#hot potato topic... | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

togrowoldinv · 7 months ago

Text

Red Hot Halloween

Firefighter!Natasha Romanoff x Female Reader

When Halloween comes, you dress up for Natasha

Warnings: Smut! 18+ please! Kissing, cursing, oral (N and R receiving), the heat that always comes with firefighter Nat

Note: Welcome to the triumphant return of firefighter Natasha! I have dearly missed writing for her. Enjoy this and check out other firefighter Nat installments here!

“So..” you begin, glancing over at your girlfriend to see if she is listening.

“Are you about to ask me to do something I don’t want to do?” Natasha asks.

“I’m actually not sure,” you reply.

Natasha sits upright on the couch and pauses the show you were watching together. You’ve been dating for almost a year now. It's been pure bliss with the woman you love.

“What’s up, sweetheart?” She asks softly. Any annoyed, even fake annoyed, tone from earlier is gone.

She takes your face in her hand softly. You hold her wrist, careful to avoid the small burn she got on her wrist from work.

“Well, Halloween is coming up,” you say. She nods along. “And I was thinking about what to dress up as.”

“Okay.”

“And I thought, well, maybe I’d wear something for you.”

Her brow raises. “For me?”

“Well, yeah. I assumed we would be staying in anyways, so I might as well wear something you’ll enjoy.”

“We don’t have to stay in,” Nat says. “I think Danvers is having a party that we could go to.”

“Yeah? That might be fun,” you say. Nat smiles.

“What is it that you wanted to ask me that you’re so nervous about?” She circles back to the topic at hand. But her phone rings and she is called into work. “I’m sorry, babe. I’ll call you later?”

“Sure,” you say.

You let her kiss you deeply before she grabs her stuff and leaves in a flash. After a couple of hours, you decide to take her dinner at the firehouse. When you arrive, Peter is manning the front desk.

“Y/n! Good to see you!” He says. “Nat isn’t back yet, but a few of the others are around.”

“Thanks, Pete. How are things?”

“Pretty good. Me and MJ are doing well,” he says, not able to hold back a grin.

“I love that for you,” you say sincerely. You see Carol walking down the hall and excuse yourself to talk to her. “I’ll say bye before I leave.”

“You better!” Peter calls after you.

Carol hears the end of yours and Peter’s exchange and turns around to meet you.

“Hey y/n,” she says. Her coolness oozes off her easily. You wonder if she ever gets frazzled. “Natasha isn’t back yet.”

“So I’ve heard, but I’m actually here to talk to you.”

“Oh? Come into my office then.”

You follow her to the small, but comfortable office. She leans against her desk with her arms crossed. You suddenly feel silly for what you’re about to ask her.

“What’s up?” She asks. “You look nervous.”

“I am a little,” you reply. “Because I’m about to ask you something that is probably incredibly stupid.”

“I doubt that, but try me,” Carol says.

“Halloween is next week,” you begin. “And I was thinking about what to dress up as for Natasha.”

Carol's eyes narrow. She is wondering where you’re going with this.

“I thought, maybe, that I could be a firefighter for her,” you spill the words out quickly.

“A firefighter,” Carol repeats. You fear she will make fun of the idea, but she smirks. “Nat would be into that. Especially if you wore her gear.”

“You think so?”

“Yeah, why are you so nervous about that?” Carol asks. She moves to sit in her desk chair.

“Well, I don’t know. I really love her, and I don’t want that to change.”

“Oh, y/n, Natasha is hopelessly in love with you. You could wear a potato sack and she’d be on her knees for you,” Carol jokes, but you know it’s true. “So, you want me to get you some gear?”

“If you could. I was going to ask her, but-”

“No, you should surprise her with this. Are you coming to my party?”

“I think so.”

“Good. Let’s get you that gear before Nat gets back.”

Before you know it, it’s Halloween night. Natasha has been working all day, so she tells you she will meet you at Carol’s place. You put on her gear, including a jacket with Romanoff written on the back. You really hope she will like your costume.

You're taking a last look at yourself in your car when Natasha knocks on your window.

“Shit, you scared me!” You say as you open the door.

“What are you wearing?” Natasha asks as you get out of the car.

You smile shyly as she takes you in. “I figured I’d be my favorite hero.”

“Wow,” Nat replies. “This is...”

“Silly?”

“Amazing.”

“Really?”

“Fuck yes,” Natasha says. You can’t help but laugh.

She moves closer to you and pins you against the door of your car.

“The only thing better than seeing you in this will be taking it all off of you later,” Natasha says. She kisses you hard until you can hardly breathe, letting her hands roam all over your body. “Let’s go inside.”

You turn to lock your door and Nat realizes it’s not only gear but it’s her gear.

“Y/n Romanoff, it does have a good ring to it,” Natasha says.

You blush and take Nat’s hand. Walking into the party, you definitely turn some heads. Valkryie’s jaw is practically on the ground at the sight of you and Steve gives you a shy thumbs up.

“I’ll get us a drink,” Natasha says. She moves toward the kitchen and you find Carol in the living room.

“Well, you pull off the gear well,” Carol says. She pulls you into a hug. She is definitely more affectionate with some alcohol in her.

“Thank you for your help with it.”

“Anytime,” she replies.

Just then a tall, gorgeous woman walks up to her. She wraps an arm around Carol’s waist and you see the blush spreading across her cheeks. So that’s proof Carol gets flustered.

“Hey, I'm Maria,” the woman introduces herself to you.

“Y/n,” you reply.

“And I’m Natasha,” your favorite person shows back up beside you. “You must be Carol’s girlfriend.”

“What do you think, Danvers? Am I your girlfriend?” Maria asks. Carol grins.

“Definitely,” Carol says practically with cartoon hearts floating around her head.

You and Nat smile at the sight before being pulled away by more friends. After a few hours and a few drinks, Natasha pulls you aside from the group to the guest bedroom.

“Should we be in here?” You ask.

“Do you think Carol isn’t in her bedroom with Maria? It’s fine, y/n.”

You nod and let Nat pull you further into the room to sit on the bed together. You'd go anywhere with her.

“This really was a wonderful surprise,” she says. “I love you.”

“I love you too, Natasha,” you reply. “I wasn’t sure I could pull this off.”

“You definitely pull it off, baby.” She stands and you spread your legs for her to stand between them. “And I want all of this off.”

Her hands move slowly across the material of the jacket to slip it off your shoulders. She leaves the suspenders on as she lifts the classic tank top she always wears over your head.

“Beautiful,” she mumbles as she sees your bare chest with only the suspenders covering inches of your skin. She leans down and kisses you hungrily.

“Natasha, I need you.”

“I know, baby,” she whispers against your lips.

She takes her time kissing down your chest and letting her lips land just above the waistline of your pants. Her pants, actually. Your hips move involuntarily as she undoes the pants and pulls them down your legs along with your underwear.

“All for me, hmm.”

“All for you, Natasha.”

Natasha smirks deviously before licking a long stripe against your folds. You shake under her touch. Her hands grip the backs of your thighs tightly as she continues to lick against you. She finds your clit with natural practice and you’re a goner.

It doesn’t take long at all for you to fall apart under her tongue. She knows you and your body so well.

“God, Natasha,” you mumble as you come hard for her.

“So perfect for me,” she says.

You pull at her shoulders and she gets the message to stand up. Sinking to the floor, you unzip her pants and pull them down her legs. Nat moves closer and positions herself right on your mouth.

“Fuck, y/n, I want to ride your face,” Natasha says.

“Please,” you whimper.

Your bodies collide and you lick and suck at her as she moves her hips rapidly. She pulls at the back of your hair. The room is filled with moans of pleasure from both of you.

“I’m close,” Natasha says.

“Come for me, Natasha,” you say against her.

That’s all it takes for her to fall apart. You bring her down from her high and she sits on the floor with you.

“You should dress up like this more often,” Nat jokes.

You chuckle. “Happy Halloween, baby.”

“Happy Halloween, sweetheart,” Natasha replies.

#natasha romanoff x reader #natasha romanoff #soft natasha romanoff #natasha romanoff fluff #natasha romanoff comfort #Natasha romanoff smut #firefighter!natasha #Burning red au

446 notes · View notes

tiannasfanfic · 19 days ago

Text

Busker

Astarion x Reader (Fluff)

| Astarion Masterlist | AO3 Link |

Summary: When the party discovers they don’t have enough gold to rent the room at the Elfsong Tavern, you come through for your friends by channeling your Bardic talents into an unforgettable performance.

Rating: General Audiences

Author Note: Gender neutral Reader/Tav, they/them pronouns (if any). No physical description given of Reader, race neutral and body type neutral. Reader wears a Bard’s outfit, but no description is given of the outfit, just a mention of what the outfit consists of (blazer, shirt, trousers, boots).

CW: None.

Word Count: 3,916

“We’ve only been in Baldur’s Gate for five minutes, how are we already out of gold???”

That was a little bit of an exaggeration on your part. It had been a couple hours since you all had passed through the archway into Baulder’s Gate proper, but your companions understood the sentiment.

Despite the exasperated look on your face, the question was mostly rhetorical. Everyone knew why the gold reserves had dwindled so quickly. It was due to a combination of upgrading equipment and restocking camp supplies. Both of these had been desperately needed as battles had gotten increasingly difficult as you made your way to the city and Gale could only make potato’s so many ways before you were all sick of them.

Which was saying a lot since you all normally loved potatoes.

But the idea of a balanced meal wasn’t that comforting when you’d finally found an inn that not only could accommodate you all, but could also accommodate you all for as long as you needed for a single flat fee when you discovered you couldn’t even afford that.

Everyone was looking forward to being out of the elements, to sleeping in real beds again and to having access to a hot bath. Eating potatoes for a few more days would’ve been a small price to pay for those luxuries.

“I could part with some of my books,” Gale said, hesitation in his voice. “Sorcerous Sundries pays well for magical tomes. A few of my rarer ones should be able to get us the room.”

“Absolutely not,” Karlach said, shaking her head. “You’ve worked your ass off on that collection.” Gale looked visibly relieved. “Ya know, back before I started working for Gortash, I used to fight at the arena. It was always a good way to make some quick coin.”

“No,” you said, sighing. “Your heart could go out at any moment. We’re better off with you saving your strength for the fighting we still have ahead of us.”

Karlach thought about this then nodded with a sigh.

“Good point, Solder,” she said, looking visibly disappointed.

“Perhaps I could -“ Astarion started saying as he wiggled the fingers of one hand in the air.

“No!” everyone said at the same time, shooting him looks of disapproval.

Astarion scoffed, crossing his arms over his chest and glaring at them.

“You don’t even know what I was about to suggest!” he said, an indignant tone in his voice.

“You’re not picking pockets again,” Wyll said, also crossing his arms over his chest and glaring right back at him.

“Tchk, you think we forgot what happened the last time?” Lae’zel scoffed.

Astarion threw his arms up in exasperation.

“That was not my fault!” he exclaimed. “How was I supposed to know that guard was going to round the corner right as I was lifting a wallet?”

“Regardless, we lost more gold bribing the guard to keep you out of jail than we would’ve gained from the theft,” Jaheira said.

“And you shouldn’t have wasted the gold!” Astarion protested loudly. “Honestly, I could’ve broken myself out!”

The argument quickly grew heated, as it always did whenever this topic got mentioned, so much so that no one noticed when you slipped away from the group and to your tent.

However, they did notice when you strode past them towards the road that lead back into Rivington. It would’ve been hard not to notice you since you were now decked out in your most colorful Bard finery and stuck out like a sore thumb.

“Darling, where are you off to?” Astarion called towards your retreating back.

“To make us some money!” you called back over your shoulder, not breaking your stride.

The companions all looked at each other incredulously, shrugged at each other and began following you, the argument forgotten for the time being.

By the time you stopped at a particularly busy corner near the Circus of Last days, Karlach had put two and two together and was nearly buzzing with excitement.

“Are we finally getting to hear you play?” Karlach asked as you rummaged in your pack.

“Looks like it,” you said, pulling a tin cup from the bag and depositing it on the ground in front of you.

The Tiefling squeed in excitement and clapped her hands.

Outside of combat, the only times they’d ever heard you play was while tuning your lyre, which didn’t really amount to much, just some casual strumming. Whenever they asked if you’d treat them to a song, you always declined, saying you weren’t particularly inspired for real music at that moment.

But, like most people, you were highly motivated by small luxuries and, when faced with the choice of sleeping outside versus in a nice room, you had found a burst of inspiration.

Once you’d gotten yourself situated, you made shooing motions with your hands to your companions. The party retreated a short distance away to a short wall where they could relax and watch the show.

If you were nervous, there was no indication on your face. Astarion watched as you readied your lyre, closed your eyes, took a couple of deep breaths to center yourself and then strummed your fingers over the chords of the instrument.

But rather than a beautiful melody, the most god awful sound he’d ever heard was produced. Everyone within earshot cringed and a few people passing by stopped to stare.

Your eyes flew open and you glared down at the lyre.

“Now now, we talked about this,” you said to it.

You flashed an apologetic smile to the people nearby who had stopped, then turn back to the lyre with a serious look on your face.

With fluid motions, your fingers glided between the tuning pins and the strings, getting the sound in order. More people had stopped to watch, looks of apprehension on some of their faces. Bards in Baldur’s Gate were a gold a dozen and were either fantastically amazing or astonishingly terrible. There was no in between. But even the terrible ones were usually somewhat entertaining and, with the threat of an invasion looming, people seemed to welcome this brief distraction, even if it cost them their eardrums.

Once the tuning was complete, you smiled triumphantly to the gathering crowd, raised your arm theatrically and then strummed the strings with a flourish.

But all was still not well with the instrument. While some of the strings elicited a beautiful melody, the others sounded somewhere between nails on a blackboard and a dying cow.

The small crowd gasped, a few people made curses of shock. Some covered their ears, including Karlach.

A look of horror came over your face at the sound, which you quickly turned into another apologetic smile for the crowd before turning to your instrument with an almost comical glare.

Astarion narrowed his eyes at you. The lyre shouldn’t have still been out of tune. You had adjusted every pin, plucked every string one by on. It’d taken you a bit longer than it would’ve at camp, he’d watched you do it many times, but the result was the same. It sounded perfect even to his ears and he knew instruments just don’t go out of tune on their own. He leaned forward where he sat, watching your hands carefully as you began tuning it again.

As your fingers began to make adjustments to the pins, he was able to catch onto what was happening. While you turned one pin to tune its corresponding string, you managed to knock the next pin out of tune with your pinky and ring finger. At first, he thought it might be an accident, but then it happened two more times and he began to suspect it was on purpose. You did have some skill in Sleight of Hand, though you rarely used it.

His suspicions were confirmed when you turned back to the crowd with a triumphant look on your face, once again raised your hand with a flourish and confidently rang your fingers over the strings.

This time, the lyre made a sound reminiscent of metal grinding on metal, making your entire body stiffen up in a cringe and illiciting cries of pain from the growing crowd. Some shook their heads as if to clear them, while others stuck a finger in one ear as if working something out, and the kids all covered their ears. Everyone in the crowd had an expression of regret on their faces, ruing the fact that they’d stopped. Yet, none of them left, curiosity now winning out over self preservation.

“I guess we can look forward to another night sleeping in the dirt,” Shadowheart said with a deep sigh.

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Astarion said, still watching you closely.

The others all looked at him quizzically and he tilted his head towards you, indicating they should keep watching.

Once again, you hit the crowd with an apologetic smile and laughed nervously, but Astarion could see now how exaggerated it was.

“My apologies everyone,” you said, your voice ringing out loud and clear to the gathered people, then slightly shook your instrument. “Thing’s got a mind of its own sometimes.”

Then you turned towards the lyre with a glare and then pointed an admonishing finger at it.

“Behave,” you said to it, a tone of warning in your voice, earning a few weary chuckles from the crowd.

Once again, you began to tune the instrument, this time turning the pins but not plucking the strings to test them. Your fingers darted back and forth along the pins, working out of sequence but adjusting each one to a slight degree. Once that was done, you flashed a nervous smile to the crowd, then readied yourself to play.

Just as you were about to start playing, your fingers mere inches from the strings, you froze in place, glanced at the audience, then made two more adjustments to pins.

You stood there for a moment afterwards, looking at your lyre with a worried expression, then turned another of the pins, but then you shook your head rapidly, as if in disagreement with yourself, and turned the same pin back to its original position.

After a couple of more worried looks towards the audience and a couple more pin adjustments, you gave a small nod of satisfaction. With one last nervous smile to the crowd, you took up a playing stance that looked more like you were bracing yourself for an explosion rather than playing a lyre, which earned a few apprehensive chuckles from the crowd. You took a few deep breaths, crossed the air with your free hand as you offered up a prayer to the gods, closed your eyes in a tight squint and cringed as you began to play.

This time, instead of some god awful noise no one knew a lyre was capable of producing, a beautiful melody floated off of the strings. Everyone recognized the opening tones of “The Queen’s High Seas” and Astarion could see the crowd visibly relax.

As the temperature of the crowd changed, you opened one eye to look down at your lyre and watched yourself playing for a second before looking up at the crowd in shock. You shook your head as if to clear it and a bright confident smile overtook your face as your posture relaxed. The crowd, now having caught onto your game, laughed appreciatively and a few people clapped.

“Well I’ll be,” Gale said, laughing and clapping his hands along with the crowd. “We might just get that room after all.”

Astarion couldn’t help but chuckle himself. You’d had played the crowd just as skillfully as you were now playing the lyre.

Once the first song was over, you easily transitioned into the more lively tune of “The Bard’s Dance.” Now that you were playing something more upbeat, your swaying turned into dancing and soon your audience was clapping along with the rhythm.

After two more songs, the impromptu performance was broken up by the city guards. There wasn’t anything in the laws of Rivington that prohibited busking, but the crowd had grown large enough it was spilling out into the street and blocking traffic.

You took your bows as the crowd began to disperse, dropping gold coins into the tin cup as they left.

The companions made their way back over to you as you were counting your earnings.

“That was incredible!” Karlach exclaimed, clapping you on the back and nearly knocking you over. “You’re really good, Solider!”

“Indeed!” Wyll said, beaming at you. “That was as fine as any performance I’ve ever seen!”

“With talent like that I’m surprised you don’t play more often,” Shadowheart said.

“I reserve it for special occasions,” you said with a shrug, then shook your coin purse. “Good news though. We’re a quarter of the way there. Shouldn’t take much longer and the room will be ours.”

That news brightened everyone’s spirits considerably.

A few hours, and a few street corners, later, you were all sitting round a table in the tavern at the Elfsong. Not only had you made enough gold to pay for the room upstairs but also a veritable feast for the party and several rounds of drinks. Since no one could decide what they wanted, the wooden surface was laden down with one of everything that was on the menu.

While Astarion didn’t partake in the food portion of the evening, he could tell it was good by how none of you really spoke as you dug in. There was the occasional yummy sound or one of you would tell the others to try a particular dish, but apart from that, talking was kept to a minimum.

As everyone’s bellies began filling up, regular conversation resumed and soon turned towards planning the next steps of their journey. Now that you all had made it Baldur’s Gate, it was time to decide where to go from here. Since the day had waned into the evening, everyone agreed to an early night and to set out for Sorcerous Sundries in the morning.

But planning an early night and actually getting an early night were two completely different things. Once the tavern bard took to the stage and the drinks continued to flow, this plan was quickly forgotten. Several hours passed in the blink of an eye.

As the bard was leaving the stage for a break after his second set, Astarion realized you’d been quiet for a bit and turned towards you only to find your chair empty. That took him a bit by surprise. It wasn’t like you to slip off without saying anything. Concerned, he excused himself from the table and went looking for you. It took a few minutes, but he finally located you when he checked the room upstairs. You were face down on your claimed bed, arms down by your sides with your still booted feet hanging off the edge.

“Darling, are you alright?” he said, voice laden with concern as he came over to sit next to you.

“Mmhmm,” came your response, muffled by the pillow you had your face in.

“Are you sure?” he said, placing one hand on your back to start rubbing it in a circular motion.

“Yeah, I am,” you said, and then moved your arms under your body so you could prop yourself up on your elbows and look at him. “I just always forget how exhausting performing is.”

Now that your face was visible, it was very apparent how tired you were. You looked even more worn down than you had after fighting through Moonrise Towers with the Harpers, which was surprising considering how prolonged that battle had been.

Having never been a stage performer himself, Astarion couldn’t relate to your current predicament, but he tried his best to be understanding.

“With all that dancing it’s no wonder,” he said, a soothing tone in his voice as he continued to rub your back. “I’d be more surprised if you weren’t tired.”

“It wasn’t just the dancing,” you said, moving your arms so they were folded on top of your pillow and then laid your head down on them. “Engaging with the crowd, keeping the energy going to keep their attention, making eye contact, talking with people at the end…I’m just as drained mentally as I am physically.”

Now that was something Astarion could understand. Back when he was still under Cazador’s thumb, he had to work the parties that regularly got thrown at the estates. Mingling with the nobles, engaging with guests, working with the servants to fix any problems that arose so the night would go off without a hitch…it was all incredibly exhausting.

“Is that why you don’t play at camp?” he asked.

You nodded.

“Yeah,” you replied. “Once I get started, I can’t help but go into a full performance like that, even for a small audience. It’s against my nature as a performer to do anything simple.”

Astarion couldn’t help but chuckle. He could see that considering how theatrical you get when casting spells during combat.

“Would you like for me to get a bath ready for you?” he asked, now running his hand up and down your back.

You thought about it for a moment then shook your head.

“I’m too tired for that,” you said, your eyes closing. “Could you keep rubbing my back though? It feels really nice.”

“Of course,” he said.

It didn’t take long before your breathing began to take on a slower rhythm indicating you’d soon be asleep. Astarion took a hold of your shoulder and gently shook you.

“Can you roll over for me, darling?” he asked, his tone soft and gentle. “Let’s get you more comfortable.”

You grumbled, but did as he asked, turning over to lay on your back, eyes still closed. Now that he had better access, he rose from the bed and started taking your boots off. Once that was done, he helped you sit up to remove your blazer.

“Do you want to change into your night clothes?”

You shook your head again, so Astarion unbuttoned the collar and cuffs of your shirt, as well as the first few buttons down the front, and helped you untuck it from your trousers. While it wasn’t as loose as the shirt you normally slept in, that gave you more room to move around.

Once he’d helped you squirm under the covers, you immediately curled up underneath them into your normal sleeping position. He sat back down then, leaning over to kiss you on the forehead.

“Stay with me for a bit?” you asked, your voice quiet and on the verge of sleep.

While he knew how you felt about him and you never made any secret about how much you cared, sometimes he had his doubts. It was hard to believe sometimes that he could be so lucky. But in moments like these, moments when your thoughts slipped out as you teetered on the verge of wakefulness and sleep, his inner doubts quieted. It made him feel what he could only assume was the feeling of butterflies.

“Of course, my love,” he said, his voice soft as to not disturb your relaxation.

While he wasn’t quite tired enough to go to sleep himself, he wasn’t about to pass up the opportunity to hold you while you slept. It had become one of his favorite things.

Forgoing his normal sleeping clothes in order to quickly lay down with you, he made himself more comfortable in much the same way he had helped you. His boots were removed, the collar and cuffs of his shirt unbuttoned, and he untucked his shirt from his pants.

As he climbed under the covers, he noticed you were fighting to keep your eyes open to wait on him. Once he was situated, you scooted over to curl up against him, resting your head on his chest as he wrapped his arms around you.

“Goodnight, my love,” he said softly, kissing the top of your head.

You muttered something that sounded like goodnight and it wasn’t long after that you fell asleep.

As the sound of your breathing slowed into the low rhythm of sleep, Astarion couldn’t help but think of the future. Now that you all had reached Baldur’s Gate, he imagined things would begin to escalate quickly, but there was still so much to do. There were quite a few people the party needed to meet up with, you had a lead on where to find Shadowheart’s parents, plus your new friend at the circus had asked you to find Dribbles the Clown. Or, rather, what was left of him, at any rate. And then there was the small matter of killing Cazador.

Astarion’s arms unconsciously tightened around you as his thoughts turned towards his former master.

Despite all of the confidence and bravado he displayed whenever he talked to you about it, the prospect of returning to the Crimson Palace unsettled him. He was terrified, but he knew if you knew that you’d try to talk him out of going, to let you and the others handle it while he stayed behind at camp. You’d already floated the idea to him once, but there was absolutely no way he was going to miss out on Cazador’s bloody and, hopefully agonizingly painful, last moments. After two hundred years of torture, he’d more than earned that right.

And then there was the matter of the Rite of Profane Ascension. Was he really going to take Cazador’s place and ascend in his stead?

He still had no idea. Despite the determination he showed you whenever the topic came up, he was deeply unsure if it was the right thing to do. He didn’t want to lose what little humanity he had left, become a hard and cruel monster as his master was. But what choice did he have if he wanted to keep you safe, to keep himself safe? Once the tadpoles were gone, he’d be nocturnal once again, relegated back to the shadows and unable to protect you in the daytime hours. He shuddered at the thought of something happening to you just because he couldn’t go outside half the time.

All of these thoughts combined into a loop of despair in his mind, only broken when the sound of your drunken companions finally coming upstairs to retire for the night. The noise startled him from his thoughts, and you stirred in his arms.

While you didn’t fully wake from your slumber, your sleep was disturbed just enough that you moved around into a different position. You turned onto you other side within the circle of his arms, facing away from him. Astarion moved his body with yours, turning with you so he was curled up behind you, the front of his body pressed against the back of yours. In this new position, he was able to bury his face against the side of your neck and breathe in your scent. Your smell was comforting to him and felt himself relax.

Now that the spiral of his thoughts were broken, he took this as a sign to stop thinking for the night get some rest. It took a little while, but between the lullaby of your soft snores and the steady beat of your heart, his worries about the coming days fades and he eventually drifted off into a meditative state.

#Astarion #astarion x you #astarion x tav #astarion x reader #astarion fluff #astarion fanfiction #astarion imagine #astarion oneshot #astarion headcanons #astarion romance #bard tav #bg3 fanfiction #bg3 x reader #baldur’s gate 3 x reader

132 notes · View notes

aesethewitch · 1 year ago

Text

Learning to Cook Like a Witch: Using the Scraps

Cooking can create a lot of waste. From peels and rinds to bones and leaves, people throw away quite a lot of scraps in the kitchen. And witches, as you may know, are experts in the art of the cunning use of whatever we’ve got around.

As a witch who spends a lot of time in the kitchen, I’ve had ample opportunities to get creative in my cooking craft. It helps that I grew up in a household defined by scarcity: not our own, by the time I was conscious enough to remember, but my parents’ poverty. It colored the way I learned to cook, using everything I possibly could, making enough to last, preserving what I didn’t immediately use, and creatively reusing leftovers and scraps.

There are some topics I won’t necessarily cover here. Composting is an option, but there are some bits of food scrap that don’t need to be composted — they can be saved and repurposed for all sorts of things, magic and mundane. Likewise, recycling, buying sustainably, and growing your own food when you can are all great options for reducing household waste in the kitchen.

For the purposes of this post, I want to focus specifically on food scraps. This is an organized list of kitchen scraps that I’ve used in a variety of other dishes and projects. I’m focusing primarily on food waste, not so much on packaging (such as reusing egg cartons, milk containers, boxes, and so forth).

Vegetable Scraps

Freeze leftover vegetable scraps to make stock. This is a fairly common bit of advice — save bits of leftover vegetables to make a vegetable stock or another kind of stock. It’s good advice! I keep a bag in my freezer that I put vegetable scraps in to save until I’m ready to make a new batch of stock. Not all veggies should be saved like this and used for stock! Some make stock bitter or otherwise unpleasant-tasting. Personally, I tend to freeze these for stock:

- The skins, ends, and leftover cuts of onions (just be wary of the skins; too much will make your broth bitter) - The ends of celery (not the leaves — they’re bitter!) - Corn cobs - Garlic skins, ends, tiny cloves that aren’t useful otherwise, and sprouted cloves - The ends of carrots (also not the leaves) - The ends of leeks - Pepper tops/bottoms (not the seeds)

I would recommend against putting things like potatoes, brussels sprouts, cabbage, and leafy greens in there. Potatoes don’t add flavor, sprouts and cabbage make the whole thing taste like those foods, and leafy greens end up bitter. If something has a strong, distinctive flavor (beets, sprouts), I wouldn’t add it to my freezer bag. These scraps often form the veggie portion of my Sick-Be-Gone Chicken Broth spell recipe!

Regrow leeks, green onions, and celery. Pop these in a bit of water and watch them grow back! It’s a fun experiment, and you’ll never have to buy them again.

Plant sprouted garlic. Aside from the fact that you can still cook and eat garlic that’s sprouted, you can plant a sprouted clove in a pot. Care for it well enough, and you’ll end up with a full head of garlic from that one clove!

Fry potato peels. Anytime I make mashed potatoes or peel potatoes for something, I always save the peels. Give them a thorough rinse and shallow-fry them in oil, turning them over until they’re golden and crispy. Toss them in a bit of salt and pepper while they’re still hot, and you’ve got tasty chips to snack on while you cook the rest of your meal! No need to cover them in more oil or anything — the heat will cause the salt to stick right to them.

Save leaves for pesto. Yum, yum, yum. Pesto isn’t just all about basil, you know. Save the leaves from carrots, beets, radishes, and even celery to grind up alongside basil, garlic, salt, and lemon juice for a delicious pesto recipe.

Fruit Scraps

Save citrus peels. Peels from oranges, lemons, grapefruits, and other citrus fruits have a multitude of uses. Candy them for a sweet treat, dry them to add to potpourri or incense, or save them to put into a simmer pot for bright, sunny energy.

Juice the whole fruit. Again, thinking mostly about citrus fruits, when you need the zest from something but not the rest, don’t just throw away the fruit. Squeeze out all the juice you can. Even if you don’t need it right now, you can freeze it to use later in simmer pots, fruity waters, or anything else that needs a touch of juice.

Turn extra fruit and berries into jam or syrup. If you’ve got berries and fruit that are about to go off, or maybe the ends of strawberries, don’t toss them! Look up recipes for jam of the specific fruit you’ve got or make an infused syrup. Syrups in particular can be used for cocktails, teas, and desserts for an extra magical kick.

Pickle watermelon rinds. That’s right. Pickle those suckers. They’re so tasty. I’ve seen people make kimchi with watermelon rinds, too, though I’ve never tried it myself!

Save seeds for abundance work. Seeds in general are great for spells geared toward long-term success, new beginnings, and — when there are a lot of them — wealth. Different fruit seeds have properties that tend to correspond with the fruit they come from, so consider their potential purposes before you just toss them! (Note also that some fruit seeds are toxic; these would be suitable for baneful workings.)

Keep cherry stems for love magic. Have you ever done that thing where you tie a cherry stem with your tongue? If I’m eating cherries, I like to save some of the stems for love workings. Tie them into little knots like you might with string while envisioning ensnaring the love you’re looking for. I wouldn’t do this with a particular person in mind; binding someone to you is almost never a good idea. I’ve used it to attract specific qualities in a person of romantic interest: attentiveness, humor, kindness, and so forth.

Use pits to represent blockages, barriers, and problems. I most often use them in baneful workings, typically jammed into a poppet’s mouth or throat to keep someone from talking shit. It could also represent a sense of dread in that way — a pit in the stomach, uneasy and nauseating. But you could also use them in the sense of removal, ritualistically removing the pit or problem from a given situation.

Herb Scraps

Freeze or dry extra fresh herbs. Different drying techniques are ideal for specific herbs. I’d suggest looking up recommended methods before sticking anything in the microwave. If you’d like to freeze your herbs instead, I typically will lay them on a damp paper towel, wrap them up, place them into a freezer-safe bag, and then put them in the freezer. Most herbs will keep for a couple months this way. When you want to use them, pull them out and let them defrost right on the counter.

Make pesto. Again, pesto isn’t just basil! Experiment with tossing in different scraps of herbs to find out what combination you like best.

Reuse steeped tea. Particularly when I use loose herbal tea, I like to lay out the used tea to dry out. It can be burned similarly to loose incense, though the scent may be somewhat weaker than with herbs that are fresher or unused. I find that it’s fine, since I’m sensitive to smells anyways.

Toss extra herbs into your stock freezer bag. Just like with vegetables, extra herbs make welcome additions to a scrap stock pot. I always make a point to save sage, thyme, marjoram, and ginger. You can add just about anything to a stock pot, but be aware of the flavors you’re adding. Not all herbs will match with all dishes.

Protein Scraps

Dry and crush empty egg shells. This is one most witches will know! I use crushed egg shells for protection magic most often: sprinkled at a doorstep mixed with other herbs, added to jars, and spread around spell candles.

Save shrimp, crab, and lobster shells. They’re a goldmine of flavor. Toss them into water with veggies and herbs, and you’ve got a delicious, easy shellfish stock. Use it to make fishy soups and chowders that much richer.

Don’t discard roasted chicken remains. Use them for stock, just like the shells. I like to get rotisserie chickens on occasion since they’re ready-made and very tasty. Once all the meat has been stripped off the bones, simmer the entire carcass with — you guessed it — veggies and herbs for a tasty chicken stock.

Reuse bacon grease for frying. After cooking bacon, don’t throw away the grease right away. Melt it over low heat, strain the bits of bacon out, and pour it into a jar to put in the fridge. You can use it to fry all sorts of things, but my favorite thing is brussels sprouts. They pick up the delicious, salty, bacony flavor from all that rendered bacon fat. So good.

Other Scraps

Use stale bread for croutons or bread crumbs. When I reach the stale end of a loaf of bread, as long as it isn’t moldy, I like to tear it into pieces and toss it into the oven for a little while. Let it cool and then pulse it in a food processor, and I’ve got delicious bread crumbs! Or, cut it a little more neatly, toss it in oil and seasonings, and then bake, and now I’ve got homemade croutons for salads. You can really hone your herbs for both of these, tuning them to be perfect for whatever spell needs you have.

Small amounts of leftover sugar. I don’t know why, but I always end up with a tiny amount of white and brown sugar in the containers. This can be used in teas, of course, but I like to offer it up to spirits. In particular, my ancestors tend to appreciate a spoonful of brown sugar stirred into a small, warmed cup of milk. You can also look up mug cake or single-serving cookie recipes; often, they’re cooked in the microwave, and they only need a little sugar to make!

Keep vanilla bean pods. Vanilla is fucking expensive. When I have a little extra and want to really splurge for a special occasion, I’ll get a couple pods. And because they’re so expensive, I hate wasting any part of them. They’re good for love magic, sure, but you can also toss the spent pods in a jar full of sugar to make vanilla-infused sugar. I’ll often use the pods to make infused milks, too; warm the milk over low heat, add the pods, and let it steep like tea. It goes great in teas and desserts. For a nice self-love spell, sometimes I’ll melt chocolate into the vanilla milk and make hot cocoa!

Save the rinds from Parmesan and Pecorino Romano cheese. You might not be able to just bite into these, but they’re fabulous additions to a stock pot. They add a rich, umami depth to the flavors. I also like to throw these into pots of tomato sauce to add even more flavor to the sauce.

Used coffee is still coffee. After I make a pot of coffee, I’ll sometimes save the grounds by letting them dry back out. I wouldn’t make another cup of coffee with them, since all the flavor’s gone, but they’ll still have attributes of energy generation and smell great. I like to pack used grounds into sachets to hang in places where I want to encourage more energy and focus, replaced every few days or so. Coffee grounds also have high amounts of nitrogen in them, which can help plants thrive; just be careful about pH values in the soil! You don’t want to hurt your plants with too much acidity.

Final Thoughts

I hope you found these tips helpful! There are a ton more ways to save and reuse kitchen scraps that would otherwise go to waste. Sometimes, tossing stuff into the compost or trash can’t be avoided. But I’ve found that being aware of the possibilities can help diminish the amount that gets wasted.

If you have questions or other suggestions for reusing kitchen scraps, feel free to drop them in my inbox, reblogs, or replies. And if you did enjoy this post, consider tossing a couple dollars in my tip jar! Supporters get early and sometimes exclusive access to my work, and monthly members get bonuses like commission discounts and extras. (:

#aese speaks #witchcraft #witchblr #kitchen witch #kitchen tips #food magic #hearth witch #kitchen magic #kitchen witchcraft #cooking tips #beginner witch #witchcraft 101 #witch community

673 notes · View notes

bluesidez · 1 year ago

Text

Firefighter!Miguel Part 2

content warning: the urge to use AAVE was slipping through the nerves of my fingers. I tried to hold off, so if you see something that looks grammatically different, then it’s probably AAVE that I couldn’t NOT add. this is all fluff too! there are also mentions of food, but that's a norm for these drabbles

word count: 2.2k, proofread! (I think there's no mistakes 😭)

Prev | Next ‧₊˚ ⋅ 𓐐𓎩 ‧₊˚ ⋅𓌉◯𓇋 Masterlist

“Eileen! Is that you?!”

You internally groaned as your grandma hopped out of the motorized shopping cart to greet yet another person.

The trip to the grocery store to buy ingredients turned into a meet & greet with the star being your grandmother knowing everyone in the town.

You felt loopy, going from almost burning down your house to contemplating whether or not the hot fire captain would prefer yams or potato salad. Maybe both?

You grumbled to yourself as you scanned the aisle for a specific brand of cookies for some banana pudding. If all else fails, this was a dessert you could make with no oven.

“And now we’re here, trying to find this child something to cook with,” you heard your grandma fuss out. Why did your business have to be the topic of the conversation?

You turned and walked the short distance to your grandma and another woman who was….her old coworker? Her church member? Or maybe they went to school together….

“Good morning Ms. Eileen,” you say, thankful that you caught her name. You couldn’t keep up with everyone like your grandma.

“Is this the baby?!” she says, shocked eyes going from you to your grandma and back to you.

Your grandma nodded, a smile growing on her face.

“Child, I haven’t seen you since you were this little!” she says, holding her hand about 2 feet off the ground. She turns back to your grandma, “This can’t be the baby!”

You stand there with your lips in a line as you wait for the realization that at least two decades have gone by since you’ve last seen her.

Or more like since she’s seen you. You’re still trying to gather who she is.

“Yeah, this is my grandchild! All grown up and now we’re trying to win over a husband,” your grandma says, shaking your arm.

You wanted a hole to swallow you up or possibly grow some wings so that you could take flight. Anything to get out of this conversation.

“A husband?!” Ms. Eileen smiles mischievously. “Who are you trying to marry?”

“Uh-”

“Honey, this child got the Fire Chief ringing my doorbell!”

“He’s actually the Fire Captain-” you mumble, trying to get your two cents in

Ms. Eileen holds your hands and starts doing an excited bounce as she vocalizes her excitement.

“I need to get right then if we’re fixin’ to have a wedding!” she said, gesturing to her hair as if to fix it.

“It’ll be soon! Just wait and see!” your grandma says, putting her hands back on the handlebars of the car. “Let us go on and buy the rest of this stuff. We’ve got a lot to do. It was good to talk with you!”

Your grandma starts to move forward, somewhat ignoring Ms. Eileen as she started to open her mouth again.

“Leave me some of that food ok?” she calls out.

“If there’s any left, I’ll let you know!” your grandma says as she turns down the aisle.

You chase after her, waving to Ms. Eileen as you leave.

“Who was she again?” you ask as you two go down a new aisle.

“Eileen Wilkins from the school.” So she was a coworker! “She still doesn’t know how to stop talking, though.”

Your laugh sneaks out of you as you watch your grandma stop at some seasonings.

“Why do you say that? You were keeping the conversation up.”

“I was just being nice! It was fine until she started bragging about that granddaughter of hers. That girl doesn’t know her left from her right. How she make it to nursing school?”

“Maybe she’s a hard worker!” you respond.

Your grandma snorts, “Yeah. Working hard at paying somebody else to do her work.”

You just shake your head at your grandma. What are you going to do with this woman?

“Will you call the number already?”

“I don’t really want to do that,” you say, tapping your foot against the ground.

This would be the fourth station within the area that you called with no record of a "Captain O'Hara." You were starting to believe that you and your grandma made him up. Just a small figment of both of your imaginations. What your grandma saw as a suitor and what you saw as a hot guy just trying to do his job.

"You need to want to call," your grandma, responds. "We didn't get all of this food made for nothing. And you're wearing my good necklace! He won't know what hit him when sees you."

You both decided on soul food. Tin pans full of food for the entire crew from greens to mac to fried catfish. Then, there was a hefty styrofoam takeout plate made especially for him. Your banana pudding for him in a tupperware container with Nilla wafers patterned along the side.

Not to mention, you spent an unhealthy amount of time deciding which scent you should wear.

You looked infinitely better than you did when he last saw you with ingredients dusting your front and smoke coming out of your windows.

Still, it would all be for nothing if you couldn’t find his station.

While yon were staring off, your grandma tapped your phone, impatience riddling her frame.

“Grandma!” you shout, holding your phone as if it were a game of hot potato.

“Just ask if he’s there!” your grandma says.

“That’s not how this works-”

“Station 29, this is Captain O’Hara speaking.”

“Hi! Hello,” you turn back to the phone in a rush, embarrassed that he might have heard you and your grandma. You introduce yourself properly this time, saying that you wanted to bring some dinner down to the crew.

You hear a noise of shock as he starts to speak again, “That would be amazing actually. The crew was just trying to decide what to eat. When can we expect you?”

“I’ll be there in 10 minutes,” you say, a little too quickly to be honest.

“Perfect. We’ll see you then!”

You end the call and look up to your grandma who’s staring at you with a small smile.

“Now you tell him to bring back my good tupperware,” she says, instantly switching back to her regular self.

You just shake your head. Grandmas will be grandmas.

“I’m just trying to get you a good man!” she fussed. “And that’s my good tupperware. He’ll hear from me until I get it back.”

“And who were you just on the phone with? You’re smiling real hard there.”

“Shut up Parker,” Miguel fired back. “And why are you even in here. Aren’t you supposed to be washing T29 right now?”

“I finished that an hour ago, thank you very much. You’re so touchy!”

Miguel got up and shuffled Peter out of his office, “I’m not touchy. You’re just irritating me like usual.”

“Oh my god? You do have someone you’re talking to,” Peter says as he digs his feet into the ground, stopping Miguel. “How come you didn’t tell me? Is it that lady with the tree-loving cat? No! It’s the guy whose dog keeps getting stuck in the wall! There’s a theme here.”

“No, I’m not- Will you move? I’m not dating anyone with daredevil pets,” Miguel responded, trying to push Peter in a new spot.

“Cap is dating?” Ben asks as he walks by the two bickering like cats. “When can we see them?”

“I’m not dating-”

“Miguel! You didn’t tell me anything,” Jess says as she comes down the hallway.

“Why won’t you ever address me as Captain?”

“I will if you tell me who you’re dating,” she says with a smile on her face.

“I’m going to lose my mind,” Miguel mumbles, letting Peter fall to the ground instead of fighting him.

“Well if you weren’t talking to your lover, who was that?” he asks from the ground, the wind knocked out of him.

“While you all were slacking, I was making sure that everyone goes home with a full stomach. Remember the kitchen fire from earlier this week? They’re bringing some food for us.”

“Will it be safe to eat?” Ben says, eyes flittering to Jess nervously.

“It was a broken gas line, you idiot,” Jess says with her mouth turned sideways. “At least wait until the food is here before you judge it.”

“No way,” Peter says from the ground. “You put them in your lap and now they’re bringing you food.”

Miguel lightly kicks Peter in the thigh, making him scream out a scale of keys.

“That face gets so many people,” Jess sighs annoyingly.

Firefighter!Miguel who jogs out to the car when you arrive. No, he wasn’t watching the clock or his cameras. He just happened to see some movement in one of the security cameras.

He opens the door for you, helping you out of the car.

It’s like you’re a totally different person from the frantic little baker from earlier.

“Can you help me get the plates out of the trunk?” you say, voice barely reaching his ears with how soft you’re speaking.

“Of course,” he replies.

He manages to carry all four hot tins of food, leaving you with just two plastic bags to carry.

Firefighter!Miguel who places the tins on the table with ease.

“Is there anything else?” Peter asks, walking up to his side.

“No, I think this was all of the tins,” Miguel replied with his hands on his hips.

“Show off,” Peter whispers with a smile on his face. He patted his shoulder and walked towards the entrance.

Miguel blushed, realizing how that might have read to you.

Firefighter!Miguel whose eyebrows raise as you hold him back from getting in line, a plastic bag aimed towards him.

“I made you a separate plate. You were especially kind to me and I wanted to show my appreciation,” you say with a smile on your face.

“Thank you,” he says, taking the bag. “Should I give you the verdict?”

Your heart beats faster, watching his pretty face light up. You nod your head, hopeful that he’ll love the food.

Firefighter!Miguel who has you sit next to him at the table. The crew is quiet for once. Nothing but smacks and the shuffling of cups could be heard.

“Don’t be rude, guys. Say thanks,” Miguel chides at his crew.

At the sound of his voice, everyone starts thanking you profusely.

Miguel starts to open his bag and you feel like you could break out in a sweat.

You watch as he opens the plate and his eyes go big.

“Hey, how come he gets the extra stuff?” Ben whines from the end of the table.

Jess elbows him to shut him up, eyes throwing daggers.

You may or may not have added some fried chicken and potato salad to his plate.

You wait anxiously as he takes a bite.

Is it weird that you counted the seconds as he chewed?

“Damn, that’s good,” he says, leaning back in his chair.

If everyone could hear your thoughts, they’d truly be terrified at the screams going on right now.

“You like it?” you ask, biting your lip.

“This might be the best food I’ve had in a while,” he replies back. “Thank you!”

Your smile grows, watching as he tears away at his food. His laser focus doesn’t stop him from smacking Peter’s hand away from his banana pudding.

Firefighter!Miguel who walks you back to the car. Everyone was chatting and laughing at the table. The after-food glow on all of their faces.

“Everything was really delicious. Thank you for this. You didn’t have to,” he says as he opens your door.

“Stop, I really wanted to thank you guys. You all are the true heroes. Oh! And my grandma would really appreciate it if you brought her container back.”

Miguel chuckles, giving you that charming smile of his. He looked so pretty that way. The black shirt he was sporting was hugging him just right too.

“Of course,” he responded. “We still have to check out your kitchen too, yeah?”

You nod, shocked that he remembered.

“Tell you what, I’ll give you my number and we can work that out tomorrow.”

He hands you a card, writing down what you assume is his personal number. As he hands the card to you, your heart picks up as his fingers graze yours.

“I’ll see you then,” he says, waiting for you to get in your car before he closes it. He taps the hood and walks backwards, watching as you back out of the driveway.

You give him a little wave and squeal to yourself when gives a hearty one back.

Firefighter!Miguel who is hounded by his crew when he gets back inside.

Some of them are making kissy faces and the others are patting his back in encouragement.

“Would you all get back to work?” he sighed, annoyed at all of the attention.

He moved fast to his office, face in flames.

Firefighter!Miguel who groans out when he scoops some banana pudding in his mouth.

You were good. Really good.

He makes an angry face as he takes another bite, “My god.”

“Oo, they got you real good,” Jess snickers as she steals a bite of his dessert.

“Hey!” he said, moving too late to stop her.

She laughs as she runs from his office. Miguel gets up and locks the door, making sure that no one else could steal his food.

It was specifically made for him, after all.

divider by: @dollywons + @starzyyy1 ❤️‍🔥

a/n: Special thanks to @slushycoookie for giving me ideas! It was brilliant and much needed ☺️

If you want to be on the taglist, sign up here!

taglist: @snails-doodles22 @xerorizz @questionable-behaviour @babygotl01292003

707 notes · View notes

darkficsyouneveraskedfor · 7 months ago

Text

The House Guest 2

Warnings: non/dubcon, and other dark elements. My username actually says you never asked for any of this.

My warnings are not exhaustive but be aware this is a dark fic and may include potentially triggering topics. Please use your common sense when consuming content. I am not responsible for your decisions.

Character: Bucky Barnes

Summary: an old acquaintance calls in a favour, leaving you with an unexpected house guest.

As usual, I would appreciate any and all feedback. I’m happy to once more go on this adventure with all of you! Thank you in advance for your comments and for reblogging ❤️

“Where can a man get a beer around here?” Bucky’s voice distracts you from watching the starchy boil of potatoes.

You step back look at him as he fills the doorway. The house was built in another time. People were smaller. Or maybe he’s just big.

“Oh, the beer stores about fifteen minutes away.”

“Great,” he says. “Phone can’t find it. Map’s blank.”

“Ah, yeah, up here, that happens,” you say. “Fifteen minutes driving. It’ll be at least an hour on foot.”

“Right,” the disappointment is crisp in his voice.

“I got a case of Molson in the fridge. Neighbour’s wife was sick and I helped out. Gesture of kindness... for anyone that drinks. You’re welcome to it.” You take a fork and poke at the potatoes. “It’ll end up in the sink anyway.”

He inhales audibly, “you don’t mind?”

“As long as you don’t. I don’t know if it’s any good. I’m not a beer person. Unfortunately, everyone else around here is,” you turn off the burner and lift the large pot.

You carry it to the sink and dump the potatoes into the strainer. A cloud of steam puffs up and sets a sheen over your face. You grunt and put the hot pot aside. You lift the colander and shake out the excess water.

You look over your shoulder and set it back down. He’s still in the doorway, watching. It must be strange. To be fair, you feel the same. You’re not used to company and he’s a far way from home.

You go to the fridge and break off a tall can from the six-pack. You bring it to him and his lips clamp sheepishly, “thanks. Coulda waited til dinner... you need help?”

“I got it,” you assure as you hold out the can.

He takes it an examines the label. “More of a Heineken man.”

“Like I said, I wouldn’t know the difference,” you shrug.

You return to the sink and dump the potatoes back into the pot. He lingers at the door as he cracks the can. You cross to the fridge again as tension pinches the nape of your neck. You take out the butter and milk. The door sucks shut and you sniff as you back up.

“I... never been to New York,” you say to fill the void. “I hear it smells.”

“Stinks,” he agrees. “Born in Indiana but I ended up in New York. Home to me. Or... was.”

“Right,” you nod as you add some milk and butter to the potatoes and grab the masher. “I grew up south of here. Small town but closer to the city. Compared to this it was a metropolis.”

“It’s quiet up here.”

“Sure it,” you agree. “It’s nice. Most of the time.”

You put a lid on the pot to keep it warm and go to the stove. You turn off the steamer as the lid begins to tremble. The timer on the stove counts down.

“I can take you to the beer store tomorrow. Sorry but I hate driving after dark. The moose don’t exactly abide by the rules of the road.” You explain.

“It’s fine,” he takes a loud slurp. “It’s beer. It’s not...” he sucks his teeth loudly. “You know, I can’t even get drunk. The taste is just familiar.”

“Fair enough,” you hit the cancel button before the time can yell at you. “Dinner’s ready.”

You open the cupboard and take down two plates. You lay them out side by side and work at doling out the portions. His shadow hovers on the other side of the stove.

“Thanks, you know,” he dares to inch closer. “You already put a roof over me, now you’re feeding me.”

“No biggie. Just the way up here.”

He sniffs and gets closer, peeking at the pan as you carve out a hunk of meatloaf, “hadn’t had good home cooking since... well, I been living off the microwave crap or take out.”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” you warn him. “It’s nothing special, I manage. As long as the meat’s cooked, I’m not complaining.”

“Me either,” he agrees. You lift the plates but before you can bring them to the table, he stops you. He puts the beer on the counter and brings his hands to the edges of the plates. “I got it.”

You let him take the food and he brings it to the table. You watch him then scoop up the can and follow him. It’s going to be an adjustment. For both of you.

You put the Molson next to his plate as he’s reluctant to claim his seat, “dig in. It’ll get cold.”

You go back to grab cutlery and come back. You sit and hand him a knife and fork. He reaches with his left hand and hesitates as you look at his metal digits.

He clutches the cutlery and quickly retracts. You don’t mention it though you do wonder if he’s embarrassed. Why? Isn’t that what makes him special? A hero? Or whatever he is.

“This place is old. My ma had the same lintels on her doors in 1934.” He points with his fork to the door frame.

“Old on top of old. Those are actually from the twenties. No one was doing renos in the thirties, I’m sure you know that. Somewhere back there, one of my great great whatever’s put in a stove and fridge and wired the place up. Kept the fire stove though. Antique now.”

“Antique, like me,” he scoffs.

You nod, unsure how to respond. You hope you don’t think you were implying anything. You get a bit carried away. Your mother and grandmother were always into genealogy and you caught a bit of the bug.

Or maybe he thinks you’re over explaining. He was alive. He would know all these things and could guess the rest. You bite into the meatloaf and stare at the painted trim on the plate.

“Ma’s place was taken down. Lived near the base since dad was there and they flattened it for a firing range. Now the place in New York... drug den now. New York, glamourous, really. You’re missing out,” he tuts dryly.

You look up at him and give a tight-lipped expression, “sorry to hear that.”

“It is what it is. The world changes. With or without you,” he reaches for the beer and swigs. His blue eyes dart to the wall and sharpen. He put the can down with a bit of force and pats his chest. He feels around and grimaces. “I’m gonna have a--” there’s a crinkle and he slides out another sucker. “Well...”

He waves the candy at you and stands. You watch him silently and scrape your fork through the mashed potato. He twirls the stick between his fingers.

“It’s good,” he points to his plate, “really.” He clears his throat and shifts on his feet, “back soon.”

He turns and marches out. You look down at your food and slice into the loaf. The grainy scent of the beer wafts over. You take another bite as your forehead creases in thought. Sam’s a funny guy and this feels a bit like a joke.

#bucky barnes #dark bucky barnes #dark!bucky barnes #bucky barnes x reader #series #drabble #the house guest #winter soldier #captain america #avengers #mcu #marvel

256 notes · View notes

centrally-unplanned · 8 months ago

Text

IRL (In Real Life) - Buffydom Propaganda And The Internet-That-Was

It is 1997. You just got back from the latest Hot Topic run to restock on whatever the most raven-black bomb of Manic Panic they have on the shelves is, so you can do double-duty bleaching your hair in the shower while watching a CRT TV precariously mounted on the lip of your sink. On that TV is the Season 1 finale of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and you are obsessed. Unfortunately for you, no one else in Bowling Green, Ohio, shares your passion for a CW WB show about vampire hunting teens who purposefully fumble their line deliveries. You are alone, and you have shit you gotta say about it to someone, anyone, who will understand.

Fortunately for you, the marketing team at ye old WB anticipated that their audience would be a bunch of fucking nerds, and boy do they have a solution to your problem! Welcome to the Bronze:

A while back I stumbled upon the inexplicable existence of "IRL (In Real Life)", a 2007 documentary about the community that formed around the aforementioned Buffy fan discussion forum/chatboard. Officially running from around the launch of the show until it switched over to UPN after its fifth season (with the forum dying a dramatic death in the process), The Bronze was a highly active center for the Buffy fandom, which generated several spillovers into real life. In particular, it was famous for the creatives and even actors on the show occasionally posting on the forum, which culminated in members of the community organizing a yearly party in Los Angeles where posters would fly out and be joined by said cast and crew. This documentary charts its culture & history via interviewing an array of its members.

As always, I am not here to give the blow-by-blow; instead, what is the narrative this documentary is trying to sell?

My previous documentary write-up was about nerd culture in the 2010’s; newly ascendant, growing confident in its own values and looking to justify that to itself, wealthy and with a developed enough ecosystem for crowdfunding to create professional, polished documentaries of its own heroes. None of that is true for IRL. Filmed on whatever camcorder/potato hybrid proto-Ebay would cough up from its zero-bid listings in a series of hotel rooms and people’s living rooms in 2003-2004 after the forum had died, this is the era of nerd culture at its most conflicted and insecure; mocked by the mainstream and unsure if it should be proud of that fact or deeply ashamed of it. And this documentary wears this conflict right on its sleeve; one of its opening lines is a confident assurance to the audience of “don’t worry, we aren’t like those nerds”:

Throwing Trekkies under the bus in the process, cold! Particularly given how it proceeds to barely even blink before pivoting to explaining their hobby of running “WITTs”, multi-day-long collaborative roleplays:

You are exactly those Trekkies my dudes; you weren’t just at the devil’s sacrament you were hosting it! "WITT" stands for Whedon Improvisational Theatre Troupe, you can't recover from that guys.

(I love how “dozens” is large by the way - it was for the internet in 2001, right?)

Anyway, beyond documenting the forum and its members, the conclusion this documentary wants you to hold is that the Bronze was a special place of real community, and it is a community of “normal” people, who made real relationships. And in particular, that internet relationships can be just as real as those found in meatspace, that these relationships transcended the digital and entered the physical; and that this is what fandom can be about.

I want to start with the ways that narrative was correct within the context of the time. I can actually explain that Klingon comment! I have one extant interview with the director of the film, Stephanie Tuszynski, and she put her motivation as follows:

FFN: What made you decide to study Buffy fandom, particularly the Bronze, for your documentary? ST: The idea to do a documentary film about the Bronze actually came to me very early on, because "Trekkies" came out in the late 1990s so I was already a Bronzer at that point. And when I saw it I started throwing things at my television. I was incensed. That wasn't a documentary about the fandom experience, it was "hey let's find the most extreme examples possible and have a freak show!" It infuriated me […] It reinforced every awful stereotype about media fans while purporting to be objective.

It wasn’t a random example - the 1997 documentary Trekkies set the “standard” view of fandom as extremist oddballs, and Tuszynski specifically wanted to counter that. It was the early 2000’s after all, nerd stereotypes were strong, you had to fight them explicitly! In a society where there is strong background hostility to one’s identity, you will attempt to normalize it using known reference points; and certainly the people on these forums were more “normal” than the stereotypes admitted to because that entire binary framework is a dead end.

More importantly to the narrative is the online aspect, “making friends on the internet”. Another find I have is a blog post from a professor who used the film in a class; and in the film’s narrative of “people with no one ‘irl’ to share their hobby with finding friends online” triggered a debate around if the online relationships are “taking away” from in-person relationships that are presumed to be more valuable. A debate that still rages to this day over social media! But the contours were different back then, the internet was presumed to be niche, ancillary, and relationships made online in a completely separate box from “in person” friendships. The documentary goes to great lengths to explain that they were a real community because that idea is so contested. Ironically, they do this by emphasizing that they met up in person, hung out, attended each other's weddings, etc; as if only by meeting up in person could the relationships be validated as real? But you can’t truly fault them for meeting their implicit critics halfway in making their case.

So what can I fault them for?

*****

I was perpetually amused when watching the doc that they included two married couples in the filming, and for both one of the spouses would talk and the other would sit there, in silence, the entire time. Maybe they were members of the community and just not talkers; maybe their lines got cut in post. But what I kept thinking was that they were there selling normality to me; married couples are just inherently less oddball, less threatening, and in the era where “nerd = virgin” just less nerdy. Like with the Klingon line, there is an intentionality to the “just like you” vibe.

Which, as mentioned with the extensive forum roleplay, inevitably breaks down once the reality of forum activity is dug into. And I buried the lede here - you may have seen the title of the “longest” roleplay was “RTBS Soul Restoration Project”, but what does that mean? RTBS was a forum member’s name, and well:

Oh yeah, we are saving our friend from “a fate worse than death: worshiping Britney Spears” - welcome to 2001 baby! This is peak “nerd wars” stuff, the normies hate our shit so we hate the normie shit right back. Which is exactly how nerd culture was in the 2000's. I am not at all throwing shade at their tongue-in-cheek roleplay, resplendent in the ludicrously purple prose and asterisk-laden action descriptions as required by the early internet; but it sits in clear tension with some of the other messaging in this film. Leave Britney alone guys!

The documentary highlights a number of common practices from the forum - people doing daily greetings, the way that it being one unending massive chain of posts with no threading or topics meant people would mass-tag individual people to respond to and form “circles” that way - but there are things it leaves out. I did what any normal person would do after watching this documentary and read through over a year of archived posts on The Bronze to understand the community - but man did I not have to, as on literally the first page of my archived link I see:

And through God’s good grace that second link is archived:

Yes there are pictures at the link, and yes later on it does compare Buffy’s cleavage to the Mona Lisa. (The Giles link is not quite functional, but I was able to find it; sadly it is not nearly as thirsty)

I also found these “onboarding” sites for new members. Remember, this forum was the official forum, which meant there were no community mods or ability to “pin rules”, it was pure anarchy - so advice filled the gaps. And one of the bigger ones, in its *sighs and rubs forehead* blue font on black background, warns against “hottie posting” aka talking about how hot say Angel is, not because it isn’t allowed, but because it is like “pointing out the sky is blue” - it is so common that it will just get washed out.

It might seem like a similarly sky-is-blue comment to note that this forum was heavily about shipping, hotness discussion, fanfiction, and the like. Of course it was, right? These website “senior members” were trying to minimize it, police it, but it broke through constantly and also simmered under the surface through discussions and RP’s from my own review of the forum. The documentary, however, spends incredibly little time on it. Brief mentions of Angel fics, and no mention (iirc) of discussion of how hot the women were at all. Because once again those details really don’t fit into the narrative it is trying to sell.

At one point in the documentary someone notes how diverse all the friends they met in this community were? Which I broke out laughing over. In one way it is not wrong, I get it! Midwest college kids meeting people from all over the country, ages 40 to 14, talking about something no one in their podunk town understands. But on the other hand, you could not come up with a more standardized slice of humanity if you tried to rig it. Everyone here is an American+ with computer access in 1998, it is a grab bag of sys admins, nerd creatives, and comp sci majors. I did a random sampling googling the people interviewed to see what they are up to now, and literally a third of them are librarians. Even their fashion is like God played a prank on this director; not even a 2000’s anime con panel lineup is this stereotypical in the combinations of alt-goth lit girls and nerdcore computer bros.

The evolutionary process of joining this forum -> liking it enough to go to the live meetups -> liking that enough to participate in a documentary about it was a pressure cooker spitting out only a certain kind of person. Which is truly fascinating to see on display! This is the internet-that-was; and it bleeds through the grainy film despite the director’s efforts at times to the contrary.

Though even then it was only a very specific slice of the internet-that-was, because this is a very special breed of Online; namely, the professionals.

*****

Something that is decidedly not typical of The Bronze as an online community is that, as mentioned before, Joss Whedon and other creatives posted on the web forum, answering questions and also just playing around, and how that led to in-person parties where both forum members and cast/crew attended - the Posting Board Parties, or PBP’s. At these they hosted fundraisers, talked about the show, and in the documentary one girl reverently describes with incredible Repressed Lesbian Energy her experience of seeing Eliza Dushku dancing next to her. The PBP had a panel of party organizers, admission systems to keep out the “undesirables”, budgets, the works.

All this the documentary shares openly; it is a peak moment where the digital becomes real in a transcendent way, opening doors analog reality never could. It is also a cold-sweat-waking nightmare story from the lens of a modern Hollywood social media manager; one person in the documentary tells the tale of how one time lead actress Allyson Hannigan posted her phone number on the forum asking people to leave her cute voicemails. The person in question immediately called, and got Hannigan herself instead of the voicemail, so they chatted for a bit (The guy telling this tale is obviously lovestruck; his wife is sitting in typical silence next to him). Today this would be a code-red, nuke your phone situation; but the circle was so cloistered, and the rules so unwritten, that no one cared in these early years.

What they share less openly is all the drama that went into this event. They wax nostalgic about how the parties brought them together, but what isn’t mentioned is the church schism it caused, as the moment cast from the show started attending the party it got mobbed by outsiders. By its ~3rd year there were approximately 400 guests but only ~50 or so were from the forum. They had a huge fight about it, the head of PFP planning committee - “Morbius the Vampire”, who was later jailed for financial fraud btw - told the dissenting faction why don’t they just throw their own party if they hate his so much, and so they did. There was more fighting about it, and eventually they held a peace summit at an LA joint called Mel’s Diner to merge the two factions together. (My source for this is a book, which I will link later)

Hilarious, for sure, but while so much of what we have discussed is “proto online nerd communities”, this part is most decidedly not. The typical web forum absolutely cannot replicate the experience of roleplay-posting your way into shaking hands with Joss Whedon and having a shitfight over party budgets in LA. But most posters never got to attend these parties, of course, this didn’t mean much to them. While for those who did, you cannot help but imagine that this played a gigantic role in making them all become a “real” community. And care enough about that circle to, well after the forum was gone, schlep to a hotel room to be interviewed for a documentary about it. Participating in a documentary is always, in some way, an exercise in selection bias; but here the pruning is turned up to 11 - this is a very elite slice of a very unique fandom experience.

*****

I have one deeper level to go on this thread, somewhat buried in time today, that further shaped the participants here: “Whedon Studies”. The 2000’s was not the birth of media studies as an academic discipline; but it was the birth of fandom-driven media studies, and Buffy was nearly unassailably the leading light of that movement. Academics hosted entire conferences (and inexplicably still do!) on Buffy, Firefly, etc; almost all from the lens of gender & media, as Buffy’s brand was deeply entrenched in that deconstructive milieu. This movement would die a fiery death during the 2010’s shift in media & gender politics, and when the controversies around the toxic working conditions on the set of Buffy/Angel led to Joss Whedon’s near-total expulsion from creative pursuits. The whole edifice is, in a deep way, “cringe” for many of its former participants today.

But what is relevant for our story is that director Stephanie Tuszynski was a full member of that movement; while composing this film she was, for example, giving talks like these at conferences devoted to the Buffyverse:

God that is a lot of talks. This film itself was her thesis project for her I believe philosophy masters, and in our scant interviews lists other fandom-academic film projects she wanted to tackle (which as best I can tell fizzled out later). And the interview subjects were often participants in the same space as well! Academic-types doing media studies with a Buffy bent, or things like culture writers for new media outlets. One of them, writer Allyson Beatrice, even published a book about the Buffy fandom that was in regular bookstores:

To quote the blurb:

A hilarious collection of true stories from Allyson's days as one of the Internet's leading cult TV fan gurus, her mind-boggling escapades include meetings with network executives in dark steakhouses to try to save doomed TV shows and one hastily arranged wedding for two committed Buffy fans.

I highlight this not to say that academics cannot make documentaries, they certainly can. What I am saying is that if you point your camera at career Buffyverse writer Allyson Beatrice, and label her as a typical forum member giving you the hometown everygirl perspective on the community, you are, however unintentionally, lying to your audience. In its quest to give you the just-like-me Buffy fandom experience, what this documentary elides is that it is often giving you the lens of people who are fans of Buffy as a career. Those people are going to be bringing very different experiences to the table - of course they are concerned with sanitization, with nerd culture debates, the works. That is their bread-and-butter trade.

This dynamic bled into the forum’s day-to-day; there was a very clear hierarchy of “veterans” and “top” posters, who organize the live parties, have deep roots in the community, and even the ear of the show team...and everyone else. Particularly because as mentioned there were no rules on the forum, but since that can’t actually function in practice they self-generated community rules and thus their own leadership class. Cliques and groups were common and named, and veteran posters even had formally designated groupies:

I had also by this time become a groupie. I so enjoyed one particular Bronzer’s posts that she allowed me to become the seventh of her groupies. It was through groupie-dom that I got my first taste of firsthand WITT: several Bronzers, on the occasion of the birthday of she-to-whom-we-group, each took turns grabbing the microphone and praising the day that she was born. In retrospect, I’m not sure why we did this. But it was fun, and very funny, too, as we each took turns waxing melodramatic off the top of our heads. And from work, no less.

The source for this by the way is a 400 page ethnography of The Bronze posted by academic who did *cough* “field research” there; I am sure their membership in the “Bronzers Adoring Darla” fangroup was purely for comprehensive data collection purposes.

And to emphasize, I am not saying this is problematic or anything - the groupie things were all in good fun, best I can tell. I simply aim to showcase how the Bronze wasn’t just a baby version of online fandom forum dynamics; but also a baby version of e-celebrity mechanics. Something the documentary does not even attempt to touch on because that would be something normal people would not understand.

*****

All of the above may have come off like one big roast, and it is a little bit, but as I have mentioned before every documentary is propaganda. It is just impossible to have a tight film building a narrative out of the pieces of letting people speak to the camera without that narrative being but a slice of the truth those people want you to know. The Bronze web forum was a very special place to these highly invested fans, and this documentary is not lying to you about that.

But it is also a big part of early internet fandom! The Bronze was famous at the time, and it is right there at the beginning of so many shifts; the first generation of non-technical internet users, a new era of ‘fantasy’ media with the trappings of prestige and social critique, a boom in critique-as-community, and more. I very much want the full picture of that community; who made it up, what did they want from it and what did they get from it, and so on. No film could offer the full picture; this film’s homebrew rawness gives a valuable piece of it, and I enjoyed it for that. I just aimed here to draw out not only what the broader, more accurate dynamics of The Bronze were, but also the cultural question of why the film focuses on what it does, hides what it refuses to show, and what that says about 2000’s internet & nerd culture. Hopefully I succeeded in that.

And also to have fun looking at some incredibly dated Buffy fandom bullshit. May it have been fun for you too! {hugs you and waves goodbye}

#essay #buffy the vampire slayer #history of the early internet #Yeah I have no excuse for the length on this one - sometimes you just wanna be self-indulgent

182 notes · View notes

gingerteawrites · 3 months ago

Text

Proathelete!Kyojuro who is so universally loved. His teammates, the fans and even adversaries unanimously agree that he's one of the best things that have happened to the sport. Commentators always managed to slip in odes to his beaming smile and stellar sportsmanship during games; his ability to lock in during critical stages and orchestrate moves that lead his team to victory is as appreciated as his light-heartedness in the off moments.

"There goes Rengoku helping carry an injured number 9 off the field. Another proof of his impeccable character!"

Proathlete!Kyojuro who after years of fame still waves at fans after games, and stops for pictures whenever he is spotted off the field. A video of his most recent interaction with a young fan quite literally broke the internet. Attracting a horde of new admirers who might care little about his sport, but sure care quite a lot about him.

It was a video captured by a bystander, where a little girl had recognized his fiery hair, approaching with a shy blush. He ruffled her hair gently and crouched, offering her his sweetest smile along with a sweet potato-flavored gummy.

Proathlete!Kyojuro revealing that he is a family man was the final blow dealt to many's hearts. It's not long before compilations of him interacting with kids and many, many thirst edits fill social media platforms. It gets even worse when he mentions the posts about him during a post-game interview, all sweaty and taut muscles when he leans closer to the mic.

"People seem to have fun with those videos," he snickers, looking directly into the camera. "Whatever makes them happy... I will say though, the little stories they make up are quite entertaining." He offers one last knowing smile before switching the topic back to the game. Everything goes up in flames after that.

[omg he reads the fanfics??]

[that smirk got me pregnant]

[we have been infiltrated!]

Proathlete!Kyojuro who is the most wholesome man ever, but will do things that make everyone suspect that despite his ever-present humility he knows. Is fully cognisant of just how hot people find him. Like him changing jerseys on the bench almost teasingly slow, fully aware of how the camera zooms in on his body and ruffled hair. Or how his joyous smile sometimes turns into something more smug, almost seductive, accompagnied by a drop in his voice when asked questions about his personal life and preferences. These last but mere moments, but they are more than enough to ignite the public's imaginations.

Proathlete!Kyojuro who is simply the national sweetheart, and never fails to live up to the title. A man of the people if you will, perfect in every way. The kind you sigh dreamily about.

Haa...

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

I saw this one fanart with him as a baseball player and felt inspired. Hope you enjoyed it!

Comments are reblogs are much appreciated (❁´◡`❁)

#rengoku kyojuro #gingerteawrites #demon slayer #kimetsu no yaiba #kny rengoku #rengoku x reader #rengoku x y/n #demon slayer rengoku #demon slayer x reader

74 notes · View notes

kingkaisen · 1 year ago

Text

♡ — Levi goes to therapy to cope with your death . . . || mentions of: depressive behavior, poor eating & sleeping habits

“You are so incredibly strong for coming here, Levi. Showing up today was the very first step. I’m proud of you.”

Levi Ackerman didn’t respond, only because he had nothing to say.

That was the excuse he repeated to Onyankopon, who had been chirping in his ear over and over again about the benefits of therapy.

In the middle of yard work underneath the hot sun, he’d put down his shovel, wipe off his sweaty forehead with the towel draped across his shoulder, and tell Levi that mental health was important.

While making dinner, chopping up vegetables alongside Gabi and Falco — they all enjoyed having meals together at least once a week — he’d drop the potatoes into a pot of boiling water, look over at Levi, and tell him that he knew an amazing therapist who would love to speak with him.

And, eventually, Levi caved. Not because he thought it would benefit him, but so his dear friend would finally shut up.

“What are you expecting to get out of therapy, Levi?” The older blonde-haired woman asked, leaning back in her big brown chair. “What brings you in today?”

“My friend wanted me to give it a try.” Levi looked down at his lap, staring at the place where two of his fingers were supposed to be. “I couldn’t exactly outrun him, so . . .”

“I understand,” she nodded slowly. “Why does your friend believe that you need therapy?”

Levi’s jaw twitched involuntarily. His eyes were glassy with tears — tears that once never fell down his face as easily as they do now. Levi’s eyes darted from his lap to a random spot on the beige wall. His uninjured leg started to shake a bit.

“Uh . . .” Running his hand over his mouth, he said with a slight tremble in his voice, “I lost someone.”

“Go on,” the therapist nodded encouragingly.

A lump started to form in Levi’s throat, and despite his best efforts, he couldn’t swallow it down.

He couldn’t speak.

All he could do was sit in his wheelchair and become a victim of the onslaught of horrific memories that flashed in his mind.

When he blinked, a tear rolled down his pale cheek.

“She is my- she was my . . . damn it.”

Levi ran his hand over his face once again. This time, when he did it, the woman noticed his wedding ring.

“Take your time, Levi,” she said.

“She was my wife,” Levi paused. “And she’s dead now. That’s all.”

“Can you tell me more about that?”

“It was the rumbling.”

“I see. How did you discover her death? Did you witness it?”

All at once, it felt as if Levi’s heart stopped beating, and snapped into pieces. His breathing — he could hardly control it.

“Stop,” the words fell from between his lips before he even knew that he had spoken. “Too much.”

“I apologize.” The therapist nodded. “Let’s start with something easier. How are your eating and sleeping habits?”

That topic wasn’t easy at all.

He found himself moving bits of food around with his silverware more often than not, unable to bring the utensil to his mouth most days. And, he could hardly sleep before he lost you. Now? He never even bothered to close his eyes.

The dark bags underneath them were a telltale sign — a silent answer to the therapist’s question.

“This was a bad idea,” Levi glared at the woman. “You can’t help me.”

“Yes, I-”

“Can you bring her back?” Clenching his jaw, he spoke with a tone heavy with dread and sadness.

“No, I can’t.”

“Then you can’t help me,” Levi said.

“Levi,” the therapist took a deep breath before she said, “I can only help you if you’ll let me. Healing takes time, and it won’t work instantly. It seems as if we’re taking things too fast for your liking, and I understand. So, how about we start with something else? Tell me something about her. Anything you’d like to share.”

Levi played with the sleeve of his long-sleeved shirt, pinching the soft material between his fingers.

“She liked sleeping,” Levi paused. “I hardly sleep at all. Always thought it was kinda funny.”

“Did she help you sleep?” The therapist asked.

“Yeah.”

“How did she help you fall asleep?”

When the therapist asked that question, Levi felt his cheeks start to warm up, the formerly pale skin becoming a subtle pink.

Being vulnerable in such a way was like having an exposed nerve, but, even so, he had to push through.

Any form of help — any relief anyone could give him from his own misery — was well worth it.

“She’d run her fingers through my hair,” Levi said. “And she’d always make sure that I could feel her next to me. An arm, a leg, her breath — anything.”

“Well,” the therapist smiled softly, “I hope you know that she’s still with you, Levi.”

Levi didn’t respond. He couldn’t; the lump in his throat had returned, if it had ever truly gone away.

But he knew.

He wouldn’t go as far as to say he believed in ghosts or anything of the sort, but the warm presence that he felt within his soul was enough.

It was enough for him to keep on living, as he knew you would be upset if he joined you in the afterlife too soon.

It would take a lifetime of therapy to work through the trauma — the sight of your ODM gear malfunctioning as you fell to your death, and Levi wasn’t fast enough to grab you — but he’d do whatever it took to heal.

And, with that, he’d continue to live because it’s what you would have wanted, and because he knew one thing for certain: you would be waiting for him.

992 notes · View notes

writingfool001 · 1 year ago

Text

Unexpected Events

Author’s Note: When I presented the prompt, this request came first so sorry to Malleus requests. I may do one later. Also I absolutely love indie or alternative style jewelry. As much as jewels are lovely and pretty, I like the interesting shapes or designs of them. For those who need a mental visual, imagine hot topic’s silver looking rings that are sold in packs.

Pairing: Azul x GN! Reader

Warning: newly wedded, You/ your pronouns, and reader is gender neutral. We’re going to act like both (YN) and Azul are 18. Also (Y/N) is a second year and a childhood friend.

“Potato, what is that?”

“Hm?” You are brought out of your thoughts and look at your hand. “A ring? I wear a few rings.”

“Obviously,” Vil rolled his eyes. “But why are you wearing one on your marriage finger?”

“Maybe (Y/N) got proposed to by a distant prince or suitor?” Kalim chimed in.

“Pssh as if.” Leona grumbled.

“I also wonder why you’re wearing a ring on your ring finger.” Riddle added. “It sticks out of the ones you wear.”

“I saw it and liked it. I may not have expensive rings like Vil or Leona, but this one caught my eye, and it just happens to fit this finger.” you answered, waving off their suspicion.

The only reason that you were wearing one was due to a foolish decision that you made when you were younger and didn't fully know the laws on marriage for Merpeople. This was only brought to your attention recently.

There was a furious banging on your door, and you opened it to be welcomed by immediate dried rice being thrown at you which you immediately closed your eyes.

"Congratulations, shrimpy!" You heard Floyd cheer.

"We're so fortunate to have witnessed such a monumental event." Jade chuckled.

"What?" You exclaim, opening your eyes and brushing the stray rice off of you. "Why did you throw rice at me? What do you mean by monumental event?"

"I've been told by clownfish that people throw rice at married people." Floyd explained.

"I'm not married though and those are at weddings." You respond as your eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Why are you two here exactly?"

"To deliver this to you," Jade presented an envelope to you. "Azul told us to deliver this to you."

You carefully take the envelope before opening it and taking out the paper then begin reading or skimming the page. Yet one line stood out.

As of this year, the Coral Sea government now recognizes your marriage to Azul - is valid.

….

…

"What?!" You yelled as you reread the line before closing your door and making your way to your alleged husband as the twins followed.

As the meeting started, you were somewhat listening as you fidgeted with the octopus ring. There were several topics that were touched on as it was school related. When I was acknowledged, you just replied with uh huh.

"You're not even listening." Azul spat.

"I don't need to because it's always the same with you. Poor unfortunate souls and shady deals followed by you going on about who knows what." You retort back.

“You both bicker like an old married couple.” Leona groaned, causing Kalim to laugh and Vil to chuckle.

That comment made you think back to how you confronted Azul.

I busted through the door as Floyd whined about how he didn't have any more rice to throw. Jade only chuckled and pulled his brother away, leaving Azul and you alone.

"I see you got the news about our current endeavor." Azul calmly stated as you closed the door. “It would appear that we are married.”

"We don't have a marriage license." I pointed it out, thinking that would change anything. “Wouldn’t that make it invalid?”

“They already did a background check on us and delivered us one.” He slid the piece of paper over you which showed the government issued marriage license.

"Tax write off and other benefits we can both enjoy." Azul corrected.

"How are you calm about this?" You question him, glaring at him suspiciously.

"As I said, it is beneficial for both of us and when one of us decides to split, then we can just divorce." Azul repeated calmly which fell off in a way, yet you agreed with that arrangement.

It's never that simple with Azul. One thing you learned from your friendship was always read between the lines. Especially when it came to Azul.

Only Jade and Floyd knew about the marriage between you two. Jade would stop Floyd before letting it slip too far if you all are around others in public. There is the occasional bickering, but nothing to the point that either of you say anything extremely hurtful to one another. Eventually, the marriage thing slipped both of your minds and you went about your normal day to day lives.

You were scrolling through Magicam as you looked at endless posts that had rings that would be considered funky or strange and would fall under the indie style category. You saved a few to look at later. You didn’t know that Azul caught a glance over your shoulder and remembered that you would always wear a few rings that sat on the base of your fingers and a few thin knuckle ones. All the rings you wore were more indie than anything. Tasteful and interesting yet nothing too crazy.

One night, you were sitting in Azul's office, studying since it was the only place that was quiet enough and no one would think you were off the top of their head. While you studied, Azul was working on contracts at his desk as you both enjoyed doing your own thing while still being in the same room.

As you were in the middle of reading a page, you heard Azul clear his throat and look up to see him set a small black box on the table.

“I noticed that you have a certain taste in rings, and I saw this one. It reminded me of you.” He explained sheepishly, even though he tried hiding his reluctance. You both held eye contact in silence for a few seconds before he went back to working on his contracts, leaving you to your own devices.

You looked at the ring and it was simple, yet it had a unique flare to it. Looking back to see Azul went back to being busy. You slip it on and quietly walk over closer to him so that you can see the small wrinkle in his nose he gets when he's focused.

You lean over and kiss his cheek, catching him off guard.

"Awe you still look so cute when you blush." You lightly tease, making his cheek get rosy.

"I'm not cute.” He grumbled as he went back to work where you noticed a slight outline under his glove, particularly on his ring finger, making you chuckle.

Maybe being married to him for now wouldn't be so bad.

#twisted wonderland x reader #twst x reader #twisted wonderland x mc #twst azul x reader #azul x reader #azul ashengrotto x reader #twisted wonderland azul #azul ashengrotto

332 notes · View notes