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sparklingchan · 3 years

Text

The Prince and I || Jeong Yunho(Ateez)

Pairing : Reader (fem.) x Yunho.

Word count : 9.2k+

Warnings : Cuss words, minor injuries, Yunho BEING A FLUFFBALL!!

Genre : Fluff, angst, Arranged marriage au, Royal au.

Description : Your marriage to Prince Yunho feels like nothing less than a fairytale - but a fairytale is incomplete without a villain, right?

A/N: This fic took longer than I thought it would lol

This is a part of the holiday treats event conducted by kafenetwork. This fic is for the lovely Anna! I hope you like it and I hope it didn’t disappoint. I’m sorry I cannot tag you here because this site always decides to eat up my posts with tags in it :((

Enjoy!

"This wedding dress is a little expensive, granny."

The silky cloth slips away from in between your fingers, as quick as sand. You hadn't ever touched a piece of cloth as beautiful and smooth as this one, really. In fact, you'd never ever seen anything like the dress presented before you at the moment. And well, as much as you want to buy it, you knew you couldn't. Not unless you use up all your life's savings.

"I'm sure Ms. Claire here could find us something less...royal." you mutter again when your Grandmother doesn't respond.

Ms. Claire, the owner of the elegant boutique you find yourself standing in this morning, smiles at you sheepishly. "Oh, what nonsense! You will be married into a royal family, y/n. I cannot have you wear a normal wedding dress."

You sigh, turning away from the mannequin that donnes your dream wedding dress and crouching down to speak to your granny, "Granny, we won't have any money left if we buy this."

Your grandmother has been in the wheel chair for as long as you could remember. But she has more energy and life in her than most young people out there, including you. She's like this ball of sunshine who adores you to death. And now that the most important event of your life is slowly coming close with every passing day, you find her enthusiasm increasing likewise. She would wake up every morning and coax you to work out and do your skin care routine every night before bed. Today too, she forced you to allow her to tag along on your last shopping trip before your big day. Though you never say it out loud, your grandmother is nothing short of an angle. And you'd do anything to make her happy.

"I have saved up enough money to buy three such dresses, y/n." Your grandmother says as you lean down , "Miss Claire, pack this one up please."

Miss Claire nods and smiles at your granny, "Surely, madam."

Her assistant takes away the mannequin to get it packed up and billed.

You sit on the small couch present in the room as your eyes roam around the room full of pretty dresses and veils and shoes. It feels surreal all of a sudden, as if you were in a day dream you'd often think about as a teenager.

"What? Do you want anything else? I have enough money for that too." Your grandmother chimes in, rolling the wheelchair a little towards you, "Should we buy one for your mom too?"

Your mom, though equally excited for your wedding as your grandmother, was more on the realistic side. She'd give you a reality check ever so often - about husbands and in-laws and everything surrounding it. You're also not very sure your mom would appreciate spending so much money on dresses in a single day, especially when your wedding stands only four days away.

"No, granny, mom has enough dresses." You run a soothing hand through her grey and thin hair, "Aren't you tired? We've been out for a long time now."

"Do I look tired to you? " she raises an eyebrow, her eyes wrinkling up as she smiles at you sweetly. She's such an adorable little woman that it makes your heart melt everytime she looks at you.

"No," you roll your eyes, "Guess we can go and pick up Maya's dress while we're at it."

"Maya as in your best friend? The annoyingly loud girl from your college?" You snort at your granny's choice of words to describe your best friend.

You hear Miss Claire call you towards the payment counter and before you could move a finger, your granny races you to it.

"Come on, girl, what are you- eighty?" She teases you with a loud chuckle.

And still, you may not say it out loud , but your granny is your whole world. And when you are married off into the royal family of your father's old hometown, the only person you'll miss badly is probably your sweet old grandmother.

Later that evening, after dropping your grandma back home, you decide to walk to your best friend's apartment which is located just a few blocks away from yours. You carry her dress with you but deep down, you know that's not the only reason as to why you wanted to visit her this late at night.

"I need advice. "

"About what?"

"Marriage and life. "

Your best friend's eyes widen at your words. Her lips part as if she wanted to comment something but then stopped herself. "Maya, dude please. I'm terribly scared and I can't talk to anyone else at home." You admit, playing with the hem of your dress. A sudden sense of embarrassment and shyness washes over you but you push all that away before they get the best of you.

Maya puts down her dress on the bed.

"Y/n, I could give you all the advice in the world but believe me, you won't be able to apply it practically. I married a normal man from a normal family. We live in a cozy apartment in a city. But for you, it's different. You'll not marry a common person- you're marrying a prince for God's sake. A Crown Prince on top of that. You'll be living in a castle far away in the mountains. I don't know how my advice would be of any help here, y/n." Maya says, her hand gently patting yours.

You shift in your place, the bed creaking softly beneath you.

Maya is unarguably right - her advice won't be useful in your case. In fact, no one's advice would be useful to you unless they've had a first hand experience with an arranged marriage and a royal life. Yet these facts do little to comfort your growing fear and anxiousness.

"I haven't even met him in person yet. I only saw him over a few stupid video calls and in his pictures. I don't know what to expect." You say.

His Highness Crown Prince Yunho is a pretty busy man it turns out. So busy that he hasn't even been able to take some time out of his duties and come visit his fiancé for a few hours. He's a beautiful man, you have to say. Elegant and stylish and well mannered and everything about him screams Royal. He often texts you in his free time and calls you once in a blue moon. He seems like a nice man indeed, the kind you'd love to marry even without his royal heritage. But being his wife and a Crown Princess is a challenge you'd have to face completely on your own.

"Your granny thinks he's a good man, y/n. Maybe you should trust her judgement. Old people have that in themselves, you know." Maya says with a small smile, "Plus he's a Prince. You'll live a luxurious life, y/n. Don't be so pessimistic! I'm sure things will turn out great."

You give your best friend a tight hug for trying to cheer you up and helping you forget your fears even if it's just for a few hours . That night, as you toss and turn in your bed, trying to keep your mind free from thoughts about your life after marriage, you realise how big of a change this one thing will make.

And you're not very sure if you're ready for that change yet.

♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡

The weather is quite pleasant today, the sun shining softly through the thin curtain of clouds and the humidity deciding to be a little forgiving today but too bad you're stuck inside your room, folding clothes and making sure all your necessities are packed in the luggage.

"Well, this is not how I expected my last day at home to turn out, " you complain to your mother who sits across from you on the bed, helping you pack your things, "But it is what it is, I guess."

Your mom chuckles, placing your folded clothes into huge black suitcase spread open on the floor. "This isn't bad. You're alone with your family and friend, what more do you need?"

A fancy Bachelorette party with your friends and a few male strippers didn't sound like a very appropriate response so you decide to just shake your head.

"Aren't you angry though? Even just a little bit?" She asks. You scowl at the unexpected, out of context question. You are scared and anxious and nervous but angry? Not at all.

"What do you mean? Why would I be angry?" You reply, crossing your arms in front of your chest, "I'm fine."

She sighs, momentarily pausing her actions to face you. Her eyes are a little moist, you notice, and her lips pressed into a sad line. "Your grandmother betrothed you to Prince Yunho when you guys were just nineteen. It is an arranged marriage, to a person you don't know and a family which holds so much power. She didn't give you freedom to choose your own partner. Aren't you angry about that?" She elaborates.

You feel a soft tug in your heart at her words. You've been so preoccupied with worrying about how you'd handle yourself after marriage that you never really thought about this. Even so, when you really think about it, you can't find it in yourself to be angry at your grandmother.

"Granny and Prince Yunho's grandmother were best friends, mom. They made a promise and I respect that. Plus granny never forced me to say yes. I did that on my own account. " you explain yourself, your hand slowly reaching over to squeeze your mom's shoulder, "Don't worry about me. I'll manage. I always do."

Its rather funny how you were the one needing assurance from Maya a few nights ago and here you are, repeating the same words of encouragement to your mother. A part of you is obviously still terrified of the future, but that's not your mom's problem to deal with. It's entirely yours.

Your mom sniffs, but a tear manages to roll down her cheek, "I'll miss having you around. Why couldn't she have arranged your marriage to a normal person who lived in the same city?"

And then it finally dawns on you. It really is your last day at home. Your last day in the city you so dearly loved, your last day in the house which has seen you grow from a little baby to a beautiful, young woman. It's your last day as y/n y/l/n, your parents' only child and your grandmother's favorite grandchild. Tomorrow, you would be a Princess, a wife, a person of political importance. And your heart breaks a little at the thought of never getting this life back again.

"Mom.." you mutter, your eyes tearing up as well. Words fall short when it comes to describing how much you'll miss everyone and everything here. Starting from your friends to your family to the smallest of decorative items in your room that you've managed to collect over the years. It's like a piece of you would just cease to exist. As the night grows darker and the day crosses over to the next one, you hold your mother close as the both of you let out the quietest of sobs and realise that this might be the last time she'd have you all to herself.

♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡

The journey from your parents' old house to Prince Yunho's ancestral palace is short - not with respect to time but with respect to the fact that amidst tearful eyes and memory flashbacks, the car ride gives you little to no time to settle your hurricane of thoughts.

As your dad's car slowly pulls over in front of a huge black metal gate, you are welcomed with a view that seems right out of a fairytale. The Royal palace is located in the most beautiful locations you've ever been to, a place you never thought could exist in real life. It almost feels like you are in a dream. With the beautiful backdrop of lush green mountains in the back, the Palace stands tall on the foothills of the mountains. The pastel pink walls and the carefully carved window panes look ethereal with contrast to the tall black gates that securely surround the palace. A group of servants are rowed in front of the man main entrance, with warm smiles and trays full of welcome drinks.

But you're far too mesmerized by the place to bother consuming anything at the moment.

This place - this breathtakingly gorgeous palace with the biggest gardens and tallest fountains- would be your home. For a long time, home meant your crammed little apartment which always smelt like cinnamon and bread. It had no big gardens, no servants, no fountains but it was your home. Your safe place. You wonder if this place could ever feel like home.

"Geez, y/n, I'm so jealous." Maya whisper-squeals in your ear as the servants lead you inside, "Do you want to exchange husbands?"

You nudge her gently with your elbow, "Shut up. Or I'll have you thrown out."

You are made to walk through a quiet hallway that has a huge wooden door at the end. On both sides of the hallway, pictures and paintings and vintage weapons are displayed like in museums and the marble floor beneath you shines like water under the sun. Every nook and corner of this place is a treasure waiting to be discovered, you realise.

The servants open the wooden door and lead you inside into what appears to look like a Throne Room. Now, you'd never really been to one before but movies and books have taught you that this is what a Throne room probably looks like - with a Grand Throne placed at the very center and numerous chairs placed on either side of it. The walls in this room are graced with more pictures and paintings of kings and queens and common people and soldiers. You wonder if your picture would ever be up there somewhere in the future.

"Oh, hello lovely people!" A manly voice booms through the hall, "I hope I didn't keep you waiting too long."

A few quick taps of feet on the floor and there stands in front of you a very familiar face - as if you'd almost seen him in a dream.

Black tuxedo, perfectly styled hair, a walkie-talkie in his hand, the man before you looks right out of a James Bond movie. "I'm Choi San, Prince Yunho's personal secretary and the royal family's representative for the day."

He claps his hands together, "Her Highness the Queen Regent, Her Highness the Queen Mother and His Highness Crown Prince Yunho sadly couldn't be here since they have some important charity event to attend. I deeply apologize for that. In their place, allow me to welcome you to the Jeong family's Grand palace!"

"You'll all be taken to your rooms now because you must be tired from the journey. If you need anything, just tell one of these servants."

The servants nod at San and signal you and your family to follow them.

"Uh, lady Y/n. Mind if I have a word with you?" San interrupts.

Although surprised, you nod as you let your family walk off to their rooms.

"Yes?" You ask San.

San's eyes are focused on your frame - every movement, every expression, every word - he's observing you as if to make sure you're the right person for Prince Yunho. You feel self conscious all of a sudden.

"Yunho did say you're a charming person. I just didn't think I'd agree with him before, but now..I definitely do." San giggles, offering you his hand, "I'm Choi San at your service, madam. Your wish is my command."

You bow gently at him, "I'm y/n y/l/n. It's nice to meet you too, sir."

San chuckles, "Please don't call me that, your Highness. I'm your employee. Besides I have something important to talk to you about. "

The last few words form a tight knot in your stomach, fear finding it's way through your veins.

"Y-yeah?"

"You have a coronation ceremony tonight. I hope you know that. We've already hired a stylist who will take care of all you from now on. She'll meet you immediately after lunch." San explains, "And here's my business card. Contact me if anything comes up, okay?"

You gulp as you accept the shining business card from him, "Thanks. I'll do that."

San smiles sympathetically, as if he understood the fears swimming inside you. He offers you a gentle, encouraging pat on the shoulder.

"I know how you feel. A palace is a scary place, I won't deny. But if I can survive here, so can you. Plus you have Yunho. He's the nicest man a person could ever ask for, I'm sure." San says.

Your whole body relaxes a little as a soft breeze of comfort washes over you with the words leaving San's mouth. This is what you'd been wanting to hear for a long time - a reassurance that you'll be safe and okay as a member of the Royal family and that Prince Yunho might be a person you could love. But for now, you focus on keeping your self calm.

"Now, do you mind walking me to my room? I find myself a bit lost." You giggle.

San finds himself chuckling in response, "Of course, your majesty."

♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡

When San had told you that you'd have your own personal stylist, you did not expect this . Even in your wildest dreams, this is not something you'd catch yourself wanting.

The beautiful blue gown clutches to your upper body at just the right places and then flows down your waist like a beautiful waterfall under the sunlight. A diamond necklace graces your otherwise empty neck complimented with matching earrings. The stylist - Alisa - puts your hair up in a pretty bun and then places a beautiful diamond tiara on your head. And when your eyes finally land on your reflection in the mirror, your mouth hangs open with no words but just air slipping out of it as response.

"Do you like it, your Highness?" Alisa asks with hopeful eyes. Her shy smile giving away the fact that she wants you to like what she's done, her efforts and ideas.

You have to blink hard for a few more seconds before coming to terms with the fact that you look so beautiful right now. A part you is in denial while a part of you is jumping around, doing a victory dance in happiness. You weren't used to seeing yourself look this good. Your heart leaps at the thought of Prince Yunho seeing you like this - almost like a princess who's lived in castles all her life. And then you realize that you would be one ; in only a few minutes.

"I love it, Alisa. You're brilliant!" You exclaim, wrapping your arms tightly around the stylist in happiness. By Lisa's stiff response, you are sure you'd taken her by surprise. Royals do not go around hugging normal stylists yet this hug was a symbol of your thankfulness towards her for putting so much effort into you, to make you feel special. Alisa's proud smile reaches to her eyes as she quickly works on placing the brooch pin in the right place on your dress.

A knock on your room's door attracts your attention and you are quick to fix yourself in case it was someone from the Royal family.

"I'll get that." Alisa jogs quickly towards the door.

When the door creaks opens, you see a familiar face standing there - familiar enough to know it was your fiancé, the most handsome man you'd ever laid eyes on, with the kindest smile and brightest eyes. Your heart stops beating for a dangerous second.

"Oh, hello your Highness. " Alisa greets him, bowing slightly, "Miss y/n is ready to go."

And when Yunho looks at you, your soul as if escapes your body. "H-hi, Prince Yunho."

He walks towards you with warm, red cheeks and perfect black hair and a stylish black tuxedo and offers you his hand, "It's nice to finally meet you, my lady."

How does one ever respond to that? How does one ever behave in front of an actual, real life prince, who also happens to be your fiancé? He presses his lips to your fingers ever so gently.

The butterflies in your stomach go wild.

"Shall we go now? Everyone's waiting for you, my lady." He asks.

You nod, wrapping an arm around his, "Yes."

The short walk towards the throne room is mostly filled with a comfortable sense of silence, except for the times when Prince Yunho points at some random picture on the wall and talks about it. Your eyes seem to be following every movement of his, and everytime your eyes meet, you find yourself melting under his gaze. You are smitten by him and there's no denying in that.

On entering the throne room, all heads turn towards you - ministers, relatives, your family, Yunho's friends, San and all servants present there observe you as Yunho walks you down the flowery aisle leading to the Throne. You could feel everyone's eyes on you, scary yet exciting, they follow your every movement and every word and every expression.

And when they bow down slightly as you stand on the right side on the Throne, you realise these people weren't just bowing at Yunho, there were also bowing down at you. Because you'll be his wife tomorrow, a princess, a figure that should be loved by the people. The only thing keeping you grounded is Yunho's gentle hand softly clutching yours. It's as if he could sense your inner turmoil before even you do it yourself. "Are you nervous?" He whispers in your ear.

"Yes, a little. "

"Don't be. I'm here with you."

The main door to the hall opens and two women walk inside, at least ten soldiers walking in front and behind them, guns at ready and eyes critically scanning all the faces.

The older woman, who you assume to be the Queen Mother and Yunho's grandmother, wears a sweet smile and walks as gracefully as ever even in this senile age. She waves gleefully at the crowd bowing down to her. On her left stands a slightly younger woman, Yunho's aunt and the Queen Regent who has been the ruler of this kingdom after Yunho's parents passed away in a tragic accident ten years ago. Rumor has it that the Queen Regent is a strict, emotionless ruler who has no mercy for criminals and is harsh with all the employees of the palace. You notice her serious gaze fixed in your direction and shudder in fear even though you've barely ever talked to her before.

"May the Queen Mother live long! May the Queen Regent live long!" Someone chants and the others follow suit in the blink of an eye.

You suddenly feel as if you are in some period drama.

The Queen Regent takes her place on the throne while the Queen Mother takes a seat on the left side of the Throne. A single wave of the Queen Regent's hand and the crowd goes completely silent.

"Hello to everyone gathered here today. I am very, very glad to welcome a new member of the family - lady y/n y/l/n. She is to be the wife of my beloved nephew Yunho and the future Queen of this kingdom. Please give her a warm welcome!"

The hall erupts into claps and cheers and your name being repeated as if in a chant. Your grip on Yunho's arm tightens.

"I'm there, my lady." He says again, "Don't be afraid."

San brings out a huge sword and places it in the Queen Regent's hands. This sword is what you assume to be the Jeong family's old, sacred sword used by generations and generations of brave kings and queens to protect themselves as well as the citizens of their beloved country. This sword is a symbol of pride and victories. And a lost history.

"As per ancient traditions, I will now be crowning miss y/n as a princess before her wedding with the prince tomorrow. From now on she will be called her Highness Crown princess Y/n. She is an important member of our family from this day forth."

"Y/n, go on and kneel in front of my aunt." Yunho whispers, nodding at you with a proud smile, "You're doing so great already."

You comply by his words and kneel in front of the throne, your head hanging low and eyes squeezed shut with anxiousness of what is to come.

"Welcome to the family, y/n." You hear the Queen Regent's voice before she gently taps your right shoulder with the tip of the sword and then the left one. You feel a few droplets of water being sprinkled on your face.

"Rise, Crown Princess. Face your people and let them welcome you with open arms."

It is done. You are a princess now. This can never be undone, this name, this title will stick with you till the end of time. You're no longer a normal girl with small dreams and basic requirements, you're a future Queen now.

Rise, Crown Princess.

And you do.

♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡

Every person has dreamt about their own wedding at least once in their life - whether it is in the peak of their teenage or in the innocent wonders of their childhood or the wildest dreams of their adult years, this thought found itself in everyone's mind.

You had one such dream too.

But your dream had always been very simple. A nice man, your closest friends and family, a cheap and beautiful wedding dress, a small party with limited people - that is all you've ever wanted. You didn't want a gathering of four hundred people who you barely knew, the new reporters shoving their cameras into your face, heavy make up or expensive jewelry, or a husband who you barely knew. But guess that is what the Gods had written in your fate. And you have no option now than to accept things the way they are.

You don't remember much from the wedding ceremony or the huge party that follows, really ; you only remember Yunho's lips pressing a gentle kiss to your forehead when the priest asks the groom to kiss the bride(probably the best part of the day), your grandmother's tears of happiness and Alisa and San winking at the two of you after the ceremony was over. Everything else felt like a blur, as if your head had been underwater all this while.

An hour or so into the party, Prince Yunho asks you to walk with him. Alone. Though reluctant, how could you ever say no to those innocent eyes? The discomfort from being surrounded by hundreds of unknown people slowly disappears as the two of you walk around the garden, your eyes never meeting but a sense of familiarity settling between the two of you.

"I'm not used to this, you know." He says with a shy smile.

The sky is beautiful, decorated with stars and a full moon but nothing compares the glow on Yunho's face when he turns to glance at you.

"Used to what?" You enquire, "Having so many people here?"

He shakes his head, "No. I'm used to having a lot of people here. That's all I've ever seen. What I'm not used to is this. Having a partner or someone else live in my room with me."

"So...?"

"I'm happy about it. I really am. But I know you're new to this royal lifestyle and we barely even know each other that well but I hope you don't regret this marriage. Because I'm sure that I won't. " Yunho sighs, "And if you ever feel like it's not worth your time anymore, you are more than free to leave. Forget about everyone else, do what your heart says. "

The last phrase catches you off guard. It is very, very rare to find people who give you this sort of freedom in any arrangement. The fact that he opens up his thoughts to you makes your heart leap with happiness. And a little sadness too that he'd think you'd leave him so easily.

"Hey," you pat his arm, "I'm not leaving anytime soon. I promise. We made a vow, didn't we?"

Yunho blushes at your words, but under the bright moonlight it goes unnoticed by you.

"Do you mind if I hold your hand?" He suggests after a few seconds of silence.

The butterflies in your stomach are seemingly having the time of their life these past few days.

"I don't." You slide your hand into his and your fingers intertwine almost instantly. His warm palm presses against your cold one, bring a sense of comfort you never thought you'd ever experience. In the midst of a chaotic royal gathering and the paparazzi trying to sneak in through the gates, you and Yunho find a small world for yourselves that no one else can ever have access to.

And for the first time in months, you realise that this marriage might be worth more than what you thought it would be.

♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡

You've always wondered what the people in royal palaces do. Do they spend all their time greeting the citizens and walking in the gardens? Do they keep dancing in the ballroom all the time? Or do they busy themselves with war conspiracies?

Sadly you realise that royal life sounds very exciting and extravagant only when you're not the one actually living a life like that. And this conclusion dawns on you only after ten days of the wedding.

The first week is packed with activities, alright. Visiting the common people and distant relatives and going to various public events. Your curiosity was at its peak till a few days ago, but now here you are, sitting on the edge of your soft bed, phone in lap and eyes drooping with sleepiness, wondering how to keep yourself occupied.

"Y/n?" The door creaks open as Yunho peeks inside shyly, "Can I come in?"

You nod, "It's your room, Yunho. You don't need my permission to enter."

"Oh, I was just making sure you weren't doing anything you didn't want me to see."

Oh. Your cheeks turn into crimson fruits as his words finally hit you.

"Anyway, I actually came to get my file. But I saw you sitting here. Are you bored?"

Are you? Heck, yes!

"Yes." You reply almost guiltily.

Chuckling, he leans down to press a loving kiss on top of your head, "Come on. I'll show you something."

You took pride in the fact that after only a week of staying here, you knew the palace fairly well. The corridors and paintings and artifacts and the workers weren't as foreign to you anymore. Yet the path Yunho takes you to seems weirdly unfamiliar.

Guess new surprises await everyday.

Soon enough, your steps halt in front of a huge wooden door labeled as ' library '.

Rows and rows of books welcome you the moment you step inside, Yunho leading the way into the most beautiful library you'd ever seen in your life. As always, paintings grace the wooden walls and a huge crystal chandelier hangs from the middle most point of the ceiling.

"Yunho...is this..what heaven looks like?"

The smell of old and new books hit your nostrils as you run a gentle hand over the book kept in the shelves, feeling the various materials of book covers brush past your fingertips.

"Maybe." Yunho responds with a grin.

Yunho's heart feels full with adoration and content at the sight of you dancing around the books shelves, gleefully taking notes of the books you plan to read on the days to come. Your eyes curl up into crescent moons as your toothy smile seems to have taken Yunho's breath away. Beautiful is what you look. Simple and elegant and so innocent.

All his life he's spent among royal people, people with political intentions and lots of money. But you make him feel differently. Being with you feels like a breath of fresh air for Yunho. And who wouldn't like that?

"Earth to Yunho." You click your fingers in front of his face after you catch him staring at you. Not that you didn't like it, but you had to do something before you turn into a mush before his eyes, "What are you thinking?"

"Oh, um..nothing." you. He was thinking about you, "How about I ask the workers to bring my office stuff over here? I can work here while you read. I don't want you to be alone."

A shameless grin plasters over your lips.

"I'd like that, Yunho. I'd like that very much. "

♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡

"How's the married life treating you?" Your granny asks you this question every damn time she decides to call you.

And surprisingly somehow, you always answer positively to her query.

"Well, good. I think so at least. " you smile to yourself, remembering the soft kiss Yunho had placed on your head as he left for an official trip this morning. Even in your half asleep state, your cheeks had turned bright red, "Prince Yunho is a nice man. "

"Oh, of course he is! I wouldn't have asked you to marry him otherwise, you idiot." She yells at you although you know she's smiling through the phone, "Anyway, I can't talk for long today. I have a doctor's appointment so I'll need to dress up for that."

That comes as a surprise, "What? Are you sick ?"

"God, no. I'm not a weakling, okay? It's the regular check up. Don't worry." She says, "Bye now. "

The line goes silent.

Sighing, you put your phone down on the night stand. On times like this, when the room is too quiet and you are too lazy to walk out and talk to other people, you start missing home. A lot more than usual. Your house, though only consisting of four people was way too noisy from sunset till sundown and somehow, you'd gotten used to it. The quietness has yet to grow on you.

A slight knock on the door attracts your attention and you immediately allow whoever it is to come inside.

"Oh, Alisa. It's you!" You exclaim as relief washes over you on seeing a familiar face.

"Yes, your Highness. How have you been?" She bows down to you, "Are you able to adjust to this new life?"

"I've been okay, you could say. Still a little overwhelmed whenever I have to face people but I think I'm getting there." You laugh a little.

Alisa gives you an understanding nod, "I totally understand. But I'm glad you're feeling more comfortable. By the way, I came here to ask you if you wanted to visit my boutique in the town nearby. It's a new one and I wanted you to come see it before the inauguration. "

Your heart jumps at the offer. You remember back in your college days, you would often go shopping with Maya, especially on weekends. The two of you would wait for months for a sale or special offers because online shopping sometimes just doesn't do it for you. You smile, nostalgic, "I'd love to go."

"And then maybe we could go and eat in the pizzeria nearby. It serves the best pizza in the world, I swear."

This is just beyond tempting at this point, a literal trap to have you step out of the role of a royal Princess and embracing the careless city girl inside of you and who are you to keep her hidden for too long?

"What are we waiting for then?"

♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡

Yunho surprises you every now and then.

On the outside, he is a strict man with the sharpest of brains and the most observant eyes. The title of being a crown prince sits heavy on his shoulders and with every passing day, the weight just get heavier.

On the contrary, the Yunho you get to see everyday is very different. Soft and cheerful and smiley, he's the literal embodiment of the sunshine and your heart doesn't seem to rest everytime you see him.

It must have been roughly a month since the wedding when he makes an impromptu plan of visiting your city and your parents' house since it had been a long time you last saw them.

"Heard you were going to your parents house?" You had gotten ready to go before Yunho did, so instead of sitting in your bedroom, you decided take a short walk outside in the gardens. And as you strolled around aimlessly among the flowers and bushes, deep in thoughts, you had come across the Queen Mother sitting by the water fountain.

"Yes, your majesty." You reply, rather intimated by her aura.

It's hard to accept sometimes that this person is best friends with your grandmother, when the both of them are as different from each other as the two poles! Your grandmother is the ever so sweet, smiling, supportive person. You would never see her angry or upset. But on the other hand, the Queen Mother is uptight, very quiet and rarely ever smiles. Just like her daughter, the Queen Regent. Maybe it's a royal thing but you're glad you don't have to see this serious side of Yunho on a daily basis.

"Good. The farther from here, the better." She mumbles.

You are alarmed at her words, "I'm sorry?"

She sighs, her walking sticking tapping the marble wall of the fountain, "Y/n, I adore you. I might not show it but I'm glad my grandson has someone like you to make his life less lonely. But you have to be careful. Not everyone is appreciative of a person of common birth being crowned as a Crown Princess. "

Fear slowly clutches you in its palms. You had gotten very occupied with Yunho and being a crown princess and making new friends, you admit. So occupied that you let your guard down. And the Queen Mother's words sound more like an advice than a threat.

"Should I be worried?" You ask, your skin going cold at the thought of someone actually wanting to hurt you.

"Not yet, no. But be very, very careful. You cannot trust anyone here. Not even me. The only person you can lean on is Yunho. Why? Because he might be as much in danger as you."

Have you ever seen how people start panicking when any sort of alarm goes off? Yeah, thats exactly how you feel at that moment.

"Y/n, let's go!" You hear Yunho call you from the front gate, already taking his seat inside his car.

You bow at the Queen Mother before jogging towards Yunho, your heart no longer into the trip as it were a few minutes ago.

Yet seeing your parents and granny after so long did comfort you.

They had prepared this small barbeque party in your backyard, your dad playing guitar and purposely singing badly to embarrass you while your mother shows Yunho your childhood pictures. And the food, oh, the food! The five star chefs from Yunho's palace could never replace this comfort food you had at your parents house. It might not be well decorated with garnishes or spices or fancy plates but it made you feel like everything will eventually be okay - which is exactly what you needed at the moment.

The entire evening you try hard to talk to Yunho but when your house is full of three excited adults, it is hard to do that. Around one am in the morning, you finally find yourself in your old bedroom, Yunho's fascinated eyes roaming around the room that feels like it were straight out of some teenage romance movie. Where in reality you'd honestly been too lazy to change the room's layout once you outgrew your teenage obsessions and interests.

"You seem to be liking my room a little too much. " you chuckle, scrolling aimlessly through your phone, your face partly squished into your favorite pillow.

The boyband posters, old polaroids from your school functions, romance novels stacked up neatly by the nightstand - all of this is as foreign to him as his palace is to you.

Yunho lies down beside you, still in awe of the room, "Yeah, it literally mirrors your personality. "

"How?"

"I can't explain it, you know," he clicks his tongue, "But everything in this room screams y/n. Like everything here is made only for you."

You raise your eyebrow at his words. He's very observant, that you've noticed, but the fact that he knows you this well in barely a month warms your heart.

"What about our bedroom in the palace? Is it not made for me?"

"Oh, it is. Of course it is. But you're staying there because you have to, right? Because we're married and all that." He replies.

"No, I'm not. I told you Yunho - I'm staying there because I want to." You say, now no longer in a mood to joke around.

Suddenly, the words from The Queen Mother swim back into your mind, as you start seeing her words in a completely different light.

Yunho has somehow always expressed how he is unable to believe your presence around him and how he acts like you're doing a favor by doing that. And you find yourself wondering if Yunho knows what she'd said to you. The danger that looms above both of your heads must not be as much of a secret to him than you thought it would be. So instead of confronting him, you decide to comfort him.

"We'll be fine, Yunho. " you drag your hand towards his, your body relaxing the moment he squeezes it back, "Both of us."

Yunho looks at you with love and desire clear in his eyes, his free hand slowly dragging towards your face. You could see it now- the loneliness from the loss of his parents and the negligence from his aunt and grandmother throughout his childhood still very much exists behind the mask of a happy prince. You do not know the language of royal people or politics but you do know the language of love and more than a stupid gold crown, he needs someone to love him. And thats exactly what you intend to do.

Was it too soon? You didn't care anymore. And you know for a fact that he didn't either.

You lean in close and press your forehead to his, "You're not alone anymore. Okay?"

You see him smile from your hooded gaze, your breath mixing with his in an intoxicating mixture. "Thank you, y/n. You have no idea how much I appreciate it."

And that in itself are a combination of words much more heavier than a simple 'I like you.'

♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡

"The Queen Regent wishes to see you."

San runs up to you the first thing the next morning, right after breakfast.

"Why?" You ask, your eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

You had a plan to accompany your granny and the Queen Mother to their small tea party in a nearby Farmhouse but you couldn't obviously say no to meeting the Queen Regent. Because well, she's the Queen.

"I don't know, your Highness. I try to stay away from her as much as possible but whenever our paths do cross, she always assigns some work to me." He whines, "Go on, I'll tell the Queen Mother that you're occupied. I will be heading out with Yunho right now anyway."

Shaking your head in annoyance, you make your way to the Queen Regent's office.

Her office smells like expensive cigars the moment you step inside, and the full ashtray on her table only feeds into your conclusions.

"You asked for me, your majesty?" You ask in a low voice.

When she looks up from writing in her journal, your heart skips a few beats in fear. Her eyes hold no resemblance to Yunho's angelic ones or even The Queen Mother's serious ones. They look like two deep, bottomless black holes that swallow everything and anything in its vicinity. Her long hair is tied in a braid and her lips quiver passively upon seeing you.

"Ah, yes." She replies, "Please have a seat."

You take the chair in front of her desk, uncomfortable at the close proximity between you and the one person who everyone tries to avoid.

"How are you?" She begins, closing her journal and keeping her pen inside the drawer, "How are things going with Yunho?"

"I'm good, thank you for asking. And yes, things are going well with Yunho."

Her question seems odd, but you let it pass.

"Okay. That's really great to hear. Anyway, I met your husband a little while ago. And he asked me to tell you that he intends to see you on the rooftop alone later tonight." She raises an eyebrow, a gentle smile playing on her lips, "Looks like he has a date planned."

Her words seem too far fetched to be true. Too unrealistic. Not the date part though, but the part where he specifically ask her to pass on the message to you. He could have easily asked San or Lisa or even told you in first person, so why would he choose the Queen Regent out of so many people when he you've barely seen him talk to her?

But you're a Crown Princess, and she's the Queen and you cannot question her. "Okay, I'll be there." You get up from your seat and bowing gently, "Thank you for letting me know, your majesty. By the way, did he mention what time I am to go ?"

"Oh um...Around seven in the evening?" She's fumbling on her words, and you're sure she's lying about something.

Still you suppress your doubts and walk back to your room, hoping to find the truth behind her words this evening at seven.

The entire day goes by in the blink of an eye, but to you it feels like an eternity. The curiosity has you sitting at the edge of your bed, ready to make a run for it if any danger ever comes your way.

Yunho, who was out with San for some official work has surprisingly not texted you today at all. And it only adds to your doubts of the Queen Regent being a liar.

And when night finally falls, you find yourself tense up more than you'd done the entire day.

The night is quiet, calm but beautiful and as you step into the terrace and the soft wind kisses your face, you almost believe the Queen Regent's words. Maybe Yunho did really plan a surprise date for you. Because this is everything that Yunho likes. A beautiful night and a company he loves.

The terrace stands high giving you a beautiful view of the entire palace complex, the gardens and everything beyond. And for a moment, your worries diminish as you step near the railing, inhaling the fresh air and you feel safe.

But, you see, that's where you are wrong. This imaginary cloud of safety that you'd thought was around you was never there in the first place. Since the first time you stepped into the palace, all eyes have been on you - on every action, every activity, every word. You'd always been swimming in a dangerous sea. One wrong move, and you realise the shark is right behind you. And just how the Queen Mother had told you, you were only ever safe with Yunho by your side. But he isn't here anymore.

So it doesn't come as a when a pair of rough hands give you a single, harsh push, sending you falling right down five floors.

"You will never be our queen." Is what you hear before your vision dissolves into a black hole.

♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡

When you were six years old, you fell down your bike once while trying to copy some stupid stunt you'd seen people on television shows do. The excruciating pain that followed the fall was something which you thought you'd never have to experience again. That was the kind of pain which hurts you down to your very bones, sending waves of shock through your body with a single movement of your hands.

And that is exactly how you expect to feel the moment you open your eyes and come face to face with a familiar ceiling. But all you feel is sore, like how you feel the morning after exercising after a long while.

The bandages on your arms and abdomen indicate that your fall wasn't as bad as you thought it'd be but it was, nevertheless, a fall which was very much done on purpose.

"Y/n, honey, are you awake?" You hear Yunho's groggy voice coming from somewhere near the foot of the bed you lie on.

"Y-yeah. What happened?" You manage to sit up even though your body feels heavy with fatigue, "How did I fall?"

Yunho appears by your bed side in the blink of an eye and your heart clenches with relief when he bends down to kiss your head.

It feels like you hadn't seen him in days, years, where as it had only been around two days since you passed out. Yunho had rushed back home the moment he found out about it, leaving all his stupid official work for some other day. Hell, he would happily give up all his responsibilities if it means he could see you and keep you safe. He'd cried for nights and days, never leaving your side even when the nurses would change your clothes or bandage dressing. The mere thought of you never waking up again was too dark for him, especially when he'd found such a happy place in you. You are the owner of his heart and everything else that he could give you. You are, literally, his only family member. His whole world. And if he loses you, he would lose himself with you.

"A-are you okay?" He sits down on the bed, holding your hand so tight as if he was afraid you'd disappear if he let's go, "does it hurt anywhere?"

"Just a little bit, but I'm okay. I feel fine." You say, smiling through your busted lips.

Your smile as if breaks a wall he'd been holding onto for days, and his eyes immediately tear up.

"I'm so so sorry, y/n. I should have been there. I should have been protecting you. I keep forgetting I'm not a stupid guy with a normal life and that people I associate with might get into trouble anytime. I'm so sorry, I should have protected you from my Aunt and Alisa. I'm so fucking sorry."

Aunt? And Alisa? What is he taking about?

"Yunho, what are you -"

"They planned it. The entire thing. They purposely sent me and grandma away so no one would doubt them. Aunt had supposedly promised my hand in marriage to Alisa a long time ago but Grandma got us married instead. They were angry. So angry that they went ahead and tried to k-kill you. " he sobs into his hands, the tip of his nose turning bright red, "Alisa was the one who pushed you. They forgot to remove the CCTV footage."

You freeze for a second, Alisa's betrayal hurting you worse than The Queen Regent's. You almost thought you could find a friend in her, just like Maya. You trusted her. You felt safe around her when in reality, she'd only been a time bomb - waiting to blow up.

"Alisa did?" You mutter, your lips drying with fear, "I-I don't know what to say. Yunho, I- I can't believe Alisa would do this."

"I didn't either. But both of them have admitted to it. The police took them. I'm so sorry, y/n. " Yunho rubs his tears away, "I talked to your granny and parents. They said you could move back in with them. The divorce will take about a year or so to get finalized but you don't have to stay here till then. You can go back home whenever you want."

Your heart crushes in your chest. The fear of abandonment Yunho carries within himself yet he has the guts to let you go is something you would forever admire and hate in him. How could he think this way, especially after you've reassured him countless number of times that you're here to stay.

"I didn't agree to a divorce. What the fuck are you even cooking up in that mind of yours?" You say, stern and angry.

He looks up at you, his guilty eyes making the pain in your chest more painful.

"Y/n, please, you cannot stay with -"

"Shut up. Just shut up. I don't care. I don't care what you think. I am an adult and the crown princess of this kingdom and I will do as I please. " you almost yell, "I am staying here, with you, for better or worse. I told you I wouldn't leave. "

Yunho bursts into tears, wrapping his arms gently around you, hiding his face in the crook of your neck as you gently pat his back, reassuring him that you'd always stay. No matter what.

"Y-you might get hurt again, y/n. I don't want you to stay and get hurt again." But his tight hold on your body tells you otherwise.

"We're both in danger for the rest of our lives. Does that mean we stop living?" You whisper, pulling away from the embrace only to grab his chin, "Does that mean we stop loving?"

He shakes his head as his lips curve down and a shaky sob escapes his mouth, "Nothing will ever happen to you again, I swear. I will keep you safe. You will not have a reason to complain again."

You nod, dabbing his tears away with your thumb, "I know. I believe you. "

You stare into his eyes - his beautiful eyes made of the finest stardust that make your brain go hazy every morning that you wake up and find them right beside you. And that's exactly how you choose to wake up every morning till the end of your days.

"Is this the part where we kiss or what, because I've waited a long time -" he cuts your blabbering off by finally placing his plump, peachy lips on yours ever so tenderly.

He steals all the air from lungs, driving you breathless and crazy with every movement of his lips on yours and the gentle touch of his fingers on your face only adds to the unbounded euphoria you feel at the moment. He's beautiful. Even with your eyes closed, you know that he is beautiful. And not just with his face, he is a beautiful man inside out. He is yours and nothing in this world can ever change that. So when he pulls away, panting and out of breath, and gently kisses your forehead, you say, "I love you, my prince."

These words. These damn words that he'd waited for months to hear, nights he spent dreaming about hearing them. And he has to mentally slap himself to make himself believe this all to be true.

Stealing a quick kiss from your lips again, he whispers, "I love you, too, my princess. "

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ds-ts-smut-fics · 4 years

Text

Lovely Boys [Chapter Four]

Summary: Janus and Logan are both in love with Remus, it’s just a matter of who can convince Remus of their feelings first.

Trigger warnings: NSFW, real hardcore insecurity, not the healthiest habits, rough sex, being caught (kind of, they’re not walked in on), mention of abusive and negligent past exes who neglected proper BDSM rules, some very rude degrading self talk, sl*t as an endearing term, pretty heavy pet play

Genre: Hurt/Comfort smut (Sub Remus, dom Logan, switch Janus), intruloceit

Written by: Virgil & Claire

Edited by: Virgil

A/N: Last chapter! Lovely Boys is complete! Get ready for some Janus whump lol

Part One

Janus rolled his eyes as Logan pulled the car into the long driveway. Janus adjusted his bowtie with a scowl. “Why did Remus and I have to come to this again?”

Logan sighed softly. "Because I need the support and I want my partners to meet my parents?"

“Yeah, it’s been, like, six months!” Remus cried with a pout. “I want to meet them!”

“I don’t see why you needed me to tag along,” Janus grumbled, but followed them out of the car anyway.

Remus pressed an excited kiss to Janus’ mouth, grinning up at him. Janus couldn’t help but smile back. Remus was dressed in a sparkly, gothic dress, and stockings with a tentacle pattern down the legs. Janus had dressed down compared to his boyfriends, dressed in a suit similar to Logan’s but with a yellow bowtie and undershirt.

Chuckling, Logan smoothed his tuxedo and offered his hands. "Baby… I need you both by my side. Besides, it's also a business dinner party, I thought you'd be thrilled to meet some of them?"

He shrugged a little, sheepish. “I could use that to pass the time.”

He took Logan’s hand and laced their fingers with a sigh, following him inside.

Setting Remus' hand on his arm, Logan twined his other fingers with Janus' and led them inside. "Kiss, babies?"

Remus giggled and kissed Logan sloppily on the lips. Janus glanced around for prying eyes, and gave Logan a soft kiss on the cheek.

Smiling, Logan relaxed a little more. He sighed, before taking them inside with a nod to the person at the door who greeted him. "Thank you, my dears…."

Remus squealed pretty much the second they got inside. He tugged on both of their hands. “Guys- Guys- Dancing! There’s dancing!”

Chuckling, Logan tugged him close for a nuzzle. "Calm, my pup… Why don't you and Janus dance, I'll let my parents know we're here?"

“I- I don’t know,” Janus said with a nervous laugh. “I don’t dance in front of other people.”

Remus pouted, and turned his puppy eyes on Logan. “Pleeeeaaaaaseeeee, Master?”

Giving in, Logan nodded. "We shall, then… There's likely to be food on that side of the room and mother usually opens her rose garden, through those doors?"

Janus grinned. “Then I’m sure I’ll find something to entertain myself.” He kissed both of their cheeks. “Find me in the garden when you’re done.”

"Will do, darling!" Logan led Remus to the floor, sweeping him into his arms with a smile.

Janus wormed his way through the crowd of strangers to the garden, only stopping at the food tables to get himself a glass of wine. He breathed in deeply when he stepped inside, breathed in all the green and the flowers and his drink. He wandered through the garden for a while, admiring all of Logan’s mom’s clear talent, finding a bench by a fish pond to rest at.

Someone hummed softly behind him. "You're new here tonight… how are you liking the garden?"

Janus glanced back and internally groaned at the woman standing behind him. Fucking small talk. He decided to be subtle. “It’s beautiful. A good place to get away from the crowds.”

"That it is… I find the best people out here at these gatherings. Did you come with someone?" She smiled, her light silver dress swirling around her ankles as she stepped closer.

“Yep. My two boyfriends.” If that didn’t scare her off, he didn’t know what would. It usually worked. He finished his glass of wine with a little hum of disappointment.

She chuckled and sighed. "Well, there goes my hope to pair you with my boy…"

Janus quirked an eyebrow. He feigned offence and made a show of looking down at himself. “Do I look that gay?”

She shrugged. "Is there a gay look these days? I'm just saying that to let you know that I wasn't coming onto you…. That's the correct phrase, yes? I'm married and my son is around your age I believe."

Janus laughed. He didn’t know who this bitch was, but he liked her. “How old is he?”

"Just recently turned 29… He has two partners, I'm hoping he brought them tonight! More wine, sweetie?" She winked. "I have a bench cooler with a nicer selection out here, Max knows me too well…"

He grinned. “More wine sounds great. And, uh, your son’s a few years older than me, but he’s the same age as one of my boyfriends, so it doesn’t really matter.”

Leading the way gracefully, she hummed. "How old are you then? Over 21, I hope?"

“Yeah, I’m about to start my second year. I’m 22.”

"Lovely! What are you studying?" Opening a bench carefully, she took out a bottle of wine and showed the label, offering to pour.

Janus held out his glass happily. “Uh, I’m double majoring. Law and philosophy. Barely had the time to come tonight, honestly. But Logan wouldn’t let me stay home.” He chuckled a little into his glass, taking a big gulp.

Her eyes widened as she took back the bottle. "Logan, hmm? Tell me about him? He sounds like a good man if he makes you relax so you don't burn out!" Is it my Logan? Oh, I hope so! You're so precious!

“You don’t have to act like you don’t know him,” Janus chuckled. “Logan Taylor? Everyone here knows him, I’m not dumb. And anyway, I think I force him to relax more than he does me.”

She dissolves into giggles. "Oh, honey… I know my Loganberry very well, indeed…. My son has excellent taste!"

Janus froze. Now would be a great time for a spontaneous, painless death. He cleared his throat and opened his mouth to speak, but couldn’t think of what to say. He couldn’t feel his heartbeat.

"Are you Janus or Remus? I'm guessing Janus… You seem more calm and reserved than he's described Remus to me." Offering her hand, she smiled widely. "Sit with me, tell me all about yourself dear?"

Oh, God, how did he get himself into this? He sat down with her and prayed they would be finished dancing soon. “I- I’m Janus,” he managed. “Uh… What do you want to know?” This entire time he was talking to his boyfriend’s mom like she was… Some random lady. How was she not enraged at the disrespect?

"Well, I know how Lo feels about you… But I'm curious how you feel about him? I know he can be a bit grumpy before coffee and if you run out of exactly the right type of jam…."

Janus took her offered hand, mostly because he’d feel too awkward not to. He tried not to smile at the thought of Logan before coffee. “Um. How- How does he feel about me?”

She squeezed lightly. "Honey, you don't know that he gushes about you two? He's always so quick to dash out after board meetings because he's got to get home to you… He's head over heels!"

Janus blushed deep red. “Logan is… My constant. He’s the only stable and, uh, secure thing in my life. I don’t… I don’t think he understands how much that means, to- to Remus and I both.”

Her heart squeezed. "Oh, Janus… I'm sure he's aware. He never works overtime if he can help it anymore, his schedule is so much more stable now. I really think you two are it for him…"

Janus barely held back a smile. “You think he’d want to stay with us?”

She grinned. "Sweetheart, I have a feeling you'll be calling me ‘mom’ soon enough. Now, where are those two hiding, hmm? Food or the dance floor?"

“They’re dancing. Remus saw and didn’t want to do anything else.” Janus chuckled nervously, taking a few more big gulps of wine.

"How sweet… Janus, are you alright? That's a bit quick on the wine…" Frowning softly, she reached for the glass. "Perhaps we should get some food into you?"

He blushed. His head was starting to feel a little fuzzy… He didn’t want to give up the wine, but he didn’t dare refuse her. “I’m okay.” He held out the glass.

She hummed, taking it carefully and leading Janus to the buffet. "I don't want Logan to be mad at me for getting his boyfriend drunk. Do I scare you that much, Janus?"

He nearly spluttered, stuttering out, “I’m not scared,” but he wasn’t nearly as good of a liar with the alcohol in his system. Jesus, this was not going well. She was certainly going to tell Logan to leave him the second they’re alone.

"Sweetie… Logan loves you!" She patted his hand gently as they walked. She smiled at Logan and Remus on the dance floor. "I may be his mother, but I have no control over who he loves…"

Remus giggled as Logan dipped him, gripping onto his shoulders and squealing.

Janus forced his gaze away, and choked out, “But I’ve been such an asshole to you.”

She giggled softly. "You were honest, and I didn't introduce myself. I try to have a conversation with people first, as a random person— it shows me their character. You are kind but honest, Janus. It's a good set of qualities!"

As they reached the food tables, Remus looked over and gasped as he saw them. He gripped Logan’s hand and tugged him over.

“Hi, Janny!” Remus’ face was bright and excited, as happy as could be.

Logan sighed but smiled. He hugged Janus, and blushed at his mother's soft laugh. "My dear… Oh, you found Mother!"

Remus was immediately distracted. “Oh, there’s chocolate!”

Janus lurched forward and grabbed Remus’ hand, wrapping an arm around his waist and tugging him away from the table. “What are you doing, there’s probably milk in there!”

Remus pouted up at Janus’ worried, exasperated face. “But it’s chocolate-“

“We can stop by that cupcake place you like on the way home, you can’t just eat random chocolate-“

Janus blinked as Remus leaned up and pressed a kiss to his mouth. Janus tried to speak as his mind rebooted, and Remus said, “Okay.”

"Awww…" Bouncing a little, Carla grinned, holding the bowl out to Janus. "Let the boy have some chocolate! He's just the cutest!"

Logan sputtered softly, taking the bowl and feeding Remus a piece. "You approve, Mom? They're very dear to me…."

Remus ate the chocolate happily as Janus scrambled to look at the card on the bowl, displaying the ingredients. He glared at Logan. “You could have just said it doesn’t have milk in it,” he snapped, momentarily forgetting about Carla’s presence.

Logan hummed softly. "I gave Mother the allergy information and she told me exactly which dishes to keep Remus away from. They're in the bowls with green edges. The blue rim means you can't have their contents." He winked. "Got to keep my boys happy and safe!"

Carla grinned, nodding. "Such a fierce protector…"

“Besides, Jan-Jan, you know I’m not that dumb! I wouldn’t eat something-”

“Exactly how many allergic reactions did you have before you told me I can’t cook with milk?” Janus crossed his arms over his chest and raised an eyebrow.

Remus blushed. “I dunno.”

“Eight,” Janus said. “Sixteen days into living with me, and you just ate whatever I handed you. Excuse me for being worried.”

Carla frowned softly. "I'm glad he has you two caring for him, then…"

Janus sighed and cradled Remus against him, resting his chin on top of his head. “Me, too. I, um…” He forced himself to meet Carla’s eyes, “I- I’m really sorry about that, um, display. It wasn’t… It wasn’t very polite. I apologize.”

She waved him off and gestured to Remus. "Worry leads to strong reactions, dear. He's a handful, I can tell…"

Logan hugged his boyfriends gently. "A lovely handful, yes indeed, Mother. I wouldn't have him any other way!"

Remus giggled and kissed Logan’s cheek. “Janny, you’re not still worried about impressing her, are you?” He pouted and Janus’ face flushed bright red. “She’s fancy, but she’s nothing like your parents! You can just be yourself!”

“Remus, please,” Janus choked out, fighting the urge to hide his face in Logan’s shirt.

Carla sighed softly, opening her arms. "Come here, darlings? Let me hug my son's boyfriends? You're so perfect for him…"

Remus giggled and jumped into her arms, hugging her tightly. Janus hesitated.

Giving Remus a cuddle, she smiled, petting his hair. "We have to have a spa day some time, you're so cute!"

Logan stroked Janus' back lightly. "It's okay, baby… You're already family, my love."

As Remus babbled on with Carla about all the things they could do together, Janus leaned into Logan’s touch. “I know. I’m trying.”

"You are and I love you all the more for it, baby." Stealing a soft kiss, Logan wrapped around him gently. "Let me dance with you, J? Mother and Remus should bond well over fashion and spa day outings…"

He blushed. “If you can find an empty room, I’ll dance with you.”

"Done!" Gently tugging, he led Janus to an empty room after a few tries. He locked it behind them. "Anything for you, baby.."

Janus chuckled freely, draping his arms over Logan’s shoulders, crossed at the wrist.

Taking his hips, Logan swayed them gently, kissing Janus' cheeks. "Mmm, there's my cutie pie…"

“Shut up,” he mumbled. He laid his head on Logan’s shoulder. “Your mom tricked me, by the way.”

"Oh? Did she do her 'you're new here, and I'm a random woman' bit on you?" Nuzzling Janus as they swayed, he chuckled.

“She did. She also didn’t let me get drunk. She’s a bitch, I love her.” He chuckled. “She also tried to set me up with you, Loganberry.”

"The horror… A protective mother who's still trying to get me dates. At least she has good taste? And Loganberry? Oh, goodness… I haven't heard that nickname since I was 12!" He grinned, kissing Janus' ear. "Feel free to use it~?"

Janus bit Logan’s ear. “Stop being weird.”

"Weird? How am I being weird, love?" Petting Janus, he cuddled him closer.

“‘Loganberry.’” He snickered and stopped the swaying in favour of pulling Logan’s body against his, nuzzling into his neck. With nobody else around, he felt more secure, able to run his hands under Logan’s coat and make Logan wrap his arms around him.

Wrapping tighter, Logan sighed. "My baby… All mine."

Janus sighed happily. “Say that again.”

"Mmm, you're mine, baby… All mine to love and cherish and protect~!" He kissed at Janus’ neck, coaxing to relax and melt into Logan’s arms.

Janus’ knees went a little weak, and he did exactly that. He hummed and nuzzled into Logan’s neck, eyes closed. The wine probably helped.

Logan supported him easily. "We're all alone, baby~ Why don't you relax? Daddy's got you."

Like always, Janus’ words slipped out before he really thought about it. “Yes, daddy.”

"Need daddy to give you some love or just cuddles, baby? You're so tense…" Stroking in long pets, he directed them to a chair, sitting and pulling Janus into his lap.

“Just cuddles, please,” he whispered, pressing his forehead to Logan’s shoulder. “Some more wine would be nice, but your mom’s probably hiding it all at this point.”

"Wine when we're at home, baby? Daddy wants to make sure you're okay…" Massaging gently, he slid Janus' jacket off to rub over his back and neck easier.

“I’m okay, daddy,” he promised. “It just… You know, makes me feel less like I’m fucking everything up. I don’t know how Remus can be so… Casual, with parents. I mean, his and mine are so alike, and Remus is just… Unphased.”

Humming, Logan nodded. "He's one of a kind… He has so much hope and love. That's why we protect our ball of sunshine, yes? I wouldn't leave him with her if I didn't know she's going to cuddle and love on him properly, baby."

Janus nodded. “I know… It’s not- It’s not about her. I’m sure she’s great. It’s just… You know. I was always told my partners’ parents aren’t my friends, they’re my…” Janus cleared his throat, “you know, like, superiors.”

Janus didn’t actually remember how much he'd told Logan about his parents. He certainly hadn’t introduced them. Knowing him, he probably only told Logan small things, when he was drunk or in subspace.

"Ah… I see. My parents are more formal, usually. However, events like this are only for friends, family. They let loose and relax, showing their true selves. That's why I thought this would be the place for you to meet them? They're not superior, just older and a little wiser?"

“I know,” he said quietly. “Or… I’m trying to.”

"Your sharp little mind knows, your heart is still catching up to the fact that you're safe and wanted?" Petting his hair, he raised Janus' face for a soft but possessive kiss.

Janus moaned happily, kissing him back with a smile. “Should we check on Remus?” He asked after a while.

Nodding, Logan hummed, sliding Janus back to his feet and settling their clothes back in place. "We should and will… My darling baby."

Janus blushed deeply and took his hand, following him out to search for Remus. He tried not to let his anxiety get the better of him as he interacted with Logan’s parents and associates, tried not to be too stiff and standoffish. It helped having Remus next to him, who could have an excitable conversation with anyone in the world— and Logan, too, of course.

Proudly showing off his boyfriends, Logan smiled from his place between them, a hand on both their hips. My lovely boys…

Reminder that I’m (Virgil) doing smut commissions on Kofi, each coffee equals 300 words for any prompt of your choosing (I can reblog some prompt lists if you guys would prefer, as well, just let me know).

Commission me here please: https://ko-fi.com/stormcloud_baby

#janus sanders #sympathetic deceit #remus sanders #sympathetic remus #logan sanders #intruloceit #intrulogical #dukeceit #not safe for sanders #ds writes #sub remus #sub janus #dom janus #dom logan #switch janus #lovely boys

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aria-writes · 4 years

Text

[Non-]Confession

Dear Tegan.

When I think of you, I’m reminded of fruit. Something sweet and citrus with a tough and slightly bitter rind, but once you really dig your fingers in there, the shell falls away to reveal the bright softness underneath.

Or perhaps it isn’t really that thick, and it’s more like the skin of a mango– easy enough once you know how, it’s just that no one really bothers to put in the effort to do so.

But when the right opener comes around, the long wait was worth it, saving the beauty inside for the perfect moment.

One fruit I personally find perfect and beautiful is the peach, which is ironic, because you definitely do not have one of those as advertised in emoji form, it’s more like a pancake than anything ;D

Insincerely, your frenemy Viktoria

P.S. ahahahahaha please don’t hate me

Tegan swiveled in his seat and glared at Viktoria and Tyler, who were sitting behind him and failing to contain their laughter.

He shook his head slightly as they high-fived. “Did you really go through the trouble of thinking of and writing down all that just to lead into ‘lol your butt is flat’?”

Viktoria clenched her hands on her desk and composed herself just long enough to say “Yes,” completely deadpan, before dissolving into another round of giggles.

Of course my best friend and my crush would team up against me, he thought to himself. Fate is a cruel mistress.

...Okay, tone it down, Kylo Ren.

“That’s just so...extra.” He inclined his head, considering. “Okay, fair, extra is kinda Arlington’s thing I guess, so if—“

“Mr. Novak! Please!” The teacher’s exasperated tone called out from the front of the room.

Tegan’s shoulders slumped as he gave Viktoria the most pity-inducing look he could muster, who mouthed ‘Sorry!’ at him and at least had the decency to look sheepish in response.

***

Tyler jostled Viktoria’s shoulder as they left class. “Congrats, you’ve finally made it into the ‘lost cause’ club!”

Viktoria pumped her fist into the air with a sarcastic grin. “Every parents’ dream!”

Tegan hiked his backpack farther up his shoulder. “I don’t know how I've managed to avoid entry for this long.”

Tyler gestured with his hands. “You just gotta act out more, in less passive ways.”

Tegan groaned and flopped sideways as he walked, leaning his head on top of Viktoria’s. “See, but that requires effort.”

Viktoria grinned and patted the top of his head. “Poor baby.”

Tegan righted himself with a groan and half-heartedly attempted to fix his hair.

“Viktoria, sidebar.” Tyler grabbed her by the arm and pulled her into the garden area before she even had the chance to blink, let alone protest.

“Why haven’t you told him?”

Viktoria fiddled with the hem of her skirt and glanced at the blades of grass peeking out from underneath her shoes. “Told who what?”

Tyler crossed his arms and scowled in a scarily accurate impression of Tadashi. “Don’t play dumb with me, Vik. It’s not cute.”

Viktoria collapsed onto the bench, head in her hands, and let her bag fall to the ground. “I just… I dunno, I feel like it’s so painfully obvious, I guess, then if he can’t tell then it’s because he doesn’t want to. React. Or see it. That I am– or, that I have, um...”

Tyler took a seat next to her and placed his hands on her shoulders. “Okay, listen. I love Tegan. And he is denser than liquid mercury.”

Viktoria’s brows furrowed. “But—“

Tyler gestured grandly outwards at their surroundings.

“Call it Newton’s third law or perfectly balanced as all things should be or whatever, but somehow, despite his IQ of like, 200, he’s not going to get a hint unless you physically drop it in his lap.” He cocked his head. “Maybe not even then,” he said, mostly to himself.

Viktoria took a deep breath, then sat up straighter and squared her shoulders. “What can I do?”

Tyler half-shrugged and braced one hand against the seat.

“Honestly, the only way you’re going to get through to him is to walk up and say something really straightforward like ‘hey, I like you and I would really like to go out with you sometime, what do you say?’...and you might have to clarify that yes, you mean as in a date date and not just as friends.”

Viktoria recoiled. “What? Tyler! That’s gonna kill him!”

Tyler rolled his eyes and leaned back against the backrest of the bench. “He’ll survive! Probably!”

Viktoria started down at her lap and picked at the skin at the edges of her fingernails.

“I’m still trying to figure some things out. In the meantime, do you mind not telling him about this?”

Tyler sighed and crossed one of his legs over the other so one ankle was resting on the opposite knee. “I can’t lie to him.”

Viktoria bit her bottom lip. “I wouldn’t ask you to. But could you please not bring it up out of nowhere otherwise? Or like, unless he directly asks you.”

Tyler solemnly raised his right hand. “Scout’s honor.”

Viktoria squinted at him. “You were a scout?” she asked, dubious.

Tyler grinned suddenly. “No, but I will swear on my most prized box of thin mints.”

Viktoria grinned back and reached over to high-five his raised hand. “Even better.”

Tyler let his hand drop and shifted his weight. “So who else knows?”

Viktoria winced and pulled the hair back out of her face. “Um, Alistair, Tadashi, Ellie, I think Neha, maybe Claire—”

Tyler blinked owlishly and motioned for her to stop. “Bruh, at this rate everybody in the entire school is going to know before Tegan does.”

Viktoria wrapped her arms around herself. “Well, at least I didn’t tell Raquel. I get the feeling that she’s not exactly a vault of secrets.”

Tyler pursed his lips and looked over her shoulder at the lattice. “Oh, you sweet summer child.”

Viktoria swallowed thickly and slumped backward in her seat. “And I just set a ticking time bomb for myself.”

Tyler raised an eyebrow and patted her on the knee. “Look, whatever it is that you have to work out, you better make it quick. I’ll do my level best, but I make no promises that I cannot keep.”

Viktoria reached over and gave him a gentle punch on the arm. “Snitches get stitches, Williams.”

Tyler shivered involuntarily. “Ooh, I just felt a chill. Did you just feel a chill? Two can play at this game, Lin. No, that’s not really–“

“–it’s too short to be threatening,” Viktoria finished, glancing up and to the left as she recalled her friends’ surnames.

“Drew. See, it just doesn’t work well.”

Tyler furrowed his brows and leaned forward. “Collins. There we go. Durand.”

Viktoria smiled slightly and rested her arm on the armrest nearest to her. “Novakova. Pereira-Carma— no, that’s on the other end, it’s too long.”

She reached over to grab the strap of her abandoned backpack. “Dude, did we just skip class?”

Tyler scratched the back of his head. “Hm, I think we did. Well, it was the last one of the day, so…”

Viktoria sighed and pulled herself to her feet. “Alright cool, I’m going to hide in my room until morning.”

Tyler grinned and shot finger guns at her. “See you then. And good luck.”

***

The next morning, Viktoria headed to the bathroom first thing. She had just set her bag of toiletries down on the sink counter when Tyler came rushing in, frenetic.

Viktoria broke into a cold sweat and whirled around to wave her toothbrush at him. “I’m brushing my teeth! I am brushing my teeth! I promise!”

“Ugh, you would not believe– well maybe you would, but I digress—“ Tyler barreled on, ignoring her.

“I stayed strong for as long as I could, but the constant battering of ‘does she like me Tyler? But like, like like me, Tyler? are you listening to me, Tyler?’ cracked me like an egg so I finally blurted it out and he goes, ‘No, I think you’re either reading too much into things or trying to make me feel better.’ I can’t take this anymore!” He threw his arms skywards, then collapsed in a heap on the floor.

Viktoria began brushing her teeth and stared at him, as other people filed in and out without paying either of them any attention whatsoever.

Extra, as ridiculous as it seems, may have been an understatement.

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sincerelyreidburke · 4 years

Note

Hey again! So like, you are under no obligation, and I send you too many asks anyway but... if you're down for writing Spencer's reaction to A FROSH GETTING EVAN THE AUDACITY I would be so pleased :) lol

First of all: you don’t send me too many asks. I believe the phrase you’re looking for is “I enable you to write fun things often”. Which is highly encouraged, in this establishment.

Second: yes. And for those who aren’t Via, let me enlighten you. Spencer is a Kiersey College drama club OC, part of the group of characters I created to enhance Quinn’s college drama club experience (and to have more fun on “Quinn Theatre Hours” Monday nights). You can read a comprehensive introduction to the drama club cast in this fic, which tells the story of the week leading up to Quinn’s casting in Dear Evan Hansen his freshman year.

Spencer is... hm, how shall we say. A giant asshole. He’s a junior theatre kid who fully expects that the role of Evan will land neatly in his lap. This ficlet depicts as much. It takes place pretty much simultaneously with the casting fic I linked to above.

This is also a precursor of sorts to a longer drama club fic, which I’m working on, that Via has also asked after. Stay tuned for that, because there is where you’ll see some serious, well... drama.

Until then: Spencer can choke. I’m entertained by the fact that I’m now being asked to write things from the point of view of the bully. Here’s what you asked for!

Today is going to be an amazing day.

And here’s why. Spencer has been waiting— all week, certainly, but also for months, even since the school year began, to see something he finally gets to see today. During all three of his years at Kiersey, the spring musical has been something to look forward to, but especially this year, with so much riding on it. Today, the cast list goes up for the biggest show of his life. Today, he confirms his place in a role he’s been dreaming of playing for months. Today, he starts to lead this year’s cast.

He knows that the show was chosen for him. Dr. C is notorious for it— she’s not shy about choosing shows based on who she has available for casting. It’s resourceful, Spencer has told her time and again; after all, you have to work with what you have. It’s like how she chose Book of Mormon last year for him— well, and for Reid, he guesses, but mostly for him. And how the director at his and Kelsie’s high school chose Thoroughly Modern Millie for the two of them their senior year.

He planted the seed for Dear Evan Hansen in Dr. C’s head last spring, an offhanded mention in a conversation, right around the time Book of Mormon was closing. He forwarded her a few articles over the summer, just to jog her interest, and he and Kelsie even went to New York to see the show in June, so he typed up a review and sent it her way. When he arrived on campus this past fall, he was thrilled to hear she’d taken his advice. It would be their spring 2018 show.

His audition went just as expected, and he read for Evan during his callback. So this morning, when he rolls out of bed at five-thirty sharp, it’s the first thing on his mind, without a doubt in it. Today is the day he starts being Evan Hansen.

He deserves this.

To start his great day, he grabs a morning workout, like always. In the gym, he sees one of the freshmen who auditioned, using an elliptical and wearing pink leggings. She has curly, golden blond hair piled into a high ponytail, full lips, and tan skin. Her name is… Maddie? Mallory? He isn’t sure, but what does it matter anyway. She was in callbacks with him last night, and she wasn’t projecting well.

So he doesn’t say hello, and doesn’t even think she’ll notice him until he passes her as he’s leaving. She’s refilling a water bottle with stickers all over it, and she waves. “Hey, Spencer.”

“Oh!” He pretends to be surprised. “Hi, Maddie.”

“Uh.” She chuckles a little, and shakes her head. “It’s— Maggie, actually.”

“Oh. Sorry about that.” He stops in front of her, and bends down— she’s a little short— to deliver a word for the wise. “Hey, by the way… don’t take it too hard if you aren’t cast in a bigger role today.” She arches an eyebrow, and he continues, because she ought to know. “There just aren’t a lot of roles that would fit… you, y’know?”

It doesn’t look like Maggie understands what he means, but she shrugs and folds her arms, all standoffish. “Well, good luck to you, too.”

“Thank you!” He flashes a smile. “It’s always great to see beginners joining the musical.”

Maggie purses her lips and scowls as he turns to go. Huh. What a bitch. He was only telling her what she needed to hear.

Well, it’s her loss. Freshmen rarely ever get speaking roles. And it’s not like Zoe is going to anybody besides Kelsie.

He texts his girlfriend on the way out of the gym. Kelsie is an early riser, too, but she doesn’t work out in the morning like he does. By now, in her morning routine, she’ll be through with her shower and doing her hair.

They meet for breakfast every morning, but this morning, it’ll be a quick affair. The cast list goes up at 9:00 sharp in the Beckett Performing Arts Center lobby, and they have every intention to be the first ones there.

So Spencer showers and gets dressed, donning a blue shirt for the occasion. He meets up with Kelsie in the lobby of their dorm, and they walk to the dining hall hand-in-hand, leaving right around 8:00. It’s sunny out today, but still freezing cold.

“So,” she asks him, as they stroll down the sidewalk. “Any bold predictions?” She pauses to grin and bump against his hip, as she adds, “Besides the obvious.”

Spencer beams. He loves their relationship for so many reasons, but especially because they support each other so well. “Well,” he begins, pulling his stocking cap down on his head. “I think Reid is a dead ringer for Jared.” Which will be easy, because although Reid is unfunny at best, Spencer is used to working with him; he got well accustomed to it on Book of Mormon.

“Oh, absolutely.” Kelsie nods. “And I think… Claire, as Heidi? I can’t be sure, but—” She pauses for an exaggerated eyeroll, which is absolutely warranted, because Claire is such a goody two-shoes it’s insufferable. “I know Dr. C likes giving her principal roles.”

“Which I, for one, do not understand,” he quips.

“Tell me about it.” Kelsie sighs, then shakes her head. “But I could see Claire going that way.”

“I could, as well.” He pauses, racks his brain of the names on the audition list. He checked it religiously, to see who was trying to get involved, even after he had secured his spot as first on the list. “And… hm… alright, I’m not saying I’d like to see Danny Cho as Larry, but given they didn’t run his part in callbacks at all last night…”

“Mm,” Kelsie hums. “I think you’re right. That’s a shame. His singing is suspect at best.”

“And his acting…” He sighs. “I hope he can pull it off.”

“Maybe he can.” Kelsie swings his hand a little, and they sidestep for a rushing student who must be late to their eight-AM class. When they regain sidewalk space, she looks to him, smoothing her bangs, and asks, “And Connor?...”

“Hm.” Spencer’s mind lands on someone, but it’s an underwhelming thought. “Cole?”

“Oh.” Kelsie pauses, like she forgot he existed. Which is easy to do, because Cole, the sophomore he’s thinking of, is quiet and irrelevant. Spencer was surprised to see him audition; he played guitar in the pit for Book of Mormon, and from there he always assumed he was a fly-under-the-radar type. But he read all of Connor’s parts in callbacks. “Well, he has the look.”

“It’s a typecast,” he agrees. “He seems… sketchy?”

“Right? Kind of a weirdo,” Kelsie says. She raises an eyebrow at him, and asks, “Do you think you could work with him?”

“Well, it isn’t like I’ll have much of a choice,” he remarks. “But who knows? Maybe someone else will get Connor.”

“Maybe.” Kelsie pauses, then smiles and says, “You can do it.”

He kisses her cheek, as they walk along. “Thank you.”

From there, they move onto a rehearsal schedule tangent. It’s not until they’re almost at the dining hall that casting gets brought up again. “What about that kid?” Kelsie asks, suddenly, almost laughing. “The really short one, the freshman? Could he beat out Cole or Danny?”

“Oh…” Spencer thinks he knows who she means. “Scarf kid?” When she nods, he laughs out loud. “I highly doubt he’ll be seeing the cast list. I mean, Kels, he’s a freshman.”

“That’s true.” She shrugs. “You did get Anthony freshman year, though…”

He straightens a little as he walks, because it still makes him proud to think about Sweeney Todd freshman year. “I reserve myself as a small exception to the rule.”

Kelsie grins. “You’re gonna be great, babe,” she says, and even though he knows he will be, it still feels nice to hear it.

Breakfast is very nice. He has scrambled eggs and sausage patties from the grill, and she has a fruit salad with unsweetened tea, in accordance with her New Year’s weight-loss diet. They have a breakfast table in the corner, by tradition, and they even see Reid when they’re in there. He’s eating with his girlfriend, and flashes jazz hands at the both of them, with a grin. “Happy casting day!”

Spencer wonders, just slightly, if Reid has seen the cast list yet. He may be a student, but he’s drama club president all the same, and maybe he has pre-existing knowledge. But on second thought, Spencer doesn’t think Dr. C would do that. She doesn’t even give him advance knowledge of casting, and he would venture to call himself her favorite student.

So he just waves to Reid, because he and Kelsie are on their way out. “Morning, Reid.” There’s something like a shit-eating grin on Reid’s face, so he can’t resist asking. “Have you seen the list yet?”

“Oh, yeah, dude!” Reid kicks back in his chair. “Didn’t you hear the good news? I’m Evan!”

Spencer’s soul leaves his body. “You— I’m sorry, what?”

“I’m so excited.” Reid smooths out his hair before he dusts off his graphic tee. “Tell me— do you think I’ll look good in striped blue?”

This is not real life. “You can’t be serious.”

“No, tell him, Bri!” Still grinning, Reid looks to his girlfriend, this chubby art student who always has ceramic work on display in the admissions lobby. “Weren’t we just discussing how lovely my angelic voice will sound on Words Fail?”

Bri nods, with her chin in her hands. “Oh, for sure.”

Reid throws his hands up, all smiles. “See?”

Kelsie steps forward, like she’s about to say something. And just as Spencer’s heart is set to beat out of his chest, Reid doubles over and bursts out laughing. “Jesus, Spencer,” he says, smacking the table. “I’m just fucking with you, dude. Could you not tell I was joking?”

“Well, he’s a little on edge,” Kelsie cuts in. “We both are.”

Reid shrugs, putting his hands behind his head like his dining hall chair is actually a lounge chair on the beach. “Well,” he remarks. “I have seen the list, but it’s not up for another…” He glances at the big clock on the wall in the dining room. “Fourteen minutes, so you won’t hear any leaks from me.”

“Wait, really?” he asks. “Have you actually seen it.”

Reid shrugs, making a face like he’s just been instructed to ‘do a silly one’ in a family portrait.

Spencer hates Reid Burke. He’s never really been sure about this fact until today. It’s partly the fact that Reid is still kind of grinning, like this is some big joke— Reid treats everything like a big joke— and partly the fact that he knows, even if he resorted to groveling (which he will not), that he truly won’t get any leaks out of him. Even with fifteen minutes left until he’ll see it himself, it’s tantalizing to know that Reid is sitting right here with full knowledge of the cast, and won’t say a word.

And by the way, what the hell, Dr. C? Since when does she leak the cast list to students?

But standing here being mad at Reid isn’t going to make the list go up faster, so he rolls his eyes, as Reid zips his lips, and says, “Well, I’ll see you later.”

“Bye,” Kelsie adds, like she is less than enthused that she wasted three minutes of her life on this useless conversation. Which is exactly how Spencer feels.

“Idiot,” he mutters, as they walk away, and doesn’t even care if he’s in earshot. “He almost gave me a heart attack.”

“Spence,” Kelsie says, taking his hand to squeeze it. “You know you have nothing to worry about.”

“I know,” he replies, because she’s right, “but what’s up with Dr. C letting Reid see the list early? How does that work? I practically picked the show—”

“It’s bullshit,” she replies, as they bust their breakfast trays. “You should say something to her, later.”

“I think I will,” he says. He’s already planning what he’ll say, as they leave the dining hall and head at a brisk pace in the direction of Beckett. It’s a quick walk, fueled by both of their adrenaline, and when they reach the double doors, Spencer takes one last breath of crisp winter air before walking inside.

Dr. C is in the lobby, crossing from the direction of Beck 1C, where the board is, back toward her office. She’s in a multicolored knit sweater, and she holds her head high, a surefire sign she just did something important. “Good morning, Dr. C,” he says, with a chipper wave. “Is the list up? We wanted to be the first ones to see it.”

“Yes.” Dr. C nods, adjusting her glasses as she stops a moment to talk to them. “It was definitely difficult to cast, and… some people may not be happy, but it’s the best fitting for the programme, as we say.”

Her wording is cryptic, but it always is. Two and a half years in her inner circle, and he knows her well. “Ah, I’m sure you picked the right people,” he says, with a wink.

Dr. C looks between him and Kelsie, then nods. “I’m confident I did,” she says, and it gives him an extra thrill of excitement. A quick glance to Kelsie and she’s smiling like she won the lottery. “Have a nice morning, you two!” Dr. C says, as she starts for her office again.

Kelsie blows her a kiss, and Spencer waves. When they meet eyes again, he takes her hand, and looks to the corner where the bulletin board is.

“Ready?” she asks him.

It’s time.

“Never more ready,” he replies, and together, they walk to the board with its promised sheet of paper.

The anticipation is adrenaline enough. Spencer knows what he’ll find on the list, but is still eager to get to it, to see his name at the top. They round the corner, and there’s the list, fresh white against the board’s maroon paper base. It’s only a few more steps.

When they get there, Kelsie sees it first. She leans forward, then recoils, like she’s been burned. “What?!” she cries, loud enough to be heard inside the actual auditorium.

“Kels? What’s wrong?” He wonders if Claire beat her out for Zoe. He consults the list to investigate, and— and— oh.

Right around then is when the world stops turning.

“Quinn Cooper?” Kelsie is staring at the list, her arms crossed over her chest, a permanent scowl etched on her perfect face. “The scarf freshman? Are they kidding?”

Spencer feels frozen. He stares at the list in disbelief, reads it up and down again and again. He feels like he’s been standing here for twenty minutes, but it’s probably only been two or three.

DEAR EVAN HANSEN

Cast & Crew List

Evan Hansen: Quinn Cooper

Connor Murphy: Cole Kolinsky

Zoe Murphy: Claire Deshaies

Heidi Hansen: Allison Halterman

Larry Murphy: Daniel Cho

Jared Kleinman: Reid Burke

Cynthia Murphy: Kelsie Wilkes

Alana Beck: Maggie Atkins

U/S Evan: Spencer Bergen

It’s fake. One of Reid’s practical jokes. They’re all out to play a big junior-year prank on him. Everyone is in on it. Including the scarf freshman.

There’s. No. Way.

“This is—” Kelsie sputters, then shakes her head. “I can’t believe this.”

“I won’t believe this,” he says, speaking for the first time since he saw the list. “There has to be some kind of mistake.”

“Um, I would sure hope so,” she says, popping the p in ‘hope’. “This is— this is a joke.”

Quinn Cooper. The freshman the size of a hobbit. Who wears scarves to every drama club meeting. Who’s barely been at Kiersey for half a year. Who just stole the role of his dreams right out from under him.

Spencer absolutely cannot believe this. “I have to talk to Dr. C,” he says, and it’s more an out-loud realization than anything, but he turns on his heel and marches straight for her office as soon as the words are out. “Like. Right now.”

But talking to Dr. C is a useless affair. “I work with what I’m given, Spencer,” she says, sitting behind her desk like some kind of supervillain, more closed-off to him than he’s ever seen her. “The cast may not look exactly how you imagined it, but some of the newer students showed real promise this year.”

“But Dr. C—” He paces in front of her desk. “I suggested the show. I practiced all summer. I thought for sure—”

“Spencer, I chose the show on my own accord,” she says, evenly. “It’s true I take input from students, but that has no bearing on my casting decisions.”

He throws his hands in the air. “But you have to see how this is unfair to me—”

“I think,” she cuts in, in this icy tone that’s usually reserved for people who fuck up majorly, and never for him, not in his entire time at Kiersey, “that once you see how the cast falls together, you’ll respect the casting decisions I made as your director.”

He sputters and rants, but he doesn’t dare disrespect her, no matter how much she’s betrayed him.

And so it goes. He’s lost out on his role, in his spring musical, to some no-name freshman who probably can’t even belt.

And just in case there needed to be a cherry on top, he’s his understudy. Of all things. How humiliating.

Spencer’s life is over.

It’s not until much later that day, when he’s sulking in Kelsie’s dorm room, mourning his lost musical season, that the idea for a solution crosses his mind.

It’s sort of her idea, but sort of his. She, at least, brings it up. “Spence,” she says, nudging his arm. He’s been scrolling mindlessly through Twitter for who knows how long, while she flips through her newly acquired script. “Y’know… you’re his understudy.”

“Well, jeez, Kels, I hadn’t noticed,” he snaps, dropping his phone onto the bed. “Thanks for reminding me.”

“That wasn’t my point,” she replies, scowling. “What I meant was… you’re his understudy.”

He knows she isn’t stupid enough to say the same thing twice over, so he tries to read her meaning. She’s gesturing, like she wants him to get it, and on top of the day he’s had, he doesn’t appreciate being made to feel like an idiot. He’s about to tell her as much when something dawns on him.

Something in the form of very, very useful knowledge. “And that means…” he says. “I perform if he can’t.”

A wise smile crosses Kelsie’s face. “Exactly.”

“So all we have to do is…” He nods. It’s taking shape in his head now. His spring musical season may not be completely lost.

Kelsie’s fingernails dance over his knee. “You’re getting it.”

“Figure out a way to inhibit his ability to perform,” he finishes. He loves her so much. “Kels. You’re right.”

“I’m right?” Her smile goes innocent. “What are you talking about, babe? That was all your idea.”

For the first time since before the saw the list, he smiles, too. He wonders if he looks as conniving as he feels. “I might be able to figure this out,” he says.

“That you might,” she replies, with a nod. “All we have to do is figure out what that looks like.”

To save his musical, Spencer is very much willing to figure that out.

#ficlet #quinn theatre hours #mini quinny #by extension #fuck spencer's rights!#kiersey drama club #drama club drama #the insanely cool reid burke #kiersey college #mel writes

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earthboundpenguin · 6 years

Text

Children of the Wheat

@jlaireweek - Day 5 - Flour

(read it on ao3 here)

BZZZZT.

Jim rolled over onto his stomach and groaned as he reached for his phone, groggy with sleep. It was too early for this.

Swiping up to see the notification, he took note of the time: 4pm. Which meant, back in Arcadia, it was… 2pm? 1pm? He wasn’t quite sure if they’d crossed over into the Eastern Time Zone yet. Either way, it was a perfectly normal time for humans with perfectly normal schedules to be texting their best friend.

Unfortunately, Jim no longer had a perfectly normal schedule.

But that didn't mean he couldn't take time out of his definitely-not-normal schedule to talk to Toby.

Jim peered at the screen to see what his friend had sent him:

[Jimbo. ur not gonna believe what coach lawrence is making us do in health class. again.]

A moment later, Jim’s phone buzzed as he received an image. He opened it, seeing that it was a bag of flour with a face drawn on it. He texted back:

[lol, seriously?]

[yeah, since *almost* the whole class failed the first time. apparently we need it to graduate. luckily, darcy and i don’t have to sweat since we already passed ;P]

[omg]

[yeah. u and claire really dodged a bullet. how’s the trip btw]

[we’re somewhere in the midwest now… maybe indiana? or ohio? not sure. i always sucked at geography]

[dude, u can just read the signs. that's what they're there for]

[yeah… they're kind of hard to read in the dark]

[oh. right. ...shoot u were probs sleeping, huh? my bad. i’ll let u get back to that]

[lol thanks. talk to you later, tobes]

With a sigh, Jim looked up from his phone. Claire was lying a few feet away, and from the look of it was wide awake. When he made eye contact, she quickly scooted across the floor to sidle up next to him. “Was that Toby?” she asked, leaning her cheek against his shoulder. His armor had finally come off a week ago, and now it seemed like she was on a personal mission to touch him as much as possible so they could both get used to his new skin. He still felt uncomfortable in it, and ridiculously insecure, but they were making progress. Slowly.

“Yeah,” he replied. He showed her the picture of the flour bag.

She immediately started giggling. “Oh man, they have to do that assignment again? That sure was nuts the first time,” she looked up at him, her brown eyes shining in the dim light of the cave. “Remember how you blew up our child?”

Our child. His stomach sank. “Hey, I was kinda busy fighting a Gruesome, in case you forgot!” he tried to keep his tone lighthearted, but notes of melancholy still managed to weave their way in.

And Claire noticed. “Jim, what’s wrong?”

He tried to remain silent, but a distressed sound rumbled low in his chest. He kept forgetting that was a thing his body did now.

“Jim, please talk to me.”

With a huff, he folded his arms in front of him on the floor and hid his face inside the little barrier he’d created. “Nothing,” he growled. “It’s stupid.”

“Try me,” she whispered, her breath close enough to tickle his ear. He felt her lightly kiss the tip of his ear, and he had to fight to keep the corners of his mouth from twitching upward - he really liked it when she did that.

And she knew it.

He begrudgingly unburied his face. “It’s just,” he began with a sigh, “I also remember thinking how it would be nice to be a dad someday. I was kinda looking forward to it, actually,” he admitted sheepishly.

“And?” she raised an eyebrow at him.

“I mean, that’s pretty much out of the picture now.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Um, I’m pretty sure I do. I’m half-troll now, remember?”

“It’s sort of hard to forget,” she said with a sly smile, planting a firm kiss on his cheek. “Doesn’t mean you still can’t be a father, though.”

“Claire,” he frowned. “I’m no expert, but I’m pretty sure the whole ‘half-troll’ thing doesn’t really work with… well, you know.”

“Again, you don't know that. Not until we.. uh...”

He looked at her with a mix of shock and embarrassment. “Wait, are you suggesting…?”

“Ohmigod, Jim! Not right now!” Even in the low lighting, he could see the pink flush blooming on her face. “But, you know. Maybe in the future. Someday.”

He breathed a sigh of relief. But a little spark of hope flickered somewhere deep inside his chest. As well as a small rush of excitement.

“And, well,” she continued, “if that doesn't work, then adoption is always an option.”

“Oh yeah, because I'm sure an adoption agency would love to hand a kid over to a monster,” he deadpanned.

“Not monster. Half-troll, half-human,” she scowled at him, pointedly running a hand through his mane of hair. “Stop being so pessimistic - when the time comes, we'll figure something out. Who knows? Maybe we'll end up adopting a troll!”

And just like that, the lopsided grin he'd held at bay earlier came back in full force. “We?”

“Well, duh. I mean, you're pretty much stuck with me at this point,” Claire teased, her blush taking on a more rosy hue. “I can't exactly go back to dating regular guys after someone as exciting as you, now, can I?”

“God, I love you,” he murmured. He leaned over and, as gently as he could, kissed her cheek. A soft rumbling started up in his chest.

“Jim, are you… purring?”

“Apparently.”

“That's adorable.” She smiled mischievously and sat up on her knees, mussing his hair lovingly before standing up.

“Hey, where are you going?” he whined, rolling onto his back.

“Don't worry, I won't be gone long.” She winked before walking to the other side of the cave, to the place where they were keeping their food supplies. It was mostly there for Claire's sake, though occasionally there were days when Jim found he could eat with her. But usually that was only when meat was on the menu. And his portion was served raw.

After a minute she came back over, carrying something behind her back.

“Whatcha got there?” he asked playfully, knowing full well that she was up to something.

“Training,” she smirked. In one swift motion, she dropped a five-pound bag of flour square onto his chest, something that would have knocked the wind out of him had he still been only human.

“Hey!”

“Don't blow this one up, I need it for breakfast tomorrow.”

He gasped in mock horror, “You cannibal!”

She giggled as she laid down on the floor next to him, burrowing in between his arm and his side. He rubbed her shoulder with one hand while he lifted up the impromptu flour-child with the other.

“I'm gonna call this one Jimmy Lake Junior Jr. the Second.”

“You’re officially never allowed to name anything ever again.”

#jlaireweek #trollhunters fanfic #jlaire #jim lake jr #claire nuñez #here have some fluff

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caindoglover · 6 years

Text

Cover

When The Darkness Comes by Shelby Merry is what I listened to while writing this. Honestly way more fitting for an aftermath to the freaking Claire incident, but my brain will not get on track and just do it already. I swear I'll get there though. lol

https://www.fanfiction.net/s/12767841/16/The-Creepslayerz

Enjoy!

They go together, but very much apart. They enter the arcade twenty minutes apart and never play the same game at the same time. They don’t even linger within the vicinity of the other, usually a couple games away. Occasionally they’ll waste money on a game and only half play in order to watch the other from afar, but it just isn’t the same as those days they spend gaming at Eli’s house. It causes a painful pang in their hearts, but they know better than to do or say anything. They simply continue the routine for an hour, until they are running pretty low on coins.

Eli wanders toward the claw machine. It is the only one he hasn’t played and the only one he has no chance of winning. He stares wistfully into the container, surveying the tiny stuffed creatures from a minion to darth vader tightly packed together. He sighs. The odds are stacked high against him and anyone foolish enough to waste their money on it.

Steve grins and chuckles to himself as he wins yet another game. “Too good.” He spins around and struts to the center of the room to check and see if there are any other games he wants to play. He is pretty sure he has played them all now. Beat them all too. That’s when he notices Eli. He smirks. The dork probably wants one of those silly toys. It’s such a childish whim at their age. And that alone should be enough to keep Steve from going anywhere near El right now, but he’s gotten a little too comfortable with just walking up to his friend outside of school, and so he does just that. He stops just short of speaking, half afraid someone might wonder why he is talking to Eli and half because he doesn’t want to break the peaceful moment.

Unfortunately it is broken only a second later. “Check it out,” a boy jeers as they walk up. “Looks like little Eli’s still into dolls.”

Eli starts and glares at the boy.

A laugh bellows from the opposite direction as another boy comes and leans on the machine. “Cause the only reasons guys play this is for their girls. And I know he ain’t got a girlfriend.”

Eli ducks his head his lips curl up in a pout. “I could have a girlfriend. You don’t know.”

They burst out laughing. “You hear that? He could have one, he says.”

Eli clenches his fist and does his best to scowl back at them, but there’s no denying the hurt that flickers in his eyes. He wishes so badly to have Steve here to rescue him.

One boy’s lips twist into a malicious grin as he pins Eli beneath his black stare. “What do you think, Steve?”

Steve snaps to attention. What? No. His eyes widen. He knew he should have never wandered so close to Eli. Mistake number one. They kept their distance in public for a reason damn it. But now he has to answer. His heart beats faster. He can’t just ignore a direct question, especially from someone he generally hangs with at school. Generally picks on Eli with. He swallows hard. This could be it. He could choose to make this the moment he breaks cover. No longer cares what people think of him. But when he opens his mouth, “Probably a queer.”

Eli gapes and his heart plummets.

The boys continue to watch Steve expectantly.

Steve doesn’t want to, his heart rebels against his words, but he has to keep going, “I mean,” he scoffs, “have you seen the way he looks at Jim. Or acts around him for that matter.”

The boys cackle.

Eli is painfully short of breath and he struggles to keep his hands from trembling as Steve’s words sink in. The laughter echoes in his head and he feels himself shrinking second by second. His stomach twists itself into knots and tears blur his vision. He isn’t sure how long he can hold it together. He needs to get out. Out. Out. He bolts.

There is a pang in Steve’s heart as he watches Eli flee. He couldn’t see Eli’s face, but he sensed that Eli was more upset than usual. The faint quiver about his body was especially telling. He wants so much to go after him, to make sure his friend is alright, but he has a feeling going empty handed would be mistake number two.

So he approaches the claw machine. It isn’t much, but Eli was looking at them so it’s something.

One boy smirks. “Winning one for your girl?”

Steve blinks and hesitates for a beat. “Yeah.” He smiles and goes along with it. It’s easier that way.

…

It takes Steve way too many tries to get the stupid thing, especially with those idiots hovering over his shoulders and backseat gaming, particularly when they boo him for missing. Even once he manages it he has to endure a barrage of questions as to why in the world he’d go for the Star Wars one instead of something like a cute pink bunny. Was his girl seriously into that kind of stuff? He rattles off answers through grit teeth before getting out of there as fast as possible. He doesn’t have time for this. He needs to get to Eli.

He is so focused that he drives right up to the house, only realizing he broke their vehicle distance rule when he opens the door to find himself face to face with Eli’s mother. She pins him beneath a stare so full of hate that it makes his blood run cold. For a moment he is frozen, unsure of what to do next. Only able to stare into the eyes of the beast.

Angie sneers and turns hard on her heel. It’s the only way to hold her tongue. She liked this boy well enough. He was good Eli. At least she thought. But her boy just ran to his room crying with Steve’s name on his lips. And it’s hard not to judge that. And that’s why she walked away. To give Steve one last chance.

Steve lets out a breath and the tension drains from him. That…was a terrible sign. He casts a glance toward the stairs and his concern for Eli deepens. Eli’s mother doesn’t get mad, not like that. And she has never looked at him that way. Did he really upset Eli that badly? He shuffles up the stairs, stopping just in front of Eli’s room. The door towers over him as he stares, fear seizing control of his limbs and causing him to hesitate. It’s something he’s never felt when faced with Eli’s room. He swallows hard, swallows the anxiety, and enters.

Eli lifts his narrowed eyes to meet Steve’s, searing him with a scornful gaze.

Steve is taken aback, but the scorn is not enough to conceal Eli’s deepest emotion, and Steve is rattled to the core by the sheer amount of pain packed into those normally bright green eyes. Now they are puffy and coated by a sheen of tears. There is a slight quiver about his friend as well. “Eli,” he breathes, taking tentative steps forward.

“You ass,” he says through grit teeth. Says what he wanted to say the instant Steve said those horrible things about him but was too afraid, too emotionally volatile. Fragile. Still is. He can feel his throat tighten even now.

Steve sits next him. He frowns as he drums his fingers against the small toy in his hands. “You know I didn’t mean what I said, right?” His brow knit together. “But we’ve got to keep our cover. Otherwise people will figure out what we do.”

“When are you going to admit it? Just admit it already,” his voice is tight and cracks at the edges. His lips tremble along with his hands.

Steve stares blankly at him. “Admit what?” He searches Eli’s face desperately. His friend is falling apart at the seams and he can’t understand why. His words never did this before. And he even went so far as to call him a waste of space once!

“It’s not about cover. It’s never been about cover!” Eli yells. “You’re ashamed to be seen with me. For people to know you’re my friend,” he breaks into sobs and the tears spill down his face.

Steve’s eyes widen and his heart beats double time. What does he do? What the hell is he supposed to do? His mind goes into a frenzy. “N-No, that’s not true.” He reaches up to lay a hand on Eli’s shuddering shoulder.

Eli smacks it away. “Don’t lie to me.” He only cries harder, and every word stutters out of him, “I’m not stupid. You’ve hurt me enough today. Don’t call me stupid too.”

Steve swallows the lump in his throat as he watches Eli carefully, hung up on what exactly to do. What can he do? “Eli…”

Eli struggles to steady himself, wiping an arm over his eyes. “I-I thought I could live with it. Being…being your dirty little secret. But then,” his lip quivers and he tears up again. “You went and told them. You told. You knew how I felt about Jim. But you…” he buries his face in his hands and sobs harder.

Steve feels tears prick at his eyes and his heart cracks. He feels sick with himself. “I’m sorry,” he whispers, his voice wavering. It’s all he can find to say that isn’t some feeble excuse. He could say again and again how badly he needs this – his stupid image. How it gives him power, a sense of being more important than he could ever dream of being anywhere else, makes him special. But for Eli, having a friend who is not afraid to admit it, that is just as important to him as Steve’s image. So he knows better than to even try. Instead he simply gets up, slowly, sets the toy on the bed next to Eli, and walks away.

Eli gnashes his teeth, barely swallowing a scream as he seizes the Vader plush and throws it at the wall.

It bounces off the wall and rolls back to his feet.

Eli crumbles, sinking from the bed and to his knees on the floor. “I hate you,” he says through his sobs. He grabs the plush and squeezes. “I hate you so much. I just-just…” he shakes his head. “Don’t understand.” He hugs the plush close to his chest and presses his face into it, his tears soaking the cotton. “Why am I not enough?”

K, remember the cute art that I said inspired last chapter? It was actually a claw machine and not a carnival. So I had it in my head boys would pick on Eli for looking at the toys in the machine, Steve would see it, win him something, and give it to him at his house to make him feel better. Cute, right? Just like the art. But then...my brain decided to angst it up. And Steve had to go and be an insecure jerk. I felt rotten getting rid of the cute completely by going with this horrible plot and so the short carnival chapter happened. Yeeeeah. In case the toy factor felt similar, that's why.

I hope you liked the Eli angst. Don't get that as much as Steve angst. Also this needs to be a thing that gets covered in the show later if Steve tries to keep their friendship on the downlow for too long. Cause, like, Steve is probably legit Eli's only friend. Yet he is ashamed to be seen as his friend in public. And that just hurts to think about. At some point Eli would need to get upset by it too, even if nothing drastic like this happened.

Also if you don't think Eli has a big crush on Jim then you are wrong and that is all there is to it.

#trollhunters #creepslayerz #steve palchuk #eli pepperjack #steli #if you want it to be steli #it can go either way tbh #my fanfics #my posts

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thewinsisterchronicles · 7 years

Text

What You’ve Done (P2)

Warning: mentions of broken bones, pettiness, tension (not sexual you nasties), pointing out Dean’s insecurities coz he’s being a little shit, bit of a cliffhanger

A/N: so I realized like 20 seconds after posting the first part that I had a huge plot hole, so I had to go back and fix it lol----- also!!!!!! let me know if you wanna be tagged. This is gonna be a long series and I'm SO PSYCHED FOR IT so just let me know k thx

also!!!! shoutout to @random-superwholock-images for the monster I used:) she’s awesome and you should totally check out her writing

(Y/H/C= your hair colour : Y/N=your name)

Dean kept his eyes on the road- or, at least, that's what he tried to make her believe. Y/N glued her eyes to the passing trees, but she knew he would glance to her from time to time in the rear view mirror. She could tell when his eyes were on her. It wasn’t exactly a foreign feeling.

Sam, however, was more… openly concerned about her.

The whole car ride consisted of him trying to get her to talk. The first five minutes featured him asking about Clyde. When she answered the questions about her father without giving any information, he switched over what she was doing in the forest.

“Why’d you come here?” he questioned her.

“I think you already know the answer to that question,” Y/N replied without turning from the window. Sam frowned at Dean.

“What do you mean?” he asked, slowly turning back to her.

“We’re both hunters,” she said simply.

“...That doesn’t mean we’d know anything about you,” Dean huffed. This girl was a real piece of work.

“If a bunch of hunters come to the same place,” she countered, “don’t you think there’d be something going on here?”

“How would anyone know to think that?” Dean asked.

“I did.”

Dean glared at the road. Sam quickly sensed the tension.

“So,” he cleared his throat, “what is it we were looking for, then? We came out empty.” Dean glared at his brother for betraying them to this Y/H/C-haired-demon. Sam ignored him.

“Abhartach.”

Sam blinked.

“What?” he asked incredulously. Dean’s eyes were a mix of confusion and surprise.

“Abhartach.” Y/N repeated, turning to look at them. “Well, not technically, since the Abhartach was originally just one monster, but it’s a… like a variation of it- or a descendant. Basically, it’s a combination between a zombie, a dwarf, and a vampire. They really like fresh blood, because of some old sacrifice the original monster demanded because... well, ’cause he was a mean dude, to put it gently.”

“Huh,” Sam huffed. “Never heard of it.”

“That’s a first,” Dean muttered. Sam rolled his eyes. Y/N smirked in the backseat, catching the eye of Dean. They looked at each other for a brief moment before Y/N put on a straight face and turned back to Sam.

“How’d you kill it?” Sam asked, ignoring Dean’s jibe.

“Well, an Abhartach comes from Irish folklore,” she explained. “The only way to stop him is to kill him with a sword made of yew wood, bury him upside down, surround his grave with thorns, and placing a large stone on top of the grave.”

“All that?” Dean asked. “Where’d you find that out?”

“This magical place I call...” she paused for suspense. “the internet.” Dean rolled his eyes in annoyance.

“And you did all that with the help of…?” Sam trailed off. He tried to put it lightly, in case she was close to him; she didn’t seem that shaken from his death, though.

“Derrick?” Y/N shrugged, “He didn’t do much. Wasn’t a great hunter. Even when he was doing something, he did it poorly. I was the bait, too. He just got in the way.”

“Sentimental, much?” Dean quipped. “Wasn’t he your brother?”

“Not by choice.” Y/N turned back to the window. She squinted out the window.

“But you’re family,” Dean stated, confused. “Family... you gotta look out for each other.”

“I know you Winchesters have this weird thing about family,” she said softly, “but the rest of us are a little different. Some of us... the lucky ones get to escape traumatic experiences, holding to what we have left after it.”

Sam and Dean were quiet, waiting for her to continue. They briefly exchanged a look.

“The rest of us try to save our own skin.”

Her face settled on a hard look, veiling it in a small smile. She turned her body to face the window as best she could, clearly ending the conversation. The boys exchanged a glance. There was something going on with the girl in the backseat.

By the time they made it back to the hotel, it was around 11 o’clock. The sun was high in the sky, blazing down on the pavement below them. The three of them left the car, quickly making their way to the wooden door marked 23. They rushed into the room, hoping to avoid making a scene.

Two full grown men and a muddy girl weren’t exactly unnoticeable.

She limped slightly, too. Dean tried to ask her about it, to offer help or something, but she dismissed his concerns; he was “overreacting.” Dean could immediately tell that it was a broken ankle.

It didn’t exactly make him trust her more.

“Here,” Sam threw Y/N a flannel. “I know it’s a bit big, but you could really use a new shirt. I can go out and grab you some pants or shoes or whatever- if you’d like.”

“That’s alright,” Y/N smiled. “I can clean them up in no time. It’d be nice to shower, though.”

“Of course,” Sam copied her expression. “Take your time.”

Y/N thanked him, smiled kindly at Dean, and left to the bathroom. A minute later, the shower turned on.

“I don’t trust her,” Dean said as soon as his voice was muted by the shower. “Clyde was a real dick, and there’s something about her…”

“Dean, we found her hiding under a tree.” Sam grabbed a beer from the fridge, tossing one to his brother. “I think we can afford to give her a shirt and let her use the shower. Besides, I think she’s fine. She’s just… wary. You’d be too if you lived with Clyde.”

“I can’t argue with that,” Dean muttered as he drank. The two of them listened to the shower silently.

“I’ll take her out tonight for dinner,” Sam offered. “Get to know her. If she seems more trouble than she’s worth, then we’ll find out what to do with her. Maybe she could go live with Jody.”

“I don’t want her anywhere near Claire and Alex,” Dean said abruptly. “If she’s anything like what Clyde tried to shape us into, then she’s dangerous.”

“Fine,” Sam complied. “But I’ll see tonight if she is or not. Then we can decide.”

The two of them finished the rest of their beer quietly, mindlessly exchanging conversation about wrapping up the hunt, since it had already been dealt with. About ten minutes later, Y/N emerged from the bathroom. Dean didn’t know how she did it, but somehow her jeans were clean. Not totally pristine, but no one could’ve guessed she’d been hiding in the bush for a couple days. She smiled softly at him when she met his eyes. They were inviting, friendly. He reflexively smiled back. He quickly wiped it off his face, replacing it with a subtle scowl.

“So, Y/N,” Sam started, gesturing to the chair in front of them. “What is it exactly that...”

“What happened?” she offered. “I told you; we don’t know each other well enough for that.”

“We’d know each other better if you would talk to us,” Dean miffed. “Conversation goes both ways; you’ve got to work on this thing too, you know.”

“I’m aware,” Y/N stated. “But to be fair, you haven’t exactly been sharing, either.”

“You’re little miss Sherlock over here,” Dean said sharply, twitching. “Always poking around in people’s heads, stripping them down into some damn appetizer you plan to devour. You’re always judging people, picking and choosing what you want them to be and shaping them into it. Daddy Clyde probably forgot to teach you about personal space, about boundaries. Why don’t you deduce away?”

Y/N raised an eyebrow, straightening up.. Sam looked at his brother in confused awe. Dean’s eyes were razor sharp, staring coldly at Y/N like she was a monster that killed someone in cold blood. Sam had only ever seen him so angry in such circumstances.

“Well?” he challenged furiously. “I’m waiting.”

“You’re always waiting.” Y/N spoke coolly, like this was all a simple conversation. Her voice flowed smoothly, trickling out her mouth and filling Dean’s ears. “I can tell. Not even from what I’ve heard, but from what you’ve shown me. You’re always waiting for something or someone. Probably Sammy, here; you can’t function on your own. You’ve been living in the shadow of your father- the daddy issues are clear here- and you’re always the grunt; Sam’s the genius. You’d be kidding yourself to think otherwise.”

Sam felt paralyzed. He wanted to step in, to stand up for his brother, but he couldn’t make himself move. Dean twitched. He couldn't hurt her; that wouldn’t end well for him. He couldn’t get mad, either; that’s what she wanted.

“So tell me, Dean,” she drawled, leaning forward in her seat. He clenched his jaw. “Has Sherlock deduced her way into your mind? I could go deeper.” She let out a short laugh, making the boys jump. “Probably a sentence you’ve never said.”

The Winchesters moved from anger to confusion. Y/N seemed to be on three different levels here. What the hell goes on in your mind? Dean thought.

Nobody said anything. Dean was staring straight at Y/N. Y/N was staring straight back, the ghost of a triumphant smirk dancing faintly on her lips. Sam’s eyes were darting between the two of them, waiting for one to break the silence.

Dean didn’t like Y/N.

Of course, he didn’t blame her for being the way he was. He’d been on one hunt with Clyde- not knowing about Y/N at the time- and had subconsciously made a vow to never cross paths again. He was always harsh, critical; putting himself in charge and letting others take the fall. Hunting was a game to him. Clyde was a robot, a cold-blooded killer. He didn’t care if his victims were human or not.

Dean had a feeling that Clyde only hunted because he got to kill something, and it wasn’t (completely) illegal; it wasn’t bad. He could say he did it for the “greater good” or some bullshit like that. Clyde was like Sam when he’d lost his soul.

Any kid raised by him had to be the same. He wouldn’t have given them any other choice.

Y/N was... unique. Strange. Deceptive. Cold and calculating. She’d be talking about one thing and noticing all your exposed weaknesses while doing so. She always seemed to glance around too much for a conversation. Sure, it could be just social anxiety or fear, but Dean recognized that look.

She was planning an escape. Always. Even when they were just talking, or sitting in the car, or staring someone down; she was always thinking, always observing. The gears in her mind never seemed to stop.

Y/N was too brash, too observant, too deceptive; she looked like a grunt but had a wit sharp like broken glass.

She was too much like Dean.

They’d left little less than ten minutes ago, giving Dean time to read up on the “Abber-teck” or whatever it was called. Everything fit together, so he supposed she was telling the truth about the creature. Didn’t mean that she was an honest person, though.

He was halfway through another beer when his phone began to buzz. He didn’t recognize the number on his phone, but it felt familiar. After letting it ring for a moment more, he finally picked it up.

“Hello?”

The other end of the line crackled quietly, making no other sound. He was about to hang up when a voice came through.

“I see you’ve got my daughter, Winchester.”

Tags:

@zeusmyster @mogaruke @melodramavibes @assbutt-still-in-hell @spn67-sister @thegreasiestbear @sammysbeanie @thyotakukimkim @lemonadegazeelle

#mine #original fic #What You've Done #What You've Done Part 2 #part two #original post #sam winchester #dean winchester #y/n #reader insert #og characters #fanfic #supernatural #spn #spn fanfic #sister fic #winsister #winchester

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thesinglesjukebox · 6 years

Video

youtube

EMINEM FT. BEYONCÉ - WALK ON WATER [2.40] This is the lowest score Beyoncé has ever received from us... wonder how that happened...

Rachel Bowles: The combination of crackling sound effects and Eminem spitting out expletives under his breath have the effect of sounding like he's doing some tricky home improvement and keeps catching his thumb with a hammer or fucking up the wallpaper. There's probably some interesting meditation on celebrity worship in this indulgent navel gazing somewhere, but it's hidden pretty well by uninspired piano and poor lyrics. Is there really room in 2017 for "spazzing the fuck out"? One would hope not. Though Beyoncé is generously, softly serenading us, "I'm only human just like you" like a lullaby about a universe where we're on Bey's Goddess level. The closing "Bitch, I wrote Stan" is hilarious for all the wrong reasons. Ultimately, this song genuinely makes me lol. [3]

Ian Mathers: In honour of dril getting doxxed, let's just say this feels a lot like Em screaming "I'm not owned! I'm not owned!" as he shrinks into a rapper who isn't fun to listen to at all. (To those questioning whether that was ever not the case: I feel you.) No idea what Beyoncé is doing here but 1. she would fit in fine on a much better song 2. she can't save the rest of this one. Plus one for her but minus one for that ending. [2]

Will Adams: "Bitch, I wrote 'Stan,'" he spits at the end, as if the pen-to-paper sound effects weren't trying to make sure we knew through the whole song. "Stan" this is not, and it doesn't help that Eminem manages a few moving moments about doubting oneself's creativity only to drop "retarded" two breaths later. His tea's gone cold, I wonder why. [2]

Alfred Soto: A grim, hectoring track delivered with relative precision doesn't change the fact that I don't want this grim, hectoring rapper blowing onion breath in my face. Skylar Grey's regressive hook assumes Beyoncé has done nothing quietly revolutionary in the last four years. [4]

Will Rivitz: Rule number one of making good hip-hop: don't emulate Watsky. Rule number two of making good hip-hop: FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, DON'T EMULATE WATSKY. Rule number three of making good hip-hop: if your song's instrumental component sounds like it could accompany a B-tier Adele song, you're probably doing something wrong. Rule number four of making good hip-hop: try to get Beyoncé on your hook. Rule number five of making good hip-hop: don't waste Beyoncé on your hook. "Walk On Water" follows exactly one of these five rules, so I think the proportional rating bestowed here is appropriate. [2]

Leonel Manzanares: Inexplicable but always welcome Queen Bey feature aside, this feels like the hip-hop equivalent of "I used to be with it, but then they changed what it was. Now what I am with isn't it and what is it seems weird and scary to me. It'll happen to you!" [4]

Joshua Copperman: One of the top comments on the YouTube video reads "just compare this lyrical masterpiece with 'the ting goes skkkrrraah, pap pap ka-ka-ka.'" If it is true that Migos>Beatles, then clearly Beatles : Migos :: Eminem : Big Shaq. [4]

Claire Biddles: Yikes, where to start -- The none-more-earnest paper-ripping sound effects? The use of not one but two ableist slurs? The 17 hour 43 minute length? Is Marsh writing his own off-Broadway jukebox musical, and is this a third act segue? Almost unprecedentedly bad. [1]

Thomas Inskeep: This death march is so dire that not even Queen B can liven it up. (And what's she doing here, anyway? She is so far above playing hook singer for 2000's great white hope.) Like he has on every record he's made in the past decade, Eminem sounds angry, out of breath, and most importantly out of ideas. I mean, say what you want about his politics, but at least Kid Rock still has a sense of fun about himself. Em is the audio version of a scowl. [0]

Scott Mildenhall: Well, it wouldn't be Eminem if he didn't kick off with a joke single, would it? If that's not him audibly attempting to rewrite the bizarre chorus at the same time as Beyoncé sings it, it should be; otherwise, it must surely be the penning of an angry letter to the producers for having left early. Some very talented and successful musicians have worked on this, and on one level, credit to them: it comfortably meets its apparent ambitions in reaffirming that none of them are above it. [2]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox ]

#Eminem #Beyoncé

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shirtlesssammy · 7 years

Text

Twigs & Twine & Tasha Banes: The Wine Recap

Then:

Witch twins!

Now:

The eponymous Tasha Banes arrives at a quaint B&B.

One guest is less than welcoming. Tasha admires a ring the woman is wearing. (Hint: we should pay attention!) Tasha passive-aggressively offers to cleanse the old woman’s aura, but the woman just snickers. Tasha gets all checked in, and later that night it’s revealed why she’s at the charming B&B –witch hunting.

She casts a “reveal” spell, and follows her charm to an underground shed, so foul smelling we can smell it in our homes, and once inside, she’s met with the pointy end of a pointy thing. RIP Mama Banes.

Destiel is Real Alert

It’s only been one night since Cas was possessed/overwhelmed/hoodwinked by the nephilim and Dean is still reeling from those events. He’s convinced it wasn’t Cas. Sam is unusually silent. Natasha believes it’s because Sam thinks Cas was in complete control.

Dean doesn’t know what to do, so Sam distracts him with the melted carcass of the Colt. Sam hopes he can fix it.

Just then a phone rings. It’s one of techno-phobe Mary’s many burner phones! And Alicia Banes is on the other end! She was hoping for Mary’s help tracking her and her brother’s mother. Max is sceptical that there’s anything to be worried about. Sam tells them that they’ll help –much to Dean’s displeasure. Sam assures Dean that Jody put an APB out on Cas and Kelly and they can’t do anything more about it. And they should help the witch twins since “their mom’s on a hunting trip, and hasn’t been home in a week.” RIMSHOT.

Agreeing to help, Dean then calls Mary.

Mary’s a little too busy to take any calls, as she and Ketch are busy interrogating a shape shifter. Dean asks if she can help with the witch twin case, and then requests “Even if you can’t swing by, can you call me back? Just some stuff going down. It’s kinda got me spun out. It’d be good to talk to you.” DEAN BEAN. To add pain to this pain, I’ll just say that he could really use a Charlie to talk to right now. (Natasha: ouch. I hurt more.)

Ketch is having too much fun hurting the shape shifter, and Mary’s getting a tad uncomfortable. Ketch don’t give a shit, and punches the shifter, who instantly changes into him.

The brothers meet up with Max and Alicia. Alicia informs them that their mother was on the hunt for a borrower witch– a witch that gets their power from a demon deal. They know where she was staying, and Max got the bartender’s phone number! Wins all around. Dean then shows Max his super rad car, complete with Chekhov’s gun grenade launcher. Alicia and Sam bond over sibling/parent rivalry. Alicia admits that Max and their mom share more of a bond. Sam says that Dean and their dad were the same. Alicia asks about Mary. AWKWARD.

They all arrive at the B&B and find Strange Man Mcstrangerson coming out of the underground shed.

And they find the Bane twins’ mom is inside the B&B. Alicia is beyond happy to find her mom okay. Tasha tells everyone that she has wine! Time to celebrate. Sam and Dean got to watch two siblings interact with their mother like normal children, and I’m pretty sure I saw both of them crying rivers of pain internally, but they wouldn’t be Winchesters otherwise, amirite? Unfortunately, everything isn’t right in Mom-ville if her whacked out finger means anything.

Sam offers to go pick up food, while the others enjoy the wine.

Meanwhile, at the BMoL bunker, Ketch and Mary are done with the shifter and Ketch suggests they “find some privacy and tire ourselves out.” Mary shuts him down cold. Lol. She’s one cold BAMF. Mary’s pissed that the torture session on the shifter didn’t get them anywhere. “Anyone that tells you that torture is never the answer, they haven’t been under the knife.” Send me all the meta on Dean Winchester and torture, please and thank you. Ketch insists that the BMoL believe the ends justify the means. He then taunts Mary by saying she can call Mick to write him up –and that she should return Dean’s call. “Wouldn’t want him to think that mummy doesn’t love him.”

Don’t worry Ketch, Dean’s felt like she hasn’t loved him for almost a whole season now. He’s good at that self-hatred without your help. When he isn’t staring forlornly at his phone with no messages, he praises Tasha for the great job she did with her children. “Parents always seem smart and strong and perfect, but it’s only when you grow up that you realize that they’re just people.” Dean’s learning all about that this season.

Mary’s listening to Dean’s messages, but overhears Ketch on the phone and eavesdrops. Her cover is blown when Dean tries calling her again, so she asks Ketch to use Mick’s computer to check email. (Mary’s on the Biggerson’s email list too!) Also, Mick is still dead still in London.

Sam’s back with the food, and motions to talk with Dean alone in the hallway. It seems that Strange Man McStrangerson has been missing for a month. They head out to explore on their own, while the mean lady from the cold open builds something from a tulpa’s nightmare.

Sam and Dean pick the lock of the cellar and open it up. They both reel back from the stench of death and then descend into the cellar.

Max heads out for a night of fun with the hot bartender from the vegan restaurant. (Wow, the vegan restaurant has a bar? Where is this town again? I’m in my car, ready to go.) Alicia and Tasha are left alone for girl time.

Inside the cellar Dean and Sam locate the bodies of Strange Man McStrangerson, the B&B clerk, and Tasha Barnes. “Son of a bitch,” Dean says for us all. Their hearts have been ripped out (much like the audience’s at the confirmation of Tasha’s demise). Max interrupts them in the cellar. He saw the light on - what’s up, guys? Sam tries desperately to head him off and keep him from glimpsing his mother’s body but it’s too late. Dean and Sam stand awkwardly in the background as Max weeps over his mother.

At Moonbase, Mary enters the storage locker and locates the shipping container Ketch referenced in his phone call. She opens it, sighs exhaustedly at the sight of Mick’s body, and strides through the hallways with purpose. She’s going to…fuck some shit up? Escape? Regardless, Ketch is also prowling the hallways so Mary slips into a handprint-locked door as another BMoL leaves so she can avoid Ketch. She turns in the small room and sees monitors up with biographical and tracking information. The BMoL are tracking herself, her sons, Claire, Garth, and Eileen. While I’m so happy that Claire and Garth and Eileen are keeping in touch with the Winchesters…I’m currently preparing to stand between them and the BMoL with Charlie’s samurai sword. Do NOT kill them - for the love of Chuck, don’t kill them.

Mary gets ready to fuck some shit up. She calls Dean and, in the Winchester family tradition, fails to inform him of any actual details. She simply says, “We’ve got a problem,” and hangs up. Dun dun DUN.

Ketch waits for her outside the door and backs her into the room, door slamming behind them. Mary asks him about Mick’s demise and Ketch neither confirms nor denies that he had any part in Ketch’s death. “You’re a psychopath,” Mary spits out and Ketch all but admits he killed Mick (which is probably the LEAST of his crimes). Finally, FINALLY, Mary socks him in the face. Ketch sends her flying and then tries to pin her to the wall. Mary shoves him away, kicks him in the balls, wrenches his arm, and pounds into his face. “Don’t talk about my boys,” she growls.

(Me: Yes YES I have been waiting for sooooo many episodes for Mary to beat down Ketch! Mary! Mary! MARY!)

“I’ve been cleaning up after them for months,” Ketch says, getting into his evil villain speech. He’s killed Federal agents, Magda, etc. “They’re damn sloppy.”

“I think you mean decent,” Mary says. Ketch tells her that it’s the end of the American hunters, but Ketch’ll keep Mary safe if she plays nice. (Ew.) The look Mary gives him reads: “Nope, it’s the end of you.” She head butts him like a badass then slips on Enochian brass knuckles. He laughs at her. Foolish Mary, those brass knuckles only work on angels! Mary demonstrates the general utility of metal slipped around knuckles, regardless of magic. Alas, Mary still has compassion at her core and she leaves Ketch alive as she tries to leave the room. Ketch zaps her in the back with a taser and she goes down before she can escape.

I got so wrapped up in Mary’s storyline that the switch back to the B&B is jarring. Max bursts into Tasha’s room and demands an explanation of his mother’s death from the thing wearing Tasha’s face. He leans in close, his eyes glow purple, and then he magically orders her to “Reveal.” She seizes under his hands and drops the following clue: “room, end of the hall, top of the stairs.”

In the room at the end of the hall at the top of the stairs, Old Lady Witch’s ears burn and she scowls, then snaps her fingers. The clerk, Tasha, and Strange Man McStrangerson snap to attention like good little soldiers. Max magic-blasts Strange Man McStrangerson out the window where it twitches on the pavement below. Dean and Max burst into Old Lady Witch’s bedroom. She tries to fight them with old lady sourness, but when that fails to work she magically pins Dean to a chair. (Well, at least he’s comfortable.) She compliments Max’s abilities and offers him a deal he should definitely refuse.

The witch mind-whammies Dean and Max to give a nice multi-media dimension to her evil villain speech. They can see and feel her attack on Tasha. The witch sold her soul for magical powers and she’s nearing the end of her very long magical life. She’s really not interested in going to Hell so she’s looking for someone to take on her magical legacy. (Apparently she negotiated a magic-shifting clause into her demon deal? I admire the negotiating chops, even if she’s kind of a dick. But wouldn’t all that murder send you to Hell anyway?) When Tasha found her, Old Lady Witch offered to teach her all her super magic. Tasha turned down her offer and the witch “made her into one of her creatures,” which is a roundabout way of saying she cut out Tasha’s still-beating heart and placed it inside of a wicker man.

The doll has all of her mother’s memories. “It’s her, mostly.” Max attacks with magic.

Max can’t put a dent in her, though. She offers him her power instead and slips off her giant ring. If Max takes on her burden, Tasha will “live.”

In Tasha’s room, Sam fights the twiggy B&B clerk as Alicia worries over her mother’s own twitching form. Sam’s not doing so well with the fight so Alicia joins the fray. Alicia is also a badass, and she knocks the B&B clerk across the room where he crackles against the wall. Alicia turns to find her mother standing and the Tasha doll smoothly, without fanfare, slides a knife into Alicia’s gut.

Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck.

Somebody call goddamn 911 or something? Augh. Anyway, back in the witch’s room Max slowly reaches out to accept the witch’s ring when Dean pulls out of her control just enough to aim his gun and shoot her. The twig dolls - including Tasha - crumble into ash. Dean reminds Max that touching that magic equates signing his soul away. Down the hallway, Sam yells for Dean, anguish in his voice.

Alicia dies just before Max arrives. Max wails over her body. Ugh, I’m so sad.

Later, Dean and Sam approach Max outside. “You’re probably in shock right now,” Sam tells him, wearing his Captain Obvious cape. Dean and Sam, who have seen each other die and resurrect more times than anybody but @supernaturalwiki can count, warn him that it’s going to hurt like hell. Max agonizes over his choices. He could have saved his whole family – his mom, his sister – but instead he laughed at Alicia’s concerns. And while that’s not true about his mom, at least, we are all familiar with the logically unsound Winchester-style guilt spiral. Dean and Sam offer to get cremation supplies but Max begs them to leave. The Winchesters, because they’re idiots when the plot calls for it, head out.

Cut to Baby out on the open road. It’s time for a BM scene!

Dean expresses his regrets over Max. He had everything Dean wished for - a happy family - and in an instant it was ripped away. The next bit of Winchester dialogue is overlaid with scenes of Max back at the B&B.

Sam: You couldn’t let Max make a deal for his soul.

Dean: We do terrible things all the time to save each other. Who am I to stop him?

Points to Dean for the parallel. Pretty sure Dean suspected Max was going to cut some kind of deal, but left anyway. Should I high five him for that? I’m so torn.

(Boris: I took this moment as a deconstruction of season 2. Max and Alicia are a direct parallel to Dean making his demon deal for Sam’s life. What will a sibling do for the other? Is this another step towards the breaking down of Sam and Dean’s dependency on each other? Or just creating complicated characters for the Wayward Daughters spin-off? :D)

Max picks up the witch’s ring, lays his sister’s body on the bed, and stands over her with the knife. Purple light flashes and the scene cuts to Alicia waking up as Max ties her last shoelace. She’s groggy but otherwise seems like herself.

He tells her it’s time to go and she readily agrees, walking out of the room with her body left behind on the bed. Max, heartbroken, takes the witch’s book of magic and immolates his sister’s body before leaving the B&B.

In the car, Sam’s tuckered out and snoozing so Dean takes the time to listen to his mom’s voicemails. When the second voicemail hits, Dean shouts at Sam to wake him.

The scene cuts to Mary waking as Ketch douses her with water. Mary’s trussed to the interrogation chair. “A taser?” Mary spits. “Not really a fair fight.” Mary knows where to hit him where it hurts (the balls amirite?). But the BMoL aren’t going to kill her (just yet). Ooooh no. Because Toni “Creeper” Bevel has arrived in her trim pantsuit to interrogate her first.

Natasha: Whew. This episode hurt. We see Sam and Dean die and do horrible stuff for each other all the time and roll with it. But part of how we roll with it is that we get to see their salvation arcs. It hurts to see such delightful characters die. Sure, Max and Alicia’s close sibling relationship was a tempting parallel to Sam and Dean (except they had way less angst). But we’ve already learned this lesson, right? And Alicia’s resurrection barely feels halfway there at this point since she’s under Max’s control. (Yuck face.) Hopefully we’ll get to see a redemption story in a later episode that DOESN’T result in Alicia or Max’s death. On the plus side, this kind of dark fairy tale horror vibe is MY JAM so I’m also really happy? Anyway, if you think I’m not going to write some fanfiction bringing Alicia back to life (her soul must surely be tied to the doll) and saving Max’s soul from Hell, you don’t know me at all.

Boris: I think we (and Sam and Dean) have learned lessons –ones that Max hasn’t yet (Dean did tell him not to take the deal, with personal experience to back his wish.) I have a lot more questions than answers after this episode, but the whole sibling parallel/sell your soul for your sibling bit was meant to highlight that it wasn’t a good choice that Dean made all those years ago. In a seemingly unrelated part of this episode Ketch talks about torture –something we all know that Dean will struggle with remembering for the rest of his life. And where to begin with Mary? She kicks ass. I really like her. And yet, Dean is still yearning for something more. He has her back, but what he really wants back was a life with her in it. (And in hopes that it will help Dean reconcile the fact he’s never getting his past back, I really liked his conversation with Tasha.)

Magical Quotes of Doom:

What the hell, man? What about Cas?

She doesn’t seem like much of a hugger.

I’m sad to say that you won’t become the Jiminy Cricket of the British Men of Letters.

“A slight werewolf mishap.” “A werewolf shot him in the head?”

I don’t play nice.

#spn meta #spn picspam #spn 12x20 #twigs & twine & tasha banes #spn recap #dean winchester #Sam Winchester #mary winchester #arthur ketch #max banes #alicia banes #tasha banes #supernatural season 12

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qohesive-blog · 7 years

Text

so we’ve got some catching up to do - obligatory college reflection // 170712

Not. Letting. This. One. Slide.

Yes, I am aware that it’s been almost exactly a year since my last post here, and I’ve got no one but myself to blame. It’s not because omg, college kept me so busy (it was), it’s not because I deleted tumblr from my phone (because I can still go on desktop), it’s not because I was so happy and satisfied with my life that I don’t need a creative outlet anymore (couldn’t be further from the truth; if anything, I need to write now more than ever); in fact, I’ve probably lost count of how many times I lied cozy in my bed, no plans on a Friday night, thinking to myself hm it’s literally been 6 months since I’ve written something even though I made a huge deal about writing consistently. oh well, can’t be bothered and then gone to watch yet another episode of Jane the Virgin. Unlike most things in my life, I won’t spend time here trying to overanalyze the specific reasons why it’s so dang hard for me to commit to writing, if there are any subconscious fears or personality traits that drive this. All I can say is that I’m exceedingly thankful for the people who God have gifted with the power of words that inspire one to move, and that I am a lazy ‘lil pooper, and that I will continue to fight the good fight. Moving on, let’s get straight into business:

Obligatory First Year College Reflection

So school officially ended over two months ago, and needless to say, I’ve been given plenty of time to reflect on my first two semesters of college. Gosh, where do I start….

The Good

I’ve had the opportunity to meet a handful of kind, genuine people who made my day brighter whenever I saw them, as well as a handful of hilarious people who make me laugh, understand my humor, make me feel comfortable, and who I just generally “click” with. And it’s been really hard for me to find those sort of people in college.

(Angela, Claire, Tracy: in a place where I felt like I had to constantly put on at least some kind of act, you guys let me feel like myself. Thank you.)

HSM!! Composed primarily out of all the freshman people who met at AAIV. I’m thankful I was able to connect with a good group of Asian Christians who I know can support me and who I can support as well. I love you guys!

The opportunity to get closer to Hannah and Jon! I first met Hannah at winter retreat like 4 years back, but we haven’t really talked until we were paired for STM last summer. Being able to see her every week and grabbing the occasional meal together has honestly been such a blessing this year. She’s a brilliant, hilarious, beautiful sister in Christ and I’m really really thankful she’s here at OSU. For Jon, we got closer senior year of high school, but this year we were able to actually hang out more since he’s more involved in the asian community. He’s probably the guy friend that I have the most fun with just because whenever we’re around each other we both get super goofy and it’s just a nice, refreshing breath of air from all the other stress in my life when I’m able to be around someone who I don’t have to pretend to be someone I’m not. Through both Jon and Hannah, I’ve been able to have some pretty meaningful conversations about faith that made me reflect about my life when I otherwise would have just went with the flow of school and work.

A satisfactory relationship with my roommate. Natalie and I…..we’re not best friends, but we also don’t hate each other’s guts like most roommate horror stories I hear about. Sure, it was awkward at first because we didn’t really talk that much outside of typical pleasantries, but after a while I started to realize that it was simply her personality: Natalie is, like me at the core, introverted, a minimalist but efficient conversationalist, and one who doesn’t usually initiate conversation. And although it’s a bummer that I’m not coming out of my first year of college, locked arm-in-arm with my newfound soulmate and a binding roommate for the next three years, I appreciated the pocket of peace and quiet that Natalie offered me whenever I came back to the room, exhausted from networking events and club meetings and talking to people I didn’t want to talk to, to some much appreciated solace. Nevertheless, throughout our time together I was slowly able to see some of Natalie’s hidden quirks that she conceals underneath a seemingly stoic exterior; she spends her Friday nights baking cookies for us, she refers to herself as a “free bird”, she blasts country music in the shower and sings along with it when she doesn’t know that I came home early.

Expanding my circle of people I usually interact with. All throughout high school, I’ve mainly just kept to my comfortable Asian community. Not that there was ever anything wrong with that, and not that I’ve completely changed from that, but I just wanted to put myself in situations in which I wasn’t used to, just because I think it’s important for me to do so since I literally can’t socialize with non asians lol.

(Jon, Natalie, Alex, Jess, Erin, Truman, Tyeal, Gitu, Emma, Shiyuan, Ros, Joling, Dillon, Johann: you guys really didn’t have to keep talking to me. I know I’m super awkward, weird, and just generally not the typical person you’d hang out with, but you guys tolerated me at the least and made your way into my life at the most. Thank you for talking about your favorite books with me, and letting me show you my favorite youtube videos. Thank you for acting disappointed when I said I was going to go up to my room at because my shift ended an hour ago and I wanna sleep, dangit, and then being genuinely excited to see me reluctantly agree to stay a little longer. Thank you for showing me your collection of sketches when I showed you my own, and then drawing your own sketch of me for me to keep. Thank you for stopping at my room, knocking frantically at my door at 2am to freak out over relationship drama, and even though I may have answered the door all grumpy, mouth set in a scowl because I had an 8am the next morning, secretly I was relieved that I had been able to reach that level of closeness with a new friend.)

Really good grades!!!! Like, realllyyyy good, like I got all A’s!!!!!!! I’m actually pretty excited about this one, since in high school each semester was usually tainted by one bad grade. To be fair, first year business students don’t exactly have the most difficult of schedules, but I’m gonna choose optimism over cynicism this time and take the opportunity to feel proud of myself. I maintained a pretty good work ethic throughout the two semesters, and the best part of it? I think I’m falling in love with learning again. Seriously, I’m excited to learn. High school was different; in high school, I got the A not because I learned the material well, but because all I had in mind were collegescollegescolleges. Now that pressure is off- I’m at a mediocre state school with a lot less competition and a lot less toxicity, and that’s really given me the chance to reexamine my relationship with education and place it under a whole new light. It helps that most of my professors were pretty amazing (Writing for Engineers and Anthropology professors come to mind) and the courses I choose got me absolutely PUMPED to get to class (Chinese Film, Korean). Of course, perhaps I’m speaking too early and I’ll actually find myself hating school once again when I’m drowning under accounting and statistics next year, but I’ll enjoy the feeling while it lasts…..

Tried new things. This year, I joined a J2K group that was doing Seventeen’s Aju nice. The last time I performed dance was in 3rd grade during my fleeting one year relationship with ballet. I’m not a horrible dancer by any means, but I’m also far from the best; in fact, I’d probably place myself slightly below average. Nevertheless, I’m pretty proud that I was able to try out this new experience, and all the hours we put in each week practicing never felt like work; it was always a fun time dancing with the other people on my team and learning how to make our moves look better. Spring semester, I also joined a fraternity. Phi Chi Theta is a professional business fraternity, but it was still something that was way out of my comfort zone. I unfortunately did not realize this fact until a few months after I joined since I jumped into it rather impulsively, but I have too much pride in me to drop it (and I also already paid $150 for two semesters). I don’t want to shy away from this just because I’m not comfortable, though. Most of the people here in PCT are really different than me. They party, drink, make jokes that I’m not used to, and are just a group that I would not have associated with if it not had been for a) a few of my friends in PCT who told me it was a good group b) my pride c) the stinging rejection of not making it past the final round of BUCC interviews (a topic for a later date) d) my pride e) my pride (sensing a pattern here? once again, a topic for a later date). Given the second chance, I honestly would not have chosen to rush PCT again, but….I’m here. And even though most of the people here are intimidating, there’s also a few handful of people that I’m curious to get to know a little better, so for the time being I have to work with what I got.

There’s probably a lot of other good stuff that have happened, but for the sake of cutting this short, I’m gonna move on. Hopefully I can revisit this topic later!

The Bad

Social anxiety. Not actual, diagnosed social anxiety, but…I don’t know. Looking back at it all, I was very, very, very naive when I applied to colleges. I thought just because I enjoyed talking among my little bubble of friends back home meant that I was a social butterfly and thus suited for business. WRONG. I’m not a social butterfly, as I quickly learned within my few first months here. Maybe I’m just really good at hiding it or something because literally the amount of people who have been shocked when I say I’m an introvert….(which is actually extremely disturbing to me lol because I’m like the biggest insecure introvert in the entire world what the heck) I hate talking, people make me nervous, I constantly recite conversations in my head before I say them, I freak out over me messing up on a word which makes me mess up even more, I hate frat parties, I hate it when I have to leave my room, I just hate hate hate hate social interaction I DON’T LIKE IT. It scares me and I can literally feel my skin crawl thinking about how awkward I am. The thing is, none of these fears really came to light until this year; I, at one point, even questioned if I were an extrovert back in high school. You know what, though? It was because home was familiar. Jerome friends were people who I literally spent 4+ years growing up with. Church friends, some twice as long, even longer. I was “social” because I was comfortable, and I also thrived within the subcultures that I was familiar with. But coming here? Everything is different. I’m not in the Dublin bubble anymore, I can’t make the same jokes around my asian friends as I do around other people. This literally broke me lol I had an identity crisis. I stopped speaking up, I feel constantly self conscious about everything, my face turns red when I’m the slightest bit embarrassed (I’ve never had that happen to me before), and I stutter when I talk. But even with these things, I look pretty much normal from an external point of view; I don’t think people think this way about me when they first meet me as much as I do. I feel like these things are so big just because I’m hyperaware of everything but I’m scared that if given enough time, they will become so big that other people start to notice too. I’m actually mildly bitter towards high school and Jerome because I was so sheltered there; people have told me Jerome was weird but this is the first time I’m actually understanding the meaning of that lol. Jerome is weird, we don’t socialize with people the way you typically socialize with people in college, and I really should be more than mildly bitter at both the environment I grew up in and myself for not being more proactive, but at the same time, I’m not sure if I would change it. Weird. Need more time to think about this.

Slightly related, a crippling anxiety that business may not be the right path for me. Yeah, so I hate talking to people and speaking up. Literally the opposite of business. A part of me wonders if me taking AP Chemistry freshman year at Jerome was a contributing factor in me not wanting to pursue science. A big part of me wants to say yes. I wasn’t bad at Chem or Bio, not bad at all, but the pressure of forcing myself to take an AP class as a freshman really ruined learning science for me and left a bad taste in my mouth at the mention of science ever since then. Now, I realize that I really wasn’t horrible at those subjects and am familiar with a more efficient way to learn and I can’t help but feel that my personality is more suited for science, maybe biology or something? I value school and I value education and genuity and kindness and I’ve met some business students who don’t really meet that. Of course, I’m sure there are business majors who are the most amazing people you could meet, but I can firmly, 300% say that I’ve statistically clicked better with non-business majors. Once again, though, I’m too stubborn to drop this, and part of me is hoping that things will get better when my classes get smaller and I get to know Fisher students a little better. Fingers crossed.

I don’t really feel connected to church. I wanted to take both semesters off from 4c and try out some other churches in Columbus for the sake of expanding my comfort circle, and because I really needed a break (once again, a topic for a later time). Well, I didn’t exactly do just that. Whether it’s because I did so out of guilt or out of my own free will, I still went to 4c. Not every week, but enough that I didn’t really fully immerse myself in a different church for the duration of last year. As a result, I was neither fully committed to 4c nor other churches. I’ve given it some thought though, and though I’m a bit disappointing that I didn’t get to spend as much time with the Veritas congregation as I wanted to, I think I should still stick to 4c for now. There’s resignations that I have about 4c, but at the end of the day, it’s my home church, and I feel like I should stay and take time to build its community.

The Things Yet to Come

Of course, it would suck to end on such a depressing note. here’s a few of the things to come in the future, some potentially good, some potentially bad; I hate having my expectations crushed so I like to keep future thoughts mostly ambivalent.

I’m gonna be a membership chair for KSA next year! Equally mixed feeling about this. Considering my earlier rant about ihatetalkingithinki’mawkwardnoonewantstotalktome, and considering family heads are basically the forefront of internal communications with the club, I’m extremely, extremely nervous. Thomas and Lisa know what they’re doing though, and they’ve done a good job so far about getting all of us to help prepare the basic details for next year. I just really, really don’t want to disappoint them and I don’t want the disappoint the rest of the e-board who picked me to be one of the four family heads out of all the rest of everyone to apply. KSA is a really cool organization, and I’d love for me to be able to personally get to know a small portion of its members, and I really, really hope my anxiety doesn’t get in the way. I’ve got a few things prepared to hopefully make the experience memorable for my future family: I got a new camera that I’m planning on vlogging with whenever we go on outings, I ordered a bunch of stationary so I can write cute birthday notes to people, and I wanna make a survey to hand out to everyone at the first meeting to gauge everyone’s expectations and get to know them on a basic level (aka taking a picture of everyone’s faces and memorizing them because I’m horrible with names). I’m praying that I won’t be too awkward to my family next semester

asl;dfjalkj ROOMING WITH HSM GIRLS AHHHHHHHH I’m so excited for this yes yes yes!!! Meeting new people has been quite the experience last year but I’ve been absolutely hyped for the opportunity to finally be able to be on the same floor as the ladies who I feel most comfortable with !!! I’ll be rooming with maddie, Claire with Hannah, and then Jesse with a random roommate and we’ll all be in one square. I myself have spent the past month pinning and buying home decor for me and maddie’s room (at the expense of my poor wallet) and last week I made this really sweet flower pressed picture frame! This is the first time I’ve actually been this involved with home decor lol; my room has always been a hideous amalgram of clippings, notebooks, trinkets, just everything that I’m too afraid to throw away. Planning for next year’s room has really changed me lol. I’m even thinking of going back and reorganizing my shelf (!!!) once I get home to make my room look more ~minimalistic~ lol.

New freshmennnnnnnnn hehehehe I’m actually kind of eager to see the new freshmen that are gonna be on campus next year. Pretty stoked that Hannah and Jenna will still be here; hopefully I’ll use this opportunity to get closer to them! It’ll be nice finally graduating from the #new2osu rank hahahaha.

Classes! This one is also kind of mixed lol. I’m really looking forward to Korean, I’ve been practicing over the summer and kind of miss seeing my classmates every day. Accounting and Stats I’m absolutely terrified for since I’ve never been good with numbers, but after the events of last year I’m filled with a determination I’ve never felt before to tackle tough academics and maybe turn them into my strengths???? For what it’s worth, I bought a bunch of new notebooks from IKEA and new highlighters and that always motivates me to take real good notes.

So there’s probably a million things that I’m missing, but I’ve been sitting here typing for the good majority of 3 hours and my fingers feel kind of funny hahaha. I got the basic stuff for the most part, and it feels really really satisfying to have finally been able to lay something down on this blog after a year hiatus. There’s definitely topics that I still wanna write about, so here’s to the continued battle against inertia and an ever inspired heart!

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