained anyway. ”So I say it's for Jack, because he's the reason we started. First couple years out of school we had regular meetups and whatnot, it was like we were still all together just with a little longer breaks in between, right? Then one year, there was this, uh, really big deal? That Jack wanted to close at work, yeah? And no matter how hard he worked toward it, he couldn't. Really sucked. Went to this big rival of his-”

”Rival?”

”Yeah, like, umm, they used to work together? But now they're kind of in opposite sides of the business. It's a thing. Anyway, ” Nursey hurried on with the story, cutting off the chance for further interruptions, ”Bitty could tell he was torn up about it - all of us could really - and so we wanted to distract him. Except, and I'll deny this if you tell him I said it, but his interests can be a little...boring. Gross nasty fishing. Country club shit I’d rather not do, like golf. And most of all history. So much history. Boy could tour a fort for daaaaays.”

”History isn't so bad! S’long as I'm not the touree,”

”Is that even a word?”

”Shut up and finish your story, ” Will said with a light shove.

”If you're done interrupting,” Nursey paused, eyebrow raised, before continuing. ”So we were all brainstorming ideas of what would be fun for our history nerd friend but not mind-numbingly dull for everyone else and it came to us - ghost hunting. All the history and research his heart could possibly desire about each haunted place along with the possibility of some excitement for the rest of us. And even when we don't find anything, we all have a little trip away together out of it. It’s always good to meet back up after a while apart. Everyone wins.”

”Except the locals-”

”Most are happy! Some people actually like tourism, you know. Besides, you got a pie out of it, so-“

“Fair enough. I guess. So - if you're all such good friends, why did they ditch you out there when they left earlier?”

“Umm...That’s not really their fault. You see, I was supposed to wait in the car until Bitty and Jack got the go ahead. I just decided to sneak out and get a jump start before we lost the light.”

“Confident much? Did you really think I’d cave that easy? Not that anyone listened, but I had already said no earlier.”

”Honestly? It never even occurred to me that the pie bribe would fail. It hasn't yet. Literally never.”

”It is good, but...never? Really?”

”Seriously. Bitty has been getting into and out of things with his baking skills ever since I've known him. If you ask him, ever since he was tall enough to reach the oven controls.”

Will was grudgingly impressed on Bitty’s behalf. And, he admitted to himself, if he had tasted the pie before sending them away, it probably would have worked on him too. ”But when it did fail?”

”When they saw I wasn't in the back anymore, Bitty texted and asked if I wanted him and Jack to wait at the turn for me to walk out. Figured this might be my only chance and told them to go ahead -”

A horn sounded from outside at the same time Nursey’s phone skittered across the counter with a vibrated alert.

”That’s me. He's trying to keep the others contained, so I better hurry. Thanks again.” Nursey made his way to the door.

”I’d say you're welcome, but I’d hate to encourage future deviance so I guess I'll just say- that wasn't as bad as I expected.” Will walked him out to the porch.

“Careful, Poindexter, you’ll give me a big head with all that praise.” Nursey called back on his way to the car.

”It’s Will!” he yelled, but the only reply was a wave out the window as they pulled away.

#fictober19 #omgcp #nurseydex #derek nurse #william poindexter #spookydoo au #fic #because apparently I just really like finishing these things after my half of the world has gone to sleep

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olboypacman · 5 years

Text

3. Young Love (The Cyborg and the Kid)

A/N: The author of the following of claims no ownership of DBZ, or any mentioned characters. I mulled over whether or not I should make this a part of this series. While some of the focus is on 18’s relationship with Gohan, there’s one or two more moving parts to this one-shot. But I figured why the hell not, so here we are. Enjoy.

****

Erasa’s holding up a two-piece navy-blue bikini to the blue-eyed, ebony haired martial artist before her. “How about this one?” Asked Erasa.

Erasa’s wearing her signature sleeveless, shoulderless green tube top tucked into blue skinny jeans. Erasa’s wearing a look that’s a mixture of hope and amusement as Videl eyes her with the utmost seriousness.

“It’s skimpy, Erasa.” Videl responded coldly.

“Come on V, you’ve said that about every piece I’ve showed you today.”

“Well it’s true!”

“Come on don’t you want to model just one? I mean wouldn’t it be nice to show Gohan,” she pauses, as if contemplating something, stroking her chin, “Oh, what was it he said? ‘How you would look in something more flattering?’” She finished giggling, going back to searching the racks for more swimwear for Videl to potentially model.

Son Gohan had said that, about her!

Happy go lucky, almost always wearing a smile.

Son freaking Gohan.

The same Son Gohan who when hit square in the head by a fastball form Sharpner, didn’t even blink. He didn’t even raise his voice at their bull-headed, blonde-haired friend.

Running her hand through her newly cropped hair she wonders how she even ended up here in the first place.

A few days ago, before class, Erasa had talked Videl into going to the mall to shop for more clothes for the upcoming World Martial Arts Tournament (despite knowing the daughter of Hercule always sticks with bicycle shorts and oversized t-shirts for most occasions).

Somehow, the conversation moved to swimwear, much Videl’s dismay.

Gohan wasn’t even paying attention to their conversation, his face in a book as per the usual.

Erasa had become frustrated with Videl and on whim roped Gohan into their talks.

She’d asked Gohan how he think Videl would look in a bikini.

Gohan had said without hesitation, “Nice, I think. It’d be pretty interesting seeing her in something more flattering.”

Instantly the color had left his face.

He’d immediately gone into panic mode, repeatedly asking the ebony haired girl for forgiveness, constantly saying he didn’t mean anything by it.

The boy from the sticks talked without thinking, that much was clear.

He didn’t have a harmful bone in his body.

At least as far as Videl knew.

But that didn’t matter to her.

As such was in her nature, she’d taken what could’ve been interrupted as an insult and as a personal challenge.

“Yeah! Well I’ll show you Gohan! Why don’t you come with us and you’ll see how flattering I can be!”

Gohan wasn’t the only person who spoke without thinking that day.

And Erasa…

Erasa simply had the most satisfying smirk on her face. Almost like she planned this along.

“Great! It’s date!” She said.

She just had to use that word didn’t she. Thought Videl.

She pats imaginary dust from her oversized t-shirt and bicycle shorts, and reluctantly follows her friend further in the store.

Erasa brings up another number for Videl. This time it’s a collection of strings that somehow is supposed to be a swimsuit.

Red-faced, Videl practically screams at Erasa, “Shouldn’t you being showing Gohan some of these!? He the one that wants to see me in it!”

Clearly having fun, the blonde giggles and then responds, “I get the feeling our Gohan would be happy to see you in anything besides those oversized t-shirts.”

“’Our?’” Questions Videl.

With a knowing smirk, Erasa says, “Whoops! Sorry V didn’t mean to step on your toes. That’s your man after all.” She finished with a wink.

Videl’s unable give Erasa a piece of her mind, as her green tube top clad friend had scampered off, most likely in search of more swimwear.

Against her better judgement, Videl continues to follow Erasa around. Intermittently, Erasa continues show Videl swimsuits. The ebony-haired martial artist continues shooting them down.

Eventually, Erasa makes a proposition. “Hey what do you think of this, think we could get Gohan to model something instead of you?”

She’s holding up a red speedo, maybe a size or two too small for a man about Gohan’s build.

Her eyes find themselves shifting over to where Gohan is. He’s browsing the sunglasses rack. He meets her eyes, and looks away quickly, blush apparent on his face. He’s wearing his familiar red-orange pants with a long-sleeved white shirt under a black vest.

She’s seen him in his training outfit. That purple number that revealed his chest and arms.

Then the thought of him in nothing but that red speedo becomes her all-consuming thought.

Without realizing it, a dopey smile spreads across her face as it becomes as red as her maiden name’s namesake.

“So, I guess you approve, huh?”

“WHAT? NO! I don’t what you’re talking about,” says Videl, crossing her arms, turning her back to Erasa.

The blonde breaks into another fit of laughs at her friend’s expense. A strong gust of wind suddenly goes throw the shop and their friend is gone.

She looks around, and says, “Where did Gohan go? He was just here!”

They each share a look and say simultaneously, “Food court.”

****

Saiyans are mostly driven by two things.

Battle and hunger.

Despite it going against his physiology being only half Saiyan, Gohan has a disposition towards fighting.

He only does so when absolutely necessary.

But at this current moment he finds himself being driven more by the latter part of his nature.

Hunger.

The food court is awash with displays of food and smells most delectable to the young half saiyan.

Pizzas, fried chicken, subs.

Gohan can’t really decide on anything.

But anything would do to get his mind off his situation.

Those swimsuits Erasa was suggesting Videl try on kept getting more and more revealing, much to his and Videl’s embarrassment.

The last straw was when she’d suggested he try on something, pulling an undersized red speedo seemingly out of nowhere.

With his abilities, he went on his way without either of them being the wiser.

That darn Erasa!

Smiling that darn smug smile like she knew something he and Videl didn’t.

She just had to go and ask him how he’d think Videl would look in swimwear.

And he just had to go and speak from his heart without thinking.

And Videl went and took it the wrong way.

Like when he’d made the comment about her hair.

He didn’t mind the long pigtails on his blued eyed classmate.

He didn’t think she looked bad with it cut short.

And she'd cut her hair at his suggestion.

That must mean he must have made some sort of impression if she changed her appearance at something he said.

But that could mean she could possibly return his feelings.

The thought both scares and excites him.

“There’s a saiyan on deck! Might as well shut down the court!” Yells a familiar voice.

He looks around trying to find who it was that yelled at him.

He eventually spots a family of three at one the tables in the food court, two of which are waiving at him.

He makes his way to the seated family of Krillin, 18, and Marron.

Marron’s dressed in black jeans, black and white sneakers and a red t-shirt with a chibi caricature of Videl on it in a fighting pose, as she waves excitedly at the half saiyan with the widest of smiles on her face.

18’s waving is much more subdued, as is her expression: a slight smile, damn near incomprehensible if one didn’t look carefully enough. She dressed in a black shirt with white sleeves accented with thin gray strips, with blue jeans, black flats and orange socks.

Krillin is muttering quietly to himself, elbows on the table, hands in his hair over a container of what smells like bourbon chicken. He’s completely oblivious to what’s going on around him. He’s dressed in a solid black t-shirt with kaki pants and black shoes.

“Hey guys! What’s up with Krillin?” Asks Gohan.

“Hey Gohan!” Says Marron, running up to the half saiyan.

“Hey kid,” answers 18. She looks to Krillin, her slight smile becoming just a bit more than for just a moment. “Don’t mind him. He’s been going on about bourbon chicken recipes for the last few weeks. About how he can never get the ingredients right to match the taste of what they serve at the malls.* Marron and I tell him his is just as good if not better. What they serve here is fine if just a bit too sweet for my tastes.” She leans over and kisses Krillin on the top of his head. “I don’t know what to do with him.”

“Thanks babe.” Says Krillin. “How are you Gohan? What are you doing all the way out in Satan City, on a Saturday?”

Gohan thinks of the two girls he left in that clothing store and red begins to creep up on his face. “Well, I’m helping a few friends from school with some shopping.”

“Really Gohan? Then what is it that’s got you red faced, hmm? These friends of yours don’t happen to be girls, do they?” Asked 18.

“How’d…?” Trailed off Gohan.

“Chi-Chi told me and Bulma.”

“Figures.”

“And what are these,” she stops for a moment barely able to contain her amusement, “girl friends of yours shopping for exactly?”

Gohan’s blush deepens.

“Come on kid, tell us!” Says Krillin, the needling of his young friend seemingly knocking him out his funk.

Krillin leans toward Gohan, as to tell him some secret. “You weren’t shopping for ‘unmentionables’ with them, were you?”

Both Krillin and 18 crack big wide smiles.

Gohan, unable to take the pressure the couple staring him down, “Swimsuits, bikinis.” He mumbles.

“Two girls,” said Krillin.

“At the same time”, responded 18.

“Hey, it’s not like that. One’s a good friend, the other one well…” Gohan trailed off.

They both burst out laughing, much to the young half saiyan’s chagrin.

Marron’s looking to her mother and father, and Gohan in confusion, missing the joke.

Krillin picks up on it and plucks Marron from her chair. He cuddles the young blonde close to him and says, “Our little Gohan’s growing up!”

She giggles at her father’s exclamations and affections.

He places Marron back down, patting his stomach. “I think all this bourbon chicken’s starting to catch up to me, excuse me. Take care of my girls while I’m gone Gohan!”

18 waives him off as he walks away, “I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself I’ll have you know.” She said with a smile.

****

Erasa had managed to talk Videl into buying one swimsuit.

A purple one-piece.

They mainly did it to buy time before they went to hunt down Gohan at the food court.

They’ve seen the boy eat before and it’s not a sight they care to subject themselves to too often if they can help it.

If Videl was being honest with herself, she’d admit she’s a little disappointed she didn’t get to model it for Gohan.

It was the lone piece she’d tried on today.

Seemingly picking up on her friend’s thoughts, Erasa says, “It suited you V. I thought it was flattering at least. Though I do think you’d really catch Gohan’s attention with a two-piece.”

“Thanks, Erasa, I really apricate it.”

The two continue to walk, making idle chatter until they reach food court.

They look around in search of their friend until Erasa exclaims, “I think I found him! And who’s that blonde with him?”

“What?” Videl practically screams in response.

“She’s beautiful too. She must be a model or something.” Says Erasa. “Oh, she’s got the cutest little girl with her too, must be her daughter. They look pretty chummy.”

So that’s it, huh?

He ditched them to pick up girls in the food court.

A sinking feeling begins to creep its way into her gut.

“I thought… I thought…” Videl mumbles to herself.

“Ah, V, maybe it’s not as bad as it seems. Maybe they’re just friends.”

18 places a hand on Gohan’s as she laughs.

“That…that…that…”

‘Two-timer’ is the word that pops into her mind.

But that word would imply feelings she’s not ready acknowledge, or at least she wasn’t ready to acknowledge them before today.

She releases a breath, steeling herself for what she’s about to do, throws her bag toward Erasa and storms off.

“Videl! Videl wait!”

****

Behind the taller boy there’s a bit of a commotion.

18 hears a young lady calling another’s name, and she sees a teenaged girl, with short black hair and steeled blue eyes heading straight in their direction.

Her young friend’s crush.

Videl Satan.

“Look out Gohan, we’ve got a hot one coming in.” Said 18.

“Wha...?”

She points in the direction of the oncoming Satan.

“Hey Videl! This is…”

“Don’t you ‘hey Videl’ me!” She screams getting into Gohan’s face.

She's a personal space invader, this Videl is. Thinks 18.

She can relate to invading the space of her of crush.

Before she and Krillin were officially an item, 18 always found ways to break down the barriers of personal space that left her little monk red-faced, sputtering and finding one excuse or another to excuse himself in order to hide his embarrassment. She would sometimes chase him down to see what else adorable reactions she could coax out of him. 18 still on occasion invades Krillin's personal space, he still sputters and gets embarrassed about it, but he doesn't excuse himself anymore. She glances down to her wedding ring. He either really loves me, or he knows better. Or both. 18 giggles to herself.

Erasa reaches Videl, just before she goes into her tirade, “Videl, calm down! Let’s just think about this.” Said Erasa.

“You ditched us to pick up girls at the food court!” Screamed Videl.

“Wha…?” Responds 18.

“Kami! You’re Videl Satan!” Interjects Marron.

“OK. OK. Multi-pronged attack going on here.” Says 18.

She gets up from her seat and forces distance between Videl and Gohan, shoving them apart. A look of mild surprise is on Videl’s face, likely at the slender, curvy woman’s strength.

“OK.” Says 18. She takes Marron by the hand, leading her to the Satan girl. “Go ahead sweetie, you were saying?”

Marron shyly approaches the young Martial Artist, excitement at meeting a genuine celebrity obvious in her bright eyes, “Miss Videl, I’m a big fan of yours. I especially like that you fight crime with Goh-“, she stops immediately her eyes darting to Gohan, realizing her mistake, “Great Saiyaman.”

Videl’s anger melts away at the sight of the earnest and bright-eyed fan. She drops to a knee, “What’s your name?” She asks.

“I’m Marron.”

She motions the little girl closer to her, and whispers, “It ok, Marron. I already know the secret. Gohan is Saiyaman.”

As if its even physically possible, Marron’s expression brightens even more. “If its not too much trouble Miss Videl, can I get your autograph?”

“Sure thing.”

The little girl scrambles immediately for something to sigh with.

“Here you go,” says 18 handing Marron a marker. “Can you sign her shirt, Miss Videl?” Said 18 with a teasing smile.

A similar smile that Erasa wore earlier today.

“Uh, sure,” Marron hands the marker to Videl and the martial artist goes about signing Marron’s shirt.

Marron, as pleased as punch, holds the bottom hem of her shirt in her hand, stretching it out slightly, admiring her official Videl Satan merch freshly signed by the heroine herself!

Marron launches herself at the Satan girl, “Thank you so much Miss Videl,” said Marron. She scampers over to her mother.

“Alright, now that’s taken care of what was it you were saying?” Said 18, referring to Videl.

“You and Gohan, flirting.”

“Excuse me?” Said 18, flipping her hair out her face.

“And you’re married!?” Said Videl incredulously, pointing to 18’s wedding ring.

At the implication 18's first instinct is go on the attack, like she often does whenever Vegeta's more abrasive nature collides with her. On the other hand, living with and learning some of the practices of Krillin's former life as a monk is causing her to reconsider that option. At the thought of further agitating the young lady before her, 18 thinks of example she's setting forth for Marron, not to mention what Krillin would think of her for further escalating the situation.

At the consideration of her family she takes a serious expression, folds her arms and says, "Videl. I've seen much about your crime fighting on the news, not mention what I've heard from Gohan here," she said jamming her thumb in his direction. What she does next would make Krillin proud (if would hurry up from his visit to the bathroom) and stuns Gohan. She bows respectfully and says, "Thank you for taking care of Gohan while he's in school and the city. And no, Gohan wasn’t flirting with me. As you pointed out, I’m happily married and to the best man a lady can ask for. I’ve known Gohan since he was 10-“

“11,” interrupts Gohan.

“What?” Says 18, turning to the half saiyan.

“You’ve known me since I was 11.” Gohan said plainly.

“But, Fuckface’s data base-“

“Hyperbolic Time Chamber.”

18 sighs, then turns back to Videl, “As I was saying, I’ve known Gohan since he 11. While I'm sure there's some young lady out there who'd be happy to have him, he's more like the little brother I never had.”

“But what about 17?” Said Gohan.

She scoffs, “I stand corrected once again. Gohan’s like the little brother I occasionally want to throttle, unlike my twin, whom I constantly want to throttle. But his constant interruptions are surely testing that theory.”

“Sorry,” said Gohan meekly.

“So, I thought,” Videl stammers, “oh Kami! I’m so sorry ma’am. I just. I don’t know.”

18 approaches the girl and puts a hand on her shoulder, giving her sympathetic smile. “Gohan,” she says turning to the young man, “do me a favor and take Marron to the merry-go-round please? I’d like to have a discussion with Videl and her friend here.”

“Uh, sure 18, lets go Marron,” said Gohan as he picked up the three-year-old.

18 waits until Gohan’s out of ear sight before she speaks.

“So, you’re head over heels for our boy, huh? That look in your eyes when you were storming over here. If looks could kill, I’d be dead a few times over.”

Videl looks away from the older blonde, “I like him, okay! I wouldn’t venture as far to say, ‘head over heels,’ but…” she trails off as a blush creeps it’s way up her face.

“Our girl’s it bad, whether she wants to admit it or not.” Says Erasa, as she takes her friend into an embrace.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t get your name?” Said 18.

“Erasa,” said the blonde extending her hand. “So, your name’s 18, huh? Interesting.”

“My father was, well that’s not important right now. What was your game here today?”

Erasa cracks that smile one more time, “I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about.”

“Come on Erasa, I was talking to Gohan before all this jumped off. Videl maybe a Satan but you’re the devil,” said 18 cracking a smile of her own.

“Okay fine. I thought I could get Videl to model skimpy swimsuits for Gohan. Luckily, I managed to get both them to come to this trip. This smile and bright eyes are hard to say no too. I figured I can embarrass those two into admitting their feelings for each other. Or at the very least find great entertainment at their reactions which could have been delicious."

“I think I found a new friend.” Said 18.

Krillin comes back to the table, eating an egg roll and sipping a soda, “Hey, where’d Gohan and Marron go?”

“Merry-go-around,” answered 18.

He takes a look at the two girls and 18, “I feel like I missed something here.”

“You were right babe,” said 18 as she ran a hand through her husband’s hair, “our little Gohan’s growing up.”

****

*Real life strikes, someone help me!!

****

Read this and more @https://www.fanfiction.net/~olboypacman

#DBZ #Android Eighteen #K18 #krillinxeighteen #krillin #son gohan #videl #videl satan #gohanxvidel #govi #erasa rubber #erasa #marron #FF.net #fanfic #fanfiction

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thebeethathums · 6 years

Text

ASC- A New Friend 13/?

John Watson x Reader x Mycroft Holmes

Notes: Transfering my old fics from 2014 to here! This is the John branch of the A Second Chance story. If you are looking for the Mycroft branch it is called ASC- A New Beginning.

As always if you can’t find the next chapter message me or check out my DeviantArt or Archive of Our Own under the same username.

You quite literally bumped into John as you came out of your room, both of you giving a little awkward chuckle as you stepped back to create a gap between the two of you. He took a moment to look you over, you had changed into a worn pair of jeans with a hole in the knee of one leg and a plaid green button down shirt with the sleeves rolled up over your elbows. Your long hair was up in a sensible ponytail that just added to how casual your overall look was. You offered him a quick grin, “Sent to deal with me again I see. I bet Sherlock asked you to wake me if I was sleeping.” John nodded, “I told him no.” “Thank you for that but it was unnecessary. I’m actually going out,” you laughed lightly. “Out?” he echoed, tilting his head to the side in confusion.

You fought the urge to giggle and nodded, “For a walk. It’s a nice enough day and I need some fresh air. You are welcome to join me if you’d like. It would save you the trouble of having to report back to my family and I wouldn’t mind the company.” Slipping past him, you started on your way to the door, sock covered feet making hardly any sound, and he trailed you like a lost puppy, “Shouldn’t you rest?” You made your way down the stairs, tossing an answer over your shoulder, “I’m used to not getting much sleep. I did live with Sherlock for quite some time and I don’t have to tell you that he can keep you up for days on end when something motivates him enough.” “But you haven’t been home in what… six years was it you said? You would have me believe that in all that time your habits didn’t change?” You paused to pull open the front door, sparing him a quick fleeting glance to find that he looked genuinely concerned. You shook your head, “I appreciate your concern, John, but I promise you I’m fine. My job requires as much of me as Sherlock’s does and with all the traveling, my body is accustomed to abrupt changes and long periods without sleep.” The mud on your shoes from the day before flaked off when you banged the soles against the top step and you quickly slipped them on while John ventured, “What is your job exactly?” “Shall I assume you’re coming with me then?” you wondered, quirking an eyebrow at him, and he nodded, prompting you to continue, “Consulting Conflict Resolution Specialist is my official title. Sherlock came up with it back when I first started working cases with him so people would be impressed when he introduced me. Personally, I prefer problem solver- when people need something fixed they come to me.” “So what do you actually do?” John asked, walking beside you as you meandered down a path that led off the grounds. “A little bit of everything I suppose. I can be a detective when needed or an information gatherer and sometimes I do damage control type things but mostly I’m a mediator and a negotiator.” “Sound interesting.” You offered him a little grin, “It never gets old and people hardly ever get along so I’m always busy.” A comfortable silence settled in as you walked and then he wondered, “What you do requires a lot more patience and people skills than what Sherlock does… you two seem so different. How is it you became friends in the first place?” You chuckled, “It’s a long story that I’ll save for another time but I guess you could say that we were drawn to each other by the level of intelligence we share… we just happened to have different strengths- much like you and him do now.” John looked confused and you let out an amused hum, “You didn’t think he chose you to accompany him on his cases just because you happened to be there, did you?” “Actually, I kind of did,” he admitted, giving a short laugh. “Sherlock chose you because you not only put up with his antics but you keep him grounded as well. There are a lot of things he is not good at but reading people’s character- that is something he is almost terrifyingly superb at. I doubt he anticipated you’d become a friend but he certainly chose you for who you are and your skill set.” John looked to be thinking that over when you glanced his way to add, “I can see why he did. You’re a rather remarkable man, John Watson.” The pink tint that came to his cheeks was entirely out of his control and you let out a mirthful giggle as you linked your arm with his, “You’re so fun to fluster.” He gave a small, embarrassed chuckle but leaned against your side slightly, causing you to shoot him a sidelong glance and a shy smile. He couldn’t figure you out. One second you were teasing him and flirting and the next you were chewing you lip shyly and avoiding his gaze- were you messing with him or did you like him? Both of you enjoyed the silence as you walked arm in arm, each of you relishing the fresh air and a chance to sort through your respective thoughts. You contemplated your argument with Sherlock earlier over your attraction to John, wondering what your brother was playing at by questioning his friend’s merits as a potential match for you and then contradictingly sending him to check on you. You were trying to convince yourself that he was just being meddlesome for the sake of being meddlesome when John cleared his throat, drawing your attention to him as he wondered, “How did you know those things? Last night I mean?” “Power of observation. I’m inclined to agree with Sherlock- people often look but rarely see.” He pursed his lips in what looked to be something very close to a dissatisfied pout and you hummed softly in amusement before explaining, “Your full name was on the train ticket Mycroft bought you and your status as a doctor was obvious the moment you opened the front door for me from your handshake. The kitchen was a mess and I didn’t have to open the cabinets to know they were empty but there was a pan in the sink signifying that someone was at least attempting to cook and since it obviously wasn’t Sherlock that left you. As for wanting a night to yourself and a new password- everyone needs time off from Sherlock when living in close proximity and the man rarely uses his own computer when he knows he can guess the password of someone else’s. You don’t seem like one to come up with a password tricky enough to keep Sherlock out of your things- no offense.” There was a moment of quiet and you wondered if maybe you’d gone a bit too far, you still didn’t know John very well after all, before he broke out in a wide grin, “That was fantastic!” You had to stop walking, you started to laugh so hard, and he gave you a confused look. Between laughs, you managed to choke out, “No wonder Sherlock keeps you around- you’re remarkable and you willingly stroke his ego.” You slowly recovered, offering him a wide grin, “Where have you been all my life? Sherlock would have been so much easier to live with with you around.” John went to respond when the grey sky finally decided it had had enough and started to shower you with a light rain. You quickly grabbed John’s hand and took off at a run, glad that you were close enough to your destination that you didn’t have to go very far in the rain. The both of you were panting softly by the time you pulled him under a large gnarled looking tree with branches enough to shelter you from the water falling from the sky. You exchanged a glance and then started giggling, John with his hands on his knees as he tried to recover his breath and you leaning on his shoulder for support. Once your shared case of the giggles died down, you moved over to the tree trunk, tracing the double helix DNA scar Sherlock had carved into it when you were teens. John stepped over behind you, running a hand over the Oxytocin molecule you’d drawn next to it, “You and Sherlock came to this tree often, didn’t you?” “Whenever we wanted to get away,” you nodded, “I used to come alone and then one day he followed me and it became our place.” “What does this stand for?” he asked, giving an upwards nod to the mark under his hand. You offered him a small smile, pointing to the DNA, “Teenage boredom. He carved the strand of DNA and said nearly everything alive is made of the same building blocks- from this tree to him and me. I carved the chemical structure of Oxytocin- the hormone that is believed to be responsible for intimacy. It was a good-natured jab at his claim that relationships were pointless since even science accounts for the human need for intimacy- it's in our biology.” “How did he respond to that?” You waved a hand for him to follow and walked around the wide trunk to pat another carving, “He carved one of the proposed structures of Humic acid. It’s produced by the breakdown of organic matter. He reasoned that since it is found where something has died or decayed, essentially everywhere, that we are always surrounded by death just as much as we are surrounded by life.” “Wow, that’s…” “Dark? Sherlock’s always been a bit morbid,” you chuckled. “He’s such a hypocrite- he keeps saying my blog romanticizes the truth but this seems oddly poetic,” John huffed tracing a finger over the scared bark and you placed a hand on his shoulder with the soft lilt of a laugh hitting his ears a moment later. He glanced over at you, “Why did you bring me here?” “It’s quiet and I like it here. I thought I would share,” you shrugged, walking back around the tree and sticking your hand outside its circumference to feel the rain that was still coming down. John just watched you for a moment, rubbing at his hair to help it dry. Your hair was plastered to your face and neck and your clothes were covered in a smattering of darker spots just like his but you didn’t seem to mind in the slightest. A smile curved at your lips as you caught some of the rain in your cupped hands before letting it fall to the ground with a little splash. You’d brought him someplace with a lot of meaning to you, shown him part of your life that he doubted anyone aside from you and Sherlock had ever seen. There was definitely something to that no matter how casually you'd brushed it off. He took a few steps closer to you and you suddenly turned, running into him again, but this time you didn’t step away and neither did he. Your chin lifted to look at him- he wasn’t much taller than you, maybe an inch or so, and your eyes were nearly level. You appreciated that for a moment since with Sherlock you always head to crane your neck to look him in the eyes and you could never quite see into them over the distance. With John it was different, you could see the grey-blue of his eyes quite clearly and it was almost as though you were looking into his very soul. You tilted your head slightly as you thought, ‘People say that, right? The eyes are windows to the soul or something like that?’ Neither of you noticed that the gap between you was slowly growing smaller as you each searched the other’s eyes until your lips were about to touch and you stopped staring as they fluttered closed. The moment of contact never came as the loud sound of a car horn startled you apart. John looked royally peeved when you both turned to find Mycroft, sitting almost smugly in the driver’s seat of the same grey Bentley you’d taken from the station. He raised an expectant eyebrow and the two of you scrambled over to hop in, finding the floor and seats already covered with towels to keep the interior clean. Mycroft simply offered, “Mother sent me to see to it you didn’t walk back in the rain and catch a cold,” as an explanation for his presence, turning the car around to take you back to the house. You gave him a wide grin and a thank you before starting up a conversation about one of the books you’d both read while John crossed his arms over his chest in a sulk and glared at the back of the other man’s head. He was more than sure he’d interrupted on purpose. What was Mycroft’s deal?

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hymn2000 · 6 years

Text

Freeze - MCU AU Fanfic - C16

(Title subject to change)

Previous chapter(s): 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

Story synopsis:- When a burst gas main destroys everything and leaves Peter with nothing, the Stark’s take him in. Thrown together by necessity, they then need to try to keep it together and build a new life. Devastated by loss, Peter doesn’t make things easy for them, and Loki and Tony struggle with their own grief and the responsibility of having someone completely dependant on them.

Chapter description:- Peter accepts his place at St Hendricks, but as the first day approaches, he feels like he’s made a horrible mistake

Story warnings/themes: character death, hurt/comfort, trauma, grief, depression/mental health issues, bullying, corporal punishment

Relationships: Frostiron (Loki x Tony) (romantic), Tony and Peter (platonic), Loki and Peter (platonic)

From the same AU as Called To Be A Rock

Chapter 16 - It’s Complicated But Understand Me

Tony let Peter think. He was busy thinking too, but more about his absent husband and less about the school. To him, the school was easy. It was a great school and they wanted Peter. Giving the kid a choice was a bit of a trust exercise: he knew that if he had any sense, he'd accept the place.

Loki was far more tricky. He'd sent a few postcards, all with impersonal messages, and from locations with little to no correlation. At first it had seemed like a redo of the honeymoon, but soon the postcards came from other places. He never wrote more than a sentence, and he never gave a return address.

Tony didn't know where to start. Loki had, on occasion, disappeared for a day or two. But when he did this, he always took his phone, kept in touch, and told Tony exactly where he was. He never went out of the country without prior notice, and he had never done anything like this before. Tony couldn't guess where he was going to go next. Truthfully, he wanted to leave him to it, let him sort himself out. But, he also wanted more than one line scribbled in a different language on a postcard. He wanted to know he was ok. He wanted to know that he was definitely coming back soon. He'd promised in his initial letter, but that didn't mean anything. Even if he kept to his promise, he might not be back for years. That was something Tony had to face up to. His husband had walked out on him, and he didn't know if he was going to come back. And if he did come back, he didn't know whether he'd be back for good.

Peter spent most of Saturday and Sunday at the library. One benefit of not being at school was that he could go there. Tony never had a problem with it, provided that he was back at a reasonable time. Peter had grown fond of Abby, the librarian, and was happy spending his days talking to her, and sitting in the armchair reading and forgetting the world.

On Sunday evening, Tony sat down in the kitchen with Peter.

"Have you made a decision about St Hendricks yet?"

Peter shrugged. He'd been trying not to think about it.

"You know we have to let them know tomorrow. You need to decide. It's high time you were back at school anyway. You've been sitting around the house for long enough"

"I haven't been sitting around the house: I've been at the library" Peter pointed out.

"Don't be pedantic. Now, please, have another think about St Hendricks" he checked his watch. "It's six o' clock now. I want an answer by no later than eight. Ok?"

Peter nodded.

"Ok. Off you go, then"

Peter went off to his room and flopped down on the bed. He thought about St Hendricks. He thought about the head teacher and the boarding master and the legality of corporal punishment and the uniforms and the social class. He thought about the science lab and the drama studio and the swimming pool and the locker room. He thought about the old wooden doors and the stone walls and the sports fields.

And he thought about Tony. He might be pretending everything was ok, but Peter still heard him crying at night. He knew Tony was heartbroken. And he also knew he was doing his best despite that. He thought about the look on his face while they were looking round St Hendricks. He thought about how impressed and hopeful he had seemed.

Part of Peter wanted to reject the school. He didn't want to be lumped in with a load of rich kids and strict teachers. He didn't want to sit in a classroom day after day pretending he cared about schoolwork and trying to keep up appearances. It would save Tony money too. Peter had seen the list of school fees they'd been given, and he'd been surprised and a little bit horrified to find just how much they were. He knew Tony was rich, unbelievably so, but he still didn't understand how he could be happy shelling out thousands of dollars a term for his education. Maybe he was mad.

Peter stayed quiet all through dinner. He stayed quiet while he washed up and helped tidy the kitchen. He stayed quiet when they went to the living room and put the telly on while Tony started looking at spreadsheets on his laptop. He kept an eye on the time.

At eight o' clock, Tony closed his laptop and turned to the boy.

"It's eight o' clock, sweetheart"

Peter looked at him. He really, really didn't want to go. He swallowed hard, and opened his mouth to say so.

"Ok"

He surprised himself, and Tony looked at him.

"Ok? Is that a yes?"

Peter paused. He wanted so badly to shake his head. But he looked at Tony, and he knew just how disappointed he'd be if he did. So he nodded.

"Yes. I-I'll accept the place"

Tony moved his laptop aside and hugged the boy close. "We'll get you kitted out this week then, son"

Peter rested his chin on Tony's shoulder and closed his eyes. This was a mistake, he just knew it. It would be just like the last school.

Peter did hope that Tony might change his mind. He woke up late on Monday morning, and went through to the kitchen, still half asleep.

"It's all sorted" Tony said, smiling at him. "You're starting next Monday"

"What?!" Peter exclaimed, suddenly wide awake. "But I'm not ready! It's too soon!"

"Peter, darling. You've had time. Your bruises are mostly gone. We'll get your uniform and everything else this week, and we'll be fully prepared and ready for you to start"

"But-"

"Ah, now don't argue with me. You have to start some time, and I rather think sooner is better than later"

Peter tried to think of an excuse. "But what about Loki?"

This comment stopped Tony in his tracks. He was quiet for a moment, but then swallowed very hard and looked at him properly.

"We don't know when he's coming back, if at all" Tony said. "We can't wait around just so he can send you off in the morning. No, you'll start on Monday"

"No! I don't want to!"

"Peter, you will start at St Hendricks on Monday morning and that's final!"

He said it so firmly that Peter dare not argue.

"I'll drive you, of course. It's a little far to walk, so it'll be lifts every day" Tony said. "They'll need to go through some stuff with you on Monday morning so we'll aim to get there early. Hey, I'm up to date with my work, so maybe we should go out now and get a few bits"

"Oh. Um, well, I was gonna go the the library"

"Ok, ok. Tomorrow then?"

Peter nodded. He supposed they'd have to go sooner or later.

The next few days were an uncomfortable mad rush. Tony had a great time - Peter did not. He was pushed from shop to shop and grew more and more stressed by the minute. He got stroppy with Tony, but Tony didn't let it put him off. He stayed calm and fairly happy for three days of shopping, excited by the prospect of Peter starting at a school like St Hendricks.

On Thursday night, Peter sat on the bed and looked at all of his new things. He felt that, by rights, he should be excited. But he wasn't. He looked at his new shoes and satchel and pencil case and stationary set. He looked at his new notebook and water bottle and trainers and football boots. He looked at his tennis and badminton rackets, at his lacrosse and hockey sticks and his various PE uniforms. He looked at his actual uniform, hung up on the wardrobe, with its painfully smart shirt and trousers, it's burgundy and navy striped blazer, and its tie. There was no mistaking that it was anything other than a private school uniform. He was adamant that he'd never wear the hat.

He looked at all the extras, the new socks and underwear and an expensive wrist watch. He looked at the towel and PE kit bag and the hand sanitiser and box of plasters and gloves and boiled sweets. He looked at his new wallet and tin of shoe polish.

And he hated all of it.

With all the shopping done, Peter escaped and went to the library on Friday. Abby quickly realised he was upset.

"What's the matter, chicken?"

"I'm starting school on Monday. Dad's gone and got me a whole load of new stuff. I know I should be grateful, and I kinda am, but I just, I'm just..."

"Scared?"

Peter nodded. "What if it all goes wrong?"

"What if it doesn't?"

Peter blinked. "I really don't want to go"

"I know, chicken. But you don't have a choice. You need your education"

"I know. But I don't think I can. Everything is still so difficult"

"You need to let yourself heal" she gave him a hug. "When my Martha died, God rest her soul, I spent a long time refusing to recover. Once you make the decision to move on, it'll get easier. It will still hurt, and you'll still miss her, of course you will. But it will move to the back of your mind. Maybe having something to occupy yourself will help"

"I hope you're right...”

“But you don’t think I am, do you?”

Peter shrugged slightly. “It’s all so hard. I didn’t realise I was so weak until it happened”

“I don’t think you’re weak. You’re allowed to struggle, and you’re allowed to grieve”

Peter sighed. “I wish I didn’t have to go. I’m just fed up”

“Of course you are. Is that why you come here? To escape from it all?”

“Kind of. Being here, that first time, it was the happiest I’d felt since the accident. It’s kinda comforting... It is an escape though. I don’t like home much right now. I’ve got to go to the doctors this afternoon too. I don’t want to do that either”

“We all have to do things we don’t want to do. Sometimes those things we don’t want to do turn out to be for the best. You just have to stick at it. Things do get better, you know”

Tony picked Peter up from the library in time to take him to the doctors for his jabs. In the car on the way home, he brought up one of Peter’s most hated subjects.

“The school has registered you with their on-site therapist”

“What?! But dad, I said I don’t want to talk to anyone!”

“Yes, and that’s exactly why I think you should. It really does help. You’ll have two sessions a week, and then it’ll go down depending on your progress”

Peter stared at him. “Please don’t do this! Call them up and say you’ve changed your mind”

“No. Now stop arguing. It’s about time you learnt how to do as you’re told”

Peter folded his arms over his chest and turned away from him. Tony sighed.

“Look, sometimes when I make you do things you don’t want to do, it really is for the best. We need to be proactive about your recovery”

Peter didn’t say anything.

“Look, kid, I care about you. I’m only trying to do what’s best”

“Have you had any more postcards?”

Tony sighed heavily. “The postman hadn’t been when I left”

The postman had been when they returned to the house. There was a padded envelope on the doorstep. Tony opened it, and found another smaller padded envelope, addressed to Peter.

“Here, this is yours” he handed it to the boy, taking the postcard out of the big envelope.

It wasn’t quite a postcard, although the back was set out like one. It was a photograph of Pooley Bridge. There was no real message this time, just ‘Loki xxx’ written on the back.

“What does it say?” Peter asked.

Tony showed him. “What’s in yours?”

“Oh. Um”

Peter opened the envelope, and found a big bag of flying saucer sweets. A note on scrap paper was taped to it, which read ‘sorry’ in Loki’s familiar writing. Peter read that one word over and over.

“He hasn’t forgotten” Peter said eventually.

“No” Tony said, looking back at the photograph in his hand. “He hasn’t”

Peter lost it on Sunday night. Absolutely, flat-out, lost it.

“Hey hey hey, come on now, what’s all that noise about?” Tony hugged him tight, rubbing his back. “Come on now. Have you hurt yourself?”

“I don’ wanna go to school!”

“That’s what this is about?” Tony took a very deep breath. “Darling, come on, quiet now. It’s gonna be fine. There won’t be another Ryan”

“How do you know?!”

“I just do”

He didn’t, of course: he just hoped. He needed Peter to settle. He was willing to look after him, but all of the disturbed nights from Peter’s nightmares were beginning to take their toll.

“Listen to me, Peter. If you keep convincing yourself that it’s going to be horrible and that you’ll hate it, then it will be, and you will. So you need to go in with an open mind. It could be fun?” he tried.

“How could it possibly be fun?” Peter cried. “I don’ wanna go to some jolly-hockey-sticks posh-nob school”

“You’ve already accepted the place. You’re going. I know you’re scared, and I know you’re hurting, but you haven’t got a choice. Come on, stop crying now. You need to have a bath and an early night”

“What’s the point?”

“Peter, don’t be difficult”

“I’m not being difficult!”

“Yes, you are” Tony said, holding him at arms length. “Stop”

Peter sniffed, wiping his eyes and nose on his sleeve. He kept his hand up by his mouth, trying to calm down.

“Breathe” Tony went over to the sink, filling him a glass of water. “Here”

Peter took the glass and took a gulp.

“Ah, you’ll give yourself hiccups. Just sip it. Slowly”

Peter did as he was told. He was tired out.

“Good. Right. Sit down”

Peter did. Tony sat next to him, stroking his hair back over his sweaty forehead.

“You’re so thin now, son” he said sadly. “What happened to my sparky little lad who could quite easily eat me out of house and home?”

“A building fell on his head”

Tony flinched slightly. “Peter. It’s nearly April now”

Peter knew what he was getting at. The accident had happened nearly three months ago. Sometimes it felt like much longer. Sometimes it felt like it had only happened last week.

“The therapy sessions will help” Tony said. “You’ll get better. I just think you need some help”

“What if I never get better?”

“You will. I did. And... Loki did... You’re allowed to move on, you know”

“I thought I was dead”

Tony drew his hand back. “What?”

“When I woke up. And it was all cloudy and foggy and dusty and there were flashing lights and unrecognisable voices and everything felt heavy”

Tony squeezed his shoulder.

“I texted Ned today” Peter said. “I don’t know why. I hadn’t replied for ages”

“What did you say?”

Peter took his phone out, opening the right message and showing it to him.

[Ned] Flash asked after you today! D: o:

[Peter] Hey Ned. Sorry I haven’t been replying. I’m not trying to cut you off. I’m just having a hard time. I’m not coming back to Midtown. I went to another school for a while but it didn’t work out. I’m starting another one on Monday. Hope everything is ok with you

[Ned] It’s good to hear from you! Good luck on Monday! Maybe we can meet up soon?

“You haven’t replied to this last one”

“I couldn’t think of what to say. I never can”

Tony handed him the phone back. “Go and have your bath”

Peter would let Tony say goodnight. He slammed his bedroom door and insisted on being left alone. As he attempted to settle down and sleep, his mind was filled with the book he’d just finished. He’d found it on Loki’s shelves in the reading nook, a childs book about two girls who move to a boarding school with their parents. He’d started it because of the school, but got more than he bargained for. The final twist saw the death of one of the sisters as she plummeted from the school tower, and this swamped Peter’s mind. He’d cried reading the final chapter, and he screwed his face up now, trying to block out the feeling of falling.

He fell asleep, but the story invaded his subconscious. Looking back, he wasn’t sure if, in the dream, he was experiencing it, or if he was the girl from the book. He was tangled in hot and cold, balancing precariously, the evening wind blowing in his face as the window disappeared. He heard the screams, saw the bright flashes from fireworks filling the sky. The crowd shrieked, and he shouted to let them know it was only him, tugging the shawl from his head, tugging too hard - wobbling, slipping, falling. All in a second, he watched the tower window get further away, watched the ground get closer, seeing his death, terrified, screaming -

Peter woke up, tangled in his bedding, still screaming in the pitch black, trapped between dream and reality, unable to see, unable to breathe, unable to see what was real and what was not.

In an instant strange light flooded the room, hands untangled him from the quilt and pulled him close.

“Hey, ok, ok darling, I’ve got you, you’re ok”

“No! No! Help, please help, don’t let me fall! I’m sorry, Pearl! Help!!” Peter screamed.

Tony held him tight, stroking his hair firmly. “It was just a dream. It was only a dream. I’ve got you. You’re safe, Peter. You’re safe with me”

Peter stopped screaming, coming back to reality, and starting to sob instead. Tony rocked him, trying to calm here.

“There now, sweetheart. Shh. It was just a dream”

He couldn’t help thinking that something had to be done about these nightmares. He knew Peter would refuse a doctors appointment, but maybe he’d have to force him, just this once. It wasn’t that he was fed up comforting and looking after the boy; it was just that the disturbed nights were wearing him out.

Once Peter had stopped crying, Tony gently pushed him off his lap so they could talk face-to-face.

“There now. Are you alright?”

Peter wiped his face with his sleeve and said nothing.

“Sweetheart. Talk to me”

“I’m so scared... I can’t go to this school, I just can’t”

“What happened in your nightmare?”

Peter turned his head away. He didn’t want to talk about it, and Tony realised this.

“Ok. Whatever it was, it was just a dream. Nothing more” he checked his watch. “It’s late, and you’ve got to be up in the morning. Let’s get you a drink and then see if you can get back to sleep”

Peter had his drink and sat quietly with the empty glass in his hands. Tony gave him a quick hug.

"Ok, back to sleep now” he said, standing up and taking the glass from him. “You need the rest”

Peter swallowed hard. “I can’t do this”

Tony sighed. “You’ve gotta go to school, kiddo. Look, it was just a dream. You’re fine. Go back to sleep”

“I can’t stop thinking about it”

“The nightmare?”

“The book”

“Which book?”

Peter picked a book up from the floor, handing it to him. Tony vaguely recognised it. Loki had read it before, he was sure. He flicked through the pages, catching a few words about boarding schools and attic rooms. He flicked to the back, reading the final event and skim-reading the aftermath. He sighed heavily.

“This is a kids book, an absolute work of fiction, and you’re letting it dictate your feelings towards St Hendricks. Please, just be reasonable. Reading drama books and making silly stereotype-based assumptions is so counterproductive. You’re just working yourself up into a silly state over nothing”

“It might be a drama but it’s not fantasy! It could happen, you know it could!”

“No it couldn’t. Now stop being so silly. You’ve been offered a place at a prestigious private school - which you accepted - which will set you up for life. It’s an incredible opportunity and you need to understand how lucky you are to be presented with it”

“That’s what they said in the book” Peter mumbled.

“Will you just forget the silly book, please?” he turned the book over in his hands, glancing at the blurb. “Next time you want to read something, bring it to me first so I can decide whether or not it’s suitable. I don’t care if it’s kids books; if they’re giving you nightmares, I’m not letting you read them”

“The thought of school is what’s giving me nightmares”

“The sooner you start your lessons and counselling sessions, the better. Settle down. I’m going back to bed soon”

“I don’ wanna be alone...” Peter whimpered, knuckling his eyes.

Tony sighed. “Ok, alright, alright. I’ll stay with you”

He made Peter lie down and climbed into bed beside him, tucking him in and holding him close.

“Now go to sleep”

Peter felt sick when he woke up. Truly, dreadfully sick. His head was banging, his throat was sore, his mouth was dry, and he felt weird and shaky.

“Let’s get your breakfasted” Tony said. “Before you get dressed. I don’t want you spilling stuff all down your new uniform”

Peter looked at his uniform, set out waiting for him. It made him feel even worse.

“I don’t feel well...” he croaked.

“You’re just nervous. You’ll feel better with a full stomach, trust me. Come on, get up! Big day today!”

Peter stayed where he was, shivering. Tony felt his forehead.

“You’re fine. We’ll have breakfast, and then you can have a quick wash and get dressed. We’ve got plenty of time yet”

Peter felt a lot less ill after having breakfast and a wash, but he still felt sick with nerves. He was scared, and he didn’t know how to deal with it, so he kicked off.

“Peter, how many times? You’re going whether you like it or not”

“Well I don’t like it! I don’t wanna go to school with a bunch of toffee-nosed twats!”

“Peter! How many times do I have to tell you not to swear? I should wash your mouth out with soap” he shook his head. “Now go and get into your uniform”

“No! I don’t want to do this! It’s not fair!”

Tony looked at him, feeling fed up. He knew he was playing up because he was upset and scared. The tears in his eyes were proof enough of that. Still, it wasn’t the best time for him to kick off. Tony grabbed him and dragged him to his room.

“Ow! Hey, what are you doing?”

“Well, if you won’t get into your uniform yourself, then I’ll do it for you”

Within a couple of minutes, Tony had managed to quench Peter’s anger. With the boy calm (but still crying delicately), Tony managed to coax him into his school clothes. Peter stood awkwardly, shuffling inside his new uniform.

“I don’t like it. Why does it have to be so tight?”

“It’s not tight, Peter: it’s fitted. You look good, like a proper little gent. Hey, do your top button back up! Stand up straight, lets get a proper look at you” he twitched Peter’s uniform, tweaking his collar and straightening his tie and blazer. “There. Put your hat and shoes on”

“I’m not wearing the hat”

“Oh, go on; it’ll be dead cute”

“I’m not wearing the hat”

“Fine, fine. Get your shoes on then”

He picked up Peter’s new satchel, checking the contents and nodding approvingly.

“Why did we have to get a satchel?” Peter asked, wrinkling his nose as Tony did the straps back up. “I’m used to backpacks”

“It’s a backpack satchel” Tony pointed out. “You can wear it just the same. It’s just loads nicer”

Peter looked at the thin straps and buckle closings on the brown leather. Tony saw his face.

“It’s a lovely bag! Don’t you like it? It's a proper bag, not one of your chainstore rubbish ones that only lasts five minutes”

Peter knew. He’d been there when they’d bought it. Tony hadn’t blinked handing over $250 for the simple bag (“It’s real leather, a proper Cambridge Satchel Company bag”). Peter had objected, saying the $10 ones he always had were more than good enough, but Tony had said that if he was going to a proper posh school, he should have the bag to match. He hadn’t given him much say in any of his school supplies. Peter tried hard not to be ungrateful, but he didn’t like the satchel, or a lot of the other stuff. He still found it hard to understand how Tony could spend so much money on a single item without blinking.

"It's freezing out there today. Where did you put your new coat?"

Peter whined quietly. The duffel coat Tony had bought him was another hated item. He'd shoved it in the back of the shoe cupboard, hoping Tony wouldn't remember it.

"Can't I just wear a hoodie?"

"Certainly not! I don't think hoodies are St Hendricks approved. Your new coat is lovely. Where is it?"

"In the shoe cupboard"

"Go and get it, then!"

Peter didn't have a choice. He retrieved the coat, holding it over his arm.

"Put it on then" Tony said.

"Do I have to?"

"Yes. Come on, you can't go out without a coat, not on a day like today"

Peter reluctantly pulled the coat on. Tony did the buttons and toggles up for him.

"It looks good!"

Peter wasn't convinced. "I look like Oliver Tate"

Tony laughed. Peter undid the buttons and toggles, adjusting the coat edges. He looked at himself in the mirror. It was certainly better undone. He kept looking at himself, in his smart shoes and uniform and posh coat. He didn't look like himself at all.

"Hey, don't cry!" Tony pulled him close. "I know, you're nervous"

"I don't want to go! It doesn't feel right!" he went to wipe his eyes with his sleeve, but Tony stopped him quickly.

"Not on your sleeve! Here" he felt in Peter's front blazer pocket, pulling out the handkerchief Loki had given him, and dabbing at the boys face. "You don't want soggy cuffs on your new uniform"

"I can't use that in school!"

"Of course you can! All the other kids will. Come on now, stop crying. You don't want to turn up with red eyes now, do you?"

Peter focused on his breathing, and after a few minutes he was quiet. Mostly. Tony kissed his nose.

"Right, I think we'd better be going soon" Tony said. "Did you brush your hair this morning?"

"Um.."

Tony grabbed a comb and dragged it through Peter's hair.

"Oooowww! You're pulling my head off!"

"Don't be such a drama queen. It's all knotted. Honestly Peter, have the gorilla's been at it in the night?"

"I don't know, have you?"

"Oi! Cheeky! Hold still, will you? It'll take longer if you keep wiggling"

Peter whined and stopped struggling. It felt like Tony was carving grooves into his skull with the comb, and he was relieved when he stopped.

"There" Tony said. "Much better"

"Is it?"

"Yes. Now" he picked up Peter's satchel and handed it to him. "Let's get you to school"

Peter sat in the car with the posh satchel on his lap, looking down at his highly polished shoes. Everything about it felt so wrong.

When they parked up in front of the school he felt like he really might throw up. It was eight thirty. Tony had said they'd been told to get there early. They had things to sort out, he said.

"Good morning Peter, Mr Stark" Mr Pipe-Fowler greeted them at reception.

He had another student with him, a pretty girl in the top year with long blonde hair and a big smile. Her short skirt showed off a lot of long, thin leg. Peter looked up at Mr Pipe-Fowler instead.

"My, my, you really are nervous!" he said, looking at the trembling boy before him. "Now, I've got something for you"

He handed Peter an A4 size whiteboard, thick with wooden edges, and a four-pack of dry erase markers; black, blue, red, and green. Peter took it, struggling to keep hold of it he was shaking so much. He looked at Tony for answers.

"We understand you're non-verbal" Mr Pipe-Fowler continued. "So you can use the whiteboard to communicate with us. Now, these are also for you" he handed him a ring bound school planner, and a timetable. "We do things by week here. You'll notice that your timetable is split into week one and week two. It's always advertised in reception which week it is, so you shouldn't get stuck. This week is week one, so you'll be looking at the top timetable. Please take care of your planner. All of your homework slips and important notices will need to go in there. Now, I believe you've been told about seeing Miss Marns?"

Peter looked at Tony again, but Mr Pipe-Fowler answered.

"She's our on-site therapist" he said. "We've put you down for two sessions a week right now. Mondays and Thursdays. You'll be delivered a note telling you where to go for it"

Peter looked at his feet. He felt embarrassed having it talked about to openly, especially in front of the girl, who was still by the headmasters side.

"Now, Peter, I'd like you to meet Alison. She's going to be your Big Sister"

Peter looked up, and Alison grinned at him.

"Hey, Little Brother!"

Even Tony seemed confused now. "Big Sister?" he questioned.

"It's something of a scheme we use when people join us mid-term. At the start of a term, the children tend to learn their way around together with the maps, (there's one on the back of your timetable), but of course this doesn't happen with single children joining. Alison here will show Peter around, taking him to and from lessons, letting him get to know the layout for the first three days. On the last two days of the week, she will see him in the morning and afternoon, and after that, twice a week to see how he's getting on. She'll look after him"

"Oh, I see" Tony said. "Well, that sounds like a good idea to me"

"You'll be in form H3, Peter" he said. "Alison here will guide you" he checked his watch. "It's nearly time for registration. Say goodbye to your father now"

A big part of Peter wanted to scream and shout and cling to Tony and refuse to let go. But he was shaking so much he could hardly move, and his eyes were so filled with tears that he could hardly see. Peter looked at Tony. Behind them, he saw a girl about his own age hugging her father goodbye. No one made fun of her or started shouting things. Peter swallowed very hard and hugged Tony as tight as he could with full hands. He started crying properly, burying his face in his chest.

“I’ll pick you up again after school” he held him at arms length. “No tears, please”

Peter couldn’t help it. He didn’t want to be left here, not on his own. He wanted to go back to the house.

“Right, be good” Tony kissed Peter’s forehead. “I’ll see you after school”

He chucked him under the chin, bid farewell to Mr Pipe-Fowler, smiled at Alison, and left Peter in their capable hands.

Mr Pipe-Fowler wished Peter luck, told him to smile, and left him with Alison. Alison put an arm round his shoulders and hugged him.

“First days are tough” she said. “I joined mid-term, just like you, in the first year. The thought of starting is always worse than the reality”

Peter didn’t say anything. He went to wipe his eyes on his sleeve, thought better of it, and used his handkerchief instead.

“So, you’re in H3″ she said, walking along with her arm still round him. “Your form tutor is Mrs Hathersage. She’s lovely. She teaches English, and she covers Performing Arts sometimes too. I don’t think she teaches your form though”

Peter looked at his new white board and pens. He supposed it was a good idea. He thought he should probably write a message to Alison, but he didn’t feel like saying anything at all. He was too scared. Alison didn’t seem to mind. She chatted away to him as she guided him to the H3 form room.

She didn’t knock, just pushed the door open. The lady stood behind the desk smiled at them.

Alison grinned. “I’ve got your newest form member!”

“Oh yes, Peter Parker, isn’t it?” She smiled, holding a hand out to Peter. “I’m Mrs Hathersage. I’ll be your form tutor”

Peter shook hands even though he didn’t really want to. He felt ok under Alison’s arm, but meeting new people still felt like a dreadful thing. He glanced round the room. It was surprisingly empty, with less than half of the seats taken. No one was really looking, too absorbed in their own conversations.

“We’re a bit thin on the ground right now, as you can see” Mrs Hathersage said. “Half the class are away on the Spanish trip. They’ll be back for lessons next week”

Alison gave Peter a quick squeeze. “I’ve got to go and register in my own form, but I’ll be back to take you to your first lesson”

Mrs Hathersage smiled at her. “Thank you, Ali. I’ll see you soon”

Alison gave Peter one final squeeze and skipped off, waving as she went. Peter looked at the space where she’d been, and slowly back to Mrs Hathersage. He could feel everyone looking at him now. It was only a matter of time before things went wrong. He stood there not knowing what to do, shaking like a leaf, tears still in his eyes.

He felt so alone.

#my writing #fanfiction #mcu #marvel fanfiction #mcu fanfiction #frostiron #peter parker #spiderman homecoming

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tea-and-toblerones · 7 years

Text

Unison Chapter 5- If You Ever Want to Join Me Baby, I'll Be Dancing in the Dark

I'm not even going to bother with a clever opening.

Rated M for the smut

I led him into my apartment flicking on the lights as I led him to my couch. My apartment wasn't exactly what you'd call big but I absolutely adored it. The kitchen was to the left of the front door. Small but it had the basics. Perfect for me since I really didn't cook much. There was an bar that separated my kitchen from the living room. The left side of the wall was mostly taken up by windows. I had placed a small desk beside it, covered in papers, my laptop and a half drunk cup of tea. Outside was a fire escape that you could usually catch me on in the wee hours of the morning, mug of coffee between my hands watching the sunrise or in the middle of the night, sipping on my tea listening to the sounds of a sleeping city. In the center was my cozy red couch, a small battered coffee table sat in front of it. Across the room was my tv, placed right beside my bedroom door.

I took my purse off, motioning for Ed to sit on the couch. as he sank down in its plush cushions, I placed my purse on the back of my desk chair. The clacking of my shoes on the wood floors breaking the silence that had fallen over us. I wasn't angry with him in the least bit. To the contrary, I was impressed, no proud. He stopped when I asked him to, no hesitation, no trying to convince me otherwise. I bustled around the kitchen, pulling down two cups as the coffee brewed.

"How do you take your coffee?" He didn't respond and for a moment I had wondered if he had fallen asleep already. "Ed? Are you awake?" "Yeah, I'm awake." His response flat and void of any type of emotion. "Just cream is fine, thanks." I pulled the creamer out of my fridge, my hand resembling a claw from one of those infuriating machines you see in malls and arcades across the country. I placed it in front of him before heading back to grab my own cup, pausing to snag a couple packs of sugar and a spoon. Before I sank down my chair that matched my couch, I tossed the couple packets of sugar on the table along with the spoon. "How'd you--?" He started, looking at me for the first time since he entered my apartment. "Lucky guess. You seem to have a taste for the sweeter things." I watched him place a splash of creamer and shake a packet into his coffee, stirring it before taking a sip. After a moment he set the cup back on the coffee table. He ran his hands through his hair with a frustrated growl. "Look, I should just go home." His hands jerking from his head where they had been resting. Bitterness saturated his voice. " What I did was not okay and I shouldn't be here." He stood up and started to head for the door before I gently called out to him. "I know your mom raised a gentleman." "Obviously she didn't." He muttered darkly but it was enough to make him stop in his tracks. "Well that's bullshit." I said calmly but firmly, making sure my voice was free of anything resembling anger. "It's rude to leave a majority of a beverage untouched y'know. At least finish your drink. " I leaned back in my chair, taking a long drink out of my own cup. He stood there for a moment before turning back and flopping back on the couch. I leaned over in my chair, reaching to push his coffee toward him. His fingers wrapped around the cup though it remained on the table. The truth is I was worried about leaving him in this state. His expression was a dark one, his teeth kept pulling at his bottom lip, his brows drawn down. His leg bouncing in aggravation. I sat in silence, knowing nothing I said was going to cause the storm to dissipate. No, it was best to just ride it out. He'd talk when he was ready. His eyes would flick to me every so often, following me around as I walked around the living room, tidying up a bit. It took me a moment to notice the silence that had enveloped the apartment which meant his leg had stopped bouncing. When I walked to the front of the couch I had seen that his eyes had fallen closed and he had started to shift forward, his head slowly making its way to the table. I gently pull his fingers from the cup and ease him into a laying position. I plucked his glasses off his face, taking a moment to admire his freckles before placing them on the table and continuing on. My fingers nimbly working on the laces of his shoes pulling them off slowly so I didn't wake him up. I lift his legs up carefully placing them on the couch as well. He stirred a bit, muttering something I couldn't quite make out. I dug a spare blanket out of my closet and fan it out over him. I collect our cups, dumping the remaining liquid in the sink and replacing it with a glass of water. His shoes had joined mine beside the door, finishing off the row quite nicely. I turned the overhead light off, turning in the light over the stove on instead in case he woke up while it was still dark out. Satisfied I went to bed myself, only pausing to place a quick kiss on top of his head and whispering a soft goodnight. When I had woken up part of me expected to see an empty couch. I was surprised when he was still sleeping peacefully, though half of the water I had left was gone so I knew he was up at some point and chose to remain here. When I came back from my run I saw one of his bright green sock covered feet sticking out over the armrest, the other was dangling off couch with his toes almost touching the floor. His face was buried in the cushions in an attempt to block the light that was streaming in. One arm was trapped under his face, the knuckles of his other hand resting on the floor. I could hear him snoring, mostly muffled by the couch. He didn't wake up until a little after ten. I was seated at my desk playing around on my computer, Everybody Loves Raymond was on the tv, mostly just for background noise, when I heard him stir. "Whatimesit?" He slurred, stifling a yawn. His hair standing in every direction imaginable as he blearily stared over the armrest at me, eyes blinking slowly in attempts to clear his vision. His hands coming up to rub the sleep that had gathered in his eyes. "A bit after ten. " He sat up, brushing the blanket aside before reaching for his glasses. "Thanks for the blanket. And the water. And for taking my glasses and shoes off...and for taking care of me. I ‘preciate it." He finished off what bit of water was left in the glass staring down at it with a vacant expression. Finally he drug his eyes up from the table and over to me. He took a deep breath "Look, about last night..." Straight to it then, okay. "Stop. You don't have to apologise again. You've done it enough." "I just want you to know, I'm not that guy." His eyes were almost looked like they were pleading with me. Begging me to believe him. If I hadn't before that look would have done it for me. "I know. Look, it's okay. I don't think badly of you. It's not that I didn't want it...it's just...I want to do it...right I guess. I'm just tired of the quick drunken flings. It's been awhile since I've had it happen organically..." I could feel my cheeks growing warm as I trailed off. There was a little smile that played across his features. A weak ray of light peeking out from behind storm clouds. "Looks like we're on the same page then. We'll wait until it feels right, no need to rush into it." He looked significantly more cheerful than he did a moment ago. His mouth and nose scrunched up pulling to the left side of his face. "I'm starving. Wanna go get some brunch?" Talk about a quick bounce back. Or was it? Part of me had a feeling it was still eating away at him and he just didn't want me to know. Rather than a call him out on it, I left it alone. I forgave him. It's up to him whether or not he forgives himself. "Sure, let me just change real quick and we'll go." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ We had started seeing each other more after that night. I got a text Monday that read 'I've picked us up something fun. Can I bring it over later tonight?' I readily agreed, curious about what it could be. When I opened the door to see him carrying two large boxes of Legos a huge smile radiating on his face. "I wasn't sure what type of kit to get so I decided to just get the classic ones and we could build whatever we wanted." We had spent at least two evenings a week building increasingly ridiculous things, very, very badly. Soon it became a game of trying to guess what the other was attempting to make. We sat with our backs to each other as we worked on our creations. I could picture him studying his blocks carefully, looking for the perfect piece. His hair mussed up from his hands absentmindedly running through it as he pondered his next project. His intense stare and he critiqued it. His tongue poking out as he pushed his pieces together. The satisfied smirk when he was done. "Is it a moldy potato?" "What? A moldy- a moldy potato? No it's-it's a car." "Well your 'car' has no wheels." "No, it does, see that's what these dark spots here are. This is the windscreen here and these are the windows." "...I see a moldy potato. I thought you said you were good at this." "I am...when there's instructions." While we both thoroughly enjoyed our lazy nights in we found ourselves at Uni's every Friday to drink, watch people perform and shoot pool. We had fallen into a comfortable routine. Most of the regulars had figured out who Ed was but like Levi had said, nobody really cared. When any newcomer spotted him and asked who he was, they would say 'That's just Todd, he works at Chipotle.' Nobody wanted to talk to Chipotle Todd. Levi was the one who actually came up with it one night as we were shooting pool. Winner played me. They were both fiercely competitive so both of them took it seriously, swear profusely when they'd scratch or miss their shot. After one particularly vulgar stream came out of Ed's mouth one of the patrons turned around and looked him up and down, asking if he was 'that one with the love songs.' Levi had snagged Ed up with one of his arms, laughing as he messed up Ed's hair. "Nah man, this is my buddy Todd. Probably just looks familiar to ya 'cause he works down at Chipotle down on Court." He glanced over at Ed who was quick to react. "I wish I was that guy, man.That shit would be lit." Ed had used his American accent in an attempt to further sell the story. Both me and Levi were struggling to keep a straight face. The guy either bought it or had enough sense in him to realise he didn't want to be recognised. Since the guy seemed to have a hard time forming coherent words, I was betting on the first one. When the guy had turned back to the bar, they had positioned themselves back at the table and returned to their game. "Todd that works at Chipotle huh?" Ed asked normally, wearing an amused expression as Levi searched for his angle. "Yep. If they do go they'll see Todd, a ginger that bears enough of a resemblance to you, thanks to the lighting, that they won't question it too much." "Thanks man, I appreciate it." Levi took his shot and straightened up. "No problem. Just take care of my girl Adi here. She deserves it." I could hear the bitterness in his voice at the last statement and it caught me by surprise. "I plan on it, mate. You don't have to worry." Levi stuck his hand out across the table towards Ed. "The greatest harm can come from good intentions. Just remember that." Ed nodded, shaking the offered hand, leaving me wondering if it was some sort of bro thing I wasn't aware of. After that everything had returned to normal and we were all laughing in no time. By the end of the night both were fairly drunk. I had started taking pictures of them, ushering both of them over. I took a group selfie, Ed's lips on my cheek with Levi rolling his eyes. The second one had Ed reaching around me grabbing Levi's face and kissing him on the cheek while Levi looked bewildered. It was almost like old times. It was also at Uni's that I called him Teddy for the first time, two weeks after our pasta date. I was getting ready to order our drinks when I realised he hadn't told me what he wanted to drink. I step away from the bar and found him with the group that was performing tonight. "Hey, whadid you want to drink?" He was talking with one of the live performers about preferred string types and hadn't heard my question. So I tried to get his attention again. "Hey, Teddy?" His head whipped around. "Yeah?" "Drink?" "A pint's fine, love." His eyes sparkling, bringing to mind a sun kissed sea, his smile causing the corners of his eyes to crinkle. Pure joy seemed to pour from him, like he was the living embodiment of the sun. He grabbed my arm before I walked off "The Jackie-O's one, oh shit what was it called..." "Wood Ya Honey." "Would I what?" he asked his brows coming together in confusion, his head tilting slightly to the side. Like always, it never fails to bring a smile to my face. "No, that's the name of it." I laugh, "It's called Wood Ya Honey." When I brought it back to him he was wrapping up his conversation. He gingerly took the beer out of hands careful not to spill any out of the glass, quickly sipping a bit off the top. I had started to make my way to "our" table but Ed had motioned to the door that led to the roof. Usually he loved to watch, his eyes closed as he listened closely, head moving to the beat. I could tell he was analyzing what he was hearing, picking up subtle nuances most people overlooked.Shrugging I followed him out the door and onto the roof. He picked the table closest to the corner of the roof, choosing to sit on the top of it instead of the bench. "That's the first time you've called me Teddy." He shot a sidelong glance at me, the corner of his mouth turning up in a smirk before taking a sip of his drink. "I was starting to think you were just never going to use it." I stared blankly at him. I hadn't even realised it. "You said only people close to you called you that. I didn't think we we're really close enough so it felt wrong to use it." I took a sip of my own beer. "But you do now?" He asked softly "I guess? It just came out, I really didn't think about it." I paused for a moment "Teddy." I say again, letting it fall from my lips, smiling at how easily it came of my tongue. Not awkward in the slightest. I had tried before but my mouth refused. "Well, I'm fucking thrilled. Especially now that I know you held back because you were waiting for it to have meaning. " We stayed out there a majority of the night. The door was cracked open so we could hear the music no problem as we laid together on the table. There was something idyllic about laying under the stars listening to the acapella sounding group. Most of the people that saw us left of alone, a few shot joking remarks about how the beer was stronger than we thought or how we needed to get a room. After the show ended we untangled ourselves from each other and headed back to my apartment. I had been waiting on the sidewalk for Ed to settle the tab (something he refused to let me pay for) swaying to My Songs Know What You Did in the Dark that was blasting out of someone's car stereo. I felt Ed's arm slip around my waist, placing a kiss to my cheek before making the walk to my apartment. Usually he walked me to the building door, gave me a kiss and headed back to his suite. After cuddling with him for most of the night I wasn't ready to stop just yet. When we had broke away I nodded toward the door. "You wanna stay here tonight?" We hadn't talked about any sort of overnight accommodations. Which seemed silly since I'd stayed over after our first date. "If you'll let me." The elevator ride was a quick one and soon we were both getting ready for bed. I had switched into a baggy shirt that featured an extremely faded Bartman skateboarding on it. I found it extremely appropriate. He leaned against the bathroom door as I brushed my teeth. "You wouldn't happen to have a toothbrush you wouldn't mind me using would you?” I reach up in my medicine cabinet, my toothbrush sticking out the side of my mouth as I dug for my spare one. "Yew can haf dat one. Izza spare." taking care to not spray him with foam as I handed it over. After all teeth were brushed he looked at me a bit apologetically. "I don't have any pajamas...is it okay that I sleep in just my boxers?" I shrug "As long as you don't mind just the shirt for me." "Of course not." He threw a bewildered look my way. "It's not like you've been parading around here in just a shirt and knickers this entire time." He was already lounging in bed, his pants somewhere on the floor at the foot of the bed. He tugged his shirt over his head and my mouth fell open. He was completely covered in tattoos. The swirling cacophony of bright colors that was splashed across his torso and stomach reminded me of a child melting crayons on a canvas. "Holy fucking shit, you're beautiful!" I practically flew to his side, my fingers automatically brushing along the lion's mane, feeling the fuzzy chest hair that appeared non existent. It's like one of those touch and feel books. I heard him chuckle lightly. "You thought they stopped at my shoulders didn't ya?" "I knew you had something tattooed on your chest, I didn't know you were this...you're a work of art Teddy. A gorgeous work of art." My mouth still open slightly as my fingers traced over outlines. "Oh, come off it..." He muttered failing to keep a smile from coming across his face. There was a pink hue that had came across his face. He reached around me to turn my lamp off. "Sleep, sweet girl. You'll have plenty of time admire them." I huffed and tugged the blanket up to my chin. His arms snaked around me, pulling me closer to him. My room was faintly lit by the street lamps so I could dimly make out his facial features. I wiggled closer, our faces almost touching. I could smell the minty toothpaste still lingering on his breath. After a minute or two I shuffled a little lower, trying to find the optimal snuggling position. Once I finished shuffling around he placed a kiss on my forehead. "You find a place you like that's comfortable?" "Mmm" I murmured sleepily. I hadn't noticed before but he smelled faintly of cinnamon and something familiar that I couldn't place but I found it comforting. It wasn't much later I that I had fallen asleep. I woke up to find that I had rolled over in my sleep but Ed's arms had found their way around me again. My bottom was resting against him and that's when I felt him. I smirk as I press my butt against him a little firmer, wiggling it a bit, biting down on my bottom lip when I hear him moan, his body reacting to mine. I keep doing it until he finally mutters. "If you keep doing that, we're going to have a big problem." I roll over to face him. His eyes were still closed but a faint smile was on his lips. Those gorgeous strawberry lips that practically begged to be kissed. My lips were against his in no time, his hands pulling me closer. I pressed myself against him and could feel how aroused he was. When we finally break away, his face his flushed, eyes gleaming. "Well good morning to you." His voice breathy and slightly dazed sounding. "Morning." I let my fingers drag down his torso, lingering over the waistband of his boxers. "But it could be better, if you'd like." His eyes widened a bit when his sleepy brain worked out what I meant. "Oh? Oh. I'd like that very much." I slid my hand under his waistband, letting my fingers glide down his shaft. He wasn't kidding about big Jesus fuck... I heard a sharp intake when I wrapped my fingers around him and began gently stroking him. The moans that came from him were absolutely sinful. When they had started to grow a bit louder I withdrew my hand. He took the opportunity to seize control of the situation by gently guiding me to my back, his mouth working against mine. His fingers came down to the top of my panties. "Can I?" His request was a quiet one, in a husky sounding tone. "Yeah, take em." I breathe. He slid them off with ease, I kicked them the rest of the way off, not caring where they went after they were off my body. His fingers traveling down, running the length of my slit before sliding his middle finger inside my opening. I moan as he began to curl it inwards, rubbing my inner wall. He slid his ring finger in next causing me to moan louder. He pulled them out, putting them in his mouth. "Let me taste you?" It almost sounded like a beg. "Mouth, fingers, cock, I'm yours." I pull my shirt off, suddenly growing extremely warm. "Talk about a work of art, fuck, look at yourself!" His fingers coming up to my nipple, rolling it around causing me squirm. He leaned forward, his mouth just hovering over it, his hot breath making me feel...things. He let his tongue flick across it a couple times before covering it with his mouth. His tongue massaging it as he sucked. He had been teasing the other one with his fingers. He shifted his focus to the other one, his mouth coming around it, sucking without teasing it with the tongue. Once he was satisfied, he shifted down my body until his mouth was over my exposed core. He pressed his tongue flat against me, running it slowly upwards causing me to shiver and hum. It wasn't long before I realised he knew exactly what he was doing. His tongue was flicking across, then slow circles, then he was just adding pressure. When he added his fingers I groaned loudly. I could feel the smile come across his face as he worked. "That's my good girl. Let go for me." I had expected it to be slightly uncomfortable due to his scruff but I was surprised, it only amplified the sensation. He was quick to pick up how my body reacted and would adjust himself accordingly. Soon, my hands were gripping onto his fiery locks moaning his name as I rocked my hips, the heat beginning to build, my body starting to tremble. Watching him suck and lick at me was infinitely hotter than I could have imagined. The way he looked up at me from under those long eyelashes was almost enough to make me lose it. "Will you come for me baby? Please?" Any bit of willpower I had was shattered with that one question. His mouth was quickly back on me as soon as my grip on him tightened, my walls fluttering around his fingers as the wave of heat had made its way through my body. I had collapsed back, breathing heavily as I rode out the aftershocks. It had be a long time since I came from oral stimulation, I wasn't sure if I was even going to but his voice wrecked me. He kissed his way up my torso, back to my lips. My hands once again in that disheveled mess of cinnamon colored curls. "Let me feel you around my cock. I want you Adi, I want to feel your tight pussy wrapped around me. Please baby, will you let me?" His fingers brushing a few stray hairs that had stuck to my damp forehead. "I don't want you, I need you Teddy. Yes. Fuck me." He rolled off to the empty side of the bed, tugging his boxers off, his cock springing up to his stomach as he tossed them somewhere on my floor. My eyes falling on the sight of him, the way it stood out against his bright skin. I was digging around in my nightstand feeling around for the tell tale foil wrapper of the condoms I knew I had in there. My fingers finally finding it. I hand it over to him, noticing how much his hands were shaking as he fought with the wrapper, finally managing to rip it open. After he slid it over himself he was back between my legs. "Don't worry, I'll go slow so I won't hurt you. Just tell if it starts to, okay?" I nod, watching him running himself across me a few times, my body shuddering at the feel of it. He pressed himself against my opening. "Ready?" I nod again and he eases his head inside stopping as soon as the ridge is inside a moan tumbling out of his mouth. There was a slight tugging burning feeling going on as I adjusted to the large intrusion. I could tell he wanted to sink in more but was waiting for my go ahead, which he got. Slowly he sank farther in, the burning feeling persisting but never grew past an annoyance. "Fucking hell, you're tight. Are you okay?" "I'm good Teddy. Fuck me, please." He began thrusting slowly and soon the burn had left completely. His hands were curled around mine, his mouth on my neck as he thrusted into me. He maintained the slow speed for a bit, savoring the feeling. "Oh, Fuck, you feel amazing wrapped around me." He marveled, a bit of strain in his voice. He continued to take his time, our bodies falling into a steady rhythm. His mouth had found the sensitive spot on my neck and had upgraded to kneading it with his teeth. I was enjoying the feeling taking our time. Not rushing to finish. Not wishing it was done and over with. I enjoyed the initmancy of it. This is what I was craving. Soon I need more of him. "Harder. Faster. Teddy. Please." I moan out, playfully biting his ear. He complied, his hips thrusting faster, crashing against my inner wall. He had raised his head up, his fingers still locked around mine. I swing my legs up around his waist, digging my heels into his lower back, urging him along. "Oh yes, fucking yes, fuck me hard Teddy!" "Christ Adi, your mouth is filthy. It's fucking sexy to hear such vulgar things from that exquisite mouth of yours." The sound of skin hitting skin was quickly drowned out by our moans. Mine had quickly transformed into cries, his moving to random swearing and words strung together. My grip on his hands tightened as I felt the warmth rise for a second time. When it hit, it wasn't in a wave. This felt like lightening crackling through my body. My vision faded for a moment as I clamped down hard on his cock causing a strangled fuck to come from him. He sped up as I was riding out my orgasm, he chasing his own, finding it at the end of mine. He sagged against me, placing kisses on any open skin he could find. I could feel his heart beating frantically, pounding against my own. Both of our breaths coming out in ragged bursts. "Holy. Shit. That was..." "Yeah, yeah it was." "You okay? I didn't hurt you did I?" He lifted his head to search my face for anything resembling pain, but only find a dazed dreamy smile instead. "No, no you were great, I'd give you a standing O but I'm afraid I'm unable to stand at this point in time." My legs may be shaky, but my wit wasn't. "You gave me a lying Oh Teddy. That's more than enough in my book." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- We spent a majority of the day in bed. After we had redressed. Shirts, because from here on out my room was declared a no pants zone. I could feel some soreness starting to settle in, knowing that it was going to be worse tomorrow. I ordered a pizza and we laid there watching some sort of cooking show where absolutely none of them knew how to cook. We started watching with the attitude of we'll watch until we figure out what this is and soon got so wrapped up in it, we couldn't turn it away. It made both of us feel better about our cooking skills so at least we gained something from it. Which means it wasn't a total waste of a day. Not that I considered a day spent with him a waste because I knew some time in the future he was going to return to music and he'd be gone. I wasn't ready for that conversation just yet. I wanted to live in the fantasy for just a bit longer. He spent Saturday night with me as well and even joined me on my Sunday trip to the market. As I shopped for my usual items I noticed him milling down the aisle putting stuff in the cart. Bagels, oatmeal packets, muffins, eggos, toaster strudels, pancake mix. "Whaddya adding?" "BREAKFAST FOODS COS IT'S THE MOST IMPORTANT MEAL OF THE DAY." He sang out as he tossed what looked like sausage links in. He pointed to the pancake and eggs, "For weekends and mornings I'm around to make it for you." He points to the bagels, oatmeal, muffins, eggos and toaster strudels. "For when I'm not there. You can even take these with you to make at work." "Teddy..." I could barely find my voice. For mornings I'm here to make it for you... "Shh...just accept the eggos." He tapped my nose with a wink, giving me my favorite crooked grin. After the market, where he insisted on paying for everything and me doling out the empty threat of never letting him go shopping with me again, He helped me put everything away. Once that was done and I began to start sorting my laundry he headed back to his suite to do his own laundry that he had pushed off until the last minute. By the way he talked he was out of almost everything. I gave him a kiss before he headed out the door. I could smell a hint of cinnamon in my sheets when I climbed into bed. I buried my face in his pillow taking a deep breath. I fell asleep holding onto it. I snagged a muffin on the way out the door because the morning text I got read "Are ya lustin for a muffin? If you're not you don't know nuffin x" and I couldn't not eat one after he put so much effort in horrible wordplay. I responded with 'Damn you and your words.' By the time I got to work he had responded 'Award winning artist here, y'know and it REALLY shows' I went about my day and by the time lunch had came around I was surprised that I hadn't heard back from him get. I checked to make sure I had sent the message and sure enough 'Do I want to know how long you sat on that?' I brushed it off, figuring he was off running some sort of errands. When I hadn't heard from him by the end of the day I began to worry. He always texted to see how my day was. I pull his number up, pushing the little green phone. After a few rings I get "Hey it's Ed, if you're getting this I probably lost my phone. Again. Send me an email if it's urgent." I hang up, deciding against leaving a message. He'll call when he see it. I shower and head to bed. My worry grew when I hadn't heard from him a second day and by the third day of getting no response and his phone going directly to voicemail, I had tapped out my worry meter. After work I headed straight to his suite, knocking on his door. There was a loud clanking noise like something had been knocked over and the door swung open. The smell of alcohol, weed and sweat had hit my nostrils hard. I saw that his suite was an absolute wreck, bottle scattered everywhere, take out boxes and half eaten food scattered about. Torn up papers littered his floor like sad confetti. Then my eyes fell on him. His hair was a matted mess, his skin paler than normal coated in a sheen of sweat. His eyes were bloodshot, surrounded by dark circles. His shirt was a dingy white and his pajama bottoms were fairly wrinkled. It was clear he hadn't changed or showered in days. "Yeah?" He sounded aggravated and his face matched the tone. "I hadn't heard from you in a couple days..." I couldn't even finish my sentence. He was an utter mess. What the hell had happened... "So to you that mean come on over?" He asked coldly. His tone had definitely caught me off guard but I was quick to recover with a bit of an attitude of my own. "When you fucking dissapear for three fucking days yeah, it does." I shoot back at him. "What the hell happened?" He let out a cruel laugh, his head falling back, shaking his head at the ceiling. "You want to know? I found out the truth that's what!" His head snapped back down, his dark eyes locking on to my own. His features twisted in a sneer. "You're a fucking reporter!" He spat at me, anger flashing in those eyes. Storm cloud grey. The darkest I had ever seen them. "Wait Ed--" "Don't-Don't you fucking dare!" He roared, his finger coming up jabbing in my direction causing me to flinch and take a step back. "I called your work! I got the number from your phone because I was gonna surprise you by picking you up for lunch and what do I fucking get? A number for a fucking magazine!" He shook his head, his hands coming up to his head, causing me to flinch again. His head fell forward. "I should have know it was too fucking good to be true! Pretending like you don't know shit about me just to get close to me. The way everyone kept asking you if you got your promotion yet and how you were so vague about what you do. Jesus fucking Christ I'm a fucking idiot." His head came back up again, this time the spark of fury was gone, replaced with hopelessness. "Was I nothing but a story to you? Was you just going to use me and toss me aside like she did? Was I gonna be your be break? A big scandalous exposé? What, Something like The Flame Burns Out: Ed Sheeran's Descent into Addiction and Alcoholism?!" His voice broke and I saw a steady stream of tears falling "I thought this was real Adi. I thought you really cared about me...how could you lie to me like that? How could you do this to me?" He sobbed, his body shaking fiercely. "Ed, l--" I saw the spark reignite in his eyes as the tears still poured out. "No! Enough! Enough of the lies! Enough of the bullshit! I can't-I can't Adi." The sobs taking over again. "I can't take it. I can't take it. I can't take it. Is this what you wanted to write? Congratulations, you fucking got it. I hope it was fucking worth it." The sound of the door slamming closed echoed in my ears.

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A/N

You can thank @bestiejessie for this because I bounced two scenarios off of them and chose the one with the best reaction. They also have a bunch different things to hit me with.

#ed sheeran #teddy sheeran #code ginger #ed sheeran fanfic #ed sheeran mature fanfic #ed sheeran smut

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rememberthattime · 4 years

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Chapter 56. EuRoad Trip, pt 1

What an extremely unusual trip for Chelsay and I. TWO STRAIGHT weeks travelling.

We normally prefer short, quick trips every few weeks, which is why we live in London: it’s convenient. Paris is just a train ride away. The Sahara is a couple hours by air. You can easily explore somewhere new every month. Unfortunately, lockdown disrupted these plans – six months of potential weekend trips were made impossible.

In a way though, lockdown also enabled this EuRoad Trip. Chelsay & I had to condense a year’s worth of travel into five months, and we had a ton of destination on our list. We were able to work from wherever given our companies were now comfortable with remote arrangements. Finally, we still weren’t comfortable flying yet.

A few weeks on the open road was an obvious choice.

The idea for the EuRoad Trip was solidified during our preceding Scottish adventure. It proved escape was possible during Covid provided you’re safe, avoid crowds, drive, and potentially work along the way to allow for an extended trip.

Beyond being the only feasible option, driving also had its advantages. First, we could bring Indy. Second, it allowed us to explore small towns and settings inaccessible by flight.

I spent weeks mapping out our drive, adding and deleting potential destinations, before finally settling on a three-phase itinerary:

Beauty & the Beast phase – drive south through France’s Loire Valley, stopping at chateaus, provincial hamlets, and the charming fishing village of Cassis.

Summer Chic phase – hot temps along the ritzy Riviera, with stops in Nice and Portofino. Eat all the pasta.

Fall phase – Pass through the jagged Dolomites landscape, returning home past the fairy tale castles of Bavaria and the German Black Forest.

In total, we’d cover six countries over two weeks. 2500 miles. Also, driving in late September between the Cote d’Azur and Bavaria, we’d be covering two distinct seasons: summer to fall.

The logistics were daunting, but distance wasn’t actually the biggest challenge. London to Skye is a total of 12 hours driving and we did it in two days. Shockingly, London to Cassis is nearly identical and we’d spread it over four days.

The real complexity was the dog. First, finding pet-friendly hotels. This was solve-able because we were driving – I just had to find one pet-friendly accommodation within 50 miles of our intended route. Booking.com makes this easy.

The second and more challenging complexity was getting Indy across the English Channel. There are normally four options: fly, ferry, train, or drive. The only flight we’ll ever put him on is the one back to the US. The ferry allows dogs if you have a car (which we don’t). The cross-border train doesn’t allow dogs …even though both the UK and France allow dogs on their domestic trains.

We could’ve rented a car in London then driven the Chunnel, but didn’t want a UK car on European roads for two weeks.

That left us with only one option. Yes, there was only ONE way we could get Indy across the Channel, and it’s kind of ridiculous. Chelsay, Indy, and I would take a taxi to France.

Even that was complicated though, and I was worried about this first day of the journey: taking a cab from our house to St Pancras, train from London to Folkestone, then taxiing cross-border to Calais. That’s a lot of transportation... and a lot of luggage movement.

Indy’s crate is also HUGE, but this turned out to be an advantage: we could fit all our bags inside. Over two weeks, we’d stay in NINE hotels, so this consolidation made frequent moving feasible.

This crate strategy also made the trip from London to Calais shockingly easy, even with all the transport transfers. The train to Folkestone was a breeze and our pleasant taxi driver, Gary, provided white-glove service as we crossed the border.

Everything went so smoothly that we arrived at that night’s hotel two hours earlier than I expected! We had plenty of time to walk the grounds of the neighboring Chateau de Chantilly, a pleasant welcome to this first phase of the trip: Loire Valley chateaus and small provincial villages. Or as Chelsay referred to it: Beauty & the Beast places.

The next day, Chelsay & I began what would become an ongoing commitment over the next 14 days. We were driving through the northern French fields surrounding Paris, and realized these were the same fields the Nazi’s first unveiled the striking power of the blitzkrieg. 80 years ago, panzer tanks stormed through these very fields, crippling one of the world’s foremost armies in just ONE week.

We decided to listen to something World War II, preferably a podcast on the Fall of France. We browsed our options and Google’s recommendations, eventually settling on “The History of World War II Podcast with Ray Harris Jr”.

At the time, we had no idea what we were getting into. We were just looking for something relevant to the current setting, but would eventually move back to our normal road trip go-to: murder podcasts.

Ultimately, we listened to this podcast almost every time we got in the car. I wouldn’t say it was a particularly crisp production – Ray would openly admit not knowing how to pronounce European names & towns – but the unbelievable detail kept us engaged.

He’s chronicled every facet of every side, recording hundreds of episodes since 2012. To give you a sense of how deep Ray dives, he’s been recording for eight years and is BARELY INTO 1942! He’s only halfway through the war!

Regardless, we thoroughly enjoyed the podcast and, over the next two weeks, learned about the Fall of France, Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain, a Winston Churchill profile, Japan’s campaign through China, and finally, Pearl Harbor. All in excruciating detail.

The podcast easily passed the time, so before we knew it, we’d arrived at Chateau du Chambord, one of the most impressive palaces in the world.

A few things immediately impressed us: first, the enormous castle, the largest in the Loire Valley, was constructed in the 1500s. Not only is the scale of construction remarkable for that time, but the profile was completed with near perfect symmetry. Not bad for a society I dismiss as ‘mostly illiterate’. Second impression: yes, this was the inspiration for Beast’s castle.

Indy played the role of our little Beast, darting from tree to tree to avoid the 94 degree heat. We eventually settled down for a picturesque picnic in the gardens. Fun fact: French picnics are hand’s down the best picnics. Baguettes, saucisson, chevre, pickles. Even Indy enjoyed his French sticks over the unpalatable British twigs.

We’d intentionally pegged the next two days of our trip for work. We didn’t want to sink too many vacation days into one trip, so we decided we’d work the first couple days and relax the rest of the journey. That said, we were still able to enjoy a few charming provincial towns while making our way to the French Riviera.

First, we stopped in Souvigny, a medieval commune with less than 2000 residents. It was such a charming town, and a place we’d never be able to visit outside of a road trip. I distinctly remember saying “This is real” as we were pulling in – I was intending it both as a question and a statement. We spent the night in unique accommodation, the former gatehouse, and explored the quiet town between work calls.

Our second work day was in Cliousclat, an even SMALLER medieval commune: this one with only 600 residents. We again enjoyed brief strolls through the town’s tiny footpaths to burn off some of Indy’s energy.

Both of these villages were pretty, but they were essentially stopovers on our way down to the ritzy Riviera. Before arriving in Nice though, we had one last town on our ‘rustic’ leg of the trip: Cassis.

Cassis is technically part of the Riviera, but being two hours east of the Big Three (Nice, Cannes, and Monaco), it attracts fewer visitors and therefore maintains some of its fishing village charm. It was still hot – nearly 85 – so we slowly shuffled through the town’s small alleys.

After lunch by the beach, we set out for Cassis’ main attraction: the nearby calanques. Calanques are narrow inlets along the Mediterranean, characterized by bright blue waters and steep surrounding limestone.

The prettiest calanque is only accessible through a 5 mile hike … so I felt terrible for Indy. A black dog, covered in fur, on an 85-degree day? Luckily there was a beach at the end to cool down.

The walk started easy enough: Indy darted from shade-to-shade, having no idea what he was in for. It was a simple walk in a picturesque Mediterranean setting: highlighter blue water ways and white chalk cliffs coated in bright green pine trees. We reached our first views of Calanque d’en-Vau hardly breaking a sweat.

…That’s when the terrain turned into Vertical Limit. Chelsay & I covered 90% of the distance in about 30 minutes, then last 10% took an hour. It was essentially straight down – so steep in spots that I had to carry Indy while trying to keep my own balance. Now I was dealing with his black fur in 85 degree heat! Were these rocks slippery or is it just sweat seeping through my socks and shoes?

We eventually made it to the beach – thank god. It was strange being on a pebbly beach (especially after Australia), but we were in the water so fast that it didn’t matter.

Once in, Indy put on a show for the rest of the beachgoers. This was the deepest Indy had ever swam. Sure, he fetched a stick from a pond before, but never really swam. He loved it though. Took to the water like a fish to… uh, water.

He’d paddle out 10m in random directions, chasing someone he thought might be Chelsay or I even though we were beside him. He looked like a crocodile with his head barely above water and long body slowly trailing behind.

A few times, Indy would sit upright, so his paddling created splashes. This caused a new excitement, and he’d try to bite the water coming from his own splashes. Chelsay and I could hear laughter coming from the beach.

youtube

The sweaty hike back to Cassis wrapped up this first phase of the EuRoad Trip. It provided exactly what we were hoping for (Beauty and the Beast settings).

After Loire Valley chateaus, provincial villages, World War II podcasts, and rustic French countryside experiences, Chelsay and I were ready to clean ourselves up for our next destination: the ritzy French & Italian Riviera.

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awellboiledicicle · 7 years

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The Boy Who Ran pt 2

This is a part 2 [part 1] [par to a short prompt based around “ Imagine that you show up in your favorite character’s universe, only for them to be missing. You ask the other characters about it, but they have never even heard of your favorite character. You soon realize that you’re supposed to play their role in the story/series”. I chose Harry James Potter. [Part 3]

Shoes.

I really should have brought some shoes. Also, should have probably looked where I was going when I decided taking off into the night was a very good idea in terms of switching up my destiny. Perhaps some socks. Hogwarts letters do not come with socks.

They are, however, flammable enough to keep someone warm while you’re reading the other, less crumpled letters you grabbed. This was mostly me ruminating on the fact that, if i was sitting in the middle of.. not London? Maybe London. Possibly London. Memory blanks are a pain. Especially when trying to pull on memories decades back and you hit The Green Light. It was a nauseating feeling I couldn’t cope with in this body, not as Harry, not as a starving-- even more so now-- skinny, bony, and cold kid. I needed to get in contact with Hagrid, or someone. The more I tried to think about it, though, think forward, my head hurt. So, change was allowed, but no gaming the system too much. So, planning. I was in the middle of a city that i had to run and then dead exhaustion walk to, I wasn’t sure how many owls would come to me. How many could without giving me or the wizarding world away-- the last thing I needed was the Durleys sending people out for me via “search for masses of owls”, or people tracking said owls. If they were looking. Maybe they weren’t.

Hogwarts would be looking, though. It’s been looking since I was left on the Dursleys’ doorstep, waiting for me to turn 11. I either had to respond to a letter-- some how-- and tell them i need assistance, or wait it out.

At that moment, I was curled up by a dumpster in an alleyway, sitting on a wooden pallet to stay out of the rainwater. It was colder than I had anticipated-- because of course it was-- and my stomach was growling to the point of pain. The upside of having to wear Dudley’s old clothes was that the baggy extra room let the heat I did generate build up, but the downside was that they got damp faster. I tried to catch some of the owls that came that day, since they... appearantly took not having a quill and parchment to respond as denial? They flew off. I had no mice or anything to offer and that kinda pissed me off. Not really helping the “Contact Hogwarts” mission I had set for myself. Keeping that in mind, I had to find food. You can’t wait for your birthday on faith alone.

After walking a considerable distance, and being reasonably sure I had picked up something from walking in the city barefoot, I was able to get food. I had tried asking around at places for stale bread at first-- that got me ran off with not unsurprising vigor. Eventually a synagogue, and then a mosque farther off gave me a small pack of food and a pad of paper-- they offered it for free, but I insisted on doing some cleaning inside for them. I think they let me if only because it had started to pour outside and was getting dark. The Rabbi of the synagogue let me sleep on a couch in the entryway, since everything else locked. Well, the reasoning was more I told him that I had no home and needed a soft place in the rain, and he said sleep there-- but before this whole thing, I know the security was part of the placement. It was soft and warm and good. Left over challa never tasted so good at 3am.

Between cleaning at the mosque, the synagogue, and trying to not be too noticeable at a local park, the days toward my 11th birthday crawled. I spent many nights under benches in a park, wrapped in a tarp and hoping devoutly that no one would notice me. The Rabbi would still allow me in, but I’d cut it down to just the worst nights, really-- when someone had reported seeing me and I felt skittish, or someone had been unsettling. Rabbi had been kind enough to not say anything to anyone, after I told him the truth. Well, enough of the truth. That my parents had died and my extended family were supposed to care for me, but beat me and starved me and hated me. So I ran away from them. I didn’t tell him names, though. In case he called them and they came looking. It was unlikely, but it was a cautionary measure.

If the Dursleys’ had people looking for me, I didn’t see them-- likely because I have a general avoidance of authority figures. They may well have just washed their hands of the whole business, I reflected, as I tried to compose a proper reply/Letter of Request of Aid to Hogwarts that sounded like an eleven year old boy wrote it. They prefer to be viewed as perfectly “normal” after all, so my disappearance would likely warrant a celebration. Dudley probably got many more gifts he proceeded to harm others with and then break. Petunia was probably orgasmic over the fact she once again had more to gossip about than to have gossiped over. Vernon was likely still a purple lump of screaming, abusive, overpoweringly disgusting, vile, worms in a tie.

I was in the middle of doodling a rather impressive image of #4 Privet Drive on fire when I became vaguely aware that, approaching up a street toward the park behind me, were the sounds a heavy motorcycle makes when you’ve ridden it over things it really should not be ridden over one too many times. Like gravel, rocky terrain if it’s a smooth riding bike, or perhaps someone enchanted a thing one ought not have to ride in the air. And was riding it down a muggle street at dusk, toward a vaguely dirty, scrawny boy with a knapsack sitting at the edge of a park. And came to a stop by said bench, the gigantic rider swinging off and grinning.

This was was the point where I had to process in full the size of Hagrid and the motorcycle. Nothing before The Green did him justice-- hands the size of trashcan lids nothing, he could have palmed my torso. Then again, my torso was rather thin, so that might be saying more about me than him. He loomed over me as i turned to stare opened mouth, but not in a threatening way-- it was more that’s just how Hagrid was. He was big and tall and wide. His beard was worth about 5 heads of hair and every inch of my self control went into not poking it, because it looked bushy and bristly, like the hair on a favorite doll or like my own. “There you are Harry! Been lookin’ for you all over!” He boomed warmly, again I feel not intentionally so much as that was just his voice. The warmth was nice though, and I was struck with how genuine the tone seemed. It took everything in my body to quench the immediate feeling that this man was trying to con me before he’d said anything of the sort. Warmth meant danger, it meant a trick. I had to remember through The Green that Rubeus Hagrid was a good man and I shouldn’t bolt. I suppose my look of confusion skipped him, or he was taking it in stride, because he continued as if I was quiet aware of who he was. “Got yer dad’s wanderin’ streak in ya, runnin’ all over the countryside, not answerin’ your letters! Got yer mum’s eyes though, must have ‘er smarts in there, findin’ you writin’ away! Lookit ya, grown so much since the last time I saw you! Then again, you was just a lil baby!” I had processed a similar scene before, mentally, and prepared to try to act through it. But one cannot look at a very large man being soft and not be thrown. At least I couldn’t. “Uh.. who are you?” I am the pinnacle of eloquence. He looked a bit surprised and chuckled, sticking his hand out for a shake and I finally understood the ‘shook his whole arm’ line. He looked concerned when I bodily tipped over and patted my back. “Easy there, Harry. Name’s Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of the Grounds and Keys of Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry! Call me Hagrid. Oh, that reminds me.” He then presented me with the slightly squashed cake. I think he was surprised when i proceeded to open it, plop back down on the bench and start eating it with my hands. I am not a proud person. Harry Potter is not a proud person. “Err.. Was going to say I sat on it but it’s still good, but ya seem to like it well enough!” “I haven’t eaten in a day an’ a half.” I said through a mouthful of cake, shoveling another handful in, and swallowing painfully. This was, sadly, only about ten percent to try fast-tracking getting to Diagon Alley and an inn. The other 90% was because I was telling the truth and was going to cry. The cake was overly moist, like it had been soaked in something, though it wasn’t bad. I was definitely going to have to wash in a water-fountain later. But dear lord did it hit the spot. “This is the best birthday ever.” Hagrid’s face darkened and his body language shifted drastically from ‘excited’ to ‘borderline angry’ and I froze. “What’d you say?” I swallowed and hurriedly closed the box, my heart starting to race. Oh no, oh no. Hello trauma response. “I’m sorry, did I say something wrong? It’s good cake, was I not supposed to eat the cake? I’m sorry for eating the cake.” “No, no-- Merlin’s beard-- It’s your cake Harry.” His voice was quieter now. He seemed to be processing something. With a look around, he put his hands in his pockets. “Harry, why’re you out here, hungry, an’ not in a house?” I blinked and looked around, before raising an eyebrow. “I ran away? Because it was better out here?” Hagrid was quiet for a while more. “Have ya got yer letter, have ya read it? Do ya know what yer parents were, what ya are?” He’d come around the front of the bench and knelt down to be on eye level with me now, and looked very concerned. Bless Hagrid. Bless every single hair on his head, including his eyebrows and eyelashes. And curse that I have to play dumb. “What I-- homeless? Some kinda freak?” “Freak? Who told you that?” He got angry for a bit and calmed himself when he saw panic flash over my face. “The.. Dursleys? That’s why I ran away. They kept locking me in a closet and telling me to stop acting weird and hitting me when weird things happened.” He seemed to be boiling up around the edges, but letting me continue so he could rage later. “They always said my parents died in a car crash and I was weird like them, but i didn’t die. And that it was my fault. So I ran once i got the letter, just.. just in case there were people like me..”

Lying, something I was much better at than normal, but it was also true. Tell a kid they’re a mistake enough and that their parents were too, and don’t let them know more, and they draw conclusions. The conclusions being drawn in front of me right then, though, were likely that Hagrid was going to turn all the Dursleys’ into pigs or something. Or tell this all to Dumbledor and they’d all turn into bugs in a small terrarium. Perhaps that was my own wishful thinking. Definitely my own wishful thinking because about the time I finished that musing, Hagrid exploded into a full on explanation of everything-- I pressed for info here and there on Voldemort, a name i didn’t really fear to think, when prompted-- from my parents to Hogwarts. Even how Mcgonagall had pressed him to come looking for me early, which was good ‘if you been livin’ like this Harry’.

I tried very hard not to fist pump over my to-cat-commentary working. It would have thrown off the whole vibe.

Hagrid did write off a quick letter to.. someone I imagine, and tell me to hop onto the motorcycle. Something about not letting this stand and taking me somewhere to get cleaned up and showing me Diagon Alley so i had someplace nice to sleep for a bit before dealing with business.

“Alright, but.. If I go to this Hogwarts place.. I don’t have any money.” “Your parents-- they left you some. It’s a job for the mornin’ Harry.” “Oh..” I climbed onto the back of the motorcycle with him. “But I don’t have to go back to the Dursleys’ right?” “Not after I have a word with Dumbledor you bloody well won’t.”

It was good I was sitting behind him. Partially because I had a sly grin from the planning here, and then from the look of abject terror because I had forgotten the motorcycle flies. By all laws of aerodynamics, a motorcycle should not be able to maintain flight. But this one does anyway, because it’s magic and it doesn’t care what Muggle math has to say.

Hagrid had to peel a very suddenly pale Boy Who Lived off his jacket when we landed. I managed to not puke or wet myself on the way through the Leaky Cauldron, so success? Success. I vaguely remembered events that lead to me scrubbing cake off my face and arms, and then sleeping. They didn’t involve Quirrell, so either we were early, I blew the line of people off, or Hagrid did me a solid and ushered me away from people before handshakes happened. I recalled the person running the counter getting very excited, then being hushed, and giving us a key. Hagrid took the couch and it look like it broke, sagging to the floor, and I felt some slightly aware part of me twinge with anxiety, but I was too tired and high on adrenaline to care. Besides, magic can fix nearly any object. Whatever.

The feeling of being in the clear was gone in about 9 hours. Not exactly 9, but for once I was experiencing the best sleep I had ever gotten and I was taking it for all it was worth.

Then the migraine came. Oh, Harry dear you poor, poor bastard. Poor bastard, poor me. Like dying, but slow and only in the spot around my scar. So, mostly my whole head region. I wanted to screw my eyelids closed tighter, but I knew that would make it worse, that this wasn’t the sort of migraine you get from a bad nerve or a pulled muscle. The cold burning was seeping now, down through my nostrils and through to the back of my throat, to the roof of my mouth. That wasn’t the main jabbing “FYI, Snakefuck McDick is nearby” feeling, but there were after effects. The jab itself was radiating over my eye and opening them to look around made everything fuzzy-- like someone was blasting white noise and shining lights at me. While also stabbing me in the head. No, I was not being dramatic, but holy hell did it feel like the migraines before The Green, but worse. Like a whole part of me stopped being me and was... ah, right. Right. Of course. Thinking ahead in time isn’t something I could do, but I’m stubborn and I knew one thing I damn sure could do. There would be no reclaiming this piece of himself, there would be no dragging it out of me. I may have had to lay in bed for twenty minutes, sweating like a fever had taken me for all I had, and focusing on the pain until I wanted to vomit-- but finding the separation, exactly, in my mind was going to be key later.

I am the boy who lived, the boy who ran, the boy who thinks, the boy who plans. And I would be damned if i’m the boy who is caught unaware.

So when I eventually got up, cleaned up and joined Hagrid downstairs in the dinning room-- complete with him speaking to several people, including a man wearing a peculiar purple turban-- I felt I was prepared.

I was, but oh, boy, never have I felt the urge to slap the back of someone’s head more in my entire life.

#The Boy Who Ran #hp #fanfic #Harry Potter

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darcyunderwood · 5 years

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Denial

“No, no, no.”

How much time had he already let pass?

Darcy’s breath ghosted over Autumn’s tepid cheek, cradling her face in his hands. There was something wet under his fingertips. Too sticky to be his tears, he thought, as the contents of his stomach threatened to claw their way out of his throat. His body was contorted over Autumn’s as if to protect her from anything else that might try to disturb her, he didn’t want her to be seen. “Not like this,” he begged to whatever might feel merciful enough to hear him. “C’mon, not like this, it isn’t over yet! — it can’t be.. ”

An inhuman, awful, sound filled the room that Darcy only belatedly realized was his own cry. How cruel and unexpected it was for this to be that fate that had finally broken the chains keeping him tied to Autumn. “Please, please, don’t go.” He tried again, one last time, his voice trembling with the finality of what he knew was happening.

And what he had to do.

Anger

The next time Darcy let himself think about it sober, something he had gotten unnervingly good at keeping from happening, he was in a Home Depot — of all places. It was far from the first time Darcy had gotten physically sick in a public bathroom but, he thought with a morose grin, this could definitely constitute as the most violent. Objectively, it was pathetic. Like, really. All it had taken was one glance in the Plants and Flower department to send his stomach on the series of circus acts that would lead him here.

It was the soil, dark and damp, just like the hole Darcy had dumped Autumn’s body in. It’s earthy smell crawling inside his nostrils where it could drip down his throat.

There might have been a sort of twisted satisfaction in purging the thoughts from his body, but without the crutch of something intoxicating swimming through Darcy’s veins it didn’t take long for the repulsion to set in once more.

He raised a hand to wipe the sick away from his mouth, roughly scrubbing at the skin until nothing but patchy redness remained. The image reflected back at Darcy was nauseatingly normal, your typical boy next door, not just going through the motions of playing the grieving boyfriend. He thought it was probably the most unsettling thing he had ever seen.

Typical boys next door didn’t dispose of their girlfriend’s corpses.

Darcy heard glass shattering into pieces at the bottom of the shallow sink before he felt the wet sting across his knuckles; shards of the mirror he had punched to pieces sticking into his flesh. It feels better than it should. Pain, like intoxication, had a tendency to override everything else and he thrived in the white hotness the anger left behind.

Bargaining

His sneakers had seen better days and honestly that might have been putting it lightly; the laces Darcy had once gone out of his way to keep clean were now stained with more filth than bleach could get rid of. Still, he thought, he probably should have at least tried to get them clean but it seemed to null a point to care about it all. Good things didn’t last very long in this world.

Maybe it was better that way.

It was sure as hell easier to accept the dirtiness. Darcy grumbled as he nearly slipped off the steel rail he was trying to balance on, limbs clumsy from that evening's choice of beverage. The sun hadn’t gone down yet but it would be night sooner than later. He figured there was time for one last train to complete it’s route. Darcy had no idea if trains even used these tracks anymore, but if his God was a benevolent one then they would. The thought alone made him scoff audibly; if his God existed at all then they were calculating and cold — opportunistic.

“You shouldn’t have let that happen to her, y’know.” Darcy hiccuped, his fingertips tightening around the neck of the bottle in his grasp. It was empty. He slurred his words at a target that wasn’t there but no matter how quietly he spoke them to the trees they always found a way to bounce back at himself.

“She was good. Good, and she should still be here.” He sighed the last word, screwing his eyes together. Sincerity had never suited Darcy and being this open, even to the trees, made his skin crawl with discomfort. Still. “Why did you take her away? Why couldn’t you have taken me away instead? It - It’s not too late.” He tripped over something and opened his eyes, oh, the laces of his shoe had come undone.

Unclean. Couldn’t everyone see how God damn dirty they were? Didn’t they care at all?

Darcy heard a noise somewhere in the distance, the dull rumbling of something that he couldn’t really make out. He supposed it could be anything, but thought about how nice it would be if it belonged to one last train completing it’s route.

Depression

It would be so simple to just.. not fight back, Darcy smiled at the thought, suddenly serene at the idea of it. He leaned against the door that would only stay locked so long as the generator in this shit show could provide power to his office; the pounding in his heart matched banging fists on a metal door. Those monsters trying to claw their way in, to get to him.

It would be the easiest thing in the world to not fight back, and so Darcy dropped his bat, because he had always had no problem taking the easy way out of things. He didn’t have to do anything at all, actually, just exhaust what power was left until everything went dark. Darcy reached for the mechanism that controlled the cameras, flicking them on, wincing only slightly when he was greeted with those things outside his door.

Maybe he ought to take them out with him, but that didn’t seem fair. There was a desperation about them that Darcy didn’t think he had ever felt a day in his life, let them live, he swallowed sharply. It couldn’t be long now and true to that thought Darcy was shrouded in darkness as the generator huffed one final breath then gave him. It was the kind of darkness that he almost felt comfortable in, the kind where no one but the bad things inside could see what he truly was. The only difference this time was that the bad things outside could see him too.

A chill crept down his shirt, scratching over his spine. Mechanical, almost rhythmic, panting could be felt behind him. Darcy shuddered, closing his eyes tight, he was ready for this but not that thrilled to find out what those things in the suits did to you when you stopped fighting.

Darcy wondered, with a bittersweet devisiveness, if he should be looking back on the moments of his life that had come to this — he wondered if he would end up where Autumn was. Or if he would end up anywhere at all.

If it even mattered.

…

After that beat of nothingness had gone on for too long (was he being toyed with?) Darcy forced himself to look through one eye. It was bright, unbearably so. “What -” He blinked both of his eyes open only to find none other than day-shift Dave staring back at him with an expression that was as perplexed as it was not surprised.

“Dude,” he breathed out with a laugh. “If you’re gonna get high on your shift can you turn the generator off first? You let it die completely.” Darcy stared at him blankly, not impressed with God’s newfound sense of humor. “Seriously, though, it’s 6:05am! Get out of here, man.” Dave slapped Darcy’s shoulder and shook his head in amusement.

As Darcy shuffled miserably out of the building he could have sworn he heard one of the animatronics giggling to another.

Acceptance

Scorched Earth Policy.

They had learned about it in World History II. At least that was what Darcy thought, but World History II had taken place during the semester that Autumn had started sitting next to him and counting the inches of skin between her socks and the hem of her sundress had always seemed more important. She thought he didn’t care about that sort of thing, and while there was so much had gone unnoticed by him, that information remained burned in his mind all the same.

He laughed aloud, to himself and the night, a little sad but mostly at peace that it would all be put to rest soon.

Autumn had never belonged to him, not really, and he certainly had never let himself belong to her. Not the way it mattered, but Darcy’s fingertips had once trespassed the inches of skin between Autumn’s socks and the hem of her sundress and that had to count for something.

He couldn’t take those moments away, at least, they would have to be pried from Darcy’s dead hands.

Fingers fumbled around the Zippo stuffed carelessly in his pocket, there as an afterthought. These grounds felt hallowed now, sacred dirt crumbling under his sneakers, on any other night Darcy might have felt tempted to lie down with the secrets and remains Crystal Cove kept buried here. Not tonight though, he thought, uncharacteristically determined to see his plans though.

There wouldn’t be another night, however, because Darcy had come to set fire to it all in one final act of retaliation. Burn down everything that was left before God could take that from him too.

They all belonged to each other now, and it was time for them to say goodbye.

#☾ *・ﾟ writing — ↳ waging my wars behind my face and above my throat

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