#i almost made a friend in line for tacos. Didn’t pan out

[eeoollaa]

Wow I’ve actually beeen so emotionally mentally and physically (in the sense of self actualization, which I guess loops back around to everything) unfulfilled and without purpose

[heychangbin]

Change o’ Plans ║ Part One

Summary: You sit beside Vito in the cemetery chapel, going through the motions, praying to saints you don’t believe in to help you make it to the end of the service and for things to run smoothly. 

Warnings: Blood, swearing, mentions of murder

Wordcount: 3232

A/N: y’all bitches fucking thought.

You hated this, hated sitting at the first pew, a modest black dress hanging off your shoulders with Vito at your side, his hand holding yours as you both watched friends and relatives walk up to stand beside of the casket, say their piece to the body laying inside, and walk back to their seat.

You bowed your head and prayed to every saint you heard of growing up that they grant you the strength to see this through. You were halfway through reciting a fifth rosary when you felt Vito's hand tighten in yours, making you lift your head and eye him unquestioningly out of the corner of your eye. His eyes were trained ahead, lips pressed into a harsh line and his shoulders were tense. You followed his line of sight and your own hand tightened, your back going rigid at the sight of Georgie, bent over the side of the casket, his large hand gripping one of the bodies shoulders as he murmured things you couldn't hear. 

You felt yourself go livid at the audacity of the man, but then again, you never knew Georgie to have any shame which is how you weren't surprised at all when he stopped in front of you and Vito instead of heading back to his own pew, his large hand coming to tap and grip Vito's shoulder,

"'Ey Vee,sorry 'bout your brother"

Vito gave him a curt nod with a clipped "thanks Georgie," 

"He looks good, all things considered, guys in the back did him good."

You could feel how your nails dug into Vito's skin but the man beside you didn't flinch, he continued to hold on tight to your hand, if it was to keep you or himself from standing and completely throttling George you couldn't be sure, but you were grateful to have him there as an anchor. 

"Listen, if either of yous need anything, you come to me, Nicky was my best friend, he was family, and that means you are too."

For a brief moment you entertained the idea of telling George he could take that sentiment and shove it where the sun don't shine, after what he did to Nick he was lucky that he was still standing and that Vito was the only family you had but before the words could leave your lips you heard Vito say from beside you, 

"Thanks George, we'll keep that in mind."

George took a step and knelt in front of you, his hand coming to rest on your knee, thumb stroking the outside dip as his eyes bore into yours and emphasized his words, 

"I mean it, anythin' at all, I'm your guy."

The weight of his meaty hand on you had you suppressing a shiver, it took everything in you to not shove him away and force out a "thanks" that almost choked you to say and disguised your struggle by bowing your head, covering your mouth and leaning into Vito's shoulder. 

It seemed to do the trick, george gave your knee what was supposed to be a reassuring squeeze but felt anything but, pushed himself up off the floor and made his way back down the aisle between the pews. 

It was another hour until the service was brought to a close but not before you walked up to the casket, your low heels clicking against the linoleum floor and echoing off the walls of the chapel. You stared at the face that looked so much like the man you loved, his face was peaceful, forehead relaxed, his long lashes fanning across the top the apple of his cheeks, his hair was combed back in the way it usually was, shiny from the product he ran through his dark tresses to keep them in place, his beard immaculately styled, dressed in a lead gray suit, arms resting at his sides, the tip of his neck tattoo peeking over the neck of his charcoal button down. If it weren't for the color of his skin that was off by a couple of shades, you'd think he was sleeping. 

The sob that wracked your body had you stumbling back and into the arms of Vito, who held you close, hand stroking your back whispering words of encouragement as you felt chest caving in on itself and murmurs rose from behind him,

"I can't—I can't do this Vee, I gotta get outta here."

"Just a bit more, then this'll all be over."

You gripped the lapels of his jacket so hard you swore you heard and felt the material tear between your fingers before loosening your hold on the material and nodding. 

"Please, don't make me go back up there Vee, I can't," you struggled to say between broke sobs

"Yeah, c'mon," he murmured, wrapping his arm over your shoulders and guiding you back to the pew.

It wasn't long after that that the minister called the viewing to a close and give directions to the plot where the casket would be lowered. 

The last rays of sunlight were lingering in the sky when Vito dropped you off with a promise to stop by the next day.

You hugged him and thanked him for being there with you before you climbed out of his car and made your way up the short walkway to your front door, giving him a final wave as you walked through your door and locking it behind you. 

You leaned against the door for a moment and just breathed, the hardest part was done.

You dropped your keys into the bowl that sat atop the table beside the door and stepped out of your heels, promising yourself to pick them up and put them away tomorrow morning. 

You took a step in the direction of the small kitchen 

"How was it?" Despite the voice being familiar and exactly what you needed to erase the image of the man in the casket from your mind, it still made you jump and kicked your heart into overdrive as it frantically beat against the middle of your chest. 

"God damn it Nick!" You hissed to the dark room at large, "you almost gave me a goddamn heart attack," you continued as you peered at the empty living room, forcing your eyes to adjust until you were able to make out his silhouette. Once you did you launched yourself at him, giving himself barely enough time to open his arms and catch you. His arms wrapping around your waist as yours went around his neck.

*******

The house was dark for the exception of the kitchen light, where you were sitting at your kitchen table, the clock on the stove indicating it was 2am in neon green numbers.

He should've been back by now….unless, you drummed your fingernails on the shiny wooden surface as you fought thoughts of the alternative from your mind.

He's gonna be back….any minute now, he's gonna walk through the front door with a bag of taco bell...

You reached for your phone, bringing the screen to life to see the clock on the screen 2:03. You pressed the power button, making the screen go dark as you pushed yourself off your chair and walked the length of your small kitchen a few times before you walked over to the counter, pulling one of the drawers open, reaching in and pulling out the pack of cigarettes and lighter Nick kept there. You taped the pack against the heel of your palm before pulling one out, placing it between your lips and lighting it. Taking a drag and filling your lungs with the smoke, holding it for a beat before exhaling the smoke in a plume of white. The nicotine did very little to settle your nerves but that didn't stop you from bringing it back to your lips and taking another long drag, flicking the edge and letting the ash fall into the sink. 

You turned to the clock on the stove again, the numbers on it reading 2:14.

Where are you Nick, you shouldve been back by now,

You flicked the ash off your cigarette again, and reached for your phone, bringing it to life, 2:18, tapping out your passcode and flicking the screen to your contacts, your thumb hovering over Vito's contact entry when the backdoor was thrown open, making you jump. You reached for the closest thing to use as a weapon, a frying pan that had been drying on the dish rack, holding it over your head ready to bring it down on your intruder when you recognized Vito. Your hold on the handle went slack when you saw Nick hanging off his brother's shoulder, his face clammy and looking too pale for comfort.

"Get the first aid kit," Vito gritted through his teeth as he struggled to maneuver himself and Nick through the threshold and crashing into the open door, the sound and Nick's groan of pain jolting you into action, tossing her phone on the counter and the half gone cigarette into the sink to worry about later, pulls one of the cabinet doors open, reaching for the small plastic box, throwing the lid open and quickly picked up a few packets of sterile gauze, ripping them open while Vito lifted the bloody end of Nick's shirt over his stomach. 

What you saw made your knees buckle, a long deep gash ran along his side, the edges dark and crusty and the surrounding skin an alarming shade of dark pink with streaks and swirls of red. 

"He just grazed me, bleedin’ already stopped,” Nick grits out in an attempt to reassure you as you crouch down beside him and carefully dab away the blood that is slowly trickling down the jagged edges, the obvious strain in his voice does nothing to reassure you that Nick is not gonna bite the dust in your kitchen chair, "just hurts like a bitch, is all."

You cover and apply pressure to the wound before looking over at Vito, the request for warm water and a couple of clean towels dying on the tip of your tongue when your eyes land on the patches of blood on his side too, tears stung your eyes and blurred your vision, No, I can’t lose both of them.

“I gotta get you guys to a hospital,” you force out through choked sobs as your eyes jump between them. 

Nick groans out a garbled “No.” at the same time Vito looks over at you from where he’s leaning against the counter, confusion clear on his face before looking down at himself,

“Shit, no, I’m fine,” he rushes out, lifting the edge of his shirt to show you that there were no wounds on him, “some’ve Nick’s blood must’ve gotten on me.” he explained, twisting from side to side before dropping his shirt back down.

You swallow the lump that’d been lodged in your throat in relief and ask him to hand you some warm water and clean towels. 

Vito turns to the sink and twists the knobs a few times, letting the hot water run as he looks through the cabinets for a large bowl to fill, meanwhile you keep a steady pressure on the wound and talk to Nick to keep him conscious. 

“We really should take you to the hospital Nick,”

“No hospital,” he groans out, his voice already sounding stronger now that he’s had a moment to rest.

“You’re probably gonna need stitches Nick,” you argue, exasperation bleeding into your voice at his stubbornness.

He doesn't say anything for a moment, the only sound in the small kitchen is the running water from the sink, you look up at him and see his eyes focused on Vito, who shakes his head at what he reads in his brother's eyes. 

You shoot your own questioning gaze at the younger man, unable to understand how Vito could suggest Nick not go to the hospital with a bleeding gash on his side, you open your mouth to say such but Nicky beats you to the punch saying, 

“I killed Sal.”

Your head snaps back to look at Nick so fast you wonder how you don't give yourself whiplash. 

“....what?”

“Sal took a shot at me when I went to talk to him, fix things with him, he had a gun under the table but his aim was off, the bullet grazed my side….before he could try again….” he paused and turned to look at you, his hand coming to rest on top of yours and gripping it tight, “I had to come back to you, is all I knew, I put one in his chest….’nd two in his head.”

You look back at Vito, “Did you—”

Before you could finish your question Nick and Vito answered with a chorused “No.”

“I had no idea what he was going to do,” Vito explained

“He followed me after I told him not to,” Nick continued, “I didn’t know he was there until….after.’

You looked at where your hands were joined, he could’ve….you shook your head as if it would help banish the dreadful thought. 

“We--I gotta lay low for a while, I’m sure Sal wasn’t the only one that thought I’d try and talk to him, when they find them, they’ll know it was me.’

Them? You looked back up at Nick, 

“Rocco, Sal’s bodyguard, he saw me go in.” he explained, brows furrowed and eyes hard as he looked at Vito.

You looked between them and caught the twitch in Vito’s cheek, the same one that told you he was bluffing when you sat down and played poker with him. 

“Vee?” Vito broke Nick’s gaze and looked at you and you saw it in his eyes, saw the truth Nick was trying to hide or spare you from, “oh Vee.”

“I had to, Rocco, he woulda—”

“You didn’t do shit, you hear me,” Nick yells over Vito, hands on his knees as if to push himself up off the chair and hissing when he shifts, muttering a fuck as he let's himself drop back down and lean against the high back. 

His hand comes up to punch at the bridge of his nose and let out an exasperated sigh and in a more relaxed tone says, 

“We talked 'bout this Vee, you weren’t there. Period. I went there alone, left alone, and you haven’t seen me since." He turns to look at you, dark eyes intense as they bore into yours, "Either of you.”

"Whaddya talkin' 'bout Nicky?"

Nick's eyes move from yours to look behind you at Vito, giving his head a slight nod to the side. 

"Imma give you guys a minute."

You heard Vito shift behind you, the sound of drawers opening and closing, then a quiet clink as he placed one of the larger ceramic bowls from your cabinets, an off blue you used for plating for special occasions and holidays, beside you and dropped a few folded towels in various shades and prints on Nick's leg.

The quiet between the two you stretch long after the muted thud of Vito’s shoes on the carpeted floor disappeared as he made his way through the livingroom and to one of the bedrooms.

When he still didn’t say anything, you shifted your weight, resting your knees on the cool linoleum and reached for the bowl of water, dipping your fingertip from your free hand in to check the temperature. Satisfied  that it was warm enough to not further irritate the skin around the wound, you reached for the towels and dropped a couple of them in the bowl, letting them soak as you carefully removed the gauze from his side. You wring the excess water from one of the towels and carefully dab at the stains, wiping away the red and revealing the pink and tanned skin underneath. You’re half way through clearing away the dried bloods when Nick breaks the silence. 

"After tonight, we—I can't sta—”

“Niccolo Emilio Tortano,” you interrupted, eyes meeting his as your hands stillied their work, “if you think I’m gonna stay in this god forsaken town without you, you got another thing comin’”

The corners of his lips turn up in a barely there smile, “Vito said you’d say somethin’ like that.”

“Vee’s a smart kid,” you nodded, dipping the soiled towel in the water, wringing it and going back to wipe away at the blood.

“He is, smarter than I was when I was his age.”

You’re selling yourself short Nicky, when you were his age, you were…. 

“I gotta plan to get us outta town,” he went on, telling you enough of what his plan was but keeping the grittier details you knew would be involved, especially of when he spoke about George, to himself. You were long finished cleaning his wound, adding some ointment and a taping gauze to his side by the time he finished explaining his plan. 

“You think it’s gonna work?” you asked, balling up the trash and pushing yourself up off your knees and walking over to throw it away in the bin under the sink. You turn to go pick up the owl of water, and catch Nick as he’s pushing himself up off the chair, bowl of pink water in one hand and the soiled towels in the other. You roll your eyes at him, leaning back against the edge of the counter while he dumps the water down the drain, turned the faucet on and let the towels soak, dumping a generous amount of dish soap and scrubbing at the stains. 

“It’s gotta.”

******

“Almost everyone you said showed up,” you said once you had moved back to your bedroom, hands reaching at the zipper at your back. 

“Almost?” Nick said stepping up behind you and lowering the zipper.

“Yeah, couple of guys came up to Vee, saying that Lorenzo and Orazio couldn’t make it but that they send their condolences, that you had promise, that it was unfortunate how things…unfolded.”

He gave a humorless huff as you pulled and shifted your dress off your shoulders, stepping out of it and draping it at the end of the bed. 

“George showed up,” you mentioned as you pulled out a pair of pyjama shorts and an old tshirt from the dresser, and stepping into the bottoms, Nick muttering a curse and asking what he’d wanted. 

“Told Vee and I that he was there for us, whatever we needed, to come to ‘im, that you were family to him ‘nd--”

Another curse interrupted you, “sonuvabitch has some balls.”

You tried but you couldn’t help that burst of laughter that came out of you, “Vee said the exact same thing on the drive back.”

That got a chuckle from Nick “It’s a Tortano trait,” he said as he came to stand in front of you, wrapping his arms around your waist, “I know that you did today wasn’t easy, I’m so--”

You pushed yourself up on the balls of your feet, pressing your lips to his, silencing his for a moment, pulling back and saying,

“I love you Nicky, without you here, there’s nothing for me to stick around for.”

Nick leaned down, pressing his forehead to yours, his hold on your tightening slightly. 

“Just a few more days, then, this’ll all be over.”

************************

@juguitos @something-tofightfor @its-my-little-dumpster-fire @the-blind-assassin-12 @suchatinyinfinity​ @bts-smolarmy @elanor-of-imladris @pheedraws @obscurilicious 

[hmsjiara]

glitter's sparklin on your heart now, darling (jj + kie)

request by @rcsales: prompts for Jiara!!: 74. “Why don’t you just sit there and look pretty?”, 80. “How do you get your skin to be so soft?” and 92. “Are you sure we should be doing this?”

i figured i should write something fluffy after my last one shot lol, and i aso wanted to write something for pride so here you go :) hope you like it, thank you for the request!

read it here on ao3.

                                      •••

“Are you sure we should be doing this?”

Now, that was a first. JJ, who just last week had done a wheelie with his motorcycle off of the dock at the Chateau, telling Kiara she was being reckless.

“JJ, you endanger your life on a day-to-day basis,” Kiara says, rolling her eyes. “Going to a pride rally is the safest activity you’ve done all week.”

“No, it’s just— I mean won’t your parents be pissed?” He asks, frowning at her from the passenger seat. “I heard your mom— she didn’t sound happy.”

When Kiara had come out as pansexual, her parents had been... supportive. They’d smiled and nodded and said that’s nice, sweetheart. But apparently, her attending a pride rally was taking it a step too far. It had escalated into a screaming match the night before, the gist being it’s fine to like girls, but talking about it publicly is crossing a line. She’d ignored it, because her parents reputations weren’t her concern, but JJ always got weird around shit like this. She’d explained it to him already: parents got mad at their kids, that was normal, they weren’t going to disown her over it.

“It’ll be fine,” she tells him, looking over her shoulder as she backs her car up. It was well past midnight— she had decided it would be best to leave while her parents were asleep. The parade started at eleven in the morning, so she’d booked them a room at a nearby hotel. This way, she could avoid an awkward confrontation with her mother, and they’d be able to get an earlier start the next day. JJ had texted her when he was in her driveway, and she’d crept downstairs with her pre-packed bag and grabbed her keys. She’d parked her car around the corner from her house as a precaution.

Kiara had worked herself up so much trying to figure out how to tell the Pogues that she was pan that their reaction to her whiskey-triggered, blurted confession while they were chilling on the hammocks at the Chateau had been somewhat anticlimactic.

John B had smiled, told her it was cool and passed her a joint, and that was that. Pope blinked once, as if downloading the information into his brain, and then nodded like it made perfect sense. JJ, however, had frowned and said, “Pansexual? What? Did you have like a giant crush on Peter Pan as a child?”

“No, JJ,” she’d said, trying to sound annoyed even as she gave him a fond roll of her eyes. “It means that I’m attracted to people based on who they are, not what’s between their legs.”

“Oh, well we knew that,” he said, shrugging, his eyes glazed and hazy from the alcohol and weed as he stared at her. “So, what I’m gathering is... this means that  even though you were macking on that Kook chic last week at the Boneyard, I still have a chance?”

Pope had shoved him out of the hammock, and JJ had fallen to the ground with a grunt. John B threw a towel at his head, but Kiara just laughed, rolled her eyes.

It was the usual JJ pigheadedness she was used to, but she had felt strangely comforted by it in that moment. She’d been so afraid they’d treat her differently, but the Pogues had acted like her announcing her sexuality was barely news at all.

It was a nice change from her parents, and even though JJ’s initial reaction had been utterly idiotic, since then he’d been nothing but supportive.

So, when Kiara mentioned that she was going to her first Pride alone, he’d volunteered to come and keep her company.

It was sweet, the kind of gesture JJ was prone to masking with cocky remarks and his usual deflections surrounding anything to do with emotions.

Either way, JJ certainly makes the trip more entertaining. It’s late, and the drive would normally be boring and lonely, but he hooks up her phone to the aux and blasts her Pride playlist. He keeps flipping through the songs, unable to choose one, but he finally settles on Born This Way by Lady Gaga.

JJ’s carpool karaoke is actually impressive— he can sing, which she knew, but there’s something about him screaming Gaga lyrics that makes Kiara’s heart jump. Then, Vogue by Madonna comes on, and he rolls down the window and starts screaming the words at passing cars. She has to tell him to stop, uses driver veto power to roll up the window, because he’s distracting, and she doesn’t want to start the weekend off by getting in a car crash.

The drive is already three hours long, but JJ insists that they stop for Taco Bell even though he’s already had dinner, claiming that it’s the least she can do, which Kiara finds ironic since he was the one who offered to come with her.

Their arrival at the hotel is just as chaotic as she expected. Kiara checks them in, her duffel bag on JJ’s shoulder as he whispers comments in her ear about the lobby’s patrons. She has to swat his hand away from the candy bowl, gives the receptionist a slightly manic, apologetic smile.

The woman’s own smile seems genuine, and as she hands them their keys she shakes her head and says, “I hope it’s not too forward, but you two make an adorable couple.”

Kiara opens her mouth to correct her, but JJ throws an arm around her shoulders and steers her away from the desk before she can protest.

“You hear that, Kie?” He asks as they wait for the elevator to arrive, his arm still on her shoulders, his breath warm against her ear. “She thinks we make a cute couple.”

She shoves him away from her, threatens to lock him out of the hotel room as a punishment. He pulls the key card from his pocket, somehow having swiped it from her, and she regrets it instantly when he presses every elevator button in retaliation. She tries to stop him, but he blocks her with an arm, and Kiara refuses to jump to reach the card he’s now holding above his head.

Instead, she moves to the other side of the elevator and pretends to be pissed, giving him the silent treatment.

JJ starts apologizing by the seventh floor, and is looking throughly ashamed by the tenth. She considers it a job well done, but his embarrassment only lasts for the duration of the elevator ride, and he’s racing her to the room when the door opens.

She swears traveling with JJ is like traveling with a five-year-old. Actually, the five year old would likely be better behaved. And she can’t put JJ in time-out if he annoys her.

Kiara had purchased the hotel room before she’d known JJ was coming, upgraded it to two beds when he’d told her. She’d convinced him it was too much of a hassle to split the bill, reminded him he was technically doing her a favor by coming and she should get the chance to repay it. The truth was, she had more than enough money, and she wasn’t going to let him spend his limited amount of cash on an expensive hotel room. It wasn’t like she required this kind of shit, she would have been just as content staying in a trashy motel, this was just safer and closer to the parade.

Still, when they enter the room, with it’s two queen beds and an en suite bathroom, the floor to ceiling windows showing a view of the city below, the PNC Plaza towering above the other buildings, and JJ goes quiet, she understands it’s because he’s never been in a place like this before.

He seems almost unsure of himself and some people might consider it embarrassing, but to be honest Kiara finds it endearing. He asks her which bed was his, and when she tells him he can pick, he beams at her like a child who’s just been given a free lollipop. He flops down on the bed by the window, his boots hitting the white sheets, and Kiara knows that her mother would faint if she saw it.

She had assumed that they would both be tired from the drive, but JJ is as restless as ever, unable to sit still as he examines every part of the room. She takes a shower while he explores, has to forbid him from going to the hotel pool at four am when he asks through the door, reminds him that they have to be up by nine.

JJ had rolled his eyes when she told him, said it was unnecessary to leave two hours before the parade started, but when she came out he was still lying on his bed, scrolling through Instagram on his phone.

She’s brushing her hair when he says, “Do we have signs?”

“What?” She asks, frowning at him.

JJ looks at her, eyebrows raised. “Did you seriously forget to bring signs? Isn’t that like the one thing you bring to a parade?”

Kiara stays silent, and he seems to understand that it‘s an admission of guilt. Okay, so she was bound to forget something, this just happened to be it.

“I’ll be right back,” he says, sighing as he grabs her keys off of the the table and starts typing something into his phone.

“Where are you—“

“Don’t worry about it.”

Kiara wants to tell him that she has to worry, because it involves him, but he‘s gone before she can say anything.

She shakes her head, resigned to the fact that JJ is almost an adult and that she can’t really control him. Even if the idea of her reckless friend driving her car to an unknown location in the middle of the night makes her nervous.

She decides to try and relax, changing into one of the hotels fluffy bathrobes and applying a sparkly face mask while JJ isn’t there to tease her about it.

When she hears the lock click, she’s lying in bed, making a list for the morning on her phone.

JJ bursts through the door, and it takes her a second to comprehend the sight of him with an armful of colored paper, glitter, and markers.

“What did you do?”

“Posters,” he says with a shrug, as if that explains it. “I went to a drug store to get supplies, since you were unprepared. ‘Cmon, Kie, get your ass over here.”

It was the same quiet, subtle consideration that had made him come with her, and Kiara had always admired that about JJ— his life was hell, but he hadn’t let that damage his character, his natural instinct to help the people he cared about.

So, she pats the spot beside her on the bed, let’s JJ lay out his supplies, and spends the next two hours telling him to put caps on markers and fighting over tubes of rainbow glitter.

She ends up making her sign the colors of the pan flag, writes the words Pan and Proud on it. JJ is strangely secretive about his, and she starts to get nervous when he is hiding it from her, but she smiles when he turns and she sees the words Hearts Not Parts written out in different shades of glitter.

He grins at her reaction, starts searching for a marker to sign his name, and she has a moment where she is studying him: lounging beside her in nothing but a pair of grey sweatpants, blonde curls mussed from running his fingers through his hair, his lips between his teeth as he focuses on writing his name, and she thinks about how easy it would be to lean over and press her lips to his.

But she ignores that urge, excuses herself to the bathroom and splashes cold water on her face, and when she returns JJ is in his own bed, finally ready to go to sleep.

The bed seems colder without him, but she resists the desire to ask him to join her again. Because they were just friends, and she wasn’t going to ruin the weekend by being selfish.

The problem, ironically, she thinks as she stares at his sign, is that JJ’s heart is exactly what’s made her like him so damn much.

                                     •••

The next morning is more hectic than she wanted it to be, but with JJ, she should have expected it.

Kiara had built an extra hour into their schedule just for this purpose, but she sleeps through her alarm and wakes up thirty minutes before the parade starts.

She trips on JJ’s discarded boots when she stumbles out of bed, swears as she almost face-plants on the hotel floor, shakes JJ a little harder than necessary to wake him up.

They end up sharing the bathroom as they’re getting ready, and Kiara complains about the steam from his shower ruining her hair, yells at him for getting in her way. JJ is still ready twenty minutes before her, and he lays on the bed while she’s panicking, infuriatingly calm.

Kiara’s so flustered that she forgets her car keys, but JJ grabs them, pushes the elevator button with a pointed look at her wedged heels.

Okay, so they’re not the most parade appropriate attire, but at least they’re cute. Kiara’s shirt, which reads easily distracted by all genders, is tucked into her jean skirt, and her hair is braided with rainbow beads,  her eyeshadow a blended version of the colors in the pan flag.

She spent a good deal of time selecting her outfit, but when she gets to the car, she realizes that she’s overlooked one crucial thing: JJ.

Besides the sign, there’s nothing to distinguish him as a member of Pride, so she insists on pulling out her glitter when they’ve arrived at the parade and parked on the side of the street.

She thought he would refuse, but JJ just says he’ll do it if he can do hers as well. She agrees, and then they’re brushing rainbow glitter on each other’s cheeks, leaning over the console so that their faces are inches apart. JJ keeps moving, tapping his fingers against the seat, bouncing his legs, reaching up to itch his nose so that Kiara has to swat his hand away.

She just tries not to think about his fingers on her face, how the blue glitter on his cheeks makes his eyes pop.

JJ is adorably focused, eyes narrowed as he applies the glitter, and then he says, “How do you get your skin to be so soft?”

Kiara shivers as he brushes a finger over her cheekbone, as if he can’t help himself. “It’s called moisturizer, JJ,” she explains, smirking at him as she starts to list all of the skincare products she uses. JJ loses interest soon enough, applying a little more blue and pink glitter and then declaring that his work is finished.

To her surprise, they make it to the parade with time to spare. It was as if a rainbow had exploded on the streets of the city, everyone was carrying signs and laughing and dancing and getting brightly-colored drinks from the stands lining the sides of the road. The sun is shining above, and Kiara starts looking at the UV index on her phone, tries to make JJ put on sunscreen. He refuses, says it will mess with the glitter, let’s out a cry of outrage when she presses dollops of it onto his cheeks anyway.

She thought he would be uncomfortable surrounded by all of it, but JJ seems perfectly at ease, studying their surroundings with genuine interest and curiosity. They buy drinks from the vendors who barely glance at Kiara’s fake ID, which makes sense since the alcohol is basically water compared to what the Pogues ingest on a daily basis.

A few people compliment their signs, and music is blasting from the speakers, and Kiara finds that she’s actually able to relax, laughing as JJ spins her around with an arm.

They get food from the trucks, JJ buying anything with the word meat in it while she opts for fish tacos. He chugs from the water bottle she brought them, the one he insisted they didn’t need, makes Kiara do a Jell-O shot.

It escalates from there, until they end up at a bar, exhausted and sun-soaked, and Kiara takes off her heels and rests her sore legs on JJ’s lap under the bar while he orders them drinks. He claims the beer will help with the ache in her feet, and it does, because thirty minutes later Kiara has pulled him away from the bar and onto the dance floor. They’re both a few drinks in at this point, and although Kiara hates it, her weight means she gets drunk faster than he does, so she’s reasonably tipsy.

It’s a blur of laughter and bright colors and rainbow face paint, all writhing limbs and bodies bumping hers. Someone calls for shots, and Kiara screams at the top of her lungs, slips her hand into JJ’s and raises their arms into the air.

Eventually, a girl with a warm smile and tan skin, her blonde curls dyed pink, grabs Kiara’s hand and starts dancing with her, hips rolling and tongue out between purple-lipstick painted lips. JJ just watches them without commenting, sips from his drink, raises his eyebrows when Kiara starts grinding on her.

The girl tugs her towards the bar, and Kiara follows, tells JJ where she’s going over her shoulder.

“Kie,” he whines, pouting at her. “What am I supposed to do? Just stand here while you go hook up with her in the bathroom?”

“Why don’t you just sit there and look pretty?”

He glares at her as she shoots a pointed look at the glitter on his face, but Kiara just laughs, leaves him standing in the middle of the dance floor.

She returns a few minutes later, a purple lipstick print on her cheek, and JJ pretends to be pissed at her, gives her the cold shoulder as the girl lays her arms on Kiara’s shoulders and starts swaying her hips.

But then a boy with black shorts and no shirt appears, a rainbow painted on his chest, screaming as he runs his hands through his brown curls and knocks back a shot of tequila. He’s obviously hammered, but it doesn’t make it any less hilarious when he wraps an arm around JJ and hugs him, presses a kiss to his cheek. “You’re adorable,” he whispers in his ear, nuzzling into JJ’s neck. “Wanna fuck?”

“Uh, no, er, I’m good thanks—“

Both Kiara and the girl she’s dancing with start cackling as the boy stumbles away, giggling at JJ’s dumbstruck expression.

Kiara throws herself at him, wraps her arms around his neck, the buzz from the tequila allowing her to whisper the words wanna fuck? in his ear.

He doesn’t push her away like she thought he would, instead he tugs her closer and let’s her take a sip of his drink, press a kiss to his cheek.

In fact, after that, they don’t stop touching.

JJ stands behind her at the bar to keep people from bumping into her, and Kiara sits on his lap when they return to their seats, clings to his hand when they eventually stumble from the bar and into an Uber. They’ll pick up her car tomorrow, she thinks faintly, when the world stops spinning.

Kiara has rainbow glitter in her hair and her feet feel like they’re about to fall off her body, but her chest is filled with this strange, warm feeling that only grows when she rests her head on JJ’s shoulder and says, “Thank you.”

“For what?” He asks, glancing at her, his blue eyes heavy with exhaustion and alcohol, his voice softer than usual.

“For this,” she tells him, gesturing to herself, the signs at their feet. “For today. For always accepting me for who I am.”

It’s cheesy, and they don’t do cheesy, but she’s drunk and JJ doesn’t seem to mind as he presses a kiss to her forehead. “Always, Kie. You don’t have to worry about that.”

[motleycrueroadie]

Along for the Ride (pt.5)

Author’s Note: Thank you to anyone that is reading this! I apologize if the pace of this is slow, now that I have my character established I’ll be moving through the scenes. This is Mick’s audition and the next one will include meeting Vince and so on!

Previous Chapters: One I Two I Three I Four

Over the course of my life, I think it’s safe to say that I have become fairly acquainted to fresh starts.

Leaving Deanna 

Moving from one end of the West Coast to the other

Changing my name to Nikki Sixx ( leaving Frank Carlton Serafina Feranna Jr. behind)

And now, leaving London for another fresh start.

 In the time that I’ve been alive, I have learned the quick and harsh lesson that you are the only person you can count on, so whether I want to have 0 or 40 fresh starts, that’s up to me. I’m not saying these are always going to work out in my favour, or that I am always going to make the right decision - quite frankly I make stupid ass decisions mostly - but I am the only person that I can truly count on. 

Do I regret leaving London? No. Do I regret the way I left them? Absolutely fucking not. However, am I feeling a little pessimistic about this band, considering that it consists of a drummer I met at a diner and some guitar player he’s dragging along? You can bet your fucking ass I am. 

Sometimes a fresh start begins with a blind shot in the dark and that is what I was doing right now. Last Friday, I met Tommy in a diner and today, the following Sunday, I’m waiting to see whether this is beginning on a good or bad note. I mean, fuck, I haven’t even heard Tommy play, he could be dog shit for all I know, but I trusted him. The kid must know his way around a set of drums, the way he was spinning those stupid fucking sticks around his fingers. 

The funny thing about quitting a band is that you have a lot more free time on your hands. Since I didn’t really have much else to do during this week, I figured I could bug Janis, and she didn’t seem to mind. Our routine remained intact. When I got off work, I waited for her to be done with her run before coming over for dinner. One of the only things that changed was how much time I spent at her place. She started letting me come over while she was in the shower, after I complained that I had nothing to do while I waited. Of course, everything Janis allowed me to do came with a price she told me. Janis explained to me the other night that because she was no “Mother Teresa” as she put it, that I would need to start earning my keep if I was going to be eating her food. We both knew she was joking, but I couldn’t let her joking go without consequence. The shades of red she blushed when I offered to do some of her chores while she showered and got dinner ready were well worth the work I put in. Janis gave me a quite modest list: water the houseplants and vacuum any dirt off the carpet that I got on the floor while I watered them. The chore itself never took me more than 20 minutes, which left enough time for me to be nosy. Somehow, Janis managed to fill every square inch of the apartment with something, all without making the place seem cluttered. She had knick-knacks and photos lining the wall and she also had this large bookcase in her living room that held all sorts of things. The radio and a cassette collection occupied the first shelf, board games on the second and on the bottom were a couple thick photo books alongside her high school yearbooks. I knew Janis was a runner from past conversations, but I had no idea she was a state champion. In fact, Janis seemed to have been the whole package in her high school days. She was a state champion runner, graduated with honors according to her diploma and had great grades but yet I didn’t see a college degree on her wall. I hadn’t brought this up yet, but I want to ask her about these books soon - she doesn’t know I’ve been through them though so I figured it could wait. 

The clock on the stove reads 3:45 when I hear a lot of noise outside my apartment. Rolling my eyes I headed towards the door, only to open it to see Tommy and his buddy Greg carrying equipment up the stairs. 

“Didn’t I tell you guys to come here at 4?” Despite the fact that it’s often polite to be early, I had told these guys to show up no earlier than 4 for our first practice because I didn’t want to disturb Janis while she slept. 

“Dude, it’s going to take me a bit to set this shit up, if we want to get started at 4 I should’ve been here earlier” Tommy grunted back intermittently, while trying to help Greg carry an amp up the stairs.Either I hadn’t made myself clear on the phone or Tommy doesn’t listen. Tommy was doing more of the heavy lifting than Greg by the looks of it, which wasn’t a good sign to me. 

“You the minivan?” I asked him, my way of offering help. He nodded to me while steering towards the door. As I went down the stairs, I glanced back up at Janis’s apartment to see if the noise had woken her up. I know it’s only 15 minutes of sleep but 15 minutes is a pretty big deal. To my surprise, she was leaning against the railing on the balcony. 

“Think you could come down here and help us out Joplin?” I call out to her, squinting up against the sun to see her in her pajamas and fuzzed out hair. 

“You boys look like you’re doing just fine!” She said, motioning with her hand for me to continue what I was doing. I hadn’t noticed Tommy walking down the stairs until he was beside me. 

“Isn’t that the waitress from the diner?” He asked me as we continued down the stairs to the minivan. 

“You tell me.” I smirked at him, knowing full well he remembered who she was. When I got to the bottom of the stairs, I turned around to find her still there.

“Can we postpone dinner until after practice?” I yell up to her. 

“Only if you play Barracuda as your last song.” She replied. I furrowed my brow, confused at the request.

“Why?” Tommy was the one to reply for me. 

“I like it.” She said, and I laughed at how matter of fact she stated this. “Plus it tells me when you’re done. Food will be hot half an hour after the opening chords.” Flashing a thumbs up back at her I turned around to continue what we were doing. 

“Do we get food too?” This came from Greg. 

“No.” I quickly replied, even though I knew Janis would feed them. I just didn’t want them there. 

We started practicing around half past 4, and finished at half past 8. In the four hours that we had spent in my apartment, I had shown Tommy and Greg a couple of songs and tried to get to know them. All I had learned was that Tommy and Greg were both in a band called “Suite 19” before this and that Greg couldn’t play the way I wanted him to. At 8:25, I had told them to start playing Barracuda because I was getting hungry and my patience was wearing thin. Heading up the stairs towards Janis’s apartment, I felt relieved to know I would be in her presence for the next little bit. Before rounding the corner I could hear Janis, not the girl that lived above me, but Janis Joplin singing Me and My Bobby McGee. Pushing open the door, I reached up to catch the bell before it could ring so as to not alert Janis that I was in the apartment. She was standing at the stove, swaying back and forth while lightly singing along to the song - just faint enough that you almost couldn’t hear her if you weren’t paying attention. Leaning against the door, I tried to keep as quiet as possible just to watch her. Suddenly, she stopped swaying and I thought my cover had been blown. 

“It’s been 30 minutes, I wonder what he’s up to?” She was thinking out loud. 

“He’s waiting to see if you notice that he’s in the apartment.” She whipped around, visibly surprised. 

“Sixx!” she practically yelled, clutching a hand to her chest. I could only laugh, and the stunned look she held on her face quickly faded into a laugh. That was one of the things that I enjoyed most about Janis’s company, she was never one to dwell when she was in a bad mood. She ebbed and flowed with the mood of the conversation. “I’m surprised you could be that silent, considering all the ruckus you’ve been making for the past four hours.” Crossing her arms, she leaned against the counter top while being careful not to disturb the pan on the stove. 

“By ruckus, do you mean a bass player and a drummer that know what they’re doing while the guitar player doesn’t?” 

“I suppose so.” She turned back to the stove, turning it off and bringing the pan over to the opposite counter to pour what looked to be meat into two bowls with fixings. She caught me watching her do this and must have noticed the confused look on my face, “We’re having taco salad Nikki. You’ll like it.” Reaching into the fridge, she grabbed a bottle of dressing and drizzled it across the two bowls before handing one to me. 

“So tell me, if this guitar player -” she motioned with her hand to indicate she didn’t know his name as she reached into a drawer for utensils.

“Greg”

“If Greg isn’t what you’re looking for, then why haven’t you called that guy from the newspaper ad?”

She was referring to an ad that I had shown her from the newspaper. Someone who described themselves as a “loud, rude and aggressive guitar player” had caught my eye. They listed a phone number, but after Tommy had mentioned Greg, I hadn’t thought to give them a call. 

“Well you see, Greg is a friend of Tommy’s from his old band” I figured I would cut the story off there and she would pick up on the rest. She snickered to herself. 

“You’re telling me that the man with jet black hair and a name like ‘Nikki Sixx’ is afraid to hurt Greg and Tommy’s feelings?” She motioned a tear running down her cheek while pouting and I scoffed at her. “Does Tommy know that Greg doesn’t fit your vibe?” She questioned, returning to her food. 

“He won’t say it cause Greg is there but yeah.” I said honestly, between bites. She nodded while continuing to chew on her food. 

“I didn’t hear a whole lot of singing going on down there tonight.” She looked over  at me expectantly, though I’m not quite sure what response it is she was looking for. “So it has been a little over a week, you’ve got a drummer you like and a guitar player you’re not so sure of and zero singer….” 

“Get to your point here Janis Jade Smith.” She laughed at how I had used her full name.

“Point is, when will I be attending this show of yours?” she was smirking but trying to hide it. Flipping her off, she laughed and we continued eating with one another in a comfortable silence.

Another week had passed since Tommy and Greg had arrived at my apartment, and things were  no better. I have little patience to begin with, but I had used it all on trying to teach Greg the way I wanted him to play. Sick of listening to me complain about the man, Janis told me that if I wasn’t going to pull the trigger and call the guy from the newspaper ad then she would. Before I had the time to process what was going on, Janis had left the apartment during the middle of dinner and returned 15 minutes later only to say “Sunday. He will be here at 4:00 pm sharp. If you like him, you tell Greg to hit the road.” So today, I was standing out on the balcony with Tommy letting him know the deal with this guy coming to audition. The faint sound of a bell caught my attention, knowing it was just before 4:00 I guessed that Janis woke up early. 

“That you up there Janis?” I called out, Tommy leaned over the railing to look up at the next floor. 

“Just came out to make sure that he shows up.” Answered my question.

“Listen man, how are we going to tell Greg to leave if we like this guy?” Tommy asked me as he moved his weight between each of his legs. If there was one thing I learned about Tommy in the short time since I had met him, it was that he had enough energy for the both of us. I could only guess that he’ll be a good partner in crime once the drinks are flowing. I shrugged my shoulders while smirking at him. 

“Act like you’re serving him a shot.” I heard a snicker above me as Tommy initially looked confused but then realized what I was getting at. 

“Give it to him straight..” Tommy mumbled under his breath as we watched a red car pull up in front of the apartment building. 

“Right on time!” Janis called out from above us. “Bring whoever is still around at 6:00 up for some dinner!” Sticking out a thumb over the railing, I heard Janis go back into her apartment as Tommy went down the stairs to help out the ad man with his equipment. I liked the looks of him, he almost resembled a slightly older version of me. 

By the time 6:00 rolled around, everyone was ready for a bit of a break. The guitarist that we kept was the man I came to know as Mick Mars, and we gave Greg the news as straight as it could be. If his ability to take news is anything like his drinking skills, I would say that he prefers mixed drinks. 

“Mick, my upstairs neighbour has offered to feed us dinner. You down for a break?” I asked him, knowing that Tommy already heard the offer.

“Why is your neighbour offering to feed us? I sure hope you aren’t taking charity because I don’t”

I know this apartment looks like a dump, but I’m not a charity case. 

“Janis and I have dinner together all the time. I’m not taking charity, I’m taking a free meal from a friend who is offering.” He appeared skeptical of my explanation. Glancing between the two of them, Tommy looked impatient. 

“I’m just hungry so do you think we can go?” Tommy asked. Motioning for the door, I began to walk out and up the stairs to Janis’s apartment. The three of us were rounding the corner to the landing where Crazy Train could be heard from her slightly ajar door. Glancing over my shoulder, I could see Mick and Tommy looking almost intrigued at this. Opening the door to the apartment, the usual bell alerted Janis to our arrival and she turned around with a pan in her hand. 

“Lasagna, salad and garlic bread tonight!” She exclaimed excitedly as she placed the baking sheet on the stove top. 

“It smells good Janis!” Tommy said as he bounded towards the kitchen, as he entered Janis handed him a plate and pointed towards the oven so he could grab himself garlic bread. 

“You must be the man from the ad that I talked to on the phone the other day.” She addressed Mick, who looked to be almost confused by the whole situation. Janis walked towards him from the kitchen with her hand extended, coming in to shake Mick’s hand. He returned the gesture and shook Janis’s hand. 

“Mick Mars.” 

“Loud, rude and aggressive guitar player. It’s nice to meet you. Janis Smith.” She began walking back into the kitchen, motioning for us to follow. We were each handed a plate and utensils while being told that we could grab a slice of garlic bread. Tommy had already planted himself on the couch in the living room, making himself at home.

“Anyone want something to drink?” She asked as Mick and I made our way to the couch in the living room. I noticed that there wasn’t going to be room on the couch for Janis, so I remained standing. Coming out from her bedroom, Janis dragged out a beanbag chair and placed it in front of the coffee table. I went to sit down on the chair when I was interrupted, “Sit on the couch Sixx, that’s mine.”

“Beer?” Tommy called out.

“One for everyone?” 

A collective yes was mumbled and Janis returned with 3 beers in one hand and her plate in the other. 

“Y’all sounded much better today. It was nice to finally hear those songs played correctly after listening to that sad sap try and keep up pace for the last week.” Now that Greg was gone, I think that Janis had given up putting on a good attitude about him. 

“We will sound even better once we have a singer.” Tommy replied, which started me on my train of thought. 

“Someone along the lines of David Lee Roth and Bowie!”

“So we want a skinny blonder fucker with moves?” Mick asked and I nodded, he was on the same train of thought. Sparing a quick glance over at Janis, she was eating quietly while watching the conversation. 

“I think I know who could be our guy!” Tommy exclaimed. 

Next Chapter

[daredevile]

Illuminate [2/5]

Summary: James Barnes, an upcoming artist in Brooklyn lives a routine life. It’s all sunshine and rainbows until you show up at his building, hesitantly becoming his roommate.

Warnings: Swearing :)

A/N: Well, I haven’t updated this in a loong time. And we’re way past summer so @ruckystarnes, hope you’ll still accept this for your summer of aus challenge lol. So, here you go @halfpasttheworst, I know you’ve been the most excited to read the next chapter, this one’s for you :) [This was in my drafts for the last few months and I never finished it...] Anway, hope you like it!!

The sunlight created a warm glow around your figure, its intensity slowly pulling you from sleep. You yawned, rubbing your eyes while adjusting to the sudden burst of light. It was quiet, peaceful even, no pitter-patter of footsteps, just pin drop silence. Milton brushed past your feet, his tiny paws gliding on the floor. You walked into the living room, noticing his mug placed on the counter, calling out his name - to your delight - received no reply. You grabbed a pan and began making breakfast. The growling sensation in your stomach grew minute by minute as you added the ingredients. Relishing the calm atmosphere, you sat in the balcony, watching cars and people go.

“Hey, Buck,” A man burst through the door, scaring the living daylights out of you. He noticed your alarmed expression and raised one hand to calm you down, “Oh, sorry. You must be Y/N, I’m Steve,” He dropped a cardboard box on the counter before shaking your hand.

“It’s fine, James does that a lot,” You replied, distracted by the softness of his hand. Steve’s eyebrows shot up before smirking at the mention of his friend’s first name.

Steve walked towards the couch, you appreciated his casual, friendly manner. Wondering how Steve could have a friend like James, someone who’s the exact opposite of him. 

“So, what made you move in here? James is usually picky about roommates,” Steve stared at you intently, his blue eyes speckled with flecks of green and gold. They were mesmerising. 

“Believe me, I can tell,” You rolled your eyes, recalling yesterday’s events, “But, I was desperate and this was my only option,” 

Steve chuckled at your annoyance, “He’s not so bad once you get to know him,” 

It was silent for a moment before you spoke, “Can I ask you something?” He nodded, “What’s wrong with him?” Steve remained silent, his body tensed slightly. “Don’t get me wrong, the guy’s artsy, funny and all - but’s what’s his deal? He seems like someone who’d have lines of women throwing themselves at him.”

“The thing is... he has commitment issues. Almost everything in his life is temporary - he doesn’t like getting attached. He pushes it away before he has a chance to get hurt, it’s his coping mechanism,” Steve’s focus shifted to the cardboard box, “He wasn’t always like this,”

“Let me guess, Lara?” You asked, recalling Steve’s voicemail. He sighed at the mention of her name.

“They were good friends, they understood each other. She took care of him, he did the same for her. They were pretty much lost in their own world. He was convinced she was the one, but...” Steve shook his head, “They fought, argued and soon, they were set on different things. He knew it was coming to an end, didn’t accept it though. I used to find him completely wasted on the couch, destroying the apartment. There was nothing I could do to help him, he just never listened. One day, she left. No explanations,” 

You stared at the ground, catching the burst of colour on his paintings in the corner of your eye. No wonder he was closed off and blunt. It was silent again, neither you or Steve could find the words to talk.

“Oh good, you guys are done talking about me,” James pushed himself off the wall, “Gotta say, my legs were starting to cramp,” His eyes trailed the box, his expression was firm, “Thanks for dropping it off, Steve. I’ll see you later,”

“But—“

“I’ll see you later,” The tone of his voice was set, Steve sighed before standing up. He walked past his friend, patting his shoulder.

You scoffed at his expression, mumbling under your breath while his back was facing you.

“Listen, I need the house to myself. So keep yourself busy for the next 6 to 10 hours. Cool? Cool.”

“What? No!” You exclaimed, he paid no attention to your refusal, continuing to set up his easel.

“Wasn’t a request,” He replied, strands of his dark hair falling to the front of his face as he leant forward.

“Fine, you have problems. News flash buddy so does everyone else. If you think you’re tricking me into feeling sorry for you, you’ve got a long way to go.” You grabbed his arm, annoyed at his lack of attention towards you. He eyed your hands, before sighing. 

“You’re gonna stand there? That’s where my easel goes,” He chuckled at your expression, receiving a glare, “It was a joke,” He raised his hands up in defence.

Swirling the hot chocolate in your mug, you stepped out onto the balcony, listening to the sounds of the bustling city. For a few minutes, your eyes were absentmindedly set on the traffic below, until a sudden burst of music came from inside.

“Seriously?”

“What?” He asked innocently.

“I didn’t realise we were back in 1942. Dude, this music is old. Older than you even!”

A fake-laugh at your comment, “This is a classic, and it’s much better than the shit on the radio these days. Plus, it’s your fault, I told you to leave.” He said, waving the paintbrush at you. “Dude,” He resumes dabbing paint on the palette, furiously mixing colours on the wood. 

“Are you done?”

“Sorry?” You snap out of your daydream.

“Are you done ogling me from afar? If not, sorry to disturb, I know I can be devastatingly handsome. But, it’s distracting.” James sends a smug smile your way, you shook your head to cover the red on your cheeks.

“You wish.” Milton brushed against your foot, satisfaction written over his features.“So, what are you painting?”

--------

“Let me get this straight, he kicked you out of your own house.” Natasha raised her eyebrow, unable to process what just happened.

“Yes, but no, he just needed some space.” You shrugged, checking the time on your phone. Only 5 hours more.

“Oh please Y/N, he’s being a jerk. I can’t believe you’re actually listening to him!” She exclaimed, motioning Wanda to listen. “Aren’t you the same girl who stood in line at Taco Bell to get those free tacos even though there were two hundred people in front?”

“Whatever. Look, it doesn’t matter, I didn’t want to be there anyway.” 

“Now you’re defending up for him. See! This is exactly what Wanda said would happen.” 

“What?” You grabbed the packet of Doritos from the table, a smirk appeared on Natasha’s face.

“You like him.”

To be continued

[inkribbon796]

Belonging

For Virgil’s birthday.

Summary: One anxious bean just wants to grab a midnight snack and enjoy his birthday in peace and quiet. His new friends have other ideas.

    Virgil crept into the kitchen, it was way too early, or for Virgil way too late, and no one else was around. He was hungry and wanted to hoard food so he didn’t have to see people in the morning.

    Unfortunately, even at two A.M there were two people in the kitchen: Patton and King. There were talking quietly, trying not to wake more people up.

    Before Virgil could back up, King noticed him. “Hey, Anx, how’s it going? Pat and I were heating up some water for hot chocolate and coffee. You want some, or both?”

    Hesitantly, Virgil came closer, already feeling awkward, “Uhh, sure.”

    “You don’t have to,” King reminded. “Silver got tacos, and bought too many since J.J and Chase are still out of town. There’s still some left if you want some of those.”

    “He won’t get mad if I take them?” Virgil scoffed.

    “Nah, he had seven yesterday, and said he didn’t want to look at another one for a week,” King dismissed. “Sometimes Silver gets into a food carving and he brings some of it back for us to have.”

    “O-Okay,” Virgil round up taking a taco and some coffee. Putting one of the hot chocolate packs in it.

    “So, ‘cause I didn’t get to tell you earlier: welcome to the Heroes’ Coalition, it’s a zoo, but you’ll fit right in.”

    “Thanks,” Virgil looked away.

    “Don’t worry, you’re not the first of the League to join us, and you won’t be the last if we’ve got anything to say about it,” King smiled. “Sides, I was watching you come into my park almost every day and I was getting worried about you some days. Cause it’s been getting cold and snowy.”

    “Wait,” Virgil stared at him in horror. “You knew that was me?”

    “Yeah,” King took a sip of his coffee. “It surprised me that no one else had put it together before me, probably because you like to hide your face so much. Compared to you, I might as well be V.”

    “Why didn’t you say something?” Virgil demanded. “You never let villains in.”

    “Can I call you Virgil, or do you want me to stick with Anxiety.”

    “Virgil’s fine,” he felt like his chest was trying to leap out of his throat.

    King just watched him for a little bit, obviously searching him for something and Virgil wasn’t sure if he wanted King to find it. “Alright, Virgil, look my dad worked in Dark’s Network, he was a tough guy, but he tried to protect me the best I could. Unfortunately, I had some uses that the network liked, so I started working there earlier than some of my other siblings, and I hated working with some of his . . . co-workers? Employees?”

    The hero looked like he was genuinely thinking of the right word to use. “Point is, my old man worked with the literal scum of the Earth, and I don’t see that in you. Yeah, your powers are freaky, and I don’t like slugs, but it’s nothing to draw and quarter you over.”

    “You have a fear of slugs?” Anxiety asked, it was always interesting to know what he summoned for people.

    “Oh yeah,” King nodded, eyes wide. “When I was ten, three of my brothers hid in my closet, waited until I was asleep and put slugs all over me. Then, like a gaggle of douchebags banged some pots and pans together to wake me up. They got grounded, but there was nothing my old man could do about it. Point is, it’s not your fault my brothers dumped slugs on me. Or made the Doc trypophobic. It’s not your fault you’ve got fear powers, right?”

    “Maybe?” Virgil tried to hide behind his coffee.

    “Okay, well, I can’t do anything about that,” King told him. “I can tell you that almost everyone here thinks you’re a good person who’s been dealt a bad hand. You’re one of us, and when I joined, Marv wasn’t too keen on me either but he warms up to people fast and you’re just sarcastic enough to get along with him great.”

    “So, what?” Virgil asked.

    “Well,” King pulled out a small box. “Patton got to talking, and we knew you wouldn’t want us to make a fuss about this, or all cram into the same room. So, happy birthday.”

    “You traitor,” Virgil gasped in panic at Patton.

    Patton just gave him a huge smile and pulled a box he’d been hiding in his lap. “Happy birthday, Virge.”

    King passed the small box over. “This is from the eggheads, Logan couldn’t be in person. He didn’t want to overwhelm you. Bing we had to tie up in the closet cause he refused to sit back. But with this, we’re all saying welcome. You don’t have to open it now.”

    Virgil took it, and after turning it over in his hand it found he could lift the lid to find a watch. It had a thin almost stretchy band and was more function over fashion. It had a digital display and was blissfully silent, Virgil couldn’t hear it ticking down.

    “What is this?” Virgil picked it up to see ANXIETY stamped into the back of the watch. Bing’s emblem scored into the metal as well.

    “It’s a welcoming gift,” Patton passed him the second box, which Virgil opened it to find a coffee mug with different song lyrics printed on the front of it. A lot of the lines of his favorite songs were on there. He smiled, touched by it.

    “Thanks,” he told them.

    “That watch is going to help you communicate with us, and if you’re ever in trouble you click this button,” King pointed out one of the buttons on the side, a red one, “and we’ll come to help you. So that way you can signal for help without being obvious. Also we put you on the same call list as Chase so if Anti is involved you don’t have to see him.”

    “Thanks,” Virgil felt nauseous.

    Anything else was interrupted when Marvin walked in, carrying something wrapped in purple wrapping paper in his hands. “Hey, just found this on the doorstep, Bing scanned it for yah.”

    Marvin set it in front of Anxiety, then walked over to the fridge to grab one of the leftover tacos. Unlike Virgil he just ate it cold.

    “You’re going to get sick doing that,” Virgil told him.

    Marvin rolled his eyes, “Kay, Mom.” Then he took another cold bite in front of him. “Yer gonna be like Jackie, aren’t yah?”

    “No,” Virgil told him, feeling that the contents of his new gift was soft. “Cause I’m just going to tell you not to do it, and then watch karma bite you later.”

    Marvin smiled, “Yer not so bad. Long as yah keep doing that, we’ll get along just fine. If ye think Anti’s botherin’ yah, give me a call.”

    “Thanks,” Virgil told him and opened up the new gift to find a black and purple scarf with gold fringes on it.

    It didn’t come with a tag, but Virgil knew who had sent it. There was only one person who could have sent it to him.

    “Who’s it from?” Patton asked, fawning over the scarf. “It looks nice.”

    Virgil shrugged, “Who knows, but it’s warm.”

    Everyone was all smiles and Virgil poured his old coffee into his new mug, enjoying the early morning and the quiet of the room.

[caffeineivore]

Cheer up emo fic!

For @vchanny-og. This will tie in with one of the fics I wrote for the @ssrevminibang. M/K. Rated a strong PG13 for brief mentions of sexual situations and a hint of violence.

The flashbulbs and paparazzi harassment she took as a fair trade-- a necessary evil for her background as well as her chosen profession. Even the gossipy tabloid stories, or anonymous, hurtful online comments and speculation. Morgan, having seen many a child actor and teen starlet fall from grace, stays out of the spotlight for the most part. No drugs, no inappropriate videos or pictures, no information on her personal life for the avid army of vultures online to devour and speculate over. It isn’t too difficult avoiding the paparazzi, either, when one lived in a Beverly Hills mansion surrounded by electronic gates and a dense circle of tall hedges, or when one was a minor working under the very protective wing of one Raven Huntley, nee Fletcher, whom Morgan was fairly sure could scare an armed robber into submission with little else than a scathing comment and a well-placed glare. Her agent was a nice lady, the way a fire-breathing dragon might have a soft underbelly, but it was well hidden under a generous layer of diamond-hard New York City sharpness. 

The lack of privacy and the intrusive nature of the general public did not become an issue until she’d turned eighteen, and well on the international fashion circuit. The pretty hotels in Milan and Paris, picturesque though they certainly were, offered little protection against the outside world. The first time that she’d gotten manhandled by a particularly determined and sleazy paparazzo, she’d been eighteen. Raven had none-too-gently yanked the man off of her and driven the business end of her stiletto heel into the man’s instep before getting in his face and letting out a blistering diatribe lavishly peppered with F-bombs. The paparazzo had backed off, but Raven had ushered Morgan up to her room, barged in after her, and unplugged all electronic devices before making a sweep and checking for anything out of place. Whatever she might have thought of the incident, she did not say to Morgan at that particular moment, but she already had her phone to her ear before she’d even left the room with stern injunctions not to order room service, go online, or let anyone in that she didn’t know.

Whatever arrangements Raven must have made that night, Morgan had woken up three days later to a knock on the door. One glance through the peephole revealed her agent, and a tall stranger wearing a plain black suit. 

Raven let herself in when she opened the door, but the man stood there for a moment, looking down the hall in what Morgan deemed to be an assessing sort of way before following Raven in and shutting the door behind him, taking the time to secure the chain latch as well as the lock. He was almost a head taller than Morgan’s willowy five-foot-nine, with wide shoulders and big hands, but what drew Morgan’s attention right away was his face, all watchful gray eyes and an impassive mouth and strong features, quite a departure from the fresh-faced, pretty male models she worked with on a regular basis. He had a square jaw and blond hair so pale it was close to silver, and a hint of an old break in an otherwise patrician nose saved him from being almost too handsome. 

“Morgan, this is Kane Wallace. Kane, this is Morgan Austen. I’ve known him since we were kids, before our paths veered in completely different directions. He works for a security firm out of Manhattan these days, but I figure this would be a nice change of scene for him, and there’s no one I’d trust more. You need a security detail, and someone who’d not only be able to make sure no one gets to you out in public, but won’t sell you out to the top buyer, if you get my drift. Kane’s mom and my dad were in law school together, back in the day, and we pretty much grew up in the same circles. He went to West Point and I went to NYU, and we lost touch for a while, but… here we are, and here we go.” 

“It’s nice to meet you, Miss Austen.”

He has a deep, measured voice, and wherever he might have been between West Point and a boutique Parisian hotel, he’d lost the New Yorker accent that still rang, sharp as a chime, in Raven’s voice. Morgan smiles, and offers her hand, and his fingers are rough and warm against hers. 

“You can just call me Morgan. If we’re to work together, we should be on easy terms. May I call you Kane, or do you prefer Mr. Wallace?”

“Kane is fine, Miss Austen.”

Morgan’s quite sure that he caught the eye roll she’d given Raven at that, but Kane doesn’t say anything, and if she’d have known that fateful meeting would ultimately change the whole course of her life, perhaps she would have been more nervous, or excited. But at the age of eighteen, the supermodel daughter of a Hollywood A-Lister, meeting a man who’d become her security detail was nothing more or less than just a matter of course, a fact of life. So she’d mustered up her cheekiest grin, tilted her head to the side, and beamed up at him with all the power of a megawatt heat lamp. “Well, hopefully this is the beginning of a long and beautiful friendship, Beefcake. It’s nice to meet you, too.”

He didn’t so much as crack a smile in response.

**

“Awww. I just got a text from Zack. Him and Noah just landed at Heathrow.”

“That’s good. I’m glad they made it safely to their destination.” 

“Don’t you think it’s romantic, Beefcake? This grand gesture he’s doing, this love at first sight thing. I really hope it pans out for our boy.”

“I’m sure he’s happy to have you in his corner, Miss Austen.”

It’s been five years, two months and ten days, and perhaps three hours since Morgan had first met Kane Wallace, and if that made her a bit like the one girl in Love Actually, she’s resigned to the fact. Kane does know that she exists, of course. But the chances of anything, even a hot makeout session that amounts to nothing, ultimately, are probably even slimmer. She’s turning twenty-four in six days, and he still calls her Miss Austen at least fifty percent of the time, and it would probably be infuriating if that buttoned-up propriety wasn’t such an intrinsic part of his disposition that it’d be a bit hard to it wouldn’t be fair to take it personally. She can’t help but needle him a bit, though. Certainly no one else would have the nerve to call him something so ridiculous as Beefcake to his face. 

They have fallen into a comfortable routine at this point-- he’s never far, whether she’s home or out, in LA or Milan or some picturesque tropical beach for a photoshoot. She has a sometimes-brutal schedule, going between sessions with the personal trainer and photoshoots and fittings and interviews, making the necessary appearances at the necessary well-publicised premieres and galas. He’s always in the background, as unobtrusive as a broad-shouldered, six-foot-three man wearing a dark suit and an earpiece could possibly be, and if he’s ever felt that the long days and the jet lag wore on him in any way, he certainly never says so. The one time, perhaps two years ago, that Morgan had apologized about a particularly long and strenuous photoshoot, he’d simply said that military training had prepared him for a lot worse, and then managed to somehow find her a Döner kebab stand still open despite the late hour. It wasn’t quite LA taco truck fare, but at midnight, still fighting jet lag and after a day of Luna bars and low-cal Vitamin Water in between grueling costume and makeup changes, it had been the best thing she’d ever tasted. 

And if she’s come to depend on him in far more than just as hired muscle to get rid of creepy paparazzi or overly-enthusiastic fans, or if she finds herself thinking about him in ways that aren’t at all professional, that’s no one’s business or problem but her own. 

She smiles up at him, wondering if he knows-- notices-- that it’s not quite the same smile that she always gives the cameras and the reporters and the fans, not even the same smile that she reserves for friends like Zack or Noah. “At least it will be an easy day for us today. Just one appointment. Ace Kato has a waiting list the length of my leg of models who want in on his photoshoots. I’m honestly shocked that he picked me out of the pile.”

He glances down, just for the space of a second, at her comment, from the bottom hem of her breezy yellow skirt to the no-nonsense red pedicure on her toes, but when he looks up again, he’s not smiling. “I’ll be right outside the studio door if you need me.”

**

The ‘easy day’ ends in disaster in very short order, after Kato corners her in the dressing room between costume changes and puts his hands on her naked back, all while smarmily whispering against her neck that he could take her career to new, astronomical heights, if she’d meet him halfway. The insinuation is obvious, and the slap Morgan delivers to his face is reflexive and shocks her as much as him. A moment later, Kane is in the room-- Morgan doesn’t even have time to wonder how, precisely, he made it through the electronically-locked door-- and pulling the photographer off of her the way a wolf might drag off a deer by its neck. It’s a blur after that, sort of-- somehow, she’s bundled up into the back of her driver’s car, and Raven, not a cuddler by any stretch of the imagination, is holding onto her the way a protective mother might soothe an injured baby chick, smoothing down her hair with one manicured hand even as she barked into her phone, clearly on the line with the agency’s in-house counsel. 

“It’ll be a settlement, probably. No one wants to drag this through a courtroom shit show. But as of this minute, no one in any of our offices will work with him ever again. It’s doubtful that he’ll press charges, even if Kane did break his jaw while pulling him off of you. I’m cancelling your appointments for the rest of the week.”

Morgan holds it together all the way home, waves off her assistant and the housekeeper and even her mother, all of whom have heard some heavily edited but possibly exaggerated version of what had gone down, and goes for a bubble bath complete with candles and wine, and it’s only after she’s bundled up in her robe alone in her room, skin pruney from the too-hot water and hair a wet and tangled mess over pillowcases meant for dry-cleaning only that it hits her. And with his usual quietly uncanny timing, Kane knocks on the door, and even as she opens it, she smells the distinct scent of fresh Animal-style In-n-Out fries-- her favourite comfort food as a child-- and that’s when the tears come. 

Without any question, the housekeeper will have something awful to say the next morning about greasy fries on the furniture, but neither of them are worried about that at the moment, and though it takes perhaps a minute or two, Kane eventually steps forward instead of back, and certainly she’s looking her worst just then-- wet and bedraggled, without a speck of makeup, wearing nothing but a fuzzy pink bathrobe. She’s also undoubtedly getting tears and snot on his shirt, but for a man of few words who rarely even smiles, his arms are strong and gentle just as she’d always imagined, and the rumble of his breathing and heartbeat, steady and low beneath her cheek, is what finally calms her down. Her hands are clenched around handfuls of his shirt and he sits her down on the bed, brings her the now-cold fries, and makes her eat them, not stepping back until she manages a ghost of a smile. 

“Raven said you broke his jaw.” Her voice is slightly scratchy around a mouthful of messy sauce and potato. An ominous glint enters Kane’s eye, and he raises his chin.

“Might have. Would’ve done worse, too, if I had to.”

“I know.” He doesn’t speak much on his background, though he’d mentioned before that he had decided against making a career out of the military due to a dislike of politics and killing people on the orders of people with selfish motives. Nonetheless, if nothing else, she knows that Raven would not have appointed him to this role were he not anything less than completely capable, and in this case, capable might as well have meant deadly. Kane still walks like a soldier, and scans a room and its occupants the way an officer might, and in those last few moments, the arms that had held her had been hard and solid as steel. “This is so hard.”

His jaw clenches, and he looks down at the spotless plush carpet underneath their feet. “You’re entitled to whatever measures you must take to recover and heal. I’m sorry I wasn’t there, earlier.”

He couldn’t have been there any earlier unless he’d had superpowers and teleported into the room. As it stands, Morgan’s still fairly sure he’d broken down the door, but she wasn’t even referring to that, at least not completely. She laughs, but it’s a hollow, almost desperate sound. “Kato’s a creep who will get his ass sued and blackballed, but he’s just one of many creeps in the world. I’m not going to let a creep ruin anything more than one day out of my life. But it’s so hard to be around you and act normal and not like I’ve been trying to fall out of love with you for the last few years, because I can act normal around you, unlike everyone else, and you don’t care if I’m looking pretty or acting charming or if I’m a mess, and you’re the only one who always knows what I need. And I have no business even having this conversation with you. It’s not fair, and I’d be no better than Kato, using his position to coerce something out of another person.”

His breath escapes in a stutter, and Morgan doesn’t have it in her, just at that moment, to look up into his face, see consternation in those usually-unflappable features, or hear any hasty apologies. This, too, shall pass. She is Morgan Grace Austen, born and bred to handle anything life threw her way with a perfect smile on her face, and she’s already cried once today in his presence. It takes every bit of practiced poise she can muster, but she manages to square her shoulders, turn away with her head held high. “I’d like to be alone, now. Please. I will be quite safe.”

He doesn’t make a sound, exiting the room and shutting the door behind him, but the solitude of her space without him in it weighs in the air like the gloom before a cold rain.

**

One can almost always find the strength to carry on, and moreover, this day had been inevitable since the day they’d first met, all those years ago. Morgan finds herself able, after a sleepless night and a day of avoidance, to act almost normal again around him. She’s cordial, and so is he, and both of them cautiously never mention the incident, and if he notices that she is careful not to needle him or call him Beefcake or touch him in any way, he doesn’t remark upon it. But she feels the weight of his eyes on her, always watchful and protective but hotter, heavier somehow at odd moments. She throws herself into work and gets a contract as the spokesmodel for an up-and-coming cruelty-free cosmetics brand, and shoots a series of PSAs against bullying in schools and online. Her twenty-fourth birthday comes and goes without much fanfare, though she throws the expected no-expenses-spared party for the occasion, inviting along a few dozen of the most tolerable and non-problematic of the glitterati for an evening of champagne and fancy finger foods in an exclusive club. Heavy security keep out enterprising paparazzi, but Morgan does select and sell one carefully-taken group selfie to People Magazine and arrange to donate the proceeds to a charity benefiting victims of sexual assault. 

True to Raven’s predictions, Ace Kato settles out of court, and though no details of the case are leaked, his demand and popularity as a fashion and celebrity photographer seem to vanish almost overnight. Raven makes a few scathing comments that he would soon be leaving town in disgrace and perhaps end up taking baby pictures in a Sears somewhere. 

The new year comes and brings with it the usual flurry of activity in Hollywood as Awards season kicks off and the deep, intellectual films of the winter months-- a far cry from the CGI-and-explosions-laden summer blockbusters-- have their premieres. 

Kane takes a week around Christmas as personal time, and travels off to some unknown destination, returning the day after New Year’s preoccupied and morose, though still impeccably polite and considerate and thorough. Morgan lets it go for all of two days before she corners him, and plainly asks him what is wrong.

He hedges, and looks down at his phone, and Morgan knows that she’s pouting by that point and doesn’t care. “You know everything there is to know about me, Beefcake. Down to how much Chipotle I scarf down every time Shark Week rolls around and how much I secretly hate Pilates to the fact that I still can’t watch The Lion King without crying. You can tell me what’s wrong with you for a change. Give me something to do to help.” He’s wearing a cotton t-shirt rather than the usual perfectly pressed button-down underneath a suit jacket, and of their own volition, her fingers curl into the soft cloth, wrinkling it. “Let me in. Please.”

He wraps his hands around her slim wrists, wide palms warm and calloused against her skin, but doesn’t pull her hands off of him, and acquiesces.

**

C’est La Vie is the type of arthouse film with a limited release, produced by some bigshot actor and featuring the usual dichotomy of virtual unknowns in leading roles and cinematography dreamy and lush as a French Impressionist painting. Morgan does not generally attend these premieres-- they inevitably run late, and she unfailingly gets cornered by either pretentious auteurs looking for a Muse du jour or well-meaning but nosy pillars of the industry from her mother’s generation, at least as inquisitive about her personal life as the most determined of the paparazzi, and more likely to be closer to the mark with it. But this evening is, as she admits to herself, a labour of love.

The gown that she has on is golden silk, Yves Ste. Laurent couture, and she’s got a good ten carats of yellow diamonds dangling on her neck and ears. But the question that Morgan gets asked the most, down the stroll of this red carpet, is who is the frail old lady there with her, hooked up on oxygen and being pushed in a wheelchair? 

“She’s a friend of a friend, and she’s never been to Hollywood before.” She gives the answer with a warm smile for the cameras, and though she’s certainly wearing impractical shoes for the occasion and her entourage is not far off, she pushes the wheelchair the whole way herself, bending down periodically to make sure that the occupant-- Kane’s grandmother, Doris, is comfortable. 

There’d been a lot of strings to pull, important people in the industry to sweet-talk, but ultimately, Morgan had prevailed in her goal. They’re seated quite close to the front, and on Doris’ other side is a legend, recognizable even though his black tie differs quite a bit from the rugged garments he’d worn in some of his most famous roles.

“My, my, aren’t you Mister Harrison Ford?” Doris whispers, the blush on her papery cheeks as charming as a schoolgirl’s. “You were my favourite, when I was younger. That Han Solo was such a dashing rapscallion.”

“Why, yes I am.” Harrison winks over Doris’ head at Morgan; this seating arrangement had been cleared with his people well in advance of this evening, and comes as no surprise. “Pleasure to meet you, ma’am.”

The movie premiere is surprisingly enjoyable, and by the end of the evening, Doris has opened up to the actor and the two are chatting away like old friends. They don’t attend any after-parties, but Morgan pours Doris a half-glass of Dom Perignon and toasts her happiness, and at a perfectly decent hour, takes Doris back home. The private plane will take Doris, in the end stages of heart failure, back to Upstate New York in the morning, to begin hospice care. 

The limo ride back is mostly quiet, and for a moment, Morgan thinks that Doris might have fallen asleep, but Kane’s grandmother coughs, then looks at her with eyes that might have gone rheumy and soft with age but are the same shade of gray as her grandson’s. “You’re a nice young lady, Miss Austen. I can see why he loves you so.”

Morgan can smile and laugh on command, but she can’t control the quick gasp, the heat creeping up her neck and face. “He’s become… a friend. We’ve known each other for six years now. But surely you’re mistaken.”

“I’m not worried about hospice care, much as Kane might fret over it. It will be peaceful, you see. I’m hoping to live long enough to watch the leaves change colour-- sorry, dear, but California autumns have nothing on the East Coast, but if that isn’t meant to be, I’ll be seeing Kane’s grandfather again soon. He looks just like my husband did when he was young, too, though Calvin’s eyes were green. He’s a good boy.” Doris reaches across the aisle of the limo, pats the back of Morgan’s hand with her quavery fingertips. “I’m glad that he won’t be alone. He’s always been such an independent boy, but it doesn’t do for one to have no one to share their hearts and lives with.”

**

Doris leaves the next day, and Kane goes with her, and though Morgan throws herself into work for the next four days, his absence feels like a void in the center of her world. She wraps up some ad-work for the cosmetic brand, makes a brief appearance on one of the late shows. Needless to say, in the space of a five-minute interview, she gets questioned about her unusual guest to the movie premiere, but she keeps it simple, stating that it’s a friend of a friend, shamelessly invoking Harrison Ford and stating to the host, charmingly, that certainly many women would love to meet Han Solo and Indiana Jones himself before they passed, and she couldn’t blame her friend one bit. Of course, as is expected, the host segues into asking her about her own love life, and Morgan simply smiles. 

“Of course I love somebody. I love a lot of people. For a lifestyle and a career that could be built out of artifice, I feel like I am blessed to know some of the best people, as friends, or colleagues, or associates. I am the luckiest girl in the world, and it has absolutely everything to do with the people I love, and not my work or my connections.” Somehow, she knows that Kane will watch this segment, though he is hundreds of miles away, and the smile she aims for the camera is the one she generally reserves for him, alone. 

She arrives home from that studio appearance the same day as Kane, though he flies commercial and lands a good two hours after her. She’s slightly jet-lagged, and relaxing in her wing of the house in her pajamas when he comes in, looking far too good for someone who’s just left a loved one to their final rest and flown from coast to coast. Morgan clasps her hands together so they don’t reach for him, but just for a moment, after he greets her-- Morgan, for once, and not Miss Austen-- his eyes soften almost imperceptibly, and that alone gives her the courage to clear the air.

“I owe you an apology, I think.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Why would you say that?” 

“Because… I promised myself, long ago, before I met you, that I would never take advantage of anyone who worked for me in any capacity. That I wouldn’t overstep my bounds, either in thought or action, because so many people do, and get away with it, and that’s just not fair.” She has to be honest with him-- he deserves no less than the complete truth, and if her smile is shaky at the corners, she at least still manages to look him in the eye. “I can’t not love you. It’s not possible. But I won’t do anything out of line. You have my word, and I’m a woman of my word.”

“I know.” He steps closer, almost too close. He smells fresh, not at all like someone who had just been sitting in a tin can breathing recycled air for hours. “I’m generally a man of my word, too. But I think I’m about to break it.”

Before she can asks him what he means, he reaches for her, and takes her hands in his. Her hands are slim and dainty, currently sporting a shimmery pink manicure and a Pandora bracelet. His are tanned and wide, with rough palms and a utilitarian black watch, and his fingers are warm wrapped around hers. “I promised myself, when I took on this job, that I’d never touch you. That I would never even think to put my hands on you, or behave in any way that could be construed as unprofessional.” He tugs her in, then lets go of her left hand to cup her cheek, and she’s almost close enough to count his eyelashes one by one, and her breath catches somewhere between her throat and her lips. “I’m about to break that promise. And, speaking of, I quit.”

Before she can say anything in response, his mouth is on hers, and he doesn’t kiss her in the gentle, easygoing way of a casual but enjoyable date. He hauls her in, lifting her slightly off her feet as his lips all but devour hers, as though she’s his air and water, one hand cupping her nape as the other anchors at the base of her spine. She feels herself moan, but the sound of it is blushingly wanton in the quiet of the room even as she sinks her fingers into his shockingly soft hair. 

It could have stopped there, maybe, if this hasn’t been building for so long, so intensely. But neither of them seem capable of letting the other person go. She goes for his shirt buttons first, ripping one off in awkward frustration as her nails get in the way, but then he laughs and lifts her up and carries her into her room, kicking the door shut behind them between more kisses-- on her lips, tracing a path from her jaw and down the length of her neck. Her own bed feels new somehow when he joins her on it, but he doesn’t touch her until she reaches up and kisses him again. She knows that he knows that she’s never slept with anyone before, and yet, after sharing everything else in the last six years, it doesn’t even feel awkward when he slides the last few pieces of clothing off her shoulders and legs. Morgan’s not self-conscious as a rule-- certainly, in the name of fashion, she’s been photographed wearing some fairly risque pieces before, often in the company of strangers, but she finds herself looking up into his face timidly as his eyes rake over the length of her, from the blonde hair fanned out over her pillows to the toes curling into the sheets. 

“God. You’re the most fucking beautiful woman I’ve ever seen in my life.” His words are blunt and a bit abrupt, but it coaxes a smile out of her, and then his mouth and hands are wandering over her bare skin, and there’s no time to overthink it any more. 

Much later, as night falls over Los Angeles, Morgan cuddles into his side, feeling slightly sleepy and warm and very, very loved. “You quit, hmm, Beefcake?” It should feel awkward to tease him when she might have possibly squealed his name at an inopportune moment in the recent past, but then again, she’s never felt more safe or comfortable than when they’re together, so maybe things hadn’t changed so much, after all. “I guess you must, for the sake of both our reputations.”

“I quit working for you. I’ll never quit protecting you, whether or not I get paid to do so. I can do remote work on security systems or whatever. That’s all just details to figure out.” He tugs her close and runs his fingers down the length of her bare back, and she leans into the touch like a cat. “Go to sleep. We can figure this out in the morning.”

“Mmm. You’re warm. You don’t snore or talk in your sleep, do you?”

“If I do, too bad. You’re stuck with me.” He presses a soft kiss to her temple and tugs the covers up over them. “I love you, Morgan Austen. I figure now’s the time to finally say it aloud.”

She feels her mouth curve into a smile against the skin of his shoulder. “I love you too, Beefcake. And now’s the perfect time.”

He doesn’t snore or talk in his sleep, but he doesn’t let go of her all night, and he’s still holding her close when she wakes up in the morning. Morgan opens one eye, texts her assistant to cancel her hair appointment, and curls back up into his arms. Today, she’s sleeping in.

[queerchoicesblog]

Marlinspikes (ILB, Danni x F!MC)

This is my last February prompts fanfic and...I warn you that it’s pretty ANGSTY/SAD (to say the least xD). Just so you know, the inspiration for this one came from Castle of Glass by Linkin Park (quoted below).

Requested by @darley1101, this fanfic takes place two months after the Pine Springs flood. Danni notices that Harper (F!MC) is still hurting badly for the events and the secrets they uncovered and encourages her to open up with her. Warning: this is pro-Josephine even if, as you’ll see yourselves, it’s a tough call for Harper. Also, special thanks to @brightpinkpeppercorn: our ILB conversations were essential for this fic...and I give you full credit for the “sin sentence”!

Prompt: “Let me love you”

Word Count: 1994

Perma tag: @brightpinkpeppercorn @psychopathdreamer21 @abunchofbadchoices @bbaba-yagaa @silverhawkenzie @begging-for-kamilah @melodyofgraves @bhavf 

Tags: @esteladannishreyakamilah 

Warning: occurrences of bad words

________________________

Bring me home in a blinding dream

Through the secrets that I have seen

Wash the sorrow from off my skin

And show me how to be whole again

Harper had been unusually quiet since she was discharged from the hospital after the flood. Sure, she had every reason to be shaken but it'd been almost two months now and she didn't seem to make any progress. She hanged out with the group, celebrated Parker's promotion to Chief of Police, went on dates but every now and then you could still see her gaze sadden and wander into the distance. She was there but at the same time, she was far away. Danni noticed and decided to investigate. So here she was, knocking on Harper's grandpa house with a box of food in her hands. She was concerned: Harper, well they all went through a bunch of traumatic experiences lately but Harper was Josephine's granddaughter and the whole thing really took a toll on her. Understandably, of course. Danni wasn't under no false illusion to see her finally happy but she would have loved to see her a little less haunted than she was -Danni could tell - beneath her tough, jokester appearance. And, on top of that, it was no mystery that she would have come back to Hartfeld in a couple of weeks. The mere thought of it made the girl frown. She didn't have to wait long, When Harper opened the door, the young woman couldn't help but notice the dark circles around her eyes badly hidden with concealer. Danni put on the brightest smile she could manage and raised the box. "Special taquitos delivery for Miss Vance" she beamed.

Harper's tense jaws relaxed visibly. "Well well aren't you the most adorable girl on earth?" the Vance girl said, pulling her in a quick hug and brushing her lips against hers. "Thank you so much, Danni. Please come in and make yourself at home: mi casa es tu casa, that's how you say, right?" Danni walked in and made her way to the kitchen. Harper followed her and lazily leaned on the threshold. "Will you stay for dinner? Elliott is out with Grandpa, they went to pay a visit Tom and I think they won't be back soon...so we have the place for ourselves" The last line was supposed to be flirty but the smile on Harper's smile didn't reach the eyes. Danni put down the box on the table and asked: "Depends, do you want me to stay?" Harper wrapped her arms around herself. "I...I could use some company. Especially your company" Danni's heart tightened seeing the infamous Harper Vance who won't turn down a tumble so vulnerable. She felt that if she had hugged her a bit too tightly at that very moment, she would have crumbled to pieces between her arms. "Then I'll stay. Let me heat them a little, they're tastier that way. Why don't you dress the table in the meantime?" The other girl nodded and mechanically gathered a tablecloth, plates, forks and knives. Then she opened the fridge. "Hey it's your lucky day, beers are on the house" she announced picking up two bottles. "Sounds like I won the lottery" Danni winked, heating the pan. Then, as her girl handed her one the bottles she opened, she spoke again: "It's none of my business but why didn't you go with Elliott and your abuelo? I mean Tom's is a friend of yours too" Harper took a gulp of her drink. "Yeah but Grandpa wants to ask him to repair his boat and frankly, I'm sick and tired of boat talks and of water in general." "Preach to that" Danni toasted. "And...I just needed some alone time. You...you are welcome to stay though, obviously" "Alone time you said...something's troubling you, isn’t it? I mean, more than usual. You have a lot to process..." "No, I just...I just wanted to relax at home" "You sure?" "Yep! Are your legendary taquitos ready? They smell delicious!" When the food was ready, the sat down and Danni filled Harper in on the latest events in town, her new photojournalist work at ClickIt, how she got to have a Skype chat with Leah Myers...anything to keep the other girl’s mind busy. However, she was taking a sip of her beer when it happened again. Harper's slowly diverted her eyes and looked out of the window. Her gaze wandered off into the horizon and she went quiet. She had barely touched any food. "I messed up this time? I mean, my taquitos" Danni asked tentatively, hoping to bring her back. Harper shivered and her blue eyes fell on her again. She looked like someone who woke up from troubled dreams. "Sorry, I spaced out" she said, smiling grimly to herself. "Hey Harper, are you sure you're okay?" "Yes, I'm...I guess I'm less hungry than I thought" "Forget my tacos, talk to me" Danni pronounced it as if it was a prayer. "You know, at least I hope you know that you can come to me for anything. I know that something is troubling you, I can tell even if you're trying to hide it. Talk to me, let me help you" Harper looked her in the eyes for a while as if pondering her words. Then she hung her head in defeat. "I don't know what to do, Danni. And I...I wish my mom was here cause she always knew the right thing to do, unlike me" Her voice cracked and she grabbed her head, covering her face to Danni. The photojournalist immediately dashed towards her and squatted down beside her, gently stroking the girl's back. "Harper, it's okay, I'm here" "Nothing is okay Danni! Nothing" Harper muffled against her own hands. "Hey, move those hands aside, look at me" A sob escaped Harper as she started shivering again underneath Danni's palm. The former barista pulled her a bit closer, always stroking her back reassuringly, and gently removed Harper's hands from her wet cheeks with her free hand. "You have every right to be upset after all that happened, let it all out, I'm not going anywhere"  she said softly, cupping one of her cheeks. "I thought I was strong, Danni but this, this is so much to process, too much" "You're one of the strongest people I've ever met, sweetheart! You always kept your cool and brought us together even when you were scared too: that's strength in my book" Danni gave her a sympathetic smile "You miss your parents, yes?" Harper's eyes welled with new tears. "Yes and the scene, blood everywhere, their bodies laying on the ground...I still replay the scene in my head sometimes, it's brutal" "I'm telling you what to do: next time it happens, you pick up your phone and call me, deal?" Danni squeezed her shoulder affectionately. "I...I have no one to talk about that" Harper admitted "Elliott has nightmares too and I don't want to upset him even more. When we found them it was hard enough" "What about Grandpa?" A flash of anger gleamed in her eyes. "Grandpa got them both killed! I would never talk about that with him: he would give me pathetic puppy dog eyes when he was the one who sold them! He told those fucking pricks and now mom and dad are gone. They literally laid on the ground in their own blood...because of him!" "Okay okay, sorry Harper!" Danni tried to calm her down before speaking again. "You hold a grudge to your abuelo, don't you?" Harper shattered her jaw and nodded, as warm tears streamed down her face. "I can hardly look at him...I try to play along for Scooter's sake but the truth is I think I hate him or something like that. I don't think I will ever forgive him for what he did to my mom, my dad and Josephine" "But Josephine almost killed us all, almost killed even you..." Harper looked fiercely into Danni's eyes. "She was betrayed by the man she loved and who made a vow to protect her and their daughter, Danni! He knew who those assholes of the Society were and yet he told them everything and didn't even try to save Josephine. She did no harm to anyone, she knew the dangers of the Power and carefully avoided them but then Grandpa handed her to those bastards. They threatened him to hurt their daughter instead, mom, because obviously he told them about her too and he helped them torturing grandma. She told me the whole story, Danni...it was awful: he handed Astrid the marlinspike that bitch stabbed into my grandmother's heart. They tortured her and forced to turn into the monster we all saw. But she was right..." "Innocent people died, you could have died...while your grandpa was maybe weak but-" "Weren't Josephine, mom and dad innocent too? But they died because of him! He is a coward and that was his sin" Harper cried "He ruined everything, Danni..we could have been a happy family, we could have been happy and safe if they were all here" Danni sat on Harper's lap and wrapped her in the tightest hug, gently cradling her girl as she cried herself out on her shoulder. After a few minutes, the Vance girl spoke again, her voice rough and tired. "It's so hard to pretend but I want Elliott to heal and be happy. I just...I will never forgive Grandpa and I'm on alert every time they are together, like if there are still cultists out there and they find them will Grandpa protect him or hand him to those pricks only because they yell louder? Elliott is all I have left...”

Danni stroke her cheek, wiping away a tear with her thumb.

“Can I speak now, Harper?” 

The other girl nodded.

“Harper, you don’t have to go through that alone. This pain you feel now-”

“This pain is all I have left of them. Of my family” Harper grimaced “But you’re right Danni...Grandma Josephine killed so many innocents blinded by her wrath. I can’t change that. The people here will always remember her because of that: she will always be the Lake Monster to them, to anyone...maybe I should leave this place after all”

“Stop it, Harper! If...if you leave this godforsaken town” - the mere thought of it made Danni frown- “you will do it because you want to: on your terms, not like a fugitive or something like that! You can’t feel guilty for all those deaths, you have nothing to do with them. You may be Josephine’s granddaughter but you’re not her. She would be proud of the woman you are now, for what it’s worth"

Harper winced, diverting her eyes.

“I know that...I rationally know that, Danni...I just” her voice cracked “I just feel like that marlinspike they pushed into her chest, the one I used to let her go...I just feel it burning in my chest too all the time as if I have no air left to breathe-”

“Then let me help you remove that marlinspike. I cannot assure it won’t hurt, but I will be at your side every step of the way. I will hold your hand and wipe away your tears. I will steal an oxygen mask from the hospital if need be! But please, Harper...let me love you, let me help you heal. We can do this together” 

Danni pronounced the last words, resting her forehead over Harper’s. Seeing the girl she fell for so broken inside was killing her. They both kept quiet for a few minutes, cherishing the moment.

“Will...will you show me how to be whole again, Danni?” Harper asked tentatively as she parted to show the weak smile on her face to the other girl.

“Of course, I will show you how to be whole again, H.” Danni confirmed before placing a tender kiss on Harper’s lips.

Then she added, gesturing at the girl’s plate:

“I believe you can get started taking a bite of those tacos. We will write a full list of survival tips later, okay?” 

[noona-clock]

Boy Next Door

Genre: Neighbor!AU

Pairing: Minho x You

By Admin B

Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8

So, here’s the deal: you had kind of just had a quarter-life crisis.

Not to be dramatic or anything.

You’d just realized you weren’t happy with pretty much any aspect of your life, so you’d quit your job. You’d sold your house, you’d said goodbye to everyone you knew, and you’d moved to a brand new city.

You wanted a fresh start because that’s what everyone always said people needed when they felt trapped in their own life. Right? A fresh start. A re-do, basically.

A new city, a new job, a new place... 

The only thing people didn’t really say about fresh starts was they were actually quite terrifying.

Yes, it was exciting to start over, but also, like... you had no idea about anything. You had an apartment already, of course, one to which you were driving right now with all of your belongings packed into boxes in your car. 

But you had decided to start a whole new career path as a freelance wedding planner. Planning had always been your thing, something for which you just had a natural talent. And now that you were at the age where most of your friends were getting married, you’d realized you found a lot of enjoyment in helping them prepare for their special day.

But... you just weren’t sure how, exactly, to become a freelance wedding planner.

It was fine, though! You would figure it out. You would stop worrying, do some research, and you would figure it out.

(That’s what you told yourself, and it worked - most of the time.)

You tried to push your anxious thoughts out of your mind as you pulled into the parking lot in front of your new apartment complex. After hours of driving, hours of fast food and car sing-alongs and podcasts, you were finally here.

Once you’d hopped into the leasing office to pay your deposit and pick up your key, you drove down to building four and found a parking spot close to the stairwell. You were up on the second floor, and you had more than a few boxes to carry up.

It was going to be a fun afternoon.

Only about fifteen minutes later, you were taking up the third box and already sweating.

See? You knew it was going to be a fun afternoon.

You were severely regretting your decision not to hire movers, even though you knew you really couldn’t afford something like that right now. Especially not when you didn’t exactly have a job lined up.

Just as you were coming up the stairs a fourth time, your heart racing and your arms straining from the weight of the box, you heard somebody jogging down the steps. They stopped when they reached you, and you felt the heavy box suddenly lifted away.

“Hey, let me help,” you heard a very friendly voice say.

...A very friendly voice which kind of... sounded familiar?

“Oh, thank you --”

Your heart suddenly froze when you saw him.

“Minho?!” you cried, your eyes wide and your mouth agape with extreme surprise.

Minho jumped a little, gripping the box so he wouldn’t drop it as he recognized who you were. “Y/N!” he laughed, his smile lighting up his eyes (and making your heart start back up again). “What are you doing here?!”

“I’m moving in,” you explained with a chuckle. “I had no idea you lived here!”

Okay, well... that wasn’t entirely true.

You really did have no idea he lived in this apartment complex, but you knew he lived in this city. And it was one reason why you’d chosen to move here.

But don’t get the wrong idea!

You were not a stalker.

Minho had been your neighbor growing up, and the two of you had been pretty good friends. To be honest, you’d had a crush on him for years, but the two of you were pretty much complete opposites. He had been on the soccer team, even becoming captain his senior year of high school, and you’d been on the school newspaper. You were friends, but you never actually saw each other at school. 

It’s not like Minho avoided you because you weren’t cool and popular - of course, not! He was one of the nicest, sweetest, most caring guys you’d ever known. He would say ‘hi’ to you in the halls, and he gave you rides to and from school when you needed them. You just never had any classes together, and you participated in different extracurricular activities.

But, anyway.

Minho had moved here because he’d gotten a soccer scholarship to one of the local universities, and as far as you’d known, he still lived here. So you figured you would move here and see if you ever ran into him. Maybe call him up and get together for dinner one night.

You never imagined you’d move into the same apartment complex, let alone the same building.

“Which one’s yours?” he asked, heading back up the stairs after he’d taken the box from you.

“422,” you told him as you quickly wiped the sweat from your upper lip while he wasn’t looking.

“You’re joking,” he laughed. “I’m 423, right next door.”

Okay, so not only were you moving into the same apartment complex, the same building in the same apartment complex, but you were literally moving in right next door to him?!

Were the two of you just destined to be neighbors or something?

“It’s like we’re destined to be neighbors forever,” Minho pointed out as he approached your new door.

“Wow, okay, I was literally just thinking that...” you said.

Minho paused when he got to the top of the stairs and glanced back at you with an adorably amused expression on his face. “Well, it didn’t take long for us to connect again, did it? We’re already reading each other’s minds.”

You chuckled, shaking your head and reaching into your pocket to fish out your door key. You also hoped the fact you were already a bit flushed from carrying boxes up and down the stairs would hide the fact you were blushing at the thought of him reading your mind.

It had honestly been almost ten years since high school, and he still had this effect on you?

Minho followed you in once you opened the door, setting the box down in the living room upon your request. 

“Thank you so much,” you gushed, still not quite believing Minho was actually in your new living room right now. “That was so sweet of you to help me.”

“Oh, that was the last box?” he queried as he eyed the other boxes already there, looking extremely puzzled.

“No... I have more down in my car.” Why did he seem so confused?

“Well, then I’m not done helping yet!” He grinned at you before heading back toward the door, his gait still as confident as it always had been. You could still picture him strutting around school, brimming with self-assurance and radiating likability.

“Minho!” you cried, hurrying after him. “You don’t have to help with the rest!”

“I want to,” he replied as he jogged down the stairs. 

You saw your car parked right in front, and even though Minho didn’t know it was your car, he obviously spotted all the boxes packed inside because he walked right up to it.

When he opened the door, reached inside, and grabbed another box, you knew you couldn’t stop him. You knew you couldn’t stop him right after he’d said he wasn’t done helping, actually. Because once Minho had decided he was going to do something, he was going to do it. End of story. He’d always been like that, and, apparently, he hadn’t changed.

About thirty minutes later, the rest of your boxes were out of your car and sitting in your apartment. You were also sitting in your apartment - well, more like lying on the living room floor, breathing heavily and letting the ceiling fan dry off your sweat.

“Seriously,” you breathed, turning your head to look at Minho, who was getting himself a glass of water in the kitchen. “Thank you. So much.”

“You’re so welcome,” he answered, facing you and leaning against your kitchen counter as he sipped his water. “Seriously.”

“Can I pay you back?” And before he could refuse - because you knew he would, you added, “Can I make you dinner tonight or something?”

Minho raised his eyebrows slightly, a grin pulling at his lips as he took another drink.

“I mean... if you insist,” he finally replied. He had shrugged casually, but that grin was still very visible, and you knew he was already thinking about what you would cook for him.

“I do insist. That is... if I can ever get up from the floor.”

You heard Minho set his glass down, head over to you, and you suddenly saw him standing over you with his hand outstretched.

“No!” you chuckled, covering your beet-red face with your own hands. “I don’t want to get up yet, I’m too exhausted.”

You waited for him to grab your hands and force you up, but... instead, you heard him let out a soft groan as he laid down next to you.

You turned your head to see for yourself, actually having to bite your lip to keep an incredibly goofy smile from appearing.

“This does feel nice,” he murmured, his eyes closed as the fan gently blew the hair off his forehead.

You had the strongest urge to reach over and take his hand, but you knew that was absolutely crazy. Not an urge you should ever give into. So you simply shifted your gaze back to the ceiling, closed your own eyes, and took a deep breath.

You just wanted to enjoy the moment before you knew you had to force yourself to get up and start unpacking.

A special guest would be joining you for dinner tonight, after all.

By 6 o’clock, you managed to at least get most of your kitchen boxes unpacked. You’d also made a quick trip to the grocery store to stock your new fridge with necessities and prepare for the meal you were making for Minho.

Okay, that was still so weird to think about.

Minho, the guy you’d grown up next to, the guy you’d had a crush on for years when you were younger was now your next door neighbor. Again.

Seriously, what were the odds?

Just as you turned the stove on to start browning the meat for your tacos, there was a knock on the door.

“Oh, darn it,” you muttered, quickly setting the frying pan on the burner and dashing to answer it.

You flung the door open, your breath slightly catching in your throat when you saw Minho standing there with a six-pack of beer. “I hope I’m on time,” he greeted.

“Actually, you’re early,” you chuckled, stepping aside to let him in. “Please excuse the mess, I’m still in the process of unpacking.”

“Uh, you literally just moved in today,” he reminded you with a little smirk. “I’m surprised you have anything unpacked.”

“If it hadn’t been for your help, I would probably still be carrying up boxes.”

A soft laugh escaped Minho’s lips, but his grin was also kind of bashful and adorable. “I, uh, brought some refreshments,” he told you, holding up the beer. “If that’s your kind of thing.”

“After a day like today, it definitely is.”

He shuffled over to the fridge as you took your spot back at the stove, and once he’d set the beer inside to chill, he joined you.

“Can I help?”

“Well, if I weren’t just getting started, I would say ‘no.’ But I want to eat within the hour, so if you’d like, you are more than welcome to start chopping the tomatoes or making the guacamole.”

“I can do that!” Minho exclaimed with a clap. “What do I need to make guacamole?”

Your brow furrowed as you slid the ground beef into the frying pan, using your spatula to break it up. “Um... avocado?”

Did he really not know what was in guacamole?

“That’s this thing, right?” he asked, reaching for the avocado in your fruit basket.

Well, at least he knew what an avocado looked like.

“Yes,” you nodded. “And the knives are in that drawer right in front of you.”

He slid the drawer open, grabbing a knife and setting the avocado down on the cutting board on the counter. Your gaze darted between the frying pan and him, and when you saw him about to cut right through the middle of the avocado, you reached out to put a hand on his arm.

“Wait, wait, wait,” you blurted. “You can’t cut an avocado like that, that’s right where the pit is.”

Minho paused, lifting the knife away and turning to look at you with raised eyebrows. “Oh! Well... how do you cut it?”

Oh, bless his heart.

He was trying to help, but... he obviously had no idea what he was doing, did he?

You smiled at him, handing him the spatula and moving to switch places with him. “Here, you look after the meat. Just pour in that seasoning and stir it all around. I’ll make the guacamole.”

“Okay,” he chuckled as he began following your orders.

The two of you spent the next twenty minutes cooking and prepping and chopping and... Okay, well, you spent the next twenty minutes cooking and prepping and chopping and finding things for Minho to do because this boy was just absolutely clueless in the kitchen.

“How about I set the table?” he finally offered as you took over grating the cheese.

“Perfect! The plates are in that cabinet, silverware in this drawer.” You nodded in each direction, thanking him graciously as he set the table and got out two beers for you both to enjoy with your meal.

A few minutes later, you were seated at your small kitchen table, clinking your beer glasses together and tilting your heads to devour your tacos. You managed to scarf down three before calling it quits, but you lost count of how many Minho ate. Usually, you had more than enough shells and toppings to make a taco salad for lunch the next day, but tonight, every bowl and plate on the table was cleaned out.

“I thought only teenage boys ate that much,” you teased as you began taking everything over to the sink.

“No, it definitely continues on into adulthood,” Minho chuckled, following behind you. “Here, let me clean up since you did all the cooking.”

“Minho, no! I cooked dinner because you helped me move in! You go relax on the couch -- well, where a couch is going to be once I go out and buy one...”

Your cheeks warmed because you’d just realized you had nowhere to sit - unless the two of you wanted to sit on some boxes.

“O--oh,” you stammered. “Maybe we should just -- go over to your --”

“What, you think I’m too good to sit on the floor?” Minho teased as he opened your fridge and grabbed two more beers. “It’s a rite of passage for a new apartment. You have to christen it by sitting on the floor. Usually, you eat delivery pizza or Chinese food, but tacos work, too. And beer.”

Instead of heading out into the living room, though, Minho gently shoved the beer bottles into your hand, turned you around, and guided you toward the living room.

“I’ll do the dishes,” he insisted. “As you may have figured out, I’m no help in the kitchen, but I’m good with my hands.”

Oh, Jesus, why had he it put it that way? Because, obviously, you were now thinking about what else he could do with his hands, and your cheeks were simmering, and your mind was racing, and you quickly opened one of the beers and took a swig. A long swig.

As you sunk down to the floor, tangling your legs into a pretzel shape, you tried desperately not to stare at Minho. He was standing at your sink now, rinsing off the dishes before setting them in the dishwasher.

This image was doing nothing to help the fantasies already swirling around in your head. It was way too easy for you to imagine him doing the dishes every night, coming to join you on the couch for a movie night or a cuddle session. Or both.

Damn it! You were starting to feel way too much like a teenager, and that was basically the opposite of what a fresh start was supposed to do. It was supposed to allow you to reinvent yourself not revert back to who you were!

“Everything okay?” Minho asked as he plopped down on the carpet next to you.

You handed him the other beer, humming positively as you took another drink.

“So,” he asked as he uncapped the bottle. “What have you been up to since high school?”

Obviously, the two of you began talking about your lives after graduation, which then somehow started a conversation about your lives before graduation. You brought up embarrassing stories, you laughed nostalgically, you remarked on the “good old days.” 

Honestly, being here with him felt like the “good old days” all over again. It was like you’d both changed but in the same way. Who you were then and who you were now still just... fit together.

“Can I be honest?” you said, your words slightly slurred as you’d just finished your third beer of the night.

“Of course. Honesty is the best policy.” Minho was gazing at you so earnestly, his elbow resting on his knee as he held his chin in his palm. His eyes were so bright and curious like they always had been, and you suddenly wondered if you should be honest.

But you couldn’t turn back now, could you?

“I had a crush on you back then.”

A single, shocked laugh escaped Minho’s lips. “Wait, what?!”

“Yep,” you affirmed, your cheeks burning as you nodded. “For, like, years. I really liked you.”

“Why didn’t you ever say anything?!”

You furrowed your brow at him, your expression clearly saying ‘Are you crazy?!’

“Minho! We were total opposites! I mean, we still are. You were captain of the soccer team. I was the editor of the school newspaper. You were popular, and everyone loved you. If you hadn’t been my neighbor, we probably wouldn’t have even been friends,” you explained.

“That’s not true,” Minho defended immediately with a shake of his head.

“Yeah, right.” Thankfully, there was no way to find out; you were fairly certain you were in the right in this situation.

“But we were friends,” he pointed out. “I... I mean, I honestly had no idea. I can’t believe you never told me!”

“Well, I’m telling you now.”

When it was way too late. Typical.

You also didn’t want to ask if it would’ve made a difference if you had told him back then because you knew his answer would retroactively break your teenaged heart.

There were a few moments of silence - comfortable silence - and you decided now was as good a time as any to break up your little sentimental party.

“I should probably unpack all my bedroom boxes,” you said with a sigh, pushing yourself off the floor.

Minho stood, as well, taking your empty beer bottle and heading to your sink.

“Thank you for dinner,” he said, taking a somewhat reluctant step toward the front door. “And the conversation. It was... really nice catching up with you.”

“Thank you for everything,” you replied. You opened your front door, leaning your head against it as Minho slowly made his way out. “Especially for making sure I wasn’t lonely my first evening here.”

“Hey, if you ever need anything, just knock.” He raised his eyebrows at you as if to say ‘Seriously, don’t hesitate.’

“I will,” you promised with a nod of your head. “Same to you. If you ever need to make guacamole, I’m your girl.”

Minho simply chuckled and rolled his eyes at himself.

“Good night,” he murmured, reaching out to gently punch your shoulder. You’d completely forgotten he used to do that, but you reacted instinctively - the way you had back then: You clutched your shoulder and let out a dramatic groan.

You heard Minho’s laugh as he shuffled back over to his apartment, and you called out a “Goodnight” before he could get inside.

Slowly, you shut your door and locked it for the night, letting out a sigh as you did so. You pressed your forehead against the smooth wood. You closed your eyes. You pushed past the alcohol in your head, and you came to the realization you didn’t used to have a crush on him.

You still did.

Part 2

Tagging @zhangjingyou  @nekononamida @lightofsunshinee @oksws @this-song-thats-only-for-you @lost-girl-inc @comicbeginning @sterlingsilver0308 @smut-wars @thegreatxingmibeyond @jjong-dae77 @min-sugahappiness @superfangirlshipper @jongin-be-my-jagi @mark-tuan-and-namjoon-lover  @isothetic @luvmesomekpopidols @miliminx  @rol-de-canela-tu-gfa  @beautifulseoulliar @jongdaelta @justasouthernlady @haveanotherkpopblog @leigh-darling @crazy-ladybug-lady @pentagonexobts @askmalstwin @sweethearterie  @heyitsmelivvyg9 for updates! Readers, let me know if you would like to be added to this list!

-Admin B

Master list // RULES // Submit a Request! // Read About the Admins

[marloweandme]

This Is Our Starting Line

Zach Marlowe stared wide-eyed at the ring box on the floor of the grocery store, trying to pretend that the love of his life wasn’t about to have the worst proposal in the history of proposals. 

RECORD SCRATCH. 

FREEZE FRAME. 

“Yup, that’s me. You’re probably wondering how I got into this situation. Well, it all started on a cold winter’s night when I was bor--”

“Zach, you were born in the afternoon.” Isaac’s voice can be heard in the distance.

Zach Marlowe’s face pops up now, replacing the frozen image of him staring down at a ring-box.

“Ahem, anyway. My life has been... Odd. If that’s a way to put it properly.” He shrugged at the camera, rubbing the back of his neck. “But that doesn’t matter. What matters is that this guy met this girl.” 

An image of Lauren pops up on the screen. Unfortunately it’s one of her sitting on Zach with Isaac laughing in the background. Zach’s face flushes red. 

“Hey! I said not to use that photo, man!”

“Sorry dude.”

Zach leaves the frame as a scuffle can be heard before he comes back, his hair sticking out in several places. 

“Anyway! So I proposed to Lauren last night.” A wide smile. “And I’m the most fucking happy man alive because she said yes. The girl of my dreams said yes.” He adjusted the lens of the camera then, looking into it directly this time. “Here’s to our happily ever after.”

CUT TO BLACK.

Kara Lansing’s face appears on the screen. For the moment, she’s smiling. 

“Awwww, there she is. The eldest Lansing looking happy for once.”

A scowl.

“Marlowe, get that camera out of my fucking face.”

A clattering of a camera followed by the image of the very nice wooden floor can be seen before the image shifts once again to Zach who is grinning.

“But I want to document this moment. You said yes to me asking for permission to marry your sister!”

The camera pans back onto Kara just in time for her to flip him off.

“I also told you to not record me!”

The camera was ripped from his hands, Kara turning it to face Zach. 

“I also said that I’d stuff your chopped up body into 25 different duffel-bags and ship them to 25 different cities. Starting with Dubai.”

Zach’s face visibly paled, a loud gulp being picked up by the camera. 

“Kara, I promise you. I’ll always protect her. And I’ll love her and cherish her. As long as I live. I will always be there to care for her. Always.”

His voice was sincere, the camera shook slightly. 

“Kara, are you--Are you crying?”

The camera was set down on the table, soon showing Zach’s kneecaps as he sat on the couch. Kara sat down next to him, folding her hands in the frame. 

“You can talk to me, it’s okay. I know you hate me but--”

“I don’t hate you. It just... It means a lot to me to know that you care so much about her. About my Laurie. I’m just always scared that I’m not going to be around for much longer. I’ve told her this for years but I haven’t really told you anything. I’ve always had this feeling that I was going to die... Young.”

Zach scoffed, hands gripping at his kneecaps, smoothing his jeans down. 

“You’re not going to die young. Just because you’ve gotten possessed and had a couple run-ins with some hunters doesn’t mean--”

“Marlowe.”

“Sorry.”

“Yes, I’ve survived a lot. I’ve survived through so many things. They’ve made me stronger and they’ve also made me realize just how precious life is. What you have with my sister? That’s precious. She’s precious. And she deserves all the happiness that you can give her. Which is why... Why I want you to give her this. If I ever am not here.”

Kara put her left hand out of view for a moment before bringing it back into frame, a white letter in her hand. She placed it on Zach’s knee. He took it.

“Kara, you’re not going anywhere. This is insa--”

“Please, Zach. Please just listen to me. I need you to give this to her if something ever happens to me. You have to promise me. And if I’m ever gone? You can’t... You can’t let her drown. She’s not going to want to talk about it. She’s not going to know how to deal with it. And Morgan? Morgan is going to need you and a bottle of alcohol. You can’t have any of it, though.”

“Okay. But what about Cristina? Am I supposed to help her too?”

“Cristina has Lauren. You just... You have to make sure that Lauren can be there for Cristina. Just promise me you’ll do this for me, Zach. Promise me.”

Zach’s left hand slowly and gingerly places itself down on top of Kara’s right. Her own left hand moves atop his, squeezing. 

“Promise.”

CUT TO BLACK.

“I can’t believe I fucking forgot to get gas. I’m an idiot. I’m an actual idiot.”

Zach’s pacing form fades onto the screen. The camera turns for a moment, revealing the look of utter disappointment on none other than Isaac’s face. Quickly it goes back to Zach who is now accompanied by Lauren. 

“And now it won’t take my card! Are you kidding me? Laur, I have to in and get this. You can wait in the car, it’s fine.”

Zach leaves Lauren standing next to his car for several moments before coming back looking more disheveled than before.

“He got his corndog mustard on my tie. This--This is of course happening right now. Of all times.”

The change in pitch could be heard, even at this distance of Isaac hiding in the bushes. Zach was seen frantically looking around before pointing towards a grocery store on the opposite side of the gas station.

“Oh thank God, I can go get a stain remover and then we can go to our dinner reservations.” 

Lauren and Zach walked over to the grocery store; Lauren looking absolutely bewildered and Zach? Well, Zach looked like he was about ready to pass out. Isaac followed at a safe distance, ducking between different aisles, the camera going in and out of focus several times. Finally it stilled to Zach and Lauren in the laundry aisle. 

“Got it! Okay, so I’ll just go take this to the front, pay, take my car keys and--”

He pat down his coat.

“Shit.”

“Oh please tell me you didn’t...”

Isaac about dropped the camera in shock at what happened next. Zach frantically had been searching his pockets while Lauren was speaking, fumbling through almost all of them when out popped his keys, clattering on the grocery floor. Along with the ring box.

Zach stared wide-eyed at the ring box on the floor of the grocery store, trying to pretend that the love of his life wasn’t about to have the worst proposal in the history of proposals.

“Babe, slow down,” Lauren began as she moved to help him pick up the contents of his pockets. “It’s not that big of a--” She stopped in her tracks when she saw the ring box, and her wide-eyed expression matched her boyfriend’s. She stood up straight -- the look of shock clear on her face even from Isaac’s distance -- and said, “Okay...what is that?”

“Okay, I uh--This wasn’t--It wasnt supposed to happen here. It was going to happen in glass of sparkling water at the dinner. You were supposed to almost drink it and then I was going to be all, ‘oh hey, what’s that in your drink’ but.. That clearly didn’t happen. So I just...”

Zach was rambling, something that he did best. Kneeling down to pick up the box, he popped it open to reveal the ring. 

“Lauren Lansing. The second we became friends, I knew I’d met my equal. My match. The one person that makes everything about this chaotic world that we both unfortunately live in feel not so bad. You have made my life more rich and more meaningful in more ways than I can possibly begin to say. You were there on my darkest day and you brought me back to the light. You’ve been my best friend--”

“I’ll let that slide.” Isaac’s voice could be heard from behind the camera.

“--And you’ve been my soulmate. Through movie nights and Valentine’s day dances that turn into horrible monstrosities. You’ve been there through everything and I want you to continue to be there for everything. I want us to face each new challenge, obstacle, and victory... Together. I love you so much, Lauren. Will you do me the honor of becoming my wife and spending the rest of our lives together having as many adventures as we possibly can? A taco truck may or may not be included.”

He chuckled, his face beaming despite the tears in his eyes. The camera zoomed in on his face as he held up the ring towards her. He looked earnest, hopeful. Like Lauren was the most amazing person to grace this planet. And to him? She was.

And it didn’t matter that Lauren’s first reaction was that she absolutely would’ve choked on the ring if it’d been in her glass. Or the pride at how her mind learned how to speed up to keep up with the pace of Zach’s rambles. Or that they were in the middle of the laundry aisle at a grocery store beside a gas station.

Later, she’d absolutely compare it to Jim and Pam’s gas station proposal, but currently her mind couldn’t make that connection. Her mind couldn’t do anything but see Zach, hear Zach, and think about how -- after everything-- there was so much good to look forward to in their lives. Together.

“I love you,” she answered, nodding her head and beaming back as she did. “I love you and your taco truck and your clumsiness and--yes. Yes! Let’s get married!”

Zach can’t stop the watery laugh as he gets up from his kneeling position and slips the ring on her finger. His arms wrap around her and he spins her around, laughing loudly in the store before setting her back down. 

“Let’s go get that dinner.”

FADE TO BLACK. 

‘He forgot to get the stain remover’ was displayed in white letters on the black backdrop.

“You’re a dick. You’re an absolute dick. I know you’re probably laying low somewhere and you’re not actually missing but you’re a fucking dick.”

Zach glared at the camera. 

“Lauren is acting like everything is fine because its Lauren and she’s stubborn and she believes the best outcome and--I forgot to breathe for a second.”

He takes a deep breath, blowing the air out shakily. 

“Your heart monitor thing went off but Lauren just thinks its an accident. I don’t even know why I’m talking to a camera, you can’t see this. Or maybe you will when we watch this at the reception and you’ll mock me for being so worried. I just... I don’t want to give her the letter. I don’t want to do it. I haven’t thrown it away. It’s in my wallet, I--Right.”

Another sigh.

“You can’t hear me. Just...”

He fidgeted with the camera, eyes watery with tears. 

“Don’t... Be... Dead.”

CUT TO BLACK.

“I can’t believe they’re here. Holy shit they’re here.”

The camera slowly focuses on a stack of papers. Upon zooming closer, it all begins to be legible. Wedding invitations. 

“Lauren’s gonna be so ecstatic. Not as ecstatic as me, of course. You know, I’ve realized something.”

Zach turned the camera around to face himself. 

“Saying the word ecstatic over and over is really hard. Try saying that word three times fast.”

CUT TO BLACK. 

.....

CUT TO ZACH.

“Okay, so I’m gonna edit all that out in the video that I show you later because I just spent about fifteen minutes trying to say the word three times fast and it was--Not pretty.”

A deep breath. His mouth opened to speak but then a loud crash and clang could be heard in the distance. Muffled. His brow furrowed and he let the camera drop to his side as he moved through the house. 

A knock, then the creaking of a door opening. 

“Lauren? Is everything ok--Oh my God! Lauren!”

The camera falls to the floor, the image displaying Lauren on the ground with Zach wrapping his arms around her. 

“Hey, hey... Tell me what’s wrong. Laur. Laur, you have to breathe, honey. Please. Tell me what’s wrong.”

A beat. Followed by Zach punching the ground softly. 

“Fuck. No. This--Oh God. That means...”

The camera shows as Zach, while hugging Lauren tightly, is fumbling with his back right pocket. He pulls out his wallet, soon followed by the letter. 

“Kara wanted me to give this to you if you ever.. If she ever... I can read it? If you want me to?”

A few moments go by with quiet exchanges, too quiet to be picked up by the camera. Soon, Zach is leaning against the wall, pulling Lauren onto his lap to hold her to him as she shakes against his chest. He holds the letter up and begins to read. 

“Dear Laurie. If you’re reading this then it means Zach gave you the letter. But it also means that I’m dead. And I’m so sorry that I’m dead.”

Zach took a deep breath, stifling a sob before continuing. 

“I didn’t want to leave you. Not now, not ever. After all, I promised you forever. Pinky promised, even. I honestly don’t know what to say other than I’m sorry. But I realize that it’s probably not what you want to hear. An apology? For me leaving? Yeah right.”

His hand rubbed at Lauren’s back, pulling her in seemingly closer.

“I know that my not being there for you is unforgivable. I know that the lasting hurt is going to be so terrible and that the pain I’m inflicting on you, Morgan, Cristina, and the others will be... Awful. All I can say is I’m sorry. I hope one day the wounds will heal and you all can forgive me for not being able to keep my promise. Especially you, Laurie.”

Zach cleared his throat.

“I love you. And you need to take care of you. Take care of Zach, Isaac, and Nic because we both know those three will always be getting into trouble. Take care of Morgan and Cristina for me because those two are... I don’t know how they will handle this. And Zach?”

He stopped, shock on his face that there was a part of the letter that addressed him. 

“You take care of my baby sister. You love her and cherish her and make her the happiest woman on this planet. Its your turn to keep the promise. You promise her forever and you keep it. She’s going to need you.”

Zach cried a little bit then before hiccuping and sniffing away the runny nose to try and finish out the letter. 

“Take care my loves. You were all the best parts of my life and I couldn’t ask for a better family. Blood or not. I love you. Goodbye. All my love, Hercules.”

The camera fades to black as sobs can be heard in the distance before white lettering pops up onto the screen. 

KARA LANSING

1993-2018.

FADE TO BLACK.

[balrogbussy]

Flavor Town - 7

I was starting to get disillusioned with grindr. Every god damn day it was the same 3 people and painfully boring conversations. I decided I had to roll the dice and get my tinder back to gold status. I started furiously swiping left and right looking for someone I could hang out with... yes, just hang out. The nice thing about tinder gold is that it shows you who swiped on you. After a couple of hours with my profile on boost and little to nothing coming from the new matches I looked at the people who swiped on me. There were a lot of profiles that looked alright, but Cameron stuck out. I quickly swiped right to confirm the match. BAM. This boy hit up my phone instantly. “Okay... work.” I say to myself as we begin our conversation. Cameron was really cute. He was a short thin latino boy with really good eyebrows and his hair made me wet just looking at it. I was playing it conservative at first, I didn’t want to scare this one away. Soon, a couple of the conversations turned a little dirty--not intentionally. I was talking about cooking for my family and I was cooking steak and he just blurted out “I LOVE MEAT”. Obviously the cheap innuendos followed. We were talking about going to see a movie and I really wanted to see the second Strangers movie, but Cameron said he was “too pussy”. I said that I’d be there so he could hide in my shoulder and he said “the sound is what freaks me out the most”... that’s when I ghosted him for the night. I threw Cameron a line and he just let that fucker sink. While I left Cameron sleeping among the rest of the fishes I found a few more hopefuls that I kept regularly talking to. I felt like I was finally beginning to mellow out and take casual dating seriously, when literally two of the guys (besides Cory) dropped the “B” word...  They started fucking calling me baby... Who the fuck is baby? I ain’t yo baby, I’m no one’s baby. It was starting to suffocate me. There was no way in hell I was ready or looking for a relationship, so the idea of having a pet name with some dudes I barely knew sent off alarm bells in my head. Who the fuck starts using pet names so soon? I know gay men move fast, but I half expected to walk outside and see one of them waiting with a suitcase on my door step waiting to move in. I turned my phone on do not disturb and passed out. The next morning most of the messages I had were from Cameron. I rolled my eyes and started to read them. He was attempting to redeem himself after failing flirting 101 and I found it pretty cute. He asked me what my plans were for the night and I said that I had none, other than just cook myself dinner. Cameron got excited “I LOVE cooking”. I decided to pull the trigger. “We can go get some groceries and cook together tonight if you want?” I honestly didn’t expect Cameron to agree but he did. I showered and got ready--probably looking a little too posh for grocery shopping and met Cameron at the grocery store next to one of the local Universities. He smiled and hugged me and he was totally adorable... only, he was wearing the SAME cologne Gerard always wore. I was fully triggered. If I never have to smell Bleu de Chanel again, my fucking life will be complete. We pick up some veggies and walked around the store not standing too close to one another as it was a little awkward at first. I asked what he wanted and he replied with “Meat” I laughed and asked if he wanted mine or something specific. He kind of blushed and said he wanted steak. Honestly the idea of eating steak a second night in a row made me wish I had just laid down in traffic. Being the polite gentleman I am, I ask what he had in mind. He mentioned he loved getting a parmesan steak with garlic shrimp at Applebees. No worries, we grab all the stuff and head to the checkout. Cameron started winning points here. He split the bill with me 50/50 and I started to think that maybe he would be a good match after all. I was getting desperately sick of giving twinks handouts like I was fucking Daddy Warbucks and every skinny little gay boy was Annie. We exit the store and I follow Cameron back to his house. We immediately get to the kitchen and I start prepping and getting everything ready. It started to become abundantly clear to me that Cameron actually didn’t cook much, as he had little to nothing to cook with. “Fun! It’ll be like camping!” I say with a grain of shade. I have to explain this, when I’m looking for a potential friend, I’m looking for someone who can take the shade and deal it back just as good. Cameron didn’t disappoint. “Shut up, cunt!” he said laughing. As I started cooking Cameron got out a bottle of wine... it was a moscato. Now, not to be snobbish, but I was educated in food and wine so the idea of pairing a moscato with steak sounded about as good as douching with taco bell hot sauce. I politely tried to explain to Cameron that a red would be better and then started to explain why. He nodded and went back to his pantry and got out a bottle of red. I apologized for being so pushy about the pairing and he just replied with “No, I think it’s hot.” I smiled and returned to my pan. Things were starting to come together and Cameron and I got to know each other pretty decently. He seemed like he would make a good friend I thought to myself, but he was also starting to put the moves on me with each sip of his glass of red wine. The food is almost ready and at this point I’m sweating my ass off getting everything ready. I was so focused on making everything perfect that I hadn’t noticed how seductively Cameron was staring at me. I’ll admit in that moment I thought “Fuck he’s hot”. I plated our food and we started to eat. I had a couple sips of the red wine he got out and it was feral. It tasted like coffee grains and toe jam. Halfway through, Cameron started to get a little tipsy, and he made a bit of a quick move and knocked his plate on the ground. It shattered into several pieces and his steak was just half eaten on the ground. I made a joke and said “If you didn’t want to eat it, you could have just told me.” Cameron got flustered and I don’t think he knew I was kidding. He reached down and picked up the steak from the floor and started munching on it. “Five second rule” he said... I laughed but cringed at the same time. Then again, it was his house, so he had a better idea of how clean his floors were than I did. After we cleaned up the broken plate and did the dishes we broke into the moscato and kept talking some more. Because I thought we would be friends I started to talk about Gerard and that whole situation. The wine we kept downing didn’t help. Cameron was extremely sympathetic and kept rubbing my leg as we sat side by side on the couch. He kept saying “Aweee booboo... what a cunt. His loss, you’re amazing.”  He made me feel really good with his reassurances. It was starting to get late and I wasn’t really in a state to drive so Cameron said I could stay the night. I agreed and asked if I could shower real quick--I was feeling musty after busting my ass in the kitchen. He showed me where his bathroom was and gave me a towel. I quickly showered and got dressed and came back out to join him on the couch. He said he was going to shower too and I paid no attention to it. I just thought we were starting to wind down and get ready to watch something on tv and fall asleep. I chill on my phone texting away and heard the door to Cameron’s bathroom open. I look up and Cameron exits the bathroom totally naked. He gives me a smirk and beckons me to follow him to his bedroom. At first I sat there for a few minutes shocked... was he kidding? I’ve had suggestive and playful friends before. I sat there for thirty seconds then decided to get up and follow him, he looked damn fine with his wet tanned skin and messy dark hair. Once in his room I got an even better look at him. He was insanely attractive, there was no way I was going to be able to resist him. We started to make out and he started to undress me. He got down on his knees and undid my belt, whipping my dick out. I was already hard and he started to give me head. He was deep throating the shit out of it, making a couple gag noises here and there but it was still hot. After a few minutes he went over and laid down on his bed and raised his ass in the air. OH. He wanted me eat his ass... I had only ate ass once before and that was right after Gerard showered. Since I knew Cameron had just showered I figured he was probably all clean so I didn’t hesitate. I played around with my tongue sticking it in and out and Cameron moaned with pleasure. It wasn’t bad at all, he was totally clean and if anything he tasted a little soapy. He then laid on his back and reached into his bedside table and pulled out a bottle of lube and some condoms. “We probably shouldn’t do this since I haven’t prepared but honestly I just want you inside of me.” Cameron was slapping his hole and moaning. Thinking back it’s kind of funny but at the time it really turned me on. I put the condom on and entered him slowly--he was pretty tight. I started off gently as we kissed and I once I was sure he was comfortable I worked up into a faster pace. Soon his bed was smacking against the wall and we were enjoying ourselves. Cameron was moaning “Fuck.... yeah daddy.... daaadddyyy” ... I kind of hated it. I don’t like being called daddy to be honest, but I found his moaning incredibly hot. Cameron started shaking and I knew he was close. He hadn’t touched his dick the entire time and he kept asking me if I was close. Once I told him I was, he started to jerk off and came in no time. I came shortly after and laid down next to him after. We were both a little out of breath. He reached over and took the condom off of my dick and held it up to the light. “Oh good, I didn’t paint you” I laughed my ass off. We both went back into the shower to rinse off and headed back to his room to cuddle. He was out in no time. I wish I could say the same for me. Cameron snored SO fucking loud that I’m sure even the fucking ghosts in Pompeii thought the volcano was gonna burst again. I mean, I could fucking feel his whole bed vibrating. I slept like shit. As soon as the sun came up I woke up him gently and told him I had to get going. I didn’t want to leave in the middle of the night or when he was asleep. We gave each other a little kiss and I headed out the door. On my way home something in me kept questioning if I could or had developed some feelings for Cameron even if they were small or beginning to blossom. He was really kind, and super attractive... but was I ready to put that kind of foot forward? I had so much on my mind. I had all these cute, kind men fawning over me and treating me so well, even through menial conversation and hookups. I was never treated like this with Gerard. I felt like the fucking Bachelorette or Tiffany Pollard in I Love New York when she stares at her wall of men and starts to ponder which one she’s going to have to choose to eliminate. Maybe it’s selfish, but I didn’t want to have to eliminate any of the guys I was talking to. I was really enjoying getting to know some of them. Maybe eventually one of them will start to look like a front runner, but for now, everyone gets a rose. 

[phandomsecretvalentines]

Outside Perspective

Length: 3k

Summary: Dan and Phil move into a new flat which has something they didn’t exactly bargain for, a ghost.

***

When I was a kid, I told my parents that I wanted to do something phenomenal. I wanted to start something that would have history teachers fifty years down the line saying “This is all thanks to one very dedicated person.” People would clap and applaud when ever they saw me, I would be the real life super man who saved the world from despair. Instead, I became an poor college student and then, subsequently, a ghost.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind being dead, it has its perks. I just wish that I had more time alive in the world to experience everything. I am tethered to my college flat which, after several years of doing nothing but looking at the same boring furniture that I used to own, gets pretty boring.

One day as I was just aimlessly floating around the flat, occasionally popping into a neighbors flat, just to see how they are and making sure they aren’t dead unlike me, I heard footsteps approaching my home. I quickly zoomed over to the door, making sure to keep myself out of sight. I watched as the door creaked open. My old landlord stepped inside, followed by two guys who looked about my age.

“This is the available flat. It is two bedroom, one bathroom. Will that be okay with you?” my landlord asked. I smiled, finally people were returning to my house. I could be like their new best friend who also can’t leave the house.

“This looks great! How much is rent?” one of the boys said, the other peering anxiously around the house. I ducked out of view as he looked up in the corner by the door. I was going to wait and see if I could surprise my new flatmates.

“It will be £700 a month. Is that manageable? What do you two do for a living?” the landlord asked them. I could see them nervously laughing among themselves.

“Yeah we can pay that. We are both online film creators. Don’t worry, we can pay it. Thank you so much for showing us the flat.” they said, looking around one last time. “When can we move in?”

“As soon as you sign the papers downstairs. Now, follow me.” and with that they were gone. I lingered by the door frame, watching them walk down the hall. I followed them to the edge of the building, unable to follow them out into the busy streets of London. I sighed. How I wish I wasn’t a ghost.

Days passed and there was no sign of the duo that came into the flat earlier. I aimlessly floated around the walls, playing tag with the dust bunnies or I Spy with the birds outside that I could never go and meet. Eventually, I decided to just close my eyes and fall asleep (if ghosts can even ‘sleep’. It’s a strange process. Basically, when a ghost sleeps, they just close their eyes and their subconscious for a bit. Sometimes, if your not wary, you can sleep for months or even years.) and wait for them to come back.

When I open my eyes again, I am underneath a bed. Next to me is a green trowel and an over sized pack of playing cards. I fly out, keeping to the corners as I look around. This is new furniture. Where did mine go? Did they just throw it out? I wondered as I flew around the new apartment which currently seemed to be empty.

There were two bedroom. The one I woke up in was colorful and lively. It had a bright green and blue duvet and was surrounded with bright plushies, pillows and pictures. The second bedroom was dark and comical. It had a solid black and grey duvet with a piano along one wall accompanied by a …. butt chair? I just shrugged it off and kept exploring. Who ever these people were, they had a lot of electronics. Computers, monitors, cameras, gaming consoles, like what? I wish I lived this life. (Actually I just wish I was alive but anyway….)

I flew back into the colorful room and settled on the bed, liking the sudden colors. It was finally something different from my old plain apartment. I was just glad to see they kept my bed. I died on that bed, you know how important it is to keep the very thing that killed you? Honestly, it’s not very important but that was one comfy bed.

Eventually, I heard the door open. One person came bounding up the stairs, chattering away as they walked into the kitchen. I floated out and watched as they talked on their phone. I looked at the strange design. It was so much different than my phone. And a lot longer. I just followed him around as he walked around the house, talking on his phone before he bid the other person goodbye and walked into his room. I followed him and watched him pull out a very nicely decorated laptop. Some of the sticker made me laugh. It was a cool collage.

Suddenly, I heard footsteps in the distance. They sounded like they were coming down the hall from the bedroom. I watched as this guys bright blue eyes (like shockingly bright, like wow hold on there buddy) darted up off of the screen to look at someone who I just entered the room.

“Hey Dan, what did you get at the shop?” the boy on the bed said to the guy who just entered the room, Dan I assume, as the guy on the bed sat up and fixed his fringe.

“Just something for dinner. I was making sure you were still here. I’m sorry about earlier I was stressed and I wasn’t thinking and-” Dan said as he rambled slightly about a conversation they must have had earlier (probably as I ‘slept’) before the guy on the bed interrupted him.

“It’s okay. I know you were stressed, things can get pretty stressful. What are we having for dinner?” he said as he reassured Dan. He stood up, walking over to the curly haired boy.

“Depends, do you want Italian or Mexican? I got stuff for tacos and spaghetti. What do you want?” Dan asked. He was very tall with curly brown hair that seemed to have a mind of its own. Whenever he talked to the guy in the colorful, and comfy looking, pajamas, his face seemed to light up.

“Tacos sounds fun. I want to see how much I can fit in the taco before it falls apart.” the colorful guy said, grinning with and impish look in his eyes. Dan just looked at him and sighed, smiling all the while as he pretended to be exasperated with his partner.

“PHillll….” he says, over exaggerating and exasperated sigh as the colorful guy, Phil I assume, just laughs and walks down the hallway, playfully punching Dan in the shoulder as he walks off, probably towards the kitchen. Dan stands alone in the room for a few extra seconds, grinning like an idiot and reaching up to put his hand where Phil punched him.

“Are we going to eat tacos or air? C’mon!” Phil says from down the hall. Dan quickly jumps around and bounds down the hall, a goofy smile still plastered on his face. I just can’t stop myself from smiling when I watch these two. I follow them into the kitchen, for once in my life feeling alive again. I am smiling and laughing and even though they don’t know that I live here, they are still the best people I’ve met thus far.

In the kitchen though, that was another problem. By the time I flew into the room, I could already hear the sweet, new sound of sizzling ground beef on the stove. I watched as one of them, Phil, was cutting up vegetables to put on their tacos such as onions, tomatoes, and peppers as the other one, Dan, kept randomly stretching his leg back and kicking Phil in the back of the leg, causing both of them to almost fall numerous times.

“Stop kicking me Howell, or else!” Phil said, playfully glaring at Dan who only smiled wider as he continued to annoy Phil.

“Or else what, Lester?” Dan said, turning around and winking suggestively, causing the both of them to burst out laughing.

“Or else…umm” Phil retorted, trying to think of a good come back. “Or else… I’ll else your mum!” Phil said, laughing as the sentence made no sense, and continued cooking. Dan looked at him, displaying a very expressive puzzled face.

“What? You couldn’t have thought of ANYTHING better? I hope these tacos are better than your comebacks.” Dan snorted, poking the hamburger in the pan a bit, watching it slowly break up and turn less pink and more brain grey.

“You want to add any spices to it?” Phil asked, looking at the, currently, unseasoned piece of meat.

“Sure, what do we have?” Dan asked, shuffling through their spices. I just watched. It’s like a real life version of one of the cooking shows the old lady three doors and one floor down always watches. Except I guess here there’s a lot more banter and less old people complaining about a dry pudding.

“I don’t know, what goes well with tacos?” Phil asked, pulling out his phone and googling what goes well with tacos. I just laughed and went to go see what Dan was doing.

“How about some chili powder? Or pepper? Is salt a seasoning?” Dan asked, looking back at Phil and grinning, hold three bottles of spices. Phil just laughed and walked over to him, grabbing the spices and sprinkling them on top of the meat. I listened to it sizzle and cook as they both continued to prepare dinner.

Finally, tacos were finished. I had tried to grab a plate too but whenever I opened the cabinet they always seemed to close it and say ‘oh the draft’. No, I want tacos too. Anyway, they sat down on the couch and Dan went to grab the remote, but it was on the other side of the couch.

“Pass me the remote?” Dan asked, looking at Phil with a face half full of tacos.

“What’s the magic word?” Phil asked, grabbing the remote and shaking it just out of Dan’s grasp.

“Now or I can’t turn on ‘The Crown’ or ‘Sherlock.” Dan said, hand outstretched and waiting for the remote, a sly smile on his face as he knows he won the minor argument.

“Fine.” Phil grumbled as he handed Dan the remote and he turned on Netflix. They sat in near quite, making the occasional comments about the show or laughing at the characters, as they ate their tacos. I intently watched the show. It was about a rather tall British guy and a rather small soldier who solve murders. Is this the quality television these days? I must have been dead longer than I remember. When I was alive, I like a simple show about plane crashes and a mystical island.

Several hours later and Netflix was still droning on in the background, but both boys were fast asleep. Their empty plates of tacos and bowls of ice cream (the second season of their show was hard on everyone) lay scattered on the ground. I pressed the remote and turned off the television, saving the two a little bit of money on the electrical bill.

Dan was curled against the couch corner, his legs hanging off the side of the couch as a thick, warm blanket is lazily draped across his chest. I glance at the clock quickly. The time on the clock reads 3:26 am. I sigh as I look back at the two. Phil has curled himself against Dan’s side, his head pressed into Dan’s arm as they both sleep silently on the couch. I float around for another several hours before returning to their flat. I see that Dan is gone from the couch, his blankets now draped over Phil to keep him warm in the flat. I see Dan gathering his things to go outside. I quickly slip one of my possessions in his pocket. I can go anywhere as long as I am attached to the apartment. Sure, this is slightly risky but I need to keep watch over the new owners of my house. I don’t want anymore ghosts to come from this house.

While Dan is in the bathroom I slip one of my books that was never removed from my flat when I died into his backpack. Now, as long as I stay with the book, I can leave the flat. I float in the darkness as Dan comes out of the bathroom, jeans and a jacket on. I grab onto the book as he grabs his backpack. He slings it (and me) over his shoulder as he walks down the stairs, careful not to wake Phil up.

Once outside, Dan just walks. He walks in no particular direction, yet he always ends up at the same spot. It’s a dock that overlooks the Thames river. He always comes back to it, just briefly, before he sets off again.

We travel across winding paths, great expanses of parks, all the while we are cloaked in the early morning mist. The dew on the ground and the cold air (at least I assume it’s cold) makes me feel like I’m just taking a walk with a friend and not hitchhiking on his backpack.

Finally, it’s around 6 am and he walks to the dock a final time. He sets his bag down and just stares at the river below. I watch him as he stares, the black waters churning beneath his feet, and I know what he’s thinking. The thoughts running through his mind are the very same thoughts that I had so many years ago.

I lay alone in my bed as Dan stands here alone now. A bottle of pills, Ibuprofen I think, was in my hand and my phone was in my other, 999 on the keypad. Now, the river is below Dan, his phone lay in his backpack, equidistant from him and the river. I was one step from death, one step from either saving or ending my life. Now Dan is in the same position, and I hope he chooses the opposite of me.

Dan looks up at the grey sky, clouds rolling in. It would rain soon, that much I knew. He looked back at the river, salty tears flowing from his face and down into the waters, getting lost in the river. I reached out to him, my cold astral hands grasping his wrist. He stepped back slightly at the strange touch. I couldn’t let him make the same mistake I did.

Dan turned back to face the river, the thoughts swirling in his mind like the churning waves of the river. The words that are said and spoken to us, the words which cut deeper than our own blades ever could. The words that drove me to the bottle of pills and Dan to the edge of the dock.

I open his phone and ring Phil, just hoping that the sound of Phil’s voice, even on the phone in a backpack, will help him. I know the pain. He was so happy last night, but that doesn’t mean that the wounds just fade away. But, even with my limited time with them as a ghost, I know that Phil makes him happy and he makes Phil happy. After all, a suicide kills two people.

I listen to the phone ring, and I know that Dan hears the phone ring too, because even through the roar of the river, he would still recognize that ringtone.

“Dan? Why are you calling me? Where are you? Are you okay?” a groggy Phil says, his sleep filled voice coming through muffled since the phone was still in the bag. I watched as Dan froze his progress into the river, turning around once he heard Phil’s voice. “Dan? Dan I’m coming to get you. Where are you?” Phil asks, waiting for Dan to reply. Dan just stands there and stares at the bag, not moving. I nudge the bag forwards and unzip it, probably freaking him out but this is for a good cause.

He looks around cautiously for an explanation as to why his bag moved and unzipped itself. Nevertheless, he grabbed his phone and answered Phil.

“I’m just at the store, I’ll be home soon. Sorry for scaring you.” Dan said, walking further away from the edge of the dock. I knew he was lying, and I feel like Phil knows he’s lying too, but he’s coming home and that’s all that is important currently.

“No, it’s okay. I just worry. I don’t want to lose you, you know?” Phil says, his voice still slightly cautious. Dan picks up his bag and starts to walk home.

“I know, I would never want to leave you alone. I’m sorry.” Dan says, picking up the pace. I hold onto my book and follow him all the way home.

Once inside the flat, Dan is met with a large hug and many sayings of ‘Don’t leave me’ by Phil. I just relax as much as a ghost can relax. I watch as the duo sits down together, sharing breakfast and coveting cereal. They laugh and smile and everything is suddenly healed. I just smile at them, a ping of sadness creeping into my heart. I wish that I had a support system when I was in need. All I had was a bottle of pills, and the emptier it got, the weaker I got. I decided to do some homework in the flat really quick. Finally, after just a few suspicious moments of me moving a paper and them seeing it, I tacked a completed list on the fridge.

‘Reasons to Stay Alive’

Every time Dan walks past, he smiles because he thinks Phil wrote it just for him.

Every time Phil walks past, he smiles because he thinks that Dan made it to show he’s getting better (he is).

Every time I float past it, I smile because I know that I will stay the only ghost and they will stay as one.

(For @heartsponge ! I hope you enjoy this gift! Happy Valentines Day!)

[travelonlinetips-blog]

New Post has been published on https://travelonlinetips.com/37-hours-in-stowe-vermont-a-perfect-winter-getaway-for-outdoorsy-couples-2/

37 Hours in Stowe, Vermont: A Perfect Winter Getaway for Outdoorsy Couples

As a native of the northeastern United States for more than twenty years, I’m biased in saying that it’s the most charming region in the entire country. And, even though I’m a lifelong Rhode Islander, no state is more quintessentially “New England in winter” than Vermont. Soaring mountain peaks, quaint valley towns, covered bridges over icy crystalline rivers, and couples packing their requisite Subarus with skis, kids, copious amounts of hot chocolate, the family dog, and … everything necessary for a day on the mountain.

Which is how Kelsey and I have come to love the town of Stowe, Vermont for our semi-annual romantic weekend getaway. Just an hour from the Canadian border, this tiny mountain town is best known as a year-round mecca for outdoor enthusiasts.

Winters offer some of the best skiing, snowboarding, snowshoeing and … well, you name it … in all of New England. And still, through decades of popularity amongst locals and tourists, it’s managed to maintain a picture-perfect small town feel.

Frankly, I’d recommend a visit any time of year. But here we provide a brief list of our favorite winter spots to visit in Stowe …

Day 1

Stowe is easily accessible by car from almost anywhere in New England or by plane with a quick stopover in a regional hub such as Logan or Manchester. With that in mind, plan to arrive by noon to kick off your 37-hour stay.

Lunch @ Cliff House

Mapletini at The Cliff House, Mount Mansfield, Vermont © Mike Richard

Start your long weekend with a breathtaking gondola ride up Vermont’s highest peak. Situated at nearly 4,400 feet above sea level, The Cliff House atop Mount Mansfield offers stunning views of the surrounding peaks and the town of Stowe below.

As you might expect, lunch is a variety of hearty soups (the onion soup is fantastic), stews, and entrees with a mix of apres ski-inspired cocktails, like their unique Mapletini. While I didn’t order this, I did steal a sip from my Kelsey and I’m not ashamed to admit that it was quite tasty.

2pm / Snowshoeing @ Wiessner Woods

If you’re looking for outdoor kit, you need only make one stop in Stowe: Umiak Outdoor Outfitters. This small, unassuming shop is a hub for winter sports enthusiasts, offering virtually any type of rental including snowshoes (rentals around $20/day), skis, extreme sleds ($5-20/day), and more. And, if you don’t know how to use it, the staff is more than happy to provide a primer so you don’t kill yourself!

Snowshoeing Wiessner Woods, Stowe, Vermont © Mike Richard

There’s no shortage of outdoor adventure options in Stowe. I’d recommend grabbing a pair of snowshoes and a trail map from Umiak. Nearby Wiessner Woods is an excellent choice for your first outdoor fix in town, with a small network of relatively short paths, all perfect for a quick, “we’re only here for the weekend” jaunt. There’s no hunting and motorized recreation is off limits, so it’s an ideal spot for grabbing some peace and quiet and communing with nature.

From there, head to Marshall Hill at Stowe Elementary School for some extreme sledding. Once a beginner’s ski slope, it’s since been converted into a badass sledding hill with a nearly 100-foot drop. Beware: this slope is not for the timid! Bonus: the nearby playground at the school is a nice spot for the kids (or childlike grown-ups) to relax between sled runs.

If you need a post-sledding warm-up, PK Coffee serves great artisanal espresso drinks and their Logan’s Hot Chocolate is arguably the best in Stowe.

Dinner @ The Bistro at Ten Acres

Lounge at The Bistro at Ten Acres in Stowe, Vermont © Termineater Montreal

The Bistro at Ten Acres is a fine-dining French-meets-American restaurant disguised in a casual and thoroughly unpretentious atmosphere. Everything from the burgers (and buns!), marinades, and steaks are made from scratch and the service is excellent to boot. Splurge on the Pan Seared Lobster — arguably their signature dish, splashed in bourbon, tarragon sauce, and polenta.

Overnight @ Stone Hill Inn

I’m hesitant to tout raw numbers but, as recently as a few years ago, Stone Hill Inn was ranked #16 among more than 21,000 (!) B&Bs by TripAdvisor readers. It’s a picturesque boutique property designed for couples in search of the perfect romantic getaway.

Stone Hill Inn in Stowe, Vermont

While I’m typically more a fan of budget/boutique hotels, Kelsey and I fell in love with Stone Hill Inn the first time we stayed there in 2012. With few rooms, it offers all the charm and intimacy of a traditional New England B&B but with plenty of space to ensure every guest has complete privacy. We like to think of it as a bed-and-breakfast for folks who don’t typically like bed-and-breakfasts (read: us).

Fiddlehead Room at Stone Hill Inn in Stowe, Vermont

Every room features a warm, beautiful design, unique floor plan, and modern appointments. Our Fiddlehead guestroom was a corner suite with almost 500 square feet to relax and spread out. A double-sided fireplace warms the bedroom and bathroom simultaneously — a luxurious feature we quickly grew to appreciate, particularly after coming in from the brisk Vermont cold. The adjacent, ensuite bathroom was almost as large as the bedroom itself with an oversized spa tub, walk-in shower, and dual vanities.

Guest Lounge at Stone Hill Inn in Stowe, Vermont

Innkeepers Todd and Kristie Roling ooze Southern charm, and get to know every guest personally. An hour after we checked in, they knew us and every other guest by name. They’re kind, gracious, and inviting.

Common amenities at the inn include free snowshoe use (with onsite trails), unlimited use of their DVD lending library, and a common area where guests can gather and relax around a towering fireplace. Plus, there’s local wine and beer available from the front desk, and the guest pantry is always stocked with free fresh-baked treats, coffee, tea, and soft drinks.

Day 2

Breakfast @ Stone Hill Inn

Wake up early for breakfast at the hotel where it’s prepared fresh daily by Todd, Kristie, and their family. In addition to a selection of fresh fruits, yogurt, cereals, granola, and muffins, hot a la carte dishes inspired by locally sourced ingredients are cooked to order.

Chicken and Sweet Corn Waffles at Stone Hill Inn in Stowe, Vermont © Mike Richard

The breakfast literally became the highlight of every day of our trip. The Roling’s herald from Texas, and there’s a distinct Southern-inspired flair behind every dish. Especially notable: the chicken and sweet corn waffles with maple butter and spicy maple syrup. Mimosas and Bloody Mary’s are also available upon request.

9am / Zipline @ ArborTrek Canopy Adventures

ArborTrek Winter Canopy Tour at Smuggler’s Notch, Vermont

It’s no surprise that, with so much varying terrain, Vermont offers some of the best ziplining in the country, and ArborTrek Canopy Adventures is the best in the state. At their Smugglers’ Notch location, you’ll spend upwards of three hours in the Green Mountains traversing up to 4,500 feet of zip lines, crossing sky bridges high above the forest floor, and rappelling from trees. It’s an ambitious trip for sure, but no experience is necessary making it perfect for kids or first-timers. (Note: due to road closures during the winter season, allow at least an hour to travel between the hotel to/from ArborTrek).

Noon / Wine Tasting @ Boyden Valley

Wine in Vermont?! Wait … what?? It’s true. And more surprising is that it’s pretty damn good. There’s a shorter growing season to be sure, but that just means the wineries must be that much more clever and work that much harder at making great wine.

Boyden Valley Wine, Vermont

Stop at Boyden Valley Winery for a tour and tasting with wine room manager Bridget Jones. Her endless energy, bubbly personality, and encyclopedic knowledge of all things wine make for an educational and fun tour. Don’t miss their Ice Ciders and Glogg (mulled wine served hot with a variety of added spices)! There’s also plenty of take-home bottles on offer, with the Big Red being their best seller.

2pm / Lunch @ Bench

The Copper Tap Wall at Bench, Stowe, VT

Like most eateries in Stowe, lunch at Bench is a low-key, unpretentious affair. So come as you are, belly up to the bar, and be sure to sample a few things from their lengthy menu. It’s all about comfort food, so expect hearty fare like duck fat fries, wood-fired pizza, and homemade lasagna. Although, there are more “adventurous” specialties like wood fire roasted duck and salmon tacos. The beer list is solid and almost entirely local.

4pm / Massage + Relaxing @ Top Notch Spa

Indoor Pool at Topnotch Resort & Spa in Stowe

After a hearty meal, it’s time to unwind at Topnotch Resort & Spa. The award-winning spa at this five-star resort is routinely ranked among the best in the country. And with good reason: the changing rooms alone are the largest and swankiest of any spa I’ve ever visited, complete with large seating areas, flat-screen TVs, fireplace, and comfy couches. It’s a perfectly relaxed atmosphere akin to hanging out in your (rich) friend’s living room.

Opt for the uber-romantic, 90-minute side-by-side couples massage. You’ll enjoy a treatment room larger than some apartments I’ve lived in, complete with fireplace, couch, and chairs. And if you really love the person you’re with, splurge on an even longer treatment with optional accouterments such as sparkling wine and chocolate covered strawberries.

Treatments here include access to the spa’s numerous amenities: a sauna, steam room, indoor and outdoor pools, and a hot tub with a waterfall (this last bit alone is worth the price of admission). Spend the rest of your afternoon by the pool, where you can order light snacks and adult beverages while relaxing in your robe and slippers.

Or, if you really love beer, abandon all that frilly nonsense and …

6pm / Stock Up at The Alchemist

The Alchemist Brewery in Stowe, VT © Jess Graham Studio

There’s no shortage of breweries, brewpubs, and beer-related destinations in New England. But, The Alchemist might just be the pinnacle, the mecca. Beer lovers travel — in their words, pilgrimage — hundreds of miles to visit the brewery. The reason is simple: it’s among the only places on the planet to buy the beer fresh (the only other outlets are located in Stowe). Their Heady Topper is routinely ranked among the best in the world.

Tasting Room at The Alchemist in Stowe, VT © Mike Richard

For a few four packs and a T-shirt, our bill in the taproom came to more than $70. And you can expect to wait an hour or more (on a good day) to cash out. But, it’s worth every penny!

Visitors are only allowed a few four-packs per beer variety. So, be sure to stock up before you …

Dinner + Overnight @ Stone Hill Inn

Once you’ve had your fill of several hours of relaxation, head back to Stone Hill Inn. I recommend planning a night in. Specifically: order a pizza from nearby Piecasso (the “Carcass” is among the best meat lover’s pizzas I’ve had anywhere in the States).

Pizza from Piecasso in Stowe, VT

Then, grab your Heady Topper and head to the inn’s billiard room for a few rounds of pool before kicking back in your room where you can enjoy a movie (from the hotel’s free DVD collection) and one last glorious soak in your private hot tub.

It’s the perfect end to a busy weekend of outdoor fun, gourmet food and wine tasting, and a perfect trip to one of the most quintessential New England towns in the Northeast.

The post 37 Hours in Stowe, Vermont: A Perfect Winter Getaway for Outdoorsy Couples appeared first on Vagabondish.

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[fluffy-dan-and-phil]

Best Song Ever

Genre: Domestic fluff

Warnings: Some cursing towards the end.

Word count: 1.9k

Summary: Phil sings Dan’s Diss track just to annoy him.

Disclaimer: If you haven’t watched Dan’s Diss track, or if you haven’t seen it in a long time, please do to refresh your memory a bit before reading this. Or maybe you’re trash like me, and know the video by heart.

Phil sat by the desk in the office, watching Youtube whilst drinking a cup of coffee. He had burnt his tongue a couple of minutes earlier, so when he brought the mug up to his mouth this time, he sipped on it carefully, and fortunately it had cooled down somewhat. He was supposed to edit a gaming video that was due in 2 hours, but he was so tired and couldn’t find the willpower to get going and do it. Dan usually did most of the editing, but he was out buying groceries, so Phil had volunteered to do it, just so they could upload it on time.

He had watched a couple of his friends recent videos when he stumbled upon Dan’s Diss track that he had posted yesterday. Phil hadn’t seen it in it’s entirety yet, since he had been really busy, but he decided that now was the time. ”Hello internet! My name is Dan, and today, I am going to roast myself with a diss track.” the familiar voice of his boyfriend said, his voice booming through the speakers that were placed on the desk. As Dan failed to put his sunglasses on, Phil giggled, and in the background a beat started playing, and soon enough, believe it or not, Daniel James Howell was actually rapping. Phil smiled as he remembered when Dan had brought up the idea of a diss track to him for the first time. Phil hadn’t believed his ears. Was his boyfriend actually doing a diss track? Yes he was. For the next few days Dan started working on the lyrics, occasionally asking Phil for advice, and the both of them would then laugh at some of the utterly stupid ones he had already come up with. When the shot of him on a bed with a flower crown came on he couldn’t contain his laughter. Dan hadn’t told him what the shot was for, just that he needed it for his diss track. As Dan rapped the lyrics that went along with it, Phil quite literally lost it. When he had watched it once, he came up with a brilliant idea. He decided he was going to learn the song so he could sing it to Dan when he came home. ”That would annoy the crap out of him.” Phil thought, giggling to himself, as he hit the replay button on the video. Fortunately Dan hade put the lyrics in the description as well, and Phil started mouthing them to himself as his boyfriend rapped them at the same time in the video.

When he hit replay for maybe the 20th time, he heard keys being put in the front door and then paper bags crinkling when being put on the floor in the hallway. ”Babe? Can you please come help me with the groceries?” Dan shouted and Phil quickly pressed ”X” on the Youtube tab he had open on the computer. When he didn’t answer, Dan called for him again, ”Phil? PHIL?! Can you come downstairs please?”. Phil stood up, pulling the hoodie he had hung on the back of the chair on again, struggling a bit with one of the arms that had somehow turned itself inside out. ”Yeah, I’m coming!” he shouted back, while taking the steps of the stairs downstairs two and two. After another few flights of stairs he found Dan bent over, untying the laces of his shoes. As he stood up again, he saw Phil. He smiled and put his arms out for Phil to walk into, and Phil did just that. Dan gave Phil a quick kiss before nuzzling his head in the crook of his neck. Dan then spoke out, his voice muffled because of him having his face pressed into Phil’s hoodie. ”I’ve missed you.”, he said. ”But you’ve only been out for like an hour and a half?” Phil answered, laughing silently. ”Yeah, but I don’t like people and I don’t like going outside.” Dan said, pulling away from the hug. They both smiled and Dan started handing Phil the bags. He took two in each hand and started walking up the stairs. He put the bags down on the kitchen counter and turned around to go downstairs and help Dan with the remaining ones. But just as he was about to put his hand on the glass door and open it, he saw Dan through it, bags in both hands, under his arms and even one with the handles between his teeth. He grunted and nodded to Phil to make him open the door. He opened it, laughing att Dan, watching him waddle towards the counter and plonking down the bags on there. As he did, he let out a relieved sigh and turned to Phil. ”Why didn’t you wait for me to get the rest?”, Phil asked, “Or you could at least have gone two times?” Phil said, laughing att the offended look on Dan’s face. ”Don’t you believe in my carrying skills?“, he said, gesticulating dramatically with his hands. ”And, going two times are for losers anyways.”, he proclaimed whilst starting to put things where they belonged in the cupboards. ”Have you started editing the video then, Phil?” Dan continued, briefly turning around to look at his boyfriend. ”Um yeah,” he lied, ”I’m almost done actually, so I think I’m heading back up to the office to finish it if that’s okay?” Phil asked, walking towards Dan, gently putting his thumb on Dan’s chin to turn his head towards him. Dan smiled and pecked him on the lips before turning his attention back to the groceries. ”Well, you do that, and I’ll start with dinner.” he said, smacking Phil’s bum as he walked away. ”HEY!” Phil yelled, looking in Dan’s direction only to be met with him giggling and smiling so hard he had crinkles by his eyes. He shook his head, trying not to smile, struggling to keep the corners of his mouth down.

As soon as he sat down in the office chair, he started to frantically edit the video, since he had told Dan that he was almost done, even though he hadn’t even started. He imported all the clips from the camera and put them all in the editing software. Dan looked particularly good in this video, his hair being slightly curly and him wearing his camouflage shirt. Phil loved Dan’s curly hair, and he didn’t get why he was so stubborn on keeping it straight most of the time. About 45 minutes later he had edited the video and had started to upload it to Youtube. As it was uploading Phil remembered the diss track. He could hear Dan shuffling around in the kitchen, the faint sound of pots and pans clinking together in the background. He opened another tab in the browser to try to find the beat Dan had used in the background of his video. After about five minutes he found it, and as he was about to download it to put it on his phone, Dan called him from downstairs. ”Phil! Dinner’s ready!” ”Coming!”, Phil shouted back, impatiently tapping his foot against the floor as the song was downloading. Luckily, it wasn’t long before it was finished and he could go downstairs. Just outside the living room door there was a stereo with an aux-cord and Phil plugged his phone into it. The beat started playing and he walked into the living room. Dan sat on the sofa with his phone in his hand, and on the sofa table there were two plates with tacos on them, as well as two tall glasses of Ribena. As Phil walked into the living room, to the beat of the song, Dan looked up, looking really confused, until it dawned on him what Phil was about to do. His eyes widened and he quickly sat up straight. ”Phil, what the actual fuck are you-” he said before Phil started rapping, cutting him of. ”A month without uploading he comes back with a tag, that no one even tagged him in, he’s not a challenge to drag.” Phil rapped, walking up to Dan, ”So prepare for an attack, and by that i mean cringe, cause this motherfluffer’s ’bout to get dragged by his fringe.” he continued, flicking Dan’s fringe of his forehead. ”NOOOOOOOOO! Stop it, I don’t want to!” Dan squealed, as he launched his body at Phil, holding him tightly from behind. Phil quickly got out of his grip and jumped away from his boyfriend, who looked like he was about to crumple into tiny pieces out of cringe and embarrassment. ”First things first you’re freakishly tall, it’s weird you look like a noodle…” Phil said, holding up his left hand to count every insult as he said them. ”No no no no no no no!” Dan said, trying to catch Phil again. But this time, Phil knew what Dan was about to do, and jumped to the left while giggling uncontrollably, with his tongue poking out between his teeth, which made it really hard for him to rap. He continued the song whilst skipping and jumping around the room in an effort to avoid Dan from stopping him. ”…The only reason you get views, is you’re another white guy, that people ship with his friend, ’cause they think it’s kawaii…” Phil sang as he put a hand under his chin and tilting his head to the right. Dan had stood still for quite some time now, with his hands on his hips, and as Phil looked at him, he saw the corners of his mouth twitch as he was trying to keep a straight face. When Phil rapped the line ”What the frick even is your sexuality?” he burst into laughter, clutching his stomach and joining in with Phil for the last few lines of the song. ”…Repress it? Yup! Before i start crying let’s wrap this shit up. I’m gonna go and masturbate, then cry into a slice of pizza…” they chanted together through fits of laughter. ”…’cause you just witnessed the roast of Danisnotonfire.” they said falling down on the sofa next to each other. Panting and giggling as the song finished. They looked at each other only to start laughing uncontrollably again. Once they calmed down, Dan climbed into Phil’s lap, letting Phil put an arm around his shoulders as he put his head on his shoulder. ”I should be pissed at you right now, but I really can’t. You are such an endearing person and this is just such a Phil-thing to do. But I still can’t fucking believe you…” Dan said, shaking his head slightly. Phil heard the smile, which was probably plastered on Dan’s face, in his voice. ”I swear I watched the video like a hundred times when you went to the shop just to learn the lyrics. That, if anything, is called dedication” Phil said. ”With that much dedication, you could probably learn ’Danger men at work’ too.” Dan said teasingly, poking Phil’s side, and then continuing, ”But I can’t believe you changed the curse words.”, Dan said as he started laughing again, ”Who would even do that?” he continued, the words becoming more high pitched towards the end. He sat up and turned around so that he was facing Phil. ”You know I don’t curse Dan.” Phil said, laughing softly, ”And it’s not like I’d start doing that after almost 30 years because of your stupid diss track.” he continued. ”Say ’cunt’.” Dan said, nudging Phil. ”No, I don’t want to!” Phil proclaimed. ”Phil, just say it!” Instead of answering, Phil leaned forward, connecting his lips with Dan’s. They were soft and warm and tasted like Dan. He put his hand around Dan’s waist and pulled him closer. ”You’re stupid.”, Dan said smiling into the kiss. ”I love you too.”, Phil said, pulling Dan even closer, continuing to kiss him, when Dan abruptly pulled away. ”Oh no! The food’s got cold now.” Dan noted, putting his arm out, gesticulating towards the tacos on the table. ”Pizza?”, Phil asked, raising an eyebrow. ”Pizza.”, Dan answered.

A/N: hi! it’s me again, here to bless your life with another fluffy fanfic. it wasn’t supposed to be this long, but words just kept coming, and who am i to be a party pooper? but i really hope you liked it! and please leave comments with your reactions on it (see what i did there?), as i’m always here trying to improve my writing. hugs, kisses and a bum-nip.

[itsworn]

1968 Dodge Dart: First Love

Christopher Thompson bought this 1968 Dodge Dart in 1987 when he was only 14 years old, and 30 years later transformed it into his Pro Street dream car.

Though in 1987 he was still two years away from being old enough to drive, Christopher Thompson managed to cut a deal and buy this 1968 Dart. There was nothing especially exotic about the car, but it was all his, and by the time he was 16 and in possession of his junior license, he had already rebuilt the car’s 273-cid V-8. He also completely rebuilt the front suspension, replaced the stock drum brakes with a disc setup, and installed an 8 ¾-inch rearend with track-friendly 4.56:1 gears.

“After I got my license,” Thompson recalls, “I drove it all the time, and I raced it four or five times a year at Carlsbad Raceway while I was in high school. It ran low 14s in what I call its ‘high school configuration.’”

After graduating from high school, Thompson’s Dart graduated as well, with a moderately built-up 360-cid engine replacing the 273. With more power on tap, it consistently ran 13.80s at around 105 mph. Over the next 10 years, he bracket-raced the car at a wide variety of tracks, including Carlsbad, Brotherhood Raceway Park, Sears Point, Bakersfield, Los Angeles County Raceway, Las Vegas, Phoenix, Tucson, and Sacramento. Los Angeles and Carlsbad, which Thompson considered his home track, were particularly kind to the Dart, with numerous bracket wins to show for it and a best e.t. of 12.09 at 109 mph without nitrous. With a 150-shot of nitrous, it tripped the lights at 10.88 at 116 mph.

In 1998, Thompson bought his first house and set up a nice shop in the garage. The Dart had a few electrical issues, so his first project in the new shop was a complete rewire. As is always the case, while working on the wiring the closer he looked the more he saw, and the more he thought about where he’d like to take the car. At the same time, a friend happened to have a turbo setup for sale and that further encouraged Thompson to dream. He bought the turbo system and proceeded to disassemble his Dart for a comprehensive Pro Street build. As often happens however, taking everything apart turned out to be the easy part. With increasing attention and time devoted to developing his career, the new house, and other commitments, getting all of the work done and putting it all back together proved to be considerably more difficult.

“There was no progress until 2005,” Thompson explains, “and then I found some time and motivation to do a little bit of work on it. I cut the back-half out and then made a crucial mistake. In addition to the trunk, floor, trunk hinge supports, rails, and other parts, I also removed the rollcage before sending the body to Painting & Stripping Corporation in Santa Fe Springs for dipping. Without the back-half and rollcage, the car folded like a taco when it came out of the strip tank. I was devastated when I saw what happened, and was just about ready to throw the car away or use what was left of the sheetmetal to build a tube frame car.”

Fortunately, Thompson called Gary Hansen at Hansen Race Cars in Montclair, California, who quickly talked him out of scrapping the Dart. “Gary assured me it was not the end of the world, and they could put it on their jig and get it fixed. He was right, and I can’t thank him enough for all that they did. Hansen was on time, on budget, and the workmanship was fantastic throughout.”

Hansen Race Cars installed a four-link chromoly tube back-half, complete with an SFI 25.5D-spec Funny Car ’cage. Though Thompson had big plans for completing the Dart after it came back from Hansen’s shop, life once again intervened and it sat idle for another dozen years.

“I knew I’d get to it one day,” Thompson recalls, “but once again the years passed by and little was done. That changed in 2017 when I participated in HOT ROD Drag Week with another car that I own, and my friend Gary Goodner planted the seed in my head to finish the Dart in time for Drag Week in 2018.”

Finishing the car to the level Thompson had in mind was a massive endeavor, but with an unbreakable commitment to have it completed in time for Drag Week, he found the motivation to put in all of the many necessary hours. “For 10 straight months I worked on the car almost every day that I had off. In the beginning, Gary would come over one day a week to help, and then his visits increased in the spring and summer, for the final push. In the last month before Drag Week, I was putting in 18 to 20 hours per day almost every day. I also had a lot of invaluable help from friends, especially Stuart, Andrew, Mike, and Brian. They were there for me when it counted.”

Thompson and his friends did the vast majority of the needed work, including installing the QA1 frontend, sheetmetal fabrication, wiring, fuel system, interior, and bodywork. Though the car was blissfully rust-free, a lot of sheetmetal work was required because of the modifications. In addition to all of the custom pieces required for the new back-half, Thompson stretched original quarter-panels 6 inches to accommodate the rear rubber.

The Dart went to Frank’s Custom in Lake Havasu City, Arizona, for final paint. Master painter James Burdette expertly applied 1968 Dodge Dark Red Metallic code RR1 using two-stage PPG acrylic urethane. “In the beginning, I intended to paint it myself,” Thompson tells us, “because I planned to drive and race the heck out of it, so I didn’t put too much emphasis on the paint. Now it’s gorgeous, probably way too nice to drive and race, but I’m thrilled with it!”

When Drag Week arrived, the Dart was close enough to being finished that it could’ve gone, but Thompson was still waiting on a few key parts so decided not to bring it. The little bit of disappointment he felt was far outweighed by the satisfaction of finally getting the car up and running after it sitting idle for most of the previous 20 years.

“This car means a lot to me,” he explains, “and it also means a lot to my wife, Jessica. She put up with it all those years when it was just sitting around, and when I finally decided to complete the build she was 100 percent supportive. She said, ‘I’ve got your back — let’s do this!’ She never complained about all of the time and money it consumed, and she was truly the key player in getting it done.

“Looking back over the 30-plus years I’ve owned the car,” he continues, “I realize now that it has taught me a lot of life’s lessons. It kept me occupied at some very trying times in my life, and it drove me to learn all about the inner workings of cars. The skills I learned rebuilding it in high school led to a career working on cars in my teens and 20s. Even more important, it has also led to unlikely friendships that are still going strong today. Over the years, it has driven many thousands of street miles and made a couple of thousand passes down the track, and it’s been dragged from house to house and shop to shop, but I never gave up on my dream to transform it into a Pro Street car, and I love it every bit as much today as I did back in the beginning, when I was 14 years old and this was my first car.”

Fast Facts 1968 Dodge Dart Christopher Thompson, Cowan Heights, CA

ENGINE Type: 344-cid V-8 Bore x stroke: 4.070 inches (bore) x 3.31 inches (stroke) Block: stock 1970 Mopar 340, cast-iron, decked, line-honed, bored and honed with torque plate, four-bolt splayed main caps Rotating assembly: Eagle 4340 forged crank, GRP aluminum connecting rods, Ross custom turbo aluminum pistons machined for clearance, entire rotating assembly balanced Compression: 9.25:1 Cylinder heads: Mopar Performance W5 aluminum heads, fully ported, combustion chamber relieved, angle milled, oil passages modified Camshaft: Comp Cams solid roller, .685-inch 242/244 degrees duration Valves: Ferrea titanium/Inconel, PAC valvesprings, Jesel 1.8:1 rocker arms, Manton pushrods, PAC tool steel retainers, locks and seals Fasteners: ARP Machine work done by: B&P (Orange, CA) Induction: Mopar Performance M1 intake manifold, Comp Turbo Technology oil-less CT4X 68mm billet turbocharger Oiling system: Milodon oil pan, Melling high-volume pump, Moroso filter Exhaust: custom stainless exhaust, including 1.75-inch header tubes and 4.0-inch pipes Ignition: Holley Distributorless Ignition System Cooling: Champion radiator, Mezerie water pump Fuel: Holley Dominator EFI, divided fuel cell with 7.5 gallons for race fuel and 12.5 gallons for road fuel, Aeromotive 3.5 gpm brushless pump for race fuel, Aeromotive A1000 pump for street fuel Engine built by: B&P (Orange, CA)

DRIVETRAIN Transmission: 727 TorqueFlite three-speed automatic Converter: Dice Performance converter 3,500-stall speed 9.5-inch torque converter, 2.45/1.45/1.00 gear ratios, built by Pro Trans (Lancaster, CA) Transmission Cooler: Derale cooler Shifter: Precision Performance Products Driveshaft: 3.5-inch double wall chromoly Rear End: Mark Williams Ford 9-inch narrowed 20 inches, aluminum centersection with lightweight chromoly spool, 3.73:1 ring-and-pinion, Richmond Pro Gear, 40-spline gun-drilled axles

CHASSIS Front suspension: QA1 bolt-in tubular K-frame and arms, QA1 double-adjustable coilover system, Mopar Performance .810 torsion bars Rear suspension: Hansen Race Cars chromoly round tube back-half, four-link suspension with Strange Engineering double-adjustable shocks and Strange Engineering springs, adjustable custom torsion bar Steering: stock 1968 Dodge Front Spindles: stock 1968 Dodge Brakes: Mark Williams four-piston lightweight, 10.5-inch rotors

BODY Modifications: rear quarter-panels stretched 6 inches, custom sheetmetal underhood and surrounding back-half, wheeltubs Paint: PPG two-stage, 1968 Dodge Dark Red Metallic

INTERIOR Seats: JAZ Products aluminum seats, black vinyl upholstery Instruments: Holley digital dash, Motion Raceworks digital dash mount and billet turn signal switch Electronics: Infinity box Steering: custom chromoly column

WHEELS & TIRES Wheels: 15×4 (front) and 15×16 (rear) Weld Racing Front Tires: 26×4.5 Mickey Thompson Sportsman Rear Tires: 33×17 Hoosier D05 slicks

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[shesinspain-blog]

F A Q / Make Moves, Bby

Inspired by this fantastic post from Christina Bates, I answered my most frequently asked questions about teaching English in Barcelona. These are all from my experience and don’t carry weight to be generalizations.

I’d like to call this post “no one will do it for you, but you can do it yourself.” Moving here is totally possible, and it may feel super overwhelming but step-by-step you will make it happen. And what better city than Barcelona?!

What did you do before teaching English in Barcelona?

I was 22 in Columbus, Ohio, finishing my Bachelor’s in Visual Communication Design. After I earned my degree in May, I worked at the taco hut for the summer, and moved here in August.

Why did you make the jump?

It was a long time coming for me. I was very fortunate to study abroad in Rome in 2015, and through 5 short weeks I fell in love with Mediterranean culture, the eternal city, and so much more. I’m obsessed with design, so I was torn for my post-grad plans. As much as I wanted to start my career, especially in a big city like Chicago or NYC, I couldn’t shake my desire to move internationally again. I did a lot of stupid simple google searches like “How to move abroad american” and “teaching english overseas.” I got this great book about how to teach overseas. Once I was certain it was a real possibility for me, I made moves to learn what to do, how to do it, and when. Choosing this path as my means to live abroad meant selecting my own housing, determining my own timeline here, and the option to say no to work I didn’t like, which gave me more mental security than some other (totally valid!) ways of being an expat. Like aupairing, for instance.

Why did you choose Barcelona?

For a person who’s constantly following her feelings, my decision for Barcelona was largely pragmatic. I know no languages besides English. I wanted to live somewhere where I could learn fast, or at least read street signs and subway maps. Barcelona’s climate range is not extreme, so I could pack less. It’s centrally located in Europe; traveling from here is easy and cheap. Then there’s the TEFL opportunities. International TEFL Academy recommended it as one of the top locations for teaching abroad. There’s a high market of under-the-table employment, so I didn’t have to spend money on a work or student visa. There is a huge international community. Barcelona has a large population, so schools and private students are everywhere. Reading guidebooks and blogs before I came here really gave me no cultural expectations for this city. I’ve gone from knowing nothing about this city to declaring it the best city on earth. Tapas, sunshine and beach hangs really do that to you ;) 

Why did you choose to get TEFL certified?

Like I said, there are lots of avenues to live overseas. I personally know people who have used the sites AuPairWorld and Workaway and Bunac. I’m considering these for future endeavors. However, TEFL certification allowed me control over my work schedule in a way other jobs did not. Knowing English already made me feel confident about the career change, and I really like my independence. Being able to separate work and fun has been important to me.

Are you on a visa?

I am on a tourist visa, which is the visa Americans have to enter the Schengen zone for 90 days. Catherine Bates has more information about getting a Spanish visa, and you can find a lot of info about visa requirements (for work or students) around the internet. 

Do you need to speak Spanish?

No, especially not in Barcelona. It’s so international here. Oftentimes when speaking with strangers, I will start in Spanish and they respond to me in English anyway. Employees at train stations, grocery stores and movie theaters have all been kind and tolerant when I resort to English. However, why not learn it?! Spanish is awesome. I’ve been learning poco a poco here, and being able to communicate in multiple languages is more than a resume-skill; it’s exciting and beautiful and so alive. When I moved here the Catalan and Spanish languages were really exhausting for me, so learning something before you go (“I would like, please, thank you, and sorry”) can help you adapt better and sooner. 

How do you communicate if your students do not speak English?

It’s almost exactly like language classes in high school / university! Immersion works. With my younger students, we do less sentences and more just vocab words, letter sounds and simple sentence structures. My tutoring students are A2 and C1 level, so it’s fine to do immersion conversations. The A2 students I use more structure for, so that they have the tools to communicate, and they’re not just thrown in the deep end.

How did you find housing?

Housing is crazy. But it’s crazy everywhere, right?! The way it works in Barcelona is basically same day / same week turnaround. People post an empty room and have it filled within 7 days. In this sense, it’s nice, because you wait until you land to start looking. You see the apartment and meet the roommates in person. I booked an Airbnb for my first month (Aug 29 - Oct 1) and looked with apps that are popular here, like Idealista, Badi and Facebook. Like I said, it was highly competitive for renters in September - this is one of the most popular times for students and workers to start a contract. Here is where not knowing Spanish was a major pitfall for me, as fluent speakers commonly wanted to speak Spanish at home.

With this kind of turnaround, most apartments did not even get posted until the last week or two of September. Oftentimes when it felt like I was running out of options, 15 more places would get posted on September 24 or something (available for October). But you can do it! I have yet to hear of someone returning home because they literally had no options. 

How did you find a job? What is the ESL market like? Any tips?

I’m kind of outside the bubble here! I work for VIP KID, which means I work 20 hours a week from home, online. I teach students ages 5-12 in China for half hour classes. So I am not really employed at a school here! I do private tutoring which offers me spending money - it’s really nice to have Euro in hand for weekends, markets, and splitting the bill at a restaurant. I found these opportunities on TusClasesParticulares, which also posts school jobs. I originally got VIP KID as a “side hustle,” and a way to make money until I found a teaching job here. But I never really pursued working at academies - choosing my own schedule and not commuting, etc, were perks of VIP KID. Once I had one job I turned more to the apartment hunt and other things I had to figure out here. A few of my friends are employed by after school programs here, and the TEFL certification has helped all of us have confidence and land jobs.

Can you make enough money teaching in BCN to live comfortably and pay off student loans, travel, etc.?

This is what ITA calls a “break-even” location, not a “potential to save” location. I completely agree. While my income has been enough to support my lifestyle, pay my rent and pay one student loan monthly, I am still very much below the poverty line. You won’t be making a big-bucks salary here in any field - it’s just the way this city is. I’ve been able to do a couple 3 day vacations. I’m getting my 8 cavities filled (kill me!). Overall, I haven’t been scared of supporting myself, but my savings aren’t something to write home about. For financial purposes, you can make between $16 and $22/hr with VIP KID (before taxes). In 2018, I would say a fair price for a room in Barcelona is between 375E and 500E. I used the city to city comparison website to see how my spending habits in Columbus would pan out in Barcelona. Some people ONLY support themselves with VIP KID - some people ONLY support themselves with private tutoring. You will find your own balance of work to be able to afford what you want to do here. 

How can I prepare before the big move?

Learn Spanish! See your friends! Join Facebook Expat communities (one of the best aspects of being an ITA student / alumni). Try to find resources that will help you lesson plan later on, so that you can hit the ground running. Join libraries and set up the ebooks, so that you have access to English books for free. Do all the beaurocratic things, like telling your bank about the move, getting whatsapp, and figure out what to do with your cell phone. Also, get a credit card! So many people advised me against this, but I have no international fees and pay it off with my American bank. It’s perfect. And DON’T FORGET A WINTER COAT. I used mine a lot, surprisingly! 

How much should I save?

You’ll probably have three months between landing and receiving your first paycheck. Budget for 3 months of no income - eating takeout, buying groceries, getting a metro card. Extending your Airbnb you stupidly booked until only the 28th of September and not actually October 1. Your phone may break. You may get locked out. Emergencies happen, and having wiggle room helps you make smart decisions instead of desperate ones. I came here with $2500 and a blank credit card. I think more in the $4-5K range would help you breathe during all the searches. You can do it with less. But more money is like buying time.

How do you become a TEFL teacher and is it as amazing as it sounds?

For me, I pursued the International TEFL Academy online program. It was a great way for me to get certified while being at University, and saved me the cost of housing / etc that I would spend taking an in-person class. The online course was ten weeks, including quizzes and projects (mostly, writing lesson plans). After this, I contacted Ohio State’s American Language Program to pursue my in-person practicum. This meant working with our University’s instructors across Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced English courses for adults. The entire staff was incredibly helpful with this experience, and I met a buddy doing the same thing! We met during our internships and wrote lesson plans together, sometimes teaching joint lessons. Obviously, programs and TEFL Certifications vary with requirements, length and learning, but make sure yours is accredited so that it holds up internationally. My first lesson I was terrified! But I was lucky with my practicum too, because the teachers helped me ease in from leading a 15 minute activity to doing a full hour lesson plan solo. I don’t lesson plan with VIP KID (it’s done for you), but I do for my private lessons, and I just try to get them talking confidently as much as possible. Yesterday, we played HedBanz and we all had a blast.

What does a typical schedule look like and do you have time to do other things?

I wake up around 9am and do my thang until I teach 12-4. I have to write feedback for VIP KID, which generally takes a half hour. Lesson planning for my private students is probably 2h/wk of my time. This means most days I’m free around 4-5pm! I feel like I have so much time. Some days I can meet friends, sketch in the city and try a new recipe for dinner. Especially without commuting (besides 30m each way to my tutoring students), I have been able to own my time a lot here.

Do you need a degree?

ITA says Spain does not “require” this but it definitely helps. It is required for VIP KID. Other countries with less supply of American teachers, or different values for them, may be more lenient with this. For example, Japan may reimburse you with your flight, provide housing AND pay $2K/mo. Every market is different.

What happens when your tourist visa expires?

For the most part, nothing. Leaving the Schengen zone is the time where people may fine you or ban you from Europe. If you’re staying in Spain, your day-to-day lifestyle will likely not bring you within range of immigration control. Despite the “border-free” Schengen policy, some places like Paris will still make you go through customs in the airport and re-check your passport. For this reason, it is best to be smart about when and where you cross country borders. A few different sources have more information on this.

What have been some of the challenges you’ve faced?

I just wrote about this recently! Frustration with myself for not learning Spanish sooner. Homesick days (which are infrequent but can hit ya hard). Apartment hunting in September, but not so much in April. It is easy to live in the expat bubble here, so I would say it is challenging to meet and befriend local Spaniards. (Again, would help if I knew Spanish.) VIP KID has been amazing, but the first few months were unsteady with pay, which I didn’t account for in my moving budget. Winter is hard - even though it’s only 50 degrees here, it was still emotionally difficult. Finally, I really miss my design community and working in the field I’m so passionate about.

Final thoughts…would you change anything?

I don’t regret anything in my life, because even mistakes have lessons. Coming here with more money would have given me greater security in the beginning, but I’m scrappy and I persisted; when that happened I found out how strong I can be. Being in Barcelona has been a dream come true for me. I’ve made friends from all over the world, learned some Spanish, and have learned a lot about myself. It’s hard to say because my time here is still not over! I’m excited to keep learning about my values, who I am and what I want in my life. The culture here is AMAZING. People really value and enjoy their lives here. Get out here and dive in headfirst (preferably into some patatas bravas).