#i keep seeing Americans being surprised at this & need to know if it's as common knowledge a i thought it was

[qwimblenorrisstan]

Surprise Pt. 5 | Soap x Reader

Summary: The boys learn that they don’t know you as well as they thought they did, while you find some newfound ‘friends’ in an American and his unofficial boss in Urzikstan.

Word Count: ~ 4.6k

Warnings: Descriptions of death, knives, blood, guns, explosions, debris, gas, torture, kidnapping, shooting, choking, heavy topics, biting, it’s a lot yall

A/N: umm sorry ive been gone for a week here’s some food!! *runs away* this is a big switchup though from mainly 141 to Alex, Farah, and a few more pieces of reader’s backstory so lmk any thoughts or theories (yk I love them) hope you enjoy<3 (side quest: find how many characters you can recognize from cod!)

Requests are open!

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The first thing Captain John Price registered when he walked into the room, the rest of his Task Force following closely behind, was that they were in some deep shit. They’d just gotten back from a mission. The one they’d been called into during the volleyball game. It had been low stakes, but instead of going back to the apartment, they’d been told to get back to base as soon as possible.

Laswell was pacing back and forth, fidgeting, two things she never did unless everything was falling apart at the seams. The last time he’d seen her so worked up had been years ago. When she caught sight of him, there was no sigh of relief or relaxation, she breathed out four words.

”They got her, John.”

He tried not to let the tension in his body show, tried not to look just how internally panicked he was right now. Simon stiffened, hands balling into fists. Price knew it was a conscious effort to not lash out immediately.

”What.”

Ghosh ground out, eyes narrowed. Soap tried putting a hand on his shoulder, a hand that Simon only shoved off immediately. Laswell just shook her head, looking to be in shock as she only sat down at one of the chairs in the dimly lit room, pulling documents out from a drawer under the long table.

Price was the first to sit, followed by Gaz, then Soap, and finally, Simon who refused to relax, his leg bouncing impatiently under the table, hands on his knees.

Laswell opened one of the files, sliding it around to where they could see it. Lo and behold, it was a picture of you from a few years back, maybe when you’d been 14 or 15. You shouldn’t have been able to get in that early, it shouldn’t have even been possible. You wore a uniform, the file listing you by your first and last name, your callsign in the center. There was no official position or branch like there should’ve been.

“Wasp.”

Price stared at it for a few moments, reading whatever he could glean over in the file before glancing up at Laswell, who in turn pulled another file out. This one looked newer, the corners were not bent or warped yet. When she opened it, there was no picture on file. This time, it stated “Marines” as your branch. Your last name was listed as “Woods” instead of Riley.

To keep Simon from finding you on the database, most likely. Or someone else.

And the thing that caught his attention the most?

The “Captain” title right next to your first name.

”That’s nae possible.”

Soap said, jaw clenched as he glanced at Simon, the man refusing to meet his eye, glaring down at the files.

”It is,”

Laswell said, breathing out a shaky breath. Trying to calm herself, Price knew.

”They found her in a camp at 12, Frank Woods took her in, pulled some strings, and enrolled her early off record. He kept her mostly off base in a safe house until she turned 18.”

Gaz’s gaze was on Laswell now, narrowed, pinned on her. Interrogation was his specialty, after all.

”A camp?”

A nod.

”Essentially a POW camp, her relations to Ghost meant she was a valuable asset to bargain.”

Price didn’t need to glance over at Ghost to see the way he’d nearly stopped breathing, the shock being a common aspect among the group. Gaz let out a deep breath, hand going to hold the brim of his cap, his gloved finger running along the seam.

”Then how the bloody hell is she in high school?”

Simon asked, trying to reason with how this could’ve happened, how you could’ve lied to them, to him, for so long about everything and he’d never even caught on. It hadn’t been a volleyball camp keeping you from attending his mum’s funeral, it had been a POW camp, one you had been in because of him in the first place.

Simon asked, trying to reason with how this could’ve happened, how you could’ve lied to them, to him, for so long about everything and he’d never even caught on. It hadn’t been a volleyball camp keeping you from attending his mum’s funeral, it had been a POW camp, one you had been in because of him in the first place. And the new, somewhat stable foster home you’d been in? A safe house provided by your new foster parent, Frank Woods, an American Sergeant that Simon had heard whispers of.

He’d allegedly been a force to reckon with during the Korean and Vietnam wars, retired now and pushing 60 probably, but no less legendary by military standards.

”She’s 23, Lieutenant. It was a cover mission.”

Another surprise.

Another lie.

“Steamin’ Jesus…”

Soap muttered, the gleam in his eye dimming from what was most likely concern.

”It was an undercover mission, but with her gone, I don’t know how we’ll handle Nova…”

Laswell muttered to herself, catching herself just in time to shut her mouth then and there, probably realizing she’d already said too much, when Price stood up, staring her down.

”Nova? The hell is that?”

He asked sternly, and Laswell gathered the files in her hands, putting them neatly back into stacks, falling back into the controlled woman he usually saw her as.

”That’s classified, John.”

“Considering we’re closely involved with her, I don’t think it is, Kate.”

He saw the slight whiplash it gave her to call her by her first name, which made sense considering it was always Laswell. Her face grew stern, despite the worried frown lines already carving into her face.

”Don’t. We’ll get her back.”

The rest of the boys watched as she walked out of the room, Gaz muttering something sarcastic under his breath, Price pacing, Soap cursing not so quietly under his breath in his full unbridled accent, and Ghost sitting deathly still.

”I’ll talk to Briggs.”

Price said firmly, words stiff as he walked out of the room.

A moment of silence between the remaining three in the room.

Soap was the first to speak.

“Fuck!”

~

The sweet and irony smell of blood filled your nose as you shakily tried to move, limbs trembling for some reason.

Blinking to try and clear the blurriness in them, you opened your eyes, only to begin rapidly blinking as something small and grainy lifted from a sudden draft and blew into your eyes.

Sand.

You hated sand. The way it shifted under your feet, how it got under all your clothing and in your mouth, under your nails, and in your shoes. The grainy, grinding texture of it against your skin when you had a high-stakes mission and had to lie in it, waiting for the perfect shot.

But sand of this texture was in a handful of places, so at least you could narrow your location down a bit. Getting up and looking around would also help.

You were in a small room, from the looks of it, leaning against a wooden beam that dug at the clothing on your back with jagged edges. Textured, colorfully patterned quilts and blankets hung around, and shifting your head to turn right despite how it throbbed, you saw a corkboard filled with pins and images of people, locations, and notes. A few of the faces were recognizable, not in a good way though. Recognizable in the sense that you had seen those faces before you thought you’d killed them.

The sandy floor beneath you had wood underneath, by the feel of it. Your palms pushed against the floor, trying to get the leverage to stand up, only for you to slump against the wood again.

You needed to get up.

This time using your good leg to push against the floor, as well as your palms, you got almost halfway up the beam, nearly standing, when the sand made your foot slide back out and you fell onto the floor again.

A small, breathy chuckle from the other side of the room had you immediately turning your head, the quick movement making it spin slightly, even as you heard the sound of metal moving against the floor as well as only one footstep every few seconds.

“I don’t like the sand either. Hard on my leg, or what’s left of it, anyways.”

The American from earlier came in, maybe Alex? You’d been so disoriented when he’d told you that you could hardly remember. Fragments of foggy bits came to light, but nothing more than that.

His hair was a sandy color, dirty blonde almost, with a mustache and hair that was sticking almost straight up but short enough to not look ridiculous. His one leg was perfectly normal, but on the other, there was a curved piece of metal to replace the lower half of it where a nub was all that was left.

He offered you a hand, one you hesitated before taking. An American soldier wasn’t a threat, or at least shouldn’t be. He pulled you up as you stumbled to your feet.

“Where are we?”

Your raspy voice asked, throat dry. You tried to clear it to no avail. He grabbed a canteen from a table a few feet away, near the corkboard, and handed it to you with the lid already popped off.

“Zaravan City, Urzikstan. We’re not close to much anything, though, this is one of our safe houses.”

He spoke while you chugged the water, it flowing down your throat mercifully and filling your empty stomach, only serving to remind you that you were also starving. Food could wait, though. When you handed the nearly empty canteen back to him with a small sigh, you raised a brow.

“Our?”

A woman’s voice, thick with a familiar accent, spoke then.

“Yes, our.”

She was standing by the corkboard, glancing over the information with a sharp eye, before walking over to Alex. Her hair was dark and thick, tied tightly back into what seemed to be a ponytail beneath her dark garb. A gun hung from her hip, something semi-automatic. You weren’t sure if that was legal or not here, but couldn’t find it within you to care.

“Farah, in case you don’t remember, Riley.”

You were glad she’d told you because you most definitely did not remember her name. Her gaze met yours, and you held it for a long minute, recognizable facial features coming to your mind, like a dream, you could reach but not quite hold. And then—you remembered.

“Karim,”

You breathed, eyes narrowing. General Karim had proven to be more than capable more times than once during the scandals throughout Urzikstan, especially to the boys.

The boys.

You’d nearly forgotten until now, but you wondered just how much they knew. Whether someone had spilled, or Laswell had told them everything. They would probably be biting at the leash, but there was nothing that could be done now, not with the mission having failed.

They were on their own now.

Farah nodded.

“It is not every day we find an American in a Mexican facility,”

A pointed glance at Alex, whose lips curled slightly up at that.

You grumbled, legs still shaky, probably from the gas that had managed to slip in before you’d put the gas mask on doing rounds through your body, the last of it yet to leave. Managing to stumble over to a chair near a small round table in the corner of the room, you sat down, it groaning under your weight.

“Not every day I see a group from America and Urzikstan in a Mexican facility.”

You shot back and watched as Farah and Alex exchanged a glance, a silent conversation happening right in front of you. Rude, but you couldn’t say you hadn’t done the same thing before.

Alex sighed, grabbing the chair with one hand and easing himself down onto it with his leg, propping the prosthetic up on a nearby crate.

His blue eyes met yours as he set one elbow down on the table.

“We were going after Santiago Garza, a key member of their cartel, which we have reason to believe has…”

He exchanged a glance with Farah, who gave a nearly imperceptible shake of her head.

“…access to things he shouldn’t.”

Alex finished. Farah spoke next, already sensing your oncoming interrogation despite not being in control of the situation.

“We answered yours, now answer our question. Why did he want you?”

Her tone was demanding, leaving no wiggle room for you to try and keep anything from her. If this whole arrangement was going to work out, you were going to have to be transparent with them, anyway. Or as transparent as you could be.

“I have a… personal history with the Garza family. Not a pretty one.”

Farah pressed her lips together but didn’t question further.

The American wasn’t as smart.

“What kind of history?”

He asked, brows raised in an almost innocent expression if it weren’t for the gleam of suspicion in his eyes. You shook your head. Not willing to talk about it. Not now. Woods was the only one you’d ever talked to about it, other than David when the bastard was even there.

Which hadn’t been often.

“What’s the date?”

You then asked. If you’d been captured in America, and then taken to a supposed Mexican facility, then to Urzikstan, it must’ve taken quite a while. Not to mention the travel from there to the safe house…

“The 24th.”

Farah answered, hands moving to idly wipe sand off of the barrel of her gun, back leaning against the wooden post. Her finger remained near the trigger. Untrusting.

It had been nearly four days.

By then, someone had to have noticed the body of Nalani in your room, and your obvious absence. A homicide and a missing person’s case as well, most likely. The boys had definitely heard of it then, despite what you assumed was a mission they were on, considering how early they left that volleyball game.

Had Woods been informed? Had anyone on your team been informed, or were they still too deep in their work in your absence?

Alex’s eyes snapped to the window as he heard something rustling outside, and within moments he was down on his haunches, you and Farah were quick to follow as he lifted one of the thin sheets lying over the windows from the bottom, glancing out for a second.

The pain in your limbs was barely even noticeable compared to the mini-adrenaline rush you were flooded with, mind and body sharp and alert. You’d performed while in much worse conditions, you could manage this one just fine, you were sure.

But without a weapon, you were defenseless.

Reaching for a gun that was laid out on the table, Alex’s hand grabbing your wrist stopped you and refused to let you grab it.

“We’ll handle this, stay inside.”

He said in a hushed tone, voice firm, even though Farah was the one with the most authority here over the both of you.

Farah slowly opened the door, peeking out, dark eyes scanning the dusty roads and markets, when several shots rang out, feminine screams following quickly as the sound of people running became all too obvious.

“Al-Qatala.”

Farah murmured, jerking her chin to Alex, before slipping her gun from her side and walking out of the door, the American man giving you one last glance that clearly said “Stay here.” before following.

Racking your brain, you tried to remember anything that might help you. Urzikstan. A small country in Western Asia. Violence wasn’t uncommon, by the sound of it. And Al-Qatala…try as you might, you couldn’t remember anything about whoever they were. Maybe some sort of gang? Probably, judging by the gunfire and angry Arabic being barked out in the streets.

But you weren’t going to be helpless, stuck in this tiny “safe house” that had two entrances and one large window a man could easily fit through. You stood up, careful to stay clear of the window to avoid catching any strays, only to find the gun that had been on the table gone.

Alex must’ve taken it.

They surely had more weapons somewhere, except for the fact that no matter where you searched, there was nothing to be found. Nothing except documents of blacked-out information, pictures on the board, and a small stash of food and water lying around. A lot of dates, too.

It wasn’t an ideal situation, but you could work with it.

A few strands of rope that you quickly picked up were lying around. Every lesson you’d overheard Woods giving to his team, drilling it into their heads, began repeating in your mind. Like a dream, almost.

“Can any of you boys tell me the five rules of guerrilla warfare?”

His voice, sharp and brusque but not hostile, asked the men in front of him.

You were crouched down, hiding in one of the small areas where the metal of the walls dented outwards slightly, giving you an area to lay down and peek through at him.

One of the men raised his hand in a salute, chapped lips opening to speak.

“Hit and run, sir!”

Woods nodded, hand shooting out to point at another man down the line of soldiers. Mostly young boys who stupidly enlisted, living for their country and dying for it. You didn’t see the point, even if Woods did. You’d never seen the point, not even when Simon had enlisted.

He could’ve been one of the dead.

He still might be. You hadn’t seen him in a while.

“Ambush, sir!”

You snapped back into focus at that, eyes watching keenly as the man nodded again. He had a habit of it; nodding very often. Even if you just inclined to take a bite of soup, he’d nod. The praise was sort of nice, you supposed. Even if you barely knew him, just having arrived here a few weeks ago.

They’d found you on one of the starving horses from the camps, near the front of the marching people, leading their way to freedom despite how sickly and beaten most were. You weren’t much better.

And when the bastard controlling that camp must’ve ordered his remaining men to circle like vultures and take out as many of the surviving prisoners as he could?

Everyone alive after the vicious attack had huddled together in a small cave, the people at the entrance usually being shot from overhead planes by the men too cowardly to approach.

They’d found you huddled up, a warm body on top of you, on one of the sides. Thrown you over their shoulder. Taken you away despite your hitting and biting, and brought you here to domesticate you again. They weren’t bad. They were just soldiers. And soldiers were all about duty and honor, two things you couldn’t find within yourself to care about much anymore. You wondered if Simon still cared about them, or if he’d been numb to it for much longer. After the death of his mother, and how pissed he’d been that you’d missed the funeral, you seriously doubted it.

Snapping out of your thoughts, you watched Woods nod again. You must’ve missed the others, but you knew them by heart by now. After watching and listening for so long.

Harassment.

Mobility.

And finally…

“Surprise.”

A hand grabbed you by the arm, yanking you forward and through the wall, through the hole you’d been watching from. Woods held you by the arm infuriatingly easily, which made sense considering how much of a runt you were. Or had been at the time.

The metal had scraped against your shoulder, cutting open a shallow scratch from collarbone to right arm. You glared at him, kicking at him even as his soldiers chuckled.

Laughing at you.

You despised how patronizing it felt, leaning forward and sinking your deceivingly sharp teeth into the wrist of his hand that held you. Blood drew, and he didn’t drop you, simply moving to hold you in his other arm, smiling warmly at you as his shoulders shook from silent laughter.

“Feisty, huh?”

He said in an amused tone, ruffling your hair while someone went to grab a medic.

The memory felt warm and fuzzy, a reminder of a long time ago, though it only felt like yesterday.

But you had more important things to do than have an existential crisis.

Spying a fan in the corner, you pried the metal caging off, wrapping both hands around one of the metal pieces on it, and yanking until a piece came off. Jagged and sharp. Just how you needed it.

Wrapping your little pieces of rope around the base to protect your hand, you crept towards the back exit, listening for the sounds of any footsteps nearby. It would be hard to overhear, especially with the sounds of yelling, screaming, and gunfire in the streets. You wondered if your little makeshift friends had joined the dead or not.

A near-silent step, a branch accidentally cracking under his step, and you were on him.

Hit and run.

The metal slid smoothly into his throat, a quiet wheeze being all he could get out before you leaned his body back, watching his eyes glaze over as the blood ebbed and flowed. You pulled the gun from his hands, searching and taking what was left of his weapons as well.

One flash bang.

One knife, the case of which you strapped onto your hip, the flash bang being tucked into it soon after.

Mobility.

You crouched down, glancing left and right on the street, and breaking into a low sprint to a building down the dusty road. A restaurant by the looks of it. You couldn’t read the Arabic on the front, it having been one of the languages you hadn’t learned, even in your training for Special Forces.

More if the men flooded the streets just as you ducked behind the counter. Letting them all know you were here with gunfire wasn’t beneficial yet, not when you were so badly outnumbered. You needed to find the central point they were getting in from.

You needed to move.

Waiting for the men to pass by, you eventually went out of the back exit of the restaurant, passing the cool chill of its freezer near the kitchen before jumping onto a ladder in the alleyway outside, climbing up, and falling prone onto the ground as soon as you were there.

Looking up over the ledge, you could see now how there were so many.

Trucks were spread about the city, men exiting them and taking cover for a few seconds until they got to where they wanted to be, and started opening fire. They communicated through their radios, but why they would be here didn’t make sense.

Why try to raid a city when you couldn’t gain much, if anything from it?

Unless they weren’t trying to gain but to take someone out.

Someone who had always been against what you assumed was their little group. And that someone was none other than Farah, judging by how quickly she recognized them, and the gleam of hatred in her eyes when she looked at them. She’d been a bit too eager to slaughter them.

And with how quickly the men were flooding the roads and streets, and their communication, it wouldn’t be long until they found her.

Unless…

Glancing at the rooftop a few buildings over, you saw none other than a large tower. Not just any tower, but an antenna tower.

You observed the crowd for a moment, scanning, watching everyone, until you saw it. Heard it, rather, the loud boom it made, the man yelling “RPG!”. It was the second story of the building across the street. You couldn’t get there in time, even if you got over there without being killed or without too many civilians dying.

You needed to buy time.

Gathering the fractures courage left in your body, you got onto the balls of your feet, and against everything you’d been told, to stay quiet and unnoticeable, you began a mad dash across the building, jumping, and not stopping to marvel when your feet hit the solid ground of the other rooftop, only running further.

You still hadn’t gotten his attention.

You were almost to the antenna tower. Now or never.

Harassment.

Slipping the flash bang out of your belt-ish thing, you pulled the pin out, throwing it up in the air. You heard it when it went off, your vision blurring white as you dove and hit the floor. He must’ve heard it too, considering that when you glanced over, the large weapon was aimed at you, and when he fired, you saw it sail through the air not only at you but at the tower as well.

Diving over the edge of the building, you heard the blast, and chunks of debris and wire began raining from the sky in your area. Your ankles burned when you stood, legs screaming against any movement. Ash floated into your nose and throat, as well as the smell of fire, and you took off into another run, diving into a building, only to run face-first into another man.

Ambush.

Your fist met his jaw before his bullet met your body, but barely. You both rolled to the floor, kicking and flailing around, landing hits on each other. He jabbed at you with his gun, his knife out of reach. You rolled him onto his back, your knife coming out, only to be knocked away by his calloused hands.

Your arm went around his neck, hand locking into place with your other elbow as your knee pressed on his neck. Your breathing was pants, more gasps than anything as he gave a final few kicks, before going limp.

You picked your knife back up, head jolting up when you heard a familiar female yell just a few streets down.

The members of the Al-Qatala seemed lost, some shouting to others in Arabic, others going on rampages against civilians just for the hell of it, seemingly. You didn’t doubt that Farah had a small army of her own, but they hadn’t been prepared.

Neither had you.

Sinking lower to not attract attention, you crept through the streets, watching carefully, or as carefully as you could through your blurry vision. Sand and dust blew into it, but you couldn’t find the strength to blink it away.

Your head was throbbing again.

You weren’t sure how you managed the journey there, brain taking a temporary lapse in recording memory maybe, but the next thing you knew, you were near an old warehouse.

Talking came from inside.

A raspy voice. Old, but not kind or warm, not like the voices of the old men you were used to. Harsh and sharp. Like a whip wailing as it flew through the air. Cut paths through it.

“Where is it?”

Silence. As you crept up to the entrance of the warehouse, where the door was just slightly ajar, you could see the outline of Farah tied into a chair. Multiple other men inside. Maybe three or four. Pulling your gun slowly out, you set the handle against your knee, putting your eye right on the scope.

“We know you have the gas, Farah, or should I call you Karim?”

Cruel.

Unnecessary.

But it gave you a kernel of information.

Information you would think about later if you had the time. If you didn’t die here.

A harsh hit to the face. Audible.

You could tell it stung, but she didn’t budge.

You lined the scope up with his head, finger closing in on the trigger, holding down, just not enough until.

Surprise.

The blast of the shot alone rang out through the warehouse. Except it wasn’t who you’d been expecting to fall to the ground who did.

It wasn’t who you’d thought it had been. Not Al-Qatala, not Cartel.

No, instead, Philip Graves, director of the Shadow Company, fell sideways in the dirt.

And the men surrounding Farah?

None other than your own team that had been handed off to Graves during your departure.

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[kaivenom]

Being another dojo sensei and meeting Johnny Lawrence at Sekai Taikai: HCS

Let's pretend all the love story with Miguel's mom doesn't happen

(Latina/Spanish!reader on mind)

Your team was finally in Barcelona for the championship and you will be staying in the same hotel as Miyagi-do, what a traditional name.

When you and the team entered the hall, a blonde man was yelling aggressively at the personal, you laughed and got on the other side of the office to check in.

With a couple of minutes you ended up yelling at the recepcionist too, aparently they have switched your bedrooms and other stuff.

When the problem was finally resolved, you met the look of that blonde.

"Good yelling, someone had to put them in place. I am Johnny Lawrence." he offered his hand to you.

"(Y/N)" you said before taking his hand and kissing rapidly both his cheeks.

"What the..." he asked surprised.

"Manners from my country."

"Wait, you are another dojo sensei?"

"I think that's why we are both here." you show him all your students, and the equipment.

"Sorry, we are..."

"American, it's clearly visible." you pointed at the spiky hair of a boy.

After that, both teams took their things and went to their respective rooms.

Next morning, you took your students to the courtyard of the hotel to a quick training, with tyres and mecanic pieces.

Then again, that men appeared, with all his students.

"What do you think you are doing?" he was carrying tyres like you did half an hour ago.

"This is a public space and we need to improvise with the space and the equipments of the hotel, don't worry, in the afternoon i will have a gym to take my student. What are you doing here?"

"Training."

"At least we have the special touch for training." you yell at your students to make them space for the new people.

"You think we will train with you? you want to know our secrets?" Johnny was now really close to you, but you are not going to step back.

"I was being nice, this is a preheating... sorry english it's not my first language, warm up, righ?. No ones habilities or secrets should be revieled." you said while booping his nose playfully and moving to yell once again at your students.

After that training, it was like that men was everywhere. In the buffet, in the hall, in the corridors, etc. He was rude, noisy, indiferent to other people's opinions... it was interesting.

The couple of weeks before the Sekai Taikai were really fun with him, aside from the present thread of the championship.

You found more and more things in common aside from teaching methods.

He is an absolute chaos but you too, and somehow you found a balance.

When the tourney ended, aside from who won, you both decides to keep on touch (you had to teach him how to do a videocall).

A couple of moths passed with calls between you both, until you came go America to see him.

You didn't planned on spending so much time on your trip, but Johnny insisted on teaching you "the american ways".

At the end you started to think on opening a Dojo on the valley to spend more time with him.

[aoioozora]

Is It Me?

Character: David 'Hesh' Walker Content: Bodyguard Hesh, Fem artist reader, fluff Note: I'm so writer's blocked from my Ghost fanfic that I needed to take a break lol. I loved writing this one. Enjoy :))

You were such a curious little creature to him. So quiet, so mysterious.

Hesh stood by the wall far behind you, watching as you lifted your paintbrush from the palette in a fluid motion to meticulously paint a single pearl among the other meticulously painted pearls on a string of necklace. He had been in the room since you started on the painting in the dim and gloomy morning several hours ago, and it was now night.

In his few months of being your bodyguard, he understood that you were a recluse, and he wasn't sure if it was a good or a bad thing. Your father, the polar opposite of you, was an actor, and you were completely repulsed by his fame. Any sort of attention from paparazzi or your father's fans drove you up the wall, leading you to spend your life in your apartment, your little haven. All your days were spent indoors, painting. If you weren't painting, you were reading or catching up with your Masters degree. You weren't much of a talker, even with friends, who you met only on occasion. And just to keep you safe, your father insisted on hiring a bodyguard for you, thus explaining Hesh's presence.

As for Hesh, you spoke to him only a little. In his career of being a bodyguard, he had never guarded a client so quiet. Too quiet. Being used to dealing with rambunctious, problematic celebrities, he was rather bored by your silence, but still intrigued by you.

If your mouth never spoke, your body did, and his keen observations of your body language to your environment told him everything he needed to know about what you liked and disliked. He saw every subtle smile and sneer of disgust, every crease of the brow, every narrowing of your eye, and every look of panic on your face at the sight of a crowd. He knew which people you disliked, tolerated, and liked, and it was a slight relief to him that he was among the tolerable.

"What are you painting there?" he asked, shifting on his other leg, trying to start a conversation.

There was no answer.

Just as he expected. You were so in the zone that the world was tuned out and you would hear or see nothing but the painting. It was a silly question to ask, especially when, upon the canvas, he could see two lovers, a returning soldier leaning over the back of the couch to kiss his wife as she leans into him completely. It was a fusion of the American retro pin-up style with the baroque- or was it renaissance? He couldn't tell. He only knew that it was beautiful and heartfelt.

This was all he saw you paint: lovers. The walls of your atelier were filled with paintings, large and small, of all styles imaginable, of intimacies between lovers; of grazing of the hands, lips about to kiss, beds shared, passionate caresses, soulful gazes. Though he wasn't a connoisseur of the arts, he knew that art was the soul's window. And looking upon the walls, he wondered if he was peering into your soul.

Hesh inhaled deeply and the smell of paint filled his nose. If there was one other thing that was common about the paintings, it was the fact that the man in them had an uncanny resemblance to him. From the shape of his body down to the very exact shade of his lips, every single detail was faithfully replicated in paint. And this didn't escape his notice.

He always knew you to begin paintings by priming the canvas with white paint. But for this particular painting, your frustration seemed evident in the way you threw a bucket of thin red paint on the canvas, splattering it everywhere and allowing it to drip down to the floor and your bare feet. It was a pleasant surprise, as he had never seen you so aggressive before.

But you eventually calmed, and here you were before him, now turning your focus from the pearls on the woman's necklace to the camouflage pattern of the man's uniform. Hesh used to be in the military until he retired to become a civilian again, and he was starting to wonder if he really was the subject of all your paintings. But he didn't want to think too highly of himself.

Your focus ebbed as you sat up to straighten your hunched back and dropped your hand to your side to ease its soreness; he took that as an opportunity to speak, as you would be most likely to answer.

"You paint the same guy in all those paintings," he observed, "Someone you like?"

He knew you heard him, and could hear your pause in the silence. "Yeah," you answered in a voice that was soft and subdued, as if trying to hide the eagerness.

His chest clenched and fluttered wildly at this admission. From his position by the wall, he took a tentative step towards you that echoed in the silent, heavy atmosphere of the room. He wanted to ask the question, and you were expecting it, and it resulted in an anxious thrum, a throbbing in both your bodies, a string pulled taut. You knew he wasn't stupid to not eventually notice how he was the subject of your paintings. If you were mute, then the paintings on the walls weren't; they practically screamed your admiration of him, of how much you wanted his hands, his body, his lips, his heart.

His steps grew louder as they closed in on you. They stopped right behind your chair; he now towered over you, casting a gentle shadow over your body and the canvas. The silence was deafening. He leaned an arm against the chair, breathing out. You felt a wisp of his exhale tickle your neck. The pleasant scent of his body and cologne, a delightful blend of cedar and orange wafted to your nose. A shiver jolted your spine.

"Is it me?" he whispered, his voice low, deep, and laden with curiosity, desire, and emotion.

There was a pause the space of three heartbeats.

"Yes." Out came your voice in an unsteady, high-pitch. One answer, and it felt like you had been stripped naked.

The last time his legs felt this weak was during basic training. He leaned further against the chair to support himself, unintentionally putting himself deeper in your personal space that you loved more than anything. But you allowed him.

The air was now heavier than a pregnant raincloud. He breathed in to calm his rapidly beating heart. He glanced at the couple in the painting, and then back at you.

"What can I do for you?" He asked.

Turning your head slightly over your shoulder, you were met with his face right next to yours. Your eyes met his, and it felt as though a key had been turned, unlocking a door. Your lip trembled as you opened your mouth slightly, now blurting out in sheer desperation,

"Love me."

He felt like the same canvas that had been splashed with paint upon hearing those words. He felt his chest swell with joy. His breathing labored slightly and his mouth turned dry as he searched for the words to say.

"That I can do," he answered after a moment, slowly and cautiously moving his hand to your cheek, as if testing the waters.

You leaned into his touch, and that was all the confirmation he needed. Words were unnecessary, for when he saw your eye linger on his lips, he moved in for the kill.

His own lips welded with yours into a kiss that was earnest and soul-satisfying, a true reflection of the painting.

End.

[doberbutts]

I also think- having recently seen a post that said Blue Eye Samurai isn't a queer story, it just has queer elements- that sometimes it feels like fans cannot make up their minds.

Do we or do we not want stories that treat being gay as a perfectly normal, perfectly common experience the same way straight people are depicted in every story to ever exist?

In BES, no one is outright stated to be queer. That's partially because in Japan, until Japan felt the need to sanitize itself to appeal to foreigners, it wasn't unheard of at all for men to be gay. Multiple famous samurai and swordsmen and nobles were either outspokenly gay or are commonly theorized to have been gay in modern historical readings. Abijah making multiple references to swinging both ways, Kaji's offer of a male prostitute, the various scenes we have of men being together in sexual positions, they're not met with surprise because homosexuality was an acknowledged thing that happened.

Taigen's erection while he's wrestling Mizu, even though he doesn't yet know her secret, is treated awkwardly because they're supposed to dislike each other and also he's supposed to be in love with Akemi, not because "whoa bro no homo".

(This is also why I keep saying that it's difficult for me to put into English words what I think Mizu's gender is, because gender and sexuality quite frankly did not work the way my 2020s American brain wants to contextualize it, and I think it's important to consider the cultural aspects here esp in a show so heavily leaning on a racial story)

However, compared to many other shows out there even regarding the same area and country, BES is significantly more queer than the majority of them produced in the last 30 years. Is Mizu herself queer? Well... maybe, depending how you define it. Back in the day, otherwise cisgender crossdressers and male-impersonators were still grouped in with those we'd call transgender nowadays. She seems to be exclusively interested in men, but also seems to be equally receptive to considering herself sexually as both a man and a woman pairing with men, than as a man or woman pairing with women which she has adamantly refused with zero interest on multiple occasions.

Is Taigen bi? I mean, maybe! He seemed more mortified that he had an unwanted erection in front of someone he wanted to impress and play with, than that he had it over someone he considers a man, using the excuse that he misses his would-be fiance.

Abijah certainly seems to be bisexual, considering we see him having sex with both women and men, and his various sexual references talk about both men and women as well. This is ignoring whatever weird sexual tension thing he's got going with Heiji, who seems both receptive and repulsed by it.

And, not to be remiss, but there is a reason I specified that homosexuality among men was pretty known. Due to the more rigid policing of women's sexuality in this era, homosexuality among women was less commonly reported (though I have heard stories of noble women and their handmaids, or the working poor women, or among prostitutes living together in the brothels, so also not unheard of but perhaps less accepted as women were largely bought and sold in marriage and sex trafficking) - but even with all of that, Kaji and Kinuyo have something together. Whether that is a mother-daughter thing, or if they were lovers, is up to interpretation. The implication that out of everyone at the brothel that Kaji genuinely cares for, Kinuyo was special, and that wasn't a particularly uncommon arrangement historically if I'm hearing about it 400 years later in a completely different country.

So this "well it's not a queer show" and "if I was told this was a queer story I'd be disappointed" is honestly just ridiculous hooey to me. Do you want characters who are able to explore their sexualities without looking over their shoulder out of fear of homophobia, or not?

[sl-newsie]

American Woman (Thomas Shelby x American OC) Ch. 32: Data Analysis

Masterlist: https://www.tumblr.com/sl-newsie/739551758747090944/american-woman-thomas-shelby-x-american-oc?source=share

The next morning I wake up feeling refreshed. I was partially right about the long trip tiring me out. Now that yesterday’s stress is out of the way I can focus on other matters. May’s maids are surprised to see I made the bed myself and keep asking if I want breakfast. I politely decline so they won’t go through any trouble but turns out May already has a meal planned for me.

“What will you do now? Are you sailing back home after one day?” She asks from across the long table.

I chew the delicious French toast. “Originally I was going to visit family in Ireland but now the Shelbys want me to work for them. Officially. No debt, no strings attached. I’d love to. It’s just…”

“That means seeing Thomas more often,” May finishes. “I understand. Sometimes I see him at horse events and it’s incredibly awkward.”

“I think I’ll allow myself to work a full year and then decide what I want with my life. Thomas can’t blame me for being distant because he has his own family to care for now.” I finish my breakfast and rise from the table. “Thank you for having me, May. It would’ve been hard to go back to Birmingham last night, after… all that.”

“Give a ring if you need to talk,” the Charleton widow assures. “Do you need a cab?”

A sneaky smile crosses my face. “I have ideas.”

One bonus from growing up in the city is that you learn to walk. Everywhere. Another bonus is knowing how to hail a cab. Or in this case a wagon. I walk along the gravel road and within ten minutes a farmer comes by driving a horse wagon. I offer a few pounds and he agrees to take me to the edge of Birmingham. At first he’s put off by my more than casual clothes but after I explain myself he starts laughing.

“My my, a real American hitchhiker! Now I’ve seen everything.”

Most of the ride is done in silence, allowing me to observe the breathtaking English countryside. So different from the dirty, noisy streets I left a week ago. I’ll miss my home but this would almost make it worthwhile to stay. If only he wasn’t around.

“Here we are, miss.”

I thank the farmer and pull my trunk off the wagon. Looking across the field I see the sign for Birmingham straight ahead. Back through the muddy streets, the shadowy alleys, the ash-filled sky. The dreadful atmosphere that seems slightly sadder than I remember. Or maybe that’s just me.

By the time I get to Watery Lane it’s past midday. When I reach the Shelby house it’s obvious Finn’s been waiting for me. The second I reach the kitchen he comes straight from his room like a magnet drawn to steel.

“Where were you? I almost phoned Tommy!”

“Relax, relax. I’m no big missing persons case. I just… Needed some time to myself. And you will do good not to mention my absence to Thomas. If I need to bribe you then I will offer a lesson for today.”

Finn’s face melts from worried to suspicious to overjoyed. He drops his book and takes a seat at the kitchen table.

“I’m all ears.”

“Right, right. Just let me put my trunk in my room- Oh no. Finn! Did you know about this?”

The closet is stocked to the brim with new clothes. Clothes for me, because Polly would never wear anything this modern. It reminds me of the clothes from American fashion magazines. Whoever made these did their homework.

“It was Ada’s idea!” Finn shouts down the hall.

A smidgen of guilt enters my thoughts. I really should have talked with her more last night. Hopefully she’ll understand why. I set the trunk down and rejoin Finn in the kitchen. As I search for potential dinner ingredients I also concoct an intriguing topic to discuss.

“Today will be about the use of data. Whether it be for science, arithmancy, or common sense, we use data every day. The proper order of data use is wisdom, knowledge, information, and the data itself.” Score! There’s still some fresh meat in the icebox. “Data is the raw facts and figures, and provides the building blocks to create information. Information, Finn, is data that has been manipulated into something meaningful, which then turns into knowledge.”

He takes this in carefully, proving my point. “So our process of thinking is like calculating math. Only instead of crunching numbers we’re crunching choices.”

“Yes.” Such as the choice I made to stay here. “We use data analytics, which is the science of examining raw data with the purpose of drawing conclusions about that information. Pairing with this, data analysis transforms, summarizes, or models data to allow us to make meaningful conclusions. Now data mining, on the other hand, extracts and analyzes large volumes of data to identify hidden relationships or patterns and predict behaviors from them.”

Finn picks up on something. “So… We could predict people?”

I look up from the cutting board. “Correct. That would be entering the field of behavioral psychology or  sociology. But we can talk about that another time. I’ll let you stew on this. Speaking of stew, that is what I’m making. But I need to grab some oregano leaves. I’ll just be a minute.”

I step out the back door and into the familiar dreary streets. No Peaky Blinders standing guard, no Inspector Campbell sulking about. I can finally walk to the market without looking over my shoulder… Still packing heat, of course. I’m not thick. Now about those herbs-

“There she is!” 

Approaching laughter alerts me to the Shelby brothers walking towards me. 

“John? Arthur? Where have you been?”

“Just had a meeting with Changretta,” Arthur scoffs. “Them Italians are giving us trouble again.”

I roll my eyes and pick out some oregano from the market display. “What is it with you boys and fighting with the Italians?”

“Enough about them. What’s this for?” John snatches the herb. “Making something, eh?”

I hold up my hands. “Okay, you caught me. I’m guilty of making tonight’s supper, if you’ll join us.”

Both brothers look pleased about the invite, especially John.

“You have no idea how good a real meal sounds! Esme’s been too busy with the kids. That and she’s expecting again.”

My eyes widen. “Esme’s pregnant? Congratulations!”

John grunts. “She’s grouchy when she’s pregnant. The kids have been a handful too.”

I take back the oregano and give him a reprimanding look. “Either hire more help or keep it in your pants.”

“Oi! Verena!”

I look to face the voice. Thomas. He’s here. Walking down the street towards me. The way he walks, like a man who cannot be touched. A mountain. I really don’t need this right now!

Despite my internal screaming for him to walk away he gets closer. “Remind me never to trust anyone religious,” he grunts. “Earlier today a priest ordered me around like a fucking dog. I thought you said God works in mysterious ways?” He scoffs and lights a cigarette. “Maybe He can get these Irish folk off me back. Arthur, John. How was Changretta?”

“A fucking moron,” Arthur says. “I don’t think he appreciated our hospitality, did he John?”

John shakes his head. Thomas waves this aside and seems to be thinking about something else.

“Verena. Come with me.”

Before I can utter a word he starts walking back the way he came. Um, what about dinner? I have other things to do than just follow you around, Thomas!

I quickly wave goodbye to his brothers and pant to keep up. “Why?”

“Because I’m going to see Ada and if you’re with me maybe she won’t bite my head off.”

We keep walking and I notice we’re approaching a grand public library. Has the great Thomas Shelby given in to using books? My God, times are crazy. The second we enter everyone scatters to stay out of his path, some with confused stares and others looking downright fearful just to see him here. I follow Thomas upstairs and spot Ada at a bookshelf down the aisle.

“Ada!” Thomas calls.

Is he really this unfamiliar with a library? Keep your voice down!

“Tommy Shelby in a library,” his sister vituperates and looks down from the ladder.

“I need to borrow a book about the Russian Revolution. And, I brought a friend.”

Thomas steps away to reveal me behind him. Ada gasps in surprise and hurries down to give me a hug.

“Verena! We hardly got to chat last night!”

Her friendliness brings a smile to my face. “Hello, Ada. So good to see you!”

“Shh!” Someone hisses from another aisle. Oops.

“Have you got a new wharf at Maida Vale now?” Thomas asks.

Ada scoffs and releases me to climb onto the ladder again. “I’ve got a new wharf everywhere now. Sometimes I see our trucks driving past.”

Thomas plays dumb. “Our trucks?”

“Shelby trucks.” Ada pulls out a book and looks at it skeptically. “Why the interest?”

Good question. How does Russian history play into our business?

Thomas takes a seat at the wooden desk. “Eh, I just want to broaden my mind.”

Ada snickers. “Has Verena been influencing you?”

Thomas’ gaze flickers to where I’m standing and his mouth twitches in the ghost of a smirk. “Very funny. No, this was my idea.”

Ada hops down and plops the book on the desk. “Well, this is a list of the bastards who ran away- Sorry, Verena. I know you’re not one for foul language. And this is written from the point of view of the peoples’ struggle.”

Thomas nods blandly. “Uh-huh.”

I put my hands on my hips. “I thought you weren’t keen on using public resources? You said the library was too common.”

Thomas keeps reading the book. “Changed my mind.”

“There was a Russian at your wedding,” Ada comments. “Mind telling me how he got invited?”

He? So there was more than one Russian at that party. Jesus, Thomas. What kind of people are you dealing with now?

“Sometimes Russian aristocrats get invited to social occasions to add a bit of class.”

“Why are you working with the Russians?” I blurt.

He looks up slowly with a lazy expression. “Why the distrust?”

“Do you trust them?” I bite back.

“Not a chance. But I have orders from Churchill himself. That doesn’t explain your hostility.”

You might be comfortable conversing with your enemies, Thomas, but I for one do not like sleeping with one eye open! Class, indeed! The only Russians my family have dealt with no nothing of the sort!

I take a breath. “A Russian killed my Aunt Eleanor. My Uncle Colon’s late wife. We do not forgive and forget something like that, Thomas.”

“Why was he there?” Ada asks again.

Thomas goes back to reading. “Why do you want to know?”

Ada looks down and keeps her voice casual. “Maybe I liked him, maybe I want to see him again. Would that be possible?”

“No, that will not be possible,” Thomas answers bluntly. “Can I rip this page out?”

Ada and I gape at him. “No! You cannot rip a page out. Property of the people.”

“You should never harm books!” I scold.

Ada’s not finished. “When Arthur took the Russian away he had his killing pistol in his jacket and then Johnny lit a fire in the woods.”

Thomas puts the book back and starts walking away. “You want all the details because you’re bored, Ada.”

“Then why is Verena here too?” Ada taunts as I start trailing after him.

“Thought you’d like to see her,” Thomas calls over his shoulder. “You used to chase rats with a revolver, Ada. Might have a job for you too.”

“Tot ziens, Ada. Thanks for the clothes! Goodbye!” I whisper quickly and hurry down the stairs.

“What was that?” Thomas asks, slightly intrigued.

“A bit of Dutch I’m trying to learn.” When we get outside I raise my voice to a disapproving one. “You made Arthur kill a man. Even though you knew he’s trying to go down a better path.”

“Our family doesn’t have another path. And did I hear right that you’re making something for tonight?”

I want to kick the dirt in spite of his stubbornness! “Yes. Your information is correct. You’re welcome to join if you like.”

“Afraid not. Today is a busy day. I’m going straight home afterwards.”

Oh. I should have known. Of course he wants to have dinner with his proper family. His wife and son. Let it go, Verena. Not everyone has to be around for dinner. You knew things weren’t going to be the same.

“Say hi to everyone for me,” I try to say positively when we reach the Shelby house. “Off to see Changretta, I assume?”

Thomas’ brow furrows. “How did you know?”

“Lucky guess. That and your face hasn’t relaxed all day. I figured you have a business meeting.”

Before I close the door he gives a subtle upward nod of his head. “Perceptive, as always.”

That’s rich coming from the man who’s supposed to see through people’s deception but can’t see that I love him. I stomp through the house and through the heavy doors into the office. Apparently all serenity from earlier has been replaced with Polly and John having a kerfuffle.

“…We’ll be handing out Bibles in the fucking bullring with her cousins!” John shouts.

“John, you don’t have to do anything. Lizzie will do it for you,” Polly responds evenly.

“John!” I bark at him. “Did you just mock the good book?”

He ignores me and goes for the front door. “Not now, Steenstra.”

“Yes, now,” I demand and stand in front of him with my arms crossed. “Do not ever talk that way around me again, John. Or any woman for that matter.”

John steps around me anyhow. “Get out of my fucking way.”

The door slams and Polly sits in silence. Wonderful! Now their anger is spreading to me too. Enough of this. I can do something useful and clear out the rubbish bins. I brush past Polly and clear away the trash from all the desks. Some out of Thomas’ office. John’s, Arthur’s. Now all that’s left is Michael’s new office.

“Knock knock. ‘S just me, I’m here for- Oh!”

A pair of wide eyes peeks out at me from behind the desk. Michael himself is slumped in the chair with a face saying there’s nothing wrong. Slowly the eyes rise to reveal the face of a young girl, only a few years younger than me. 

“A new guest, Michael?” I ask and greet the girl with a smile.

“Verena, meet Charlotte Murray.” He pauses for a second and adds: “My new friend.”

Jesus, these Shelbys are all alike. I really hoped Michael would be different. Am I going to have to work here as the only single employee?

I look between the two with a devilish smirk. “Ah, yes. We all need friends. I just need the trash and I will leave you to… get more acquainted.” 

I take the rubbish bin and slip out the door, catching a look of thanks from Michael. Yes, go ahead. I give up trying to tell people what is right. Hell, I myself have lost so much from that. All that time trying to reach the good in Thomas was a waste. It’s time to think for my own security.

@meadows5

[calliecat93]

So thoughts on the new episodes now that I'm back on the bandwagon:

Outfoxed: It was okay. Not my favorite, but it's fine. I LOVED seeing Koki being a nerd about foxes, it's adorable. Also, I think so far, her new VA is doing a fantastic job. It's different from Heather Bambrick, but similar enough to not be jarring and letting the VA do her own take. Also, Gourmand has a dog now? Ugh... can someone call the Humane Society, please? Anyways, pretty standard episode. Not great, but not awful either, and hey foxes!

Clever the Raven: This one was better. It felt like the characters got to do a bit more and thus have more fun character moments. It looks like they're doing more common/North American animals at least so far, which since this was in production during COVID, I guess that's all they could do. Which is fine, there's a lot they haven't done yet that I'm actually surprised they held back on. Also, all the villains (aside from Paisley) just being around for no real reason (not even doing anything evil, just there) and Clever annoying them was the best haha~! I actually learned a good bit about ravens that I didn't know, like their ability to mimic sounds. Overall this was a fun one~

Race To Goat Mountain: This one was pure fun! Since Paisley's intro she's honestly been super underutelized, only having I think two solo appearances and the rest with the others. Which is a bummer because it's meant she's lacked a lot of the personality that the other villains had, so this one REALLY helped make up for a lot. Seeing more interactions with the Bros and Paisley was sorely needed. But yeah, this was so fun~! I laughed so much. From Martin's issues with the Bighorn Sheep suit to the crew acting as commentators to Martin being a total drama queen when he's stuck (seriously, Martin is a riot in this one XD). It's a fun ride from start to finish~!

Owl Odyssey: So due to an accident, the Bros and the girls get rocketed to a faraway land, a LOOONG ways away from the Tortuga and without any gear/equipment/discs aside form the Miniturizer. Jimmy doesn't get included which is a bummer, but I guess someone needs to keep the Tortuga safe haha. This was another really fun one! From the girls annoying Martin to poor Jimmy getitng run out of the Tortuga to the girls thinking that the Bros have gone insane... y'know, more than usual. God there's SO may funny moments XD. I won't spoil too much, but there's also a bit of bro feels and that is an easy way to make a good episode a top-tier one!Not to mention all the owls! They've done some specific ones before, like snowy owls and desert owls, but this one is more broad with a whole variety in different continents. This was a really fun odyssey, loved it~!

So I'd say that Owl Odyssey is the best one for being hilarious, adventurous, interesting, and even a little feelsy while still having a good creature lesson. Then Race to Goat Mountain, then Clever the Raven, and Outfoxed at the bottom since I thought it was the most boring unfortunately. But hey it still did its job of teaching the kids, all four of them did. Which if we have more episodes like the last two in store, this is gonna be a fun season~!

[jammatown919]

A Witch and Her Familiar (1)

As promised, A Witch and Her Familiar! I’m currently planning four parts, the rest of which involve Raelle more heavily, but I’m a college student with limited free time so I appreciate your patience!

In the beginning, Morrigan was just another crow. One of many that, during Scylla's stay in the Cession, had been become participants in her Work; originally by happenstance of being present when she needed them and eventually because they sought her out upon realizing she paid in treats.

All the crows were friendly enough, by the standards of wild birds, and fairly cooperative once Scylla gained their tentative trust. They all seemed to blur together by way of behavior, neither affectionate nor hostile, just there to offer their services and leave with full bellies. As an individual, Morrigan might never have stood out if not for her distinct appearance.

The white marking encompassing her chest and the back of her neck, marking her as a separate species that was, curiously, native to an entirely different part of the world, stuck out like a sore thumb. Where the other crows, all the common American variety, looked far too similar to tell apart, Morrigan was impossible to miss. This made her, out of every crow that came to visit, the only one Scylla could identify by sight. The favorite by default.

Being recognizable offered certain advantages; Scylla could get to know her personality, her usual haunts, her preferred foods, even give her a name. It left open an opportunity for a deeper connection, which Scylla was happy to make.

Morrigan, for her part, seemed to recognize Scylla just as well. After realizing that her new witch friend was not immune to favoritism, she began to appear more often than the other crows, to the point that Scylla could hardly step outside the Collar house without seeing her. Sometimes she brought trinkets, but usually she just clicked her beak and waited, either to be used in Scylla's experimental version of Nicte's bat trick, or just for a pity treat.

Before long, she began to appear at the kitchen window bright and early, pecking at the glass and lamenting her lack of attention in long, loud 'kraaaa's. Scylla found the whole display remarkably endearing. Less endearing, however, was the fact that she kept waking Edwin, who had already been so patient and understanding with Scylla's presence in his home.

To nip this problem in the bud, Scylla made it a morning ritual of sorts to be in the kitchen before Morrigan arrived, boiling two eggs. One, she would keep for herself, and the other would be diced up and fed to her new friend, as well as any other crow comfortable enough to take food from her hand.

On one such morning, the first in which another crow tried to get that close, Scylla observed a very peculiar behavior she hadn't seen before.

The other crow, a small, dark beauty, hopped up beside Morrigan on the windowsill, interested in nothing but the small bits of food in Scylla's outstretched hand. Morrigan responded immediately with flaps and caws and pecks, until the intruder backed off into the garden.

"Morrigan!" Scylla chided, surprised. She'd never known the bird to be so aggressive with her food. Invasion of space, perhaps? But Scylla had been closer for far longer.

Confused, she tossed the rest of the egg into the garden so the other crow could have a fair shot, noting with interest that Morrigan did not seem to care. She simply pushed her beak against Scylla's fingers as she made to withdraw them back into the kitchen where she stood.

"There's no more, stupid," Scylla murmured affectionately. It was the first time Morrigan had ever deliberately touched her, and, confused as she was by the situation, she relished the contact. Especially with Tiffany mere days away from leaving with a new Dodger family, it was comforting to know that she would still have some form companionship.

A thought struck her suddenly as Morrigan seemed to nuzzle into her hand. It hadn't been about sharing food or space, but rather something much more personal.

"Oh," she realized aloud. "You didn't want to share me."

She was reminded then of an old Dodger friend and his obnoxiously jealous cat Familiar. Well, perhaps 'friend' was too generous a term; they'd known each other for two months, seven years ago, with him being nearly eight years her senior, but he'd been kind to her. Kind enough to put up with and answer a twelve-year-old's thousand questions about his Familiar, the Link they shared, and how it had come to be.

A Familiar, he'd taught her, was the living extension of a witch's very soul, bound together by a unique, permanent Link that, once established, could not be severed even by their own will. Though still two entities with their own minds and personalities, they were together in all things. Pleasure and pain, joy and despair, life and death. Eternal companions, never again to know the meaning of loneliness.

The bond they shared was as much a natural occurrence as it was a conscious decision. Sometimes, a witch and animal just fit together, but the choice to Link was ultimately theirs, and one could reject the other easily. Every experience was different; some Linked almost immediately, some took years, and some failed to connect properly at all and lost their chance forever.

As a child only just discovering the concept, Scylla had wanted a Familiar desperately, but at this point she hadn't thought much about it in years. Even now, as it crossed her mind that a crow would make a fine Familiar, she didn't consider it very seriously. A botched attempt to Link could ruin what she and Morrigan already had, and that was not a risk she wanted to take. To her, a friend was far more important than a Familiar.

And yet, it didn't take very long to come up again.

A few days later, Tiffany was gone, and Scylla was once more entirely business. With her temporary ward safe at last, she was free to give her full attention to the fight with the Camarilla, and that was exactly what she did.

She introduced Quinn to her new Work, dubbed Morrigan's Whisper in honor of her favorite child, for the purpose of talking strategy. Morrigan, as always, hung around after the display, seemingly content to hop along behind the two women as they walked off to discuss things that need never concern her.

Eventually, though, they went too far for her tiny legs to manage, and rather than flying off as any other crow certainly would, she simply flew up to settle herself on Scylla's shoulder. Quinn regarded her with vague interest and smiled.

"That's a fine Familiar," she remarked.

Scylla paused suddenly in reaching up to scritch Morrigan's chin, much to the bird's chagrin. She was a bit surprised that Quinn even knew what a Familiar was, given the Army didn't teach a thing about them, but she supposed the older woman was close enough to the Dodger community to have seen one or two, or at least heard of them.

The misconception itself, Scylla had honestly seen coming; wild animals didn't typically follow witches around the way Morrigan did without being Linked. Still, it was awkward to have to correct.

"She's... not my Familiar," she said quietly.

"Really?" Quinn seemed genuinely surprised. "Pretty affectionate for a wild bird. I bet you could Link if you wanted."

"I'm not sure that I do want to," Scylla confessed with a remorseful glance at Morrigan. It wasn't at all for lack of loving the bird; in fact, that was the problem. "We'll be fighting a war soon."

"All the more reason," Quinn replied. "You could use her."

It was a strategic response, one that Scylla could see the sense in, and yet it left a foul taste in her mouth. Yes, Familiars had their combative uses, despite the Army's general disregard for them, but she didn't like the implication that they were simply tools to be used. That Morrigan was a tool to be used.

She tried to keep in mind that Quinn really hadn't meant anything by her comment. Not everyone understood the personal connection between a witch and their Familiar. Scylla wasn't sure even she understood it fully, or that anyone could without experiencing it firsthand.

Still, she was closer than most, and she knew that was because Quinn was right. She could Link with Morrigan if she tried. They fit together, like her old friend and that awful, jealous cat. They had the potential for the closest, most intimate bond a witch could experience, and that was precisely why Scylla didn't want to take Morrigan into the fight.

"It doesn't seem very fair to drag her into a war that has nothing to do with her," she said. "What would she get out of it?"

She knew there were benefits to be had for the animal, particularly an extended lifespan that matched that of their witch, but that would only matter if Scylla survived the war. If she died, it would kill Morrigan instantly, and knowing that would be a weakness she couldn't afford.

"She'd get you," Quinn replied, as if that could ever be significant enough compensation. Honestly, Scylla thought it was more of a downside. "With a witch like you looking out for her, she just might be the safest bird on Earth."

That was true enough, she supposed. Any witch would fight tooth and nail to protect their Familiar, and Scylla would be no exception. But that in itself created too many problems. Would she be compelled to avoid necessary danger to preserve her life for Morrigan? What if it came to a choice between Morrigan or Raelle?

In that moment, she knew the answers; no, she wouldn't shy away from danger, and Raelle was always her priority, but she feared the extent to which the Link might influence her. Already, she felt a desire to protect Morrigan in the ways that she could, and if she allowed the Link to take her affections to their extremes, there was no telling what choices she would make.

"I don't think now is the time," Scylla admitted to Quinn, Morrigan, and herself in equal measure. Maybe eventually, but not now. When the war was over, if she made it, perhaps she would return to the Cession with Raelle and see if Morrigan would still have her.

She used that thought to comfort herself as Morrigan, as if sensing rejection, leapt from her shoulder and took off into the sky. As much as she wanted to Link, it just wasn't practical for them to have each other now. For the moment, she could only hold on to a pleasant daydream; that someday, if they were lucky, they would figure out how to make it work.

But, as it happened, 'someday' was in far closer proximity than Scylla had expected.

The news came suddenly and hit Scylla like a brick; Raelle's Unit had been blamed for the death of a young witch, Vice President Silver's own daughter, and were being taken to the nation's capital to await trial and what was sure to be unjust punishment.

Scylla knew there was only one way to proceed, but that didn't make saying goodbye to Edwin any easier. Still, she managed it, and even fooled herself briefly into thinking she would get out of the Cession without any additional heartache.

And then, just as she opened the door to get into the passenger seat of Quinn's car, a familiar dark shape fluttered down to land on the roof, leaning in as close as it could get.

"Morrigan," she said quietly, both glad for the chance to say goodbye and devastated by this final test of her resolve. "I have to leave."

Morrigan stayed rigid on her perch, even as Quinn ducked inside the car to give them a moment of privacy. Usually, this would be when she started clicking her beak for treats, but now she just stared, like there was something else she wanted and no way to ask for it.

She didn't need to ask. Scylla knew.

"I shouldn't take you," she murmured. "It won't be safe."

But, of course, Morrigan didn't understand. She never would, in the way that Scylla wanted her to, without a Link to make it happen.

Almost without realizing, she reached out and let Morrigan hop onto her forearm, drawing her in close. Her conviction was already dissolving, and the bond between a witch and potential Familiar felt less like a choice in that moment than an instinctual urge.

"I can't make you my priority," Scylla whispered, almost but not quite apologetic. She could never truly be sorry for choosing Raelle. "I already promised myself it would be her."

That, Morrigan did seem to understand. She let out a low cooing sound, as if to say that it was alright, that she didn't need to be the priority. She just needed to be together. And, deep down, Scylla knew she needed it too.

Flapping a few times to get enough lift, she repositioned herself onto Scylla's shoulder. So close together, Scylla could swear she could feel the little creature's heart beating together with her own, their breaths syncing perfectly, and before she knew what was happening, she let go and allowed whatever force had drawn them together to finish its work.

And just like that, she could feel everything. The phantom touch of her sleeve beneath little feet that weren't hers, her own determination to reach the woman she loved reflected and somehow strengthened by this tiny part of herself that still wasn't quite her, and more than anything, a deeper understanding of what exactly Morrigan was.

She would not be a burden, nor something that would threaten her resolve to go into danger. She would be something to fight for, and someone to fight with. She would offer all the love and assistance of which she was capable, and she had already forgiven Scylla for bringing her into this war.

Scylla could have basked in the fresh new-Link feeling for hours, but there were still important things to be done. She knew automatically that Morrigan did not want to be confined to the car and let her flutter off to a nearby tree branch to await the moment of departure, unafraid that they might lose one another during the journey.

That was one thing they would never have to fear again, and Scylla relished in it as she ducked into the car and pointedly ignored the knowing look Quinn shot her way. It didn't matter where Scylla went or what she did, she would always have at least one friend.

Whatever path she took, Morrigan would follow, now and forever.

------ If you enjoyed this piece, please reblog to share it with others! Reblogging is the best way to show a creator that you appreciate their work, as likes unfortunately do nothing to help a post circulate. 

[space-mouse]

Unexpectedly high medical bills are common in the United States, but there are ways to get relief. According to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, one in five Americans are affected by outstanding medical debt, for a total cost of $88 billion.

In a 2022 study, the bureau found that roughly 20% of U.S. households report that they have medical debt, with collections appearing on 43 million credit reports. As of the second quarter of 2021, 58% of all bills in collections on credit records were medical bills.

Medical debt affects households unevenly, too, according to the agency. Past-due bills are more prevalent among Black and Hispanic people than white and Asian people, and medical debt is more common in the Southern U.S., in part because states in that region did not expand Medicaid coverage.

While the process of fighting high medical bills can be time-consuming and frustrating, advocates stress that patients shouldn’t be intimidated by the system. If you’ve received a surprise medical bill, here’s what you should know:

Always see if you qualify for charity care

When Luisa, 33, received a medical bill for over $1,000 after an emergency hospital visit for a viral infection, she was able to have the whole amount covered by the hospital after appealing to their financial assistance policy.

“At first I thought it was just a cold, but it turned out to be something I needed specific medication for,” said Luisa, who asked to be identified only by her first name due to privacy concerns. “It was really bad by the time I went to the ER.”

Luisa had heard about the patient advocacy organization Dollar For thanks to a viral video, and she filled out the nonprofit’s online form after receiving her surprise bill. The organization contacted the hospital, which was based in central Florida. Eventually, the hospital contacted Luisa directly to let her know she did in fact qualify for financial assistance. Even though she had already paid a portion of the costs with a credit card, Dollar For was able to get those payments refunded.

Laws governing hospital charity care require that nonprofit hospitals lower or write off bills for individuals, depending on household income. To determine if you qualify, you can simply Google the hospital along with the phrase “charity care” or “financial assistance policy.” Dollar For also provides a simplified online tool for patients to see if they qualify.

“Federal law requires hospitals to have these programs to keep their tax-exempt status,” said Jared Walker, CEO of Dollar For. “If you’re within their income range, they will write off, waive, forgive, or reduce your bills.”

Even if you’ve already been paying off medical debt, the hospital will be required to refund the payments you’ve made, he said.

“It was my first time going through something like that,” Luisa said. “I tried to be an informed consumer and ask questions when I was in the hospital about the costs, but obviously it’s hard when you’re sick in the emergency room.”

Appeal to the No Surprises Act

While protections against surprise bills have long existed for those who have Medicare, Medicaid, and Tricare, laws are now also in place for those with private or marketplace insurance.

The federal No Surprises Act covers people who have insurance through their employers, the marketplace, or individual plans. It says that insurance companies must reasonably cover any out-of-network services related to emergency and some non-emergency medical care. That means that if you’re being charged more than you’re used to or expect when you receive in-network services, that bill may be illegal.

To challenge any bill covered under this law, you can use the free help desk and hotline of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Many states also have free consumer assistance programs to help with disputes and insurance questions. You can always contact the medical billing department of any hospital in writing to say that you believe a bill is in violation of the No Surprises Act and ask the hospital to deal directly with your insurance company.

“The complexity of the system itself is as big a problem as affordability,” said Kaye Pastaina, who heads research on patient protections for KFF, a nonprofit health policy organization. “A lot of it is from the fragmented system and complex rules, but also lack of awareness about existing protections that are a part of federal law that might help.”

Ask for an itemized bill

Even if you don’t qualify for charity care or you’re not sure your bills are covered by the No Surprises Act, you may be able to reduce the charges.

Medical billing is notoriously byzantine and rife with errors. Anytime you receive a bill, ask the hospital or healthcare provider for an itemized bill that includes the billing codes of all the care you received. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) mandates that providers share this information.

Next, check whether the billing codes are accurate. Again, simply Googling the codes with the phrase “medical billing code” can help. If something is off, contesting your bill with your medical provider or physician’s office can yield changes.

Another approach: comparing the bill with insurance companies’ estimates of fair charges for services. If the price you were charged is more than average, you can have your costs lowered. You could even take the provider to small claims court over the discrepancy (or let them know you have a case).

Finally, compare your insurance company’s “explanation of benefits” to the bill. This explanation of costs covered and not covered must match the hospital’s bill. If they don’t, you have another reason not to pay, and to ask the provider to work with your insurance company further first.

Remember the process requires persistence

Despite the hassle, these steps can save you considerable sums of money. Even after taking these steps, you can always appeal health claims with your insurance company, if you think there is any reason the bills should be covered entirely or more than the company initially decided. You can also contact your state insurance commissioner for support.

“What we’ve seen in our research and the data is that those folks who appeal — and there are few who appeal — but for those who appeal, there’s a high level of overturning,” Pastaina said.

[percontaion-points]

The Chemist chapter 8

Click to see the rest of the snark & image descriptions

Chapter 8

The pictures that were Daniel but at the same time weren’t. 

The holes in the file on Daniel’s history, the missing photos. 

Time, dates, birth dates —the easiest small changes to make if you wanted to hide something. 

Daniel’s strange reluctance to believe what he was seeing when he looked at the spy images. 

His struggles with loyalty. 

Those long, long fingers. 

“Other Daniel,” she whispered. 

Is this book seriously trotting out the “evil identical twin” trope? JFC stop. 

She nodded to the photographs scattered on the floor. He seemed to notice them for the first time. He leaned over to examine one, then bent down to grab it. Then the one underneath, and the next. He crumpled t

hem in his fist. 

“Where did you get these?” “Compliments of a small department working for the American government—entirely off the books. I used to be in their employ. They asked me to freelance.” 

His face contorted in outrage. “This is highly classified!” 

“You wouldn’t believe my clearance level.”

And what? He thought that somebody grabbed Daniel, took him to a farmhouse dozens of miles outside of the city, and started torturing him… FOR FUNSIES?!

“Well, since you already know the details, I guess it’s not a huge breach of policy for me to tell you that I shut down the de la Fuentes situation six months ago. De la Fuentes’s death is not common knowledge. What’s left of the cartel is keeping this quiet so they don’t appear vulnerable to the competition.”

Naturally, the mysterious government agency that couldn’t be bothered to find out that Kevin Beach is still alive, also can’t be bothered to find out that the terrorist HASN’T BEEN ALIVE FOR HALF A YEAR. 

First things first. She reset the screen saver on her computer to come on after fifteen minutes of inactivity.

I love how she knocks Kevin out, and the first thing she does is the most inane activity imaginable. 

Explaining things? Pfft! Not in this book!

Back to Other Daniel. The Batsuit was a chore to remove.

The stupidest thing about this is that as soon as Julie saw him, she identified him as Kevin Beach, Daniel’s supposed-to-be-dead identical twin brother. 

SO WHY THE FUCKITY FUCK IS SHE STILL CALLING HIM “OTHER DANIEL” AND “BATMAN”?!

There would be repercussions to deal with. She needed time to rest and heal —time no one was going to give her.

Chapter 8 summary: Julie tells the mystery man (she will not stop calling him “Batman” because he’s dressed in all black; I refuse to stoop to her level of stupidity) that she’s sedated Daniel. The mystery man then ties Julie to a chair, and takes the gas mask off. Julie is surprised that it’s Daniel’s identical twin brother… the one who’s supposed to be dead.

He then finds the photos of him talking to the Mexican drug lord who’s supposed to be in charge of this terrorist attack. Julie spills everything, about the attempts on her life, about being asked to step in to deal with “Daniel”. She guesses from the gun Kevin has that he’s CIA, but that if not even her agency knew Kevin was still alive, that he’s working off the books with this one. Kevin is more angry that somebody tortured his brother than the fact that somebody’s clearly setting both Julie and Kevin up (and using Daniel as bait). 

Julie then… somehow or another, gases both Kevin and his giant dog. Julie holds her breath, and despite the fact that her hands are zip-tied behind her back, she manages to put the gas mask on. She frees herself before she locks the dog into a room, and parks the car in front of the door to prevent it from getting out. After that, she checks Daniel’s body all over more closely for a tracking device, and finds one “nestled against his femoral artery”. She figures that it sent out an alert when she started torturing Daniel, which is why Kevin swooped in to save the day. 

She then resets her broken nose. And will not shut up about the mysterious chemical concoction she made that she nicknamed “survive”. It’s kept intentionally vague, but the only thing I can think about is that it’s mainly to hide how dumb the entire thing is. She then passes out on the cot. 

[tofufactorynightschool]

滔滔不绝; Chatterbox

好久不见！It's been a while; my bad! Things have been so busy here I can barely find the time to finish my homework, text my friends/family/etc back, check emails, and get a good night's rest. Several times, I meant to write an update, but I guess I never found the time til now--over a month! Oops. So here goes!

The update I wanted to write almost a month ago was:

It's been a crazy first week in Taipei! During the first weekend, I (along with five of my other housemates) got locked out by another housemate. (She deadbolted the door by accident.) Call after call did nothing to awaken her, but the program director got us hotel rooms for the night. Then the next day I almost got heat stroke, I was so dehydrated and overheated and sleep-deprived. I met my language partner (the first and so far the only time I've met her, which will hopefully change soon), and we walked around Taida's campus, darting into AC-bubble after AC-bubble. It was graduation season, and we saw swarms of black-cloaked grads with their colorful hoods on campus, drifting between the palm trees and the stone buildings. The heat and the light makes the memory feel hazy, light-dappled.

Then I had my first Chinese classes, which were a huge wake-up call, because I could barely keep up (or more simply/accurately, was not keeping up). I almost changed out of the class after the first test, but I decided to hang in there. We're now about 4 or 5 tests in, still not sure if I made the right decision! We're almost at the 期中考 midterm point (worth 20% of the final grade), so I guess we'll see soon. (Though I'm writing this post instead of studying for the midterm ...) My 老师 is a funny, charming Japanese woman, who seems to be a little harder on us than my housemates' 老师 are on them ... but I guess maybe that's for the best for my learning style.

I've had some embarrassing language learning mishaps: saying 准备奶茶 instead of 珍珠奶茶 in class, accidentally ordering two milk teas, 什么的。。。In my day to day life, I can get by okay; but to be fair, I mostly talk with my housemates, all of whom are either American or speak English very well. (Not sure how much good that's doing for my language learning, but I think it has made it a less lonely experience--not being fluent, you really feel the gap between what you want to, or need to, express and what you are able to express. It is a fundamentally lonely feeling.) But sometimes I think I've been too busy to feel lonely...there's a few things I miss, sure, a few people I miss intensely, but I feel like I am surprised by how little I feel the urge to go home. Rather, I am nervous for the day that time comes.

There's so much to love here. Almost every morning, I bike to class with a YouBike, which is a convenient bike rental system. The campus is gorgeous; it's like a tropical forest is embracing the school. The birds, turtles, butterflies ... The food ... I feel like anything I say might come across as understatement. It's so delicious. It's also very affordable. I've had so many different things here: qingrenguo, danbing, sooo much milk tea, etc. etc. I can count on one hand the number of times I've even glanced at the stove since arriving. Taipei is so exciting and, somehow, peaceful at the same time -- I don't know if that makes sense. People have been so friendly, things are so beautiful, even the metro has all these cute little cartoons (Taiwan is big on cute culture, and I can't lie, I do love it). Convenience is the order of the day: the transit system, the 7/24 (to use the local notation) convenience stores, the air conditioning, etc. I overall feel incredibly safe here, even at night. There's a lot I wish we had in the states like this There's a lot to do, too. (I'm going to write a list of my activities in another post, otherwise it might get too long.)

To be honest, my days are so full I can barely introspect (my most common pastime back home) and I've also hardly thought about research at all; I'm a little nervous. I can hardly believe that we're halfway through...

滔滔不绝 (tāo tāo bù jué) - unceasing torrent, a torrent (of words)

[muertawrites]

eddie munson and food

this man lives on cup noodles and cereal. he doesn't know what a vegetable is and thinks black pepper is a fancy spice. the most complicated things he knows how to make are grilled cheese and kraft dinner (she says like she's not american), and those are rare. if you can cook or like to cook, though, he'll eat whatever you serve him - he's really not as picky as he seems.

grocery shopping with him is always an adventure. it's almost like shopping with a kid; if he had his way, your weekly meals would consist of doritos and pizza rolls. you're constantly having to tell him to put things back, keeping an eye on the cart to make sure he doesn't sneak in as much junk food as he can. he's also super chaotic in a grocery store - hanging off the end of the cart while you push it, drumming his knuckles on everything he passes, kicking random boxes off the shelves to see if he can catch them before they hit the floor.

"can you be chill for like five seconds?" you plead as a fifth box of instant mashed potatoes smacks down at his feet.

"no. absolutely not."

asking him to get things for you to keep him occupied is also a disaster.

"baby, we need lettuce."

"... yeah?"

"you brought me spinach."

"it's green and leafy. it's lettuce."

he thinks the fact that you can make things from scratch, no matter what it is or how simple the process, is magic. he'll lean over the counter and just watch you cook, never absorbing anything but always amazed by your ability. even if you can only make something as elaborate as spaghetti with canned sauce, it's like a gourmet meal to him.

if there are any comfort or ethnic foods you make often, he wants to hear all about them; they're also his favorites, purely because they're yours and he loves listening to you talk about them.

for the hispanic babes: he's mesmerized by tortillas. will hover in the kitchen just to watch you make them.

"so that's how you're so friggin strong. rolling those things out and making them your bitch."

"you flip those things with your hands? babe, that's so fuckin metal!"

(i love making tortillas from scratch store bought tortillas ain't shit)

he's a habitual stealer of your food - anything you have, he'll sneak a bite or a sip of it, no matter what he has to eat. once he finishes his fries, he'll take a couple of yours. he regularly leans over your shoulder to drink from your straw. if he comes home and you're already eating dinner, he'll grab a fork or a spoon and poke it into your dish instead of getting his own; chinese and indian food are common in your house because of this.

was surprised to find out there was more than one kind of cheese.

his favorite thing to cook for you is butter noodles. if you're feeling lazy or are a little short on cash, he'll pop open two packs of instant ramen and slather the plain noodles in butter and black pepper. bone apple teeth.

you help him make baked goods for his side business. he loves everything you bake (if you bake), and whether you like to partake in the ganja or not, he appreciates you taking the extra time to add it to his favorite recipes.

(this is just me projecting) it actually started because you don't smoke. you're sensitive to pot and get really bad paranoia and anxiety, even from a contact high. eddie, being the loving and protective man he is, refuses to smoke in the house / apartment / trailer / whatever because of this. you felt bad in winter when he had to suffer the cold, so you did a little research and figured out how to baste some of his stash in butter to add to cookies and brownies. he proposed to you after taking the first bite (and was actually kind of serious about it).

he started sharing your special baked goods with some of his more well-liked clients just because he was so proud of you and wanted to show off your skill, but they became super popular. now you make batches just for him to sell from time to time; they're regularly gone within a day.

hates fish; it makes him nauseous. big fan of red licorice.

likes to feed you. instead of offering you things to try, he'll hold his hand or fork / spoon up to your lips for you to bite from. gets a little turned on when his fingers "accidentally" slip into your mouth. loves it when you lick things off his fingers.

will sometimes belch in your face just to gross you out and annoy you. he thinks the way you scrunch your face up when he does it is cute. always kisses your nose immediately after. he's a little shit.

[anexperimentallife]

Jan 18, 2022: US couple in danger of being forced to leave our baby daughter overseas

TL;DR: We’re an interracial, neurodivergent US couple in the Philippines. I’m also physically disabled. A paperwork snafu left our daughter (born here during lockdown) stateless, and Immigration is skeptical about an extension to our visas while we get it sorted, meaning they may force us to leave without our daughter in MARCH.

There’s a guaranteed way for ONE of us to stay, but it costs 10K USD PLUS other fees, and we don’t have that just laying around. I cannot begin to imagine the trauma to El if they force us to leave without her, not knowing when we’ll see each other again.

PayPal Donation Link (preferred bc this one takes the lowest fees)

GoFundMe

Ko-Fi

Secondary Paypal Link (bc some non-US folks had trouble with the preferred one--but this one takes full fees)

Details, for those who want the whole story:

(New post because the old one was getting clogged with updates.) I am autistic, and physically disabled, with several comorbidities. I moved to the Philippines in 2018, in part to make my disability check stretch further. My girlfriend joined me here later that year. Immigrating to the Philippines on a tourist visa is a fairly common practice, as you can keep getting extensions for up to 36 months, after which you have to leave the country and return to “reset” for another 36 months, so that was our plan. Of course, lockdown hit in 2020, so that became impossible.

A couple of months after lockdown hit, we found out (surprise!) that we were having a baby. Our daughter Eleanor was born in the Philippines in March of 2021, under COVID lockdown. Complications with the birth tripled our hospital bill and required a C-Section.

Here’s where it gets tricky: Zoey (aka @thesurestthing ) had gone into the delivery room with a paper on which she had written all the names we had been considering, and was so groggy from the C-Section anesthetic that she didn’t realize they were putting ALL of the names on the form, PLUS adding her last name as a middle name (which is the tradition here). I would have stepped in, but this is the Philippines, and the father isn’t even allowed in the delivery room here, so I had no idea what was going on until much later. (And thanks to anesthesia, neither did Zoey.)

You know that comedy trope of someone reciting their name, and it takes like thirty seconds to get through the whole thing? Yeah, it was like that. We weren’t happy about it, but our annoyance was overshadowed by having a baby.

Considering our newborn (and my health, and the pandemic, thanks to a letter from my doctor) Immigration granted us an additional ten months extension beyond the usual 36, which would take us to March of 2022.

That should have been plenty of time to get things sorted, but when we went to have El officially declared a US citizen, we found that the snafu on her birth certificate meant her name was too long to fit on the American forms. And the local registry office refused to submit a request to amend her birth certificate until we could provide several very specific “proofs” of using the shorter name.

In some cases it was a matter of, “You need document A as one of the three proofs. To get that, you need a copy of Document B. Oh, but you can’t get Document B unless you already have Document A.”

So took literally months, two lawyers, and a favor from a friend to get that documentation together. Among other things, we had to find a church that would hold a baptism or dedication ceremony for a baby born to two atheists (luckily, a friend in Manila’s wife knew a Bishop here, and called in a favor for us), and hire a lawyer to swear and affirm that sixteen is a higher number than fifteen (I wish I were joking there).

It took even longer because in the meantime, I got COVID, and we all had to quarantine at home. (Thankfully El didn’t get it. That took a couple of thousand out of the donation fund, though, considering I had to be on an oxygen machine for a month, among other treatments.)

When we finally got everything they required  to submit the request to fix El’s birth certificate (middle of November), we were informed it would take four to six months to get an answer and/or an amended birth certificate from the main office in Quezon City. This means we are likely looking at the middle of May before we can get the birth certificate with her correct name. But our extensions expire in March. You see the issue? If our request for reconsideration is denied, they could force us to leave the country without our daughter unless we come up with enough for the SRRV (explained below).

And we need the corrected birth certificate before we can even BEGIN the process of having El recognized as a US citizen and get her a passport. (The US embassy here has also cut back on services, and stated they are no longer processing emergency passports, so we’ll have to wait the normal length of time.)

The local immigration office has advised me to apply for the SRRV, a special retirement visa which would give me (and only me) permanent residency, meaning I could stay with El no matter how long the process takes. Zoey would still have to return to the states without us, because she doesn’t qualify. Also, the SRRV requires a minimum ten thousand US dollar deposit, in addition to other fees. And as I told the guy at Immigration, we don’t HAVE ten thousand dollars just laying around.

One person at the local office has said there’s no chance of another extension, and that the SRRV is our only shot. Another one said they think we MAY be extended again because of the extenuating circumstances, but it apparently depends on what kind of day the person in Quezon City (who has never seen us) is having when they get our request.

The kicker is that we can’t even APPLY for reconsideration until February, and by the time we get an answer, if we’re denied, it will be too late to do anything about it.

To sum up: If we’re denied another lengthy extension (which there seems to be a 50/50 chance of), we could be forced to leave the country without our daughter, and unable to return to her until the country opens back up. And no one knows when that will be. If we can come up with the money for the SRRV, though, it is GUARANTEED that at least I can stay with her. Losing her mommy would be terrible enough; I cannot begin to imagine the trauma to El if she has to lose both of her parents until who knows when--months, years, whenever they open the country again.

Even if they DO approve another lengthy extension (again, looks like a 50/50 chance), it’ll still cost thousands. So if we end up not needing (or not getting enough money for) the SRRV, anything donated will go to that, plus paying off medical bills, taking care of needed travel--Because even if everything goes perfectly, and they extend us for as long as we need, we will still have to travel to Manila to present El in person at the embassy before they’ll affirm her citizenship, and unless they reopen the country by the end of our (hypothetical) new extensions, we’ll still have to leave behind the life we’ve built here and start completely from scratch.

For that matter, even if we come up with enough for the SRRV, unless they open the country by the time El’s paperwork is sorted, we’ll STILL have to relocate once our daughter can legally travel, because our little girl needs both her parents.

Basically, it’s all a big mess caused by a misunderstanding at El’s birth. To be honest, we need about three times what is listed on the GoFundMe when you consider the medical and legal and travel and likely relocation expenses and all, but we weren’t comfortable asking for more.

Amazing what a cascading pile of adversity can be caused by a single moment of confusion during childbirth, isn’t it?

If you actually read all that, thank you. It helps to blurt the whole thing out on occasion. If you can help, please do, because we’re running out of time, If not, please reblog.

And thank you again, especially to those who have already helped. Thanks to your generosity, we’re almost halfway to the initial goal of being able to apply for the SRRV (and we’d be even closer if I hadn’t gotten COVID). If we can get that out of the way, all other efforts go towards the rest of the fallout from this situation.

[thatblackravenclaw]

Make it up to you

Blog Details + My Library

Steve Rogers x fem!black!reader

word count: 1k

warning(s): cursing, oral (fem receiving), not proofread

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.

I wonder if Tony knows these debriefings would be a lot more bearable if they weren’t so boring. Like, where’s the team spirit? Where’s the excitement of yet another successful mission? And here comes Steve’s ass. Every time it’s his turn to talk he always says something about me.

“Stardust?”

Told you.

“Yes, Captain?” A sarcastic smile upon my face.

“You need to pay more attention to your surroundings. That agent was right behind you, and you didn’t even know.” Bullshit!

I was completely aware of my surroundings and had the situation under control. I felt the guy’s presence and I was about to give him a surprise when Mr. Holier Than Thou decided to come and “save the day”.

“Yes sir.” I roll my eyes continue zoning out.

He blabs some more, doesn’t call anyone else out, and then we were finally dismissed after two and a half hours. I’ve never left a room so fast.

A hand lands on my shoulder. I raise my elbow to their face but stop an inch from it. I side eye and see Natasha.

“There’s my favorite spider.” I lower my arm and turn to face her with a genuine smile.

“You let him get to you.”

We start walking towards the bar in the common area.

“No,” stretching out the ‘o’, “I actually kept my comments to myself.”

“Yes, but you were shooting daggers at him for the rest of the meeting.” She sits down on the stool, and I go behind the counter. Vodka. Vodka. Where’s the Vodka?

“Staring at me during meeting, Romanoff? I knew you had a crush on me.” A smirk pulls at the corner of my mouth. I pour a shot for the both of us and right as I’m about to throw it back…

“Isn’t it a bit early to be drinking?”

I stare at him with the most irritated look I can conjure.

“And with that, I will be taking this,” I lift my shot up in the air, “To my room.”

I give him one last look before walking to the elevator. He’s such a pretentious dick. You would think that since he’s from the 40s that he would have more manners. Well, actually, I heard husbands used to abuse their wives, but no one talks about it much. They must keep up their All American Dream façade.

I need a distraction. As soon as I get to my room, I waste no time. I set the shot glass on the dresser and look around. Right now seems like a more perfect time than any to take down my braids. I mean it’s already 4 which means that I’ll most likely be doing this all night, but whatever. Tomorrow is my day off anyway.

I grab the remote to turn the tv on. Let’s have an 80s movie marathon. Maybe it’ll calm my nerves. 80s. What a great decade besides the racism, homophobia, and economic status. Let’s see, School Daze? I should be halfway through detangling by the time the movie is over.

BOOM BOOM BOOM

The fuck? I walk over and open my door. I roll my eyes and turn back around but leave the dorm open.

“Steven Grant Rogers. To what do I owe this pleasure?” My butt hits the bed and I look at him.

“You’re mad at me.” He closes the door behind him.

“Oh, no. No, no, no. I’m pissed at you. BIG difference. I don’t understand why you pick on me and it’s only me.” He walks up to me and gets down on his knees so that we’re in eye level of each other.

“I’m sorry babe,” He leans in and pecks me on the lips, “I just don’t want them to catch on to us.”

I kiss him back and widen my legs so he can get between them.

“Why can’t you do and also pick on other people? It’s starting to feel racially motivated.” He rolls his eyes and pulls me closer to him.

“You say that every time something doesn’t go your way.”

“Because it’s true!” I move out of his hold and lay in the middle of the bed.

“You’re being dramatic.” His hands creep up to the bottom of my suit.

“Wooooow so now we’re being openly racist.” My bottoms are off and he places a kiss on my clothed core.

“I’m sorry, doll. Is there anything I can do to make it up to you?” Suggestiveness in his tone.

His kisses move down the inside of my thigh while he pulls my underwear down. I look down and embarrassingly enough there a wet patch.

“I can think of a few things.” I respond, almost breathless.

A kitten lick to my clit has my back arching. I grab ahold of the comforter below me and tighten with each pass through my folds.

“Oh, fuck,” My eyes shut up my hand reaches down to his hair.

His tongue slowly swirls around my bud while his index and middle finger stroke equally as slow. His free hand is around my thigh. The contact, no matter how miniscule, turns me on more. The second his tongue leaves my clit I feel a throb. I whine at the loss, but if finger quickly replaces his tongue as he cleans up the slick that has dripped out of me.

The pressure on my clit is just right as has me enclosing his head in my thighs.

“Faster,” a clear shakiness in my voice. His obliges. His cheek is laid on my thigh, breath fanning over my pussy as his finger picks up speed. A squelching noise is heard, but the pleasure is too overwhelming for me to be embarrassed.

I feel his position shift on the bed. I look down and see him focused on my clit when his eyes flicker up to me. He looks so submissive, and the sight alone makes the band snap and my orgasm washes over me. With a chaste kiss to my clit, he sits up rubs my thighs to calm the shaking.

“Am I forgiven?”

[pyroclastic727]

Is Amity autistic?

In the Owl House fandom, we hear a lot about how Luz is written to be ADHD. Now I would like to present the flipside: Amity is coded as autistic.

Here’s the breakdown.

Amity is touch-averse. “BuT aMiTy ToUcHeS LuZ aLL tHe TiMe” nice try. The key to autistic touch-aversion is only being okay with touch when she initiates it. And that totally matches up with Amity. See, Amity is really happy when she initiates touch with Luz. She’s also cool with it when Luz holds her hand after standing near her for enough time that Amity can predict an incoming touch. That’s because Amity consents to that touch and expects it.

But when other people touch her? She doesn’t take kindly to that. When Luz initially bumped into her at Covention, she snapped at her and degraded her. Even when she bumped into Luz in Enchanting Grom Fright, her initial instinct was to snap at Luz, since she didn’t expect to be touched. When Hooty touched Amity’s face without consent, she flipped out and beat him up. Not even Lilith beat Hooty up when he wrapped her up in his mucus-filled tube, but Amity gave Hooty the injuries we all wanted to see him with, because he breached her boundaries without her consent. Even as late as the last episode, Amity fell over when her face got close to Luz’s on the bleachers, because she didn’t expect it.

Amity stims. Okay, this one took me a while to catch, since most of the time, Amity is very controlled with her actions. This symptom isn’t very intense; her senses aren’t understimulated too often, and she really only does it when she’s really excited.

Mainly, when Luz offered to carry her. While she adorably scrambled for words, she also flapped her hands against her legs. At first I thought it was just a cute thing she did, but there’s more to it. She was so excited to be held by Luz that it showed up in her hands flapping...a common stim. With Amity feeling more comfortable around her new friends than the old ones, I wouldn’t be surprised to see more stimming in the future.

Amity always has The Mask as her expression. You know, the one with her eyes half-lidded, eyebrows raised, mouth slightly downturned. I also call it the Resting Blight Face, for...reasons.

At first I thought it was just a way to hide her true emotions, since her parents are assholes. But even though Luz makes her feel accepted, she keeps doing it. It’s more like...you know that feeling when you’re thinking really hard, or uncomfortable, or ashamed, or even just relaxed, and you can’t think of which expression to wear quickly enough, so you put on an unreadable one to tide people over? Apparently most people don’t do that, since allistic people tend to have expressions for those feelings, ones that arise naturally.

Another symptom of autism is having hard-to-read expressions, or being less expressive. In Amity’s case, it’s the fact that she doesn’t see a need to have an expression in calmer moments, so she just uses her usual expression.   

Amity hyperfixates. This has several facets, so I’ll break this down.

She initially hyperfixated on school. And that’s how she became top student. Amity Blight is who you would mistake for a “gifted student.” But make no mistake...she is not gifted, and gifted is a bullshit label used to overexert people and force them to keep school as their special interest for their entire lives (and I may have a bit of a vendetta against it). Anyways, we already know she’s a perfectionist. My theory is that Amity originally was hyperfocused on school--the Abominations track, to be exact--and that’s part of how she got so good. Then, her focus shifted, but the school expected her to keep being top student. Cue the perfectionism; she was no longer able to focus on school like she wanted to, but everyone expected her to, so she got insecure about it.

She hyperfixates on Azura, just like Luz did. Yeah, she keeps it secret from the world, for most of the time. But she definitely likes Azura a lot. I mean, she started to reconsider her opinion on Luz when Luz offered her an Azura book. She destroyed her jock career because she tried to use an Azura move in real-life Grudgby. Her interest in Azura is long-lived, starting about the time that her interest in school would have expired (which would explain why she stayed closeted). And we can’t ignore the fact that she sees Azura in Luz and is definitely enjoying the parallels between herself and her fictional counterpart. (Which might not be a coincidence, but that’s an entirely different theory).

She hyperfixates on Luz. Yes, part of this is a crush. But a lot of us have watched Amity’s personality go from alpha bitch to cutest little bean in the Boiling Isles, all thanks to Luz’s influence. Lumity is not a rivals-to-lovers speedrun due to bad writing, it’s due to Amity hyperfixating. She’s already extremely introspective, going so far as to keep a diary where she analyzes and makes sense of herself. It’s not a stretch to say that she identified the faults that kept her from Luz and worked hard to change those off-screen. 

Amity keeps a journal. To me, this seems like masking. You see, Amity is what people would consider to be high-functioning, since she can pass for allistic. But in order to do this, she has to put in significant effort on her part. See, when she does something that makes it so she doesn’t pass, she just sees it as a problem (since she probably doesn’t know about autism, and she passes well enough that she would totally be undiagnosed). Then she tries to fix the problem, in order to keep being perfect. 

Amity has awkward body language. Thanks to the journal and other ways of masking, you don’t see this early on. But once she feels comfortable enough around Luz to let her guard down...she completely forgets boundaries. To review: in episodes 15-17, she throws herself at Luz, holds her formal rival’s hand for 24.71 seconds, blushes every time she sees Luz, and loudly declares her thirsty thoughts about Luz in uniform before literally running away. While some of this can be seen as normal gal pal things or crush things...you’d think a repressed wlw like Amity would try very hard not to touch Luz, so as to avoid being outed. Or at least she would do less of that stuff, so as to respect Luz’s boundaries the way she wants her boundaries to be respected. But that’s not the case, since she straight-up misses a lot of social cues. And since she feels comfortable around Luz, she doesn’t feel the pressure to be so paranoid about the cues, and can be her awkward self. From her point of view, she probably sees it as being freed from her parents’ judgment.

Amity takes things literally, sometimes. Now, this doesn’t happen all the time, since she isn’t heavily affected by this autistic trait. But when Luz says “I’m picking up what you’re putting down” and Amity says “I’m not putting down anything” and looks down...she not only missed the conclusion Luz drew from her words, but also assumed a literal meaning from her words. I can’t come up with many other instances of this, mostly because this doesn’t happen often. I would assume that Amity missed these a lot early on, and learned how to mask/identify them.

Amity is easily upset when things don’t go as planned. Let’s review these. In the library, she gets really mad at Luz when they end up stitched to a book, and it takes Luz’s sweet personality to get Amity to loosen up and laugh over it. When she goes to practice magic, and Luz steals her wand and uses it to get her siblings kidnapped, Amity locks Luz in a cage and assumes that she will get badly injured if she tries to fix the problems she caused. When Luz comes to her school, she panics and focus on how that doesn’t change anything. When she burns Willow’s mind, she appears absolutely terrified of being punished, flinching and bracing for impact when Luz finds her near the memories, constantly trying to distract Luz as they work together to save Willow, and hiding behind Luz when she confronts the Inner Willow. When Luz asks her to join her in Grudgby, Amity doesn’t initially agree, instead taking much more of the episode to come to terms with her involvement in it.

Amity likes predictability. She’s not attached to routines, but she does like being able to expect things. If she makes a plan for the day, she expects that day to adhere to that plan, and she doesn’t respond well when it changes. When Luz comes to her school, she focus on how that doesn’t change anything...not how that would ruin things or complicate things. Whenever she gets involved in Luz’s shenanigans, she either gets angry, scared, or takes a while to accept it. In a broader sense, she takes a while to accept that Luz and her shenanigans are a permanent fixture in her life--sixteen episodes, to be exact.

Finally, it would make for some excellent representation. An ADHD Dominican-American bisexual protagonist is pretty groundbreaking. But an ADHD Dominican-American bisexual protagonist girl who dates an autistic wlw witch girl from another dimension is exactly the kind of intersectional representation you’d expect to see from an unrestricted Owl House crew.

...Now, this might just be me hardcore projecting. I’m a little scared to post this because I don’t know how much of this is me reading into imaginary things, or trying to convince myself that Amity is like me. Feel free to debate/disprove me or support me in the comments. 

[hockeyforthefirsttime]

The Art of Not Falling in Love- Roope Hintz

AN: This is a piece that is very self indulgent BUT it has a plot despite being like 80% smut. I am thinking of making more parts if people like this 

Word count: 5k 

TW: like its smut.. so like what do you expect. (Wrap it before you tap it) spanking light dom!Roope female reader 

You could never quite understand how you got into this situation. You’d sworn to never fall in love ever. The pain of watching the gruesome divorce of your parents, the way your friends seemed to find “the one” left and right, only to be heartbroken, was simply too much. So you decided to simply don’t fall in love ever. 

And you’d kept that promise to yourself, ever since 15. Sure a few crushes came up now and then, but you never acted on them, and you made sure no one knew about the feeling. The only person in your life that knew about this promise to yourself was your best friend Jamie.

The first person you’d met in Dallas when you’d first moved there. You had been a freshman in college and he had been, ironically so, the first person to hit on you in Dallas, and you hadn’t even officially gotten there yet.  It happened on the plane ride. He was seated beside you and you couldn’t for the life of you remember the pick up line he used. You just know it was bad, cause you remember laughing at it and the way he tried to manage his long limbs into the airplane seat. It had gone uphill from there on, and you were glad he didn’t get offended by you laughing at him. 

Now, however, you were sitting in the stands of the American Airlines Center, watching him and his team scramble across the ice in a turnover, passing the puck up the ice. Roope Hintz picks it up and flicks it into the goal, just over the left shoulder of the Blackhawks goalie, making the Stars take the lead with three minutes left in the third period. The stands erupt in wild cheers and the team celebrates on ice. You jump with the rest of the crowd, and clap enthusiastically. Knowing that it’s gonna be an insufferable team to meet afterwards. After all, athletes tend to be after winning a game like this. 

The buzzer goes off and the Dallas Stars have officially ended their losing streak. The crowd is going wild, jumping up and down, making the stands shake just a little. Thats when you decide to sneak out of the stands and find your way to the outside of the locker room, where Jamie had promised he would meet you. 

You have been around a few times, and sure enough you find your way. Jamie had made sure to let the security staff know that you would be around after the game. There is a soccer ball laying around so you pick it up and start bouncing it on your jeans clad thigh, then dropping it down onto your foot and up again, alway in control. You lose yourself to the ball, concentrating on keeping it in the air, so much so that you don’t notice the door slamming open until the boom of it makes you drop the ball. 

“Jesus fuck.” 

You whisper as you look up to find the source of the noise. What you find shouldn’t surprise you, but seeing a shirtless Roope Hintz standing there with a frown on his face, makes heat rush up your neck regardless. 

“Who are you?” 

He looks suspiciously at you, taking in the skinny jeans and the absence of a jersey. As well as the forgotten soccer ball. 

“Sorry, just here for Oleksiak.” 

You try to shrug it off, looking for the ball again. His eyes squint suspiciously at you, but his head tilts backwards as he calls for Jamie. He comes bounding out of the locker room, shirtless, but fresh out of the shower. He’s in the middle of zipping up his game day slacks, and the smile already on his lips gets wider.  

“You could have waited with the others you know?” 

Jamie says cheekily to you. The heat to your face returns, but not in full force. You look at his tall stature and the smaller man beside him. And for some reason, the blonde star of the night is the one to make you look away. You shoot daggers at Jamie instead. 

“You know, you could have told me where they were, so I didn’t have to stand here like some other crazed fan.” 

Roope slowly turns around and walks away, closing the door with one last curious look directed at you. 

“Oh come on, we all know you’re crazy for me.” 

Finally you can feel yourself relax a little, with a sigh you take a step closer to him. 

“Yeah, crazy for you to leave me alone.” 

He wraps you up in his arms and lifts you up in the air, laughing as you gasp at the surprise of being lifted up. 

“Congrats by the way, you played well today.” 

You say to him, as he lets you back down on the ground again.  

“Thank you Sparks.” 

“Now go get dressed completely, I suppose you want to celebrate tonight?” 

His signature, tooth lacking smile is on full display as he slings an arm around your shoulders. Jamie looks at you with a mischievous look. 

“We really want to celebrate this, and besides, we really need to get you laid.” 

You wrench your way out of his grip and scowl at him, pushing him in the direction of the door to the locker room. 

“Get dressed you idiot.” 

You say with a flat voice, trying to remain serious, and failing when you see Jamie wink at you last minute. You immediately go back to juggling the soccer ball, as the door slams shut. 

A couple of girls are walking towards you, and you suspect they’re here looking for their boyfriends or husbands. That’s until you see the flustered cheeks and whispers of “I can’t believe we made it all the way here.” and the agreements that follow. 

Their eyes land on you and your soccer ball, and their expressions instantly sour. You try to shrug it off, but when the whispering starts again, you look up from the ball. You start getting suspicious when one of the three girls flicks her long, perfectly curled, brunette hair over her shoulder and opens her immaculately painted lips to say something. 

“You shouldn’t be here you know.” 

The confidence in her voice almost has you fooled for someone who belongs there. Almost. You’ve never seen her close to any of them ever, even if you had managed to stay out of the public eye yourself. Something about this trio didn’t feel right. You stop juggling the ball and drop it to your foot, catching it without bounce and then placing your foot on top of it.  

“Why not?” 

You ask out of curiosity of what the answer would be.

“Well, it’s reserved for the wags, you know, so you don’t belong here.” 

You tilt your head and raise a brow, questioningly. 

“Isn’t that what the owner's box is for? you know with reserved seats, food and really comfortable sitting options?” 

A blush seems to rise through her make- up and you restrain yourself a little, you really don’t want to make her an enemy. Just in case. 

“Yeah.. I just need to see my man before we head home.”

She stutters out, looking at her two friends who nod encouragingly at her. 

“Okay, just remind me who it is again?” 

You play dumb, knowing that the media is about to get out of the room in a minute. 

“Jamie ofcourse.” 

And her voice is so confident as she says it, you let a smile show before chuckling. They really thought they could fool anyone with that. Just in that moment, the door opens and cameras and notepads or tape recorders start filing out of the door. 

You walk over to the door, holding it open for the stream of reporters and crew. Then you duck a head in and yell for Jamie. 

“Oleksiak, your girlfriend is here…” 

It isn’t intentional all the way, but it comes out in a sing- song voice.  

The entirety of the team turns to face you. Briefly you meet the eyes of Roope, who’s still shirtless. Just as Jamie passes you by with a confused look, you tap his now clothed arm to make him bend down just a little.

“Ehh, so someone somehow got past security, apparently you’re her boyfriend.” 

You say to him, loud enough for the closest teammates to hear. 

“Jesus Christ, not again.” 

Jamie mutters. Stephen Johns is closest and has his phone in seconds calling someone. You let a glance out the door and see the girls huddled together, suddenly looking unsure. Jamie takes a look over your shoulder and sighs. 

“Guess I should distract them until security gets here, just stay here.”

You roll your eyes, but stay put. Then suddenly you realise where you are, feeling like an intruder. 

“Sorry guys, didn’t mean to intrude, just thought you should know about the girls outside.” 

You say, trying to not look too closely at anyone. You can feel the heat rising up your neck. 

“‘S alright, not everyday we get to know a girl from Jamie's side.”

Tyler Seguin says from his seat by his gear. 

“Oh I know, he has a hard time finding decent ones.” 

You say it absentmindedly, but the entire team seems to crack up at that. You feel a little bad, but you also know it as true and it's already said, so you can’t take it back. 

“Seems like he did alright with you.” 

Roope says as he pulls his button up over his arms and starts pushing the buttons through the holes.

“Ahh, a common mistake. Not a girlfriend and not sleeping with him either.” 

His brows raise and a cheeky smile forms on his face. But he doesn’t say anything else. You feel off, of sorts. He doesn’t irk you like the girls did. And it was kind of scaring you. It’s the feeling you get when you start being intrigued, and you don ‘t need that now.

-------

You’re sitting at the bar, alone, not that you mind it, because the girl who finally got Jamie had been ogling him all night and talking too loud, and it was a relief when you saw them walk out the door. He had asked multiple times if it was okay for him to leave, so much so that you almost drove the uber back to her place yourself. 

Staring down at the drink in your hand, you realised you were too sober and too far behind on studying (not really) to be sitting here, in a place you didn’t want to be. So you got up, turned around and immediately crashed into a hard chest. Looking up, you find a wild head of blonde curls and a heavenly cologne. Roope Hintz.

“Can I help you you mr. Star?” 

You said ask as he leans closer, if that was even possible, without touching you. He at least has the decency to chuckle and look a little bashful as you address him that way. 

“You sure you’re not even a little infatuated with Oleksiak?” 

Rolling your eyes, you lean back onto the bar and cross your ankles. 

“Why? Are you jealous?” 

You give him a flirty smile, just for the hell of it. Roope steps forward so his feet are planted on either side of yours, not touching this time either, and leans an arm beside you, making him come impossibly close to you. 

“What if I am?” 

He asks, and his eyes are roaming all over your face, ignited with a desire you haven’t seen in far too long. It makes a heat pool in your stomach, and a little in your cheeks. Just purely out of the close proximity. 

“Then you’re gonna be sorely disappointed.” 

You try to sound casual, but Roope leans a little closer.

“And why is that?” 

You can tell he is curious, and your judgement is compromised from the closeness of him. Maybe one night wouldn’t hurt, right?

“I’m a one time offer, an-” 

Roope doesn’t even let you finish your sentence, before he has your hand in his. Just as you touch it feels like a wave of something indescribable washes over you. You’d never felt anything like it. 

“I can do that. Come along now, we haven’t got all night.” 

Roope drags you away from the bar and you scramble to keep up the first few steps. When you catch up, he laces his fingers through yours, and heads out the door. It’s cold out, and since you haven’t really been outside today, all you have is the sweater you came to the rink in. You hadn’t been dressed for a club at all, but he didn’t seem to mind. You wrap your arms around yourself, to try to preserve some of the heat from the inside. Roope has a keen eye and steps behind you, wrapping his arms around your waist. 

“One time offer, remember?” 

“Oh yeah, that doesn’t mean I can’t be nice, or no?” 

And as he pulls you closer to him, you can feel in your bones (and your lower back) that he isn’t nearly as nice as he’s pretending to be. And you catch yourself thinking that you can’t wait to see what this turns into. 

“Just, doubting what you define as nice, that’s all.” 

At that Roope, let out a little chuckle, before leaning down a little and placing small kisses on your exposed neck. He works his way up to your ear. 

“I can be very nice, it all depends on you though.” 

With a final kiss to your cheek, he steps away from your heated face, and looks at the uber that’s now in front of you, double checking that it’s the right one. How in the hell had you missed the car pulling up to the curb? Roope opened the door to the back seat and let you enter first. Then he entered shortly after you, told the lady driving the car his address and turned to face you. 

“Didn’t think you were that shy, sweetheat.” 

He gestured to the entire middle seat between the two of you. You just shake your head, with a coy smile on your lips. 

“Just been a while.” 

You say quietly, not wanting the driver to hear. Regardless, she looks at you, very discreetly, through the rearview mirror. You give her a reassuring smile trying to convey that you feel safe and that you’re okay. She gives you a wink in return. 

“I’ll make it worth your time.” 

Roope leads you into an elevator and punches one of the higher numbers, all the while his eyes are roaming you, mentally undressing you. Most definitely wondering what he would find underneath the sweater and jeans. You are absolutely feeling a little shy with the way he looks at you. However, at the same time you’re looking at him, wondering what he is going to do, if he will be soft or hard in demeanor, if he’s gonna be rough or boring, but somehow something in his eyes tells you, it’s gonna be anything but boring. 

The elevator stops, and he steps closer, taking your hand in his, entwining your fingers and leading the way out of the elevator. Just two doors down he pulls some keys out of his back pocket and steadily unlocks the door, no fumbling. You take it as a good sign even if you already knew that he wasn’t even close to being drunk. The lock clicks in place and the door slides open, revealing a dark hallway. Roope steps in first and flicks on the light. It’s neat, considering what you had been expecting. The door shuts behind you, and you hear the lock clicking. 

Toeing off your shoes you turn and find Roope already staring at you. His eyes are considerably darker. He drops the jacket he had been wearing to the floor and beckons you with a finger to follow him, all silent and a little domineering, half a smile on his lips. You see the light flicker on in the hallway as you follow him down to the left and then the first door on the right hand side it’s the only open door, but it’s not fully lit inside. Carefully you step inside, when nothing happens, you take one more step in and the room is suddenly full of tension. 

The light here is turned on low, and Roope is standing in front of you taking slow steps towards you. Determined to stand your ground you remain unmoving, but your eyes roam him, and he seems to notice. With a smirk he takes a hand behind his neck and promptly yanks the shirt off of his upper body. You feel your jaw dropping just a little as you scan him over. 

“Look at me in the eyes babe.” 

Heat rises to your cheeks, but you remain in your spot steadily holding his gaze. He takes a step closer, and then another, until he’s standing mere inches from you. A devious smile is playing on his lips, when one of his hands lands on your waist. His thumb rubs circles on your hip, just underneath the emerald sweater of yours. 

“Are you sure about this?” 

He asks, taking his other hand up and caressing your cheek. You nod your head yes. 

“I’m gonna need you to use your words for me.” 

The hand that’s on your cheek is suddenly forcing your face upwards to meet his eyes. 

“I’m sure about this.” 

You whisper, again meeting his eyes. Just as the sentence leaves your mouth, he immediately goes to kiss you, but you pull back just slightly, just to tease, and maybe test him a little. He sees the mischievous glint in your eyes, and his smile widens.

“Oh you wanna play like that, huh?” 

Roope’s hands slip from your body, before meeting again behind your thighs, lifting you up into his arms. You stare down into his darkened eyes, and lean into him. He lets you kiss him for a couple of seconds, before he deepens it. You let him, not really feeling like fighting him. His lips move from yours and down your neck, as he walks towards the bed, you can feel him leaving a few hickies before dropping you onto the bed. 

“Off with the sweater, kaunis.” 

You look up at him, while crossing your arms and gripping the bottom of the sweater, letting him take in all of you as the green top comes off. Underneath is a simple black bra and you can see his pupils dilate at the sight of you. 

“That one I’m gonna take off myself.” 

He leans over you, until you’ve laid down flat on the bed. He’s hovering over you, resting on his forearms, yet his hips have already settled between your legs. You can feel him there hard and heavy. His breath playing across your collarbones, makes you feel the anticipation building in your entire body. 

He presses a quick kiss to your lips before he starts leaving open mouth kisses down the valley of your breasts, he shifts his weight so he is leaning more on one arm and slides the other underneath your back, and makes quick work of unfastening your bra. The tension leaves the straps and you let them fall off. Then with his teeth he bites the middle of the bra, lifting it off your body and chucking it away with his free hand. 

“Upea.” 

You don’t question his words, honestly feeling a little more turned on as he speaks to you in a language you don’t understand. With a wink he kisses each of your tits a few times, before moving further down. 

“Still good?” 

He asks, and you feel your heart ache a little at it, and immediately shove the feeling aside.

“Yes, so good.”

You say, all out of breath as his fingers pop open the button, and slowly pull down the zipper of your jeans. In a swift motion he has his fingers in what you assume is the belt loops and has pulled down your jeans along with the black underwear you had been wearing. Instinctively you try to close your legs, but two calloused hands on either of your knees stops that motion. 

“I’ve got you.” 

Roope says as he leans into your right thigh and starts leaving kisses again. Closer and closer to your core, and when he finally is there, he switches to the other tigh, repeating the process. Your hands, which have been clenching the sheets, finally go to his long hair, tugging a little. Roope lets out a little groan and you swear you can feel it in your entire body.

“Aww, look how wet you are, all for me?” 

He asks in a husky voice. 

“All for you, all for you.” 

Roope seems to revel in the admittance rolling off your tongue, before he lets himself have a taste. At least that’s what you think is happening. You feel his hot breath fan over your core, and he is painfully close, you lift your hips just slightly to meet his mouth, just as he pulls away. 

“My bed, my rules. Now, you’re gonna have to ask really nicely to cum, before I let you. Got it?” 

You’re so lost in desperation for his mouth that you can only nod. You both hear and feel the sigh escaping him, before he lands a little smack on the inside of your thigh. It causes you to let out a strangled moan and clench around nothing. 

“Didn’t I tell you? Words.” 

“I’m sorry, I’ll ask to cum.” 

And then he’s all over you. The pent up feeling you have in your body only seems to grow as he spends his time licking and lapping at your folds. With his arms around your thighs and eyes firmly set on yours, your body's working overtime trying to feel everything. You feel your grip on his hair tighten as his mouth finds you clit and a finger easily slides inside you. 

“Fuuuck, feels so good.” 

You draw out the vocals as he hums against you. Your breathing went uneven a long time ago, but now you’re struggling to control anything that comes out of your mouth. Especially as the second finger enters you and he makes a “come here” motion with his fingers, finally finding that one particular spot. It nearly sends you over the edge.

“Ah ah, ask first.” 

Your brain feels like mush as he continues his assault on your pussy. 

“Please may I cum?” 

Roope hums against you, before leaning away a little. 

“No, I want you to beg.” 

He goes back in, feeling the way your body is wound so tightly you don’t know where to turn, not being able to think clearly. 

“Please, I’ll be so good, just please please let me cum.” 

Again Roope hums. 

“Okay, only if you’re a good girl though.” 

He says looking up at you, with that smirk of his, before he dives back in.  You can feel the tension in your body tightening, and when his tongue does a particularly intense stroke over your clit you can’t hold it anymore. Your legs clamp around his head and you let out a drawn out moan of pleasure as he lets you ride out the high on his face. 

When you can’t take it anymore, you gently guide his face away from your core. Roope has this cocky grin on his face and you can’t help but like it being directed at you. You pull him up towards you and kiss him deeply, not really caring if you can taste yourself on his lips. Finally he lets your hands wander over the planes of his upper body, feeling the muscles tense and flex as your fingers trace every ridge of his body. He seems to really like kissing you, but he does notice that your hands go lower and lift his hips up a little to make room so you can pop the button of his jeans. As soon as the zipper is down, your hand traces the waistband of his boxers. 

“You gonna play with me like this all night, rakas?” 

He asks with a playful tone of voice. 

“Maybe.” 

You tease, pulling on the waistband of the boxers, before releasing it, making it snap against his skin. He leans away from you completely, getting up so he’s on his knees, but otherwise full height. Your legs are caught between his, so you can only sit up as far. Not that you mind though, with the way he towers over you, giving you perfect access to the bulge that’s now in your direct line of vision. Without really meaning to your jaw goes slack. His pointer finger is under your chin, making you look up at him.  

“Eyes up here, yeah?” 

You nod innocently at him, making him groan at the sight of you. 

“Good girl. Now let’s see if we can put that mouth of yours to good use.” 

You blush at his words and the smirk on his lips. Regardless, you start peeling the boxers and jeans down his legs. Slowly. Since this is going to be a one time thing, you think, you’re gonna savour this moment. His skin is hot beneath your fingers, but not as hot as your cheeks the moment his cock springs free of it’s confinement. You’re definitely not complaining about any aspect of it. 

Without a second thought you put your lips around the angry red tip, letting your tongue explore every inch of his dick. Roope seems to like what you’re doing, judging by the groaning and panting above you. One of his hands is in your hair, doing a makeshift ponytail as you continue to suck him off. Suddenly, he all but pulls you off his cock, which now seems even more red than it was before. With strings of saliva hanging from your mouth, connected to his dick. Roope lets out a groan that makes your inside tingle before he slides back off the bed.

“I’m going to ruin you so good, rakas.” 

He kicks off his jeans and boxers before he is over you again. You look him in the eyes nodding, before spreading your legs, letting him settle between them. He cages you in with his arms, and for some reason, even with his dark gaze upon you, you feel safe. And when he grabs your arms, pinning them beside your head you let out a content sigh. Not only because you’re completely letting go, but because you can feel his cock brushing against your stomach. The anticipation is almost killing you. 

Roope, kisses up and down your neck, whispering dirty somethings in your ear, because they aren’t nothing. They are all his fantasies, of what he has come up with that he wants to do with you. As well as to you. Most of all though, you think he just enjoys watching you squirm in need of him. When he lets go of your right hand, it traces your throat.

“Now, put my cock inside yourself.” 

It’s a demand, and you follow through, out of desperation to feel him inside. You wrap your hand around his dick, carefully tugging at him, running your thumb over the tip, teasing. With a little smile on your lips. Roope is quick to kiss it away, delving into you, with a passion you’ve never felt before. “Inside, now. Or this teasing of yours is gonna have some serious consequences.” 

He mumbles against your lips, so you do as told, guiding him to your entrance. You both let out content sighs as he finally sinks into you. He is going slow at first. Letting you adjust to having him inside you. 

“Look so good for me like this.” 

You can only nod as he starts moving his hips in slow, deep thrusts. He finds a pace and as soon as you start clenching around him, when he hits that part of you. His pace picks up. The hand that’s still holding onto yours, they are now intertwined in each other. His other hand is caressing your hip. You’re pretty much just a blubbering mess of his name and curses as he hits all the right parts. 

With a final kiss to your lips, he leans up a bit, so his thighs are resting on his calves creating a steep angle, so you almost slip off him. Almost. He pulls you closer by the hips, making you yelp out, before your legs are planted on either side of him, giving yourself a little more leverage as he hits deep inside of you. The moan that escapes you is genuine, and you squeeze your eyes shut in pleasure. At that you feel a sharp sting on your thigh again. 

“Eyes on me.” 

In the fog of pleasure all you manage to get out is a weak. “Yes, sir.” 

Opening your eyes, you see Roope straining a little as well. His cheeks are tinted and his breathing is really uneven. But his eyes are blown with pleasure, and as you guide his hand to your lower stomach where you can vaguely feel him moving in and out of you. It looks like a new fire has been ignited inside him. 

His hand slips from yours as he lets it go to rub at your clit again. The pleasure almost becomes too much, and your eyes roll a little at the feeling. 

“May I please cum, sir?” 

You manage to moan out, barely remembering his demand from before. 

“Hold it for like three seconds, I’m gonna count you down.” 

So you look him in the eyes and let him blow out your back for a few more thrusts, and then he starts counting down. 

“3”

His rhythm changes as he slows down and goes harder, deeper. 

“2” 

He moans as you clench around him. 

“1, cum for me.” 

And you do. It starts in your stomach, and like a warm tide it washes over your entire body. Roope fucks you through it, before he finally pulls out and with a loud groan he is jerking himself off, letting go in hot spurts all over your torso. He finishes and stares down at his personal masterpiece. With your rapidly raising stomach and chest covered in his cum, you can tell by the smirk on his lips. He’s satisfied.

“I’ll be right back.” 

Roope says with a wink, and you just nod. Because even though you just had the best sex to date, you were trying to gather your thoughts. On how to get home. You don’t see where he goes, but you hear water running from a sink. When he’s back from the bathroom, you assume, he has a wet  washcloth in hand and is wearing a fresh pair of boxers. Gently he wipes his cum from your chest and stomach, and a little in between your legs. 

And you’re almost completely ruined by how gentle he is. But you have a promise to keep, and you’re not planning on betraying yourself. He leaves again to toss the cloth into the hamper. When he comes back, you have gathered your underwear and bra, and are standing on the floor on slightly shaky legs. 

“You’re leaving?” 

And that was really the first sign. 

“Yeah, one time offer. Remember?” 

You answer, looking for your jeans. Roope sweeps them off of the floor and hands them to you. 

“Yeah, right.” 

You get dressed in silence, and when your last sock is on. You straighten up. 

“I’ll just find the way out myself.” 

It’s meant to be casual, but Roope immediately refuses. 

“No no, I’ll walk you out.” 

And he does, following close behind you. You’ve just gotten your shoes on, when your phone pings. It’s a notification from uber that your ride is here. You’ve put your hand on the door knob and opened the door, when Roope, who was leaning against the wall, pulls you back and kisses you deeply. 

“Next time you need an orgasm, give me a call.”

He says with a wink. 

In the car back to your apartment, you can feel it. You’re not gonna get rid of Roope after what just went down in his bedroom. The worst part of it is that you’re not sure you want it to be a one time thing. Fuck.