#i just want them to be together especially since angie comes out as a lesbian at the end anyway let them be happy | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

kreept12 · 3 years

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So I saw a The Good Place AU on ao3, rewatched the show and I had so many ideas for a different take on it like seriously !

So here's a bunch of the ideas I had bc I'm losing my mind at this

First of all : Warning, there's gonna be spoilers of season 1 and probably 2 of the show, please go watch it it's so good and funny.

So all the class are residents, except Tsumugi and Kiibo. Kiibo is the equivalent of Janet. Welcome to The Good Place, yaddy yaddy, except there are 3 bad apples : Ryoma, Maki and Kokichi.

Each one of them are given an identity that isn’t theirs and they’re trying to pull it off, for a while at least. When the day after their arrival chaos happen and they find themselves the only one without the “emergency suit”, Ryoma decide to tell Tsumugi and Kiibo, but Maki and Kokichi saw that he was a fraud too and kept him from giving himself away, because right now Tsumugi and Kiibo don’t know what’s causing all the chaos, but if Ryoma gives himself away, is sent to The Bad Place but chaos is still happening, they will know the other two are here. Ryoma ask them what’s their plan then, which Maki says they try to blend in. Try to BE good people. Kokichi doesn’t believe one bit of this but act like he does to convince Ryoma. And so begin their journey to becoming good people.

(more under the cut cause it’s kinda long)

Here a list of the soulmates btw (not ship, most of them are made for plot purpose)

Suichi Saihara | Kaede Akamatsu

Kaito Momota | Maki Harukawa

Tenko Chabashira | Korekiyo Shinguji

Ryoma Hoshi | Kirumi Tojo

Kokichi Ouma | Gonta Gokuhara

Himiko Yumeno | Miu Iruma

Angie Yonaga | Rantaro Amami

But it turns out that trying to be a good person isn’t necessary instinctual for them, Ryoma is the one doing well but oh boy the other two are messes. Maki keeps menacing other people and her polite smile is so forced even Gonta knows it’s fake. Kokichi just keeps making pranks on the other residents because there’s no harm in a little prank (he just had problem adjusting to this new group and hates that he likes some of them so he pranks them so they get away from him and he doesn’t have to be vulnerable around them.)

Ryoma ends up sitting them down after a few days and telling them they need help. So they debate about who would be the best fit. They end up with Korekiyo, mostly because he studies human and they guess moral are part of humen so maybe he knows the best way to be a good person, plus the guy is lonely most of the time, doesn’t gossip and creepily study and takes note of the other residents.

They ask him and he accepts. He takes it as a new way to study human behaviour in a field he didn’t specialize during his life. (btw, here the characters are aged-up, they’re in their 20s so they can have more Life Knowledge:TM:). They chose to meet up at Korekiyo’s house to study because his soulmate, Tenko, hates his gut and never comes to visit; while the other three have way too caring soulmates that comes to visit them on a daily basis (Kaito being the more insistant, Gonta and Kirumi try to respect their personal boundaries but still, the gang doesn’t want to be interrupted by them, so at Korekiyo’s it is.

A little more about Tenko and Korekiyo. When Tsumugi introduced them to each other, Tenko was out of her mind. First, she’s a lesbian, second, she finds Korekiyo super creepy and has a bad feeling about him, worst than all other degenerate male she ever met (nevermind the fact that she says this every time she meets a new guy). Korekiyo is also unpleased by this arrangement, mainly because she’s a bit much for him. Tsumugi says soulmates aren’t always romantic, they can also take form in a strong companionship. Both are still skeptical when she leaves and basically avoid each other. Korekiyo also asked Tsumugi about other neighboorhood and if visiting is possible, since he would like to see his sister.

(Little point here, I doubt Korekiyo might be a serial killer here, he might have thought about it but never acted on it. He’s still pretty fucked up by the abuse his sister made him go through, but he also doesn’t recognise it as abuse yet, part of his character arc would be to come to term with that)

So ! The teaching is... Sure going. Korekiyo is good at teaching the theory but oh boy if he doesn’t suck at practice. They’re sure learning, but it’s still a trainwreck and Ryoma is the only reasonnable person in this house. They need a person who is a good person naturally, and wouldn’t go tell Tsumugi their situation...

Yeah they take a look at Gonta and it’s settled. The man is way too nice to everyone and “a true gentleman never tells friends secret to others !”. They thought about Angie for a moment, she seems nice with everyone and alwyas organise parties or artistic activities to unite everyone together, but she’s close friend with Tenko and Himiko so they doubt she would let Korekiyo hang out with her friends.

Gonta is not the best teacher. He tries his best, but even though he is nice and try his best to help everyone, he is also incredibly naive and can be mislead to do bad things pretty easily, which is what Kokichi proves within the first day his soulmate agrees to help them. They basically have a Insect Meet and Greet. Once Gonta understands he hurt his friends, he’s pretty sad and isolate himself. Ryoma would probably come talk to him. Gonta talks about how he didn’t act like a gentleman and he regrets it, which leads to a conversation about why he wants so badly to be a gentleman and their past life. Ryoma mentions how he didn’t have anything to live for back on earth, no family, no friends, no lovers. Gonta says he’ll make sure he does now, which makes Ryoma laugh. They grow closer after that, Gonta trying to spend more time with him.

Meanwhile, Kokichi is onto something. Since he arrived here, he felt like something was wrong. Tsumugi keeps saying they have no idea what’s causing all the chaos and there’s no way someone got here by accident ? Three frauds in one go ? That’s not right. So he investigates, everyone. Their past, their actions, their words, he wants to know everything and understand what is really this place. He doesn’t trust anyone. So he used the Insect Meet and Greet to find more info while everyone is busy. That’s when he’ll cross path with Shuichi, because he sneaked into his and Kaede’s house. Shuichi become suspicious of him from there on and they develop a kind of rivalry where Shuichi knows Kokichi is up to something but doesn’t know what, and Kokichi likes to mess with him. He also likes to mess with Kiibo to ask them a myriad of questions about everything and nothing.

Kokichi : Hi Kiiboy !

Kiibo : Not a boy, but hi (bc hell yes nb Kiibo and maybe this whole thing was based of my want to write this dialogue down, but who knows really)

MEANWHILE, Maki ends up hiding with Kaito who has been trying to talk to her for a while and now she can’t leave him because there are insects everywhere outside. They sit there for a while, Kaito trying to start a conversation, but getting frustrated because she doesn’t talk back until they both lash out. Maki insists she doesn’t want to make friends, especially with him and not on the basis of them being soulmates or whatever. She adds that he doesn’t want to be friend with her, trust her. He asks why but she doesn’t answers. So he starts all over again, straighten up and introduce himself again. “Name’s Kaito Momota, Luminary of the Stars and totally not your soulmate.” She sniggers and introduce herself. They chit-chat for a bit and once the insects are gone, they leave. They say goodbye and Maki avoids him a bit less after this.

The day after the Insect Meet and Greet, Kokichi arrive at Korekiyo’s home earlier than the others. He brags about how much of a shame it is that Gonta won’t work with them anymore, really it’s too bad. Except that when Ryoma arrives with Gonta in toe, his eyes are the size of saucers. In the days following, Kokichi still tries to use Gonta and make the giant hate him, which is slowly irritating Ryoma. He asks him why he keeps trusting Kokichi after everything he’s done, but Gonta says he believes Kokichi can become a good person, it’s actually the point of everything they’re doing. After a while Kokichi expends his pranks to the other frauds and Shuichi. That’s when it clicks for Korekiyo who goes to talk to him in private. He tries to ask him why he’s trying to get everyone who is close to him into hating him. Kokichi denies everything, just says it’s fun. Korekiyo just tells him it’s not doing him any good and they won’t hurt him if he let them get closer. He still prank them all, but it’s less mean.

There is also a point where the group wonder if Miu isn’t a fraud too because of her loud mouth. She’s super annoyed by the automatic swear words blocker. She’s so loud and don’t get along at all with her soulmate Himiko who finds her exhausting.

Also at some point, after Korekiyo began to understand that he was abused by his sister, Tsumugi reaches out to him. She give him a letter from his sister. She tells him visiting is not authorised yet, but she managed to negotiate postal communication just for him. He doesn’t take it well. At all. He has a mental breakdown, having flash-back and being terrorised of what to do with this letter. He doesn’t leave his home anymore and doesn’t answer to anybody, the group can’t have class with him. Everyone is getting worried and ends up asking Tenko for helps. They don’t really think he’ll talk to her but they really tried everything else. Himiko slides a word in their favor and Tenko agrees. She goes to the house, knocks and tells him to open. He doesn’t. She stays in front of the door for a while. After a few hours, Korekiyo finally asks what she wants. She says she wants to make sure he’s not dying or something. He says she heard his voice so now she knows he’s not dead, she can leave. But she doesn’t. She asks him to open the door, that it’s typical degenerate male behavior to lock themselves up and not face their emotions. She’s about to say he’s an idiot for making everyone worry like that, but the words die in her throat as the door opens and she sees her soulmate. He’s a mess. He lets her in. He sits down on the floor, she follows. After a few minutes she asks what’s going on. He tells her about how he recently found out what he always believed was false and maybe someone he cares a lot about actually hurt him a lot. He talks about his sister, about what he thought. He says he was wrong but don’t go in the details, he can’t for now. He cries and lose his composure again, which rings a billion alarms and raise his sister voice in his mind. Tenko instinctively reach her hand out and tries to stroke his hairs in a reassuring paterms. After a while, he calms himself and show her the letter, tells her he doesn’t know what to do. She takes it, rise to her feet and help him up. She goes to the chimney, light up a fire and give him back to him. “You don’t have to worry about this if it doesn’t exist anymore”. He let it falls into the flames and they both watch it burns until they are only ashes left.

Korekiyo still needs some time, but he slowly let the other back. Tenko also go to talk to Tsumugi, telling her to cut the postal communication thing. She seems disapointed but agrees.

After that they both start to get better. Tenko slowly try to have a better view on guys, she understands maybe not all of them are bad, like all women are perfect. Korekiyo is slowly opening up to others, slowly trying to move on from the abuse. It’s slow, for both of them, Tenko stops calling guys degenerate, but keeps the male, Korekiyo drops the hat, but keep the rest of the uniform. They’re making progress and supporting each other in little ways.

Maybe the cast of Danganronpa 2 can be the demons (you know bc of Ultimate despair and all, and maybe the survivors of the game can be the demons that would end up agreeing with the humans) but I didn’t thought too much on this.

ANYWAY that’s a few things in my mind. If some of you are interested I’ll probably answer questions about it or post more if I have ideas. Maybe draw, who knows ! Hope some of you liked my ideas

#danganronpa #new danganronpa v3 #danganronpa v3 #the good place AU #maki harukawa #ryoma hoshi #gonta gokuhara #korekiyo shinguji #kokichi ouma #tenko chabashira #tsumugi shirogane #kiibo

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elysiashelby · 4 years

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In Another World - T. Shelby Imagine Ch. 6

Paring: (Eventual) Thomas Shelby x Aliena Welsh (OC)

Fandom: Peaky Blinders

Word Count: 5,428

WARNINGS: Cursing, Self-Harm, Self-Deprecation

Summary: Aliena Welsh has been living in the universe of the show Peaky Blinders for a year, and the time has come for the show to start. But how will this affect her and Thomas’ relationship?

MASTERLIST CHAPTER 5.3 CHAPTER 7

A/N: THE SCENE IS SEPARATED BY THE BLACK LINE BREAKS! LOOK FOR THE SECOND ONE IF YOU DON’T WANT TO READ THE SCENE!

To be completely honest, I’m basing Aliena’s personality and actions off of myself, so since I have depression that means she does too. I have self-harmed in a stressful situation, so to me- it makes since that she would do it too as the tension are rising and she has to deal with the guilt of letting bad things happen to the people that are close to her. It’s especially harder since the one she cares for the most knows she’s allowing stuff to happen to him and his family.

A week and a half has passed and today the boys are going to the fair. I got ready and rushed over to John’s flat. Polly had already told me that I wasn’t to make breakfast for the family because it was all of the boys going out this time. I knew Ada was with Freddie and I think all Polly knew was that she had been out.

She told me that she was going to the church and I knew she would be meeting that bastard Campbell. Anyway, I let the kids have the day off. So, they were still asleep when I decided to ring Cassie. I still talk to her in an American accent, by the way.

“Why the hell are you calling me so early in the morning, Ali?”

“‘Cause I’m bored.”

“Bitch.”

“Slut. Now do you want the tea or not?” Yes, I taught Cassie 2010’s slang. I told her it would be like our own language. She loved the idea.

“Okay, lay it on me.”

“So, there’s a new barmaid in town. Tommy is completely smitten with her, or is gonna be. I can just tell.”

“No, shit! Fuck, what’re going to do?”

“What do you mean what am I going to do? Nothing! I can’t do anything. You know what he told me the other day!”

“That I’m a girl who isn’t family and you’re going to find a good man of your own.” We said simultaneously.

“You’ve said that a million times, Ali.”

“Well, it fucking sucks that he doesn’t see me as a woman. A girl, he said, a girl! There’s nothing I can do, Cassie. I’m fucking stuck suffering.”

“And working. When are we gonna go out again?”

“Fuck if I know! I’m just really needed here, is all.”

“Stop pulling my leg. You’ve already used that excuse. “Oh but they need me!” “I need to take care of the kids!” “They’re really stressed, right now!” Shut up and admit that you don’t like not being around Thomas.” She laughed.

“Shut up! That’s not it. They really do need me. I just can’t tell you why.”

She hummed. “Well, at least, you have your eyes set on someone. Mind that he doesn’t reciprocate it, but it must be nice to dote on someone.”

“Wow, thanks.”

“What? In my opinion, it’s better than not having anybody to obsess about. It gets lonely over here, you know.”

We talked for hours. Eventually, the kids came down ‘n I had to feed them, but I just moved the telephone with me. Since I knew what was gonna happen today, I told them that they would be playing in the back and that’s it.

“I’m sure. How is Angie and Tina?” I said.

“Still doing everything together. Seriously, this is why I need you to find a day off ‘cause I need some me and you time. I'm fucking stuck being a third wheel here.”

“Sexual tension, still there?”

“Of-fucking-course!”

We both laughed.

“But, ever since we talked about it. I noticed it more. Tina’s lingering glances at Angie and such. It’s just so sad.”

“Well, if she is a lesbian, hopefully, she’ll find someone.”

“Yeah, that would be the best outcome for her. The worst being, her family forcing her off in a loveless marriage. Hey, think she could like both?”

“Let’s hope.”

We both hummed sadly.

Just then another voice cut in, “Excuse me, Miss, you’re getting another call?”

“Who from?” I asked.

“6 Watery Lane, Small Heath, Miss.”

“Put it through. Bye, Cassie!”

“Bye!”

“Hello?”

“Aliena, come down here quick. Don’t bring the kids and tell ‘em to stay inside the house.”

“Okay, Pol.” I hung up the phone and rushed upstairs. I knocked on Katie’s door and entered.

She was busy rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. I said. “Katie, something’s happened and your Aunt Polly has called me back to the house. That means no more napping, you’ll have to look after your siblings. And you’ll have to make lunch and maybe dinner. Your Aunt Polly said no going outside today, so keep that door locked after I go. Understand?”

“Yes, Aliena.”

I stroked her cheek before kissing her forehead and leaving her room. I rushed to put on me coat, hat, ‘n scarf as I went out the door. I shouted goodbye to the kids and locked the door behind me and stuffed the key in me pocket.

As I walked down the street, I noticed that there was furniture in the streets and people in their night clothes. Men didn’t greet me as I walked past, but I went up to a familiar face.

“Mr. Johnson, can you tell me what’s happened?”

“Oh, Ms. Welsh! Those bloody new coppers came in and threw everything out. Told us that the Peaky Blinders gave them the okay. Is that true?”

I put on a troubled face. I made me voice small and trembling. “I… I don’t know, Mr. Johnson. I’m terribly sorry.”

He picked up a chair of his with his head hanging. “It’s all right, love. A word of advice, Ms. Welsh, be careful around them. Wouldn’t want the light of the Shelby family to darken.”

Me eyes widened as a blushed rushde to me face. “The light, Mr. Johnson?”

He chuckled while handing his items to his wife. “That’s your nickname ‘round here, Ms. Welsh. The little shiny light among those Peaky Blinder devils. A smile from you will cause any man in this city to behave.”

I chuckled, looking down with a small smile on me face. “Well, thank you for telling me, Mr. Johnson. I’m sorry this happened to you.”

“We’ll be fine, dear. Go on about your business. I’m sure they have you running somewhere.”

I gave him and his family one last smile before I continued me walk home. I got some pitiful stares and some glares, but I ignored ‘em. When I reached the house, I unlocked the door and walked in.

As I was taking off me coat, I shouted. “Polly, I’m here!”

“We’re in here, love!” She shouted back.

I walked into the parlor where Lovelock and Scudboat were.

“Go on.” Polly said. “Finish your report.”

“They’ve done in The Guns, The Chain, The Marquis. They didn’t touch the Garrison.”

Polly scoffed a hand rubbing her bottom lip.

“They did John’s street, too. But they didn’t touch the place.” I added. Her eyes widened like saucers.

“Jesus Christ. Well, the boys will be coming here soon. Scudboat, Lovelock, go and fetch a bucket of mild. Ali, come help me get the glasses.”

It took them an hour to get here. Polly told them to have a seat, but only Arthur sat down. I looked over at Tommy who was already looking at me. I turned the left corner of me mouth up as a sort of smile.

I pulled me sleeves up and started filling their cups. I passed it to Tommy, first, then Arthur. Scudboat and Lovelock already had their own. John stopped me saying that he’d get his own. I used a cloth to wipe the stuff off of me.

“The coppers told everyone Arthur had agreed to it when he was arrested. They said the Peaky Blinders had cleared out to the fair to let them do it.” Polly told them.

“I never said nothing to that copper about smashing up bloody houses!” Arthur said.

“All right!” Tommy said. “Which pubs did they do?”

“The Guns, The Chain, The Marquis. All the ones that pay you to protect them. The only one they didn't touch was The Garrison.” Polly answered. She lit her ciggie before talking again. “Made sure people think we were in on it. Smart, this copper. So go on. Drink your beers. Get out.”

All of them put down their beers and started making their way out, except Tommy.

“You better show people you'll still the cocks of the walk.” Polly called out after them.

Tommy walked ‘round to where I was as he ordered. “Hand out some cash to the landlords of the pubs. Pay some veterans to fix the places up.”

Arthur barely putting on his coat asked. “So what about you, Tommy?”

“I've to go to Charlie's to stable the horse. She looked foot sore in the box.”

Arthur was visibly upset by Tommy’s answer.

“Let them see your faces.” Polly said before closing the doors to the betting shop. She turned ‘round and looked at me. “You can go now, Ali.”

I nodded, looking over at Tommy who just nodded at me. I turned and went for the door. I was gonna go back to John’s ‘n cook them kids dinner.

I was barely out the door when I heard the pounding of footsteps.

“Aliena!” Tommy shouted. “I have a plan. Tell me if it pays off or not.”

“Alright.”

He nodded. “Gonna burn the King’s pictures. Will it-?”

“Yeah.” I interrupted him. I turned back ‘round.

“See you, tonight, then?” He shouted.

I waved him off. “Of course!”

I walked to John’s flat with a little more pep in me step.

I made their dinner, had some, tucked them into bed, and then made me way down to the fire. Loads of people were piling in. I walked over towards the boys.

“What’s ‘appening, then, lads?” I shouted as I bumped into John forcefully.

They cheered for me, oddly enough.

“Look, Finn and I have to go ‘n get more then I’ll be back, eh, Ali!” John said to me as he ran backwards.

“Fine, hurry up then, la!” I chuckled as I turned me attention to Tommy ‘n Arthur. They were watching the fire. Arthur with a drink in his hand, not yet opened. Tommy nursing a ciggie.

“The only reason I’m not smacking that outta your hand is ‘cause this is a special occasion.” I teased with a smile on me face.

He scoffed. “Then, everyday must be a special occasion.”

I tsked ‘n attempted to smack away his ciggie. He raised his hand up in the air with a smirk on his face. I gasped loudly and put a hurt look on me face. I attempted to smack it out of his hands, but it was too high for me to reach.

“Oh c’mon, Finn could do better than that!” Tommy chuckled.

“Oh, do one! You fucking cheater, you!” I knocked me body into him.

John and Finn soon came back. Somehow, Tommy managed to get a picture of the King ‘n chucked into the fire. “Chuck them on, boys.” He ordered.

People cheered including Finn, and Tommy chucked another photograph in.

Arthur spit his cork into the fire before saying. “Well, I hope to God you know what you're doing.”

I looked to me right ‘n saw John pass his pint over to Finn.

“Oi!” I yelled. “Don’t you take a swing of that, Finn Shelby!”

He brought the bottle down from his lips. John laughing at him.

“Oh, let him. It’s a fire.” John said.

I looked to Tommy ‘n he nodded. I rolled me eyes and lightly kicked his shoe. He looked at me, pointedly, and I stuck me tongue out at him.

The reporter came. So Arthur, Finn, John, and I all moved over. I watched as they talked. The fire gave me a logical reason for me blushing.

‘He just looked so stoic and handsome. Take me breath away, I swear.’

John ‘n I made conversation, mainly abar the schooling progress of his kids. I told him and Arthur, very loudly might I add, abar how Finn was doing. He begged me to stop, but I only did after a little more teasing.

When the reporter left, we all shuffled back to where Tommy was. We were talking for a while. I didn’t even notice when I was taking swings out of the boys’ bevvies. When I was talking to Tommy, John came over ‘n slung his arm over me shoulders.

“Oi, Aliena. Let’s have a song.”

I laughed nervously. “You outta your bloody mind!” I pushed his head away from me face.

I’m guessing Arthur heard ‘cause his head whipped ‘round. “Oh, come on! Sing a song, Songbird!”

I shook me head. “Nu uh!”

“Oh, come on, Ali. Give us a song.” Tommy added in with a smug smirk.

Me jaw dropped in shock. I muttered. “You little traitor.” I cleared me throat. “Fine, you’re lucky I’ve been drinking! What am I singing? Happy, sad, love songs?”

I got shouts of “love songs” and “happy.” It wasn’t just the boys. I threw me head back trying to find a proper song to kick things off. I knew that none of them would know any of the songs I’ma gonna sing, but I’m too out of it to care.

So, I picked “Saturday Night’s Alright (For Fighting)” by Elton John. People were really confused at first until the boys started cheering for me. Then, they started joining in too and a fight really did break out. I spun Finn ‘round ‘n ‘round since I wouldn’t be able to lead John in a dance. I sang “The Love Club” By Lorde and John did pull me away from Finn.

Next, I sang “Supaloney” by BENEE. I even did the dance. Look these were modern songs, but as long as Tommy stuck around, Arthur was cheering, and John ‘n Finn were dancing with me. Nobody said a word and danced with us. I sang “Electric” by Alina Baraz then “Cooler than Me” by Mike Posner before switching over to oldies.

I stopped dancing and just started singing. The first oldies song I picked was “Can't Take My Eyes off You” by Frankie Valli, “Put Your Head On My Shoulder” by Paul Anka, “Dream a Little Dream of Me” by Doris Day. The crowd was slowing down, visibly tired so I sang “So This Is Love” by Ilene Woods.

When the song finished, I rubbed my throat. Tommy walked over to me and asked if I was alright. I nodded. “Okay, lads! One last song then I’m done!” I announced. I was racking me brain for the right song when a hand clasped me own.

I looked up at Tommy. “What?” I asked.

He had a smile on his face. “Sing a song we can dance too.”

Me face contorted into something I couldn’t describe. I turned into a giggling mess. “What on Earth are you talking abar, Thomas Shelby?” Me voice had turned into a squeal by the end of me sentence.

He took a hand in mine while the other rested on me hip. I put a hand over me mouth, absolutely speechless.

“Let’s have a dance, Ali. I’m the only one you haven’t danced with.”

I laughed with a big embarrassing smile on me face. I shook me head and sniffed as I regained me composure. I sang “At Last” by Etta James as I swayed with Tommy. I giggled a lot and covered me mouth. It felt like I was singing it to ‘em ‘n he got a kick out of it, making faces at me ‘n such. When I sang that we were in heaven, he rolled his eyes while shaking his head.

We kept leaning into each other. But the final lyric came and so did the end of the dance. We stayed like that only for a moment, staring into each other’s eyes but then he broke it.

“Right! Fire’s over, go on home!” He yelled. Tommy walked over to Arthur while I stared. Me mood was shattered just like that.

I was surprised when someone tugged me to them. It was John, of course. I smacked his torso as he started walking us to the house. That night I slept in Tommy’s room. He stroked me hair ‘till I fell asleep.

The next morning, Polly and I were talking over drinks. I was sipping on juice while she had her tea.

Polly reached for the newspaper and started looking over it.

“Looking for Tommy’s section?” I asked.

“Yes. I want to see how much trouble this boy has stirred up.”

Then Ada came in, making a beeline to the bread and jam.

“Good of you to join us. Where have you been all day?” Polly asked Ada.

“In bed.” Ada replied.

I looked away with widened eyes as I took a sip of me juice.

As Ada was cutting herself a slice of bread, she continued talking. “Couldn't sleep. Then I couldn't wake up. Then I was cold, and then I had to go for a wee.” She grabbed the jam and her plate ‘n sat down at the table. “Then I was with this bear on a boat. That was just a dream. Then I was hungry.”

Polly made a point to stare at her, but Ada only started to get her serving of jam as she asked her. “Why are you reading the paper?”

“Why wouldn't I be?” Polly retorted.

“Well, I've never seen you read the paper. I've only ever seen you light fires with them.” Ada said before taking a bite out of her breakfast.

“The BSA’s on strike.” Polly said while putting down the newspaper ‘n picking up her cuppa tea. “Miners are on strike. IRA are killing our boys. Ten a day.” I watched as Polly’s eyes widened. She connected the dots.

‘I’ve been waiting for this moment! Now, I don’t have to tell blags anymore!’

I had to bite me tongue, so I wouldn’t smile.

“Stand up.” Polly ordered Ada.

“Why?” Ada asked her.

“Just stand up.” Polly put down her cup as Ada put down her bread. They both stood up. “Side on.”

Ada turned to her side and Polly grabbed her boob, lifting it up a little.

I chuckled while Ada shouted. “Polly, what are you doing?” We looked at each other with grins on our faces. But Polly was not smiling.

“Ada,” She said concernedly. “How late are you?”

Ada’s face changed from smiling to frowning. I mean she’d been caught. She looked away then at the ground. “One week.” She said. Ada took a look at Polly. “Five weeks.” The corner of her mouth lifted into a grimace before she admitted it all and Polly sat down. “Seven, if you count weekends. I think it's a lack of iron. I got some tablets.”

“But they didn’t work?” Polly asked.

I pretended to be concerned about this whole thing. I rested me head on me hand as me elbow was on the table. A worried expression painted on me face.

Ada sat back down. “No.” She answered while shaking her head, mockingly.

Polly nodded her head. “Aliena, today you’re taking care of our Ada. I’ll make a telephone call, and see if we can get her an appointment with a woman I know to find out. Go on up to your room.”

I instantly got up and took Ada’s scran in me hands. “Come on, love.” I said to her.

She sighed before complying with Polly’s orders.

As we were walking up the stairs, Ada asked me, “Ali, do you think I’m pregnant?”

I looked at her with me own grimace. “It’s been seven weeks, Ada. You’d be abar two months into your pregnancy.”

She whimpered with a scared look on her face. Then, she raced up the stairs.

The whole day, she just ranted abar how she couldn’t have been pregnant or how she could. Abar how sure she was Tommy would kill Freddie, or they would try to kill each other. I tried soothing her the best I could. ‘Til she started crying ‘n I told her if she keeps on worrying like that she’d hurt the baby. That shut her up.

Polly came in abar 3 o’clock saying that she got Ada the appointment for 7. I was in charge of getting her bathed ‘n ready. Once we were all ready, we made the journey over to Polly’s friend. Ada had a death grip on me hand the whole time.

Mrs. Simeon, was the woman’s name ‘n she checked if you were pregnant as a job. Sorry, I don’t know the name for it, but she’s like an OB-GYN— I think. Ada had to go into the room alone while me ‘n Polly waited outside the room.

I sighed audibly while rubbing me forehead and me leg crossed on top of the other. “She’s pregnant, isn’t she, Pol?”

She sighed, too. “Fucking, yes.”

Ada soon came out with a pout. I knew it was because Mrs. Simeon didn’t tell her the results. But she told them loud ‘n clear to Polly. She paid the woman and Ada stormed off. I ran after her and stole the ciggie she had lit from her hand.

She protested but I held a finger to her. “No fucking smoking while you’re knocked up. You hear me, Ada? No fucking smoking from now on. It hurts the baby!” I looked down at the burning ciggie in me hand ‘n brought it to me lips.

I took a puff out of it. Polly came out. “Keep bloody walking, the both of youse.” Polly took hold of Ada’s arm. I followed after them, still smoking.

“If anybody sees us here, they'll know."

“I'm not getting rid of it, Aunt Pol.”

“Just come home and we'll talk about it.”

“You get off of me, or I'll scream it, I swear.” Ada yanked her arm out of Polly’s grip. She stood still, effectively stopping us all. I leaned on one side, bringing the ciggies to me lips for another puff.

Polly looked ‘round as if trying to look out for familiar faces. “All right, you want to do this on the street? Let's do it. Whose is it?”

“If I tell you, you'll tell them and they'll cut him to pieces.”

“Not if he marries you, they won't. Will he marry you?”

“I don't know. I don't know where he is.”

“Jesus Christ, Ada!” Polly exclaimed while I muttered, “Fuck!”

I was just making little comments to keep up with appearances. I knew Freddie was on the run for now because of Campbell. I threw the ciggie on the ground and smashed it out.

“Look, he's gone away but he said he'd come back.” Ada said while I scoffed.

“Yeah, but they all say they'll come back.”

“He's not like that, he's a good man, he promised.” Ada started breaking down, so Polly pulled her in for a hug.

“He will come back, Aunt Pol, I know he will!” Ada said, muffled.

Polly looked at me while nodding her head and I took a surveying glance ‘round the street. I shook me head.

After a few pats on the back, we hurriedly walked back home.

I was out all day. I had to clean up John’s flat ‘n then collect from the families. When I was done hanging all of me stuff up, I walked into the parlor to see if anyone else was home. The doors to the betting shop were open ‘n sitting at the furthest table from the door was Tommy.

He looked deep in thought. I walked over to him, me heels clicking against the floor. He looked up at me.

“Did you know?” He asked me.

“Know what?”

“About Ada.”

I was in front of him, now. I nodded.

He scoffed before downing the drink he had already poured. “How long?”

I fiddled with me hands, humming. “Um. I caught them while I was looking for Ilsa. They were under a bridge that’s near one of Ilsa's friend’s home. I thought the girls might have been playing down there, and there they were.”

“You didn’t tell me.”

“She begged me not to.”

“Your loyalties lie with her, then?”

I scoffed while giving him a flabbergasted look. “Loyalties, Thomas? It’s women’s business, Tommy. Look at it this way, I’m telling you now.”

He laughed, mirthlessly. He leaned back against his chair and poured himself another drink.

‘Was probably shocked that I dared to use his own words against him.’

“Are you mad at me?” Me voice came out small. Like a whisper. Me nerves were set a light.

Tommy shook his head. “No, not mad.” He paused before leaning forward where he originally was. “I’m just surprised you can keep secrets from me. You are, afterall, so easy to read.” He gave me a pointed look, a mocking look.

I bit me lip while looking up at the ceiling then away from him as I nodded.

‘I wanted to ask him what he meant by that. But, I don’t think I’d like the answer.’

I cracked me thumb out of reflex. “Well, when you’ve calmed down, let’s talk.” I knocked on the table and then started walking back into the parlor.

“We can talk now.”

I whipped ‘round. “No!” I yelled, tears streaming down me face and me hands immediately coming into the conversation. “You got a cob on ‘n I don’t want to talk to ya while you’re like that. We’ll both say things we don’t mean, or worse what you do mean to say and I don’t want to hear it right now!” Me arms went limp as they were previously held out in front of me. I nodded at him before turning back ‘round. I was wiping me tears when Polly walked past me.

I ran to my room ‘n as much as I wanted to slam me door shut, I couldn’t. I leaned against the door as me shoulders shook with sobs. I slid down to the floor. I put me hand over me mouth, trying to stifle me sobs.

I flinched when I heard the glass shatter. Polly had thrown Thomas’s glass at the wall.

Me thoughts were running at a million miles per hour. I wanted it to stop. I was still crying as I crawled to me bed and took out the suitcases. I opened the one with all the items and looked for something sharp.

Then, I found it. A pocket knife. I left it out of the suitcase while I put the rest away. I sat against me bed and ran me fingers along the pocket knife.

A thought ran across me mind, ‘I’ve never done it with a knife before.’

I choked on a sob and took a big gulp of air.

‘I can’t take it anymore. What if I stayed down there and he made fun of me for having a crush on him? He’s gonna start pushing me away. I can’t take this anymore, not this much stress. I can’t bloody well tell him everything, but did he expect me too? But I can’t! I can’t do that all the time!’ I thought.

I picked up me dress and bunched it up at me waist. I unclasped the knife that was in me left hand and held it at the outside of me left thigh.

It was scarless. I’ve never cut here before. I’ve done me stomach and arms, but never thighs.

I got the sheets from me bed and stuffed them in me mouth in a hurry. Me breathing quickened even more as I pressed the knife against me skin.

And then I just did it. The pain was euphoric. I watched the blood seep out of the cut I made. I did another and another.

‘Fat. Ugly. Worthless. Manipulative. Annoying. Whore. Clingy. Slut.’ Were the thoughts that ran through me mind.

It was like I was snapped out of it when I heard a bang and then another right after it. I looked down at me thigh and it was all red. There were drops of blood on the floor.

‘What do I do? How would I get all of this clean?’

I slammed me head back against me bed. I stopped crying and was just breathing hard. I dropped the knife and hid me face in me hands. I tugged me face down before I let it go. I sat there doin’ nothing. Then, I heard the door slam again and I rushed to my feet.

I held me skirt up and ran to where we kept the medical supplies. I slammed it down on the counter near the sink as I sat on it. I looked around for alcohol ‘n I couldn’t find it. So, I hopped down ‘n shuffled to where Tommy was sitting at.

I took the bottle in me hands ‘n then walked back to where I was. I sat down there again ‘n poured the alcohol onto me cuts. I winced a little, but the pain brought me more satisfaction than discomfort. I got a gauze pad in me hand ‘n placed it over them, then wrapped it ‘round.

I heaved a big sigh when it was all said ‘n done. I sat there for a while before I decided to get back up. I got a dry cloth ‘n filled up a bowl with water then walked back up me room.

After I scrubbed out the blood on me floor, I put it on me desk ‘n went to sleep.

The next day, I didn’t see him. I knew he went to talk to Campbell ‘n then see Grace. I smelt the opium from his room. It made me cry and pick at me wounds, which I had been cleaning up secretly.

Bloody Ilsa and Finn got good eyes. They asked me why I’ve been walking with a limp. I told them I’d banged me foot pretty hard. They, of course, believed it.

It was morning. I was getting ready. I whimpered when I had to pick up me leg to put on me shoes, boots they were. When I had put down me leg, there was a knock on me door.

I startled me for a second. I looked at me left thigh to see if any blood had seeped through, but there was none.

“Come in.” I said.

The door opened and in came Tommy. I scoffed at the sight of him.

“You said that we’d talk when I wasn’t angry anymore. So…” He was in one of his suits with his cap in his hands.

“It took you a day to get over it?”

“I was busy.”

“Sure.” I said as I already felt like crying. I closed me eyes and pinched me nose. When I opened me eyes, I kept them to the ground.

He cleared his throat. “First, I want to apologize for making you cry. I know you don’t like it when I raise my voice and I took advantage of that. I know that when it comes to women things are different, especially when it's about romance. I had no reason to lash out the way I did at you, so for that I’m sorry.”

I nodded. “I accept your apology, Tommy. Anything else?” I lifted me head and looked right at him.

He looked away, trying to rack his mind for whatever he did wrong.

I made a smacking noise with me mouth before I said. “I’ll help you out. There was a smell coming from your room.”

Tommy’s eyes closed tightly. “I used opium to go to sleep last night, sorry.”

I shrugged. “Don’t do it again.”

Tommy nodded before slowly making his way out of me door. He turned back ‘round with his cap now on his head. “You know, you have the nose of a blood hound.”

I nodded with a smug smile across me face. “And the eyes of an eagle. And the ears of an elephant, so be more careful ‘round me.”

He had a little smile before walking away. I kept me own little grin. I snapped me fingers twice and clapped me hands. Another reflex of mine.

Me eyes widened when I realized I had something to tell him. “Tommy!” I shouted. I ran after him and caught him by the arm on the stairway.

“What is it?” He asked.

I blinked before letting him go. “Today’s meeting will be fine ‘n as long as you keep your ego or pride in check. It’ll go the way you want it, okay?”

His eyes widened, eyes shifting from left to right with his mouth hanging slightly open. “Okay” He said.

I smiled and told him goodbye.

I watched as he left. He gave me a two-finger salute before the door closed.

His meeting with Billy Kimber will be fine!

I went back to me room to finish doing me hair.

TAG LIST: @amirahiddleston @nemesis729 @salvatoreitmeanssaviour

#thomas shelby imagine #thomas shelby x oc #thomas shelby x reader #thomas shelby fanfic #thomas shelby angst #in another world #tommy shelby imagine #tommy shelby x oc #tommy shelby x reader #peaky blinders #peaky blinders imagine

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onthevirgeofdestruction · 3 years

Text

35 Q’s for Fanfic Writers

From this post

I’m having a shitty, rude alter-y, crap night so I’m just going to answer all of these to distract myself and focus and to not bother anybody just making my own post and putting it under the cut btw, notice to anyone not aware: since I’m moving I won’t likely be updating anything until I’m done doing so.

1. From one to five stars, how would you rate your writing? (No downplaying yourself!) 3/5? Could use more editing and description and can be weirdly paced.

2. Why do you write fanfiction? Because it’s better than focusing on pain 24/7.

3. What do you think makes your writing stand out from other works? I don’t seem to have a specific narrative voice that people recognize but I’m pretty proud of mostly organic dialogue.

4. Are there any writers that inspire you? as a rule i never look up to anybody for inspiration but there’s some stuff in my ao3 bookmarks I fawn over.

5. What’s the fic you’re most proud of? Right now, none of them. It changes normally, anyway. If get too proud then I’d get my ass kicked by RSD if someone didn’t like it so it’s safer this way

6. What element of writing do you find comes easily? Dialogue.

7. What element of writing do you struggle with most? Organic description, poetic language kind of stuff. I can paint a scene but I’m not so great with bring out out a feeling with description alone.

8. Which character(s) do you find easiest to write? Janus and Virgil are probably tied. They both have things I struggle with but I don’t have to go back and do much adjusting of language and tone with them. Though admittedly my Virgil is signifigantly more foul-mouthed than canon and I tend to prefer pre-AA feral asshole Virgil.

9. Which character(s) do you find most difficult to write? Patton. I write him the least, so people can probably tell. I love Patton, I really do, but it’s so hard to keep away from fanon Patton.

10. What’s your favorite genre to write for? Angst w/ H/C obviously. Or if you’re talking about regular book genres, Fantasy. I fucking love fantasy world building.

11. Who or what do you find yourself writing about most? Trauma. I blame Daeram. As if Ayri isn’t a giant Angst Demon.

12. Tell us about a WIP you’re excited about. Slopes. I’m really into it. I’ve got three one shots running right now. Patrons can read the first part of the unnamed cat remus one, there’s also a coffeeshop au tropey nonsense one like eglantine & lycoris, but Slopes is addiction angst. Mmmmm. Virgil is addicted to coke and alcohol and will listening to his friends even be in time? Who knows, especially not me, but there’s already over 30k.

13. First fandom you ever wrote for? InuYasha. Or was it Harry Potter? Or shit, The Blue Sword? Fuck, I’ve been writing for a long time, I really have no idea.

14. What’s your favorite fandom to write for? Sanders Sides. The characters are the perfect dynamic for writing since they exist in balance of each other and the popular, easy to project on archetypes featured are incredibly fun to do basically any scenario with.

15. What’s the weirdest fandom you’ve ever written for? Weird storywise? Kingdom Hearts? I can’t even follow the plot anymore. Weird Fandomwise? Sanders Sides. Its simultainiously the fluffiest and angstiest nonsense at the same time.

16. Any guilty pleasure trope(s)? Vampires. Gay ones. Gay Vampires. I also love calm tol and angy smol.

17. A trope you’ll never, ever write for. Any tropes that normalize incredibly toxic behaviour or tropes that are inherantly ableist, but I can’t think of any.

18. Wildest fic you’ve ever written? Incorrigible continues to be complete nonsense.

19. Do you prefer canon-compliant, AUs, or something in-between? AUs. I mean closest I even have is canon-divergence other than a single short.

20. Gen fic or shippy stuff? I like it when there is gay nonsense along with a plot that is treated as more important than the relationship the most. But I like both. There’s more shippy stuff in tss so i read more shipping action by default.

21. Favorite pairing to write for? (platonic or romantic!) Anxceit/Sleepxiety, but in general, give me darksides or give me death/j

22. Do you listen to anything while you write? Almost everything I write has a special playlist I listen to to help me write it, but otherwise I listen to my Nyan playlist, an alter is picking the tunes, or a voidfam playlist. I never have music off. When my internet is down I just listen to the songs I own or Anxiety’s theme on loop.

23. Do you prefer prompts and challenges, or completely independent ideas? I’m fine with all of them. I love working with prompts but I tend to deviate. And I’ve never done a challenge since I can’t do deadlines and bad things happen bingo never sent me a card and I applied three times.

24. One-shots or multi-chaptered works? I am generally multi-chaptered stuff, but I’ve been working on a few one-shots lately that are much longer than most one shots.

25. Have you ever daydreamed about side adventures/spin-offs from your fic? Tell us about them! I was originally thinking of doing some little 13-year-old Dreaming!Roman (y’know, the one with a job) shorts but it turns out I just had an alter of that little bastard and that’s why I inexplicably know more about him then I ever even considered. I still might do them after Dreaming is done. But that’s paced so slowly who knows when that might happen. Otherwise I put stuff in my notes and just do shorts of it if I’m like “oh you know what’s cool???” but since I can’t daydream maybe this question doesn’t apply to me.

26. Is there anything you’ve wanted to write, but you’ve been too scared to try? I want to do more autism stuff, and I’ve had it demanded a few times, but I’m scared of being that explict about it for some reason. Possibly because I might be, possibly because I’m scared of doing it wrong even though I’ve accidentally coded multiple characters autistic. I’m scared of explictly tagging them as such, too.

27. What’s the nicest comment you’ve ever received? That I can remember off the top of my head? I’m going with one from @a-genz-with-trauma-and-kins. It really helped me out and was just so kind and literally the best christmas gift I got in 2020.

28. How well do you handle criticism when it comes to your writing? I can handle it alright but Daeram is a little fucking pissbaby about it. Constructive criticism helps people get better, so I appreciate it. I can’t handle critism that is incomplete, though. “i just don’t get it” or “I don’t know I don’t like it” kind of things. If I can’t understand the why to fix it then things get out of control. And then I spiral and RSD for like four days minimum. If it came from an anon or a troll, too, It might not bother me for as long. Things that are just like “this is shit and you should feel bad” just make me laugh. Couldn’t even bother to read it long enough to insult me proper? I don’t care.

29. Have you ever gone outside of your comfort zone for a fic? How did it turn out? I have a few times. Mostly in shorts and prompts, I think. I think they turned out okay. They’re not particularly inspired or anything.

30. Tooth-rotting fluff or merciless angst? Depends on my mood. Am I triggered? give me the fluff. Am I vibin? Angst.

31. Do you have any OCs? Tell us about them! Fuck, fam, no, I can’t, I have so many. I have multiple original stories and some of them have very large casts and like holy fuck. Or do you mean in Sanders Sides fandom? Um, Morgan and Thorn in PD. The lesbian and her himbo dynamic. I love them. They’re dorks. Morgan is strong person with sharp tongue and soft romantic heart and Thorn is just so kind and so dumb and so exciteable he’s like a puppy. They were just filler characters and I got attached to them. Felton even gets redemption for being an ass later in PD, like oof i never intended to include so much OC content, especially for names I just picked randomly.

32. Summarize a random fic of yours in 10 words or less. nope I’m doing all of them because these are fun plea for my new self: 2 gay vampires, 4 humans, 1 braincell dreaming while I wake: trauma child needs therapy and so do you break: big oof, oh dragons, oh why, go virgil go rebuild: virgil is so not okay there’s more virgil to deal painful death: gay teens drink themselves into a new religion stargazing: whoops we didn’t realize people actually cared whole castle: everyone will throw down for kid!patton, even you incorrigible: found family with a shot of psychological horror and crack dangerous instincts: wholesome crime syndacite action slopes: addict gets mugged and thinks that’s just fine with him conflagration: logan avoids everything ever like a champ cat!remus: bored fae shifts gay pining from one person to another caffeine cyptids: caffinated gay panic goes faster than regular gay panic eglantine & lycoris: more tropes than you can toss a shoe at storytime: overpowered virgil also overreacts literally always

33. Is there anything you wish your audience knew about your writing or writing process? an alter and I write together and I have absolutely no idea what’s going to happen, what I’m writing about, or even what year it is. I often don’t even remember what I wrote. There’s no outline. I have an idea and I pick things at random for it. There’s just notes and an evil gleam in a demon’s eye. The only reason I know more than readers is because I take a long time to edit and some of these stories have fucking alters up in my head who can tell me things. Daeram tells me nothing. The writing demon supposedly has all this knowledge but I have absolutely no clue because he does not talk to me, he just fronts and slams out 9k in a few hours or we cofront to write and I’m like “oh no she didn’t” while typing

34. Copy and paste an excerpt you’re particularly fond of. i’m fond of the entire painful death series and I tried to find something I really liked without spoilers in stargazing and I couldn’t so here’s a random thing from incorrigble: “So, what do you do with your friends?” Patton continued on with a megawatt smile. “Grand larceny,” Virgil deadpanned and glared at Patton, who was taken aback. Remy and Andy just broke out laughing while Virgil tentatively sipped his still-too-hot-cocoa.

35. Ramble about any fic-related thing you want! slopes my dudes slopes i have learned so much about cocaine! like wow! I thought for a minute it was going to end with MCD around 30k but it swtiched from whump to hurt/comfort and I still don’t know if it’s going to be MCD but look at that funky little coke/alcohol addict go, it’s a medical wonder he’s alive! It’s not like there’s what seems to be a little talked about interaction between alcohol and cocaine that causes a toxic chemical to build up in the liver which can result in liver failure and sudden death at basically any moment! Which is part of why it may result in MCD but this time no ghosts! maybe it’ll be h/c with whump elements or maybe it’ll be whump with h/c elements we can’t know for sure

#ayri writes #tw drug mention

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artificialqueens · 3 years

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Tree House Kisses, Chapter 37 (Adorney) - Scorpio and Veronica

A/N: Click here for previous chapters or to read on AO3, click here! XOXO!

Chapter Summary: Courtney and Adore begin repairing their friendship, slowly but surely.

Chapter 37: I Have Confidence

“Bonnie!” Courtney flung herself into Bonnie’s arms, causing the older woman to laugh and put down the tongs, stepping away from the grill.

“Hiya darlin’, how are you?”

“I’m good now.” Courtney’s voice was soft, muffled in her hair.

“Dory told me you were coming, so I threw on a couple of veggie burgers.” Bonnie gestured to the grill.

“Aww, thank you!”

“Do you still eat cheese, or have you gone all the way to the dark side?” Bonnie held up a package of jack cheese, which she was about to put on the burgers.

“Cheese is fine,” Courtney laughed. “Although you know I’m really here for your macaroni salad.”

“Hey, Court? You wanna stop hanging on my poor mother and help me set the table?” Adore called from the other side of the patio, arms full.

“Coming!” Courtney pressed one last kiss to Bonnie’s cheek before skipping over to happily fold napkins, just as Angie came outside with a couple of serving bowls.

As she laid out the silverware, Courtney looked up at Adore, setting the condiments at one end of the table. She snatched a piece of red pepper from the veggie tray and grinned, thrilled to be here with her best friend and surrogate family on this beautiful, breezy Spring evening.

Adore smiled back, the light in her hazel eyes making Courtney’s heart nearly burst with happiness.

“Who wants toasted buns?” Bonnie called.

“I do!” Courtney exclaimed, eyes glittering with amusement at the joke she knew by now was coming.

“Well then, come sit on the grill…”

Adore and Angie both groaned, but Courtney laughed uproariously as if it was the first time she’d ever heard Bonnie’s lame joke.

“Why are you encouraging her?” Adore asked, slinging an arm around Courtney’s shoulders and guiding her towards the house to get the rest of the food.

“She’s cute. I missed her-” Courtney stopped suddenly, not wanting to kill the jovial mood, but Adore nodded.

“She missed you too,” Adore said, tossing Courtney another smile before she entered the house.

Courtney took a deep breath, grateful and happy, and then followed her inside.

Trinity adjusted her pillow behind her back, accidentally jostling the porch swing and Willam on the other side.

Willam had joined Trinity at her Granny's for the weekend. He never missed an opportunity to get some homemade cornbread, mac and cheese, and Granny Bonet’s Famous Peach Cobbler.

Plus Granny Bonet was sweet as pie, soft-spoken with a roaring laugh. She always seemed genuine when asking Willam what he has been up to since they last had seen each other, never making him feel any different than her own grandkids.

"Shit, Trin! Don't make me drop the weed." Willam snapped, adjusting the book on his legs.

"Sorry, sorry. This thing was stabbing me in the back," she said, finally getting the pillow in place and turning to get comfortable.

"Eh, Fuck it!" Willam shrugged, taking the half-open joint to his mouth and wrapping it closed. "If I can roll up while Violet is driving, I can fucking roll anywhere. That bitch drives like she’s playing Mario Cart."

Trinity burst into laughter, nodding her head in agreement unable to vocalize.

"I don't understand how the hell she even got her license," Willam snorted, spurred on by Trinity’s giggles.

"It's really not that bad," Trinity said, finally trying to defend their friend.

Willam gave an incredulous look over the flame he quickly ran over the joint.

"It's more so when she's impatient," Trinity clarified.

"Oh." Willam rolled his eyes before actually lighting and taking a quick intake. “So, all the time.”

"She's gotten better recently. I think Pearl's been helping her or something," Trinity shrugged, grabbing the joint.

"Wait, what? Pearl doesn't even have a car. That's not right." Willam sat up, staring seriously at Trinity.

Trinity held his gaze, intrigued by the wheels turning in his head. What could he be thinking?

"They're having sex!" Willam finally exclaimed triumphantly.

"What? No!" Trinity’s brow furrowed.

Willam shook his head and continued, "Actually, it's pretty obvious. And right under our noses. Violet’s one sneaky bitch."

"No, no, no, no, no," Trinity coughed, deep and loud.

"Yes!"

"Do you really think Violet is over Fame though?" Trinity asked, intentionally rocking the swing as Willam took another hit.

"Well, yeah. Or...maybe. Probably. At least, she should be."

"No." Trinity shook her head adamantly. “She’s definitely not.”

"Okay, Trin. If Pearl and Violet haven't hooked up already; they will. I bet you that."

"Bet what? Because I don't even know if Pearl is really Violet's type," Trinity hesitated.

"How so?"

"Like compatibility...in bed and stuff like that. You know Violet is forward and aggressive and Pearl seems sort of nonchalant but in the ‘you can't tell me what to do’ kind of way. Violet has to be the boss, and Pearl doesn’t seem like she’d let her. Incompatible." Trinity shrugged, snatching the joint from her cousin’s hand. “Don’t forget to share, dick.”

"Hold up! And how would you know what either of them is like in bed? You’ve given this a lot of thought, cuz." Willam looked genuinely shocked and confused.

“It’s just a guess,” Trinity said, rolling her eyes. She put the joining to her lips, inhaling deeply, even as her cheeks darkened in embarrassment. “I mean, you know, it’s not like I obsess over it or anything...shut up.”

“Omigod, Trin, are you gonna start lezzing out with those whores?”

Trinity started coughing and laughing, shaking her head.

“Never say never,” she wheezed, laughing even harder at the scandalized look on his face.

“What’s so funny?” Roy asked, tapping on Courtney’s thigh. She was sitting next to him in the booth at Denny’s, giggling to herself over something on her phone for about the 20th time since they’d sat down. They were with April and Bob, getting a late snack after the movies, and her mind was clearly elsewhere.

“Oh, um...sorry. Adore just sent me this-” Courtney gave a sheepish smile. “You know what, it’s not important.” She closed her phone and stuffed it into her jacket pocket.

“Well, thanks for finally joining us,” Roy said. He was going for lighthearted, but it came out a bit cross and scolding.

“Sorry, daddy,” Courtney teased, causing April to burst out laughing and Roy to make an even grumpier face. She stole a French fry off his plate, biting her lip to keep from laughing.

“I think she needs a spanking,” Bob said, and Courtney turned to stick her tongue out at him.

“You need a spanking,” she informed Bob.

“Hell yeah I do.” He cast a sly look over at April. “You wanna spank me?”

“Not especially,” April said, feigning boredom as she sipped her strawberry milkshake.

“What about you, Court?” Bob wiggled his eyebrows. “Want to teach me how to behave?”

“You’re sick,” Courtney said.

“Come on, someone must want to punish me,” Bob whined, and then yelled, “Ow!” as Roy kicked him hard under the table.

“You’re welcome,” Roy said. “Now eat your chicken fingers.”

Courtney laughed, then felt her phone buzz in her pocket, fingers itching to open it and see what Adore might have sent. She reached inside; even just touching it made her feel better. When Roy got into a heated debate with Bob over whether the Jackass crew was in fact funny, she quickly flipped it open and checked.

ADORE: LOL but can you blame me?

COURTNEY: Of course not. You’re only human.

Courtney finished sending the text, quickly putting her phone back, when she looked up and saw April gazing knowingly at her. She shrugged guiltily, pulling her root beer float over and taking a sip.

Once Courtney and Adore made up, play practice became about ten times as fun. They didn’t have any scenes together, so whenever one of them was on stage, the other would be cheering them on silently from the wings.

Courtney was especially supportive once the performances began—not once leaving during Adore’s big solo, ready to leap out and fight anyone who would dare upset her this year. Fortunately, the protestors stayed home. Apparently, as Mrs. Maguire thought, just the words ‘Sound of Music’ were enough to appease them. They didn’t bother watching to see the genderqueer lead, lesbian nuns, drag queen baroness or gay messenger boy mincing about.

Closing night was a bit bittersweet for Roy—after all, he’d had a starring role in every show his entire 4 years there. College would be different, and he knew that this part of his life was now officially over. Courtney hugged him tight, and Adore teasingly told him that it was okay if he wanted to cry.

“Fuck off,” he said, burying his face into Courtney’s hair.

“What, I’m serious! We’re all very impressed at this display of emotion,” Adore said.

“Yeah, it really shows how secure you are in your masculinity,” Courtney added with a wink.

“Ugh! You’re both assholes!” Roy said before he stomped off stage.

“Hmm. I guess he’s not that secure,” Adore commented, and she and Courtney both began to giggle again.

As May bled into June, days getting longer and warmer, Adore began to feel antsy for summer to begin. One Saturday, she invited Courtney for an old-fashioned sleepover in the tree house, just like the good old days, and Courtney enthusiastically agreed. It was their first one in almost a year, and both girls were excited to reconnect, but maybe a bit nervous. There was still so much that they’d never said to each other. Still so much that they didn’t know how to put into words.

Adore climbed up the ladder with pizza and drinks, just as Courtney finished laying out the sleeping bags.

“Pizza delivery!”

“Ooh, yay!” Courtney exclaimed. “And um...I stole this from the liquor cabinet. Hopefully Adam won’t miss it.”

She produced a nearly full bottle of Jack Daniels, which impressed Adore, and made her send a grateful little prayer to Karen’s latest boyfriend.

“Thanks, Adam!”

Feeling like she could use a little something to help her relax, Courtney took a big swig from the bottle.

“Ugh, this is disgusting!” Courtney winced at the bitter taste, giggling.

“There's Coke too,” Adore said, and off Courtney's horrified expression, clarified, “Coca-cola, you dumbass. You can use it as a chaser.” She gestured to the white bag on top of the pizza box.

“Oh. Right.” Courtney flashed an apologetic grin and pulled a bottle of Coke from the bag, taking a sip.

Adore shook her head, chuckling, taking the bottle from her.

“Here…” She poured some of the soda out the window, then carefully replaced it with Jack, taking a sip to make sure the ratio was right before adding a little more alcohol. “Perfect.”

“Ugh, Adore!” Courtney opened the pizza box, groaning. “There’s pepperoni all over it!”

“Oh shit.”

“Gross…”

“Sorry!” Adore said, explaining, “I haven’t been hanging out with a lot of vegetarians lately, I forgot. Here, I’ll eat the pepperoni off for you.”

“Then there will still be pepperoni juice,” Courtney whined.

“You’re such a pain in the ass. Pepperoni is barely an animal. I don’t even know what animal it is!”

“Yeah. Don’t you think that’s a problem?” She pushed the pizza aside and dug into the bag of cheesy bread instead.

“Well. Sorry,” Adore said again, and Courtney leaned back, giving her a smile before taking another swig of Jack and Coke.

“It’s cool, I can eat this.”

“So…” Adore traced the edge of the sleeping bag with her finger, by now a bit sleepy and rocking a healthy buzz, finding herself realizing again just how much she’d missed her best friend. She felt bad, wished she could take back all the months of silence. But instead, she settled for trying her best to find out how her life was going these days. “...How are things with Roy?”

“Good. Great, actually,” Courtney sighed. “He’s the best.”

“He really loves you a lot,” Adore said, the memory of their argument a few weeks back still fresh in her mind. How Roy was the one who, in spite of everything, got her to make up with Courtney—and all because he wanted his girlfriend to be happy. It was disgustingly sweet, actually.

“Yeah. It’s gonna be so weird when he’s gone next year…” Courtney said.

“Oh, right. Shit. How’re you gonna survive?” They’d been joined at the hip for so long now that Adore couldn’t imagine what school—or life—would be like for Courtney without him.

“I’ll manage,” Courtney said, rolling over onto her side. “Anyway, he’s going to UCLA, so he’s only gonna be a few hours away. I’ll probably still see him all the time.”

“That’s cool.” Adore took another sip of their makeshift cocktail, swallowing down her residual bitterness about Roy and Courtney’s perfect teen romance along with the whiskey.

“What about you. Any...special girls I should know about?” Courtney asked carefully. She took the bottle from Adore’s hands.

“Special girls? Okay mom.”

“Shut up, you know what I mean! Anyone who-”

“Nah.” Adore shook her head slowly.

“Do you and Violet still ever-”

“No,” Adore said, not even letting her get out the question. “We both realized that it was super toxic, and we’re much better off as friends. And this time, it feels like it’s stuck.”

“And Pearl?”

“Pearl?” Adore furrowed her brow, shaking her head. She and Pearl were still in that weird place where things were almost flirty but not. And she was still the only one who knew the whole truth about what happened with Courtney. It was too hard to explain, so instead she just said, “No. Although she has been really great this year. You know...with everything.”

Courtney took another sip, nearly polishing off the bottle, and Adore crawled over to make a new one.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Go ahead.” Adore once again poured the Coke out the window—this time maybe a bit more, and then replaced the contents with Jack.

It was a few moments before Courtney spoke again. She appeared to be collecting her thoughts.

“How did you know that you were gay? Or...when…did you start thinking about it?”

Adore turned around, head tilted.

“Where’d this come from?”

“I’m just curious. You never really talked to me about it.” Courtney held a pillow in her arms, hair falling across her eyes.

Adore considered what to say, how honest to actually be in this moment, deciding that a few lies of omission were probably the best idea for everyone.

“I guess I always sort felt a little...different. And then when Violet started tutoring me, she kind of guessed? And she made me feel like...I don’t know. It was normal. Or at least, okay.”

“Of course it’s okay,” Courtney assured her, then asked, “So...was she the first girl you ever...had feelings for?”

Adore’s tongue felt thick in her mouth. She didn’t want to lie, not tonight when they were supposed to be bonding. But on the other hand, they’d only recently found their way back to each other, and what if she destroyed their delicate new reality? She didn’t think she could bear another fight, another period of loneliness like she’d had this year.

“Um...I guess I had little crushes before, but nothing that ever...went anywhere,” Adore finally said. Which was true.

“Oh yeah? Like who?” It was a fair question. A casual question. Her best friend showing interest in the inner workings of her heart.

“Uh…” Adore racked her brain for an answer that would satisfy her. “Remember that counselor we had at drama camp? Asia?”

Courtney did remember—she was a pretty Black girl with a dazzling smile, funny and lively but always sure to keep them in line.

“Oh yeah. She was cute,” Courtney nodded approvingly.

“And of course, um...Shakira.”

“Of course.” Courtney giggled, then bit her lip. “Anyone else?”

“Oh! Remember that girl who worked at Video Village? With the pink hair and all the piercings?” Adore grinned slyly, starting to have fun with this walk down memory lane.

“Her?!” This one, Courtney didn’t seem to appreciate, but Adore just shrugged.

“Yeah! She was hot.”

Courtney took another thoughtful sip from the bottle before asking, “Have you ever liked a boy?”

“I used to try to make myself like boys,” Adore said. “Or, imagine that I did. But it was always just some dumb pop star or something. Like...remember Ashley Parker Angel?”

“No. Who?!” Courtney looked utterly confused, brow furrowed.

“The blond from O-Town.”

“O-Town!” Courtney giggled gleefully, a hiccup escaping her as she passed the bottle back to Adore. “Omigod. You had their picture on your binder and no one could figure out why.”

“Yeah, I know. Their music was terrible,” Adore admitted.

“They made music?”

Adore laughed, shaking her head.

“And god, even my fake crushes were dudes with girl names…”

This made Courtney giggle some more, holding her pillow tighter. Her eyes drifted shut for a moment.

“What about you?” Adore asked.

Courtney’s eyes popped back open.

“What about me?”

“You ever like a girl?” Adore teased, poking her in the ribs. Fully expecting her to squeal in disgust, or burst out laughing.

But instead, Courtney looked back at her and said, “Besides you?”

Adore stared back at her for a long, heated moment. A million thoughts swirled in her head, but none so strong as the realization that Courtney was just fucking around, making her pay for her teasing. Adore started to laugh, shaking her head.

“Good one, bitch.”

Overcome with an impulse she couldn’t ignore, Courtney leaned forward and pressed her lips to Adore’s. And for a moment, it was perfect—Adore’s soft lips against hers, breath sweet and smoky from the drinks. And then Courtney felt a hand on her shoulder, shoving her backward.

Courtney clapped a hand over her mouth. What was wrong with her? This was exactly how she’d fucked things up last time. Her cheeks blazed red.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean-”

“I know,” Adore said hoarsely.

Courtney’s eyes filled with tears, terrified that this time, she’d fucked up for good.

“Are you mad?” she whispered.

“No.” Adore shook her head, giving a wry smile and reaching forward to pry the bottle from her fingers. “But you’ve probably had enough of this.”

Courtney let out a relieved chuckle, tension leaving her body as she laid back down against the bean bag chair. Things were okay; they were still friends and everything was back to normal. Or at least, as normal as possible.

“Dory?”

“Yeah?”

“Will you snuggle with me?” she asked, voice soft and tentative.

Adore turned to her friend, giving a gentle nod, saying “Of course,” before curling up beside her.

For a second, as she breathed in, Adore realized that Courtney must have switched shampoos. The scent of her hair was different, and the unfamiliarity of it gave Adore a strange pang of sadness.

But then, as they settled in some more, Adore realized that lingering beneath the surface was something she knew very well, something innately her that would never go away, no matter what perfumes she might use. And that, the sameness, was enough to make her smile to herself, arms wrapping tightly around Courtney as she pulled her in close.

#rpdr fanfiction #tree house kisses #scorpio #veronica #adorney #adore delano #courtney act #bianca del rio #bitney #bob the drag queen #trinity k bonet #willam belli #lesbian au #high school au #angst #fluff

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sketchyracoon · 4 years

Photo

I may have lost any semblance of control on my life i had before. Among Us AU details under the cut.

Many of them have accents. I had the idea that they were from a big like multi-country space project and fell in love with the idea of the American(s) on the ship just startling the others because of things like the lack of bidets in the US.

Red (Elliot) is 38, is a Texan and you can tell he says Ya'll as a descriptor and many of the others are slightly fearful of the way he mashes words together. his whole personality can be summed up with "I'm a cowboy baby" and the fact that he's angy.

If I'm honest he is the only American on board that really startles the other crewmates even the other Americans are like "hey dude chill".

Orange (Herbert) is 27 probably from France (haven't really decided yet) and he was more confident before shock horror bad things happened to the whole crew. (More on that at five). Herbert is also very easily overwhelmed, he tries to pay attention but is often confused. I’ve also decided to change the egg on his head to be a hat in the future but I decided that after I drew the egg.

Pink (Eun-Jung) is 29, South Korean but he got some schooling in Britain and has probably traveled a lot. He looks soft but he can and will throw a mean punch. He and Herbert have crushes on each other but they kinda put it to the side when shit went down. There have been many times however when Eun-Jung has sat down with Herbert and calmed him down and dried his tears.

Green (Philip) is one of the younger crewmates being 22, he's a very studious lad he loves adventure novels and always wanted to go to space.

Especially after watching shows and reading books about space. He keeps trying to get together group DND nights but it's very hard for him to cater to everyone's interests cause he's the kind of DM that wants everyone to have fun but he also has a lot planned for a session but nothing ever happens because everyone is always goofing off. He still has fun tho and so does everyone else.

White is Angie, If I'm honest I named her that because of the halo she's wearing, and I thought it'd be funny. She is a not so single once single mother who lost her husband when her kid was born. She used to live in England but moved to Ireland for new scenery and for the space project.

She and black (Jolene) met in school and quickly fell in love. They Are Married! And the whole crew hates (loves) how sappy they are. Angie is stubborn and strong but also very kind and level-headed, she's not easily overwhelmed like Herbert is but when she does get overwhelmed, she doesn't crumble like he does. Doesn't mean her wife doesn't comfort her tho.

They both are in their late forties (Angie is 48 and Jolene is 49) and I named Jolene, Jolene because of the song. Jolene is Irish btw idk if I made that clear. And she is the definition of a chaotic lesbian, Angie tries very hard to keep her air of being a distinguished bi but she's also very chaotic at heart. They both are greying hair-wise but Jolene keeps covering it up with dye. Jolene thinks her wife looks very elegant with the white in her curls. Jolene can be summed up with that one Tumblr post story about a girl who told a girl she liked that "her air must be mad crisp" because of her plants.

Cyan (Tea) is Scandinavian and listen this like Eun-Jung's name is where is gets shaky google wise, and if this name isn't really a Scandinavian than I guess it's just an eccentric nickname. (I’m assuming it’s pronounced like the drink but if I’m wrong sorry) She is NERDY AND PROUD, but like not movie nerdy girl I mean genuinely weird nerdy. I guess technically everyone is a little nerdy in this crew but she's a feral kind of scientist. She is technically the captain of the ship because of her science background and her previous work with the Scandinavian branch of the space mission. Her goggles are prescription. She is 36 and has a little crush on the resident father of two purple (Perry).

Perry is a loving dad and all-around kind dude, he fathers the group sometimes intentionally. Often taking control of making food, and sometimes the group meetings, even tho technically he's not in charge. He's an open ear to the entire crew and he loves his two kids so much. He doesn't talk much about how he and his Ex split up but it's clear that he and his kids are happier without her. He Kinda likes Tea back a little but he's so busy being a good dad that he doesn't know that. He's often found baking for everyone and is in fact the culprit behind the extra five pounds everyone gained when joining the ship. Perry is 32. His family is from India and he visited his extended family there a lot but he was born and raised in the UK.

Blue (Liz which is short for Elizabeth) is not the greatest with people, she tries her best but she often comes off weird she's 51, one of her hobbies is learning and practicing different rules to fighting styles. She’s trying to teach herself taekwondo but the lack of instructor and need to use downloaded videos is holding her back. She's got some skill in boxing and ran a self-defense course back on earth. Her entire class was sad to see her go but the respected her decision and on the off days that the ship gets reception to radio back earth or other ships she makes sure to message them back with well wishes.

Yellow (Zack) is a little shit lord, he is the youngest on crew at age 19. He got in through a series of events up to and including the fact that his parents were exasperated by him and that his Aunt Liz (who he calls Aunt Lizzy) telling them that they were short a crewmate. the previous yellow left and they were having trouble getting a fit for the crew's specific needs, everyone else was on different crews and couldn't leave to fill in their gap. They were planning to leave with nine people when Zack reluctantly signed up. He was 18 at the time he first signed up and after a year of training, he was greenlit just in time for the mission.

He doesn't really get along well with anyone but he slowly opens up to the crew overtime. He got labeled as a problem child because of undiagnosed ADHD and focus problems and by the time he was diagnosed it was too late and all of his teachers had basically given up on him.

The entire crew tho is cool with it because many of them are neurodivergent. Liz and Zack are the other Americans of the crew. But Elliot is the only one who is not bi/multilingual. Unless you count Texas accent as a language which a many of the crew jokingly do. In which case he is fluent.

But then disaster struck, after a few months of bonding and growing close as a found family people started to die. After some trial and error, they found out that Herbert and Zack were behind it. Liz and Eun-Jung being two of the few remaining both reacted differently Eun-Jung was controlled anger barely keeping it together and Liz was deeply disappointed, she wanted better from her nephew.

What was weird tho was after ejecting the pair their display panels confirmed that they were "imposters" and now that they thought about it it was weird that they were all locked to this one specific floor of this ship. but no matter that was a thought for another day. now able to go to the lower floors the remaining crew mates all went to bed.

The next morning however everyone was back and alive not even a scar remaining, even the imposters. returned. After a lot of shouting (mainly from Elliot who was pissed about being stabbed) the crew started to reluctantly trust what Hubert and Zack were saying that they didn't want to hurt or kill any of them but something made them and it was like they were in a haze.

It was only directly after a kill that they could snap out of it and control themselves briefly (kill cooldown) before they lost control again. Since then they've been stuck in this sick loop where they all keep taking turns being stuck as imposter killing each other. At first when it happened again, they thought it was Herbert and Zack again but once it didn't stop anything and the ship told them that they weren’t imposters.

They realized that it was randomized. Overtime they learned the rules. Only Imposters can access vents, the kill count, that they can then follow around and do things as ghosts after thy get murdered, etcetera. But one thing they didn't realize was the punishments.

Overtime as they each tried to break the rules by, revealing themselves as imposter, trying desperately hard to go pacifist, or any number of other things like trying to remove their helmets, or talk on comms before emergencies on meetings they were punished.

Philip is now growing plants off of himself. Eun-Jung has a similar punishment but it's solely cherry blossoms. Herbert is stuck killing everyone by eating them with a giant mouth from his stomach. I don't know Elliot’s punishment yet but the thought to make him Texan squared did cross my mind.

Angie is turning into one of those rad many-eyed angels from Dante's inferno. Jolene is now growing goat horns and her eyes are now goat-like. And Idk what other punishments to give Tea, Perry, Liz, and Zack, I want them to be related to the hats and stuff you can wear in game like some of the others but how to you punish some one using a banana? Or two kids? Or googles? I’ll probably come up with something later especially since they are all mostly hidden by the suits, that means that conceivably their punishments are hidden by the suits.

#among us #among us ocs #my art #i've lost it. bye ya'll I'm lost in the sauce #i'#I spent so much time while i drew them thinking of their dynamics and stuff and how the universe would work for optimal angst

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athingthatwantsvirginia · 4 years

Text

A Thousand Beach Boys Songs

PART TWENTY-EIGHT OF THE DO YOU SEE HER FACE? SERIES

Pairing: Jess Mariano x Original Character (Ella Stevens)

Warnings: drinking, drugs (just marijuana), smoking, anxiety about future, plentiful pop culture references

Word Count: 6.8K (idk this just happened)

Summary: Jess and Ella visit California.

The sun was high and bright in the Philadelphia sky, beating down on the concrete of the city, when Ella finally awoke at half past nine to the sound of a siren outside. Early August had brought a heat wave to the East coast, and the hot air always rose to the top floor of Truncheon. They were sleeping only under a thin blanket, and Ella had found she had thrown it off herself at some point in the night. Or perhaps Jess had. He was a light sleeper, often had bad dreams, tossing and turning. But his side of the bed was empty, with a sticky note left on the pillow in his place. She furrowed her brows; it was Saturday, the beginning of her last two weeks before classes and office hours started, and she didn’t know of him having any plans. Stifling a yawn, she picked up the note and squinted at it in the harsh sunlight streaming through the window.

Morning Daria,

Went to get coffee. Be back soon. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.

-James Dean

In spite of the roll of her eyes, Ella snickered before rising out of bed. She pulled a mauve cotton dress over her head, tying her hair into a low bun. Padding on bare feet into the living room, she smiled as she noticed Chris was up, pouring himself some cereal at the tiled island. Matthew had stayed over at some woman’s house, though he wouldn’t tell them her name. Ella went to the corner of the living room and put a Joni Mitchell record on. Then, she hopped on a stool across from Chris.

“Where’s your boy toy?” Chris asked through a mouthful of cereal, his hair sticking up in all directions.

She snorted a laugh. “Getting coffee. He left me a note.”

“Adorable,” he deadpanned.

“Mm. Sickening, isn’t he?” Ella asked, mocking fondly.

Chris nodded, then tilted his head over in the direction of the record player. “Really? Joni Mitchell?”

“She’s a genius. Choose your next words carefully,” she warned.

“Isn’t she just a little...too sweet?” he asked.

Ella scoffed. “No one who likes disco as much as you do should be allowed to criticize a Renaissance woman like Joni Mitchell.”

“Disco is the best,” Chris said casually. “And Joni Mitchell is the worst.”

“Ugh, I’m gonna pretend I didn’t hear that,” Ella groaned, rolling her eyes dramatically. “I had this girlfriend last year who hated Joni Mitchell. It was, like, half the reason we broke up.”

Chris’s eyebrows shot up in an expression of surprise as a smile broke out on his face. “Girlfriend?”

She nodded. “You’re looking at your resident bisexual.”

“Yes! You’ve got to come to Pride with us in September! Jess and Matthew came last year, and they’re great, but, they’re also both so very straight,” he said, laughing slightly.

Biting the inside of her cheek, Ella allowed her own grin to appear. She’d never been to a pride parade before, though she had always wanted to. Eventually, Lane, Zach, and Bryan had figured out she was dating a woman for a couple months during her third year of college. And they’d taken it surprisingly well. Lane wasn’t completely sold on the idea, but Ella wasn’t shocked, given the strict Christian Kim upbringing. They didn’t kick her out, didn’t speak to her hatefully, only shrugged (with a few lingering, confused looks from Lane) and went about their day. And so they had been added to the list of four people in the whole world who knew about her sexuality, though she’d never actually told them her label. Jess was the only one who knew the details of who she was.

But Philly was different, she had to remind herself. Chris was openly gay, held hands with his boyfriend in public, even kissed him occasionally. There were some looks, but no remarks. No one made jokes at their expense. It was refreshing and liberating and, at times, almost made her feel like crying. And though she was dating a man, she was still just as bisexual. There was a part of her Stars Hollow would simply never have been able to swallow. Especially since Jess had been her boyfriend for so long, she knew some people in town wouldn’t have even believed it. They would have told her it was a phase, it would pass, or she would eventually be a lesbian. The only people in town she thought might be able to understand were Miss Patty or Lorelai, though she had never gotten the courage to tell them.

“Yeah, I’d love that,” she replied, trying to ignore the sting in her eyes. She blinked back the wetness, tucking her hair behind her ears.

Over the speakers, Joni Mitchell crooned a long, lilting high note, making Ella giggle as Chris uttered a grunt of dissatisfaction.

“She really broke you two up?” Chris asked, beginning to sip the sweetened, sugary milk from his bowl.

Ella shrugged. “Partially. Her name was Angie and she was this badass singer. But we just didn’t click. Music tastes were only a small part of the equation. She was a little too jealous and I was a little too hung up.”

“Hung up?”

“On Jess,” she said shortly, thinking back to the last morning she’d spent in Angie’s apartment. When Angie had accused Ella of having lingering eyes for the men at her concert the night before. And Ella hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the way Jess had never cared she liked both men and women. Had never bought into the stereotype of bisexual promiscuity.

Putting his bowl in the sink, Chris shot her a smirk. “And he’s the sickening one?”

“Whatever,” she said, rolling her eyes. “But, hey, not like Jess has great taste, either. He loves Hemingway and hates poetry.”

“I know,” Chris said, commiseratory, as he leaned against the counter back across from her. “When he bad mouths Tennyson? It’s the closest I’ve ever felt to homicidal.”

“I don’t know. Tennyson’s nothing compared to Byron,” Ella argued, shrugging slightly.

Chris gasped. “Not you too! And here I thought we were beginning a beautiful friendship!”

Just then, Jess returned with a bag of coffee in one hand and his keys in the other. He always locked the door out of instinct, even when someone else was home. It was a habit Ella had noticed, but didn’t know the origin of.

“Your girlfriend’s a traitor,” Chris said, feigning shock.

“Old news.” Jess went behind Chris to the coffee machine, his eyes tired without a dose of caffeine. Though he was nowhere near Gilmore level, Ella had noticed how dependent on coffee he had become since his teenage years.

Chris shot Ella a final, joking glare, which she returned, before retreating back into his and Matthew’s room to get dressed.

When the coffee was started, Jess put some tea on for her without having to ask. “I can’t believe you’re awake. Thought you’d still be out when I got back.”

“Not everyone likes to get up at sunrise, jackass,” she retorted with a smile.

“I’m not judging you, Morticia. I know how the sunlight drains your vitality,” he said, smirking.

“My God, you’re still so hilarious.”

“It’s been said.”

As Jess finished what he was doing, he walked toward her, elbows on the counter. He leaned over and pressed a long, sweet kiss to her lips.

“Hi,” he said softly.

“Hey,” she replied, a dreamy, sleepy glaze in her hazel eyes.

Waiting for the coffee and tea to brew, he took one of her hands in his own across the island. For a moment, they were both seventeen and holding hands as she took her break at the diner. Luke often chided Jess for getting distracted by her while he was supposed to be working, their fingers tangled together over the counter while they had murmured conversations, customers around them long forgotten.

“Thanks for the note, by the way,” she said. “Very 2003 of you.”

“Well, I didn’t wanna wake you up and I figured you might miss me too much if I didn’t leave one,” Jess said, shrugging.

“Don’t flatter yourself, Mariano,” she teased, rolling her eyes at his smug expression.

“I would never,” he replied. Then, she saw his face grow more earnest. “So, I got a call from Jimmy while I was out.”

“Really?” she asked, eyebrows raised.

He nodded. “Yeah, I started talking with him again about six months ago. Not like we’re close or anything. But he called to tell me he was marrying his girlfriend, and then he started checking in every month or so.”

“And you’re okay with that?” she asked. Images of a crestfallen Jess, shivering in the backseat of his car, flashed in her mind.

Again, he shrugged. “He apologized for kicking me out. Which is more than my mom ever did. I mean...he’s still a deadbeat. I’m not ever gonna call him ‘daddy.’ But he lives in Venice.”

“Yeah. And?” she asked, brows furrowed in confusion.

“And he said we could come visit any time we want. You’ve still got two weeks before you go back to school, we just finished this month’s Zine yesterday, and Chris and Matthew can manage without me for a few days. What do you think?” he asked, a familiar hesitation lacing his voice.

She took a moment to consider it, her eyes calculating. The look on her face almost made Jess want to smirk out of pure nostalgia; he could practically see the gears turning in her head. “California?”

“Yes. The subject of a thousand Beach Boys songs.”

“Thought you said I’d hate it there?”

“Well, when we get there you can decide for yourself.”

She snickered half-heartedly. “But does he mean you can visit? Or we can visit? I mean...I don’t want to go if he doesn’t expect me.”

“He knows about you. And I can guarantee his wife will like you a hell of a lot more than she likes me.” Averting his gaze sheepishly, Jess ran a thumb over the back of her hand.

Again, she took a long pause before she spoke, tugging at her earring with a free hand. “Well, we obviously can’t afford to fly. And your car is out. So, we’d take my station wagon?”

“My car is not that bad,” Jess scoffed. “It’s driven me across the country a couple times.”

“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again,” she said, “that car is death on wheels. When would we leave?”

“I don’t know. After breakfast,” he suggested, nonchalant.

A surprised, breathy chuckle escaped her lips.

Smirking small and hopefully, Jess continued. “We’d be there by Tuesday. There’s bound to be a few cheap motels we can stop at on the way.”

No matter how well Ella knew Jess, there would always be a part of him capable of catching her completely off guard. The part of him which was wild and impulsive, while she often trapped herself in monotony. But, as she searched her mind for reasons not to go, she came up empty. Once she started school, there wouldn’t be any time. And though she was still feeling a little overwhelmed, away from Stars Hollow for the first time ever, she grasped on to the jewel of excitement shining within her. She had never really been anywhere. And it was finally time to go somewhere. She smiled widely.

“Okay, Mariano,” she said. “I’ll finally get to see what Joni Mitchell’s been singing about.”

. . .

The sky was a pale gray, blurred with a drizzly morning rain. By afternoon, they would be on the West Coast, after having driven for two days. Their backs were slightly sore from the lumpy motel mattresses and their stomachs uneasy from greasy diner food along the way. But Ella smiled softly as they sat in sleepy silence, a Led Zeppelin CD Lane had given her before she left playing on the station wagon’s speakers. Her fingers tapped silently on the steering wheel with the beat, the cracked pavement highway before them free of almost all cars. Only about six more hours to go. She didn’t know what to expect, and the nerves were brewing within her. Jess had told her some about his father and his family, but not enough to make her calm down. Enough to make her calm down probably didn’t exist.

She let her thoughts wander, the anxiety in the back of her mind quieted momentarily. The fingers of her right hand were laced with Jess’s, her free left hand steering.

“Y’know, I can see why you and Matthew are friends,” she thought aloud, breaking the comfortable silence.

“How do you mean?”

Ella shrugged slightly. “I don’t know. You’re both into Bukowski and obscure quotes on t-shirts. You’re both shy. Though Matthew doesn’t have the whole broody writer thing going on like you.”

“I’m not shy,” Jess said defensively, brows furrowed.

She scoffed, tossing a doubtful glance his way. “Of course you are, Jess. You’re blushing right now.”

Sighing in frustration, Jess waved a dismissive hand. He could feel the heat of his face increasing. “That’s because you’re you. Not just anybody can make me blush.”

“Well, you also barely talk to anyone else besides me,” she continued.

“Maybe there’s just no one else worth talking to.” A crease of annoyance formed between his brows, almost a pouty look on his face.

“Whatever, tough guy.”

Jess breathed out through his nose, unable to get the flush to leave his face.

“Hey, being shy is not a bad thing, Mariano,” she said emphatically. “It’s just the way you are. It’s cute.”

Jess ran a hand over his mouth. “I am not cute.”

“Sure you aren’t,” she replied, her voice a sigh as she feigned innocence.

“At least I’m not a Stevie Nicks groupie,” he said dejectedly.

Ella only laughed again as they made their way West.

. . .

As soon as they reached the shore, Ella took Jess’s hand and squeezed tightly. He smirked over at her, squinting in the harsh August sunshine. The sky was free from all clouds, deep blue against the lighter shade of the water. People dotted the sand, but they had a pretty substantial amount of space as they laid out their towels and Ella dropped her purse down. Saltwater stung her nose, and she shaded her eyes with the flat of her hand as she looked around. It was low tide, and she could see fishing poles stuck in the sand far away in both directions, until the figures shrunk down to the size of ants and disappeared behind the horizon. Before she could succumb to her nerves, she stripped her flowy black dress off, left in nothing but the dark green bikini she’d bought for a trip to the lake with Lane a summer earlier. Raking her hands through her hair, wild in the sea wind, she wished she had paints with her. She’d brought her sketchbook and her charcoals of course, but an easel and a set of oils would be just too much to lug around. And, too expensive.

Jess could see how anxious she was, as she tugged absently at her earlobe. Standing across from her in only his black swim trunks, he took her hand again. “Hey, earth to Eleanor. You wanna go in?”

Biting the inside of her cheek, Ella shot him an indecisive look. “Or I could sit here and draw. Or we could read. Or do literally anything else but get swallowed up by the Pacific.”

He scoffed. “So dramatic. I’ll be right there. It’s low tide. C’mon. World bites you, you bite back.”

She rolled her eyes. “I don’t think you’re interpreting that phrase correctly.”

“And I don’t think you’re as good at stalling as you think you are,” he shot back smugly, smirking. “C’mon.”

Though she let him lead her to the water, she still muttered begrudging hesitations. Her skin was crawling with anticipation, not only because she was about to feel the ocean for the first time in so long. They had yet to arrive at Jess’s father’s place. Both he and his wife were at work, his step-daughter at school. It made more sense for them to visit the beach first, then be at the house by dinner time. It wasn’t as though she was worried about them not liking her, or about being intimidated by them. The feeling was hard to pinpoint. Maybe it was because she was stepping into a part of Jess’s world she had never bore witness to. Almost the way it felt to go visit him in New York as a teenager. Then, however, there hadn’t been two days of driving to precede it, allowing time for her to stress.

The water was cool as they walked in, making goosebumps rise on her freckled skin. Small shards of shells crunched beneath their feet uncomfortably until they were in up to their knees. She could feel the current against her legs. Waves crashed into whitish foam and bubbles around them, spraying droplets of water on their faces. Her hand tightened on Jess’s the further out they walked. Soon, they were up to their waists in water, the ocean crashing. Jess could see the fear shining in Ella’s hazel eyes as the tide beat against them, though the waves were nowhere near jarring or difficult to stand through.

“Hey, Daria,” he said, disentangling their fingers and bringing a secure arm around her waist instead. “Relax. Once we get out past where the waves are crashing, it’ll be easy.”

“Remind me again why I agreed to this?”

She scanned the water ahead of them frantically, the point past which the waves were only forming and not crashing looking both near and impossibly far. Her muscles were rigid and she squeezed her eyes shut as they turned their backs against a particularly strong wave. Water rushed over her, wetting the ends of her hair. Jess’s solid form felt almost like a life raft as they turned again and finally made it to the calmer part of the water.

“Because this is an exercise in adventure and spontaneity,” Jess answered finally, voice raised slightly over the noise as he repeated the words she’d spoken in the car yesterday verbatim. If they were going to California, it would be a crime to waste the chance to swim in the Pacific, she’d said. Above them, seagulls squawked in the cloudless sky.

Ella had to admit, as scary as it was, dipping into the water felt an utterly refreshing break from the summer heat. Still, her hands shook with anxiety. “I’m plenty fucking adventurous.”

He chuckled. “And now this can be a reason why.”

She rolled her eyes, then glanced back to the shore, where their small pile of towels and other belongings looked small and insignificant. Sighing through her nose, she faced Jess again. “Doesn’t it seem like we’re really far out?”

“We’re not,” he said, shaking his head and gesturing to the other swimmers much closer to the flat horizon than they were. “It’s low tide, so it just seems far away, okay? Don’t worry.”

She raised a doubtful eyebrow.

They waded in the pristine blue water, deep enough for Ella to be unable to touch the seafloor. Jess could still stand if he tried, but it was a stretch. Instead, they floated over the constant waves, mounds of water which carried them up and deposited them back down over and over. At a particularly high peak, Ella, acting on instinct, wrapped her arms around Jess’s shoulders and hugged him tightly.

A grin formed on his face as his arms wound around her, his heart practically jelly in his chest. He could count on one hand the amount of times Ella had allowed him to see her so vulnerable. It made him feel wanted, needed, in a way so foreign to him he had to bite his bottom lip to keep an astonished laugh from escaping him. When they were down near the bottom again, he ran a comforting hand up and down over her back, under the water.

“Relax,” he repeated, more softly this time, close to her ear. “I’m right here.”

Sighing heavily, Ella nodded. “Okay. Okay. I’m relaxing.”

“I can see that.”

A petulant scowl crossed her face, but she released him from her strong grip. Their hands were still linked, but she began to gain her own bearings as the waves continued, slow and steady. Eventually, she was brave enough to submerge herself in the water, wetting her flushed face and frizzy hair. Jess’s own locks fell over his forehead boyishly, dripping on his cheeks. Ella smirked as she pushed it back and away from his face.

“Look at you,” Jess said proudly as she finally let go of his hands, gliding over a wave on her own. “You’re halfway to Blue Crush.”

She snorted a laugh at his odd reference. “I was actually thinking more like Splash. Always choose the mermaid over the surfer.”

“My mistake,” he said lightly. “Does that make me Tom Hanks?”

“In theory, but, in practice, you’re always James Dean.”

. . .

Beachy decorations adorned nearly every inch of the walls in Jimmy’s house. The kitschiness charmed Ella immediately, as did Jimmy’s wife, Sasha. She had bleached blonde hair, cropped close to the head, and deep blue eyes radiating generosity. Upon arriving, she gave Ella a big hug, enveloping her in the scent of cinnamon. And Ella had to keep from raising her eyebrows in surprise when she saw Jimmy. He looked almost exactly like Jess, though the hair and the eyes were lighter, and he was slightly taller. It made far more sense to her why Jess looked nearly nothing like his mother. Lastly, Ella came to meet Lily when Jess opened the living room cupboard to reveal her sitting with her knees to her chest, reading. Ella could tell by the way no one else batted an eye that the habit of cabinet reading was not a one-time thing. The girl, around twelve, short and bespectacled with straight, mousy brown hair, reminded Ella almost of Rory. Though Lily radiated a peculiarity which Rory never had. It was welcome. Ella appreciated Lily’s confidence in her odd behavior, much the way she encouraged April’s long, winded rants about science or math. Weird girls were everywhere, just as Ella thought they should be.

Heated and tired, Ella and Jess sat on one side of the ramshackle dining table, hands clasped underneath the surface, as they watched Sasha clear the dinner plates away and go to get the ice cream for dessert. Both Jess and Ella offered to do the dishes themselves, but Sasha would hear none of it. Instead, they sat with the other two of the house’s residents, in near-silence. The air was suddenly tense, Jimmy and Jess sharing a few charged looks between them. Without Sasha’s hospitable aura, there was nothing to keep them from facing each other for real. It was the first time they’d seen each other since Jess had been kicked out, and in-person was always so different from the phone.

“Lil, did you finish that science poster you had due tomorrow?” Jimmy asked, Sasha having gotten up from the table at the tail end of a conversation about Lily’s interests in school.

Her nose was already buried back in her thick fantasy novel. She had picked it up from the ground next to her as soon as her mother left the room. Nodding, she gave a small grunt of confirmation, but didn’t look up.

Jess’s grip tightened slightly on Ella’s hand, and she could see his shoulders grow taut. He held onto her just as she had him as they drifted along the waves earlier in the day.

Clearing her throat, Ella ran her free hand through her hair and put on the most convincing smile she could muster. “So, Jess told me you’ve got a pretty cool record collection?”

Jimmy nodded. “Yeah. I’ve been working on it for about twenty years.”

“Cool. I only have a couple dozen, but one day maybe I’ll have a whole shelf,” she said, grasping at straws to keep the conversation going.

Jess said nothing; small talk had never been his forté. Especially with the man who had come into his life again eighteen years after abandoning him. But he was trying his best to keep his bitterness at bay, just as he had when he had lived there before.

Chuckling under his breath, Jimmy leaned back in his chair. “That’s a nice thought, but it’ll cost a fortune if any of those records are worth a damn.”

“Yeah. Hopefully someday I’ll get there.”

“You sound just like me at your age. But I ended up with two hundred records and eighteen cents in my bank account. Math was never one of my strengths,” he replied, taking a sip of the white wine from the glass in front of him.

Jess scoffed. “Eleanor has a college degree and no kids to flake on. I think she’ll be just fine.”

Narrowing his eyes just a touch at his son, Jimmy maintained an air of easy-going composure. He had his shirt untucked and one leg crossed over the other lazily. Though she tried to stop it, the word ‘slacker’ definitely came to Ella’s mind when she saw him, partially due to Jess’s influence, she knew.

“And what about you? How’s Truncheon?” Jimmy asked.

Jess shrugged.

“The Zine for this month should be coming out tomorrow. It looks great. There’s a lot of abstract stuff,” Ella chimed in, lamely, when she saw Jess wasn’t going to respond further.

“Here’s hoping it’ll stay afloat,” Jimmy said.

There was nothing malicious about his tone, nothing manipulative. She could see almost nothing of her own father in him. But Jimmy was a different breed of faulty fatherhood. No hope. Very little encouragement. Sasha took the reins with most of the dinner conversation. And Jimmy mostly added stories of his days spent homeless or in crappy housing out in Hollywood when he’d been scheming to become a musician. He spoke about the pointlessness of his dream. Of dreams in general. Ella thought his life seemed perfectly fine, even if managing some stand on the boardwalk wasn’t what he’d envisioned. But he was almost making himself more washed-up. And he saw Jess the way everyone in Stars Hollow had. In fact, he seemed to see Jess as himself. Maybe Jess being successful in his dreams was what drove the stand-offishness. Even with the compulsory invitation to visit and the monthly phone calls. Given the interactions she had witnessed, Ella wouldn’t have been surprised if it had been Sasha who forced Jimmy to play parent to his son after so long.

“Here’s hoping,” Jess echoed, voice flat and face expressionless.

Mercifully, Sasha then twirled back into the room with bowls of vanilla ice cream and questions for Ella about grad school. Jess retreated back into brooding silence while Ella rubbed circles on the back of his hand with her thumb.

. . .

Taking a sharp intake of breath, Jess jerked awake. The air mattress on which they slept shifted and squeaked at his sudden movement. Ella, who Jess’s arm had been draped over, was jostled as well. He sighed quietly, reminding himself of where he was. Waiting a moment to change position, Jess thought Ella was still asleep. But, after a few more seconds, she stirred and her hazel eyes opened a crack. The open window in the spare room let in warm nighttime air, and the hum of cicadas was the only other sound in the house besides their breathing.

“Go back to sleep,” Jess whispered hastily.

Instead, she lifted her head to look at him. His eyes shone in the moonlight and she could feel his slightly winded breathing. Sympathy washing over her face, she sat up despite his murmured protests. She ran a hand through his disheveled hair affectionately, then moved the back of her hand to his cheek. His face was reddish even in the low glow of the room, and his skin was warm.

“You got a little sunburnt,” she said quietly, her voice groggy. Her touch was soft and gentle.

The small gesture of concern was enough to make Jess have to avert his gaze. His chest was tight with panic from a dream he didn’t even remember, and he didn’t trust his voice enough to speak again. Swallowing thickly, he stared out the window at the stars peeking through the wispy clouds, pale against the dark sky.

Breathing a long breath through her nose and clearing her throat, she began stroking his hair again. “Did you have one of those dreams?”

He only nodded. While Ella slept heavily, could fall asleep anywhere, Jess almost never made it through a night without waking up at least once. Sometimes for no reason at all, but many times due to nightmares. Often he dreamed in hazy flashes which jolted him back to consciousness with feelings of dread and anxiety. As a teen, the only solution had been blasting loud music to get to sleep, a remedy he still wasn’t sure the cause of. With Ella at his side, though, he needed his headphones less and less. Not every time, but sometimes, she would wake up upon feeling his movements. Would stay up talking until he was finally lulled back to at least a doze. He would never wake her if she didn’t on her own, and always told her not to worry, to get back to bed, but she never did. Not until he did too.

And it wasn’t as though she was surprised, or not used to it. The first time she’d found him breathless in the middle of the night, eyes embarrassed and full of fear, had been in high school. Only around the second or third time he’d slept over with her. The rest of the night was spent playing cards and discussing books. His cheeks had burned with shame the entire time, despite her constant reassurance. She didn’t mind at all. She still didn’t.

Ella followed his eyes out the window, where there was a view of the beach. The moon reflected against the water, and the shore was empty. “Hey. You wanna go for a walk?”

He furrowed his brows in silent questioning.

“There’s no one out there. And out there we won’t have the Children of the Corn staring at us,” she said, gesturing to the strange artwork hanging on the wall above the desk. There were four drawings, each of a Victorian child with large, gaping eyes and a lifeless face.

Jess snickered half-heartedly, considering it for a moment. Then, he nodded again. Ella let a small smile across her face, standing up and throwing her simple black dress on again, with the flannel Jess had been wearing earlier over it. Though he felt shaky, Jess rose and tugged on his jeans and a t-shirt. Barefoot on the creaky wood floor, Ella took Jess’s hand and led him outside. He flinched away from the many dogs sleeping in the front yard. She pulled him through the garden and past the front gate quickly.

The walk down to the sand was short and silent. Most of the time, after a nightmare, Jess didn’t want to talk. Ella hardly knew what he dreamed about. Instead, she would talk to him about her day, tell stories, list her favorite things, until his heart calmed and his eyes began to get heavy again. But, as they walked down to the beach, they both just took a moment to breathe in the surroundings. The houses painted ostentatious colors and the cheesy stands on the boardwalk. Palm trees rustled in the nighttime breeze, stronger as they got close to the ocean. Soon, the soft, cold sand was beneath their feet. Wordlessly, Jess took a seat on the beach a few feet up from the waves. Ella plopped down next to him, criss-cross applesauce with her hands resting behind her for support. She closed her eyes and listened to the ocean. The whoosh of the water and the air. The smell of the sea and the slight chill of the wind. She didn’t love going in, but she certainly could understand the Pacific’s unique beauty.

Taking in a deep breath, Jess stared down at his legs and tried to fight off the mixture of emotions churning in his stomach. He still felt ashamed every time he woke Ella up, though it was always accidental. And he couldn’t shake the sick uneasiness coursing through him. Whatever the dream had been, he was glad he couldn’t remember any specifics.

“You okay?” she asked, opening her eyes again and facing him. Her long hair fell over her shoulder, unkempt.

Looking out at the ocean, Jess smirked sharply. “Yeah. I’m fine.”

“Okay,” she replied, nodding in understanding.

The tenderness in her voice struck him, but he swallowed down the feeling. Another long silence passed between them, comfortable, before a thought occurred to Jess. His smirk was more genuine when he turned to her and undid the button on one of the breast pockets of the flannel she had thrown on. She tilted her head to him in askance, but her eyes lit up with realization as he pulled a small plastic bag and a lighter from the pocket. The shirt was baggy on her frame, and she hadn’t felt the weight of them with Jess in the forefront of her mind.

“Where did that come from?” she asked, chuckling through her words.

Jess shrugged, the lighter in one hand as he opened the bag, which held a small stash of marijuana and a pack of rolling papers. “I forgot this here when I went back to New York. And either I’m great at stashing things or daddy dearest is clueless, because it was still in the closet where I left it. I found it earlier when you were in the shower.”

Her eyebrows shot up, impressed. “It’s probably a little of both.”

“True,” he said, rolling a joint with deft fingers. “I’m the son of Liz Danes. And no one can hide drugs like that woman.”

Biting at her cheek, Ella took a long look at him. His profile was clear in the moonlight, strong and handsome. Stubble shadowed his cheeks and his hair, messy from sleep, fell into his eyes. There were moments, few and far between, when Jess let the pieces of his childhood slip out. Since meeting him, Ella had slowly begun to put the puzzle together. He almost never told her an outright story, or made a big deal of things which he should have. The drinking, the drugs, the boyfriends, the violence, the instability, financial and otherwise. His past wasn’t who he was, but it, in a way, made things click for her. Everyone had a story. Jess didn’t often share his, but it still affected him every day. Less and less now that he had a life of his own, but, on the rarest of occasions, Ella could see ghosts of the scared, lonely boy Jess had once been. A boy whose only defense had been sarcasm and only escape had been books. Her heart twisted in her chest as she watched him, but she said nothing. She only ran a hand up and down his back, and placed a kiss on his shoulder as he worked. He smiled a tiny smile, keeping his eyes on his hands.

Soon, he had lit the joint and passed it to her. The tip glowed orange in the moonlight as she inhaled deeply, the familiar smell filling up her chest. She exhaled the smoke in a long stream, handing it back to hin. Neither she nor Jess were big on pot, not even in high school. The last time she’d smoked pot was the first time Lane had. Hep Alien’s guitarist, Gil, owned a sandwich shop, and one of the shop guys grew pot in his basement. His stuff was pretty good, though Lane had gotten incredibly paranoid and sworn it off for good after the first few hits.

“So, was California Jess a stoner, surfer type?” Ella asked, words snaking out from between her lips in clouds of smoke. Her mind was already beginning to buzz and smudge around the edges. A warm, pleasant tingling enveloped her legs.

Jess chuckled. “No. He was a leather-clad loser who didn’t graduate high school and owned nothing but a duffel bag full of books.”

Her expression fell, growing somber. “You weren’t a loser, Jess. You’re not a loser.”

Scoffing, he passed the joint to her again. “Right...I just…”

Pausing, he sighed and rubbed at his eyes with the heels of his hands. Ella could see him struggling for his words, in a mood she couldn’t quite decipher. Part of it was the high, but part of it was something else completely.

“Even Luke kicked me out. And you were going to college. I didn’t want to...I couldn’t stick around and keep you from anything,” he explained, head growing light with the influence of the drugs. “My mom didn’t want me, my uncle didn’t want me. No one wanted me there.”

Ella furrowed her brows and shook her head sadly, handing the joint his way again. “I wanted you.”

Breathing out shakily, he felt the joint begin to burn his fingers and stubbed it out against the cool sand. He drew his knees up to his chest and rested his elbows on them, hands clasped in front of him. Hiding his face with a bowed head, Jess tried to fight the tears which formed in his eyes. Coming back had brought memories he didn’t remember forgetting. Long nights filled with regret, unhappy days dealing with customers at the bookstore, uncomfortable family dinners where he could never really find his place despite how hard Sasha tried. The feeling of not belonging was so similar to the one he’d had in Stars Hollow. But, in Stars Hollow, New York was just a bus ride away, and Ella was just a walk down the road. Isolation took on a new meaning during his six months in California.

Ella was surprised to hear him sniffle and see his form begin to tremble. She whispered his name, but got no response. After a moment of hesitation, she brought her arm around him, her head next his own as it rested on his shoulder. Shivering with his small sobs, Jess looked up again and let silent tears fall down his cheeks, though his skin flamed with shame.

“And imagine my surprise when I got here and my dad was just as big a loser as me,” he said, breathing short, frustrated breaths. “But, he managed to get a new family anyway.”

Sighing heavily, Ella pressed another kiss to his shoulder. “Jess, you’re not like him-”

“Oh, I’m not?” he asked doubtfully.

“Absolutely not,” she said, a new firmness to her tone. “You wrote a book. You own a business. You were employee of the month at Walmart!”

He shook his head.

“No, Mariano, I’m serious,” Ella continued, insistent. “You think Jimmy would ever be able to get employee of the month anywhere? Just because you didn’t love school doesn’t mean you’re not a hard worker. Jess, you’re the most passionate person I know.”

“Very funny, Stevens.”

“Believe me or not, it’s true. It’s just a fact. Your dad is a fucking idiot. But you’re not him. You are intense and shy and funny and kind and so fucking smart, alright? You’re only 21 and you’ve already done more than he ever has. And I know it fucking sucks that he didn’t grow up in time for you, but that wasn’t because of you. In spite of all that, you still manage to be you,” she said, her voice soft but ardent. The words spilled out of her mouth in a fervent rush, her mind loose and clear and high. “He really fucking missed out. Because he doesn’t know you.”

Jess could feel her voice rumble in her chest against his arm as she leaned on him, holding him. And he didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. He didn’t know what to say. The emotions bubbling up from beneath the surface muted his words. He stared out at the waves again, and a reluctant smirk formed on his face after a moment, though his cheeks were still damp.

“Haven’t heard you go all motivational speaker in a while,” he said, voice watery but smug.

She let giggle escape her lips and straightened up slightly. Wiping away his tears with her thumb and kissing the top of his hair, she drew his head to her shoulder. “Yeah, well, desperate times.”

“Thank you, Eleanor,” he murmured, noticing how the sky had begun to lighten to a soft bluish gray.

“Don’t mention it,” she replied.

And they sat on the sand, sheltered in their embrace against the wind, into the early hours of the morning as the sun rose over the ocean.

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dalekofchaos · 5 years

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My problems with Avengers Endgame

For the most part, I like it. Could’ve been better. But here are my problems with the movie

The bad taste Thor fat jokes and mocking jokes about Thor's PTSD and depression....like really? Also nice of the Russos for throwing Thor's character arc out the window and abandoning his people....TWICE. Instead of taking responsibility and rule with Valkyrie as his equal, Thor just abandons his people just to be a Guardian....for reasons??????

Sidelining Carol. WHAT IS THE FUCKING POINT OF TEASING HER ONLY TO LEAVE HER ON THE FUCKING SIDES. NO SERIOUSLY, FUCKING WHY??? Why does Wanda get to unleash on Thanos, but Carol gets knocked around by Thanos? Fucking seriously? What kind of fucking bullshit is this. What kind of actual fucking disrespect is this horseshit?

Not making Carol and Maria married and being the representation fans wanted. Carol’s butch lesbian look was more representation than a nameless guy saying he was seeing another guy.

Fridging Black Widow before her fucking movie even comes out, jesus fucking christ, they really went "you're getting a Black Widow movie lol lmao bitch you thought" it’s not just that. Natasha isn’t even given respect after her passing. She isn’t given a goodbye. All she gets is the men turning into whiny pissants and Bruce tosses a bench into the lake. Natasha sacrificed her life for her family and to stop Thanos and THIS IS THE FUCKING THANKS SHE GETS???

Gamora is still fridged. Past Gamora is loyal to Thanos. That makes no fucking sense. Did the Russos even WATCH Guardians Of The Galaxy? Gamora in 2014 was working AGAINST Thanos. She plotted on hiding the power stone away from Thanos. Present Nebula didn’t even need to convince her, she should’ve helped Present Nebula from the beginning. There was no need for it. Even worse, Strange couldn’t just bring Gamora from a time before she went to Vormir. Gamora couldn’t have been spared her fate. And even worse. Both Gamora and Nebula are denied the revenge of the man who has abused, manipulated and gaslighted them their whole lives and they couldn’t be allowed the opportunity to kill Thanos? Fuck you.

Hank and Pierce's bad toupees

Not making Loki the rat who frees Scott and having it revealed and having Loki's grand dramatic slut return entrance. Loki just escaping with the Tesseract and not doing anything with it is just dumb. But what’s really dumb is not having Thor and Loki escaping together in Infinity War while Thanos is fighting The Hulk. He had it and he didn’t use it. It just feels like Loki’s death was ultimately pointless now. And apparently Loki escaping with The Tesseract was pointless, Loki is seen in his cell in Asgard....how the fuck is this supposed to make any sense at all? So honestly I would just have Loki be the very last one to return and reveal himself as the rat who freed Scott. It would make more sense than anything. Loki is the very thing that started The Avengers, it makes sense that he returns to help them against Thanos.

That fucking Hydra Cap reference, he needed to stay in cover, I know but we wanted to forget it ever happened

Once again the shows are screwed over. No Quake, Ghost Rider or The Defenders

Nebula does not kill Thanos.....fucking bullshit fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you. Nebula should’ve killed Thanos. Nebula by far suffered the most and the hand of Thanos. She was abused, manipulated, and isolated because of him and he killed her sister. Additionally, all of her movies, but especially Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and Endgame flesh out and develop her character quite well, giving the audience ample time to connect with her. Furthermore, a great portion of Nebula’s body has been replaced with metal, which we already knew from previous films but was highlighted in Endgame itself, when Nebula simply sticks her hand in the energy field surrounding the power stone to retrieve it, destroying the “skin” on her hand but leaving her “skeleton” intact. Because of this, it is likely that Nebula had a better chance of surviving a snap than any other Avenger (except for maybe Bruce), and the cinematic payoff of allowing her to be the one to kill Thanos would have been far greater than letting Tony kill Thanos. You could even have Thanos say “I am inevitable daughter” Nebula could have a Eowyn moment “I am not your daughter” and finally Nebula would kill him. Nebula deserved to kill Thanos. And since Nebula was the one who snapped, we know Gamora would return, maybe since they worked together, Nebula would bring back Natasha. Like they all fought to bring an end and bring everyone back. Gamora and Natasha deserved to return and reverse the bullshit fridging. Tony could return to his family and once again they didn’t have to make Far From Home of making Spider-Man be “the new Iron Man” Tony could retire in peace and tell Peter “the world is in safe hands of the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man”

Steve Rogers abandoning his found family and the horrible implications of Steve staying in the past. Before I talk about the implications, I just need to say it makes no sense. Steve made peace with his life in the new world. Peggy wanted Steve to move on, Steve grew as a character. He even saw Peggy was happy in Endgame(however I would’ve had Peggy be seen with her wife Angie, yes fuck ABC I am still bitter) and Peggy herself said she was happy with her life. It makes no sense for Steve to just abandon Sam and Bucky just to be with someone he kissed once. I honestly would’ve been happy if he chose to sacrifice himself to bring Natasha back. I would even be happy if Steve came back, married Sharon and chose to retire, and pass on the Shield to Sam. Just anything is better. It’s not a satisfying conclusion to Steve Rogers’ character arc. A satisfying character arc means more than giving the character a prize at the end of the story. Women are not prizes. Peggy Carter is not a prize. Peggy Carter would slap the shit out of Steve Rogers if she knew he threw his life away just to be with her and ruining her own life in turn. Even if I didn't like how they paired Peggy with Daniel, even I understand that Peggy moved on and found love and married a man who lost his leg for his country without superstrength or fame, and they had kids. Steve took away Peggy's agency, destroyed her family and ruined his own journey. Even more insulting is the fact that Bucky Barnes was brought back to life and Steve barely acknowledges him. Ever since The Winter Soldier, Steve’s journey has been focused on Bucky and he barely even acknowledges him. He fought a fucking war that split The Avengers for him and he STILL does not even have one last moment with him? What the fuck? But you know the real stupid thing about this? Tony and Natasha died just so to make the world a better place. The better place that Steve then leaves at the end of the movie. Steve’s entire character arc throughout the MCU would be opposed to altering the timeline for his own selfish desires. This is not the Captain America I know. You’re seriously telling me that Steve Rogers didn’t value his present friends, possible girlfriend and life even a little bit? What has been done to Steve Rogers is unforgivable and I would rather Steve dies sacrificing himself in bringing Thanos down. That would’ve been a better send off than ignoring everything about his character arc. As for the implications about going to the past? He knows about the future, he knows HYDRA infiltrated SHIELD, he knows Bucky is being used as their weapon and will kill the Starks, he knows that Peggy, Howard and Hank are surrounded by Hydra, he even knows about the civil rights fighting. it’s a little alarming Steve Rogers’s idea of a retirement plan was to go back to the jim crow era to cuddle up with his old flame. Apparently a happy ending for Captain America is a white man in the US. He went back to an era where a cis het white man would feel very safe and comfortable. He doesn't choose to fight for Civil rights in the 60's(how is Sam supposed to feel that Steve did nothing for the movement?), Steve and Peggy don't crack down the Hydra infestation and there isn't a Bucky rescue. Like really bad implications

#anti mcu #anti endgame #thor odinson #captain marvel #carol danvers #black widow #natasha romanoff #Loki Laufeyson #loki laufeyson #captain america #steve rogers #gamora

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aboysbestfriendishismum · 6 years

Text

Chapter 50 - Xanadu, Donna Summer and Dave Gahan in leather pants (Part Three)

In the previous chapter: Eddie is fascinated by Angie at the club, he dances with her and almost kisses her, but he's interrupted by Mike Starr, who wants to dance with the girl. Jerry gets mad at the bassist for taking liberties with Angie, their bandmates try to calm him down and Starr tells him he's not into her and only does it to tease him a little. Jerry then has a clarifying talk with Eddie, who admits his interest towards Angie, and the two of them agree to go for a sort of truce and avoid talking about her at all. The guys who lost the bet perform as the Village People and the crowd loves it. The morning after, Angie and Eddie are together on the beach, talking and joking, Eddie finds out Angie's friend will arrive in the afternoon and he's a little sad about it because he'd want some more time alone with her. They meet Mitch, alias Michelle, Eddie's old friend and Beth's neighbor, and Angie's almost intimidated by her beauty. Mitch asks him if he wants to surf some more with her but Vedder prefers to stay with Angie.

“Ok, I'm going then”

“Yes, Eddie... for the third time, you can go, don't worry. I promise you we won't burn your house down” Angie's sitting beside me on the sofa and rolls her eyes before turning to look at the guy who's standing on the doorway.

“Haha no, it's not for that. It's just... well, I'm sorry I have to leave you two alone...” it's nice of him to include me too, although at least two thirds of this room know exactly who he's more sorry for.

“No problem, Angie and I haven't seen each other since Christmas, we've got a lot of things to tell each other. It's gonna take me a minute but as you know our friend here needs a little encouragement, so we'll probably go pretty late until the evening” I already know I'll have to torture this bitch to have her tell me something. After I saw her at Christmas, and considering our phone calls since then, I was expecting to see the usual grieving and inconsolable Angie I'd have to cheer up. Yet I see she cheered herself up with no one's help this time. Well, no one...

“Right, you probably want to have some alone time too. Well, gotta go now” yes Eddie, thank you really, you're sweet, but I need to be alone with my best friend to talk and gossip about everyone and everything. And about you as well.

“Just go do your soundcheck, Eddie, we'll be alright” Angie repeats as she's covering the chocolate cake she baked with a napkin, well, what's left of it after our attack. Is she already putting it away?

“I already called Craig anyway”

“You trust us so much!”

“He'll come by at eight to pick you up. Or to lead you to Winter's, it depends if you wanna take Dina's car or not”

“Yes, please, let's take my car, so I can go back to L.A. right after”

“But only if you feel like driving, if you don't I told you, you can crash here at my place, it's ok”

“Thank you, Eddie, I'll see how the night goes. If I'm tired I'll gladly accept your invitation” I hope I won't have to accept it, I love Eddie's hospitality, but I've got the feeling I'd be a bit in the way”

“My friends are throwing some kind of party on the beach after the show, I think you'll take my offer”

“You didn't tell me” Angie remarks clearly surprised.

“Oh. Well, surprise!” Eddie briefly sets foot back in the living room, holding out his arms and showing a wide smile.

“It's not as surprise anymore” she scowls.

“When Craig and the guys are involved, everything's a surprise. Alright, gotta go now”

“Eddie, go away” Angie jokes throwing a pillow at him.

“See you later at the club”

“See ya. And thank you for the tour. And for cotton candy!” fuck it was good.

“You're welcome. It's a must after rollercoaster rides. See you tonight girls”

As soon as Eddie leaves and closes the door behind himself, Angie stands up and unfortunately takes away the dish with the cake.

“I'm exhausted, I guess I'll take a nap until tonight” my friend stretches her arms as she walks back to the couch and then just plops down yawning. I don't think so.

“You didn't tell me you've got a new puppy”

“A puppy?” she looks at me suspiciously.

“Yeah”

“What do you mean, I don't have dogs in Seattle” she really doesn't have a clue what I'm talking about, it's almost like I can see the wheels spinning in her head trying to figure out where I'm getting at.

“I don't mean dogs, it's another animal species...”

“Huh?”

“This one wags its tail too, and fawns on you of course, but it's a different kind of beast...”

“The fuck are you talking about?”

“Come on, the one waking on two legs... who obey his princess' commands, all doe-eyed, and holds your hand on the scary rides at the carnival”

“You're not normal” she shakes her head not looking at me.

“I'm talking about the pup who's just left through that door”

“Yeah, at this point I got it, thank you”

“How come you didn't tell me?”

“Sure I told you! I also invited you over here to see his show”

“You told me it was a friend, not a... friend”

“I don't get it”

“You didn't tell me it was your friend” this time I add some eyebrows wiggle.

“I still don't get it”

“A friend” I repeat blatantly winking.

“Sure he's a friend, so what? I don't understand”

“Fuck you Angie, you understand me so well: FRIEND!” I insist air quoting myself.

“He's a friend, without those... things!” she mimics my air quoting.

“Why? Don't you like him? He's not a bad specimen at all”

“Would you stop talking about Eddie as if he was a piece of cattle?” she scolds me, surely I cut her to the quick.

“Sorry. A nice young colt?”

“Dina!”

“Ok, whatever. Why don't you him?”

“I didn't say that”

“You do like him then!”

“I didn't say that either”

“Yeah, sure, like I needed you to say anything at all. I already know”

“Great, you know everything already, so let's talk about something else” Angie crosses her legs on the couch and frowns, a clear signal for me to let go.

“Right. Let's talk about Sean: did the Merman send pictures to you too?”

“You mean the ones with the seaweed jacket or those where he imitates the faces of mantas before throwing them back into the water?” the frown turns into her usual grin.

“Don't tell me he didn't send you the ones with him wearing a bikini?!”

“Sure he did, I only decided to remove them permanently from my memory. Thank you for reminding me”

“That jerk is having the time of his life. In spite of us”

“He has to balance and compensate for the other jerk, who's now become a serious person” Angie laughs as she mentions the astounding transformation of Richard the misfit.

“He didn't even get drunk at Christmas, almost scary”

“He didn't even go around throwing stones at people's decorations”

“He didn't even go to the shopping center to tell children queuing up to meet Santa that he was an imposter”

“Eeeeeh love changed him” she puts her hand on her heart and blinks dreamily, thinking she's funny. As if she hadn't batted those Maybelline lashes at Eddie the exact same way until five minutes ago.

“Why are you still the same then?”

“You're still the same pain in the ass too, still single?”

“Yeah but it's a choice. I mean, I've just started college, I want to look around first. Especially now that I have more options” I had one girlfriend in eighteen years, well, one and a half, I've got to make up for wasted time, ok?

“The analogy with cattle market goes on”

“Hey, it's true! You can't compare Boise's with Los Angeles' population, it's the law of large numbers. And then, you know, girls, but also guys... I mean, students are all far away from home, in a larger more open minded context, they're more open to cultural stimulus and less inhibited by provincialism and its prejudices” in Boise it's easier to find a hit man rather than a lesbian, not because there are no lesbians, but because they're well hidden.

“Do you mean gay people come out more easily?”

“And bisexual. And also just curious people. And who am I to deny help in satisfying someone's curiosity?”

“No special girl though”

“I'm not in a hurry, my dear. But you seem to be on the right track”

“Ok, let's see what's on tv”

“We're up in fifteen minutes, where the fuck were you?” a guy with long brown hair partially tied up in a small pony tail on top of his head walks up to us with a threatening attitude as soon as we get backstage.

“Thank you for your warm welcome, Stone. This is my friend Dina. Dee, this is Stone Gossard, he plays guitar and, yes, that's his real name” Angie literally jumps between me and the guy with the guitar.

“Nice to meet you. Anyway it's not our fault, those guys didn't want to let us in” I point at the security guys.

“Weren't you with them? I'm gonna tell them off. I warned them!” the knight in a shiny armor called Eddie addresses his friend who led us here, then storms away to tell something to the security people.

“Oh well, we're here now, who cares!” I try to defuse tension, which seems to be palpable given the faces of the other musicians and I don't know if it's actually because we're late, because of the emotions for the imminent show or because the apparent leader of the band is angry.

“I stopped at the to talk to Diego for a minute and told the girls to go, I didn't think they'd be rebuffed” Craig justifies himself with no one really, not with Eddie who disappeared somewhere.

“Come on, nothing bad happened. And sorry for the rough welcome, I'm Jeff” a big guy with gentle eyes and a weird hat holds out his hand for me to shake it and remembering the conversations with Angie I recognize him as Eddie's roommate in Seattle. One by one the other band members and roadies and the singer of Alice in Chains introduce themselves, I immediately recognize Layne 'cause I saw him in a couple of videos.

“Anyway Angie and her beautiful friend are to blame too, they held me hostage at Eddie's place giving me cake. I couldn't say no to these sweet ladies” Craig goes on and puts a suspicious arm around my shoulders.

“And where's this cake? You didn't even bring us one slice?” Mike, the guitarist, whines “I bet it was a chocolate cake”

“Actually, it was” I admit basically breaking his heart.

“I guess everybody ate my cake, huh?” Eddie appears behind our back, exactly behind Angie's ear, with a beer in his hand.

“There's still half of it, don't worry” she reassures him patting his back and he offers her a second bottle of beer from out of nowhere.

“Are you sure they won't throw us out of the club if they catch us drinking?” I don't wanna be the party pooper, I just wanna be sure about the situation to stay away from trouble.

“Nah, they don't really card you here, anyway it's safer not to drink in the club, here in the backstage it's ok.” Craig reassures me and he still hasn't loosen his grip, actually he's holding tighter “And you're with me, you're safe”

“I'm gay” I learned it's better to nip things like this squarely in the bud. Also, when I say it our little group gets casually silent, even music stops in those two seconds. Well, that's better, I won't have to repeat.

“Ok. Can you be gay and drink with me at the same time?” Craig plays dumb but it's evident he's a little disappointed, even though he's being zen about it.

“Haha sure, no gay laws against that”

“Great, let's go, darling!” Craig pushes me into a hallway and everybody tags along. I spot a small group of three, four people chatting in front of a door. One of them is a very tall girl with glasses and long blonde dreadlocks. For a moment I feel like Angie feels 90% of the time. She's with three guys, a blonde and two dark haired ones.

“Hey Jerry, Stone'd kill for that vest, where did you get it?” Angie makes a joke about blondie's outfit. Apart from the multicolor vest, he's wearing red long johns and white shorts with skull print. And I thought I was daring too much matching a plaid skirt and a Little Mermaid's t-shirt. Anyway, clothes are not the things that catch my attention the most. It's the guy's name that sets off an alarm in my head: Jerry?

“I'm right here anyway” Stone complains giving Angie an apparently angry, but actually amused look. He is that Jerry.

“Sean knitted it for me! What? Don't you believe me? Now you look at him and see this bad, ugly, extremely gross drummer, but he's a champ at crochet” the asshole answers as he points at one of his friends.

“Hey! That's not true! I'm not bad!” the guy wipes invisible tears off his eyes.

“Great, you made him cry, are you happy now?” Angie jokingly scolds Jerry and I'm more and more dumbfounded. His friend is crying as a joke, but Jerry hurt you for real, how can you be so nonchalant?

After a small show of Angie and the blond amazon giving paper napkins to Sean, another round of meeting and introducing starts and I can't help clenching my teeth when it's Jerry's turn. He hands me a beer then opens the bottle with an opener attached to his key ring. I coldly thank him. He must have imagined I know everything.

“Why do you even talk to him?” I ask Angie when we're alone, trying to get the best front row places. She's not very happy, she'd rather be not so close to the stage, but I convinced her with the pretext of taking better pictures.

“Who?”

“Jerry! How can you talk to him? How can everybody? After he was a jerk to you” we're right in front of the stage, that's basically as tall as Angie.

“Well, it's very easy for everybody else: they don't know” she shrugs. That's so Angie, both shoulders shrugging and secrets.

“What do you mean they don't know?”

“We kept it low profile”

“Nodoby knows you broke up? Or nobody knows you were together at all?”

“Both. Except for Eddie and Mike” she reveals turning her back to the stage as soon as the music in the background gets louder, so that we can face each other and communicate more easily.

“And why didn't Eddie punch him in the face? Or did he?” he can't be on tour with him without a nice fistfight.

“No, he didn't”

“Surely because you told him not to, that'd be the only reason”

“I didn't... oh well, now that I think about it, technically yes” Angie stops in the middle of her thoughts and I was right as usual.

“I knew that”

“Anyway it's easy for me too, it's in the past now. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's not like I'm not mad at him anymore, but...”

“But you've got the new stallion now, so who gives a fuck, right?” if this is the reason I can only agree, good for you, sis! Even though I can't stand Jerry getting away with this.

“You're such a dork” she states without looking at me, observing the people slowly piling up under the stage around us.

“You are the dork and I don't need to explain why, do I?” I'm serious now and not because I got mad or something. I've known this dork since we were children and I can't just let go without trying everything to have her open her eyes, every fucking time.

“I don't... I don't want to delude myself” she admits not so easily as she seems extremely concentrated on the club's floor.

“Since I've arrived I've seen no trace of illusions, only very tangible signals. Whale-sized signals, Angie”

“Sometimes illusions are so strong they seem real”

“But it's worth running the risk sometimes, I can assure you”

“He's got an ex girlfriend” she says after a while, right when I think I had the last word.

“So what? Is she stalking him? Did she threaten to kill you?”

“No no. It's just... I think he's getting closer to me because he misses her. I don't know her, she could as well be here now” she looks around as if she was actually looking for this mysterious ex, the perfect bugbear for Angie not to admit and deal with her true insecurities.

“Sure, he misses her so much he didn't even mention her today”

“It doesn't mean anything, he's very private, he doesn't talk about his shit all the time”

“Listen, I don't know anything about this girl or how did they break up and why. And I don't even know shit about him, apart from the couple of things you've told me these last months. But there's one thing I know and it's that the guy who's on stage right now, trying to untangle that guitar cable can't take his eyes off you” Angie suddenly turns around to look at the stage and little Eddie, who's been lovingly staring at her the whole time, feels caught red-handed and looks down first, then back up at her with a guilty smile.

“Eddie's too-” she shakes her head almost imperceptibly as she waves at him.

“Angie, shut up”

“But-”

“If you don't want to get me angry, don't finish the sentence”

“How do you know how it ends?” she asks with a sad smile.

“I know, I know you”

“If you know me, you'll understand me”

“I understand you but since I know you, I know that if you came here to California it's not just to meet me or see your friends play as you can easily do in Seattle too. I know and you know”

“You're right” she folds her arms against her chest and takes a deep breath before speaking.

“And if you came this fare, if you took this step you'd never take, it means you secretely believe it's worth it”

“I missed him” she whispers. Actually she must have spoken at a normal volume but it was barely audible with the loud music in the club.

“What? I can't hear you?” of course I play dumb.

“I missed Eddie, I wanted to see him, to be with him... for a while”

“You're in too deep, darling!” I snicker victoriously.

“Do you think I don't know? I'm so stupid” Angie steals another glance of Eddie, busy with some roadies around an amp, then just walks away.

“Hey, where are you going now?” I huff and follow her. Why does she always have to make things difficult?

“We can't stay here, there'll be hell here, I can't take pictures if people kicks my camera crowd surfing”

The concert is great. I mean, the concerts, Alice in Chains are so good and it's hard to admit it, but Jerry's a fucking guitar god. Pearl Jam, that's their name now, are a surprise. I'm not saying I was expecting them to suck, after all if they've been called to open for a band who got signed by a major they had to be good, but I didn't think they were that good. Angie told me they'd been playing together for a short time and Eddie had recently replaced the old singer and was still shy. Shy my ass. Maybe it's because he was playing in a familiar place in front of a crowd that was half his friends, but I saw a cool aggressive singer, who also joked with the audience and confidently owned the micro-stage. After the end of the show we spend half an hour more at the club, then we go out and we all start splitting and going on different cars and exchanging info about where the party's taking place. I thought about something round here but if I didn't get it wrong I heard them mentioning Dana Point, that's basically half way between here and Los Angeles. That's great because Eddie volunteers for driving my car taking me and Angie and this means one hour driving less for me. And it also means one hour more for the love birds to be together in a small space and for Angie I'm willing to sacrifice myself and be their third wheel. Anyway, since my friend is a dumbass she's got the smart idea to ask Michelle to come with us. I'm sorry for Eddie but the face he makes when Angie gets into the backseat with me is priceless. I try and save the situation telling I feel I can drive but Eddie's too kind and too polite to let me. Angie vs. Logic: 1-0. My friend basically ghosts out on us during the ride, despite Eddie's attempts at including her in the conversation. She just makes some remarks here and there and remains silent for the rest of the drive, while Mitch and the guy talk about surfing, about an alleged crisis of vert as opposed to street skateboarding and the width of a certain model of bass guitar.

Eddie parks the car, like anybody else, next to the railway and as soon as we get out of the car he's already arm in arm with Angie, just not to waste any more time.

“So? Do you like it?” he asks pointing at the landscape as we walk along the bridge over the railway that leads to the beach.

“Yes, it looks so peaceful” my friend replies and it means she maybe got her voice back.

“It's quiet during the day too, Doheny is never too busy,” Michelle adds “but it's one of the best beaches to me”

“This is where I surfed for the first time” Eddie reveals and Angie finally looks at him in the eyes.

“Really?”

“Yeah, I was eleven, I used to came here to spend the weekend with my friend Christopher, who's Jamie's cousin actually” he explains, referring to one of the many friends of his I met tonight.

“Who set up the party” the girl points out.

“I rode my first waves with a twelve dollar board. It was a fucking coffin, full of craters. It was like surfing on a fuckin' log!”

“I assume surf technology took giant steps forward since then” Angie jokes as we get to the end of the bridge and enter some kind of small park with palm trees and picnic tables on one side, under the light of a long line of torches. Here are the others, who already started the party and were waiting for us.

“Hehe yeah, and I can afford something more decent to surf on. Anyway, I don't care, I'll never forget riding those first four waves on the log” Eddie's in a nostalgic mood and I, and I bet Angie too, can see waves rolling in his eyes.

“One of those waves in particular left a mark on you!” Michelle exclaimes, walking up to Eddie and jokingly lifting up his sweatshirt, pointing at something on his chest or belly, I can't really see anything in the dark. Angie lets go of the singer with the pretext of questioning the girl.

“Why? What did he do?” she asks with a little too much emphasis.

“Do you remember not so long ago, when I told you about surfboard leashes?” Eddie chimes in as he wants to explain himself, as we get to Stone's table.

“Yes”

“Well, those in 1975 were so stretchy that the board would fly back at you at supersonic speed”

“Breaking your face” Mitch adds showing a small red dot under her chin.

“Or planting against your sternum, like in my case” Eddie takes off his hoodie, shirt and t-shirt in a single move and stands right under one of the torches, pointing at a small scar we finally can see. Luckily Angie's already sitting because given the expression briefly appearing on her face, I think she'd have fallen face first into the sand without support.

“What are you talking about?” Jerry asks and honestly he could as well mind his own business.

“Battle scars” the blond surfer girl explains, as she helps herself with chips and beer.

“If we start listing all the bones Eddie and I broke, we'll end by dawn maybe” Craig makes room for me to sit beside him. He's clearly trying to be gentler than before not to give the impression he was kind only when he thought he could hit on me. There's nothing wrong with that, at least it's nice to find some sensitivity and empathy in people for once, it's just I've been observing this kind of behaviour all my life and I can't help but smile to myself when I notice.

“What about you Angie? Were you a daredevil child too?” Michell wakes her up from her daydreaming.

“Me? Uhm actually no, not at all”

“No?”

“The first and last time I set my foot on a skateboard I broke my coccyx, so my career in that sense was really short”

“Ouch! That must hurt!” Jeff grits his teeth and insinctively puts a hand agains his butt.

“This is new, you never told us. Why?” Stone is the most surprised of them all.

“Anyway show us the scar or it didn't happen, right?” Craig turns to look at Eddie, who turns to his friend like he wanted to jump at his throat any minute now.

“I was there and I can say it's true” I save both Angie from embarrassment and Craig from death.

“You were there because you were the one who put me on that fucking skateboard”

“We could be Toni Hawk and Rodney Mullen in a dress!” I complain as I help myself a big serving of popcorn and throw a couple at my friend.

“I've never worn a dress in my whole life”

“I don't think so” it's Angie's categorical answer when someone has the crazy idea to suggest jumping in the ocean in the middle of the night. I'd have been surprised if she accepted.

“Ok. Who stays on the beach cleans everything up!” Jamie yells as he takes off his pants and throws himself towards the water, followed by the whole gang, me included. Someone else is missing though, not just my friend. After I froze my butt in the icy water, I swim back to the shore and walk up to the beach, where Michell hands me a towel. I wrap myself up with it like a burrito, she slowly dabs herself with another towel.

“Have you seen Eddie?” I ask her because I left him my clothes and bag and I can't see them where I left them.

“He went on the rocks with his girlfriend, down there.” she says with a wink, then points at a series of rocks not far from here “I'd wait a minute before disturbing them”

With his girlfriend? Is she here? Who the hell is she? Was she among us all this time? Or has she just arrived? And how did Angie take it? And where is she now? The answer to my questions comes after I take a few jumps towards the spot indicated by Mitch. There he is, Eddie, sitting on a rock and watching the stars with his girlfriend: Angie. Who else? If Michelle considers her as Eddie's girlfriend, it counts for their friends too. After all it's quite obvious, it took me ten minutes to figure it out.

They're very cute together but I'm fuckin' freezing and I want my stuff back, I need to put some clothes on asap if I don't want to die. I walk up to them cautiously, from behind, and I end up eavesdropping what they say. But I swear I didn't want to! Anyway, their conversation speaks for itself.

“You could go too anyway”

“Nah, I don't really feel like...”

“Bullshit, you just don't want to leave me alone”

“No, I just don't want to get sick in the middle of a tour”

“Your tour mates aren't giving a fuck”

“One more reason to stay safe, there must be at least one healthy person”

“You don't have to babysit me tonight too, Eddie, you've already been doing it for two days”

“But I love it... can I babysit you a little longer?”

“Hahaha sure”

“Listen, I'm gonna keep seeing these assholes for a while, but you're leaving tomorrow. Do you mind if I'd rather spend this time with you?”

“No, I don't. But I never figured you for a masochist”

“I guess you'll just have to get used to that”

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

“Angie? It's time to wake up!” this is my fourth attempt and if I keep on knocking on the bedroom's door it's only because I know she has to go back to Seattle. If it was up to me, I'd let her sleep to keep her here with me a little longer.

“Yeah, just a minute...” I hear her mumble through the door, exactly like the other three times.

Maybe we should have stayed awake without sleeping at all, considering she leaves so early in the morning, but she didn't resist, she was dead tired. So I stayed awake alone, sitting on my rooftop smoking, looking at the stars and pondering about my stupidity. Two days, I've had her here with me for two whole days and when I saw her for the first time on the beach and heard the news two days seemed such a long time to me. Now what? They're gone and what did I do? Nothing. I mean, it was great, we spent a lot of time together and had fun and I believe I won't forget a single second I spent with Angie. But she'll be gone in a little more than one hour and I didn't tell her anything or kiss her. Why is it so difficult? I keep trying to push the conversation in a certain direction all the time but there's always some kind of diversion taking us somewhere else, somewhere not necessarily unpleasant but generally very far from being in he arms. I was pretty close a couple of times, the first one I got interrupted by Mike Starr who was in the mood for dancing, the second one it was Dina. Actually she isn't to blame, she just wanted to get dressed and avoid hypothermia. And I could have got a move on anyway, I mean, if I can't even kiss a girl in a secluded corner of a small romantic beach under the starlight with the sweet low surge of the ocean waves as a soundtrack... well, I don't know then, I'm just hopeless I guess. Anyway, that was it and I can't go back, I can only look and think ahead and try to make the right choices in the future. I walk back into the kitchen and I reach in my pocket to check if the tape I made for Angie's still there. And where else would that be anyway? Normal guys simply hit on girls, I give out love-themed mix tapes that'll be heard by the receiver when she's like miles away. I didn't get anywhere acting as an adult, right? Now I'm gonna try boyish techniques...

I check out the time once again when the coffee is ready and go scouting in the bathroom area. I put an ear to the door to hear any possible sound but I can't hear anything. I cautiosly enter and like I thought, I find it empty. Thank god you were an early bird, Angie! I knock once again at Angie's door, that is at my bedroom's door, and no one answers. I slowly open it and she's still in bed, as it turns out.

“Angie” I call her from the doorway a couple of times but she doesn't move an inch. I walk up to the bed almost intimidated, maybe by her beauty or by her low snoring or by the word LOSER written on the t-shirt she borrowed. I get right beside her and keeping my eyes on her all the time I sit down on the bed next to her, trying not to make a sound. And I don't know why since I'm supposed to wake her up and should be loud instead.

“Angie, wake up... Angie!” I shake he shoulders softly but I get nothing more than a groan of complaint as a response.

“Mmmhh”

“Come on, Angie, it's late” I go on and she licks her lips and tilts her head to the left towards me, as if she looked right at me but keeping her eyes shut all the time. For a moment I think she's about to wake up but then she parts her lips slightly and starts breathing deeply, while her head falls back into the pillow in slow motion.

I feel more and more like the writing on the t-shirt Angie's wearing because I'd sit here just looking at her sleeping for hours, examining the smallest gestures and movements, and it's like I'm walking on the thin line between being in love and being a creep.

“Angie, I know you wanna sleep but I also know that once you wake up, you'll kill me if I make you miss the bus to Seattle. Get up, come on” I shake her again and this time she babbles something more comprehensible that I've already heard.

“Yeah, just a m...” she can't even say the whole sentence and she's already back to sleep.

“Angie” I lean down on her until I can feel her breath against my cheeks and find out it's a very nice feeling. And weird ideas intrude my mind.

“Don't even think about it” I tell myself as I try to look away from Angie's lips but it's easier said than done.

“She's not the Sleeping Beauty and you're not Prince Charming, you dumbass” I repeat to myself as my mouth follows a track of its own.

I'm an inch away from a kiss and I feel lightheaded, I don't know if it's for the umcomfortable position, for sleep-deprivation or excitement or because I'm basically breathing in only the carbon dioxide the girl I love is breathing out. I barely brush the tip of my lips against hers then immediately back up, once I realize what I'm actually doing. Is this the first kiss I wanna give to her? While she's asleep? While she can't react and tell me to fuck off? I lay down beside her, resting my head on the same pillow, and I look at her face trying to fix every single detail in my mind, to commit this moment to memory and never forget it. Then I get up from the bed.

“Sorry, Angie, there's no other way” Daydream Nation's cd is in my stereo, I select track number 5 and crank up the volume before pressing PLAY.

“FUCK!” Angie exclaims as she abruptly sits up on the bed.

“GOOD MORNING!” I yell over the music without turning it off.

“WHAT... WHAT TIME IS IT?”

“IT'S TIME... hehe it's time to get up” I giggle and turn down the volume to more human levels.

“Ok, I'm gonna get up now” Angie holds her head between her hands then look around still confused.

“Forgive me, princess, but you wouldn't wake up, I tried everything”

“Everything?” she asks and accurately avoids looking at me. She must be angry.

“Well, yeah, calling and shaking you didn't work...”

“I'm sorry, I'm... I'm gonna get dressed and ready now” Angie lifts the covers and gets out of bed immediately, going straight for her backpack and looking for something inside, still without looking at me. For a moment there I think I see her blushing.

“Sure, I'll leave you alone now. And... well, I made coffee if you want it” I add as I leave.

“Great, thanks”

“Anyway you could have taken a slice of cake” I scold her as we get out of the car.

“No, it's yours. And I had plenty of it yesterday” says Angie and now she's vaguely more alive and talkative than earlier, although I can see she's tired.

“One more bite wouldn't have killed you”

“No! And I got cookies anyway. And also the sandwiches you made me. By the way, you shouldn't have, I could buy something once in L.A.”

“Look, I know you're saying this because you think they're not edible and don't wanna offend me. I can assure you they're good”

“Hahaha I trust you, don't worry, it's not that. I meant you already did a lot for me”

“Uhm maybe I like doing things for you, is it bad?”

“No, it's not. Thank you anyway”

“You're welcome”

We keep walking until we get to the fucking bus station where we'll have to say bye in a while. And I know I'll meet her again in a few days but I also know it's gonna be different in Seattle. I mean, it is different now, here in San Diego, and it could have been even more different. In Seattle it's all the same and knowing me and knowing Angie's insight, it'll be the same for a while.

“That's mine, the third from bottom” Angie points towards a white bus with blue, red and yellow stripes on the side parked at the other end and that's where we head to, as I zip my jacket and pull up the hood over my head because of the cold morning wind.

“Uh I almost forgot” of course I didn't forget it, not even for a minute, I've been turning it in my hand inside my pocket for an hour.

“What?”

“Something for you, for the bus ride” I show her the cassette and I knew she's have smiled but I wasn't ready for that kind of wonder, I'm never ready for that.

“Is it your home?” she asks referring to our old conversation. She showed me her home, the songs she takes shelter in, and it'd be my turn now.

“Yeah, for some months now...”

“Your new home in Seattle, huh? I'm curious...” Angie looks at it although nothing's written on it, as if she could unlock its secrets from its blank cover. She doesn't understand all it takes is looking into my eyes: she believes I put my new life in Seattle on tape, whereas I was talking about the last few months I spent slowly and hopelessly falling in love with her.

“I didn't write titles of course”

“So that I can live the moment listening to it?” will I survive one week without her adorably making fun of me?

“Also” I reply and I must look not very amused because her voice changes, although I can't see why.

“Hey, I was just kidding... I like the idea of being surprised, I did it too”

“Hehe sure, I know, you're talking like I got upset or something”

“Aren't you upset?”

“No, why would I?”

“I don't know, you're strange”

“Strange? You mean, more than usual?”

“Hehe yes, you... you look sad”

“Well it must be because I am sad”

“Why? What happened?” her porcelain face becomes worried.

“What happened... what's happening here, now... you leaving...”

“Are you sad because I'm going back home?” Angie looks at me as if I spoke another language.

“Yeah... I mean, my little house on the beach will be empty again. And I'll miss you, you know” it takes me a lot to make this half admission and Angie doesn't react as I'm expecting.

“Hahaha shut up!” she basically blurts out laughing at my face as we make our way across the bus station.

“It's true”

“Oh Eddie, do you know what you need?” she sighs and asks what really looks like a rhetorical question.

“What?” you to stay?

“A girlfriend, Eddie. You really should find yourself one”

“Ah. D'you think so?” the conversation takes an unexpected turn.

“Yes”

“Well, ehm, yeah, maybe. It's not easy though”

“It'd be very easy for you, if only you didn't make your life so difficult”

“You're absolutely right about that”

“If you just stopped building castles in the air, maybe you'd realize it's easier than you think”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean you should shake off this idea of yours of the perfect girl and look around”

“Perfect girl?”

“Yeah, the girl who appears from out of nowher and turns your life upside down, who makes you lose your mind with a gesture or, how did you call it, a detail that drives you crazy. You said your problem was that you fall in love too easily. Well, it looks like the exact opposite to me. I'm not saying you should get with the first girl you meet but maybe you could stop staring at the pedestal waiting for someone to climb on it and give an opportunity to normal girls”

“Pedestal, but... what the fuck are you talking about?”

“All I'm saying is that if you stopped waiting for the mythical ideal girl, maybe you'd notice that the right girl for you is already there and she's right before your eyes but you don't even notice” she states as we get right in front of her bus, which is already surrounded by a small group of travellers and sleepy accompanying persons like me.

“Really?” I was almost getting mad at her but I like this part of her speech. I like it a lot.

“Yes, it could be someone pretty close to you, a friend you don't even consider” you think I don't consider you, you're so silly.

“Please forgive me, Angie, it's kinda early and I can't get all the shades and subtleties of the spoken language. Are we still talking hypothetically or do you mean someone specific?”

“I don't know, what do you think?”

“I don't know, I wouldn't ask you if I did”

“A specific person”

“Ok...” I take a step towards her.

“There's a girl who could, I mean, who is perfect for you, but you don't give a fuck about her”

“That's what you say” another small step.

“I say it 'cause I know”

“Maybe you're wrong” third step, at the third one I'll be all over her.

“I hope so, because she's such a gorgeous girl and you must be blind not to notice her. Apart from the fact she's beautiful and a force of nature, you basically love the same things and you should see the both of you when you talk. There's so much chemistry!” she talks very fast, too fast for six o'clock in the morning.

“Angie, who the hell are you talking about?” I'd love to think about a sudden boost of self esteem and confidence but I'm smellin' a rat.

“I already know what you're gonna say, you know? She's only a friend, I can't, blah blah...But that's your mistake, separating love from friendship, because before being lovers you have to be partners and friends, and you and Michelle have this deep connection that-”

“Michelle” it's not a rat, it's pure shit.

“You'd be perfect together”

“MICHELLE?!” I must have crazy eyes or maybe I'm screaming a little too loud because Angie flinches and backs up.

“Yeah! See? I told you, I bet you didn't even think about her!”

“Actually I didn't”

“Well you should!”

“Tell me you're kidding”

“Hehe no!” she laughs. She laughs. And I'm about to lose my patience.

“Angie, being with Mitch would be some kind of incest, I've known her for twenty years or something, she's like a sis-”

“She's like a sister, we're just friends, blah blah... just like I told you before! I knew that”

“So... you're saying the solution to all my problems would be getting together with my best friend who lives one thousand miles away from me?” I take a deep breath and try to keep calm.

“Long-distance relationships can work, if there's trust and love”

“Between Mitch and I there's no trust or love, nothing's there, Angie. Our friendship is too deep and apart from that she doesn't like me that way and I don't like her that way”

“You don't like her?”

“NOT IN THAT WAY!” I raise my voice again and as I look around I notice I caught the attention of the other passengers.

“You're an idiot, Eddie, let me tell ya” Angie shakes her head and pulls back up her backpack that was slipping off her shoulder.

“If that's what you think...”

“You're too fuckin' picky! I see you can do that but... I don't know, I can't work you out” why is she getting all worked up? I'm getting all worked up too.

“You're the one to talk” I can't hold back this time but my allusion goes unnoticed.

“I could understand you didn't want Violet, to a certain extent, because she was very distant from your world and you didn't have anything in common. But Michelle?! She's a musician, a surfer, a skater, likes sports, she's an environmentalist and socially commited! She told me about what she does, what you do, for homeless people. And the fact she knows you so well is a plus to me, because she knows how to approach you and take care of you, she knows your flaws and weaknesses and can understand you better than anyone else. But you... you don't wanna hear about it! I... Fuck, I don't know?! I'd be curious to know what a girl must look like for you to like her, since I know you I've never seen a girl you like, not even one by mistake. Who knows what did your exes look like? They must have been some kind of living goddesses to b-” Angie keeps talking and talking and at some point I stop listening to her because the more I listen the more I get mad so I just put an end to this bullshit in the only possible way: I reach for her nape, pull her head toward me and kiss her.

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

I'm swimming. Weird right? Even weirder is the fact I can perfectly breathe under water. And I don't even have gills! I know because as I look for Eddie in the dark depths of this, I don't know, sea? Lake? While I hear him calling me and try to reach him, I touch the side of my face and neck, expecting to find some kind of openings but nothing's there.

“Angie!” there is Eddie's voice again so I stop asking myself silly questions about my underwater respiration.

“I'm coming!” I answer as I move towards a bright spot in the distance. 'Cause actually I'm not really swimming, but I'm not walking either, it's something in between. The light turns out to be closer than expected and in a minute find myself in front of a small rusty spotlight pointing down towards the seabed. Following the light trail I finally find what I've been looking for.

“Angie...” I hear him calling again but more weakly. I dive-bomb towards Eddie's silhouette, slumped over between two rocks. Besides the amphibious skills, I'm clearly very strong too because I throw away one of the big rocks with one hand and I use the other to grab Eddie by his arm and drag him up with me as I swim towards the surface. The rise is very long, I'm fast but it seems to me I've been swimming for hours before I finally get out of the water. I hold on to the floating bed base and manage to climb on it, pulling Eddie up with me and saving him. But is he safe for real? I look at him and he's so pale, I try and shake him and slap him but he doesn't move.

“Eddie...” I lean on him to try and check his breath but nothing comes out of those sweet lips. The first aid classes I took finally turn out to be useful, although I wish I would never need those. I lift his chin tilting his head back as much as possible, I open his mouth delicately but quickly and check inside with my fingers to verify that the airway is clear and there's nothing that could be dangerous, I pinch his nostrils closed with my fingers and, always putting pressure on the jaw, I take a deep breath in and place my lips tightly over his to blow big and quick breaths. I back up and release his nose for five seconds then start it all over again, two, three, four times. I place two fingers on his strong neck checking for a pulse I can't feel, I lay my hand at the center of Eddie's chest and push for thirty times, as they taught me, using my whole upper body weight to provide all the force I have. I wanna cry but I can't, this is not the right moment. I go back to Eddie's lips, desperately trying to blow life inside him, when at some point I feel something weird: his mouth is not frozen anymore, it moves, his lips tenderly curve upwards. I pull away abruptly and I see him staring at me with his ocean blue eyes and a dimpled smile.

“You love me then?” he asked amused.

“YOU'RE AN IDIOT!” I yell at his face punching his pale chest, right where I pushed with my whole self a minute ago.

“Angie...” Eddie doesn't lose his cool, he keeps smiling at me and starts tracing the tips of his fingers across my back, first through my soaked t-shirt and then right under it.

“That's a pretty cruel prank to pull!” I scold him again, but he just rest his other hand on my shoulder first, then takes the lock of wet hair stuck against my cheek and pushes it away from my face “You scared me to death”

“I know you want to slap my face now, but I also know you'd be mad if I didn't kiss you again”

“I...”

“Angie...” with a delicate but quick gesture, Eddie pushes me sideways and turns me on my back, basically inverting our positions, and starts kissing me like a madman.

It's all strange and normal at the same time, everythings warm and bright and enveloping and I can hear music in the distance. But I can only hear the bass and percussions, as if it came from underwater or from another room, and I can't understand what song it is. It just makes me wanna dance. I pull away from Eddie and lean over towards the water's edge, trying to recognize the melody, but he doesn't like the parting. I can barely see the frown on his face before one last kiss, that's almost a bite, and before he throws me back into the water.

I can't see anything at all, all I see is me

That's clear enough

And that's what's important, to see me

My eyes can focus

My brain is talking

It looks pretty good to me

“FUCK!” I wake up startled, the taste of a kiss still on my lips and Sonic Youth raping my ears and brain.

“GOOD MORNING!” the kisser, actually the real life version of him, greets me snickering and I feel so fucking embarrassed for the adventures of my subconscious.

“WHAT... WHAT TIME IS IT?” I ask him the first thing that comes to mind just to avoid silence.

“IT’S TIME… hehe it’s time to get up” Eddie finally decides to end the torture but his dimpled smile only reminds me how close I was to those dimples in my dream.

“Ok, I’m gonna get up now” I hesitate a little more while Eddie explains how he tried to wake me up, then I actually get out of bed and reach for my backpack, I take my clean underwear and pretend to look for something else to avoid looking at him and see those lips that... Why am I like this?!

“I didn't write titles of course”

“So that I can live the moment listening to it?” I joke as I try to penetrate the cassette box with my eye to get to know the content in advance. I'm very curious about Eddie's home, I want to know him better. I know something about his music taste, I know The Who are his favorite band and he likes Butthole Surfers and Minor Threat. Either that or he's particularly attracted to their t-shirts aesthetic! I think he put some Fugazi too, together with Springsteen, Dylan and Tom Petty. Well, I can say I already have the whole Side A in my mind. But there's a whole Side B to discover and I can't wait to get on the bus, put the tape in my walkman and put earbuds on. Because, yes, I'm about to say bye to Eddie and I won't see him for a week at least but with this mix tape it'll be like having him with him all the time.

“Also” he replies with a strange voice. I look up at him and notice a frowned expression.

“Hey, I was just kidding… I like the idea of being surprised, I did it too” I thought he was used to my unpleasant sense of humor by now.

“Hehe sure, I know, you’re talking like I got upset or something”

“Aren’t you upset?”

“No, why would I?” maybe because you're being defensive.

“I don’t know, you’re strange”

“Strange? You mean, more than usual?” yes, because you're not crazy-strange, you're unhappy-strange.

“Hehe yes, you… you look sad”

“Well it must be because I am sad”

“Why? What happened?” I'm immediately alarmed. What if he saw Beth last night? Or maybe it's exactly the opposite, maybe he hoped to see her but she didn't show up...

“What happened… what’s happening here, now… you leaving…” me? What have I got to do with this?

“Are you sad because I’m going back home?”

“Yeah… I mean, my little house on the beach will be empty again. And I’ll miss you, you know” you'll miss me, sure. You'll miss somebody, having someone to talk to, but it's not like I'm the only person on the plante.

“Hahaha shut up!”

“It’s true” I know it's true for you. The problem is it's true for me too. And we've got all the premises for a disaster. We'd better change our way.

“Oh Eddie, do you know what you need?”

“What?”

“A girlfriend, Eddie. You really should find yourself one” that's when I start giving him some kind of lecture, although that wasn't my first intention. It's all his fault though! He's fuckin' asking for it, I mean, how can he not sense the connection between Michell and him? How can he say she's not his type? Why is nobody his type? How can it be? And why have a type anyway? I like tall movie nerds with a big nose but that doesn't mean I wouldn't give a chance to, I don't know, short music and surf lovers with a cute button nose. Is it possible he doesn't like anyone? Eddie's very handsome, no doubt about it, no one knows it more than me how hot this guy is. And he's also a good and mysterious soul, a passionate artist... I mean, he has it all. But if not even a knockout like Mitch is his type... I don't know what to think.

“You don’t like her?”

“NOT IN THAT WAY!” Eddie raises his voice all upset, drawing the attention of the other waiting passengers even more, after they've been following our discussion from the beginning.

“You’re an idiot, Eddie, let me tell ya” why do you have to make it all so difficult?

“If that’s what you think…”

“You’re too fuckin’ picky! I see you can do that but… I don’t know, I can’t work you out” if Violet's not his type, Michelle's not his type... I can only imagine what I look like to his eyes.

“You’re the one to talk” he mumbles and I see where he's getting at. He's the picky one whereas I'm the opposite, I'm the one who's always been chosen and never chose. I'm not saying my attitude is the right one, I think somewhere in the middle would be the ideal solution.

“I could understand you didn’t want Violet, to a certain extent, because she was very distant from your world and you didn’t have anything in common. But Michelle?! She’s a musician, a surfer, a skater, likes sports, she’s an environmentalist and socially commited! She told me about what she does, what you do, for homeless people. And the fact she knows you so well is a plus to me, because she knows how to approach you and take care of you, she knows your flaws and weaknesses and can understand you better than anyone else. But you… you don’t wanna hear about it! I… Fuck, I don’t know?! I’d be curious to know what a girl must look like for you to like her, since I know you I’ve never seen a girl you like, not even one by mistake. Who knows what did your exes look like? They must have been some kind of living goddesses to b-” Eddie gives me a skeptical look the whole time without blinking an eye, then disbelief turns into an actual frown and I suddenly have this déjà vu moment. But I don't have the time to remember where I already saw that frown, 'cause I get knocked down by a sort of hurricane, that lifts me off my feet and then throws me back down with a bang, leaving me with trembling knees and hands. I know Eddie's kissing me, I'm aware of that, I can clearly feel his lips slowly moving against mine, his hand caressing my hair, his fingers so dangerously close to my weak spot on the nape than the mere thought he touch it almost makes me lose my mind. I'm present to the moment I'm living right now and I wouldn't want to be anytime and anywhere else, but that doesn't mean I'm actually understanding what's happening to me. Actually, I can't find any trace of logic in all this, I start believing I never really woke up, that I'm still in Eddie's bed, wearing his Loser t-shirt, nomen omen the Latin would say... And maybe I'm right there because all of a sudden it seems like I can hear the rumbling sound of music in the distance, coming from a closed space: it can be the stereo of a car that's getting close, an after hours club, the powerful clock radio of a hard sleeper. I don't know where it comes from, I only know it sounds a lot like the one I heard during the dream and if I wasn't an atheist and a rationalist I'd start considering omens and oracles. But Eddie backs up slightly and when I open my eyes and meet his I definitely lose every sense of time and space.

“Too many words for six o'clock in the morning, Angie” it's barely more than a whisper against my lips.

“I... Oh my god, I'm sorry, it's... it's sleep deprivation, basically it's like I'm drunk. And you know that when I'm drunk I talk too much and use a lot of big words. Well, actually I haven't used any big words now, that must be an exclusive feature of alcohol consumption, but the chatty aspect is still there. That and snooping around into other people's business 'cause I generally not. Not because I'm a thoughtless uncaring person, of course, but-” Eddie's eyes are quizzical during my whole rant, until he decides to put an end to this as well, the same way as he did before. Eddie pulls me against him once again applying a soft pressure against my neck, then kisses me, burying his fingers in my hair completely and now I'm the one who forgets how to breathe. I'm the gasping one on the floating bed, while Eddie tries to revive me and ignores the fact he's the cause of my blackout. The 4/4 rhythm is still in the background, still the same, it doesn't get close or move away. My arms are limp, dangling at my sides, and I must look quite ridiculous but I don't really know where to put my hands and honestly I don't even know I have limbs right now and I'm not really sure about their real purpose. This drunk-like state continues until Eddie decides to take my lower lip in his mouth and start nibbling on it, before moving his tongue over it ever so lightly. That's when reality hits me like a cold shower. Only it's not reality but lucid insanity, so typical of me. Because as soon as Eddie slips his tongue between my lips and inside my mouth, I've got the feeling someone suddenly threw the door of the music room wide open or just threw me in there and everything's suddenly clear. And it's not Sonic Youth. And it's not Tom Jones either. It's Depeche Mode, performing on the roof of the bus.

When I'm with you baby

I go out of my head

And I just can't get enough

“Still too many words, huh?” I ask when Dave Gahan, fully dressed in leather, stops singing and just dances around Vince Clark, who plays keyboards like crazy.

“I think so” Eddie replies as he brushes his nose against mine shaking his head.

“Sor-” I can't even say one word and he's once again attacking my lips, pressing his body so hard against mine that my backpack falls from my shoulder and leaving very little space between us.

By now I remember I have arms, maybe because Gahan has just pulled them up over my head while we're dancing together and I wonder why isn't he sweating with those fuckin' leather pants because it's so fucking hot in here. I don't really know where I put my hands but when Eddie backs away from me and I open my eyes again, I see his hood's not over his head anymore and he's now circling and gently caressing my wrists with the tip of his fingers. I see it and feel it. Feel it too much.

“Interrupting a woman who's speaking is not really feminist, you know?”

“Isn't it?” he asks pretending to be surprised and alarmed. I answer shaking my head “Not even with a kiss?”

“Nuh-uh”

“Well, you have my apologies then, my princess”

“I accept your apologies”

“I'll wait for you to finish talking before doing it again”

“Great, that'll be better”

“Fine”

“Fine.” I repeat, then I stare at him in silence for a few seconds, still too many for my taste “I finished”

“Fine” he echoes before his passion washes over me once more with another kiss.

“Angie, it's time to go” Eddie says when I still have my eyes closed and am sitting at a bar, drinking smoothies with Depeche Mode, and for a moment, for the umpteenth time, but more convincingly, I really think I'm still in Eddie's bed, while he's calling me to get up because it's late. And I'll probably curse profusely because I'm about to miss the bus. Anyway, when I open my eyes I find myself at the bus station, right in front of the white bus that's gonna take me back to Seattle, a long series of faces smiling and winking at me as the passengers put their largest suitcases in the trunk of the bus.

“Huh?” I ask still woozy.

“The bus is about to leave”

“Uh! Ok, let's go” I try and come to my senses putting one foot in front of the other but something, or someone, blocks me.

“Angie?”

“Yes?”

“The bus”

“Yes”

“It's this way”

“Oh yeah, sure! Sorry, hehe, I'm still sleeping basically” I apologize and walk the right direction.

“Angie?”

“Yeah?”

“Your backpack” I turn around and see it on the ground next to Eddie's feet. He giggles as he takes it and walks up to me.

“Thank you” I gesture for him to give it to me but he keeps the bag and takes my hand, pulling me towards the bus.

Eddie literally has to take the ticket from my backpack and show it to the driver because I just can't, then gets on the bus with me and makes me sit down.

“Do you wanna put the backpack up here? I'll help you” he asks pointing at the overhead compartment.

“No, thank you, I'm gonna keep it here for the moment, then I'll think about it”

“I can help her too” a good looking woman around thirty with nice curly hair and red-framed glasses looks up from her book and smiles alternatively at me and Eddie.

“Thank you...”

“Ok, gotta go now or I end up going back to Seattle in advance instead of playing in Oakland”

“And Stone would kill the both of us”

“Exactly... Bye Angie, call me when you get home, ok?” Eddie bends down on his knees to give me another kiss who's barely there but it's not less effective than the others.

“Ok”

“Maybe even before that if you can, I guess you'll have other stops after L.A., right?”

“I think so... but maybe you won't be home and-”

“I don't care, leave me a message, I just wanna hear you, ok? Have a safe trip”

“Thank you, have... a nice... show” I answer in between kisses.

“See you in Seattle” after one last caress on my cheek and a kiss on my forehead, Eddie says bye to me and my travel companion and gets off the bus.

“I don't wanna be nosy, dear, but let me tell you: you're crazy”

“Excuse me?” I stop staring at the aisle where Eddie's just passed and turned towards the female voice who's just spoken beside me.

“You're crazy, leaving a guy like that alone on Valentine's Day” the woman goes on and nods at the window.

I look out and see Eddie pulling his hood back over his head and waving at me, before putting both hands in his pockets. I reply with the same gesture right when the bus starts to move. Valentine's Day? Who on earth ever thought of this?

#pearl jam fanfiction #grunge fanfiction #eddie vedder fanfiction #pearl jam #eddie vedder #stone gossard #jeff ament #mike mccready #alice in chains #jerry cantrell #sean kinney #chapters

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