#i love my college during spring so it's great to soak it up as much as possible

[igarbagecannoteven]

megs!! hi!! how are u? ok for the questions, randomly chosen, 14, 23, 39, 46, 55, 70 <3 good luck with the novel opening and I hope you're having a good day <3

myle!!! hello!!! i'm doing well how about you??? thanks for the luck <3

14. what is your favorite location and position to write in? i write at my dorm desk a lot, but when the weather's nice i love to write outside! also my bedroom floor back home has wonderful vibes :)) i like sitting crisscross or sitting on top of legs (idk what that's called,,, kneeling? but not really)

23. is writing the beginning, middle, or end the easiest? hardest? first off, writing anything is hard, so jot that down ksjdfksdjfljsd no but i guess the "easiest" would maybe be the beginning? altho i regularly realize i started at the wrong time and have to cut/reshape it so maybe not lol. middles and endings are both hard, but i think finding that final note to end on is really really difficult and i'm not sure i've ever pulled it off at the level i'd like so. yeah. endings suck

39. what's your most self-indulgent wip? oof there are so many XD most of my wips are self-indulgent really, but if i had to pick one,,, idk if this counts as "self-indulgent" but i have a cashton arrival au (like the 2016 sci-fi movie) that's. um. really really tragic and a little philosophical and not at all what people are looking for in rpf and i'm absolutely in love with it. it's been temporarily shelved for,,, reasons lol but when i'm able to pull it off the shelf and shine it up it's going to be killer and i know that i'm mostly likely going to be the only person who loves it but idc :)) it's going to be so fucking good :)))

46. if you could only write one type of au for the rest of your life, what would it be? ohhh gosh that's a hard one. gut reaction is superhero au but also idk if i have that many plots in me for it lol. i wish friends to lovers was an au instead of a trope so i could say that lol bc that's basically all write anyways slkdjfkdsjjf okay final answer is superhero aus but i would not be happy about it after a couple years lol

55. have you noticed any patterns in your fics? words/expressions that appear a lot, themes, common settings, etc? i use the phrase "flashed a(n) [adjective] smile" in basically every single thing i write and i am not ashamed to admit it! it's a bangin' phrase that can be used in a bunch of different ways and also it has a sort of snappiness to it that i like :))

70. are you subscribed to any writers on ao3? yep! i'm subscribed to 21 authors, mostly 5sos fic writers, but not all! most of them aren't very active tho lol and those that are generally post lots of fic that's nsfm (not safe for megs) but that's how it be sometimes

writer’s ask time!

[shemarmooresfedora]

Rebuilding Family

Summary: Y/N and Spencer were college sweethearts at Cal-Tech but once Spencer got accepted to the FBI Academy, he ended things deciding it was not fair to make Y/N wait for him. When they meet again years later, he discovers something unexpected.

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem!Reader

Warnings: one allusion to sex

A/N: me and @samuel-de-champagne-problems are doing a 500 follower co-celebration that you can find here! we would love to hear from you <3

Masterlist

Chapter 34

You came down the stairs in the morning to see Spencer staring out the window of the sun room.

He occasionally sketched something in his journal, poking his tongue out of the corner of his mouth, before glancing up again.

“What’s up, love?” you asked him, wrapping your arms around his waist from behind so you could peek into his journal full of sketches.

“I want to build a treehouse for Jo to use and the twins eventually. Maybe even grandkids,” Spencer smiled softly.

“I like that idea but please tell me you are having someone help you. I don’t want you up on a ladder by yourself,” you warned him.

“Derek was more than happy to help,” he kissed the top of your head.

“I’ve got to go to Lowe’s to get the wood planks. Do you want to come too or I can bring all the kids with me?”

“I am not going to miss alpha-male Spence,” you bit your lip, “This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

“I’ll get the kids up if you make coffee,” he bargained.

“Deal,” you gave him a quick peck before sending him up the stairs.

Spencer came back downstairs with the two twins in the double carrier and Jo holding his hand. He was dressed in jeans with a measuring tape hooked to his belt and the leather brown doc martens you bought him on his feet.

“I was not expecting to be this turned on at 8 in the morning,” you whispered to him with a giggle which caused him to blush.

“Can we get donuts on the way, Mommy?” Jo asked.

“Of course, Baby J. Let’s go.”

-

You had Ollie and Ophelia in their portable car seats in the shopping cart while you and Jo were eating your donut munchkins and watching amusedly as Spencer pretended to know what he was doing.

“It’s okay to ask for help, love,” you reminded him.

“Fine,” he huffed, “Let me go get an employee. I have all the practical knowledge of how this should work but believe it or not, I was never a big handyman. I would just call my landlord when something broke.”

After getting the wood situation settled, Spencer brought Jo to the paint swatch section.

“Princess, you can pick any color you want for me and Uncle Derek to paint the tree house,” Spencer told her.

Jo took her time, carefully examining each swatch and considering her options before deciding on a pale lavender.

“Excellent choice,” Spencer smiled, kissing her cheek, “You got your love of purple from me.”

-

“I’ve got it!” Jo announced at the knock at the door.

“Jo!” Derek smiled as she opened the door.

“Uncle Derek!” she jumped into his arms.

“Long time, no see, kiddo. You’re growing so fast.”

You walked into the entry way with Ollie and Ophelia in your arms.

“Spence is already out back. Please be careful, you two. I don’t want to drive to the hospital today,” you cautioned.

“I’ll be out in just a second. I need to see my two godbabies first,” Derek extended his arms, taking Ollie from you and giving him little kisses on the cheek before doing the same to Ophelia.

“They still keeping you up at night?” Derek asked.

“Not as much nowadays, it’s a little harder with twins because as soon as one cries, the other follows. But Spencer always insists on getting up so I really can’t complain,” you smiled.

“Alright, I’ll head out there and get to work so Jo can have her new treehouse as soon as possible,” Derek waved.

“Hey, man,” Derek greeted Spencer as he walked outside.

Spencer looked up from his journal, “Oh, hey! I have got some preliminary blueprints sketched out that you can take a look at. Thank you so much for your help today. I really appreciate it and the kids will too.”

“Of course. You know things between me and Savannah are getting pretty serious so maybe my kid will be playing up there one day too,” Derek smiled.

“That’s so great to hear, Morgan.”

“I have you to thank for that. Seeing this life that you created outside the BAU inspired me. It made me realize I want more than to be a travelling single man my whole life,” Derek stated.

“I’m happy you’ve found someone you can see yourself settling down with,” Spencer smiled, “You and Savannah are welcome over any time for dinner.”

“When did you know Y/N was the one?” Derek asked.

Spencer couldn’t believe the Derek Morgan was asking him for girl advice. But then, he remembered he had everything. He had managed to win over his dream girl. His soulmate. His everything.

“The first time she laughed at an awful joke I made. I just knew from that moment on, I wanted to hear it over and over again and I would do everything in my power to keep that smile on her beautiful face,” Spencer admitted.

The sliding glass door of the sun room opened.

“Sorry to interrupt but Jo and I just made some fresh lemonade and I don’t want you guys to get dehydrated out here,” you said as you placed the pitcher and cups down on the table, “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Spencer’s lovesick gaze was laser-focused on you.

“I asked him when he knew you were the one,” Derek informed you.

“Oh,” you smiled softly, reminiscing, “For me, it was on our first date when he held every single door for me and would even run ahead to make sure it was open. I knew I had found myself the perfect gentleman.”

You gave him a quick peck before heading back inside.

-

You woke up already crying. You cuddled further into Spencer’s chest as you teared up.

“I don’t want to go. Please, Spence, I want to stay home with you and the kids,” you sobbed.

“Love, remember, I asked you last week if you wanted to go back or if you wanted me to find a job instead and do you remember what you said?” Spencer cupped your chin and gently forced you to look up at him.

“I love teaching,” you sniffled.

“I completely understand if you change your mind but I think you should give it at least a day.”

“No, you’re right,” you kissed him before getting up and heading to the bathroom to get ready, “Besides, it’s spring so before you know it, the semester will be over and I’ll have all summer with you and the kids.”

“That’s my girl,” Spencer smiled.

-

“Okay bye, my beautiful babies,” you kissed Ophelia and Ollie’s heads, “Be good for Daddy while Jo and I are gone.”

“I will text you pictures of them every hour on the hour and you can facetime us at lunch if you want,” Spencer assured you, giving you a goodbye kiss.

“Ready, Jo?” you asked, extending your hand for her to grasp on to.

“Yes, Mommy,” she grabbed your hand.

“Have fun at school and work!” Spencer called out, crouching down and moving Ophelia and Ollie’s little arms as if they were waving goodbye.

-

Your day had gone as well as could be expected. You felt like eventually you would be able to adjust back to your regular work schedule. Spencer’s constant texts throughout the day and the multiple framed family photos that he got you for your office desk definitely helped.

You got home, setting your keys and bag down on the counter next to a takeout bag. Of course, Spencer got you takeout from your favorite restaurant on your first day back because he’s just that sweet.

You hadn’t heard any noise from within the house since you got home so you headed out to the back porch.

You saw Spencer in a hammock tied between two trees in the yard, soaking up the sun. Ollie and Ophelia were sprawled across his chest with a protective arm draped over them and Jo was curled up into his side with his other arm wrapped around her.

You quietly walked over and snapped a picture that definitely would be added to your office desk’s collection before laying down on Spencer’s other side.

He awoke from the rustling you made trying to get yourself settled.

“Why are you crying, love? During our last check-in, you seemed fine,” he whispered concernedly.

“Nothing is wrong, my family is just too cute and my husband is too sweet,” you smiled softly, “Now pass me a baby. You can’t hog them all to yourself.”

in case you missed it, i posted a stand-alone smut one-shot of RF titled ‘All Clear’ but it is not necessary to read to continue the plot of the story and it is strictly 18+

taglist (just ask to be added or removed): @samuel-de-champagne-problems @g0lden-cth @spencerreid9 @averyhotchner @coldlilheart @k-k0129 @ickleronniekinsemotionalrange @harrystylesandthegoobs @cmily @jswessie187 @rem-ariiana @hoodpankow @mochionly @doctorreiding @reidsfish

[atlafan]

Office Neighbors - Part Twelve

a/n: a lot going on, but a happy time all around, enjoy! (reblogs and feedback are super helpful!) not proofread, sorry!

warnings: angst, fluff, smut...the word “homo” is used negatively. If that makes you uncomfortable, then please don’t read, or skip over that scene, you’ll be able to tell it’s coming. 

words: 16K

masterpost

Harry made love to you, quickly, before Andy got home. You both were just getting yourselves cleaned up when you heard the front door open and close.

“Hello?! I thought you guys were going to the pub.” Andy says and you both hustle out of the bedroom. “Did you say yes?”

“I said yes!”

Andy beams at the two of you and rushes over to give you both a hug.

“Congratulations!”

“Thanks, buddy, thought we all could go out and celebrate together.” Harry says. “Wanna go wash up?”

“Yeah!”

The three of you all go to the Thai place for dinner, and then head home to enjoy the ice cream cake. You were beyond excited, and you promised yourself you’d call everyone tomorrow to give them the good news.

“When are you gonna tell Mum?” Andy asks Harry with a mouth full of cake.

“Um, m’not sure yet. I’d like to tell my own mum first.” Harry chuckles. “I’ll have to FaceTime her when I first get up tomorrow.”

“I’m sure we’ll tell your mom soon, Andy.” You smile at him.

“What kind of wedding do you wanan have?”

“Small.” You and Harry say at the same time.

“Just close friends and immediate family.” Harry says.

“I thought girls liked big weddings, though?”

“Not all girls.” You laugh. “I think it’s more special when it’s intimate. When you have giant weddings you care more about making everyone coming happy when the days is supposed to be about you and your partner.”

“What did Phil and Julian do?” Andy asks.

“Oh, they’re not married. They’re in a civil union. They were rings, but they’re not married.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t know.” You shrug. “It just wasn’t something they wanted to do. Not everyone needs to get married. I think it depends on your values and stuff. Your dad and I both really like the idea of marriage, so we’re getting married.” You smile.

Andy nods and continues on with his cake. Later on, after Andy goes to bed, you and Harry find yourselves having a little make out session in bed. You were straddling him, and he had his arms wrapped around you.

“Can I ask you something?” You breathe.

“Yeah.”

“I love the ring, I really do, but…” You bite your bottom lip.

“But what?”

“I just wasn’t expecting it to be so big.”

“That’s what she said.” He bursts out laughing and you roll your eyes with a sigh. “Sorry, I had to.” He strokes your cheek. “I figured that since we won’t be spending a lot on a big weeding that I could go a little extra on the ring.” He pecks your now swollen lips. “I thought you deserved a nice, big rock to go along with my nice, big co-“

“If you finish that sentence I swear to god I will pack up and leave.” Harry laughs and grins at you. “You’re in a goofy mood tonight.” You run a hand through his hair.

“I’m giddy, babe.” He kisses you again. “I’ve never had a fiancé before.”

“Hmm, me neither.” You smirk.

“Look at us, having a real first together.” He boops your nose and you can’t help but giggle. “I love you so much.”

“I love you too.”

You lean back in and lightly bite down on his bottom lip. You suck on it before licking into his mouth. He squeezes your hips before sliding his hands to your ass. One of his hands traces around your stomach and inside your leggings. He tugs on the band of your panties and slips his hand inside there as well. You grunt against his lips, but let him continue. His fingers slide between your folds, and you tug at his hair.

“Sure you’re not too tired for this? You’ve had a long day…” He says as he looks up at you, still feeling around.

“Yes.” You groan. “Then when we’re done I’ll be about ready to pass out.”

“Okay.” He cranes his neck to kiss you, and he slides two fingers inside you.

You gasp into his mouth from the feeling. He drags his fingers in and out of you slowly and rub his thumb over your clit. You rock your hips back and forth at the same pace as his fingers. You grip at his shoulders as it becomes more intense.

“Put one of your hands back in my hair, babe.” He grunts. You were soaking his fingers and he was trying to not lose it in his pants.

You do as he says and get a good grip on his locks and he moans softly. You press your lips back to his, not wanting to be too loud, and continue to ride his fingers. He curls them up and pets them against your front wall and you gasp again. You continue to moan into each other’s mouths as you get closer to your breaking point. The hand you have on his shoulder slides down his torso, and you tug on his jeans.

“No, it’s okay.” He tells you. “This is just about you, Y/N.”

“But it’s gonna hurt if I don’t.” You whimper.

“It’s fine, baby, just wanna get you off.”

He bites your bottom lip and your eyes roll into the back of your head. You come around his fingers and ride out the shocks. He slowly removes his hand from you and he sucks his fingers into his mouth as you catch your breath.

“Harry, are you sure you don’t want me to-“

“No, sweetheart.” He pecks your lips. “You were gone for so long, just missed you.”

You kiss him again and get off of him to go clean yourself up. Truth be told, even if Harry had let you rub and tug at him, he wasn’t sure if he’d be able to come. He was fine earlier, but the conversation during cake was distracting him. How was he going to tell Paige has engaged, and more importantly, how was he going to tell her she wasn’t invited?

//

Harry had sworn Andy to secrecy. He explained he wanted Paige to find out from him. Anne and Gemma were overjoyed with the news, as were your family and friends. You sent them all pictures. You even had Andy take a few pictures of you and Harry together in the backyard as a makeshift engagement shoot, it was fun. Andy blew bubbles to add some aesthetically pleasing effects.

“I swear if he doesn’t go to a college for art, it would be a damn shame.” You say as you look through the pictures. “Might post this one on my insta.” You show Harry a photo of you and him, he was holding you from behind and you both had big smiles on your face.

“Whatever you want, babe.” He kisses your cheek.

“So, there’s something I wanna run by you…” Andy was over at Caroline’s today so it was the perfect time to chat about wedding stuff. You were outside with him as he was gardening.

You enjoyed sitting in a chair while he would tend to the flowers. He always looked so cute with his bucket hat and tools.

“What’s up?” He says, turning to look at you. He takes his hat off and wipes some sweat from his forehead.

“How long do you wanna wait to actually get married? I mean…there’s not rush, but I don’t know if I wanna wait that long.” You look down at your lap and twiddle your thumbs. “I’m one-hundred percent sure about us…”

“So am I.” He scoots over to sit in front of you and he takes your hands in his. “Wouldn’t have proposed if I wasn’t. I just figured we’d be engaged for a while so we weren’t planning while you were working. This is a big year for you.”

“I know…but planning a wedding could be a good distraction for me. It’s like you’re always saying, I probably don’t have a great work-life balance. I could carve out time to work on both.”

“Alright, when are you thinking, then? This spring?”

“I was actually sort of thinking later this fall.” You mumble and look at him. His eyes widen and his mouth suddenly feels dry. “Like beginning of November? I was thinking maybe we could have a really small ceremony at the Boston Commons, and then Julian mentioned on the phone he could get us a deal at the hotel. It would be perfect for your family and whatever friends you’d want to have fly in. He said we could use one of the smaller function rooms for the reception. It’s still warm enough in Boston in November to be able to do something outside too.”

“Would…would just a couple of months be enough time for you to get an outfit together. I know you said you weren’t sure if you wanted to wear a dress, but fittings take time regardless.”

“Honestly, I was thinking of just taking a trip down to Macy’s with Nora and looking at some stuff there. I might wear a dress, but if I see a pantsuit I like I may go for that. I’ll wear white still, I think, I don’t really like the blushes or the peaches…” You try to read his face, which could be very difficult sometimes. “Are you having an internal freak out? Is this all too soon for you?”

“No, not at all…um, people just might think you’re, uh, pregnant since we’re rushing a little.” He swallows. “You’re not pregnant, are you?”

“What? No, I would tell you if I was, babe.” He nods at that. “I just, I mean, it’s nice to be your fiancé, I just can’t wait to be your wife, that’s all.”

His features completely soften. He felt like a puddle of mush. He was so fucking in love with you, and that love, for the first time in his life, was actually being reciprocated. Truth be told, he’d take you right to the courthouse now if he could. He definitely didn’t want a long engagement, he just didn’t want to add to your stress. He stands up and cups your cheeks and presses his lips to yours in a tender kiss.

“Come on, let’s go inside.”

“But you’re gardening.”

“I’ll get back to it in a minute. Let’s go grab my planner and see what weekend could work best in November.”

“You’re serious?!” You nearly squeal as you stand up.

“Yeah.” He smiles. “I wanna be your husband as soon as possible too.”

You wrap your arms around Harry’s neck, and he hugs you back briefly before you go inside. He grabs his planner from up in the loft and you both go into the kitchen to sit at the table to look at it.

“Here.” He taps on a date. “November 6th…”

“Oh, and it’s a Saturday, that’d be perfect, baby.”

“You really wanna get this all together by then? It’s gonna be a lot.”

“Julian’s got my back with the hotel, and Phil said his restaurant could cater the buffet. We’ll save a ton of money. Also, Mark’s part-time job is a DJ, so music is covered too. We just need to get your family here, essentially.”

“What about a honeymoon? Do you wanna take a trip or something?”

“Andy usually goes to Paige’s for Thanksgiving, right?”

“Yeah.”

“So what if we just take that entire week off? We could go somewhere warm if you wanted…or, I mean…I’m sure I’ll be spending the holidays in London with you, we could go on a trip then?”

“No, that’s a family thing, and yeah, you’re definitely coming.” He ponders for a moment. “I think a trip during Thanksgiving week could be fun, actually. You won’t miss your family?”

“I mean, I will, but we’ll see them at the wedding.” You shrug. “I’d much rather take a little vacation with you.”

“Where would wanna go?”

“On a gigantic level if money was no object? I’ve always wanted to go to Greece, but I know that would be tough to swing, especially on such short notice…”

“Hmm.” He puckers his lips in thought. “Yeah, that’s something we should really plan out…maybe we could save that trip for another special time.” You nod at him. “Somewhere warm…oh! What about Florida? That’s a perfect time of year to go, and hurricane season will be over. We could go to Miami or something.”

“I’ve never been to Miami! That would be a lot of fun, there’s so much to do there.”

“Alright, it’s settled then.” He slaps his hand down on his planner playfully. “We’ll get married in on the 6th, and then we’ll go on our honeymoon during Thanksgiving. I’m a master at planning flights, so let me take care of that, yeah? If Phil could get us a menu or something I’d like to do a tasting…”

“Agreed.” You were smiling ear to ear. “Oh my god, we just set a date!” You squeal and throw your arms around him. “I love you.” You kiss him. “I love you so much.” You kiss him again.

“I love you too, baby.” He kisses you. “Now, let me go back to tending to my flowers, I’ll be pissed if my roses get fucked up.”

He gets up and you can’t help but giggle at him.

//

It was time for the annual back to school shopping trip. You stayed back since it was a tradition for Andy to go with just his parents. You didn’t mind. Andy not only needed new school supplies, but he needed some new clothes as well. He had grown another few inches over the summer. His doctor thinks he’s going to be about six feet by the time he’s a sophomore in high school. Harry and Paige decide to meet up at Old Navy for the shopping spree.

“Okay, Mum and I are going to hang by the changing rooms. You can go around the store on your own, look for sales, and then you will try on the clothes for us.” Harry says firmly.

“Fine, but no coming into the room with me.” Andy mutters. “It’s embarrassing.” His voice cracks slightly and then he clears his throat.

“So you want me to tug on your jeans out in the open? Alright.” Paige shrugs.

Andy makes an exasperated noise and walks away, making Harry and Paige laugh. The two make their way to go sit at the chairs outside the changing rooms.

“I’m surprised you’re not looking around yourself.” Harry says to her.

“I have plenty of clothes.” She chuckles.

“Listen, uh, while he’s busy looking at clothes, there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you.” He takes out his phone and shows Paige his lock screen, which was now a picture of you two kissing, and you were cupping Harry’s cheek with your left hand to showcase the ring. Andy had given you about two seconds to stage the photo.

“Um…why are you showing me a picture of you two kissing?”

“Look closer, at her hand.” He sighs.

Paige squints and then gasps, putting a hand over her mouth.

“Oh! You…you proposed to her already? That’s great! Congratulations.” She moves to hug him, but he shakes his head no.

“We’re in public.” He mumbles. “Anyways, yeah, we’re engaged now.”

“That’s incredible, I’m really happy for you.” She gives him a sincere smile. “Andy knows?”

“Yeah.”

“When did you do it?”

“A week or so ago.”

“And you’re just telling me now?”

“No offense, but you weren’t exactly top of my list of people to tell immediately. I was waiting until I saw you for this. We’ve been busy figuring things out. What Andy doesn’t know is that we’ve set a date already. We plan to tell him later. We wanted to make sure everything could happen where we want it before we started telling people.”

“Holy shit, you already set a date?” She puffs out some air from her lips. “Well, that’s great. When is it? I’ll put it in my phone now.”

“You don’t need to do that.” He puts his hand over hers to stop her from taking her phone out. “We’re keeping it really small.”

“So?”

“So…immediate family and close friends only at the ceremony and then a few extra friends at the ceremony.” She gives him a confused look. “You…you’re not invited.”

Before she has a chance to react Andy comes over holding a pile of clothes.

“Do I need to try every little thing on? Or is one outfit okay?”

“One, um, one outfit’s fine.” Paige says. “Go on.”

“Mum, are you okay, you look pale?”

“The, uh, leather from the shoe section is wafting over here and it’s giving me a headache. I’m fine, baby, go try your things on.” They watch Andy go into the dressing room, and she turns to look at Harry. “Alright, run that by me again.”

“You heard me the first time.” He says quietly. “You may have wanted me at yours, but I don’t want you at mine. Do you know how embarrassing it was to be put at the old college buddy table?”

“I thought you’d feel more comfortable there! Where did you want me to put you?”

“How about with my son?!”

“Okay.” Andy says coming out in a tee shirt and jeans. “Tug away if you must. They fit really well, though.” Paige huffs and stands up to check out the clothes. She tugs on the waist of Andy’s jeans and nods. “Can we go to the shoe store after? I was thinking I could get some boots for fall.”

“What kind of boots?” Paige asks. “You have two sets of snow boots, and rain boots already.”

“Like…like the boots Dad wears.”

“I can order you some online, I get them from a shop in London.” Harry says. “I like this outfit on you, go ahead and change and then we can check out.”

“I don’t know why you thought now would be a good time to bring this up to me.” She says. “You’re really hurting my feelings, Har.” She says quietly as Andy goes to change.

“I knew I’d be seeing you.” He shrugs. “I…I can’t keep doing this with you.”

“Doing what?”

“Pretending like we’re best friends who hooked up once and accidentally got pregnant. We were in a relationship for two years, and then you decided to walk away. Fine. We see each other and do this co-parenting for Andy. I feel like I leaned on you for a long time because you were around, but I have someone else in my life now to fill the hole you created.” He runs a hand through his hair and blinks a couple of tears away. “You have no idea how hard it was to sit there and watch you walk down an aisle that didn’t lead towards me.”

“Harry, I-“

“Okay, all set.” Andy says. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, it’s my allergies, let’s go checkout.”

“Can we get lunch before we go to Staples?” He asks, and Harry and Paige look at each other.

“I don’t have time for that, honey.” Paige says. “Um, are you starving? I could get you a pretzel for a snack?”

“Okay.” Andy shrugs.

Paige and Harry split the payment for the clothes. Andy carries his bags out of the store, and Paige pulls Harry to walk next to her, behind Andy.

“This conversation isn’t over.” She says quietly to him. “Clearly you’ve been keeping some things buried and we need to hash it out.”

“Fine, but I’m not changing my mind about the wedding.”

The rest of the afternoon Harry and Paige said about two words together. She hugs Andy goodbye before she gets into her own car. Andy climbs into the back seat of the car.

“Hey, Dad?”

“Yeah?”

“When can I start sitting in the front seat?”

“Hm, I don’t know, they change the safety ages all the time. When you’re thirteen I think? I can check when we get home.”

“Okay.” Andy picks at his bottom lip, a habit he picked up from Harry. “Is everything okay between you and Mum?”

“Never better, why?”

“Things just seemed weird with you both today.” Harry sighs at that. He’s not sure how honest he should be with Andy about all this.

“I told her about my engagement, and she was really happy for Y/N and I…but then I told her we set a date.”

“You did?! When?!”

“A couple of days ago, please act surprised, Y/N and I wanted to tell you together.”

“Okay.”

“So, Mum wanted to know when the date was, and I told her she didn’t need to worry about it because…I wouldn’t be inviting her.”

“But she invited you to hers, how does that make sense?”

“Andy.” Harry sighs again. “I only went to hers because of you. I wanted to see you all dolled up and walk her down the aisle. I also knew she just needed a little extra support because of Gramp not physically being there.”

“I’m…really confused…I thought you were, like, friends.”

“I know, it doesn’t make a lot of sense. Mum and I are friends, but sometimes she acts like we’re best friends, and it makes things difficult for me. I think she forgets that she…that she broke my heart, and that since it’s been so long it shouldn’t matter anymore, and I should just be over it, and I am, in a way, but I don’t like getting too comfortable with her.” Harry pulls into the garage and turns the car off. He turns to look at Andy. “I know you don’t know the full story, and you don’t really need to. Mum and I are okay, you don’t have anything to worry about, alright?” Andy nods at him. “Good, now, let’s go inside, Y/N will want to see all your new things.”

Andy acted as surprised and excited as he could when you and Harry told him about the date for the wedding. He was shocked that it was happening so soon, but happy for the both of you. He was excited to be a part of another wedding since his mother’s ended up being so much fun.

“Will I be allowed to bring friends?” Andy asks.

“You can bring one friend.” Harry says. “That’ll be fun, a little sleepover in a hotel.”

“Yeah! Wait, the Ariana Grande concert is in November…”

“No worries, Andy, it won’t conflict with anything.” Your assure him.

“Okay good.” He sighs with relief. “Caroline’s coming with me to that, so I guess I’ll invite Brandon to the wedding.”

“We’ll make sure to put you both in a suite with Grammy and Auntie Gem. You, Brandon, Ritchie, and Lizzie can all have your own party.”

“Cool.” Andy smiles. “I’m really happy for the both of you.” He gives you both a hug, and then goes into his room to put his things away.

“Well, he’s certainly handling things better than when Paige got engaged.”

“I think this is different with him. He had her to himself his whole life, and then all of a sudden he didn’t. I’d probably be resentful too, but he said he had a really great summer with Noah and Rachel, and that’s all that matters to me.” He looks back towards Andy’s room. “Can we go chat up in the loft?”

“Yeah.” You follow Harry upstairs.

“Just wanted some privacy, um, I told Paige we were engaged today.”

“Oh! How did she take it?”

“Good…at first.”

“What happened?”

“I told her we had set a date already, and she wanted to know what it was, and I told her it didn’t matter because she wasn’t invited.”

“And you thought a good time to have that conversation was while you were clothes shopping with your son?” You ask flatly.

“Everyone’s always telling me to rip the band aid, so I did.” He huffs. “We’re meeting tomorrow to talk more, she’s not happy with me right now, I sort of started to tell her off, but she just wasn’t understanding.”

“What else is there to talk about?”

“She seems to think we need to hash some things out, or whatever.”

“Well, there’s clearly some unresolved shit buried between the two of you. Where are you going to meet her?”

“For coffee in the morning…are you alright with that?”

“Yeah, I can hang out one on one with Andy for a bit. We can watch TV and eat pancakes.” You smile.

“You’re amazing, you know that?” He takes your hands in his. “I hate that I even have to deal with this bullshit.”

“Harry…” You nuzzle your nose to his. “It’s okay.” He pecks your lips and sighs.

“Thank you for always being so cool about all this. I don’t know I’d do if you were a classic psycho.” He laughs.

“Oh, I’m plenty psycho, just not about stuff like this.” You smirk and kiss his cheek as he laughs more. “This isn’t something I have much control over, you know? It is what it is.”

//

Harry wasn’t really looking forward to coffee with Paige, but he gets up and goes like he said he would. She was there waiting for him already, sipping on a piping cup of tea. He sees that there’s a second cup on the table already.

“Hi.” He says.

“Hey.” She says. “I got yours…black coffee.”

“Thanks.” He sighs and sits down.

“Okay.” She sighs. “I don’t want this turning into something heated, I think we can both have a mature discussion, we’re adults.”

“Right.”

“What you said to me yesterday, I…I didn’t realize you were still harboring those kinds of feelings. It’s been so long, Harry, I thought you were over all of it.”

“I am.” He says as he sips his coffee. “But I can’t help it when memories come back and I’m reminded that I wasn’t good enough to be the one to put on a wedding for.”

“We would have just gotten divorced, and you know it.”

“Did you ever even love me?”

“Of course I did! I just thought it was puppy love, infatuation…lust.” She chews her inner cheek. “I didn’t think I’d be spending the rest of my life with you, I was twenty-one years old! I still wanted my life to be my own. We had an accident, a happy one, and I don’t regret a thing, I love Andy with every fiber of my being, and I’m happy you’re his father.” She looks away and then back at Harry. “We wanted different things, Har.”

“No, we didn’t.”

“You wanted to get married and have more kids, did you not?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I didn’t.” She says bluntly. “I certainly didn’t want to have more kids.” She scoffs.

“But you’re such a good mum!”

“It’s my choice! I never wanted to have kids!” Harry’s eyes widen at that.

“Then why did you?”

“Because…because when I looked at all of my options, I just couldn’t…I don’t know, I looked at it as fate or something, like I was meant to have Andy or something. It was a perfect storm, Har, the condom broke, and it never had before, and I gotten off the pill. I was supposed to be Andy’s mom, and that was plenty. You deserve to be with someone who wants the same things as you. Part of why I ended up with Noah is because I knew he didn’t want more kids either. I also like that he’s older, but that’s a whole mixed bag that I won’t get into.”

“Right, because I’ll always be the immature punk?”

“You’re a fucking year younger than me, get over yourself.” She rolls her eyes. “You really don’t want me at your wedding?”

“No.” He sips his coffee. “The last thing I want to think about that day is you. It was nice of you to invite me to yours, and because of Andy and Y/N I went. If I didn’t have her I honestly don’t think I would’ve gone. I’m sick of carrying around all of this baggage, Paige. I’ve known you for fifteen years, or at least close to it, and I feel lucky that we don’t fucking hate each other, but we need to distance ourselves more.”

“How do you want to do that?”

“No more family vacations.” She frowns at that. “You can use the cabin whenever you want, I don’t care about that, but Andy’s not a baby anymore, we don’t need to do every little thing together like we were doing. Unless it’s his birthday or a holiday, we don’t need to do something as all of us together. I feel like we lean on each other for things more often than we should because we were such good friends at one point, but you have a husband now…you don’t need me.” He swallows. “And I don’t need you.”

“I see.”

“Do you? I feel like you live in a fantasy world sometimes, and I enable it to not make waves. You never ask if something is awkward for me, or-“

“So if we have a party or something on the boat for Labor Day, you wouldn’t come to something like that?”

“I don’t know.” He shrugs. “I’d have to ask my fiancé about how she would feel.”

“I just think it’s important to make memories with Andy with the two of us so he has that when he’s older.”

“And I agree with you. I’d like to continue doing our annual back to school shopping spree, and similar traditions. I think we’re really good co-parents, Paige, but that’s where it needs to end with us.” She blinks some tears away and then she chuckles.

“Feels like you’re breaking up with me. Must feel good.” She smirks.

“It does, in fact.” He smirks back at her. “You do understand where I’m coming from, though, right?”

“Yeah, I do.” She sighs. “I’m so sorry if I’ve been making things difficult for so long. I felt like because I left I needed to make sure you were okay, and that’s why I made sure to keep you so involved with everything. I wanted you to feel like family since yours is so far away.”

“And I appreciate that! Really, I do. I think for a while that worked for us, and maybe I was sort of relying on it because I was so focused on work, and I wasn’t really meeting people I wanted to date for long periods of time, but Y/N…she’s changed everything for me.” He takes a deep breath. “For so long I felt like I was never going to fall in love again, and that I somehow fucked up and missed my chance at having the love of my life, but I don’t believe that anymore. She’s the absolute love of my life, Paige.”

“I’ve never wanted anything more for you, Harry, please know that. I never wanted to hurt you, and I know it hurt like hell when I ended it. I knew things would work out for you eventually. I’ve loved seeing you so happy. You’ve got a pep to your step again.” She smiles. “Just like you used to.”

“So, we’re on the same page then…about us sticking to more boundaries?”

“Yeah.” She nods. “I think it’s for the best all around.” She sips her tea. “Will you at least send me pictures? I wanna see what Andy’s going to wear and all that. Oh!” She goes into her bag. “I don’t know if you want these, but I have some photos from the wedding. Ones with all of us, our friends, and a cute picture of you, Y/N, and Andy.” She takes out a baggie of pictures for Harry.

“Thank you, I do want these, actually. And I’ll make sure we send you pictures.” He smiles.

“Okay.” She smiles back. “Well, I’m glad we could just get it all out there and clear the air a bit.”

“I’m sorry I brought it all up while we were shopping with him, it wasn’t great timing.”

“It’s alright, I would have probably done the same thing if I were in your shoes.”

“While I have you…Andy asked me when he could start sitting in the front…”

“He did?!”

“Yeah, I told him I’d look it up. It’s thirteen, right?”

“I have no clue, those safety regulations change all the time. I’d say thirteen is good.”

“He’s gonna be so annoyed.” Harry chuckles.

“Just wait for him to bring it up again, and then tell him we said thirteen.” She crosses her arms. “And if he pulls some bullshit with you like he did with phone, you just send him to me and I’ll straighten his ass out.” She smirks.

“We’re excellent parents.”

//

With everything officially smoothed over with Paige, it was easy living for Harry. He was proud of himself for finally just laying it all out there. It made him much more chipper during syllabus week. It took your classes about two minutes into your lectures to realize the rock on your finger was an engagement ring, and many of your students squealed and congratulated you. Many that came by to see Harry congratulated him as well.

“Hey.” You say as you slip into his office, closing the door behind you and leaning against it. “Got a second?”

“Course, darling, what’s up?”

“Are we inviting our colleagues?” You whisper.

“To what?” You roll your eyes at him. “Ohhhh, our wedding.” He smirks.

“You’re not funny.”

“And yet, here we are, engaged.” He grins.

“Not for long.” You cross your arms.

“Alright, alright, don’t get your knickers in a twist. Would you like to invite them?”

“I mean…maybe to the reception? I really do want to keep the ceremony small.”

“I think we should invite them to the reception, yeah. They’ve been a part of our love story since the beginning, babe.”

“Especially Janette.” Harry nods at you. “Okay, so it seems like we’ll need to order some very specific invitations.” You chew your bottom lip.

“Y/N.” He hums. “This is supposed to be fun, remember?”

“It is!”

“You’re getting stressed.”

“I’m not!” He gives you an unconvinced look. “It’s the good kind of stress. The more we do, the more we get to check off, and then there’s no stress. I’m going shopping with Nora in a couple of weeks, I can’t wait.”

“Are you going to have a bach-“ There’s a knock on his door, and you open it.

“Oh…sorry to interrupt.” Andre blushes.

“You’re not!” You say. “We were just discussing, um, something not work related, I’ll just go.” You slip out.

“She can be a bit squirrelly sometimes.” Andre chuckles and Harry hums his response.

“What’s up?”

“Got an overload request from one of my students, and you’re his advisor so I need your signature.”

“Ah.” Harry waves him over and he signs the form. “They should really make these paperless so it’s les work.”

“I know, an email could easily suffice, thanks.”

Harry gets up and goes into your office, he closes the door and sits down in one of your chairs.

“Yes?” You chuckle.

“Has your hand been hurting at the end of the day?”

“No, why would it?”

“Well, it’s got so much extra weight on it now, I wanted to make sure.” He smirks, and you sigh heavily as you look at him. “Anyways, I was going to ask you if you plan to have a bachelorette party.”

“Oh, of course I do. Nora’s gonna plan the whole thing. We were thinking over Indigenous People’s Day weekend since most people will have that Monday off, do a long weekend type thing.”

“What do you think you’ll do?”

“Bar hop most likely.” You shrug. “Dance, drink, that sort of stuff. Are you going to have a bachelor party?”

“I don’t know who I’d have it with…” He twiddles his thumbs. “My two best mates live overseas, and I don’t want to ask them to fly twice, that would be insane.”

“So have them fly in a few days early and do something fun with them then. Our parties don’t need to be on the same day, you know? I’m sure we’ll be having lots of little parties between now and then.”

“True, Lucas sent us two different calendar invites.” He chuckles as he stands up. “Just promise me something?”

“Anything.”

“No strippers.” You burst out laughing at that. “Or exotic dancers.”

“What century are you living in?!” You wipe a tear away. “Harry, the only man I want giving me a lap dance is you, okay?” He nods as you bite your bottom lip.

“What?”

“Would you ever give me one? Do a little strip tease?”

“Maybe on our honeymoon.” He turns to walk towards your door, and then he looks at you over his shoulder. “And only if you’re a good girl.”

A chill goes up your spine as he leaves your office.

“What a fucking menace.” You say to yourself as you try to shake his words off.

//

Seventh grade was off to an interesting start. Harry annoyed Andy by taking first day of school pictures before he dropped him off. It was a new hallway and a new locker to get used to. Mostly everyone he had homeroom with the year prior was in his homeroom again. He noticed that some people had gotten taller, some voices had gotten deeper, some people’s skin had started to break out, and some of the girls looked…fuller. Andy hadn’t really noticed the changes amongst himself or his friends. Caroline was still as sweet as ever, but she did tell him in confidence that she started getting her period, so if sometimes she got snappy with him that may be why. Andy knew he had gotten a little taller, and he knew his voice was starting to crack, but he was thankful nothing else had really seemed to change.

He walks into his new homeroom, and sits down. Every year it was the same thing. The teacher would ask everyone their named, they’d give out locker information, and then the school handbook. Brandon comes in and sets next to Andy. This year Andy’s homeroom teacher was a science teacher, so it was all bench seating with two to a table.

“Hey.” Brandon yawns. “It’s crazy, every year I think I can get up early for school no problem, but here I am, running late.” He rolls his eyes.

“My dad makes me go to sleep and get up early at least a week before school starts. It’s annoying, but it helps.”

“It’ll only get worse, too.” Caroline says as she sits down with Tyler at the bench next to him. All of the tables were set up around the perimeter of the room. Andy was happy he’d be sitting next to his two best friends. “My sisters get up at 5:30 in the morning just to get ready for school.”

“Shit, why that early?” Brandon asks her.

“Shower, hair, makeup, and breakfast that my mom forces us to eat.”

“Luckily, we don’t have that problem.” Tyler says. “We can just roll out of bed.”

“Speak for yourself.” Andy scoffs. “I have to get up early to do my hair.” He runs a hand through it. Brandon smirks and ruffles Andy’s hair. “Quit it!” Andy giggles, and does the same to Brandon.

“You quit it.” Brandon giggles, and the two smile at each other.

After homeroom, it turns out Andy and Caroline have math together, and the teacher says they can sit where they like. They sit next to each other, and she smiles at him.

“What?”

“You know, you never told me what happened with you and Brandon after I left the wedding.”

“That’s because nothing happened.”

“So you didn’t dance with him?”

“No, we danced, but that was it…his dad called to tell him to be ready.”

“And nothing happened later on? I mean you both hang out all the time.”

“The timing just hasn’t been right.” Andy shrugs. “Playing basketball and skateboarding isn’t exactly romantic, Caroline…” He mutters.

“Sure it can! Remember when you were showing me? You had to put your hands on my hips and hold my hands.”

“That was so you wouldn’t fall!” He blushes. Andy remembers that day really well, and even though he asked Caroline first if he could touch her, he definitely enjoyed being able to show her a thing or two.

“Mhm, sure.” She smiles. “All I’m saying is, anything could be turned into a date.”

“Well…you know how my dad and Y/N are getting married in a couple of months?” She nods yes. “It’s gonna be in Boston, and I wanna invite him. They said I could have one friend come.”

“Oh, that’ll be great! I bet-“

“Alright, class, settle down. I’m hoping you all did your summer math work as we will be going over that after I take attendance. Welcome to pre-algebra.” The teacher says and everyone gets quiet. “Once we’re done with that, I’m going to give you all a pre-test to see what you remember.” The majority of the class groans. “I know, I know, a test on the first day, but it’s just for me to see how I can best help you.”

Andy takes his planner out and flips through a few months.

“What are you doing?” Caroline whispers.

“Counting down the days until art starts.” He side eyes her and she has to bite back a laugh.

After school, Brandon and Andy stand together as they wait for their rides. It was only a half day, but they were both exhausted.

“I’m really glad we have science and history together.” Brandon says to him.

“Me too. I have some classes with Caroline and Tyler too.”

“Same here. And there’s gym too for all of us at least.”

“I’m just glad we’ll still be able to call each other to do homework. I’d be really lost without you, B.”

Brandon smiles at Andy, and before Andy can say something else, he sees your car pull up. The boys say goodbye, and Andy climbs into the backseat.

“How was your first day?” You say to him.

“Okay.” He shrugs. “I think math is gonna be tough this year.”

“Well, lucky for you I’m pretty good at math, so don’t be afraid to ask me for help.”

“Thanks, Y/N. Is Dad teaching?”

“Yup, he’s in the middle of class. He’ll be able to get you tomorrow.” She grins. “I thought we could be a little adventurous and go to McDonald’s for lunch.”

“Dad doesn’t let me go there…”

“Well, you’re not with Dad, are you?”

“Can you even get anything there?”

“There’s a flurry and a large fry calling my name.”

“Y/N?”

“Yeah?”

“You’re the best.”

//

Harry comes back from his class to see Andy sitting in his office. He was munching on some apple slices.

“Hey, buddy, how was school?”

“Good.”

“Did you have anything for lunch, or do you need some money?”

“No, Y/N took me to get something to eat quick.”

“Yeah?” Harry smiles. “What did you have?”

“Um…well…I don’t wanna get her in trouble…” He swallows his last apple slice as Harry furrows his brows at him.

“What do you mean?”

“She took me to McDonalds.”

“Andy.” Harry sighs. “Why would you ask her to take you there when you know I don’t want you eating that stuff?”

“She asked me! I told her you didn’t really like it, but she said it would be fine. I didn’t even get fries! I got a happy meal with apple slices.”

“That burger is gonna sit like a rock in your stomach.”

“I got chicken nuggets.” He mumbles.

“Whatever.” Harry huffs and sits down. “Your classes went alright?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.”

Later that night as you were getting ready for bed, you could tell Harry was a little tense. You brush your teeth and look at him through the mirror.

“Any particular reason why you’re staring?” He asks as he spits the mouthwash he was swishing into the sink. He turns around to look at you.

“I’m just trying to read you. You’ve been sort of quiet today. Are you alright?”

Harry crosses his arms and looks at you intensely. You hated it when he looked at you like this. His features were hard, and he just looked intimidating.

“Why did you take Andy to McDonalds after he told you I don’t like him eating there?”

“Are you serious?” You laugh. “I just wanted to have a little fun with him.”

“By undermining me? Didn’t we have a chat about this, like, a long time ago when I did it to you? And that was by accident, you did this on purpose.”

“You act like my intention was malicious. What’s the big deal? We eat out all the time?”

“Yeah, we get pizza from the place downtown that uses locally sourced ingredients, or we get Thai food. Not fucking-“

“He got chicken nuggets and apple slices, it’s not like he pigged out.”

“Because he knows better.”

“You know, you never exactly told me he couldn’t eat there.”

“Well, he told you, and you went anyways.”

You had a couple of options here. You could easily argue with him. You could tell him how stupid it was to be upset over something like this, but if you did that you wouldn’t be validating his feelings. So, you swallow your pride.

“I’m sorry.”

“No you’re not.” He scoffs.

“Harry.”

“You’re only saying that because you don’t want me to be upset anymore.”

“You’ve been keeping this bottled up all day.” You sigh.

“Because I didn’t want to talk about it in front of him.” He looks away.

“Say it, Harry.”

“Say what?” He looks at you again.

“Tell me he’s your kid and not mine, and that I had no right to just change the rules.”

“Y/N.”

“It’s okay, that’s what you’re thinking, right? It’s not like that’s false. He’s your kid, and I’m his buddy. Maybe that’s all I’ll ever be to him, but someday you and I are gonna have a baby, and I’d like to treat that eventual kid once in a while with some fast food.”

“I guess we can cross that bridge when we come to it.” He plucks at his bottom lip. “You’re more than just a buddy to him, you have to know that. That’s not what I was trying to say, I just wished you had asked me first.”

“You were in class! I just, ugh, I had a craving for fries and ice cream, I really am sorry.”

“A craving, huh?”

“Don’t even go there. You never crave food?”

“Sure, I crave things all the time, doesn’t mean I always indulge.”

“I won’t take your son there again, okay?”

“Stop it.” He puts his hands on your shoulders. “He’s yours too. And maybe I should have told you I didn’t want me ingesting that crap.” You roll your eyes at that. “But I know he sees you as a mom.”

“I mean, one time he told me I’d make a good one, but-“

“He referred to you as ‘Mum’ once.”

“He did?! When?”

“When we went to Boston over April vacation, when I had to put him to bed…he said he was having fun with me and ‘Mum’…he was like half asleep, but still.”

“Maybe he just got me confused with Paige.”

“No, baby, he knew who he was talking about.” Harry hugs you, and cups your jaw. “He loves you and he knows you love him too, and I love knowing that you two are bonding. Take him to Sub Way next time, yeah?”

“Okay.” You smile and he kisses you. “I really am sorry, I didn’t think you’d be so upset.”

“It’s alright…we’re on the same page now, right?”

“Yeah.”

He nods and lets you go. You both get into bed and curl up with each other. You turn over to face him, and you nuzzle into his chest. He holds you close to him and strokes your back. He kisses your forehead and basically lulls you to sleep. Times like this you didn’t mind being babied at all.

//

“Look at that size of that thing!” Nora exclaims when she meets you at the mall in Manchester to go shopping. “Makes sense that he got you something so massive. Big dick, big ring.”

“Nora!” You squeal and nudge her. “Shh, come on, let’s go look at clothes.”

“Still thinking you might wanna do a suit?”

“Yeah, I feel like I’ll be the most comfortable in that. I feel like I’ll just look classy, you know?”

“You’ll look stunning.”

You both walk through Macy’s and look at all of the options. The pants were the easiest part. A high-waist pair of slacks would look gorgeous, it was finding the right top. You didn’t want to wear a body suit or a corset.

“Oh! What about this?” Nora says, waiving you over. “It’s lace, so it’ll add some texture.”

“It’s beautiful. I like the spaghetti straps. Let’s see if it works with the pants and blazer.”

“And the heels. You’re gonna be a show stopper.” You both giggle and go into the dressing room. You try everything on and step out. “It’s gorgeous, it’s so you in every way.”

“You think so?” You bite your bottom lip. “I think a bun and a veil will look great with it. I love it.”

“Harry really doesn’t care you won’t be in a dress?”

“Nah, I was actually thinking of changing into a short dress for the reception. Something simple.”

“Oh! I saw a cute short, white dress out there. Let me go grab it. It had a high neckline, but it was open in the back.”

“That sounds perfect!”

You buy everything, and have them put into nice dress bags. You and Nora decide to grab a bite to eat.

“So…can I ask you something?” Nora says to you.

“Of course.”

“Not that I’m not over the moon happy for you, but is there a reason you’re getting married so fast? I know you’ve known for a couple of years, and things are different at our age, but…you’re barely going to enjoy your engagement.”

“I’m enjoying it plenty, trust me. I just didn’t want to wait until after I got my doctorate, you know? I…I wanna start trying for a kid as soon as I get my degree, and I told him I didn’t care if we were married or not, but I think I do care. I wanna be married and have that extra security if I’m going to have a baby with someone. We love each other, why wait?”

“And he’s okay with all this?”

“Yeah! I think sometimes it’s tough for him to accept how much I wanna be with him because of his ex, but he’s coming around. He’s really excited. I mean, I am too. I’m finally going to meet his family in person, and his two best friends.”

“Maybe one of them will fall in love with me, and I’ll have my own British man to sweep me off my feet.”

“One of them’s Irish.”

“Mm, even better.”

You both laugh and continue eating before you part ways. Harry had taken Andy out for the day, so you were able to slip inside and hide your new things in the back of your closet.

//

“Dad, today was awesome!”

“Yeah, wasn’t too embarrassing going bowling with your old man?”

“No way, we haven’t gone in forever, it was fun. And I broke my high score on the pinball machine.” Andy was biting into a slice of pizza while Harry was sitting across from him smiling, resting his chin in his palm. “It’s kind of like when I used to just see you on the weekends.”

“Yeah, I really was your classic weekend dad, huh?” He chuckles.

“No, weekend dads let you eat candy until your teeth rot out and let you stay up really late. You still made me follow all of Mum’s rules.”

“Because I respect her, and she respects me.” Harry sits up straight. “Listen, there’s something I wanna ask you.”

“What’s up?” Andy wipes his mouth with a napkin and looks at Harry.

“Well…I was chatting with Uncle Niall and Uncle Louis the other day about the wedding. They’re itching to know who my best man is going to be.”

“That’s gotta be hard to choose between the two of them. You guys are like the three musketeers.”

“We are! But my choice is pretty easy because I don’t want it to be either of them. See, there’s this other man in my life I think would make a lot more sense to be my best man.”

“Really, who?” Harry grins at Andy and his eyes widen. “Me?!”

“Yes, you. No one else felt right.”

“So, will my suit be different that the others?”

“Of course.”

“Can I have my nails done the same as you?”

“You really want to?”

“Yeah…I wanna get into painting them more. I think it would be cool if we matched.”

“Definitely.”

“I’m really excited, Dad, thanks…this means a lot to me.”

“It means a lot to me that you wanna do it. You’re really becoming a nice young man, Andy.”

Andy gets up and hugs his dad. Today was a really good day. He can’t wait to tell you the good news when he gets in.

“Babe! We’re home!” Harry says as him and Andy get inside.

“Well, if it isn’t my two favorite guys.” You smile as you come down from the loft. You kiss Harry’s cheek and give Andy a hug.

“I take it the shopping went well?” Harry asks.

“Very well, so no snooping through my closet.” You say firmly.

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Y/N, guess what?” Andy says.

“What?”

“I’m gonna be Dad’s best man.” He beams at you.

“That’s amazing!” You hug the both of them again. “It’s all coming together.”

//

“Andy, if you move, I’m gonna mess it up.” You tell him as you paint his nails black. He asks you to leave his pinkies purple.

“Sorry.” He watches you. “You don’t think I’m gonna get made fun of, do you?”

“Lots of guys are painting their nails nowadays. Just look at your dad, no one makes fun of him.”

“Yeah, but he’s big and strong, and could knock someone’s lights out.”

You swallow at that. It was true. Harry was a boxer, and if he really wanted to, he could beat the shit out of someone.

“You know violence isn’t the answer.”

“I know…I’m just not as intimidating as he can be.”

“You have his eyes, you just need to learn how to stare someone down the way he does and you’re golden.” You wink at him and he chuckles. “Are you really nervous about someone making fun of you?”

“I don’t know.” He shrugs. “Wearing a bandana or clipping back my hair is one thing, I just don’t wanna come off…girly.”

“I take offense to that. I’m a girl, what’s wrong with looking like me?”

“I guess nothing.”

“I’ll paint mine just like yours, would you like that?”

“Yeah, thanks, Y/N.”

You and Andy had gotten into the habit of nail time. Harry would sometimes join in, which was fun, but it was something the two of you could do together. It was a Sunday evening ritual. Andy’s friends loved the different combinations he would go with. Andy blushed when Brandon held his hand to look over a design you had managed to get on his thumb one day.

Then one day during locker break, Andy was switching some books out that he wouldn’t need for the afternoon. There weren’t a lot of people around.

“Hey, Styles.” A boy, Greg, and some other boys come over to him.

“Oh, hey, Greg.” Greg slams Andy’s locker shit. “Um, I wasn’t finished in there…” He goes to turn his combination but Greg grabs his hand. “You better not have this when basketball season starts back up.”

“What do you care?” Andy yanks his hand away. “Don’t like it, don’t paint your nails.”

Greg looks at his friends and laughs before shoving Andy up against the lockers.

“What are you, a girl now? Is Andy short for Andrea?” Greg smirks.

“Obviously not, you idiot.” Andy huffs. “Let me go, Greg.”

“Make me.” He shoves Andy harder against the lockers. Andy tries to give him his most intimidating gaze, but it’s not doing much for him. “You know what else makes you a girl? You like boys, Andrea.”

“Don’t call me that! And who even told you that?”

“It’s so obvious you have a thing for Brandon. You two are always all over each other.”

“What do you care?!”

“It’s annoying to watch.”

“Hey! Let him go!” Brandon comes racing down the hall and yanks Greg away from Andy. “What is the matter with you?!” He shoves Greg.

“Oh, look, your boyfriend came to your rescue, how nice.”

Before he has a chance to say or do anything, Andy watches as Brandon’s fist connects with Greg’s jaw, causing Greg to fall to the ground.

“Boys! What is going on out here?!” One of the teachers says as she rushes to the scene. “Principal’s office, now!”

Andy and Brandon look at each other, and then make their way down the hall. They sit on a bench outside the principal’s office to wait their turn. Greg had to be brought to the nurse.

“Why did you do that?” Andy whispers.

“He was being an asshole, obviously. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine…he was being really…homophobic…” He shakes his head. “I didn’t think people were still like that.”

“Well, they are, and it’s scary.”

“Maybe I should stop painting my nails.” Andy looks down at his hands.

“No!” Brandon puts his hand over one of Andy’s. “I really like it on you. You rock it. You’re, like, so cool.”

The boys are both called in to give their side of the story, and then Greg is brought it. When they all come out, Andy’s eyes widen when he sees everyone’s parents in the lobby. You, Harry, Paige, and Noah were all trying to keep cool as you chatted with Mr. and Mrs. Stewart. Greg’s father was keeping to himself.

“Andy!” Harry yelps and rushes over to him. “Are you alright?” He puts his hands on Andy to check him over.

“I’m fine, can you stop?”

“Honey, what happened? We got a call that you were in a fight.” Paige says.

“Excuse me.” Principal Morrison comes out of his office. “If all the adults would like to come in.” He sighs. You and Noah start to walk forward. “Just biological parents please.”

“Principal Morrison, that’s my step-dad, and my almost step-mom, they can both go in.” Andy says.

“Andy, it’s fine, we’ll wait out here with you.” You tell him.

Harry nods at you and goes into the office with the other parents.

“Right, well, it seems that Greg picked a fight with Andy, and Brandon stepped in when he saw what was happening. Greg said some hurtful things to Andy.” Principal Morrison explains.

“Like what?” Harry asks.

“Apparently he started calling him Andrea, and was making fun of his nail polish.”

“Well, there you go then.” Mr. Foley, Greg’s father, says.

“Excuse me?” Paige says.

“What’s a boy wearing nail polish for?”

“Um…” Harry holds up his hands. “It’s pretty common, mate.”

“It’s not like Brandon to be violent.” Mrs. Stewart says.

“He seemed to be defending Andy.” Principal Morrison says.

“It’s not common, actually, it’s odd.” Mr. Foley says. “Boys shouldn’t be painting their nails. I see how your boys are at basketball, it’s inappropriate.”

“They’re best friends.” Mr. Stewart says. “They’re close, there’s nothing wrong with that.”

“They seem a little too close if you ask me.” Mr. Foley scoffs.

“Well, none of that should be any of your concern.” Harry says. “What my concern is,” he steps forward, “is that you seem to be teaching your son it’s okay to bully other people for being a little outside the box, and it’s borderline homophobic.”

“Maybe don’t raise a homo then.” Mr. Foley says bluntly.

“Gentlemen, please.” Principal Morrison says.

“What the fuck did you just say?” Paige says, also stepping forward.

“I said, don’t raise a homo and my son won’t have a problem.”

“Right, that’s what I thought.” She smirks, and lunges at Mr. Foley. Harry hooks an arm around her waist to hold her back. “You piece of shit, you think you’re this big tough man, teaching such awful values to your kid? You’re a piece of shit, and your son is following suit!” She struggles in Harry’s arms. “How fucking dare you!”

“Paige, settle down.” Harry says and she takes a deep breath as he lets her go. “Clearly Greg instigated things. Andy wouldn’t pick a fight with anyone. He knows how to use his words if he has a problem with someone.”

“Didn’t learn that from his mum now did he?” Mr. Foley smirks.

“Fuck you.” Paige spits.

“What can we do, um, moving forward? Are the boys going to be suspended?” Mrs. Stewart asks.

“Greg will be given in house suspension for instigating, and putt his hands on Andy. Unfortunately, because Brandon did hot Greg, he will be suspended for the rest of the week, and when he returns we have to give him a week of in house suspension.”

“So, even though he was just defending his friend, he’s going to get punished more?” Mr. Stewart asks.

“That’s the policy.” Principal Morrison sighs.

“What about Andy? Who’s to say that little fuck won’t bother him again?” Harry says. “I won’t have my son being afraid to go to school.”

“Andy wasn’t fighting so he won’t have to face suspension. His teachers will be alerted, and an eye will be kept on him. We have a zero tolerance policy for this kind of thing.”

Harry and Paige look at Mr. Foley.

“Tell your son to stay away from ours.” Harry says.

“No problem there. Don’t need any of what Andy’s got going on rubbing off on Greg.” He scoffs. “Are we done here?” He says to Principal Morrison.

“Yes.”

All of the adults leave the room, and everyone waiting looks at them. Mr. Foley grabs Greg’s arm and pulls him out of the room entirely.

“Brandon.” Mr. Stewart sighs. “You’re being suspended for the rest of the week, and then you’re gonna have in house suspension.”

“What?!”

“I know it doesn’t seem fair.” Mrs. Stewart says. “We’re proud of you for standing up for Andy, but you really shouldn’t have hit that boy, okay?”

“I’m really sorry, Brandon.” Andy had tears in his eyes.

“Don’t be.” Brandon says to him. “I’d do it again.”

//

The car ride home was quiet. You and Harry had to cancel the rest of your classes for the day. Paige and Noah were coming back to the house. Everyone sits down at the table when they get inside your home.

“Andy, I’d like to hear the full story, if you feel comfortable.” Paige says, putting her hand over his.

“I was at my locker, minding my own business, when Greg came over and he started up with me. He slammed my locker door shut and shoved me up against it. I told him to stop and he wouldn’t. Then he asked me if I was a girl, and I called him an idiot, and then Brandon ran down the hall and pulled him off of me, and then….ugh, then he called Brandon my boyfriend and that’s when he hit him.” Everyone looks at Andy with sad eyes. “I’m not gonna stop painting my nails, I’m not changing anything. Greg can go fuck himself.” He huffs, and you crack up first laughing, and then everyone else has a chuckle.

“I’m so sorry that happened.” Harry says to him. “Kids your age can be so mean, and he seems to be getting a negative influence from his father.”

“I wanted to slug him.” Paige says. “What a prick.”

“I feel bad that Brandon’s being suspended.” Andy says.

“I know.” Harry sighs. “Something tells me Principal Morrison won’t be putting it on his permanent record, though.”

“Do you all mind if I go lay down? I’m a little tired.”

“Of course, honey.” Paige hugs him and kisses the top of his head.

They all watch as Andy stands up.

“Um…it was nice having all four of you there…thanks.”

“What exactly is going on between him and Brandon?” Paige asks quietly.

“Nothing.” You say. “He would have told me if anything serious happened between them. I think something’s bound to happen at some point. I think they’re both still figuring it out.”

“It’s good Andy has such a good friend in his corner.” Noah says. “Everyone needs someone like that.”

Paige and Noah eventually leave to go be home in time for Rachel. Andy was asleep when they said goodbye. Or he was pretending to be. He was texting Brandon under his covers. He wanted to make sure he was alright.

“Andy?” You coo as you go into his room. “Dad made tacos if you’re hungry for dinner, honey.”

“Yeah, okay.” He sighs and gets up. “Thanks, I’m just gonna wash up.”

You nod and go back out to the kitchen.

“Is he coming out?” Harry asks as he gets everything on the table.

“Yeah.”

Dinner is mostly quiet, but Andy seemed to be doing okay. You and Harry cozy up on the couch with separate books, and Andy comes out.

“Can I watch TV?”

“Sure.” Harry says, handing him the remote.

“Can I…sit between you two?”

“Of course!” You say and scoot away from Harry to make room.

Andy plops down between the two of you, and puts on some show on Cartoon Network. You and Harry keep mindlessly reading. You were half expecting Andy to lay in your lap, but about twenty minutes in you look over and see Harry watching the show with him, his arm around Andy, and Andy’s head nuzzled into his chest. It was so sweet you thought it was going to give you a cavity. Harry was eating it up too. Even though he knew this was a really tough day for Andy, he was happy to be having this moment with him. He knew as Andy got older they would just become fewer and farther between.

“Andy, if you don’t wanna go to school tomorrow, it’s okay to stay home.” Harry says to him.

“It’s okay, I’ll go. I’m not scared.” He yawns. “I’m gonna go read before bed, goodnight.”

“Night.” You say as he walks off. “I hope he’ll be alright.”

“He will be, he’s tough. Come on, we should go to bed too.”

You nod and follow him into your shared bedroom. You both go through your nightly routines and get into bed. He holds onto you a little tighter than he normally does. You knew he had have been worried about Andy, but he was trying to keep it cool for everyone else’s sake.

“Harry?”

“Hm?”

“How about I be big spoon tonight?”

“Alright.” He rolls over and you wrap yourself around him. He’d never admit it, but he needed this tonight.

//

Harry’s alarm goes off at five in the morning. You groan and roll onto your back to let him get up, only he turns it off and turns on his side to look at you. He reaches to stroke your cheek, and he takes your out stretches hand to his lips. He kisses on your palm and wrist.

“You’ll be miserable if you don’t do your yoga.” You mutter with your eyes closed.

“Don’t feel like it.” He mumbles as he continues to kiss on your hand.

You turn your head and open your eyes to look at him slightly. You move your fingers to his mouth and he sucks on your pinky. A small whimper leaves your lips and that’s when he knows he has you. He lets your pinky go with a pop and shifts under the blankets to get on top of you. You were naked, since that’s how you slept, and he only had boxers on. He mouths at your neck and licks up to your earlobe. He grinds his hard length against your center and he groans.

“Can feel how wet you are already.” He says into your ear. “I wanna fuck you.”

“You do?” You say innocently as he continues to grind himself against you. You move your hips up to meet his and he moans.

“Yes.” He kisses on your chest and sucks on one of your nipples. You push his hair back for him and you bite your bottom lip as you watch. “Can I?”

“Can you what?” You smirk.

“Fuck you. Please? I really want to.”

”Yes, Harry.”

He sighs with relief and rips the blankets away. He gets his boxers off and grabs a condom to roll on. He quickly gets back between your legs and you grind yourself against him.

“Like feeling me between your folds?”

“Yes.” He bites his bottom lip as he slowly pushes inside you. You moan out as he comes down to you, chest to chest. “Love it when you’re like this.” You pant. You move in sync with his thrusts and it has your eyes nearly crossing.

“Love it when you’re so good for me.” He moves to sit up on his knees, and pushes your thighs together. He grunts and his head rolls back. You take great pleasure in watching him lose himself. “You’re so fucking tight, Jesus.”

He lets your legs fall open and grips your sides as he continues to fuck in and out of you. You so a slight glute raise to give him a better angle, and you start rubbing your clit.

“Fuck, Harry.” You groan.

“Oh fuck, Y/N, oh god, shit.”

You both cry out and come at the same time. Your orgasm was so strong it just about brought you to tears. You cling to him as he falls on top of you. Your aftershocks cause you to clench around him a few times, but he continues to stay inside you. He kisses your forehead and you wince as he pulls out.

“Can we cuddle for a bit?” He asks as he throws out the condom.

“Yeah, let me just pee.”

You get up quickly to clean yourself up and then you get back into bed with him. He rests his head on your chest and you scratch his head, running your fingers through his curls.

“I should have Andy stay home today…I know he said he’d go, but…”

“Harry, if he doesn’t go the bullies win. If he really didn’t want to go he would tell us. If he doesn’t go today it’ll just be more difficult to later.”

“I know, you’re right.” He sighs. “I just…I admire him so much. When I was his age I just dressed like everyone else, I never did anything out of the ordinary because I didn’t want to get made fun of. I didn’t become myself until uni. People still gave me looks, but I was old enough not to care. He’s only twelve. He may be brave, but he’s only twelve…I’d hate for any of this to break his spirit.”

“Well, luckily for him he’s got a great dad for a role model. He’s able to be himself because he sees you doing it every day.”

“I…really don’t know what I would do without you sometimes.”

You kiss the top of his head and use your other arm to hug him close to you.

//

Andy was very brave at school. Some of Greg’s friends glared at him, but he had Caroline and Tyler by his side. When Brandon returns to school, and into the actual classroom, Andy feels overjoyed when he sees him sitting in homeroom.

“Hey, B.” He says as he sits down.

“Hey.”

“Did you get all your work? They wouldn’t let me be the one to drop off the worksheets because of Greg.”

“Yeah, I’m all caught up, thanks.” He rests his chin in his palm and puts his other hand over Andy’s. “Missed you.”

“I missed you too.” Andy’s cheeks were on fire.

“Let’s see what we’ve got this week.” He looks at Andy’s nails. “Dark green?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s…that’s my favorite color.”

“I know.” Andy smirks, and now it’s Brandon’s cheeks that are on fire. “Are your parents mad at me or anything?”

“What? No, not at all. They were pretty cool about everything, actually.”

“Oh, good…”

“Why?”

“Because, um, when my parents get married, I mean, when my dad and Y/N get married, they said I could invite a friend for the weekend. It’ll be really fun since we’re staying in a hotel suite. We’ll be with my cousins Lizzie and Ritchie.” He swallows. “Would you want to go?”

“Are you serious? Yeah! I’ll ask my parents when I get home. When is it?”

“November sixth.”

“Cool.” Brandon smiles.

“Cool.” Andy smiles back. “My dad asked me to be his best man, too. It’s gonna be awesome.”

“Makes sense since you’re literally the best.”

“Brandon.” Andy giggles as he blushes.

“What?” He giggles too. “It’s true.”

//

“Have loads of fun, babe.”

“I would, but you won’t let go of me.” You chuckle.

This weekend was your bachelorette party, and Harry was hugging you goodbye out at your car, and he hadn’t let you go yet.

“Sorry.” He clears his throat and steps away from you. Then he steps closer to you again to kiss you for the millionth time.

“Har.” You giggle.

“I know, I’m being clingy, I’m sorry. I thought I’d have Andy for the long the weekend…I’m not sure what I’m gonna do with myself.”

“Why don’t you hang out with Andre?”

“Yeah, I might catch a movie with him.”

“Good.” You smile. “I have to go or I’ll be late picking Janette up.”

“Alright.” He kisses you one last time and lets you get into your car.

You pick up Janette and you both squeal as you make the trek down to Boston. You were extremely excited. You’d be sharing a hotel suite with your friends, and the best part was Nora graciously planned the entire thing for you. You couldn’t have asked for a better maid of honor. Next weekend would be your bridal shower, which would be more casual than anything because you and Harry didn’t even put a registry together, you just had a honeymoon fund. You two really didn’t need anything since you were already living in a home together and bought what you needed. So the bridal shower would just be a casual luncheon in the back room of a grill in town.

The second you and Janette get inside the hotel room, Nora starts making frozen margaritas. You look around and see that the theme would be cinco de mayo, very cool. She puts some beads around your neck and hugs you.

“I hope you’re hungry because we’re eating at Fagitas and Ritas tonight.” Darcy says.

“Thank fucking god, I love it there. Everyone, this is Janette.”

“It’s so great to meet you!” Nora says. “Nice to finally meet the work bestie face to face.”

“It’s great to meet you all too. Y/N’s told me wonderful things.”

Janette gets acquainted with Claudia and Mark as well. You weren’t worried about anyone not getting along. Janette reminded you a lot of your friends in general, it’s probably why you clicked with her off the bat.

“Y/N, is Harry doing anything fun this weekend?” Mark asks.

“I’m not sure. He thought he had Andy this weekend, but it’s Paige’s weekend, so he may make plans with his other friends.” You shrug. “He can’t do his bachelor party until right before the wedding when his friends fly in.”

“Paige couldn’t have just switched up the weekends?” Darcy asks.

“She’s supposed to get him for long weekends since Harry has him during the school year. That’s how it used to be when she had him during the school year, so he just wants to do what’s right. He’ll make his own fun, it’ll be fine.”

You all get ready, take a few pictures, and head out. You take the green line to Park Street, and then head down the alley to the restaurant. It was an incredible place. They served liter pitchers of frozen margaritas for groups to share. Your friends would come often, and would get sneaky, often taking an entire liter to the face, and that was the plan for you tonight. You got your tequila lime shrimp tacos, and you all told stories as you downed your drinks. You lean into Nora.

“You’re not taking me to a strip club or anything like that, right? Harry was pretty adamant that he didn’t want me doing that.” You slur.

“No, babe.” She chuckles. “I was thinking a drag show at first, but you always hear about how they can’t stand bridal parties, you know? And then I was thinking of asking Phil and Julian about that gay bar you go to with them, but again I didn’t want to be annoying. We are going to a club for a bit, and we are going to see some men dance, but I wouldn’t call them strippers.”

“Exotic dancers, if you will.” Claudia says. “They stay on the stage the whole time, so you don’t have to worry about a lap dance.”

“And we already took out plenty of cash to throw their way.” Mark says. “I’ve been before, it’s fun.”

“Harry doesn’t need to know.” Janette winks.

“Would you care if he went to a strip club with his friends?” Darcy asks out of curiosity.

“I don’t know.” You shrug. “He’s really not the type to ogle women, he’s too shy for that I think. He’s a bit possessive in that I don’t even think he would enjoy going somewhere like that because none of the women would be me, you know?”

“Jesus.” Mark says. “Got yourself a good man, I have to say.”

You all raise your glasses to that, and when you’re done you head out, thankful for the cool October air hitting your skin. You hop back on the T to get to the place Nora had set up reservations for. Watching the men dance made for a lot of squealing and blushing on your part, it was all good fun. They showed a little skin, but weren’t stripping, and they really did stay on the stage.

Four men come out dressed in slacks and cummerbunds. I Wanna Sex You Up begins playing, and the choreography looks oddly familiar. Your jaw drops when it registers.

“Nora, you didn’t.”

“I had to.” She chuckles.

“I’m very confused…” Janette says. “Delighted, but confused.”

“In the first season of Glee a few of the guys get together for an all-male acapella group, and this was a memorable scene for Y/N.” Nora explains. “I requested it in advance, let’s tip well.”

You sway back and forth in your chair and sing along with the song as the men continue to dance essentially for you. You were laughing so hard you were crying by the end of it, and you hug your friend. Once you all have had your fill you head to a club so you all could dance.

Now you really felt like you were in your element. Nora had reserved a VIP sections at one of your favorite clubs so you could all dance freely without bumping into a bunch of sweaty strangers. You were sticking with tequila tonight as to not get sick. You were having loads of fun, but you couldn’t help but wonder what Harry had gotten up to, so you tell your friends you need to use the ladies room quickly. The ladies room in the VIP section was actually clean, you were shocked. You may pee just for the hell of it. You take out your phone and call your fiancé.

“Y/N?”

“Hey, baby!” You slur. “Just checking in, whatcha up to?”

“Well…it’s one in the morning, so I was sleeping.”

Oh, shit, you think to yourself. You hadn’t even checked the time on your phone before you called. Now you felt like a proper dick.

“Shit, Har, I’m so sorry. I didn’t even realize how late it was, and I was thinking of you, and-“

“Babe, it’s alright.” He chuckles. “I went to a movie with Andre and Sandra and then we went out for drinks and a bite to eat. It was fun.”

“Oh, good! Any plans for tomorrow?”

“I’m hoping to get up and go for a run, and then I’m gonna work on my manuscript. Then I may have dinner with Lisa and her husband, but we’ll see.” He yawns.

“I’m really sorry I woke you…”

“I’ll fall back asleep don’t worry about it. What did you all get into tonight?”

“Drinking, dinner, more drinking, we went to, um, a show, and now we’re drinking more at a club.”

“Ah, so you’re still out?”

“Mhm.”

“Go be with your friends, baby.”

“I know, I just…wanted to hear your voice, that’s all.”

“Mm, well I’m glad you called, then.”

“I love your sleepy voice.” You pout, not that he can see it.

“Y/N, you’re gonna give me a stiffy if you keep talking like that, so, please, go back out and have fun, yeah?”

“Okay, I love you.”

“I love you too.”

You sigh and go back out to continue dancing with your friends. You all get back to the hotel around three in the morning, and everyone crashes. The next day was all about recovering cozily. Room service was ordered and many movies were watched.

“Do you think things will change much once you and Harry are married?” Mark asks as you all do face masks.

“Nah, the biggest change will be going onto the same insurance plan.” You laugh. “We’ll start having kids, I know that much.”

“Do you have any big plans for after you get your doctorate?” Darcy asks.

“Mhm, we’re going to take Andy to Disney World as a combined celebration. Harry’s been dying to take him there for, like, and end of middle school thing, but we really wanna go before we have an infant on our hands, so he’s gonna say it’s for his thirteenth birthday instead.”

“That’s the perfect age to go.” Janette says. “He’ll remember way more, plus I bet he’ll enjoy the alone time with the both of you.”

“He’s gonna be so surprised.” You say. “I love that kid.”

“Any tea to spill about him and his friend?” Claudia asks.

“He hasn’t told me much recently.” You shrug. “Which is perfectly fine. He’s coming to the wedding with him, that I know for sure.”

//

Harry wasn’t home when you got back from your bachelorette weekend, so you take the opportunity to have a long shower and get into some comfy clothes. You hear the front door open and close, and go out to see Harry coming in with Andy.

“Hey, guys!” You say brightly.

“Y/N!” Andy says and comes to give you a hug. “Did you have a good time with your friends?”

“I did, yeah. How was Mum’s?”

“Good, we went shopping for a Halloween costume.”

“And what are you planning to be this year?”

“A rock star, so, so she got me a blow up guitar that has a strap, and I’m gonna wear all black. It’s gonna be sick.” He heads down the hall into his room.

“Is he going trick or treating?” You say as you wrap your arms around Harry’s neck. He hugs you for a moment before giving you a lip smacking kiss.

“Yeah, he’ll go out for a bit with his friends, and then I guess Caroline is having a little party at her house.”

“Oh, my…a boy-girl party, huh?”

“I know.” Harry sighs and grips your hips. “He’ll be picked up at 9:30 and not a moment later.” He kisses you again. “How was your weekend?”

“It was a lot of fun, it was so good to get away with them for a bit. Just another reminder of how excited I am to marry you.”

He squishes his nose to yours before letting you go. The evening is cozy as the three of you decide to play a board game before Andy goes to bed. It was an incredible game of Scrabble. Harry tugs you into your bedroom about twenty minutes later, and gets you undressed. You giggle as he kisses on you. You shift to get on top of him, and you pin his wrists to the pillows. You suck on his bottom lip and he groans before you lick into his mouth.

“God, I wanted you so bad this weekend.” You say to him as you kiss down his body. “Miss me?”

“Course I did.” He holds your hair back as you wrap your lips around his throbbing dick. His breath hitches as he feels your tongue run over his slit. “Fuck.” He breathes.

You bob up and down on him for a bit before he has you on your stomach. He pulls your hips back and starts fingering you from behind. You clutch at the pillows. You feel him open your cheeks up and his free thumb starts rubbing on your other hole. He hadn’t done this in a while, you almost forgot how good it felt.

“Shit, Harry.”

“Like that?”

“Feels so good.”

He was knuckle deep inside you, petting against your g-spot, and he gradually starts to work his thumb inside you. You gasp, but let him continue. You suddenly feel…full! It was sending you. You fuck yourself on his fingers while he continues to work his thumb into you.

“Alright? Still feels good?” He grunts. His tip was leaking just watching you.

“Yes, fuck, don’t stop.” You moan out into the pillows so you’re not too loud. You completely lose it around his fingers, and he gives you a moment before retracting himself. You wince a little when you feel his thumb leave you. You stay in position for him while he rolls a condom on.

“You good like that, babe? Your knees don’t hurt?”

“No, I’m good, please, give it to me like this.”

He nods and leans down to kiss you before getting back behind you. He grips your hips and pushes his thick tip inside you. Your back arches once he bottoms out. His pace is slow at first, wanting to ease in and out of you. You start moving on and off him at your own pace.

“Impatient.” He grunts as he lets you use him.

“You weren’t going fast enough.”

“So just tell me to go faster.”

“Thought you liked it when I used you.” You smirk at him over your shoulder and he bites his bottom lip.

“Will you get on top?”

“Yeah.”

He pulls out of you and gets on his back. You swing your leg over and sink down on him. You pin his wrists against the pillows again, and bring yourself down chest to chest. You lick into his mouth as you move on and off his hard dick. Your fingers intertwine and he squeezes your hands.

“Let me rub your clit.” He groans.

“Ask nicely.”

“Can I rub your clit?”

“Yes.”

You let go of one of his hands, and he snakes it between the two of you. You gasp into his mouth as he rubs circles into you. Sweat pools between your bellies, and you both lose it. You rest on top of him for a few moments before getting off. Once you’re both cleaned up you snuggle up to him in bed and lay your head on his chest.

“Slept like shit without you, if I’m being honest.” You tell him and kiss on his tattooed collar bones.

“I had to use my body pillow for the first time in forever.”

“I wrapped myself up in my little blanket burrito like I used to, but it just wasn’t the same. I enjoy your heavy body way more.”

“I’m always afraid I’m gonna crush you.” He chuckles.

“Oh, like when you lay fully on top of me? I fucking love that.” You smirk and he shakes his head.

“You’re suck a little freak.”

“Yeah, but I’m your freak.” You kiss his cheek. “I’m also not the one that enjoys giving people rim jobs, so I don’t wanna hear it.”

“I didn’t even do that tonight!”

“You still got in there.”

“And you liked it, so don’t kinkshame me.”

“I’m not! I like that you’re a little kinky.” You giggle.

“Just so you know, I don’t do that with just anyone…” He mutters.

“Aw, well don’t I feel special.” You say sarcastically. “It’s so good to know you’ve only had your tongue up a few people’s asses.” He blinks at you and you start laughing. “Chill, I’m just teasing.” You peck his lips and turn over, and he turns with you to wrap himself around you.

“You’re lucky I think you’re incredibly cute, you know that?”

//

Trick or treating was fun, but short lived. Andy his friends hit up the houses they knew that had the best candy, and then made their way to Caroline’s. You and Harry were at a Halloween themed game night at Mateo’s. Caroline’s house had a finished basement, so it was the perfect spot for a little party. Most of Andy’s homeroom was there. Her sister’s had helped set up donuts on strings for a little contest. There was music playing, and everyone was having a good time. There was even a wall with decorations for people to take pictures. Andy takes plenty with his friends.

Once Caroline’s sisters go upstairs, the kids all get into a game of truth or dare. They all sit in a circle on the floor, and put a bottle in the middle. The dares were lighthearted at first, someone had to cluck like a chicken, someone had to chug a can of soda, someone had to see how many marshmallows they could fit into their mouth, normal kid stuff. Then it got a little more serious. Some were daring others to go into the closet for seven minutes, others had to admit to having crushes.

“Okay, Brandon…” A girl named Maggie says, “truth or dare?”

“Dare.” He shrugs.

“Alright, I dare you to go into the closet with Andy for seven minutes.”

Andy nearly chokes on his drink, and looks wide eyed at Brandon.

“What exactly do you want us to do in there?” Brandon asks.

“Doesn’t matter, whatever happens is between you two.” She shrugs.

It wasn’t like they were the only same sex people to be asked to go into the closet. Some kids were out already, but things weren’t as obvious for Brandon and Andy.

“Do you want to?” Brandon asks him.

“I guess.”

They both get up, and go into the closet. Someone starts a timer for seven minutes. Andy leans against one of the walls of the closet. It was roomy.

“It’s too dark in here.” Brandon says as he turns the flashlight of his phone on. He sets it on the floor so it’s not blinding. “There we go, now I can see you.” Andy gives him a small smile. “Have I told you how cool your costume is?”

“Thanks, my mum helped me put it together. Although, Y/N helped with the eye liner.” He rubs the back of his neck. “I like yours too.”

“I don’t know, I thought it was kind of lame.” He chuckles. “A baseball player isn’t exactly original, but my mom wanted to make sure I was wearing pants.” He sighs.

“I know! Parents are always so worried about us being cold. It’s not like we were out that long.”

“Hey, remember when we were thing one and thing two in elementary school? We had to meet up like every weekend to make sure everything matched!”

“Yeah! I’m so glad we don’t have to do that anymore.” Andy stands up straight. “How long do you think it’s been?”

“Just a couple minutes.”

“This is such a weird dare…feel like I’m in an eighties movie.” Andy scoffs.

“I know, it feels like a force.” He sighs. “M’not gonna kiss you in a closet. That’s just what everyone wants. Then we’d have to walk out of here all awkward.”

“I don’t want you to kiss me in here either.” Andy chews his bottom lip. “But I do want you to kiss me, Brandon, really bad.” So many things had been left unsaid between them, and this was the first time Andy really said it to his friend.

“Maybe we can find somewhere else to go, somewhere less obvious.”

Andy nods, and the door opens. A few people frown as they can tell nothing happened between the two. It was getting closer to 9:30, and neither Andy nor Brandon wanted to get interrupted by a call from a parent again. Brandon watches as Andy goes over to Caroline.

“Is there somewhere private he and I can go?”

“Weren’t you two just alone?” She raises an eyebrow at him.

“Yeah, but it would have been so obvious…”

Caroline looks around. She thinks to tell them to go to the bathroom, but that would be obvious too. Her basement was a walkout, and the outside portion had been screened in for bugs. They could go out there for a few minutes. They could just say they’re getting some air.

“Go outside for a few minutes.” She nods over to the sliding door. “I’ll standby to keep watch.”

“You’re the best.”

Andy and Brandon go outside unnoticed by anyone else.

“You’re okay out here…like this?” Brandon asks.

“Yeah.” He takes a deep breath. “I need to know something before we do this, though…I mean, how do you feel about me? Because I like you, Brandon, like really like you.”

“I really like you too.”

“You do?”

“Yeah.”

“For how long?”

“I don’t know when it started exactly. I just know that I do.”

Andy smiles at him and backs up to the siding of the house as Brandon walks towards him. Andy reaches up and turns Brandon’s baseball cap around so it wouldn’t get in the way. They both chuckle out of nerves. Brandon cups one of Andy’s cheeks and leans in.

“You’re sure?” Brandon asks.

“Yes.” He breathes.

Andy closes his eyes, and braces himself. Brandon’s lips press against his. The first thing he notices is how soft Brandon’s lips are, but he wasn’t surprised because he was always using chapstick. The second thing he notices is how he feels warm all over. He had butterflies in his stomach, but they were the good kind. He reaches up to cup one of Brandon’s cheeks so he won’t pull away. They stay like that for a few moment, kissing innocently. Brandon pulls away to get some air and presses his forehead to Andy’s.

“How was that for a first kiss?” Brandon looks at him.

“B-better than I ever imagined.” He tugs on Brandon’s jersey to pull him back in and they kiss once more. They both giggle afterwards. “H-how was I?”

“Best kiss I’ve ever had.”

“Jesus.” Andy blushes. “We, um, we should keep this quiet until after the wedding. If we say anything to our parents they may not let us share a hotel room or they might add more rules or something.”

“Shit, you’re right…yeah, let’s keep it to ourselves for now. I…I mean, I don’t even know what this all means, like, are we gay?”

“Well…you could be, but I like boys and girls.” It was wild how easily he was just able to admit it. “It’s called bi, or whatever, so that’s what I think I am. Does it matter? I like you and you like me, that’s it.”

“Right, that’s all that really matters.” Brandon smiles.

Andy feels his phone buzz in his pocket, and he takes it out to see that Harry texted he was out front.

“I have to go, my parents are here.”

“Okay.”

The boys hug and then kiss one more time before going inside. Andy and Caroline share a knowing look, and then he makes the rounds saying goodbye. He heads upstairs and thanks Caroline’s sisters for having him, and then goes outside with all his candy. Harry would need to inspect it when they got home. He climbs into the backseat of the car. You were in a giggly mood from the wine you had drank at game night.

“Andy! How was the party?” You ask him as you turn around slightly to make eye contact.

“Oh, um, it was good, really, really good.”

[mimisempai]

Wait for me on the other side 3/8

Chapter Summary:

Rain... Fireworks... Romance?

https://archiveofourown.org/works/32948254/chapters/82052251

April 15, 2021 - 7:00

Loki, his heart pounding, approached the mailbox whose flag was raised.

He opened it and unfolded the small note with trembling fingers.

Thank you for this lovely attention. I haven't stopped wearing it since I received it.

You tell me that this connection with me allows you to open up to others and not feel alone anymore and you ask me if I want to continue this correspondence?

I don't want to stop either!

I don't know if we'll ever meet, but I want to continue to get to know you and for you to get to know me.

Tell me what you like.

Yours, Mobius.

Loki breathed a sigh of relief, put the letter in his pocket and left. He would have to work before he could write. This was no longer a matter of a quick word, he wanted to take time to think before he wrote.

As he walked through the school gates, although he loved his job, for once he couldn't wait for the day to be over.

April 17, 2019

Mobius was sitting in what had become his special Loki spot, the armchair in front of the bay window, a steaming cup of coffee next to him, reading Loki's latest letter.

I love Norse mythology and my work.

My favorite cocktail is Gimlets, gin and lime.

This brings me to my favorite color: green.

I have a sweet tooth, I like all kinds of sweets and pastries, and on the other hand I also like everything spicy.

I like quiet evenings reading and listening to music.

I like Jane Austen, The Brontë sisters and Paulo Coehlo.

I like to use metaphors but I have heard that they are not always great.

And although I can't stand violence, I like daggers, especially old ones.

Oh and I forgot, I like the house on the hill.

Mobius promised himself to go and see in Sylvie's antique weapons store if she had any antique daggers.

I can't stand cruelty, condescension, and lies.

And although they are green I hate peas.

Mobius laughed at the last sentence, he finished his coffee and went to get his notepad to start writing.

April 19, 2021

Loki, sitting cross-legged on his couch with Croki's head on his leg, was reading Mobius' latest letter.

I like to take watches apart and put them back together, to see the mechanism inside. They are all different.

I like to walk in the streets of New York and discover places by chance.

I like to draw, or rather make sketches that I never finish.

I like whiskey, Jack Daniels, and occasionally a good glass of red French Bordeaux wine.

I like all kinds of music, but my preference is for jazz.

I don't like lies, preconceived judgments, and gratuitous meanness, well, just plain meanness.

And I also like the house on the hill.

How did you end up living there anyway?

Loki read the letter again, folded it up and put it in the little box with the others before going to bed and thinking about what he would answer the next day.

April 21, 2019

Mobius went out still in his robe because it was a day of rest. He was surprised to see that Loki had already answered if he was to believe the little flag. He refused to question the fact that his heartbeat had accelerated.

He went to get the letter, then read it in front of his breakfast, Croki at his feet.

I rented it after college. It was the strangest place I had ever seen. I couldn't imagine anyone building it. Or... I couldn't imagine anyone building it and not living in it. I liked the way it sort of...hovered over the water. I loved that path that led to it. I don't know why, it has a strange, timeless charm.

April 23, 2021

Loki, on break between classes, took the letter out of his pocket and read it again.

Yes, the fact that you have to walk so much to get to the front door and that it's uphill, it's like you have to earn the right to enter the house. Every time you enter the house, it's like you're embarking on a quest whose prize is the right to enter.

I'm sorry, I must sound eccentric.

April 24, 2019

During his lunch break, and all day, he read that simple phrase from Loki over and over again.

Don't apologize, you can be eccentric. You can be whatever you want.

Mobius had always felt different, both in his personal and professional life choices, and this simple phrase eased some of his inner struggles. He couldn't ignore the warm feeling in his chest.

*********

A few weeks passed. The wind was blowing violently on a late spring day in New York. Loki was walking rapidly towards the school. His phone started to vibrate in his pocket, he grabbed it to answer the call.

-Yes?

Loki lost the smile on his face.

-Look, this isn't easy for me either. You know that... no, I'm not mad that you called. I just... I'm sorry, I have to go to work and I...

He was approaching the school and didn't want to continue this conversation as more and more students came in.

-I don't think that's a good idea. No. Sigyn, I'm asking you not to come. Because we need more time... Especially if we want to stay friends. I just don't think we should... look, I'm on my way to work, we'll talk about it. Bye.

Loki sighed, shaking his head as he walked through the large front door.

" Already feeling demotivated?" asked Natasha as she greeted him with a smile.

"Oh no no!" protested Loki.

"That's good timing. Heimdall has caught the flu and we need someone to cover his classes while he's absent. Since you have an art degree, I was wondering if..."

"No worries! I'm happy to oblige."

"Perfect," Natasha thanked him, "You can check with the assistant about Heimdall's schedule and make arrangements then. Thank you Loki, really. If the exams weren't coming up, I wouldn't have asked you."

Loki replied, "No worries, really."

If anything, he was glad to see that even though he was the last one in and the youngest teacher, he was trusted.

At the end of the week, as he walked home with his arms full of groceries, he thought maybe he should have thought about it before saying yes.

Because he was exhausted.He hadn't realized how much time and energy it would take to handle two positions.

Fortunately, Heimdall was back at work on Monday.

Loki put his groceries in the car and thought he'd stop by the house on the hill before heading home.

When he arrived, the little flag was up.

He took the letter and opened it.

Hi, pen pal. You haven't written in a while. I hope all is well.

You actually I

This is ridiculous, just a few words to write and it makes me sound like a babbling teenager.

Well I'm writing it down: I MISS YOU

It was obvious that the last words had been written with force.

Loki felt a strange warm feeling in his chest. He had also hugely missed the correspondence, so he hurried to answer on the spot and put the letter in the box before going home.

**********

Parking the car in front of the mailbox, Mobius chose to ignore the butterflies in his stomach as he saw the little flag raised.

He took the letter out of the box and once he got home, Croki fed, he went to his favorite place to read the letter.

It has been a difficult week.

I couldn't get away from work and only had the strength to go to bed at night. I can't remember the last time I looked up at the sky, or saw a damn tree. That's what I miss. The nature around me.

It's not so bad when I'm busy. It's when I have a minute to breathe, to look around, that it seems really hard. I wonder what I'm doing here, alone, in this gray city. I miss the trees.

PS: I missed you too

June 15, 2019 - 9:00 pm.

In the evening, Mobius left the house with a small tree in the pickup's trailer. He was driving towards the city.

June 15, 2021 - 9:30 pm

In the middle of the walk from school to his apartment, Loki saw the black rain clouds gathering in the sky. Suddenly there was a rumble of thunder in the distance and as he was on the home stretch, the rain began to pour.

June 15, 2019 - 9:35 PM

Arriving at 105 MacDougal Street - Greenwich Village, obviously still under construction, Mobius parked the pickup and pulled a shovel and the tree from the trailer. He began digging a hole outside the construction site that would become Loki's apartment building. Once finished, he began planting the tiny, fragile tree.

June 15, 2021 - 9:35 pm

Loki was completely soaked as he walked the last few yards to his front door. He struggled to find his keys, dropped them, and grew more and more frustrated as the rain poured down on him, when suddenly it stopped. He was baffled, as thunder and lightning continued to flash across the sky, and the rain continued to fall all around him, but not on him.

He looked up.

Above him were the dense green leafy branches of a young tree that formed a canopy swaying in the rain right above Loki. It hadn't been there a second ago, but now it was sheltering him, and Loki was stunned.

June 15, 2019 - 9:37pm

Mobius smiled as he swung the shovel into the pickup's trailer before heading home.

June 15, 2021 - 9:37 pm

Loki, overcome with emotion, broke into a smile and whispered to Mobius, even though he couldn't hear him, "Thank you."

Raindrops fell through the green branches as Loki danced under the tree, his face to the sky.

*********

2019 - A few days later

Casey stood on the small path in front of Mobius' house, "Wow!!!"

Mobius motioned for him to follow him inside.Casey entered, still stunned by the house.

"So, this is where you're hiding?"

Mobius replied with a smile, "Yeah.You want a beer?"

"Yeah thanks."

Mobius pulled two beers out of the fridge and they went to the chairs in front of the bay window and talked about the house for a while. Casey had lots of questions.

Casey took a sip and his face became more serious.

"Mobius. I didn't just come here to escape my pathetic existence in the city. I came to talk to you about TK and ask you to come back with us. We need you."

Mobius shook his head, "TK? Sorry Casey but no."

"I'm sure if you talked to her..." insisted Casey.

"Forget it.Ravonna doesn't want me to come back. I don't want to come back. Everyone's happier now."

Casey argued, "What about your work? Your work was awesome. Even she admitted that. Look, I know it's hard, but if you put your problems with her aside, you-"

"I said forget it." replied Mobius, this time with a sharp tone before softening, "Sorry. It's just... I like it here. And I like my job at the store."

Casey nodded and accepted the answer before asking, curious again, "Are you in a relationship with anyone?"

Mobius answered after a slight hesitation that didn't go unnoticed, "No."

"Why did you hesitate?"

"I didn't hesitate."

"Yes, you did."

Mobius insisted, "I...I'm not involved with anyone, okay?"

"Okay." replied Casey, who smiled playfully before continuing, "All I'm saying is that maybe you should think about the future."

Mobius began to laugh. He couldn't stop himself.

Casey looked at him as if he had gone crazy, "What?"

Mobius continued to laugh.

"What?"

**********

A few days later, with Loki's letter open in the passenger seat of his pickup, Mobius drove to the train station near Brooklyn College of Arts.

He parked, picked up the letter and got out, heading for the entrance to the station.

Around this time two years ago, I lost something.

In the Brooklyn train station.

I was going back to my parents and left it on the platform. See if you can find it for me. I won't tell you what it is.

Then put it in the mailbox. It's your mission if you choose to accept it.

Mobius could not resist a challenge. So he found himself at that moment looking for an object he knew nothing about. He walked through the station. There were a few people. He looked for a single man and saw none. Just a few families and an elderly couple.

He continued to search when suddenly, through the window overlooking the station platform, he saw a young man with long black hair get up and get ready to board the train.

Mobius wasn't sure if it was him, but he felt deep down that he was Loki, and he was amazingly handsome. Mobius hurried through the door and onto the station platform. He was about to head towards him when he stopped.

The young man had embraced a woman who had her back to Mobius.

They kissed and said goodbye.

Neither of them noticed that Loki, for it was undoubtedly Loki, had left a book on the bench behind him. Mobius saw it, but it would be awkward to approach and interrupt the kiss. He hesitated.

The train driver announced the final boarding.

Loki separated from the woman, obviously reluctantly, and boarded the train.

The woman Loki had kissed did not move and watched the train pull away until it was completely out of sight. He did not notice the book. Mobius watched him leave and once he was gone, he approached the bench. He looked at the book that Loki had left behind. It was a well-worn copy of Persuasion by Jane Austen. It had definitely been Loki.

********

Loki impatiently went to the mailbox, thinking that perhaps Mobius had already been to the station.

He opened it, and was disappointed when he didn't see the book and just a little note.

WHAT ARE YOU DOING ON THE 4TH OF JULY?

Loki, a little disappointed, answered immediately on the same piece of paper and just as he was about to leave, he heard the characteristic sound of the little flag being raised and went back to the box and opened it. He grabbed the small paper and unfolded it.

L: Going to the fireworks, I guess.

I go every year.  Why?

M: Would you like to watch them together? From the cliff. The fireworks on the lake are beautiful

L: I know, I watched them from the house the time I lived there.

You're not asking me out, are you?

M: No, no. I just thought it might be nice to do the same thing, that's all.

L: The same thing, two years apart.

M: It's better than staying home.

L: Okay. Let's go see the fireworks.

M: See you in 10 days then. July 4th at 10pm in front of the mailbox.

Mobius did not wait for an answer, and walked happily back to the house. Even though he had denied it, it still felt like a date of some sort.

The butterflies began to fly again.

July 4, 2019/2021 - 10:00 pm.

Two years apart, in the same place, Loki and Mobius sat next to the mailbox. Mobius brought one of the seats from the garden furniture and Loki brought an old folding camping seat in his car.

He is armed with his pad and pencil.

The strange and timeless conversation started again, always punctuated by the little flag that went up and down.

L: Did you go to the station? I never got my book.

M: Let me keep it for a while. I want to read it.

By the way, there's something I wanted to ask you.

Who was the girl at the station?

Your fiancée?

Why didn't you tell me about her?

Loki thought it sounded like Mobius was jealous, but didn't want to get the wrong idea.

L: You don't tell me about your love life either.

M: Because I don't have one unfortunately.

My God, I can't believe you didn't tell me you were married.

L: I'm not married. We broke up when I moved to New York.

I'm on my own.

The fireworks just started.

M: They started here too.

I'm sure yours are better, since it's supposed to get better every year.

L: Probably. Let's enjoy the sight.

Afterwards, during the fireworks, the flag did not move for a while. Then when the grand finale was over, and the silence fell, the flag suddenly rose, making Loki jump.

M: At the station, when I saw you... I didn't expect... I mean, you didn't tell me you were so gorgeous.

Loki read these words and could not suppress a small gasp of surprise. He looked around embarrassed even though he knew for a fact that no one was there.

L: Not fair.

You saw me but I still don't know what you look like.

Mobius ran his hand over his face and figured that since it was truth night, he might as well go for it.

M: You're right. I wouldn't mind knowing what I'll look like in two years. Why don't we meet in the future and tell me what you think?

Loki thought about it and then looked at his watch, it was 10:43 pm, he took a deep breath, suddenly excited and nervous

L: Why don't you call me on July 4, 2021 at 10:44 pm

As Loki finished the last line of the "4" the phone rang.

He almost fell out of his chair.

He steadied himself with a pounding heart and picked up, "Hello?"

________

Who is on the other end of the phone...?

Chapter 1 - Chapter 2 - Chapter 3 - Chapter 4 - Chapter 5 - Chapter 6 - Chapter 7 - Chapter 8 (End)

As always, bear with me as it is not beta'd and english is not my native language I hope you enjoyed it nonetheless🥰

[pascal-istheway]

Deep Water - Chapter 1

Read it here on ao3!

Fandom: Triple Frontier

Warnings: Some Violence - Implied Non-Con

Relationships: Francisco "Catfish" Morales/Reader, Santiago "Pope" Garcia/Reader

Characters: Francisco “Catfish” Morales, Santiago “Pope” Garcia, Triple Frontier Ensemble

Tags: Slow Burn, Smut, Fluff, Angst, We are basically torturing Frankie for this, I’m apologizing in advance

Word Count: 3130

MASTERLIST

Two Years Ago - Columbia

The last call anyone had heard from you was four days ago. You’d been in Columbia on a humanitarian mission with a local group, something about teaching today’s youth or whatever, Santiago hadn’t really listened to much if he’d been really honest. He just wanted to make sure his baby sister was safe and with people that could look out for her.

You had assured him on the call that you were fine, you’d brought the knife you were allowed to carry with you, but had to leave the gun he insisted he buy for you back in the states to which he explained how that defeated the purpose of owning the gun. You just rolled your eyes at him, knowing how overprotective your brother was. Santi was always on you for being safe, regardless if it was in Columbia or back home in your apartment in a somewhat sketchy neighborhood.

But as you bounced in the back of a windowless van, hands bound and eyes covered, no clue where you or your crew were being taken, you suddenly wished very much that you’d had that gun.

Five years ago - You

“Load up! Let’s go!” Santi smacked the side of the truck as he yelled out to the apartment for you, boards and cooler loaded up. “Come on! We’re wasting daylight here and the guys are already out there!” he waited a few more seconds before hollering your name again.

“I’m coming! Jesus, hold your fuckin horses, I was trying to find my hat…” you ran out to the truck, opening the old creaky door to his rusted ford and sliding in next to your brother on the bench seat. You casually toss your hat in the back seat before buckling your seatbelt. The beauty of living in California was all the access the best surfing the states had to offer. Your brother and his best friends from his unit were all meeting up for an early morning at the local spot and you decided to tag along, hoping to see the boys again.

You’d known some of these guys your whole life, thankful that they all got to serve together. Santiago would’ve been ok on his own, but he and Frankie had been close since they were kids. Knowing that they were out there in the shit together gave you the comfort that they were having their backs covered.

Santiago drives into the public parking lot, all of the guys already there except for one, Tom, who you had yet to meet. You hop out, saying your good mornings to most of them while keeping your eyes out for Frankie. You knew he wouldn’t miss an opportunity to be here but yet, you didn’t see him amongst the guys.

Not wanting to seem desperate, you just helped unload, carrying things to the spot on the beach for the guys to start getting their gear on and ready. The sun had barely started to come up, making the sky a brilliant color of orange and pink. The most beautiful view in California.

“Oh shit! I forgot my hat in the truck! I’ll be right back,” you run back to the truck, feet struggling in the sand.

When you reach the truck, you fling the door open and bend over, searching for your hat that’s fallen on the floor in the back seat.

“Careful, you don’t want to get stuck like that…” you hear him behind you, teasing you as you snatch your hat and spring back up.

“Frankie! You made it!” you squeal, throwing your arms around him. He pulls you in, arms snaking around your back as he tucks his nose into your hair.

“Wouldn’t miss it,” he says softly into your ear before pulling away, “last real surf of the year” he smiles, the corners of his smile not quite reaching his eyes.

There’s a sadness in his voice, one anyone else would miss if they didn’t know him. But you do know Frankie. You know him better than almost anyone. You know what his voice sounds like during all the highs and lows, what it sounds like when he cried after his mom died, what it sounds like when he told you he got accepted into pilots training, and what it sounded like when he was drunk and whispered he loved you at 3 am.

“What’s wrong?” you pull back, holding yourself at arm’s length from him.

His mouth opens, the words right at the edge of his lips, but then they close again before he shakes his head, “nothing… let’s just enjoy this. Ok?”

So you do… you surf and swim and enjoy the morning with the guys. The warmth of the sun caresses your skin, soaking into your bones to warm you from the ocean. There’s a moment when you’re out on the water, the waves reflecting like glass and you let yourself enjoy the way it casts its light off Frankie’s long hair, bringing out the specks of gold and grey in his messy sea-soaked hair.

You love this - being out here with all of them. Your brother is the only real family either of you have. Your parents died when you were younger and when you were old enough to take care of yourself, Santiago enlisted and gained a new family. Brothers in arms.

You try not to think about the worry in his voice from that morning, doubt creeping in as the day went on. This was a rare occasion that all the guys could get together like this and usually when they did, it was before a big mission out of the country. Your heart sinks, realizing what this could possibly mean. Santi wouldn’t have told you, knowing that he wouldn’t have wanted to ruin the day. But Frankie? He told you everything. What held him back from telling you something as important as this?

“Here, you look like you could use this,” Frankie dumps himself down beside you in the sand, handing you a cold beer. You glance up at him, grateful for the drink, and bring the cold bottle to your lips, taking a long pull before swallowing.

“Thanks, it’s perfect,” you smile, leaning back on one hand and bracing the bottle on your thigh.

“Did you have fun today?” Frankie asked, taking a drink from his own bottle.

“Yeah, it really was the perfect day. Perfect weather too. Got some great waves out there,” you looked out to the water crashing up on the shore and watched as the sun splattered a watercolor of incredible colors throughout the sky.

“I think Santi is setting up the bonfire if you’re planning on stickin’ around,” he nudged your shoulder with his own.

“Yeah of course… he was my ride anyways,” you take another sip, enjoying the familiar feeling the hops gave you on an empty stomach. Knowing where that leads though, you look at Frankie and tell him “we should probably get some food in us soon.”

“I had a feeling you’d be hungry,” he reached behind him into a small cooler and pulled out two sandwiches. Chicken for himself and peanut butter and jelly with a side of Doritos, just like you liked. “Made ‘em special, just for us,” he joked.

A smile crept over your lips as you grabbed the sandwich baggie, pushing your beer in the sand as you ripped the bags open. He watched in disgust as you opened your sandwich and plop the Doritos on the PB&J, closing it and taking a massive bite.

“Dmon’t knmock mit ummil yoo twy it” you say around your food, knowing damn well he didn’t understand a single thing you said.

“Sure thing sweetheart,” he nodded, brows furrowed with amusement as he took his own bite.

You guys laugh and talk around your food and drinks, the effects of everything making you warm and at peace. Frankie is one of those people that you feel so at home with, not that your brother isn’t one of those, but Santi isn’t someone that you’d call at 2 am to come and get you when you’ve had too much to drink. He would just scold you the whole way home while Frankie - well Frankie would let you rest your head in his lap and would rub your head the entire way home, soft fingers tucking your hair behind your ear as you drift off to sleep from the lull of the engine.

And the only reason you know this is because he’s done it on several occasions for you. In college, shit even in high school. He protected you from Santiago when he found out you had your first boyfriend, although he did give you an interrogation of his own privately afterward. He was there for you through your first heartbreak. He taught you how to shoot your first gun… and your second.

When he turned to you, the haze of the drunkenness between the two of you, and blurted out that they were leaving again, despite being under the impression that they wouldn’t ever have to go again being so close to the end of their contracts, you were of course heartbroken. This was someone that was so much more to you than your brother’s best friend. He had become such a pertinent part of your life. You hadn’t mentally prepared yourself for that news.

You looked back over your shoulder at Santiago, Will, Ben, and Tom, laughing and talking around the fire while you and Frankie sat off to the side. The casualness between them all as they joked between each other, not fearing one last deployment. Your heart squeezed for them. They had each other, bound together by something so strong, something you’d never fully understand.

“Take a walk with me?” his voice pulled you from your thoughts and you see Frankie next to you, hand stretched down to help you up.

“Sure,” you take it, dusting the sand off yourself and grabbing another beer for the walk.

You walk until you can barely see the fire in the distance, the night becoming so dark all you can see is each other at your sides under the blanket of stars.

He whispers your name, taking your hand and pulling you to a stop, “I can’t leave this time without saying anything… I have to…” his words get caught in his throat.

You know what he wants to say, the words he needs to say because you’ve been feeling them for as long as you can remember, “Frankie…” his name comes out as a whisper.

You’re inches from each other, breath mingling together between you as he leans in, his eyes searching for the permission that he didn’t need to ask for. He already owned you, heart and soul, he just didn’t know it yet. This man would always own you, no matter what he did, no matter where he went.

You close the space, your lips gently brushing against his. Softly at first, but as his hands come up to frame your face, the passion that ignites behind him explodes. His mouth parts, yours following his lead as you allow him to explore your mouth. God this man knows how to kiss. It’s incredible, unlike anything you could’ve ever dreamt. Your hands move to his neck, pulling him in closer as his tangle in your hair.

“God, you’re so perfect…” he whispers against your lips. His mouth moves down your jaw, kissing and nipping its way down your throat. Your fingers find their way in his hair, playing with the soft curls at the base of his neck. A moan escapes your lips as his teeth graze your skin softly.

“Wait,” he pulls back, attempting to catch his breath, “I want to do this right. Not on the beach like some cheap date,” he half laughs, looking down at his tented pants and groaning, clearly regretting stopping.

“We don’t have to stop…” you suggest.

“No, I don’t want it to be like this for our first…” he pauses, “I want it to be,” his cheeks almost, blush? “I want it to be right… to be perfect.”

The sincerity in his voice carries to his eyes and you can tell he means it. He wants to love you right, the way you deserve. Not in the dirt or in the sand, but in a soft bed with fresh sheets and plush pillows. He wants to be able to wrap you in blankets after and hold you until the morning sun comes through the curtains and shines down on your freshly fucked skin. He wants to wake up next to you and see your hair splayed against his pillows.

The thought makes you smile, and you nod, knowing this is the start of something absolutely incredible. Something you never thought possible…

Columbia - Frankie

“God I fucking hate the goddamn jungle,” Benny slapped a mosquito on his neck, wiping away the blood on his hand on his shirt, “Fuckin’ gross.”

“Would you shut the fuck up Benny and keep your eye on your spot?” Ironhead said over his com, “this is supposed to be recon, not a fuckin’ vacation.”

Pope rolled his eyes at them, anxious to get eyes on Lorea, but more importantly, anxious to get eyes on you. He had told the guys exactly what they needed them to know, which was almost nothing about why they were actually in Colombia. Specifically leaving out the very important detail that you were the reason why he had gathered up the troops, paid them each $17,000 out of his own personal checking account, and practically begged them to come down under false pretenses of the Agency needing them for a recce mission on Lorea.

He didn’t even need to beg them, they all had packed their bags willingly and flown over the border into Columbia to gather intel on Lorea. Pope had shown them around the area and talked up a big game about how the narcos were causing all these problems and Lorea needed to be dealt with.

Technically, the recon wasn’t a complete lie. He had been down here for over three years, running himself in circles around the cops and narcos on Lorea’s payroll trying to find a bullshit way to get to him. He’d tried everything and at the end of the day, everything isn’t enough when it comes to this guy. He had his hand in every single nook of this god-forsaken country.

He had a girl on the inside, someone who ran money for Lorea and had offered to give up the location in exchange for her brother’s safe return from jail. Admittedly, she may not have given him this information if he had not been sleeping with Pope, but no one could blame her. He’d had it with this fucking country and at this point, there were no more rules to break. Sleeping with an informant was the least of his worries, especially now that he knew that you were somewhere in the house he was staking out.

Tom turned to Pope, “so you sleeping with her?” He took a piece of gum and shoved it in his mouth, offering one to Pope.

Santiago turned to him and scoffed, “what the fuck is that supposed to mean?” he grabbed the gum and unwrapped it, shoving it in his mouth, “ew man, what the fuck is this shit?”

Tom laughed, “Cola flavored.”

“You owe me a piece of Hubba Bubba dude,” he said, spitting the gum out along with a huge wad of spit. He took his canteen and swished his mouth out as Tom laughed at him.

Back in the day on missions, they had this unspoken rule, someone always has to bring gum. It was like a good luck charm. And Tom, being the leader, always brought the flavor he wanted, never the one that everyone else liked. Fucking asshole. You don’t fuck with tradition…

“I’m at the gate,” Benny’s voice cuts through their ears.

“How’s it looking over there,” Pope responds, holding his binoculars up to take a look from his vantage point.

“Well, looks like things were done about 82% right… They got all the toys out here but these cameras aren’t even aimed at the weakest breach point…” Benny reports.

“Your girlfriend making her normal money drop?” Tom asks

Santiago glares at him, “she ain’t my girlfriend.”

“Informant, whatever…”

“Yeah, she said she’s prepared to record the inside of the house. We need proof of Lorea and the money,” Pope sighs.

Frankie’s voice cuts in, “Hey, uh Pope, I got kids over here. Does he have kids living in here with him? Because that is not what I signed up for.”

“The family is not the problem fish, they are the answer,” Pope says. “Lorea’s very devout… sends his entire crew with his family every Sunday morning. Leaves him, and three guards home alone… every. Sunday.”

Miller pipes up, “why would he do that?”

“Well, he’s worried about someone taking his kids. That and he never leaves his money. Also I don’t think he believes anyone actually has the balls to come out here in the middle of the fuckin’ jungle and rob him,” to this, everyone laughs.

“Look alive guys, we got incoming,” Miller said over the comlink as a van approached.

“Shit Pope, you didn’t tell me your girlfriend was beautiful,” Benny says over the com.

“I fuckin’ knew it,” Tom turns to Pope and shakes his head.

“Fuck off.”

They watch her pull through the front gate, van bouncing through the mud and muck. Gunshots echo out in the distance and Ironhead comes over the com, “I got an execution going down over here guys.”

“Courtyard?” Pope asked.

“Yep… looks like mostly men and two women judging on the builds, can’t see any faces though,” Ironhead responds.

“Fuck…” Pope whispers, “uh, yeah that’s his spot,” his voice tightened.

Screams echoed throughout the coms from Ironhead’s mic, “shit guys, he’s taking some girl into the house… I -” his voice cuts out, clearly unable to watch anymore.

The screams could be heard even without the coms, Pope knowing exactly who it belonged to. He’d heard every sound you could make, screams, crying, laughter. He was your brother and helped raise you, he may have needed confirmation you were in there but in his gut, he already knew.

No one else would be able to see the way his heart rate had quickened, hoping that you weren’t in that group of people, now lying dead on the court. As the last gunshots echoed out throughout the jungle, and your screaming stopped, Pope did something he hadn’t done in a very long time… he prayed.

[writingbakery]

“season of the witch (& the werewolf)”

this is purely indulgent, fluffy, silly nonsense i dreamed up a while back, & am finally pushing out into the world! i may add more parts if it’s well received! <3 taglist; @lady-bakuhoe @katsukisprincess

[pairing; werewolf! kirishima x witch! reader]

[warnings; fluff, pining, crack, strangers to lovers, soft moments, clumsiness, slice of life, magical au]

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

fall, mid september

the leaves crunch sweetly beneath your boots as you make your way through campus; the air is chilly, still, like it’s holding an unspoken breath. how silly.

you shake off the lingering feeling that something.... important is about to happen, focusing your thoughts back on potions - magical college was much harder than normal college, and as a young witch in training, you needed to stay on track. this was only your second of six years; the almost daunting courseload was lightened only by the knowledge that you were exactly where you were meant to be, hopelessly in love with magic.

as a green witch, potions is a major part of your studies - second only to herbology, a smile on your lips as you remember your blooming greenhouse. potions and spells were vital to every witch, but in your case, they were the focal points of your magic. being in tune with wildlife was one thing; being able to borrow from & control it was entirely another.

you’re lucky, however - it’s fall, aptly dubbed the “season of the witch”, your magic stronger and more present. it’s your favorite season, partially because of the energy rush and partially because of everything it entails; halloween, chillier weather, your favorite films on tv.

so wrapped up in thoughts of elderflower and frog legs are you that you don’t even see the person in front of you, colliding with a sturdy chest and nearly toppling to the ground. nearly.

strong arms snake around your waist to catch you, warmth radiating from the laughing body of the man who’s both your savior and your reason for needing saving.

tall, broad, with a shock of red hair and peeking dark roots, smiling so wide you can count all four sharp fangs & hardened incisors - a werewolf’s mouth, if you remember your shifters correctly.

“careful there! that’s a pretty face, i’d hate to let the ground have it all for itself,” the werewolf teases, and you flush darkly before pulling yourself together.

“sorry, i was just.... wrapped up. potions,” you attempt to explain, but the tall redhead just waves off your concerns. now that you’re looking at him properly, he seems oddly familiar, like you’ve seen him but never seen him.

“it’s half my fault anyways, i was too busy lookin’ at the birds,” he shrugs, shaking his head. “i think you’re in my potions class. professor greenbirch? just finished?” that’s where you’ve seen him. a back row sitter, usually half asleep in his cauldron or dicking around with friends.

“that’s the one. this project has sort of taken over all my free thinking space,” you admit, tapping your fingers against your textbook; the way the young werewolf’s eyes widen makes you giggle. “i figured you missed that part. i’m [y/n l/n], green witch & second year.” you hold out your hand, which the werewolf blatantly ignores, pulling you into a rib crushing hug instead.

“i’m eijiro kirishima, also a second year and werewolf - but i’m sure you guessed that already! since i crashed into you so rudely, lemme buy you a coffee? and maybe we can team up on this project i had absolutely no clue about,” he laughs, and his smile is so bright you don’t have the heart to say no. besides, what’s the worst that could happen?

“sure,” you agree, gently prying yourself from his grip, and the two of you are off to the local cafe for chamomile tea and brainstorming.

winter, late january

you frown as you peek out of your frosted window, tending to your greenhouse plants. the weather’s been too chilly for them to thrive the way you want, & your heating spells can only do so much. bundling up in an oversized hoodie and gloves isn’t helping your shivers, but at least youre not directly outside.

technically, you’re meant to be picking herbs and various natural ingredients for your workspace, restocking on materials so that you can continue your studies - and your flourishing side business selling potions to your classmates.

instead, however...

krishima bounds through the grass excitedly, his wolf in full form - silky black fur, tinged with red, a massive creature that had frightened you nearly to death the first time you’d seen it.

ever since that day, swapping project ideas in the warm and bustling cafe, he’d been glued to your side, like a puppy nipping at your heels - he helped you with errands, kept you company late at night when you were lost in spellbooks, and even brought you coffee on the way to potions class. he’d become a great friend, and you were lucky to have him, as much as you teasingly complained about his clinginess.

although, as you watch his body morph and shift back into lean, corded muscle and a sunshine smile, the butterflies erupt full force, and you’re starting to realize you can’t hide your blossoming feelings forever.

he’s shirtless, as usual, a pair of dark sweatpants hanging low on his hips as he cheerfully drops the basket of ingredients next to you, eyeing your shivering form. for a moment you’re almost jealous of his wolvine blood, keeping his blood burning boiling hot despite the cold nipping at his skin. your eyes travel lower, past the broad width of his shoulders, trailing down the cut of his abs & the sprinkling of his dark-haired happy trail disappearing into sweats that hid nothing - clinging to well muscled thighs, and a very impressive print—

you pull yourself out of such thoughts with another shiver, although kirishima blames it on the cold, bless his heart. he’s quick to pull you into one of his notoriously strong hugs, surrounding you in warmth and a hint of cinnamon & pine, a scent you’ve come to associate him with.

it’s nice, comforting almost, and you can pretend you’re not flushing pink from his muscled arms around your waist, keeping you close.

“did you get everything?” you ask instead, pulling back a bit to eye his expression - kirishima has a tendency to get distracted in the woods, “playing tag” with the squirrels and diving into lakes. such a puppy at heart.

he nods, however, his toothy grin showing he’s extremely proud of himself. “i’ll show you everything i got in a minute - i found these really cool pebbles, and this super rare flower, but first we’ve got to warm you up.”

you flush deeper at that, ignoring his teasing tone as you cuddle closer to him, a little unconsciously. “whatever, puppy brain. not all of us have blood so hot it melts steel,” you grumble.

his laughter disturbs every bird in a ten mile radius, but it’s disarmingly cute, and very fitting - you’re smitten to the core, no matter how hard you try to deny it to yourself.

spring, late may

the weather’s finally warm enough to make your brow line with sweat as you dig out weeds, your floppy sunhat somewhat shielding you from the bright sun. your plants are finally coming in strong, tall and leafy and bubbling with happiness that seeps through your pores every time you brush over their stems.

it fills you with pride, a sense of giddiness that’s only heightened when you hear a familiar laugh from behind you, loud and full of sunshine you can’t shield your heart from.

kirishima’s in his element during the springtime, shedding his old fur, touching up his dyejob - the reds twice as vibrant now, and your fingers itch to play with the gelled up strands.

his skin flushes golden under the warm rays, makes him sunkissed and beautiful in all the right ways - you’re lucky to breathe normally around him, let alone control your racing heart.

he spots you easily, waving goodbye to his classmates before dropping down next to you with enough force to shake the dirt in your hands. he’s quick to hug you, immediately launching into a sped up recount of his day - all the while holding you close, nearly in his lap. odd.

he’d been clingier than usual lately, always hugging you close or playing with your fingers, face buried in your neck when he got tired or upset. it’s sweet, even adorable, but your tender heart can barely take it, and you’re not sure how to bring it up without making him - or yourself - embarrassed.

for now, you’ll just soak up the extra attention & hope to god it doesn’t make the fluttering in your stomach worse, your aura sickly sweet pink and flushed enough. eventually, you’d have to confess how you felt - it was eating you alive.

for now, however, this is enough. you tuck a daisy behind kirishima’s ear and laugh at the way he sneezes immediately, confusion written all over his face.

summer, early july

it’s sweltering, your greenhouse & garden safely locked away under cooling charms as you drape yourself over the couch in kirishima’s dorm room. you’re sweating despite the fan tucked under your shirt and ice cubes in your mouth, probably because you’ve got a redheaded, hotblooded werewolf in your lap.

kirishima’s clinginess has only gotten worse, not even the heat keeping him from burying his face in your stomach, arms tucked around your thighs. it’s lovely but too warm, the added heat from his body stifling as you finally push him off.

“too hot,” you complain, but kiri just wines in response, and you clumsily pat his head in apology.

he surprises you, leaning up to nuzzle his cheek against your palm, even kissing your fingers. he’s got your full attention now, and you watch his affectionate actions with a smile.

“what’s gotten into you, hm? you’ve been real cuddly, pup,” you hum, and the way his cheeks redden makes you laugh. “what, you thought i hadn’t noticed? you’ve been stuck to me like beetroot on toadeye powder, what’s going on?”

you’d kept mostly quiet about his ever increasing clingy behavior, but with the way he’s avoiding your eyes, you’ve got a feeling you know just what his response will be, and your heartbeat quickens.

he’s quiet for a long stretch, opening & closing his mouth like he’s deciding just what to say, & how to ssy it. it’s endearing, but you’re nervous, waiting to hear the words you’d been praying for.

“fuck it,” he says suddenly, sitting up on the floor so that his face is right up next to yours. confusion fills you as you sit up too, attempting to make space - but he tugs you right back down by your hands, lacing your fingers together and squeezing once, twice.

and then he kisses you, soft and sweet with a thousand and one unspoken words. it’s so gentle, a caress of his lips on yours and before you know it your hands are tangled in bright red locks, keeping him close.

“oh,” you say softly once you finally part, chest light and airy despite being breathless; kiri just laughs shyly, kissing your hands with a grin.

“yeah, oh. guess we should’ve done that sooner,” he blushes, but his tone’s still teasing - as always.

you roll your eyes and whack him lightly with your joined hands, your smile too wide to contain.

“and to think, all that pining for nothing,” you tease back, squealing as the young werewolf comes to bury you in a flurry of kisses, sweet and soft and full of love.

fall, mid october

you trudge through the grass, yawning as you crunch through the multi-colored leaves. there’s leafpiles everywhere - perfect for jumping, your inner child says, and you smile. it’s just chilly enough to make you shiver, but warm enough to forget a coat, and you hum as you walk, deciding to indulge yourself a little and kick through the masses of leaves.

however, you’re not accounting for the twigs to catch at your ankles, stumbling down and you wince as you brace for the rough fall—

two strong arms wrap around your waist, tugging you up and back against a strong chest, rumbling with laughter. cinnamon and pine tickles your nose, and you smile wider, giggling a bit yourself.

“we really gotta stop meeting like this,” kirishima teases, pressing a sweet kiss to your cheek before setting you back on your feet. you spin around quickly, hands resting lightly against his chest as you lean up to kiss him proper.

“oh shut it. don’t think i’ve forgotten about you rolling through the leafpiles like a puupydog,” you laugh, poking his cheeks gently; he’s dressed warmer than usual, a college hoodie and a varsity jacket. he’s quick to peel the latter off, however, and drape it over your shoulders. oh.

“i had a feeling my favorite little witch wasn’t dressed warm enough, so i came to rescue them from the cold,” he explains, taking your hands and kissing at the chilled skin. he’s always thoughtful like that, looking after you so sweetly. it makes your heart swell and your cheeks pink, the way he’s always thinking of you.

“well i had a feeling my favorite puppy hadnt taken in enough nutrients today, especially after a full moon’s night spent wandering in the forest. elderflower and ginger, to help with all your aches & pains,” you chastise gently, holding up the thermos full of herbal tea.

kiri takes the thermos with an excited gasp - he loves when you brew him things, always claims it’s twice as special coming from your hands. now that you have separate potions II classes, he can’t partner with you anymore, so he readily accepts whatever you give him happily.

“we still on for pumpkin picking? i wanna carve out professor horden’s creepy ghoul face to scare bakugou.” his voice rings out excitedly between sips, taking your hand in his free one once more; you laugh at his silliness, your heart twice as full as last year and steady growing.

the pair of you walk through campus just like this; holding hands and laughing about everything & nothing all at once, the future bright.

it’s the season of the witch, after all - the witch and the werewolf.

[dragonrajafanfiction]

Epilogue: Ja Mata, Friends

I finally finished the Main Story Quest Rewritten Series! Yaaaaay! *Kermit Flail!*

Erii settled down on her knees and opened her little red suitcase. She wrote down on the paper notepad that she was supposed to be going to Korea to start a new life, but you notice that she didn’t pack very much. 

Your body still aches terribly to the point where you wanted to puke. Your eyes rolled with fatigue. But Erii was showing you her things and writing down her words in her way to chat with you even though you could only stare blankly.

You were in the middle of a graveyard of bones. The cooling effect of the broken canister of liquid nitrogen mixed with the spring air and created a dense fog in the Red Well. But you could still see the outlines of ribs, femurs and skulls among the pile of debris. Charred skeletons embraced each other in battle and deadpool remains mixed with human remains. It reminded you of a scene in an ancient fossilized tar pit. Over hundreds or thousands of years, countless animals and people fell into the pit and died together. Archeologists discovered them but their bones were all mixed up.

Erii showed you her Roman shoes, her white strapped shoes, her hairpins, stockings and ribbons all neatly packed. Then she showed you her little toys. Then she showed you her postcards.

“On April 24th, I went to Tokyo Sky Tree with Sakura. The warmest place in the world is on the Sky Tree.”

“On April 26th, I went to Meiji Shrine with Sakura. Someone held a wedding there.”

“On April 25th, I went to the amusement park with Sakura. The haunted house was scary, but with Sakura there it wasn’t so scary.”

You blink sleepily and suppress a yawn to avoid the pain of stretching your bones. “Hmm… at Christmas, I will take you to see Siberia.”

She nods seriously as this is a solemn vow to her.

Erii quietly took out some of her clothes and pressed them against your skin. The battle had ruined the last remnants of your wedding dress. She opened a blouse and slid it on your arms, pausing when you flinched and hissed in pain, only to continue when you relaxed. Then she buttoned up the front for you. She handed you her skirt and slipped it over your body. 

A soft noise, like a stone rolling down a hill made you sit up in alarm. Erii pressed one hand to your shoulder to keep you from standing. She wrote in her notebook. “Sakura is here.”

You blink at an approaching, staggering human shaped shadow in the fog. For a second, you think it’s Z and your heart lifts. In a few more seconds, Lu Mingfei came into view. Erii with her amazing hearing had already sensed his approach. That explained why she had dressed you and covered you up.

The man looked exhausted and soaked to the bone. At the sight of Erii’s wave, he relaxed to near collapse. “You’re here!” He exclaimed.

Lu Mingfei stumbled the rest of the way into her arms. He hugged her tightly and after a long time, he quietly began to cry. You watched them embrace, feeling happy for them at first, and your eyes grow dull.

Chance was gone. Ruri Kazama was gone too. He fell asleep in the mind of Chime and you would never be so greedy as to use the clapper on him to bring him back. Chime was off somewhere with his brother. It was uncertain if you’d ever see him again. Somehow, you’d seen the world, been wooed by the most beautiful men of Tokyo and still had ended up alone with no one to hold you and cry. 

Lu Mingfei had arrived in a black Mercedes and that’s what you took to get out of this place. You fell asleep on your way there.

You woke up days later to an IV in your arm in the comfort of the luxury suite. You stare up at the princess canopy. You’re surprised. How could it be that this place remained untouched throughout the whole disaster? Ruri Kazama knew your room. Perhaps by his fierce order, all the Devil Clan members knew not to destroy the bedroom of his precious love.

“MC…” A familiar voice speaks out of the dimly lit corner. You sit up. 

Renata was sitting next to your bedside. Her long blond hair was down over her bare shoulders. She wore a frilly blue lace top and a light yellow skirt with a white obi belt at her waist. A black knee brace interrupted her silhouette. For a moment you stare silently into each other’s eyes, expressionless. 

“Is there still a bug in this room?” You ask.

“I had Fingel remove it.” She said, standing and sitting next to you on your bed.

You finally wrap your arms around her, rest your head in her chest, and the tears roll down your face. Renata doesn’t cry but the strength in her arms as they hold you, so firm and so tightly, conveys her thoughts. You slept for twenty years and traveled all the way across the world. You’d fought with monsters and devils, gangsters and gods. But you still managed to find each other in the end. In this secret hide away in the dark, you could hold each other again. You press your ear to her chest and listen to that strong heavy heartbeat and hear her breathe in and out. “Renata… I loved you back then.”

“I thought so too. I was too embarrassed to say anything about it. I was afraid of getting in trouble with the nurses. But please. Continue to call me Zero. It’s more than my new identity. It’s who I am now.” She pulled away from you slightly. “Do you know about… him?”

You know she’s talking about Z and you nod. “A little.”

“Please keep it to yourself.” Her eyes were gentle, but her voice held a command. “There are things that are still far beyond that we cannot understand. But if you stay useful to the end, he will not leave you.”

It takes three months for everything to settle and, in the meantime, you stay with the men in Takamagahara Night Club. Your bloodline test returns completely clean and you are installed as a full member of Cassell College.  You don’t tell them how it happened, that you were bitten by the Light King parasite and filled head to toe with its fetal blood. When Erii embraced you, the effect was the same. She bathed in the blood of a young dragon and her bloodline issues resolved. In Caesar’s report, he simply states that your bloodline problems were clerical errors and you were never a dangerous hybrid.

In those months, the club Takamagahara was fully restored. Though Tokyo still lies in ruins, a great final performance has been arranged. You settle in your seat next to Zero and she looks at you and smiles.

The curtain was slowly opened. Caesar’s fingers ran across the keys of a piano, Chu Zihang blew out the first note on the saxophone and the applause rolled over like a tide. The spotlights swayed over them and the banners that read “Love Sakura!” “BasaraKing forever!” and “Sacred Ukyo!”

Zero huffed to your right. “Someone should stand behind Lu Mingfei before he faints.”

Erii sat next to you on your left and held up a sign. “Go Sakura!”

Tonight is his debut show and the farewell show for the three of them. The theme is ``Goodbye, Ikemen Team.” The TV regrettably announced that BasaraKing, Ukyou, and Little Sakura would be returning to the United States due to their expiring contract. Tonight is their last performance. They would also be ending their careers as performers, so this was truly Sayounara.

All the tickets were sold out in advance. Not even VIPs could get a hold of them. Whole bar fixtures were removed to accommodate more guests. The dance floor was full of women, young and old. Everyone was dressed in costumes from shiny sexy short skirts to dignified long black sleeves. In order to ensure safety, the Metropolitan Police Department temporarily activated traffic control measures and everyone had to walk to the Takamagahara.

Apparently, Cassell had pulled some sort of mass brainwashing. All the people who witnessed the raging deadpool in the club suddenly didn’t remember it that way at all. They only remembered you and the boys protecting and helping people during the storm and that was it. Cassell was scarily efficient at hiding the truth of the world from the world.

Lu Mingfei stepped to the microphone and looked at Erii and sang a shaky little “Sayounara.” He picked up the champagne on the piano cover and drank.

You only understand the word Sayounara in the song. It’s all in Japanese. Lu Mingfei might not have the best voice, but he does have the best Japanese of the three. You quickly pick up a handkerchief. “Erii… don’t cry! Come on, you have to give your support! You can still chat over Line tonight.”

There was no more fear that Erii would rage out of control and kill everyone. So she was free to express sad emotions like this. Now her red eyes ran with tears. “I want to go to the US with Sakura.” She wrote.

“And you will! You will! Eventually… Don’t despair okay?”

The best theater speakers in Tokyo were tuned to the use of the Takamagahara. The sound from the subwoofers burst like ten thousand cannons. Caesar’s piano skills were handed down to him from the world’s top masters and flowed into the sound system. Chu Zihang’s saxophone was also very good. The musical emotional refrain climbed higher and higher. And then when the hall seemed to no longer be able to accommodate such surging music, the top of the hall suddenly opened letting in the moon and starlight.

The spring had turned to summer and the warm air of the seaside city flooded in. You look up at the star strewn sky and grin. Your hand tightens on Zero’s hand. “Make a wish.” You whisper.

Caesar got up from the piano and Chu Zihang put down the saxophone. They all walked to Lu Mingfei’s side and the three took each other’s hands and bowed deeply. 

Cries and applause swept the stage like a storm. And the enthusiasm can't be contained. Women rushed the stage to embrace the young men who were leaving but the stage was too high to climb. So they throw roses, thousands of roses until the stage is covered with bright red, pink and white.

“Ukyou! Ukyou! BasaraKing! Basaraking! I love you! Don’t leave!”

It was time for the final rankings of the performers. At this moment, the spotlight suddenly came on to Lu Mingfei. Whale who had lost an arm in the disaster strode onto the stage. “According to Takamagahara practice, whether Little Sakura stays in our warm family depends on one thing - love! That is, your love!” Whale shouted. “Only the flower tickets of your love can get him to stay. So vote for him. Waiter! Please reveal how much love did LIttle Sakura get during his internship?”

A waiter came with an envelope on the platter. Whale tore it open with his teeth and shouted “320 flower tickets!”

“Oh…” You wince. Poor Lu Mingfei. Chu Zihang and Caesar and easily gathered over 900 ticket buyers in a few days. And after months here Lu Mingfei couldn’t gather half that.

But Whale continued. “In addition to the flower tickets purchased before the show, the total is 100,320 flower tickets! Congratulations Little Sakura, you passed the internship period and you are now a member of our Takamagahara club family!”

Whale took a check from his pocket. A projector enlarged the check until it was the whole background of the stage. It was a check for 100 million yen. Lu Mingfei stood in stunned silence. The check was signed by Erii Uesugi.

Erii had stood up at the end of the show but now she held up a new sign with a sad silent face. The sign read clearly. “Sakura, please stay.”

“Oh… Oh Erii…” Your heart was moved by this. You reach out to her.

Zero takes your arm and whispers urgently. “You have to go now. Or else you’ll miss them.”

You hesitate. Erii doesn’t look at you or shift from that spot. Lu Mingfei stares at her over the crowd but the curtain goes down in front of him. Zero is pushing you now and you have to go.

Erii still stands there even though the curtain is down.

Zero drags you out a side entrance to a waiting Alfa Romero Sports car.

“You can comfort her later.” Zero says as she shuts the door of the driver’s side of the vehicle.

“Yeah…” You buckle up and then do a double take. “Since when did you learn how to drive?”

“Since forever ago.” She turned her head and backed out of the alley and sped down the street so fast you were pressed into the leather. 

The helicopter was parked in a large parking lot two blocks away and the eight executive members of the Hydra lined up to send the Cassell team off. After this incident, the Japanese branch was established again, but a new agreement was signed. Anjou gave up his personal control over the branch, though he still holds the highest decision making power.

The last surviving member of the original family was Nanami Sakurai and she was promoted as Minister of Japan and the new acting director of the Executive Bureau. Chisei and his brother were missing in action and assumed dead. But before his disappearance, Chisei had left the leadership to Mrs. Sakurai. Caesar and Anjou spoke to Mrs. Nanami and she was impressed by their words enough to let you have a special internship and training as a White King bloodline operative and you would be handling all matters when it came to the Devil Clan and unstable hybrids.

“These small gifts left by the clan chief are not quite high end,” Crow gave sunscreen in glass bottles to Casear, Anjou, Lu Mingfei, Zero, and Fingel. “They’re his whole collection. He was really serious about going and selling sunscreen.”

“I’ll smear it on the prettiest girl’s back for him.” Caesar said.

“That would make him happy. That’s what he looked forward to the most.” Crow said.

Your heart aches slightly, thinking of Sakura Yabuki. You wondered where Chisei was now. You hoped he managed to find peace somewhere with his brother.

Caesar approached you. “Are you going to be alright by yourself?”

Your lips curl upward. Then you dip your head and delicately remove your contact lenses. Your eyes are glowing golden, permanently. One didn’t just brush up against the experience of being a dragon king and not be left with some sequelae. “Caesar… Are you going to be alright by yourself?” You ask in a sly voice.

Caesar averts his eyes. “Okay, okay, point taken.”

You replace the contacts in your eyes. “I’m no Caesar Gattuso, but I think I can hold my own here.”

Caesar’s eyes soften. “We’re going to look for him.”

Your smile fades. “Don’t look too hard.” Your chest aches again. “Chime needs time. And so do I.”

Caesar pulls you into a tight hug. You inhale deeply and focus on the bright sweet scent of tobacco. “Don’t forget to text me when you get in. And tell Nono I said hello.”

“I will.”

You approach Lu Mingfei. His eyes are dim and he doesn’t look up. You shake your head. You’re living because of this guy, so you can’t punch him or threaten him too badly. You tap his nose and he looks up at you, looking irritated. 

“Better step up, pretty boy. She went through a lot for you.”

“I know… I... “ Lu Mingfei rubbed the back of his head.

“Don’t say anything! I’m having the hardest time not dragging you back to the Takamagahara right now. It’s 100 mil yen man… come on.” You suddenly hug him tight.

“Ow! Ow! Have you been working out or something? Geez you’re gonna leave a bruise!” He whined.

“Text her.” That’s the last you say to Lu Mingfei.

You approach Chu Zihang. He looked down at you with golden eyes hidden behind black eyed contact lenses. Even now, you didn’t feel particularly close to him, especially not close enough to hug. Chu Zihang was holding a long white wood box that contained Chisei’s swords anyway. He nodded once to you.

“I will be following your progress closely.” He said.

Principal Anjou was blowing out a puff on his cigar as you approached him. He handed you a small white card. “This is your official Cassell Credentials. You’ll be on remote study, but given your performance, you can study at your leisure.”

“Thank you, Principal. I would like to learn Japanese, and how to drive faster than Zero.”

Zero looked up from where she was about to board the helicopter and rolled her eyes at you, but there was a trace of a smile on her lips.

The helicopter took them up into the sky and you watched as its white light disappeared like a shooting star flying into the distance, taking your friends away across the ocean to the United States. 

You turned back to Crow who bowed deeply until he was horizontal. “Mrs. Chief. Forgive my bad English, but your car is ready to go to your new accommodations at the Hydra headquarters in Genji Heavy Industries.”

You grin flashing your white teeth at him. “Arigatou.”

[lovelylaurie]

Chronology - Part 3

Growing Up Laurie x (March) Reader Words: 3524 Request: @psychshawnjuleshanluke​ A series where each part follows reader and Laurie’s relationship over time. Part 1 | 2 | 3

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     Winter, long awaited, wasted no time in cloaking the world under a shroud of chill and ice. The boughs of sturdy oaks hung heavy under the weight of snow. The forests and fields, once so full of adventure, were now treacherous, impassable landscapes. But you were not without consolation. Books offered a welcome escape, and you frequently visited Mr. Laurence to borrow more. And Laurie was making good on his promise to write letters. The first came barely a week after he had left, and every one since was an incredible boost to your spirits. You responded to each and every one, no matter how short or inconsequential. And thus your lengthy correspondence grew to be an immense comfort and joy. 

      You sat, now, in the living room of your house. The fire crackled and sputtered happily, providing some heat to combat the cold winter night outside. Laurie’s most recent letter was tucked into a book beside you.

Dearest (y/n),       How could you think I would spend Christmas anywhere but home? I may have some friendly acquaintances here, but I would never miss an opportunity to see you for their sake, and I still need to fulfill my promise to return at every chance I get. “The companions of our childhood always possess a certain power over our minds which hardly any later friend can obtain,” as Victor Frankenstein says. You would love it here, (y/n), there are so many libraries and bookstores and places to explore that I wish you were here with me to see them. And you will be. Soon, I hope, if you can come in the Spring as promised. But in the meantime, I have so many wonderful things to tell you next week. I will see you soon. Farewell and forever yours, Laurie

      Around you sat your sisters, as Meg had come to visit, talking and chatting, and musing on what name she would choose for the baby, because she was now pregnant and we did not yet know that it would be twins. Though humbled by domestic life, Meg was as starry-eyed as ever about Mr. Brooke, “I’m just so excited for my first Christmas with John. And with a baby by next summer! Everything’s happened so fast, but I wouldn’t have it any other way,” she beamed blissfully. “I can’t wait for the ice skating and snowball fights and all the fun we’ll have,” said Jo. Beth, who was leaning against her, simply smiled. “I’m looking forward to drawing the snow, it’ll be great practice,” proclaimed Amy  “What about you, (y/n)?” asked Jo, who was now looking at you expectantly. “Laurie,” you confessed. “We’ll have great fun, I can’t wait until he gets here.” “You and Laurie have grown very close…” Meg said, sounding awfully self-assured. “We’ve always been. He’s my closest friend and companion.” “Partner in crime, more like,” she interjected. You pretended not to hear her, “I loathe this separation.” Amy smiled playfully and teased, “Is that really all it is?” “Huh?” Jo leaned over to hit her, “No, Amy, don’t! Meg’s already gone off-” “I’m still here, Jo.” “-and I couldn’t bear to have any more of us drawn away,” she protested hotly. Everyone turned to look at you. “Well, I don’t really see what you’re all getting at. We’ve always been this way, Laurie and I.”   “How do you feel about him, (y/n)?” Meg asked softly. Jo tried to reach over and hit her, too, but she was brushed off. You were beginning to feel quite oblivious, not clued into something that seemed so obvious to everyone else. But then, through all the compiled worry, the longing, aching for his presence, it dawned on you. The rush you feel when he looks at you, when he smiles, the flutter in your chest when he laughs, the flush of your cheeks when he grabs your hand. And when he kissed you… It seemed so obvious now, so clear, you were astonished that you hadn’t realized it before. Love. “Oh...” Meg looked pleased, “And she’s realized.” “Meg,” Jo whined, glaring at her sister, “how could you?” Their bickering faded as waves of realization washed over you and everything fell into place. In the midst of this cacophony, Beth leaned over, quietly and tenderly, and whispered to you with excitement twinkling in her eye, “You love him?” “Yes,” you breathed, with a smile forming at the corner of your lips.

      The following morning, you were seated at the table, slowly picking through your breakfast with marked disinterest. Now more than ever you couldn’t wait for Laurie to arrive. Though holly and tinsel hung from everywhere, and Beth began to play Christmas carols throughout the day, it didn’t feel like the festivities could really start until he was here. But you had no idea when- Jo jumped up suddenly, “The Laurence’s carriage! It’s outside!” You sprang to your feet and ran to look. There it was, coming down the path. And in the window, you could just barely see, was Laurie. “It’s Laurie!” you shrieked as you threw on boots and a coat as fast as you could. Then you flew out of the house and down the path, barely stopping to close the door or notice the snow soaking the hem of your dress and toes of your socks. It didn’t matter. For him, it didn’t matter. “Laurie!” you called as the carriage came to a stop, “LAURIE!” The door burst open and he jumped out with a huge smile spread across his face. You engulfed him in an enormous hug, “Theodore Laurence, what took you so long?” His arms wrapped around you and his face nuzzled into your hair as you leaned your head on his shoulder, “Absence makes the heart grow fonder.” Then his voice dropped and he held you tighter, “I have missed you so much, (y/n).” You remained in each other’s embrace until Mr. Laurence stepped out of the carriage as well, at which point you both pulled away and a blush crept onto your face. Laurie insisted that you get inside, after seeing that you had only a thin coat on, and no scarf, hat, or gloves. When you got to the house, he was embraced again by Jo and Marmee and everyone else.       His return was as sweet as his departure was bitter. Your whole life suddenly seemed a little brighter, and you were surprised to find yourself not remotely worried about his leaving once again in only a few weeks. His presence now was so precious, so wonderful, it overshadowed all those concerns. One afternoon, to get away from the prying eyes of your sisters, you had suggested a walk, on a path well-trodden over the years that started close to your house, looped through the forest, and then doubled back on itself. It was comforting and calming to be alone with Laurie, surrounded by the sparkling snow and featureless white of a winter sky. The conversation was jovial and friendly, flitting between Laurie’s life at University and yours back home. “Out of all of us, I believe Meg has changed the most,” Laurie posited. “She’s the only one to have really changed at all.” He paused a while before continuing, “Do you ever think about the future, (y/n)?” There was a sudden change and drop in his tone that frightened you and ignited a feeling of disquietude deep in your mind. He sounded incredibly trepidatious, and you wondered, uneasily, at the cause. “I rather enjoy the here and now,” you responded shakily.   “But we have so much to consider.” It was unlike Laurie to be this, so serious and deliberate. What was he hinting at? What was he trying to say? He had long held a special place in your heart, one you had recently put a name to. Meg’s future, marrying for love, was one you were just beginning to see for yourself. With Laurie. Possibly. But his hesitancy approaching this same subject was unsettling, and you began to think that he didn’t have the same plans. “I just want to enjoy a walk with you, Laurie, and not have to think about things that make me worried.” He was silent, and a nagging thought began to worm its way into your mind. Perhaps college had changed him during the past few months. Perhaps it had made him more realistic about his obligations and prospects. He couldn’t marry you.       The crisp sound of snowy footfalls ceased as Laurie came to a stop beside you. Turning to face him, now a few steps ahead, you saw the way he seemed to lean ever so slightly more on one foot than the other. His hands were stuck in the pockets of his coat, unbuttoned despite the cold. “Can’t we talk, (y/n)?” He was somber, pleading, and incredibly tense. “Why?” it came out almost as a whisper, as a plea for him to stop and allow you to ignore it for a little while longer. “Why?” he repeated, “You know why.” Laurie’s face always had a special look when tense. His eyebrows didn’t knot, he didn’t frown, his expression suspended by a stoic serenity. He gazed at you, with eyes half-lidded, conveying an intense depth of emotion that pulled at the pit of your stomach. You shook your head. “No. No, Laurie, you’re being mean.” Something in him broke. “I know I’m not fit for high society. I’m not like Amy, I was never supposed to marry rich. And- and I just- you can’t, so-” you could only speak in fragments as your thoughts devolved. He took more steps towards you, “But (y/n), It’s always been us, it’s always been you and me.” “What?” He held out his arms, “You’re my whole future, you always have been. That’s why I’m doing this. Everything, all of it, is for you.” Whatever had broken in him fell apart as his voice cracked, “And I realize I’m not this great man, but… I figured you’d have me, (y/n).” That took your breath. “Oh, Laurie, of course-” you stumbled towards him and he pulled you in a longing embrace. In his arms, the full weight of your admission crashed down on you. He is your future, just as you are his. You thought he couldn’t have you, and he thought you wouldn’t, and the very idea of that sickened you. Because losing Laurie would be losing a part of your life, your soul. He felt so warm, so real, as he held you close. “I love you,” you whispered. A smile, a twinge of glee, played behind his eyes and at the corners of his lips. He held your cheek in his hand, “I have loved you ever since I’ve known you, (y/n).”       Then he leaned down, catching your lips in a needful and tender kiss. You felt like you were about to explode, about to burst with emotion and passion. Whatever doubts, whatever fears and worries you had floated away as you melted into him. It was perfect.

--

      Christmas day dawned quietly as the dim light cast sweeping shadows across the sleepy room. But any semblance of serenity was soon broken as your sisters awoke. First Amy, then Jo, and finally Beth. They rushed at you and pulled you out of bed with shrieks and giggles. Marmee peered in with a kind and maternal smile, “Merry Christmas, girls.” “Merry Christmas!” was the instant reply. Amy and Jo sprinted past her down the stairs as you and Beth shuffled slowly after them. Presents were piled modestly beneath the tree and the table was heaped with plenty of breakfast treats. But as the gifts were doled out and began to be unwrapped, you noticed something was missing… Amy exclaimed fervently, “Laurie’s presents this year are spectacular, what did you get, (y/n)? I’m dying to know.”       He had given Meg some small domestic trinket, a picture frame which she immediately loved. Jo got some new pen nibs, because a recent writing frenzy had bent all of hers, as well as a dapper pocket watch. She had shrieked upon opening the box and now couldn’t stop pulling it out of her pocket every few minutes. Amy got a beautiful and tasteful pair of earrings that sparkled and glittered with her every movement. Beth got a new book of music, full of pieces she had somehow never learned before. It was quite a find. She flipped through the pages, running her fingers slowly across the bars and measures as the music played in her head. But for you… “Nothing.” They stared at you dumbly. “But we’ve agreed to meet later, so I’m sure he’s just waiting until then.” Sensing the tension, Beth proposed trying to play one of her new pieces, which everyone jumped up to hear. You were incredibly grateful. Touching her hand discreetly, you mouthed ‘thank you,’ which she understood and returned with a smile.       You eventually lost track of time listening to Beth work out and piece together phrases and melodies. Laurie had promised to meet you at ten, but it was already five past and there was no sign of him, no figure approaching down the path, no footsteps in the snow outside. So, confused and concerned, you elected to go to the Laurence house yourself. Though the sun was by now shining clear and bright, the morning air was utterly devoid of heat. You would have waited outside, but the biting cold and your growing sense of unease drew you in. A servant showed you to the study, where you began to wait. You gazed off at the window, lost in anxious thought. Five minutes passed. And then ten. And fifteen. Finally, Laurie greeted you with an unexpected kiss on the cheek and a quiet, “Merry Christmas, (y/n).” “Laurie!” you jumped up in surprise and immediately hugged him. Oddly, nothing seemed wrong. He wasn’t distant or unhappy. He clutched you close, perhaps tighter than normal, and you pulled away quickly. “You have some explaining to do. First, no present. Meg gets the picture frame, Jo the pen nibs and watch, Amy the earrings, and Beth the music. Even Marmee gets a matching scarf and glove set, and Hannah got cinnamon and saffron spices. Oh! And you gave Father those books on philosophy. Then there was no sign of you, and I’ve been here waiting, and you’re incredibly late-” you stopped speaking because he was looking at you so intently, so lovingly, his eyes brimming with a passionate, but quiet, intensity. He spoke evenly and softly, “That’s because I’ve been talking with my grandfather. And if you’ll have me, then-” he reached into his pocket, but you hardly noticed because you were so breathlessly, stunningly speechless. What he was telling you, asking you, was everything you had hoped for and everything you could ever want. It wasn’t a pair of earrings or a book, it was a life and a future full of love and happiness. “I have this for you,” he pressed something small into your hand and you had to tear your eyes away from him to look at it. It was a ring, with a gold band, delicately filigreed, and an elegantly small, but still sparkling, diamond set into it. His smile glowed. Your heart practically beat through your chest. You could barely speak but still managed to murmur, “Yes. Yes, Laurie, of course.” He beamed, “You will, you’ll marry me?” “Yes!” you exclaimed, and he kissed you, passionately and fervently. His relief and elation were clear, unquestionable, as he gazed at you after pulling away. You kissed him again, and he kissed back feverishly. It was a heated, exhilarating moment, and you found it nigh impossible to tear your eyes off the brilliant, beautiful boy in front of you.       As you left to tell your family, you found Mr. Laurence outside in the hall. Letting go of Laurie’s hand, you rushed to his grandfather, “Oh, Mr. Laurence, thank you! Thank you so much, I don’t have the words. I- I know Laurie can do so, so much better than me and that this is probably never what you had planned, but I can’t thank you enough.” Your eyes began to water, brimming with excitement and gratitude. “I think you know him as well as I do, Ms. March, if not better. He loves you, and no match could ever be better for him.” Laurie was practically bursting with emotion, a deep and affectionate ardor. You rejoined him and it warmed your heart to see the way he gazed at you. You could scarcely believe that you would get to spend the rest of your life with him. You were so young, so new to the real world. It was probably wiser to wait, until you were a little older, until Laurie graduated. But you couldn’t care less. You felt like running to your house, like running everywhere, anywhere, your limbs felt jittery, electrified. Instead, you walked slowly, with Laurie’s arm draped lovingly around your shoulders and a buoyant spring in his step. Somehow, you didn’t feel remotely cold. And neither did he, apparently, for as you approached the door, he leaned down and said softly, “I’ll wait out here.”       You rushed through the door and burst into the front room excitedly. Meg looked up “(y/n)! You’re back!” Jo ran in from the kitchen, a pastry in hand, “What did you get?” You stumbled over your words, unable to express your complete and utter joy, “I- and Laurie-” you stopped with a dumb grin stuck on your face, glancing from your sisters to your parents and back again. Then Amy burst into a smile almost bigger than yours and shrieked before pointing at your hand and screaming, “A RING!!” commotion erupted and everyone rushed forward to look at it, talking over each other with questions and congratulations. Then finally Marmee found you. “I know I should have asked you first, as Meg did, but I couldn’t. This is just- it’s everything.” “I understand, (y/n), of course,” she smiled warmly and lovingly, pulling you into a comforting hug. As the chaos began to die down, Jo looked at you intently, “Where’s Laurie?” “He’s outside.” Meg gasped, “What, in the cold?!”       They all rushed over and he could barely utter a ‘hello’ before he was pulled inside and everything erupted all over again. But once he could, the first thing Laurie did was turn to your father, “I’m sorry I didn’t ask you, Mr. March, I know I should have.” “You’re practically family, Laurie, this just puts it down on paper.”         You were inseparable for the rest of the day. Laurie was unable to go just a few minutes without holding your hand or putting his arm around you. As twilight approached, early in the evening, you settled on the couch together. You sat sideways in his lap with a book in hand. He wrapped his arms around you and twirled your hair in his fingers, reading lazily over your shoulder. The weight of the day’s events hung heavy on your eyelids and pulled them down. Drifting off every once in a while, you leaned closer and closer to Laurie until your eyes opened and you found yourself resting against his chest. He chuckled as you awoke and mumbled an incoherent “Wha?”  “You fell asleep.”  “Oh,” you replaced your bookmark and set the book down. “Keep me talking, I want to stay awake a little while longer.”  “Alright, then.” He cleared his throat. “How did you enjoy your Christmas present?” “It was perfect.” You gave him a small kiss before continuing, “I’m sorry I couldn’t get you anything.” You fidgeted with the fabric of your dress. It had been bugging you slightly, all day, that you had been unable to find or afford anything while he had literally proposed.  “That’s nothing,” he murmured, “you’re all I need.”  You reached out to hold his hand, “That’s sweet, Laurie.” “It’s true.” He tapped your hand with his thumb nervously, “I was worried you might say no.”  “How come?”  “We’re far too young, I’ve barely begun university, I’m being reckless and going too fast, I didn’t consult your parents.” His words didn’t sound entirely his own, as if he had been told them. “Is that what you discussed with your grandfather?” He nodded, and you could see his distinct look of blank, stoic tension begin to build in his now half-lidded eyes.  “I’m not worried,” you assured him softly, leaning your head back down on his chest. He held you closer.  “No?” His tone was incredibly earnest. “Why’s that?” You paused, for a while, to consider exactly how to express the depth of your feelings for him, your complete certainty that everything would be fine.  “Laurie…” He grasped your hand. “You’re a part of me, of my very soul. I don’t think we could be apart if we tried.” He said nothing, allowing a dreamy silence to surround you. So entwined in his arms, you surrendered to the lull of sleep. 

--

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@sadhwstudent

[duckseamail]

Break It - a short story

Here’s the short story I wrote for my english class!!! It’s about 2.5 k words, and kinda sad (it has a nice ending though!!!). I’m really happy with how it turned out, and would love any feedback!

Winona’s bangs are plastered to her forehead, rainwater sprinting its way past her eyes and over her lips. Her shoes slap on the saturated gray pavement.

Half a block away, she can see the faint glow of the porch lights from her apartment building. She grabs the edges of her raincoat tightly, hoping it's still wholly spread over her backpack, and sprints through the puddles and up to the front walk. Unfortunately, her face is assaulted with a smack by the large, unkempt bush that she can avoid on a good day. 

With a fierce kick at the stoop, Winona pushes into the small entryway.

She makes her way through the second pair of doors and goes to the stairwell. With a sigh, she starts the trek up to the seventh floor.

When she reaches her floor, she crinkles her nose in disgust. The thin carpet is thoroughly soaked and gathering little puddles of muddy water from all the people who have been coming in during the late afternoon downpour. 

She gets to her door and puts the key in the lock. It sticks a few times before finally, with much cursing and trying to force the locked door open, the locking mechanism catches and smoothly turns. Winona glares at the key as she pulls it out and enters her home. 

“Yeah...yeah, waiting for the rain to clear out next week sounds do-able.” A voice coming from the kitchen says.

Winona slips her soggy tennis shoes off and into the wicker basket by the door. She should ask her mom to take her to get some new rainboots soon.

“I actually did have a couple questions about the burial to ask you, Mr. Moro.”

Winona is about to hop past the square of harsh white light illuminating the hall when an arm shoots out in front of her. Busted. Mom is still on the phone with Mr. Moro, but the way her mouth is pursed conveys the “stay there and wait for a conversation” perfectly fine without words.

Mom walks around the small kitchen as she talks. She grabs a large, pink and green mug from the rack next to the sink. Winona watches as she takes out the ceramic jar labeled “calm” in a flowing cursive script and places a teabag from it into the empty mug.

“Thanks again for your time; I’ll call you soon.” Mom hangs up. Neither of them says anything.

The high, screaming whistle of the teakettle breaks the momentary silence.

Winona wishes she’d had time to change out of her wet clothes before having this conversation. The cold and sticky feeling of the bottoms of her jeans clinging to her ankles is almost as bad as the fact that her socks are basically little swimming pools. Rivulets from her hair drip over her ears and down her neck, soaking into the shirt collar.

“I got an email from your math teacher this afternoon,” Mom says

Winona ignores the insinuation that she should be explaining herself about now and asks, “What did it say?”

Her Mom’s hands tighten around her mug, and an angry flush breaks out high on her cheekbones. She seems to be so overcome that she can’t speak, so Winona unzips her dry backpack and pulls out the failed test and hopes it will explain itself and she can leave.

��Here,” she says, handing it over.

Mom sets down her mug with a dull thunk and takes the papers.

After a minute spent flipping through them, she says, “You said you spent all of last weekend studying for this.” Mom brings a hand up and rubs across her forehead that’s lined with tired wrinkles and fixes Winona with a disappointed sort of glare. 

“Yeah, well. I tried for a bit. But it’s not like anyone else cared about this test either, okay?” Winona says flippantly. She bites the edge of her hair, then continues speaking around it. “It just wasn’t the sort of test you’re supposed to study for.”

“What do you mean the sort of test you don’t study for?!” Mom asks incredulously. Her voice is creeping up, louder and louder. “You need to take responsibility. What would your grandma have to say about this if she were here?”

“ I am taking responsibility!” Winona shouts, her hair falling entirely out of her mouth and smacking her jaw.

“Obviously, you’re NOT!”

“You don’t even know how to organize a funeral! How can you talk about responsibility?” Winona yells back. All of a sudden, the frustration in her mom’s brown eyes freezes over. 

“Just. Just go.” Mom says, seething. She turns her back and dumps her over-steeped tea into the sink.

Rage at this icy dismissal floods through Winona’s blood and exits in a strangled roar. Before Mom can say anything back, she spins on her heel, storms out of the kitchen, down the short hall, and into her bedroom.

Winona grips her heavy wooden door with as much strength as she can muster and slams it closed.

“WE DON'T SLAM DOORS IN THIS HOUSE!” Mom shrieks from where Winona left her in the kitchen.

“I DON’T CARE!”

Her ears ring, and she flicks the overhead light on, only to turn it back off immediately. Though the anger simmering in her body is no longer boiling over, the bright light is too cheerful. The lightning that flashes through the window, however, is perfect.

Balling her hands up, Winona thrusts them under her arms in a half-pout half-hug and paces in circles. “This isn’t even a house. It’s an apartment.” She mutters snarkily to herself. She considers opening the door to send the comment her mom’s way but decides to keep stewing on it. She can come up with something better.

On her fifth lap around, her eyes catch on her grandmother's glass figurine, sitting primly on her cluttered desk.

It’s of a young woman lying back on a log, propping herself up on her elbows. Her tiny glass face looks up with a beautiful expression of wonder; the clear eyes seem to see everything and hold infinite wisdom. They’re surrounded by minuscule eyelashes that look too fluffy to be glass. The woman’s smooth glass lips are parted like she’s just seen something she needs to share immediately (more than once throughout her life, Winona had spoken to it in the hopes that maybe one day it would talk back). The woman’s hair is long and curls gently, sitting lightly over the figure’s shoulders and bouncing a few centimeters above the top of the log.

But Winona’s favorite thing about the glass figurine isn’t her face. It’s the sloping curves of the carved dress. It folds softly down to the ankles, each sweep lined with small creases, and the hem is covered in miniature flowers. The back fabric of the dress drapes over the log's rough ridges in a fantastic clash of textures. The sense of fluidity changing into firm resolve, the cracks and knots carved into the log holding strong. It knows exactly what it is; no room for doubts. It’s a log, each uncountable twist and turn working together to hold up the woman on top of it.

It’s fitting, though, because Winona’s Grandma Helen had gotten it the day she graduated college. Winona had been told the story of her family’s most prized possession many times. It was her favorite thing to do as a kid when Grandma came to visit. She and Mom would take turns telling the story, and when it was done, Winona always begged to hear it again.

Winona’s great-grandfather had been an extremely old-fashioned man and hadn’t been willing to help send her grandma to college. It had caused a massive fight between them that ended with Grandma leaving and vowing to only come back with a diploma in hand.

So, she’d left and spent the time working towards a degree in American history.

On the day of Helen’s graduation, she’d gone home to see her parents. Now, Grandma had kept in contact with her mother, but just like she had promised, this was Helen’s first time in years seeing her father again. 

He’d been sad and apologetic, begging for his daughter’s forgiveness. Apparently, there had been tears shed on both sides. And, of course, Grandma had missed her father desperately, and once she received an apology, she was quick to forgive him.

But an apology wasn't all Grandma had received. Her father also wished to congratulate her on her achievement in college. So he'd commissioned an artist to create a glass figurine of a young woman lounging on a log, looking ahead to the possibilities before her. It was based on a picture he had of Helen just before their fight, which made it all the more special.

Then, when Mom was a little kid, Grandma had given it to her. Mom brought it with her to every place she’d ever lived.

And finally, after a childhood spent pestering about when it would finally be her turn, Winona was given it for her sixteenth birthday just over seven months ago. 

Winona snaps from the torrent of memories to thunder booming. She takes a few steps up to her desk and runs her fingertips over the skirt of the dress.

Mom often comes into Winona’s room just to sit and look at it for a while - never touching - a habit that’s increased in the past few weeks since Grandma died.

She must find it comforting.

The thought of her mother feeling anything but sadness and pain swirls her remaining anger into a tempest. She wants her mom to hurt, to regret what she said about the stupid test.

Her head and her heart ache, and she wants her mom to feel that.

So, Winona wraps her hand around the glass figure and picks it up.

It’s surprisingly heavy for how delicate it looks, but Winona pitches for softball in the spring and has a good arm. She faces the plain door that Mom had just yelled at her about slamming and takes aim.

One of the ridges on the log catches against her palm as the figurine launches into the air. She doesn’t feel the cut, though.

The figurine tumbles over and over in the six feet it has to travel to hit the door, glinting a bit in the dark room. Adrenaline rushes through Winona’s brain, and with a crash, it collides.

The log bursts apart, tiny glass crystals falling like snow to the carpet. The young woman’s head breaks off and drops down in three chipped and scratched pieces. The body, surprisingly, is comparatively intact. The arms are gone, shattered among the carpet fibers; the dress's light folds are broken off, and there are deep cracks along the front. There is a large chunk missing from the upper back where the shoulders used to be. But, when Winona looks at where the body of the figurine rests, she can tell that it had once portrayed someone sitting.

And for a moment, standing and looking over the wreckage, calm and satisfaction is all she feels.

Then, the reality sinks in. Her mom’s, her grandma’s, her most special possession is gone. Winona broke it, and from the way it’s spread out over the floor, it can’t be fixed.

It feels like all the air has been knocked out of her. Winona opens her mouth, but she can’t tell if any sound comes out. It’s like all her senses are covered in a staticky fuzz.

Suddenly, her bedroom door flings open, knocking aside some of the larger pieces of glass.

“Are you okay? What hap-” Mom cuts herself off abruptly, and Winona wrenches her gaze up from the floor.

Mom’s eyes are fixed at her feet. Her mouth wobbles around words that die before making it out. Winona watches the tears drip down her mother’s cheeks, and everything feels terribly wrong. This shouldn’t be happening.

“Mom,” Her throat clenches, stopping her. She tries again. “Mommy, I- I didn’t mean- I’m-”

Her mom turns and leaves the room. The door is still wide open, and light from the hallway dances among the shards.

Winona finally notices her own sobbing. She isn’t sure how she missed it before because everything about her face feels wet. Her eyelashes are clumpy, and there is no break in the water streaming down her face. It goes past her nose, collecting snot on the way, and then parts. Some tears fall off her chin, and others collect in her mouth, coating her tongue with the taste of salt.

Slowly, she takes a blanket from her bed and curls up under it on the floor. Wiping her nose with her sleeve, Winona waits for the crying to stop.

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

She wakes up to a pounding headache and a hand softly shaking her shoulder. Winona shifts the blanket off her face and sees Mom peering down at her.

Arms carefully reach around Winona’s shoulders and lift her so that she’s perched on the edge of her bed. Her clothes are removed and replaced with warm, dry pajamas. They’re the fluffy, purple polka-dotted ones - her favorite.

A plastic cup of water is pressed into her hands, and she takes grateful gulps of it ‘till the cup is empty.

The bathroom sink across from her room turns on, and Winona realizes her mom has left again. It’s only briefly, however, and Mom comes back with a wet washcloth in hand.

Winona takes it when it’s held out and rubs the sticky, overwhelming feeling of dry tears off her face. The water is warm and soothing, and even after she's clean, she takes an extra moment to press the cloth to her worn-out eyes.

She hands it back, and Mom places it on the bedside table before taking Winona’s right hand in hers. Winona wonders why she’s doing this when she notices a sharp red line crossing most of her palm. A throbbing heat is building there, but quick as a flash, her mom wipes a soaked cotton pad over it and then rubs on a layer of cooling antiseptic. Lastly, she places two large bandages over the entirety of Winona’s palm. Then, Mom helps her stand up.

Walking across the room into the now dark hallway, she realizes all the glass on the floor is gone. Mom must have taken the time to thoroughly clean up every last shard and speck while she was sleeping. Winona isn’t sure why, but as she’s walked over to her mom’s bedroom, she wishes she had been able to clean it up. It was her mess, after all.

But, her brain is moving too slowly to think up the words to best express that out loud, and moments later, she’s being herded onto one side of her mom’s bed.

The digital clock blinks at her. It’s 9:53 at night. Mom tucks the covers securely around Winona’s shoulders.

“I’m so sorry, Nony. We’ll fix things in the morning, okay?” Mom’s voice is hoarse when she says this, but the time for thinking is over now. Winona nods her head sleepily in reply and closes her eyes for the night.

[evalinkatrineberg]

Practice Prompt 1 - Part 2!

I could hardly focus the day that the Selected girls were to be announced on The Report. From the moment I had woken up that morning, the first rays of sunlight peeking through the periwinkle curtains that covered my bedroom window, the only thing on my mind had been the question of whether or not I would be Selected. I went through my normal morning routine in an almost zombie-like state, trading my bedclothes for a t-shirt and shorts, and brushing my hair back into a ponytail without even thinking. It was always kind of like a game, creeping out of my bedroom as quietly as I could. I cast a quick glance over my shoulder at Lydia, who was still sound asleep. In a few short seconds, the bedroom door was closed behind me, and I was down the stairs, grabbing my keys and tugging on my sneakers before sneaking out the front door.

Lukas and June were already waiting for me at the end of my driveway. “Sleeping in today, I see,” Lukas commented, the corners of his lips tugging upwards in a small smile.

“Sorry,” was my only reply as the three of us set off on our morning run. It had been our routine for a few years now. At first, it had only been me and June. Being next door neighbors and classmates, it had been easy for us to coordinate a time to get out and run together, seeing as we had been on almost identical schedules our entire lives. Running had been something that we had decided to take up the spring of our sophomore year of high school, and we’d continued that tradition into college, having both committed to the same university.

When I had met Lukas in my freshman physics lab my first semester of college and mentioned that I enjoyed running during an icebreaker, he had instantly asked if he might be able to join us on our morning runs. Apparently, he had run on his high school’s track team, although he never pushed me and June’s pace, despite having more experience than us. Once we found out that he was leasing a basement apartment in a house two blocks over from the street June and I lived on, it had been a no-brainer to us that he should join our group. We had expected it to be back to just June and I for the summer, but apparently Lukas was hanging around to take some extra classes.

The three of us didn’t speak as we made for the park on the edge of our neighborhood, a beautiful, scenic forest with a babbling creek and a network of well-maintained dirt paths. The only sounds were our feet pounding the ground and our heavy breathing, mixed with the early-morning chirps of the birds hidden in the trees. Already, the air was starting to get a little steamy as the humidity of the daytime began to settle in, a slight fog lifting off the creek that meandered on the left side of the trail we always began our run on.

A new sound broke through the air. The buzzing of Lukas’s watch, signalling that we had completed a mile, was accompanied with a heavy exhale from him. Shortly after, he asked, “So, is there any particular reason you’re pushing the pace today, Evalin?”

I frowned, not slowing as I cast a quick look at him over my shoulder. “What was our first mile split?”

“Six minutes, fifty-five seconds.” His words were steady, but his voice was slightly more airy than usual.

“Damn,” June panted. It sounded like just saying that one word took a monumental effort on her part.  

“Sorry,” I responded. Two apologies today already, and it wasn’t even seven in the morning yet. That had to be a new record for me. “I’m just a little lost in thought. I didn’t realize how fast we were going.”

“Are you thinking about the Report tonight?” I could practically hear June’s teasing smile in her voice. “You know, I entered the Selection, too, and you don’t see me literally running myself ragged over it.”

“You are keeping pace with us,” Lukas pointed out, “so aren’t you technically doing the same exact thing as Evalin?”

“Och,” was June’s only reply as she audibly hit Lukas with the back of her hand.

“I truly don’t understand why you two even entered anyway.” Lukas sighed as we made a turn to the left, taking us over a small wooden bridge that crossed the creek. “It’s just a glorified beauty pageant, and, no offense, neither of you are really pageant girls.”

“Are you insinuating that we’re not drop-dead gorgeous?” The offense in June’s voice may have been faked, but the edge on her words was anything but. She had never been afraid to start a fight, even when we were children. Back then, if she saw someone being pushed around on the playground, she was the first person to fight for them, often resulting in her coming home dirty and bruised. Her parents always bemoaned how unbecoming her behavior was for a Three, but I had always admired the way that June was totally unafraid to stand up for what she believed in. It was for that reason that I wasn’t entirely surprised when she told me that she was planning on pursuing nursing in college. Her love of other people, and her genuine desire to help those in need would make her a great nurse, in my opinion.

Lukas sighed again as we made another left turn, bringing us to a winding trail that would eventually lead us back to the same entry point we had used to get into the park. “It’s just that you’re both booksmart, not very people smart.”

I raised an eyebrow, despite the fact that I knew he couldn’t see it.

As if he sensed it, he continued. “June would probably get into a fight with someone within the first five minutes of being at the palace, and Evalin is too damn nice for her own good. She’d get eaten up alive by all the politicians and schemers in Angeles.”

“What’s wrong with being nice?” I frowned, the sound of my heartbeat racing in my ears. Maybe he was right. Had I been foolish to enter in the Selection? I had never been particularly politically savvy. I could certainly research more about political science and Illean history, sure. In fact, I had begun to do some research in the days after submitting my Selection application, although I hadn’t brought it up in conversation. I found political theory interesting, but applying it to what I observed on the news was more challenging than I had anticipated. There was nothing wrong with a good challenge, though. I kind of enjoyed having something new to push me out of my comfort zone.

“Nothing, normally,” Lukas answered, “but politicians don’t play nice.”

June snorted. “Thank you, Captain Obvious.”

“June would be perfect if she was Selected, then.” I shot her a look over my right shoulder, only to find her matching my own grin. Her dark eyes sparkled as the light hit them, complimenting her downright radiant features perfectly. June would be an ideal candidate to be Selected, truth be told. She was passionate, strong, and simply stunning in appearance. Despite her habit of getting into fights as a child, her dark skin didn’t display a single flaw now, and her curly hair seemed to just bounce with joy and enthusiasm.

“Hey, listen, I follow the golden rule!” Her footsteps were a steady beat just behind me as we hit the pavement again. “I treat others the way they treat others!”

Lukas barked out a laugh as I replied, “Mmm, I don’t quite think that’s it.”

“I know,” she answered. “I improved it!”

On the horizon, my house was beginning to come into view. Even from a distance, I could see that me father’s car was no longer in our driveway. He must have left for work early this morning, then. Usually, I was able to run, shower, and drink at least one cup of coffee before he was telling me to grab my bag and get out the door so he wasn’t late. My mom’s beige car was still in the driveway, though. It wasn’t an old car, but it was modelled after a style of classic car that my grandfather had often gushed about, according to my mother. It was originally one of the gifts my father had given my mother’s parents after he had asked them for their blessing to marry my mother. My grandfather had always insisted that the gift was excessive, and that my father shouldn’t try to buy my mother’s hand in marriage, but my grandfather had kept the car anyway. When he passed away five years ago, he left the car to my mother in his will.

“Oh, by the way,” I began, slowing as we reached the edge of June’s driveway, “my mother took the day off from work today, and is planning a big brunch. You two should definitely come over, if you can.”

“Thanks for the invite, but I desperately need to shower, thanks to someone -” she glared pointedly at me, smiling nonetheless “-setting a killer pace this morning.”

I looked down at my own shirt, which was soaked through. “I should probably do the same.” June just laughed as I added, “I’ll see you later, then.”

“Until tomorrow,” Lukas agreed with a wave, jogging off down the street before disappearing around the corner.

I was tempted to yell after him, to ask him if he really thought that I wouldn’t last if I was one of the Selected. I didn’t know why his opinion mattered so much to me. It wasn’t as if he had any experience in the palace, or was studying anything related to politics. His opinion shouldn’t mean too much, shouldn’t mean anything, and yet, I was one second away from calling out his name.

It was too late, though. Short of chasing after him, I wouldn’t be able to get his attention now. With a sigh, I began making my way up my own driveway and then on to the porch. I untied my shoes before unlocking the front door, placing my shoes on the shoe rack and following the smell of cinnamon and coffee to the kitchen. It appeared that my mother was planning a full on feast for brunch, complete with french toast, eggs, and even bacon. The hiss of the gas stove and the purr of the coffee machine was practically a symphony to my ears as I placed my keys on the counter, reaching up to pull a glass out of the cabinet above the sink.

“It’s a hot one today, isn’t it?” It was more of a statement than a question. My mother leaned against the counter opposite of the stove, arms crossed as she eyed my sweaty clothing up and down.

“Don’t worry, I’m going to shower,” I assured her, “as soon as I have a few sips of water.”

“No rush,” she replied, laughing slightly. “Are you excited for tonight?”

I bit my lip, taking a few seconds to stop and sip some water before responding. “I’m kind of excitedly nervous.” I frowned, placing my now empty glass in the sink. “Does that make sense? I feel like I shouldn’t be nervous, because there’s tons of women in Carolina who have a better shot than I do, but I also don’t want to completely count myself out.”

“That makes sense.” My mother moved over to the stove now, glancing over at me as she flipped the french toast. “I think you have a good shot, but we’ll just have to wait and see. Just like everybody else.” As she spoke the last few words, she poked the tip of my nose, smiling warmly before turning back to the food on the stove. “Now, please go shower!”

I laughed and rolled my eyes in mock exasperation. “Aye-aye, captain!”

When I had finally made my way up the stairs and into my bedroom, I found that Lydia was somehow still asleep. I didn’t understand how she could stay in bed so long. If I wasn’t up by eight in the morning, at the absolute latest, I felt like I didn’t have enough time in the day to get everything I needed to do that day done.

Even as I grabbed my outfit for the day out of my dresser - a pair of loose-fitting, light wash jeans, along with a beige button-up shirt - and made my way into the bathroom at the end of the hallway, I couldn’t help but run through all the possible outcomes of the night. More likely than not, my name would not be called, and life would continue on as normal. As much as I didn’t want to admit it, this would be a pretty upsetting outcome. I had definitely been letting myself get my hopes up. It would suck if all my daydreaming was squashed in one fell swoop tonight, but I would get over it. I’d have to. In that scenario, I’d have to be able to get myself back into my normal routine. I could not afford to put my entire life on hold for one ruined fantasy.

A slight deviation on that scenario was if they didn’t call my name, but if they did call June’s, or anybody who I knew, for that matter. I pondered that outcome further as the hot water of the shower rolled down my back and caused the bathroom to fog up around me. If that was the case, if June got called, I would likely be happier for her than I would be sad for myself. June deserved it, as did many other girls I had met throughout my life. Even being able to say that I was friends with one of the Selected girls would be pretty cool. Plus, knowing June, I was sure she would fill me in on all the inside drama without me having to be involved in it myself.

The last outcome I could conceive of, and the one I least wanted to think about, was one where my name was called. The possibility of that even happening seemed so far removed from reality that it was hard to determine how I would even feel in the event that it happened. I’d definitely be excited, that was certain, but the implications of being Selected loomed on the horizon like a dark cloud. It would be amazing to finally leave my hometown and see more of Illea, but I’d miss my family and friends dearly. Being Selected would also mean putting my education on hold, which would likely prove a challenge for me, since being into biology had been basically a quarter of my personality since I was six years old.

I wasn’t even sure what I would say or do if I ever got the opportunity to meet and speak to the prince. I mean, we practically lived in different worlds - what could we possibly talk about? I knew that he had studied political science at Angeles University, but my own knowledge of political science was still, rather embarrassingly, limited. Other than that, most of what I knew about him came from the media. I had heard about his engagement to Evie Waldia, and the subsequent breaking off of the engagement. Beyond that, the only thing I knew was that he was a pretty handsome guy. Honestly, I’d probably be able to make better conversation with Princess Safiya, since she was studying to go to medical school. At least we’d probably be able to commiserate over some science and math courses.

I need a personality outside of schoolwork. I shook my head, shutting off the water and wringing out my head before grabbing my towel off the rack that was nailed to the wall just to the right of the shower. What was I even in to, besides science? I liked looking at the stars, which was still kind of science related, but it was a start. I wondered if you could see the stars from the palace, or if the light pollution there blotted them out?

I liked to read, and to run, both of which were pretty generic hobbies, but that fact would hopefully only make it more likely that we could find some common ground around them. I had also often dreamed about being a ballerina when I was about five years old, and even now I still found watching ballets performed on stage an incredibly emotional experience, in a positive manner. If nothing else, maybe we would be able to talk about music.

It appeared I would really have to undergo a journey of self-discovery if my name was in fact called tonight. Perhaps that was for the better, though. Maybe it was time for me to branch out a little.

By the time I made it downstairs, my brothers were already seated around the table, silent save for Gabriel, who was talking about one thing or another he had heard on the news last night. Lydia had also made her way downstairs, though she was still in her pajamas.

“I’m just saying,” Gabriel proclaimed, raising his hands in the air in mock surrender. “The timing of this Selection just seems a little too quick to me! I’m having a hard time believing that this wasn’t a purely political decision.” He looked around the table at my siblings’ faces, but nobody met his gaze. Randall and Sam both looked down at the table, and Lydia just yawned and looked out the window.

“Come on,” he tried again, “I can’t be the only one that thinks this.”

“He has to know what he’s doing, in having a Selection,” I argued, taking up my usual seat next to Lydia. “I’m sure this wasn’t a decision anyone made lightly.” Though, Gabriel did have a point. The turnaround between the prince breaking off his engagement and the announcement of the Selection was rather fast. I wasn’t entirely convinced he was over Evie yet, if I was being honest. Breakups weren’t an easy thing to get over, especially when the people involved had been together for a long time. Ultimately, though, it was the prince’s decision to make.

“I just don’t get it, though,” Gabriel continued. “If I had just broken up with my girlfriend, the last thing I would want was thirty-five girls that were ready to fight over my heart coming into my home.”

“Well, it’s good that you’re not the prince, then,” I retorted. He rolled his eyes at me, and I stuck my tongue out at him in return. Typical mornings in our household always consisted of this kind of bickering. It was hard to avoid in a house with five kids.

“You’re only saying that because you want the prince to fall in love with you.” He crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair, turning his head to look at her mother, who carried an assortment of jams and butter in her arms.

As I leapt up to help her get the rest of the food from the kitchen, I snapped back at him, “So what if I do? Is it so horrible of me to want to fall in love?”

“No,” he answered, rolling his head back to look at the ceiling, “but there are so many other times and places for you to fall in love! I don’t get why you’re willing to put your whole life on hold for a man who’s probably only looking for a rebound!”

“I don’t even get why it matters to you!” I placed the serving plate of bacon I had been holding down on the table harder than I had intended, wincing at the loud sound made by the collision of the two objects. “It’s not like you’re the one who entered the Selection! Besides, the chances of my name even being called are few and far between, so there’s no need for you to go and get your knickers in a knot over the possibility of me being played!”

“If this is how you’re all behaving in the morning, I am not looking forward to seeing what you’re going to be like during the Report tonight.” Satisfied that all the food was on the table, my mother had taken her usual seat to the right of the head of the table, and was looking at all of us expectantly.

“All of you better be quiet tonight,” Lydia stated, serving herself some french toast. “I want to hear everything that’s said on the Report.”

Much of the rest of the day from that point forward was a blur. We all ate brunch, and then attempted to go about our day as usual, but, for the most part, we all failed miserably. My mother, who would have normally been at work at one of the city high schools, where she taught music theory, had taken the day off from work, and instead spent most of the day looking out the front window at the driveway and twisting her wedding ring around her finger. Lydia had started out the day by filling out job applications, but had abandoned that at some point to go bake chocolate chip cookies instead. Gabriel kept finding excuses to leave the house, citing the need to purchase random items, like soap or paperclips, claiming that he hadn’t realized he had run out of until that very moment. I was half tempted to join him, but also didn’t want to get into another argument.

Randall and Sam had warned me not to go upstairs, stating that they were getting retribution for the gnome prank Lydia had played on them a few weeks earlier. Lydia’s prank had been harmless, really. I didn’t even think she realized how easily the glitter that coated the miniature gnome statues she had purchased would rub off on the boys’ bedspreads, or that it wouldn’t come out in the wash either. Regardless, I didn’t bother arguing with the boys, and instead opted just to grab a book and head somewhere else.

I found myself sitting on the back deck, attempting to read, but really just staring at the same few pages, completely unable to focus. I was on the verge of giving up and going for another run when I heard the back door slide open behind me, and turned to find Randall sticking his head out, an impish grin plastered on his face. “Dad’s home,” he announced. Then, in a quieter voice, he added, “and my work is complete. Don’t worry, I didn’t touch your bed!” With a wink, he was gone, vanishing back inside the house.

I followed him inside, frowning at my watch. It was already seven thirty in the evening. How could time have gone by so quickly, when it felt like it was dragging? More importantly, why had my father spent nearly twelve hours at work?

My second question, at least, was answered rather quickly, by the array of desserts that now lined our kitchen table. Alongside a plate of the cookies Lydia had baked earlier were various flavors of ice cream, along with a box of lemon tarts from my favorite bakery in town. He must have left work early to pick all of this up. I blinked at the display, as if it was a mirage that would simply vanish before my eyes, as I placed my book on the very edge of the table.

“I thought it might be nice to have a special treat while we watched the Report tonight,” my father said in way of explanation, offering me a small smile.

“Thank you,” was all I managed in reply, still a little disoriented by the fact that it was somehow seven thirty, and the Report was going to begin in half an hour.

Only half an hour until I could stop obsessing over all these what-ifs. I could do this.

I grabbed a plate off the table and placed two lemon tarts on it, before wandering off into the living room, and curling up on the corner of the couch. Slowly, the rest of my family trickled in as well, my father stopping to turn on the TV before taking a seat next to my mother on the end of the u-shaped couch closest to the TV.

My mother frowned as she looked over at me. “You look a little red, Ev.”

“Sorry, I lost track of time when I was outside earlier.” With any luck, even if I was burnt, it would fade in a few days, leaving me with even more freckles than before, but otherwise unaffected.

“Make sure you rub some aloe on it before you go to bed,” she advised absently, turning back to whatever was playing on the TV.

I could hardly hear whatever was being said on the television over the beating of my own heart in my ears. This was it. These could be the final moments before my life was changed forever. Or, more likely than not, I was getting myself all worked up over absolutely nothing, and would kick myself for it later. I needed to relax. I needed this to be a normal night, where Lydia would throw popcorn at Sam when our parents weren’t looking, or where Gavin would jokingly argue with our father about how chemistry was superior to biology. Relaxing was easier said than done, though, when nobody around me was relaxed.

So I resigned myself to creating my own sense of normalcy. “Should I be afraid to try one of your cookies, Lydia? Am I going to bite into one and find out it’s filled with toothpaste?”

“Shhh,” she hissed, a smile spreading over her face, “that’s the secret ingredient!”

“Is that why Gabriel went to the store so many times today?” Sam must have caught on to what I was trying to do. “You traitor!”

“I didn’t buy for one second that you desperately needed paperclips at eleven o’clock in the morning!” I pointed my finger at my oldest brother, who was already rolling his eyes.

“He bought you paperclips to help you hold your life together, Evalin,” Lydia supplied, punctuating her sentence with a spoonful of rocky road ice cream.

“Harsh,” I yelled, slapping my sister gently on her arm with the back of my hand. She nudged me with her foot in return. “But for your information, my life needs binder clips to hold it together, in the very least. There’s too much going on for paperclips.”

That was an outright lie, and I was pretty sure we all knew it, too. My life was about as average and boring as they come, and would continue to be that way, when my name wasn’t announced for the Selection. What surprised me was the fact that I was kind of bothered by that. I had always thought that I was very content, happy even, with my life, and yet, I couldn’t help but feel a little sad at the thought of this little bit of excitement, the disruption of my routine, ending so soon.

“Maybe he should’ve gotten a stapler instead,” Randall interjected. “That way he could pin you down here instead.”

“Well, if he wanted to pin me down, he should’ve gone with thumbtacks,” I retorted, narrowing my eyes at my youngest brother. “Come on, this is basic office supply knowledge!”

With a shake of his head, Gavin stood up, walking back to the dining room for another scoop of ice cream. “Sorry, I failed Intro to Office Supplies my freshman year.”

“That explains how sloppy your notes are,” I called after him, twisting slightly to see if he would react in any way. Much to my disappointment, he did not.

“At least he knows a bobby-pin isn’t something you can use on a corkboard,” Lydia offered, flashing a half smile in my direction before turning her attention back to the TV. Any second now, the announcements would begin. Any moment, names and pictures would start flashing across the screen. Lydia practically pushed Gavin out of the way of the TV as he returned to the living room, not wanting to miss even one second of the broadcast.

I couldn’t blame her. For once, I felt the same way. At least we didn’t live in a province close to the end of the alphabet, like Waverly. Carolina would come to pass pretty quickly. It would all be over in a matter of seconds.

A part of me really hoped that it would be June’s name and picture that flashed across the screen. Her being Selected seemed like the perfect compromise between the nerves of actually being Selected myself, and the disappointment of not being Selected at all. The second hand accounts of palace life I would undoubtedly receive from her would be wonderful. I’d miss having her as my running buddy, sure, but she’d make a great Lady, and I’d still have Lukas. He could help me analyze her letters while we ran.

“They’re starting,” Lydia screamed, hitting my arm repeatedly.

Indeed, the first provinces were being announced. First was a girl from Allens, named Idalia. She was absolutely stunning, with dark hair and a friendly face. I swallowed. Winning the prince’s heart was definitely not going to be an easy endeavor for any of the Selected with competition like this.

The announcer continued. “From Angeles, Emily Rose White!”

“Wasn’t she in that movie,” my mother began, only to be cut off by shushing noises from Lydia.

“From Atlin, Alaina Achilles!” The name sounded familiar enough to me, but I couldn’t quite place it. I didn’t let it bother me. I was sure that Lydia would start researching information about all of the contestants as soon as they were announced, anyway.

“From Baffin, Celine Montclair! From Bankston, Sage Copeland! From Belcourt, Violet Kensington III! From Bonita, Itzel Bree Morales! From Calgary, Clemence Westley!”

More and more pictures flashed across the screen, but I barely registered them. My heart couldn’t seem to decide whether it wanted to beat as fast as it could, or simply stop beating all together. Time stopped and started over and over, my stomach rolling like waves in the ocean as the names continued. The next one was Carolina. The next one.

“From Carolina -”

Please say June Iscariot. Please say June Iscariot. Please say June Iscariot.

“Evalin Berg!”

I dropped the plate with my untouched lemon tarts on it. The sound of it shattering was the only sound in the room, save for the continuing voice of the announcer on the television, as a picture of me flashed on the screen. It looked like the picture was taken when I was still in my mother’s car, the day we had dropped my application off. They had taken our pictures when we were inside, but I guessed they must have had more photographers snapping shots of the potential girls outside as well.

It wasn’t a bad picture of me, but certainly not my favorite. My hair was pulled back into a low ponytail, and frizzy as all hell, thanks to the humidity. I had on makeup, at least, but I hadn’t yet taken off my glasses, as I normally would for pictures. The clunky frames took up a good portion of my face, and usually didn’t photograph well. In the photo, I was looking off to something on my right, maybe analyzing the length of the line outside of the Services Office, my eyes wide and my lips slightly parted. If anything, I looked nervous. Why would they choose me with a picture like this?

Lydia was the first to react, leaping to her feet on the couch, literally jumping as she screamed and looked down at me.

“I,” I began, not quite sure what to say. The chances of this happening had been slim to none. “I’m sorry about the plate! I’ll go get the broom, and clean it up!”

“I’ve got it.” My father stopped me in my tracks with a wave of his hand, slowly pushing himself off the couch and towards the coat closet by the front door, where we kept the cleaning supplies.

There was a frantic banging on the front door, and my dad repeated, “I’ll get it!”

I jumped up the moment I heard June’s voice echo through my house. I walked slowly at first, avoiding the mess of plate shards and lemon tart I had created on the floor, and after clearing that, practically bounded to the door. The moment she saw me, June raced through the doorway and crushed me with a hug, beaming at me once we had broken apart. Her parents lingered in the doorway, smiling politely at the two of us.

“Would you like to come in?” I gestured vaguely in the direction of the living room. “We have ice cream and lemon tarts, and cookies that might be filled with toothpaste.” My heart was still racing, and I knew that my eyes were wide and my hair absolutely wild, curls falling into my face every time I moved, but June’s parents didn’t mention it as they thanked me and made their way inside.

“So, how does it feel, Lady Evalin?” June’s eyes were alight with excitement, and her tone rife with teasing.

“Fake.” No, wrong synonym. “Unreal,” I corrected, shaking my head. “Like, I’m a bio major from Knoxville, Carolina! I’m nobody! How the hell did I get Selected alongside the likes of Emily Rose White?”

“And Ava Jones,” Lydia added, shouting from the living room.

“The pop star?” I asked as June and I made our way towards the living room.

“The very same,” Lydia confirmed. “Along with that actress, Saxon Monroe - the one who played Lydia in Pride and Prejudice.”

“How am I supposed to compete with people like that?” My mind was completely blank, even as everyone around me was a buzz of conversation. It was like I was on autopilot, like my mind had overloaded and shut down, leaving me to flounder my way through these next few hours. Or maybe days. Or weeks. Months, even.

“Don’t compete,” June stated, placing one of her hands on each of my shoulders. “Just do what you do best - be yourself.”

I wanted to ask how I could possibly be myself at a time like this, but my mouth couldn’t form the words.

“Listen, I think my parents are calling me to go back home with them, but I’ll see you tomorrow morning, okay?” I nodded, and June smiled before walking back towards the front door.

I turned to look back at Lydia. “I think I need to shower again. And sleep. Definitely sleep.”

“You’re a mess,” she replied with a laugh, standing up and setting her now empty bowl on the coffee table.

“Yes.” My mind was finally returning to the present, the cogs and gears slowly starting to spin again. “I just need time to process this.”

“That’s understandable.” I felt her arm around my shoulders, guiding me towards the staircase. “It’s not just every day that your childhood dream becomes a reality.”

I just nodded, trudging up the stairs, feeling like blocks of lead were tied to my feet. This was exciting news, and I was excited, but I also had no clue what to do. I had spent my entire life preparing for college, and a career - not for actually getting the chance to meet the prince of Illea, and possibly even fall in love with him. What would he think of me? Probably not much, if I was to be honest.

“Thank you,” I whispered as Lydia pulled open the door. What I saw next was almost as unexpected as hearing my name announced on the TV about an hour earlier.

Slices of bread covered our the floor of our room, our dressers, the desk, and Lydia’s bed, interlocked and connected like pieces of a puzzle. It would take forever to clean up all the crumbs left by the bread, even after we picked up the slices themselves. True to his word, however, Randall had left my bed untouched. Sleep would be unhindered by breadcrumbs, if nothing else.

This was not what I needed tonight.

“I’m going to kill them,” Lydia decided, kicking aside some of the bread with her foot.

“Just collect the ants attracted to our room by the breadcrumbs and release them in the boys’ room,” I suggested, yawning as I pushed aside more bread so I could get my bedclothes out from my dresser.

“What?”

“Nothing,” I amended, waving her off. “I’m going to shower, and then to bed.” I tossed one last look over my shoulder in her direction. “I guess you could say that this is a pretty crummy prank.”

Lydia rolled her eyes. “You should’ve added bad puns to the special skills section of you application.”

“It appears that my application was just fine without that detail.”

With that, I was off, beyond ready to just clear my thoughts and collapse into bed. I could figure this all out tomorrow. Until then, I was content on living moment-to-moment, and all the current moment required was hot water and sleep.

[reminiscences]

another attempt at blogging

i started this tumblr a couple years ago at the same time kate did. i can’t remember why—i’m sure tumblr was in the news again for some reason. i guess it was before the great porn purge. i was talking about blogging again this week with my friend daniel, and i woke up this morning and he had sent me a blog he wrote on a new tumblr account early in the morning, so to continue my regression to the early 2010s, i too have rebooted tumblr, given it an era-appropriate name, and decided to give it another go.

the problem with having a newsletter is that i don’t think anyone wants to hear from me in their inbox daily, so i’ve become very precious about the things i write there. it feels like it has to really matter. i like blogs because they’re disposable and can be dumb and not your best writing. how many two-graf tumblr posts did i write in 2011 that were just thoughts i idly had during a statistics lecture? anyway, here’s the first blog, they won’t all be this long probably. 

When I think about eventually looking back at this year I think about what I want to remember from it. I will remember the first week of March. I’ll remember the last birthday party I attended in person at Branch Ofc, a perfectly serviceable Crown Heights bar that was very full of people. I’ll think about that night and how I showed up to the party with a Ziplock full of homemade salted chocolate chip cookies in my purse, how I shared them with a table where the birthday-haver and their friends sat. Breathing in the same air as the four dozen other people crammed into the bar. I can’t imagine it now. I like Branch Ofc because it is unpretentious without pretending to be a dive, unlike Sharlene’s, which tries too hard to mimic the aesthetic trappings of an authentic dive bar but is really just a normal Park Slope bar. Branch Ofc is just a bar where you can buy drinks, and it was an eight-minute walk from my old apartment. It used to be a bar with a photobooth and Big Buck Hunter but I think both of those are gone now. 

For a few days in March, it felt like people were preparing for a snow day. Everyone was slightly more on edge than giddy—but only slightly. “WFH but make it a coffeeshop” I saw on someone’s Instagram story, a selfie with four of their friends coworking somewhere in Bushwick, completely nullifying the point of a work-from-home edict. I ran into my friend Maddie at the renovated Key Food on Nostrand the next week. Maddie, her roommate and I were in the aisle with the Pop Tarts and the Oreos. “I feel like I should get those?” we asked each other, pointing at junk food. I wasn’t wearing a mask or gloves; nobody was. Some guy wearing a Cornell University Sigma Chi tshirt walked by us with the largest bag of dried beans I’ve ever seen in my life slung over his shoulder. That was a man who had never soaked dried beans in his life. I wonder if he ever ate the beans. We were a bunch of idiot 20-somethings blindly grabbing for cans of soup and Fritos for the end of the world. What were any of us doing there? Why was it imperative that day that I make and freeze a lasagna? Maddie’s roommate had fresh lasagna noodles from Eataly she wasn’t going to use before she left for her parents’ house, and she said I could have those. She brought them over for me and I idly wondered if you could get Coronavirus from someone else’s fresh pasta noodles or if the heat of the oven would kill the germs. I made my lasagna.

I’ll think about how March-to-May is just one long gray blurry streak in my head. I baked, I got into running, I said “running with a mask? No thank you, no more running for me,” I got a job, I felt bad about getting a job when everyone I knew in journalism was getting laid off. I did a lot of Zoom Zumba. At first I slept terribly, and then I started sleeping too much, and then I stopped sleeping again at some point during that stretch. There was a novelty to suddenly being inside all the time that made it feel like an excuse to get “really into martinis.” I got really into martinis. Then I stopped drinking for a couple months. Remember “Zoom happy hours”? 

The thing I use most as a means of setting apart different eras in my head is the music I used as a soundtrack at the time. I rang in the 2014 new year in my cute apartment on Westcott Street in Syracuse with my college boyfriend, drunk and blaring Cold Cave, before we walked down the street to Alto Cinco and got Mexican food and passed out. It was my senior year and I only had a few more months of living like this and I loved the small life I’d built for myself there. Of course, it couldn’t stay. When we broke up a year and a half later after he moved to New York, where I had been living for most of a year, I walked around the neighborhood near the Myrtle-Wyckoff stop, close to where we were living together, listening to Mitski’s 2014 album Bury Me At Makeout Creek. I sat in Maria Hernandez Park and watched a bunch of kids play Red Rover. I didn’t especially want to go home because I hadn’t taken an escape route into account when we broke up and somehow timed it out so that things ended after the first of the month, leaving me with three-and-a-half weeks of continuing to share an apartment with someone whose heart I had just broken. In retrospect it’s clear to me that I had just outgrown a relationship with someone five years older than me who hadn’t grown up at all, but I hear that Mitski album now and all I think about are the cold early April days of 2015 when no place and no person felt like home. There’s a line in First Love/Late Spring, by Mitski, where she sings “胸がはち切れそうで,” which translates to something like “My chest is about to burst (with grief).” My advice to recent college graduates moving to New York is to simply not do anything the way I did it. 

So when I think about 2020, I do not want to associate any music I previously had fond memories of with this year. This is unfortunate because every musician I like who produces sad music has nothing but time on their hands now and they’ve all come out with new songs and albums. My recently played selections on Spotify look like a cry for help: Phoebe Bridgers, Bright Eyes, even Tigers Jaw. 

On Saturday I couldn’t sleep in. I woke up at 5:30 and watched the sun appear through my bedroom windows. I kept rolling over, trying to sleep again, but it was futile. Eventually I got up and got dressed, and left my apartment on foot. The walk into lower Manhattan is a few miles from my new place in Fort Greene. I walked west on Fulton, and then down Flatbush. It would have saved me ten minutes to take the Manhattan Bridge, but I’ve always regarded it as the ugliest of the bridges to cross on foot or on bike—last fall, I would walk home from Ben’s apartment over the Manhattan Bridge, and it was just so grey. You get an okay view of Dumbo, I guess, on the walk east, but it isn’t much to look at. When I got back to the Brooklyn side on those walks, I’d get on the A at High Street and take it back to Nostrand instead of walking the last couple miles. 

So I chose the Brooklyn Bridge this time. It was as busy as you’d expect it to be in a non-pandemic event. Instagram boyfriends took pictures of their girlfriends, who took off their masks for a few seconds for the right shot. I saw a couple taking engagement pictures in front of the lower Manhattan skyline. It felt so normal, pedestrians and bicyclists squeezing past each other at the narrow points. 

I was listening to Saint Cloud, the Waxahatchee album that came out a few months ago, turning it over and over in my brain like a rock you pick up at the beach and end up carrying with you on a long walk. The album, outwardly, has this gauzy blue-sky Americana vibe but when you listen to the lyrics of some of the songs it feels like peeling back layers of skin until you hit a raw nerve ending. Every song feels like a eulogy for this year. “You might mourn all that you wasted/That’s just part of the haul,” Katie Crutchfield sings on Ruby Falls. I got to the title track, which closes out the album, as I ascended the bridge. When you get baaaack on the M train, watch the cityyyyyy mutaaaaaaate, she sings. I guess she’s singing about New York. Is there another M train somewhere? I don’t know. I’m going to think about this stupid year whenever I listen to this album, I thought.

I got off the bridge at City Hall, surveyed the ongoing occupation movement there and the literal dozens of cops that had seemingly been deployed to stand there and, at best, do nothing. I walked down Centre Street, eventually winding through the little park by Baxter Street where two adults were playing ping pong, which felt like a socially distanced sport, all things considered. I walked down all those side streets in Chinatown as the sun struggled to break through the oppressive clouds. I walked by Nom Wah, past the salon Polly taught me will give you a very good $12 blowout, past that annoying bar where the bartenders are dressed like scientists, past the place where Kate and I got our auras read on her birthday in January, and ended up at Deluxe Green Bo. I ordered my spicy wontons in peanut sauce and ate them right there, the hot plastic container burning my knees as I sat on the sidewalk. 

Afterwards I walked by all my favorite places—the skatepark under the bridge, Cervo’s, Beverly’s (RIP), Little Canal, Jajaja, the Hawa Smoothie near the East Broadway F. The skaters were hanging out in Dimes Square. Everything had changed but standing outside Kiki’s, it felt for a second like almost nothing had. It was almost a normal Saturday on Canal Street. The sky stayed electric blue until I got back to Brooklyn. 

[canid-slashclaw]

The Outliers - A Guild Wars Love Story

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7,

Chapter 8 "Easy, son. We'll take this one step at a time. Just watch were yer walkin'," Daniel said to his son as they carried a wagon wheel over to the craftsman shed. "I'm fine, father. It would take quite a lot for my wounds to spring any leaks."

"That's what they all say until it happens. Exercise is good for mendin' the body. But the way you abuse yours, those wounds might not ever heal properly."

Kaleb helped his father hoist the massive wheel onto the augur then placed a securing pin through the vertical spindle. He looked over the array of tools then picked up one of the rawhide mallets and began vigorously tapping some wooden pegs into place.

"I'm just trying to get back into the fight, that's all. Once this thing heals, I'll be good as new," he said while pointing his thumb towards his back.

His father just shook his head and scoffed. "No question where you get your tenacity from, that's for sure."

"Hey. Once I'm done here, I would very much like to head on over to see Ulfgar. I haven't seen that old norn since before my deployment."

"He'll be delighted to see ya of course. Go right on ahead, son. I'll take care of things from here."

The elder Grimwald waved for his son to leave just as the youngest member came rushing out from the back kitchen door.

"Kaaaleeeb!"

"Katie! Hi sweetheart." His youngest sister rushed up to him then gave him a big hug.

"My goodness. You have the strength of a bear. Did some norn kid slip some animal spirit ale in your drink?" Kaleb laughed as he spun his youngest sister around. Within seconds, he winced in pain forgetting that the war wound was still quite painful.

But in spite of his injuries, he made absolutely sure to hold onto Katie as he gently brought her down to the ground.

"Awww. Does it still hurt? You don't need to spin me around if it hurts you."

He knelt down to look her in the eyes. "You don't hurt me one bit. I'm just a big, dumb brother who sometimes forgets his own limits sometimes. Isn't that right dad?"

Daniel smiled and waved to his youngest daughter then beckoned for her to come to him.

"C'mon, darlin'. Wanna help me fix up a wagon?"

She nodded then ran off to greet her father. Kaleb headed back inside to get into some better attire.

Several things had changed in the Grimwald household since Kaleb was away. For one, their family was one of the first to have indoor plumbing with hot and cold running water. And secondly, Rachel was taking a serious interest in attending one of the Asuran colleges in Rata Sum.

The warm shower felt so relaxing against his skin. A days' worth of grit and grime all washed away in a matter of minutes plus he never had to leave the house.

Warmth. He missed that sensation when she held his hands those five months ago. Her smile, although not human, was enough to bring a glow to his heart. Those amber eyes... how he longed for a chance to stare into them more deeply.

Kaleb closed his eyes as the steaming water streamed down his face. He could see her feline form lying on the bed, grooming herself. His mind began to wander, imaging other possibilities.

How would it be possible?

He pondered as he could feel his manliness rise to its fullest potential.

How would we be able to...

"Kaaaleeb. How long are you going to be in the bathroom?"

"Ahhh! Wait! Hold on just a minute Katie. I've gotta get dressed."

Jeese! Can't a man be left alone for just five minutes to contemplate carnal thoughts?

***

Kaleb headed to his familiar haunt, the Jotun's Corpse. If there was anyone in town who had connections to getting in touch with Amalthia, it would be him.

As he walked through the doors and towards his favorite barstool, he was immediately greeted by the mountainous norn who gave him the biggest, but one of the gentlest, bear hugs he had ever experienced.

"Welcome back to the lodge, boy! If I didn't know better, I swear I was looking at another norn."

"It's good to see you too, Ulf. So what makes you say that?"

"My boy. Tales of your ferocious battle have reached all the way to this humble watering hole. Normally I reserve bragging rights for myself, but today is your day."

The old norn grabbed a large copper goblet and spoon then started rapping the base of the drinking vessel with all his might. Everyone immediately took notice as the thunderous echo of his voice resonated throughout the tavern.

"Here ye. Here ye! Good denizens of Claypool. A newly minted town legend has returned and is standing before you today in these very halls. Kaleb Grimwald, a boy whom I knew since he was a wolf pup, has returned from a great battle and I am here to tell everyone of his heroic deeds."

"For it was those many months ago that he, and four of his bravest comrades faced and army of thousands of ravenous centaurs who were bent upon their total destruction. Did they falter?" Ulfgar paused then inclined his ear to the audience.

"NOoo!" The patrons shouted in unison.

"Did they shirk their duties?"

"NOo!"

"Were they victorious?"

"YESss!"

Kaleb stood there looking like a midget, compared to the norn, and just smiled. He knew that Ulfgar's days of adventure were long behind him and being able to tell a vicarious tale helped the old norn return to his glory days.

After the highly embellished account was finished and the merrymaking festivities had subsided, Kaleb sat down on his ever-familiar stool then soaked up as many lagers as his body could handle. He waited for a break in the revelry before asking the shaman about how to get in touch with a certain someone.

The old norn could sense that Kaleb had a question to ask so he went over and waved for the patrons nearby to leave. With the two of them sitting side-by-side Ulfgar folded his massive arms and smiled.

"What's on your mind, lad? You've got that I've-got-a-favor look on your face."

Kaleb knew that whenever Ulfgar referred to him as 'lad' it was on a much more serious and heartfelt note.

"First, I wanted to thank you for boasting about my heroic tale. And second, the numbers were just a wee bit inflated. It was hundreds of centaurs, not thousands."

"Bah. Just numbers. The people here know of your deeds and that is what they appreciate the most. Anyway, what was it that you really wanted to tell me?"

Kaleb traced the top of his stein with his left index finger before downing a draught. "Our suppliers were a couple of charr. The owner's daughter was the one who saved our lives. I just wanted to get in touch with her."

"Charrs, eh? Give me names, boy. That would be a good start."

"Let's see. The daughter's name is Amalthia. She has no last name since she's a gladium. And her father's name is Ludrick Crushsomethingorother."

"Crushblow! Centurion Ludrick Crushblow of the Fifty-First Blood Legion Brigade. Now that's a name I haven't heard mentioned by anyone in ages."

"So you know him?"

"Know him. Boy, he and I used to hang out all the time back during our great hunts. Every other week back when I lived just outside Hoelbrak, we could get together at the local pub and exchange some amazing tales. He's a good soul, lad. Don't let his fearsome appearance deceive you. He will stand by those who have honorable hearts," Ulfgar smiled as he took another drink.

"He always seemed like a grumpy old charr to me. But then, I never really got a chance to know him on a personal level like I did his daughter."

"Is that so? Well, what I can tell you is that there is more to him then you can possibly imagine. But in time, and if you are patient, you will learn these things."

"I hope to be that patient. By the way, what do you know about his daughter Amalthia?"

"Not much, I'm afraid. She was sent off to a fahrar before I really had a chance to know her. What I do know is that she was exiled from her warband for being unable to save one of her bandmates. It was supposedly due to her small physical size. Her warband leader blamed her for the death of their comrades and cast her out when she was nineteen. She's been living with her sire ever since."

"What about her mother? Amalthia mentioned her several times and in a none-too-good light I might add."

Kaleb downed the rest of his stein.

"Siri Blastfuse. Now that's a dam who has a heart as cold as Jormag itself. My advice - never cross her path."

"That bad, huh? I do know that Amalthia mentioned her mother more than once when listing off the negative things that went on in her life. She must have been a real bitch."

"Aaww. Now don't go insulting wolves that way, boy. My mother was Wolf Clan."

Kaleb looked at him sheepishly. "My apologies. I think the lager is taking effect. But I understand if you are unable to get in touch with her."

"No worries, lad. I'll find a way of keeping you and her in contact with each other."

"Good. If you can, I have a letter here that I've already written to her. If you can find a way, I would really appreciate it if you could forward it to her."

Kaleb handed the old norn a sealed envelope.

Tucking it into his shirt pocket, Ulfgar responded. "Consider it done, lad."

Feeling the effects of the alcohol, Kaleb tried to steady himself as he got up from his stool.

"Oh. One other thing... where is the nearest library?"

For the first time in their many years of knowing each other, Ulfgar was completely dumbstruck by the question. He scratched his beard for a moment with his fingers while pondering the question.

"Only one I know of is at the center of town. Why are you needin' a library for anyway?"

"Um. Learning new cooking recipes for when I get back into the army?"

"I think you've had too many lagers, boy. Go home to your folks and sleep it off. I promise it will all be better in the morning."

[tinyfelthat]

Up to Bat: 1

Story page // My ask box

Author’s note: I can’t wait for you guys to read this! I’ve been working really hard on it for a while. Without further ado, here it is:

Chapter 1: Top of the First

Mia is running late. Today is her first day working at her dream job, and she’s running six minutes behind schedule. Six minutes isn’t a lot, but for Mia, it feels like six hours, because she’s wanted a job like this for as long as she can remember. She’s been a numbers geek since she learned to count. She fell in love with baseball as a kid, watching it on television and going to games with her dad, and she fell in love with statistics in college. Putting everything together seemed completely natural, and when she landed this job, she was, in a word, ecstatic.

Somehow, the traffic is light on her route to the stadium, and she makes it there nine minutes ahead of schedule. But she gets lost on her way to the statisticians’ office, and arrives there at 8:33am. She feels a pang of guilt for being three minutes late on her first day, but there’s nothing she can do at this point, so she shrugs it off as best she can. She’s supposed to be there thirty minutes before the official work day begins in order to be shown around the office and for some administrative stuff, anyway. The man who interviewed her for the position is waiting for her. He’s middle-aged, with thinning brown hair and a wide, friendly smile. She can’t remember his name, but she hopes that it won’t be an issue.

“Amelia Simon?” he asks.

“Yes, that’s me,” she replies.

“I don’t know if you remember my name from your interview. You seemed a little overwhelmed by the idea of working here. In any case, I’m Andrew Green, and I’m your new boss. Let me show you around the office.”

“Nice to meet you again, Mr. Green,” Mia smiles at him.

“Please call me Andrew. We’re all friends around here, Amelia.”

“Well, then, please call me Mia. It’s what I prefer.”

“I’ll remember that,” he pauses for a moment for dramatic effect, “Mia.”

Andrew first shows Mia her cubicle, then the break room, followed by the location of the bathrooms, and finally the conference room, where she’ll be for major meetings, including those with players. She fills out some paperwork at her new desk, and brings them to Andrew in his office.

“You seem eager to get started,” Andrew says. “I can already tell you’ll fit in quite well. You’re our newest, fresh out of graduate school. I can’t wait to see what you can do for our statistics team and for the players themselves.”

Mia grins. “I really can’t wait. It’s been my dream to work for a baseball team, any baseball team, for as long as I can remember, and you’re my hometown team. I’d hoped I’d be able to work for this team, but I wasn’t sure there’d be a position for me to take here. And I can be close to my family too! I can’t believe this is real.”

“Well, it is. Take a moment to soak it in, and then we’ll head to your first stat team meeting.”

Mia takes a deep breath in, and holds it. She releases it slowly. “I’m ready,” she tells Andrew.

They walk together to the meeting room, where the rest of the team’s statisticians have gathered.

“This is Mia Simon, everybody. She’s the newest member of our little operation here,” Andrew introduces her, and she waves awkwardly at them.

They go around the room, introducing themselves to Mia. She doesn’t remember any names because she’s nervous meeting so many new people at once, but she tells herself that it’ll be okay and that she’ll learn their names quickly enough.

“Today is a big day!” Andrew announces, once they’ve finished the introductions. “Pitchers and catchers report for their first official Spring Training workouts on Wednesday, and we have lots to do before they get there, because the rest of the team will be arriving on the following Monday.”

Mia puts her hand up, and Andrew points at her to speak. “Will we be meeting with the players during Spring Training at all?”

“Only the senior members of our stat team will travel to Florida to meet with the team during preseason workouts. However, our junior statisticians -- and, yes, that includes you Mia! -- will remain here. You will be meeting with some of the players throughout the regular season, though, again, you will not be traveling with the team at all. You’ll each be looking at and analyzing the stats for several players who are on the roster, or some minor leaguers and non-roster players invited to Spring Training, or a combination of the two. That’ll be all of you, junior and senior statisticians.”

“Okay,” Mia nods her understanding. Another hand goes up, that of a young man who looks to be around her age.

“Yes, Niall?”

“Which cubicle did you give to Mia? The one next to mine?” Andrew nods. “Okay, good.” Niall seems pleased.

The meeting wraps up with instructions on what each statistician should be doing for the next week to prep for the preseason, and they are all given player assignments. Mia is assigned to look at the stats for a couple of non-roster minor leaguers who were invited to Major League Spring Training to compete for a spot on the team, along with Harry Styles, the face of the franchise and star slugger of the team. She thinks this must be wrong, and she goes to approach Andrew, but he is preoccupied with one of the senior statisticians, so she goes back to her cubicle and asks her new cubicle neighbor, Niall.

“It seems like Andrew gave me the wrong instructions,” she tells him, and passes over her papers.

“Nah,” Niall says. “Someone else is ‘actually’ assigned to him. This is just a test to see what you’re made of.”

“Really?” Mia says, relieved. “Thanks for the heads up. I was really worried. I mean, Harry Styles? He’s amazing and I couldn’t help him get better if I tried.”

Niall laughs. “That’s what you think, but even the best players benefit from our help. That’s why we have a job at all. By the way, I’m Niall Horan. I’m the second-newest member of the stat team. I asked if you were in the cubicle next to mine because I wanted to make sure you had somebody young to help navigate you through the first few days.”

“Thanks, Niall. I really appreciate that. I’m Mia Simon, but you already knew that.” She extends her hand, and they shake hands, an unspoken agreement to be friends.

***

One week later, on Mia’s second Monday at the job, she and Niall are sitting in the break room, chatting and finishing their lunches, when Andrew walks in.

“Ah, good. Just the two people I wanted to see,” he says, and clears his throat importantly. “Two of our senior statisticians are really sick. They both have strep throat and are very contagious, and they’ll be out for at least a week. In any case, I need two more people to fly to Florida tomorrow with the group to help explain some stuff to the players and coaches. I was hoping you two youngsters would like to come along to see what Spring Training is all about. In addition, I was hoping some young faces would help the players pay more attention to what we’re saying.”

There is a silence, while the two process what Andrew told them. Then, once it hits them, their mouths drop open. The two look at each other like little kids who were just told by their parents that they’re on their way to Walt Disney World.

“This has to be a mistake,” Mia says after her heart rate slows a little. “Why us?”

“Because you are the only two junior statisticians on the team who haven’t been through any part of the preseason or regular season yet. Niall was hired in October, right after the season ended, since we didn’t make the playoffs. And you were obviously just hired. We wanted to give you an opportunity to see what it would be like, if and when you become senior statisticians. Besides, you two are our best and brightest new additions anyway. I saw what you did with Styles’ stats, Mia. You’ll do great. Don’t worry too much.”

Andrew smiles encouragingly at them. “I’ll let you two go home when you’re done eating and pack. I’ll see you bright and early at the airport, all right? Eight o’clock sharp. We’ll be there for four days, including tomorrow, so keep that in mind.”

***

Back at her apartment, Mia is riddled with anxiety. She doesn’t know what to pack, because she’s never been on a trip quite like this one, so she calls Niall. He picks up on the second ring.

“Hey! What’s up?”

“Hi Niall. I have no idea what to pack for this trip. Do I pack business casual? Or do I pack team apparel? Or do I just pack regular clothes? Help me!”

She knows she sounds a little crazy and desperate, but she doesn’t care. She’s too wrapped up in her own anxiety about meeting members of the team she’s been rooting for as long as she can remember.

“Whoa,” Niall says, a little taken aback. “Calm down a little. It’s just a business trip. I would say pack business casual and maybe put a jersey or two in there as well if you really want to. We’re meeting the team as statisticians, not as fans, you gotta remember that.”

“Right,” Mia grounds herself. “Of course. I’m so dumb. I’m just so excited that I let my emotions get ahead of my logical self. Okay.”

“You gonna be okay now?”

“Yeah, Niall. I think I’ll be fine. Thanks. Bye. See you tomorrow at the airport, eight o’clock sharp.” Mia smiles into the phone, despite her nerves.

“Bye Mia,” Niall says, and hangs up.

Mia tosses a couple of her favorite jerseys into her bag, including one that reads STYLES with a number 10 on the back. He has been her favorite player since he was called up to the majors a few years back. She’s a little overly anxious to meet him, she thinks. She tells herself to calm down. He’s just another person. They’re all just people. Why is this so intimidating?

***

Bright and early the following morning, or rather, dark and early at 6am, Mia rolls out of bed, exhausted, but with a big smile on her face. She’s going to fly down to Florida! She’s going to meet some of her favorite players! And best of all, she’s doing it in an official capacity as a statistician for the team,so they have to listen to her. Admittedly, this makes her a little more nervous, because she has no idea what she’s supposed to say, but she’s too excited to let it bother her.

After showering and getting dressed, she tries to eat a light breakfast, but she’s too nervous to eat. She only manages a few bites of food, so she grabs a banana and a couple of granola bars to take with her. She calls Niall on her way out the door, and gets his voicemail. When she arrives at the terminal at 7:40,  she’s greeted by Andrew and two other senior statisticians from the office, Daniel and James. Niall arrives at the gate five minutes before their boarding call, super out of breath, but with a wide smile on his face.

“My alarm didn’t go off,” he says by way of explanation for his sweaty, disheveled self. “In all the excitement yesterday, I must’ve set it for 6:30pm somehow. If it hadn’t been for Mia calling me when she was leaving her apartment, I don’t think I would’ve made it. I’m lucky I live relatively close to the airport.”

“Well, Niall,” Daniel clears his throat and smirks at him. “We’re, um, glad you’re here.” He glances at Mia, who narrows her eyes at him.

“Me too!” Niall agrees, oblivious to the clear venom in Daniel’s voice.

Luckily, their boarding number is called then, before Mia can say anything to Daniel that might damage her career. They are sitting in business class, which is a first for both Mia and Niall. They’re assigned seats are next to each other, which they appreciate. The looks that they’re getting from Daniel and James are unpleasant, to say the least. Mia is a bit uncomfortable when she realizes that she’s the only woman in their group, but then she remembers that it was supposed to be Andrew, James, Daniel, George, and Sue. There aren’t that many women in the office, she realizes, and somehow that calms her enough that she falls right into a deep sleep that carries her all the way to Florida.

***

“Wake up, Mia!” Niall whisper-shouts into her ear.

She sits bolt upright, obviously startled, and then slouches a bit and swats at him. “You scared me!”

“Sorry. I guess I had too much coffee. We’re about to land in Florida, by the way. That’s why I was waking you.”

“Oh, okay, cool.” Mia says, and turns to snuggle back into her comfy seat. But then his words register. “What?! We’re here?!” she squeals, and then, realizing that she’s in public, quiets herself. She’s still bouncing in her seat a little when the pilot announces the time, the weather, and that they’ve arrived.

Mia and Niall catch up with the rest of the group at baggage claim, as they’d rushed off the plane as soon as they could. The two friends get stuck behind a family of six who were blocking the end of the gangway to the plane by taking a selfie with the “Welcome to Orlando” sign. The family is clearly headed to Disney World, but Niall and Mia still think they have the better end of the stick. Once everyone has their luggage, the group gets into a set of two waiting cars. Daniel and James get into the first one, and Andrew insists on getting into the second with Mia and Niall to prepare them for their first full-team meeting.

When they get to the sports complex, the driver tells them that their bags will be brought to their hotel rooms and will be there when they arrive there in the evening. They all nod, and step out of the car. Mia is on autopilot and silent, taking everything in, when they arrive at the fancy boardroom where they’ll be having the meeting. Mia is the last of the group to enter, and when she does, she loses her breath for a moment out of shock. Her eyes sweep the room, looking at all the players, and she locks eyes with Harry Styles.

[cskiner]

Floyetta

           A few months ago, my mother texted me while I was at work—pray for your grandmother, she said. To an outside audience, this would seem a vague and ominous phrase, but to me it was not. My grandmother was not a nice woman. She was rude to my mother and worse to my father, who was her second of two sons. Perhaps she blamed him for her divorce from my grandfather when my father and his brother were very young; more likely, she decided my ten-year-old uncle would be the new patriarch, and wrapped in her own tragedy, could only thinly love one man and bestow guilt upon the other. My mother avoided her as often as she could. My uncle’s wife only referred to her as “the mother,” the corners of her lips curling downward in distaste when the phrase had to be uttered. My grandmother was not a nice woman.

The text message, my mother showing any level of compassion for her mother-in-law, meant that my grandmother might die.

           I took the call at work, stepping out for the fifteen I never used. I did not like my grandmother, but that does not mean that I did not love her. My dad told me on the phone that she had fallen at home and broken her hip, and that during hip surgery her heart stopped. She was resuscitated, but lost several liters of blood and broke a rib in the process. Plus, her hip was still broken, but she was much too weak to undergo a second surgery tonight. They would have to try again in a few days.

My parents were living in New Zealand. My aunt and uncle were vacationing in Maui. My cousins that had not recently been alienated by my grandmother’s biting insults were busy holding down their father’s business. My older brother lived in the Bay Area and had just started a new job that he could spare little time from, and I, in Los Angeles, was the closest to my grandmother’s hospital in San Diego. I hated this hospital. My other grandmother, my beloved Lola, had died there a few years ago from an unexpected brain bleed, and my family had slept in the waiting room for days before her heart stopped. I wanted to throw up, but Fridays at work were thirteen-hour shifts, and I was only nine hours in.

           My dad called me during hour twelve for an update: grandma was stable for the night. I told my bitch of a boss that I might have to take the weekend off, attempting an appeal to sympathy with an excuse I once promised myself I would never use: “my grandmother is dying.” She made me stay late at work that night.

           I downed more whiskey, neat, than usual at my boyfriend’s house that night while crying into his arms. Not for my grandmother—for myself, for the unfair circumstances that had thrust me into adulthood sooner than I wanted. We packed overnight bags and were on the road early the next morning. Will distracted me on the drive down with stories of his grandmother to counter my own—she moved in with his family when he was a teenager and brought her own elderly chaos to the household. I explained a little more about grandma to give him context about her self-pity.

           My grandmother was named Floyetta. Not because my great-grandparents liked the name, no—because her father had wanted a boy to name after himself, a Floyd II. Having a girl instead apparently wasn’t reason enough to look through the baby book for a different name. Her mother, Frances, who I knew until she died at age 99, was a frivolous and inexplicably happy woman. She loved everything pink, wore only muumuus, ate only fine steaks and sugary sweets, and let her poodle sit in a high chair at the dinner table. Her love for this poodle was so strong that when her husband died of liver failure (alcoholism was the true culprit), she drafted a will, expecting that she wouldn’t live much longer. The will left almost everything to her poodle, rather than her daughter, a struggling single mother. When Frances did live for twenty more years, my grandmother moved her in and took care of her day in and day out, feeding her by hand when she lost her teeth. Telling her story, I began to remember why my grandmother was not a nice woman.[Office1] 

           I remembered insults she had spat at my cousin, Andrea, about Andrea’s mother being at fault for her father’s infidelity. I remembered hearing that she tried to get out of my dad’s car while he was driving her home on the freeway, and he had to lock the doors so that she couldn’t tumble out. I remembered that she threw a fit when I was eight because when she vaguely implied dehydration, I brought her too much water. That she “accidentally” called and admonished me for forgetting to call her during finals week at college. That my mother refused to tell me why she almost never came with us to visit my grandmother: I was too young to hear. But she was family. I was her only available support system. It was an obligation, rather than a favor—she had not exactly been our family’s ‘rock,’ but I went anyway.

           When we reached the hospital, I braced myself, but not enough. In her hospital gown and twenty pounds lighter than when I last saw her, grandma looked like Frances had right before she died. The resemblance shocked me back into my twelve-year old body, visiting my withering great grandmother Frances at the hospital and following the nurse’s instructions to douse my forearms in hand sanitizer. Dismal beeps from heart monitors echoed down the hallways and I counted the tiles on the floor to avoid glimpsing other sick patients. The hospital smelled like sterile death and I wanted to get out.

Will steadied me, holding my hand with an iron grip he had never deployed before. I tried to feed grandma her pain medication, crushed into a few tablespoons of vanilla yogurt. She refused after one spoonful (one was impressive, really—she’s not known for cooperating) and we switched back to the tiny sponge soaked in apple juice. It was clear that she was not faking the pain the way she used to. I was disarmed. Grandma’s refusal to do anything productive had always made me angry, indignant at the very least. Now, it just made me sad.

           Will found the nurse and asked her if they could increase the pain medication or try a different kind while I held back tears in the corner, fighting the urge to bolt. He knew all the specific terms, all the alternatives to suggest. He was authoritative but not rude to the nurse and asked the doctor all the questions I had forgotten.

Will had not met my grandmother before this, and I had told him very little about her in the last year that we had been together. I knew family was important to him, but he was not the first man I’d heard that from. My last boyfriend broke up with me because his mother told him to—the wrong kind of “family was important to him.” Will, on the other hand, had voluntarily become my miserable grandmother’s healthcare advocate because the look on my face was telling him, I want to, but I can’t, and somehow he understood.

After a few hours, grandma fell asleep. I sat with her awhile, squeezing her hand when she woke up. Once, she woke up and couldn’t see me; I was on a bench by the window rather than the chair by her bedside.

“Where is my granddaughter?!” she mustered the loudest voice she would use all day, panicked. I rushed to her side and waited until she fell asleep again.

She really loves you, Will mouthed. I know, I responded through tears. I remembered that when she could drive, she did not miss a single one of my dance performances. Last spring, she showed me pictures that she took on her digital camera when I got my first pair of pointe shoes at age ten and refused to take them off, walking them around the house until I had blisters.

Grandma’s grandchildren were the closest thing she had to pride and joy, if she had any. She boasted our accomplishments to anyone who would listen, although in a way that made us feel a little more like circus animals rather than precious grandbabies. A portrait she sketched of my brother around age twelve is still framed in my parents’ house. Grandma spent months on it, trying to get his nose just right. Her artwork was beautifully meticulous, detailed beyond necessity, and realistic in a way that made me wonder why her own reality was so skewed—but it never left her bedroom. She had a habit of mastering things that never turned into practical skills. She told me last year that she finished law school after her divorce, but never took the bar exam. She didn’t have an explanation as to why—or if she did, she wouldn’t tell me.

Grandma fell asleep again during her second very slow blood transfusion, and an old friend came in to watch her for the evening, promising to send us updates. Will stood beside me as I looked at grandma one more time, thinking it very well may be the last, and steadied my shaking hand again to lead me out of the hospital. When my parents flew home to visit grandma a week later, my mother noted that when grandma recounted my visit, she remembered Will vividly, but forgot Andrea’s boyfriend of five years.

Leaving the hospital, Will and I realized we had not eaten anything all day. Dinnertime was quickly approaching, and in my hunger and shock I had fixated on one option: a sandwich shop called Cheese Shop in La Jolla. My parents had taken my brother and me to Cheese Shop every summer when I was a child—they had both grown up in the San Diego area, and La Jolla was about in between their families’ homes. Every summer until we could no longer afford it, we stayed a week at a hotel on the La Jolla Shores, from which Cheese Shop was only a three-minute walk down the beachfront. The taste of deli sandwiches permeates these memories strongly: I would always throw out the pickle and revel in the extra four slices of cheese that I was never allowed at home.

My father would take me with him to the deli for eccentric root beer bottles, turkey avocado club sandwiches, and the best oatmeal cookie that the world has ever seen. We wandered through the selection of European chocolates and came home with more sweets than sandwiches, and one summer I drank myself sick on vanilla cream sodas. Surfers in their towels tracked in sand so that we could smell the ocean in the sandwich shop. We lugged our haul back onto the beach, where I demolished my sandwich and then plunged right back into the waves for a stomachache.[Office2] 

Will and I plugged Cheese Shop into the navigation system, and even though it was almost an hour away, my mind was blank for food alternatives anywhere nearer. He asked no questions.

My father and I bonded over our obsession with Cheese Shop sandwiches, a bond that I rarely felt we had despite our very similar dispositions. I couldn’t help but think it would be strange to visit the deli without him, but I felt a strange sort of compulsion to go, and an even stronger compulsion to show Will this landmark of my childhood. Though we had only been together about a year, I felt this way about him often, as though I could share everything good and never lose ownership of my secrets. He displayed a very similar compulsion when we visited his hometown last month, showing me all his hidden passageways and the boy scout summer camp he loved so dearly.

Arriving at the little shop on the beach, I exhaled for the first time since leaving the hospital. Will humored me by raving about his pastrami sandwich and buying extra oatmeal cookies for our drive home. I knew he could sense that this visit had thrown me more than I wanted it to—his hand rested over mine the entire meal. Warm physical contact does wonders for comfort.

Parents at the table next to us were having trouble controlling their toddler son: he was a bit possessive over his mother’s phone, on which he was playing a game or watching a video or something else with obnoxious sound effects. Will and I looked at each other knowingly, and on our walk down the street we discussed. I loved talking about children with him—it was a recent development that let me know he was on the same page in regards to our future. In the last few months, we had tentatively transitioned from saying “when I raise my kids” to “when we raise ours.” The idea that a family could be made from this, from someone I chose to love and that loved me, became overwhelming. I had always been taught that family was an obligatory acceptance, one that I would have to excuse flaws for. Family was not an easy love. Yet here in front of me was this lovely being who loved me back, who I could decide to build a life with. And I loved him for his flaws, not despite them. The easiest love I had and have ever known.

We walked down the beach, arm in arm. I had forgotten to account for summer gloom, so Will donated his sweater and I disappeared inside it. We settled in a little nook to watch the waves crash, on the beach that had occupied my childhood. Musing about our future and watching children play in the waves, I fell asleep in his lap and dreamed of days, months, years ahead.

---

csk

10/2019

to all my beautiful readers: sorry I haven’t posted in so long, and I know this one was a lot to get through! I’ve been doing a little more narrative and a little less poetry lately, but I’m especially proud of this one so I thought I’d post it. more poetry to come next semester, I hope!

[let-it-raines]

Are we ever going to see anything from Emma's point of view in Second in Command? Love your work :D

Well hello Anon! You probably thought I was ignoring you for how long it took me to answer this, but I didn’t want to come up empty handed. So I present to you a short little drabble of when Emma and Killian met from Emma’s point of view.

For reference, Killian’s POV is in chapter one here :)

Sometimes she misses America. She doesn’t miss her hometown,the place where she’s now an outcast when she was once a valued citizen, butshe misses her actual home. Shemisses the fact that she could walk to the beach from her house, and she misseshaving a house with a backyard, her old swing set rusting in the grass belowthe oak tree where many a childhood memory was made. She misses the place whereshe grew up, the magic of the small town, even if it’s not so magical anymore.

She misses the weather during the spring. Sure, it rains,but there are more sunny days than anything else. Here, in the midst of London,it’s like it rains more than the sun shines. Her hair is constantly frizzing fromthe droplets that fall from the sky, and she owns more rain boots than anythingelse, which is odd for a girl who once wore nothing but sandals and whitetennis shoes, maybe the occasional ankle booties that were more for looks thanpracticality. Now she dresses so that her feet don’t get wet.

On days like today, where the sky is overcast and the rainmakes the street look like nothing more than a blurry image, all she wants isto curl up in her bed and watch a movie, something cheesy and romantic and entirelyunrealistic because romance doesn’t work out like it does in the movies, notfor girls like her who are damaged goods. But she can’t do that because she hasto work, her parents giving her more responsibility at the pub than before eversince she decided she didn’t want to go to college – or university as they callit here.

So she pulls on a pair of her favorite skinny jeans andpulls her hair up in a high ponytail, thinking that she needs to get it trimmedbecause it still brushes the middle of her back, before heading downstairs andgreeting Will as he opens up for the night.

As the night goes on a few people filter in and out, butit’s mostly empty tonight, most likely due to the rain and the fact that it’s aTuesday. That’s when the chime over the door goes off and she sees a guy with abaseball cap on walk in, jeans soaked through so that they cling to his thighs,showcasing the muscles underneath – she doesn’t stare, she swears – and waterabsolutely rolling off of him. She’d feel bad for the guy, obviously surprisedby the downpour outside, but then he’s walking across the pub, water followingin his trail, and sliding into one of their booths.

He’s going to fuck up the leather if he sits like that, andthey can’t afford to reupholster the material. Plus, it’s the same materialGrandpa put in, and she never wants that to change. So she’s at least going toget him some towels to sit on and dry off with, but it’s when she’s walkingtoward the stairway to their apartment that he turns his head, a flash of blueeyes and perfectly trimmed stubble appearing underneath the bill of his cap.

Holy shit, shethinks, mouth gaping open at what she’s sure is a dream because that can’t bewho she thinks he is. Why the hell would he be here? Shouldn’t he have securityor like a cape and a crown or something? How the hell did a prince, a fuckingprince, end up in her parents’ pub absolutely dripping with rain water?

She doesn’t quite know what possesses her to do what shedoes next, but the guy’s obviously a little down on his luck – if that’s evenpossible – and she doesn’t want him getting sick and dying of pneumonia onlyfor that to be traced back to her. She’s not here to get blamed for somethingelse she didn’t do. So she takes a breath, squaring her shoulders, and walksover to him.

“Up,” she begins, raising her hands to demonstrate what shemeans like the guy can’t understand English, and wow this was not her nicestfirst impression.

Instead of standing he raises his head to look at her, andwhile she’s not one to fawn over the two princes like every other girl sheknows, she can admit that he’s handsome, even if he’s soaking wet. Maybeespecially if he’s soaking wet.

When he doesn’t respond, she says it again. “Up.”

“Just…just what do you think you’re doing, lass?”

Did his voice just squeak??

She nods her head to the booth and crosses her arms over herchest, and why is she being so stern? Youdon’t trust men, a little voice in her head reminds her. You’re just trying to help someone out,another voice says. “You’re going to ruin the leather with how soaked throughyour clothes are, and while this place isn’t the palace, it doesn’t mean youcan just ruin our booths.”

Shit, she didn’t mean for that to sound so rude.

Something flashes in his eyes, and she realizes that it’sprobably concern over the fact that he’s been recognized. But he’s getting outof the booth anyways, towering above her as she looks up at him as she’s tryingto hold her ground over whatever the hell she’s just gotten herself into.

She doesn’t know what’s come over her because she’s grabbinghis forearm, his skin warm against her fingertips despite the water, andleading him up to her apartment. That’s safe right? She’s not going to getmurdered by a prince. Would he even get arrested for that? How does that work?She’s pretty sure his dad doesn’t even have to have a driver’s license, so thelaws are a little murky.

Once they’re upstairs and neither of them have spoken, she doesn’t even know what to say, shereleases his arm to get some of her dad’s clothes. Her dad’s definitely a sizeor two larger than him, so she finds a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt knowingthat he can wear those without any problem.

When she gets back to the living room, he’s staring at apicture of she and her parents during her fifteenth’s birthday dinner, hisfingers running across the frame as he holds it.

“In case your detective skills aren’t great,” she tells him,startling him so that he puts the frame back down with what can be described asbutter fingers, “those are my parents. And obviously me.” She walks over to himand hands him the clothes. “Here. Put these on. They’re my dad’s, and theyshould fit you. I can put your clothes in the dryer if you want. We have onehere, just got it last year.”

Why in the world did she feel the need to add that lastpart? He doesn’t care about their appliances or when they got them.

“I, um,thanks,” he tells her, taking the clothes and scratching his beard. “That’sreally kind of you miss…”

“Nolan,” she answers. “I’m Emma Nolan.” Oh crap what doesshe call him? “It’s nice to meet you, your Highness.”

His face recoils, a look of disgust passing over him quicklybefore disappearing. “Please,” he says, “just call me Killian.”

She’s not one to swoon over a guy with an accent, but hisvoice is deep and the words roll off his tongue. She understands why there arealways stories about him with women. The accent (though that is normal here)and the looks and the whole prince thing.

She can’t help but laugh at thinking of how her mom wouldabsolutely flip out if she was here. “My mother might murder me if she heard mesay that, but okay, Killian.”

“Can, I, uh, can I just change in one of these rooms?”

“Bathroom is the first door on the left.”

While he’s changing, she start’s to realize how weird thissituation is. It kind of feels like one of those Hallmark movies her momwatches, but more real. Like, she’s not going to fall in love with the guy andchange the monarchy with her sparkling personality and magic vagina.

Did she just think the words magic vagina? That’s from a movie, isn’t it? She doesn’t know. Itdoesn’t matter.

She needs something to do to occupy her time and her handsafter starting the dryer, walking to the kitchen to make some hot chocolate.She thinks of making it the old fashioned way, but instant will do for now.

“Hot chocolate? No tea?”

Shit, she didn’t even know he’d come back, and wow she’sglad she wasn’t holding a pot of scalding hot water because that would haveburned had she dropped it.

“Well, that’s very stereotypical British of you,” she jokes,turning around to look at him and sprinkling some cinnamon into her hotchocolate. She doesn’t know if he’d like it, so she leaves his plain. “But Iguess you are as stereotypical British as they come.”

“Are you not British, love?”

Oh wow, dumb question,Killian, she thinks, scrunching up her nose to keep her from saying thatout loud.

“Well, ifmy American accent is anything to go by, I’d say no.” His cheeks flush red and herface melts, just the tiniest bit, into a soft smile at the fact that she justembarrassed him a bit. “Dad’s American. Mom’s British. I’ve got dualcitizenship. Was raised in America until a little after I turned eighteen, sowe’ve been here for about two years now. Cameacross the pond,” she’susing a cheeky accent now, and she hopes he doesn’t get mad at that, “when mymom’s dad died, and he left us the pub.”

“That’squite the story, Emma.”

It is, butshe doesn’t like talking about her history too much, the recent bad faroutweighing the earlier good. So she shrugs her shoulders. “Eh. It is what itis.”

Shedoesn’t know how, but they dissolve into a good conversation. He doesn’t seemtoo keen on sharing things about himself, and she can’t tell if that’s justbecause of who he is compared to her or if maybe he’s just having a bad night.She seems to decide on the latter, the bags around his eyes not somethingpeople his age normally have, so she just talks about herself, not somethingshe likes to do but she doesn’t mind too much tonight.

He willchime in when she says something he likes. They watch a lot of the same showsand read a lot of the same books, fantasy series and comedies seemingly hisfavorites as well. He’s funny, she realizes, and he never mentions anythingabout his position in life. If she didn’t know better, she’d think he was anormal guy. She likes him, thinks he might actually be an interesting person,but she knows that tonight is most likely a one time thing. She’ll probablynever see him again.

When thedryer dings to let her know that his clothes are dry, a pang of disappointmentrushes through her, but she ignores it as she gives him his clothes and heredresses. It’s been a nice night, and it’ll be a cool story to tell one daydown the road when she and Ruby are watching him get married to some duchessfrom Norway.

“So youcan’t stay up here, but I can’t technically just kick you out, especially now thatyou’re not going to ruin our booths with your wet clothes. So you can eitherstay down in the pub or go someplace else. It doesn’t matter to me.”

Somethingseems to flash across his eyes, but she doesn’t know what. Surprisingly enough,he ends up sitting at the bar counter nursing a rum and talking to her untilclosing time. When it’s time for him to go, he gives her a soft smile, eyesbright even in the dimness of the pub, and walks out the door telling her it was nice to meet you, Emma with akiss on the back of her hand.

When shelocks the door behind him, she collapses her back against the wooden frame,tightly closing her eyes and before looking down at where he kissed her hand,whispering to herself, “what the hell just happened?”

[writerly-ramblings]

Thoughts on “The Penderwicks at Last”

All right, there’s been enough interest from the (so sadly tiny) group of Penderwicks readers on here, so here are my semi-coherent thoughts on the last book, At Last, because, as previously stated, I have Thoughts. Spoilers ahead for all the entire series.

I’m going to start by saying that I am not the intended audience for these books: I’m in my twenties. That being said, I’ve waited over a decade for The Penderwicks At Last, and I reread the entire series to prepare. I read the last one in a few hours, and ugly cried through the second half.

Fair warning: my parenthetical comments waged a territorial battle and won.

PROS:

Everyone gets a happy ending. I think, over time, I’ll feel less conflicted about At Last because, in the end, everyone is happy, and does it matter how they got there?

Skye, particularly, is so much happier. The events of the fourth book clearly had an impact, and Lydia has grown up with a much less fearful, hurting, angry, or traumatized Skye.

Batty’s memories of Arundel being mostly patched together from stories her family has told felt incredibly realistic to me, and I enjoyed watching her rediscover the estate.

Ben is great, and I’ve always loved the Penderwick children’s dedication to their chosen obsessions/careers, so I’m glad he’s got that. I also loved when he told Jeffrey he’d marry him, but not if he was broke. (The humor in these books!)

Rafael is still around. We don’t see him, but we know he’s still friends with Ben. Other Penderwick friends have fallen off the map between different books (Anna, Keiko, Molly, Mercedes), and it was good to see someone stick around.

I liked Wesley. He felt like a red-herring (I can’t be the only one who was desperately hoping Batty was going to decide she wanted to be with him after all), but he was a delightful character. He’s kind to Lydia and Alice, makes himself helpful around the house/with wedding prep, loves Hitch, and respects Batty’s boundaries. He’s a good person. And the mobiles!

Cagney’s family is adorable. And Skye teasing Rosalind about her childhood crush on Cagney is a dead-on sister thing to do.

Mr. Penderwick and Iantha are still very much in love, and still very much adorable and loving parents.

“Jeffrey, no one wants to marry you!” (Okay, this is was a laugh-or-you’ll-cry moment, but I did laugh!)

Also in the bittersweet category would be Mrs. Tifton’s talk with Jane in the carriage-house. We won’t talk about the fact that I really, really wanted Mrs. Tifton to be right. What we will talk about is Jane rage-sewing, being a good older sister, holding it together, and refusing to sully her honor (I love that Jane has maintained her bizarre approach to honor that includes even hypotheticals). Thinking about it, this scene mirrors the one with Skye and Mrs. Tifton in the first book (with Lydia standing in for Batty here), and I like that touch.

CONS:

A lot of the issues I had with At Last are really my own problems, not shortcomings in the book. One instance of that is how I felt about Lydia as a narrator. The first four books mature in tone as they go along, due to the seriousness of the issues facing the characters, making them compelling reading for someone older than the intended audience. I liked Lydia, but she felt much less mature than her sisters at similar ages, and wasn’t facing comparable difficulties. And she wasn’t nearly so interested, or involved, in her sisters’ lives as I would have liked. (Which is understandable, given the age gap, but frustrating as a reader who cares mainly about Rosalind, Skye, Jane, and Batty.)

Technology is weirdly handled? I’ve always liked the timeless quality of the previous books, and all the texting and general cell phone use threw me. (And, really, how many eleven-year-olds have access to cell phones and use them exclusively to text their brothers?)

Jane gave me a kind of dispirited, hollow feeling. She’s twenty-five and still hasn’t sat down and written a full novel. She has two abandoned books and one in the planning stages. I don’t mean I wanted her to be published, but it felt very flighty, especially for someone who’s been serious about writing since she was younger than ten. (I kind of wanted more of Jane in general, actually. How was college? How is she managing to keep a waitressing job she’s terrible at, and why wouldn’t she work in, I don’t know, a bookstore or library instead?)

This leads into my next, larger but vaguer upset: Everyone’s happy, but I was still dissatisfied. I know that most of the time life isn’t glamorous, but aside from Skye, the other sisters don’t seem to have done much? Rosalind has taken fifteen years to marry Tommy, Jane hasn’t finished even a draft of a novel, and it seems like Batty’s going to graduate college and start a music school in western MA (which is fine, but also, where are her years touring in Europe and her own career in music?). I don’t know. I think I just wanted to believe, for 256 pages, that adult life could be more exciting and adventurous, and live up to childhood expectations.

Honestly, I like Lydia, but she’s not why I wanted to read At Last. This goes back to me not being the target audience, but it’s the older four I care about, and I felt like frustratingly little was said about them. And I’ve read interviews with Jeanne Birdsall, where she talks about this book being the point she was writing toward, and I’m just having trouble wrapping my mind around the idea that, if this was the endgame, middle-grade novels were the best format for the story. (Am I biased here? Definitely. Did I love these books as a child and teenager? Without a doubt. Would I, right now, prefer to have read a literary fiction novel where the older sisters’ adult lives were given as much weight as their childhoods? I’d be all over that. Again, I acknowledge this as my own bias, not a shortcoming with the book.)

SKYE:

(Because, let’s be honest, this is where I fell apart.)

I’m so, so happy Skye is working on her doctorate. As someone else who didn’t want to date at seventeen because I wanted to “soak up the universe,” I appreciate the fact that she’s out there, doing just that. But it also made me so sad. Because her family loves her, so they put her on speaker phone during important family meetings, and they miss her when she’s gone, and Lydia doesn’t know her, as a person, the way her other sisters and Ben (sort of) do. And this is very much tied to my own life, as I look at likely moving to a different country, leaving behind parents I love and a whole host of younger siblings.

So I’m glad she has the life she spent her whole childhood wanting, but I also wish we’d gotten to see more of how she grew, and healed, and changed post-In Spring. Because the Skye we see in At Last isn’t the Skye from the other books, and that’s good, it means she’s less hurt (and also almost ten years older), but it also means I didn’t feel like I knew much about her anymore.

I have almost no thoughts on Dušek and agree with the opinion other people have voiced that he seemed to be there mostly to squash all doubt about Jeffrey. He seemed sweet, but I didn’t know, or care about, him. (And I think the lack of Skye contributed to this: I didn’t know her, so I didn’t feel invested in him.)

THAT ROMANCE:

I feel like noting that I’ve read Little Women more times than I can count, and I willfully ignored not only that, but also the blatant Penderwick-universe foreshadowing (like Batty saying Jeffrey could marry her, after he saves her from the bull all the way back in the first book). Because Birdsall did deviate from Little Women in other, large ways, for example: none of the sisters die. Did I suspect Jeffrey would end up with Batty? Yes. Did I fervently hope that he’d actually end up with Skye? Also yes. Does it make me seem incredibly shallow that this is what occupied a great deal of my brain for twelve years? Probably.

It’s worth pointing out that I’m a sucker for childhood friends who fall in love and get married (Anne and Gilbert, Meg and Calvin, Ella and Char, Miri and Peder, don’t get me started on FMA … I’ll cop to having a problem), but also that I’ve never been bothered by Laurie and Amy. They make sense together, and Jo’s opposition to Laurie is based on legitimate concerns that just don’t exist for Skye and Jeffrey, thanks both to the fact that they live in the twenty-first century, and that Jeffrey doesn’t have Laurie’s hot-headed argumentative steak, stubbornness, or laziness.

And it’s not necessarily that I think Batty and Jeffrey wouldn’t be good together (other than the fact that, unlike Skye, Batty did, at least while younger, consider him not an “honorary Penderwick” but an “honorary brother”), but we never get an explanation for how Jeffrey feels about Skye now, or how/when he got over her (because, when you think about it, that must have been a Process. According to Jane, circa In Spring, Jeffrey’s been in some form of adoration/love with Skye since a few weeks before he turned eleven, and at least until he was eighteen, which is seven years. He’s twenty-five in At Last, which means, in the span of time the series covers, he’s spent just as much time in love with Skye as not. And seven years is a long time - more than a quarter of his life. And that’s a conservative estimate, since the last we hear of this is that he and Skye fight about this at his graduation, but that likely wasn’t the exact moment he fell out of love with her. And the jump from Skye to Batty is more difficult to swallow, given all of this, than Jeffrey going on to marry a non-Penderwick. Though, to Jeffrey’s credit, it’s heavily implied he’s going to marry Batty, but this is conveyed strictly through Jane; he’s not out there himself, desperately trying to win nineteen-year-old Batty’s affection in order to replace her sister).

Mostly, while reading, I felt misled, because if there was creeping Batty/Jeffrey foreshadowing, the Skye/Jeffrey foreshadowing was burst-into-your-music-room-and-tell-you-off strong. Jeffrey asks Skye if she ever thinks about them getting married all the way back in the third book. And Skye never shows similar inclinations toward romance, but the whole plot of In Spring makes it seem like this is due to being traumatized by the circumstances of her mother’s death. She isn’t interested in romance as a teenager, but she does love Jeffrey as a friend, and since the purpose of the events of In Spring is to make her less terrified of relationships, and because it’s Jeffrey she originally opens up to about this, there’s a lot, thematically, implied here. (I feel like the argument at Jeffrey’s graduation is maybe meant to show that she’s never going to be interested, but given both that she states that she wants to prioritize college over romance, and that the fight happens off-stage and is only summarized, this isn’t really clear.)

I do feel like this is where Little Women has the advantage: Jo doesn’t love Laurie, and she also has practical reasons why marriage wouldn’t work for them. We never see that from Skye. We see her afraid of love, and fighting with external factors, but we never actually see her not loving Jeffrey for reasons that are related to him.

So I think my main issue here is that their relationship felt very unresolved. Are they even still good friends? And why was it necessary for Jeffrey to fall in love with her in the first place? The fraught conversation in In Spring could just as easily have been Jeffrey or Jane pressing Skye about why she wouldn’t date Pearson.

(Skye and Jeffrey are previously so earnest, and At Last feels like the death of a friendship. Not in a final, we’ll-never-speak-again way, but in a quieter way that makes me think they haven’t really been close since Skye left for college, and that just makes me sad. Where are my “Friends forever” as sworn by the Penderwick Family Honor? Because, yes, yes, everyone grows up, but I didn’t want them to grow apart.)

IN CONCLUSION:

Has anyone actually made it this far down? Was a dissertation called for? Am I a little obsessive/ridiculous/insane?

What might not have come across, but what I do strongly feel, is that At Last is a good read. Lydia’s likable, the return to Arundel is well done, there are a lot of sweet, funny scenes. And none of my criticism really is to do with the material. My disappointment stems almost completely from my own expectations. Will I go on to reread the first four books and then pretend I’ve misplaced the fifth (while imagining it’s told from Rosalind, Skye, Jane, and Batty’s perspectives; and, possibly, that it has a different ending)? Who knows. Maybe, once I’ve sat with the fifth book for a bit longer I’ll like it more. Maybe it doesn’t matter. Maybe those twelve years when I speculated about what would happen in At Last, that decade that the characters kept me company, matters more than whether or not I liked the end.