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rovewritesit · 4 years

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Angel Of My Dreams (Chapter 5) John Deacon x Reader Series

GIF: @johndeac

Apologies for the delay! Work has been an absolute shit fest. The big show I’m on got canceled, but we still have to finish the season at some point so oof. Also, my boss is moving to Italy? Pray for my sanity, folks.

Series Summary: After reluctantly joining a band with your childhood best friends, you are thrust into oncoming stardom with no sea legs and an overwhelming sense of anxiety. But you just might find your way, thanks to some seasoned pros by your side. And the interest of one particular bassist.

This series is a work of fiction and is loosely inspired by real people and events. Absolutely no offense is meant to actual Queen or their families.

PART 1 - PART 2 - PART 3 - PART 4

Pairing: John Deacon x Reader

Chapter Warnings: Strong language. Feelings of anxiety. Angst (oooo!)

Chapter Notes: I've rewritten this chapter so many times that I don't even know what it is anymore. Angst is hard, my dudes! Why can't it all be flirty glances and quick banter?!

Song/Title Inspiration: Angel - Fleetwood Mac

Songs Mentioned:

Moonlight in Vermont - Frank Sinatra

Blues Run The Game - Jackson C. Frank

Taglist: @yourlocalmusicalprostitute @brianmays-hair @deacyblues @squishy-geckboye @hae-bee @aprilaady @theresalexis @uglipotata72829

- - - - - - -

September 1982 - The Music Inn, New York City

“Bri, get a load of all these fucking maracas!”

Brian makes his way over to where Roger is gazing at a massive wall adorned with shaker-filled shelves, dipping his head low to avoid the sea of guitars hanging from the ceiling above his long frame.

Queen was back in New York for their first-ever appearance on Saturday Night Live. Finding time in between the intensive rehearsals during the week had been hard, but Freddie insisted they would make the time for his favorite New Yorkers. When the time was finally found, he, of course, was unavailable, off antiquing at some of Manhattan’s luxury spots but promised to meet up with the group later on.

The Limbs managed to snag the other three men for a trip to the historic Music Inn. Nestled in the heart of Greenwich Village, the dingy treasure trove was located a stone’s throw away from the city’s most prominent folk clubs that boasted discovering the talents of Bob Dylan and Simon & Garfunkel.

You were quite confident that your newfound English friends would love it. Every visible space was stuffed or covered with an abundance of musical paraphernalia. So much so that you had been in the store dozens of times without ever finding out what color the walls were. Its layout was always changing to fit the ever-growing amount of items displayed, the familiar specks of dust that sparkled in the sunlight being the only constants.

“Hey, Jeff!” Steve calls out to the eccentric owner. “Where are these from?”

The aging hippie shuffles over. “Mostly South America,” he explains in his usual gravelly drawl. “A customer brought back some new shekeres from West Africa last week that have a nice sound to them.” Jeff motions up the sprawling wall. Roger immediately grabs a few, testing the sounds out against the ones Steve is already playing with - the two of them like kids in a candy store.

Jeff had been a good friend to The Limbs since their early teen years, having let the group spend hours on end attempting to learn every exotic instrument they could get their hands on. Anyone who entered the shop could count on him as a spirit guide of sorts to a wealth of worldly music. And while The Limbs had kept their first album fairly plain in context, they were already itching, particularly Steve, to experiment on the next album. Whenever that would be.

Now that a few more of their singles were moderately successful hits, Columbia Records was focused on milking it for all that it was worth. The execs were currently setting up an extensive American tour of the Mid - West Coast part of the country, all the major cities they hadn’t hit on their first tour.

“Y/N,” Jeff gestures for you to follow him, probably excited to show you a new find seeing as you were always eager and willing to give them a test run. You make your way down the staircase lined with large balalaikas to the musty lower level filled with various sound equipment and electronic instruments.

“What on god’s green earth would you use that for?” you hear Rich’s deep voice implore. He rolls his eyes as Eddie moons over an ornately engraved mandolin.

“It worked for Rod Stewart, didn’t it? That mandolin solo in Maggie May shredded,” he retorts. “Plus, look how pretty she is!”

You watch your feet as you carefully maneuver around the amps and pedals haphazardly strewn around the floor, following Jeff to the back of the room - taking special care to step around John, who is crouched low looking over the wiring of a particularly grody-looking amp.

Upon entering the store, he had taken off on his own right away, immediately entranced by the sprawling selection all about him. But you had caught the worn, far-off look in his eyes when he greeted you with a short wave earlier. You try not to let the lack of attention bother you as you pass him without so much as a glance up. The heartfelt conversation you had the last time they were in town had rooted itself in your memory. Spilling your guts like you did that night wasn't a common occurrence for you- figuring you were already easy enough to read due to the panicked expression often etched onto your face.

Why him? Even your bandmates weren’t privy to the babblings of your intimate thoughts. It couldn’t just be his boyish tooth-gap or the pleasing line of his straight nose. Maybe it was the confusing mix of nerves and comfort you felt whenever in his presence. It was unlike the persistent butterflies you were used to when around attractive humans. Feeling instead like a gentle humming that you somehow sensed everywhere at once.

You’re brought out of your swimming thoughts as Jeff clears his throat loudly to get your attention. You must’ve been staring blankly at the floor for quite a while. He gestures to a bulky item draped in a tarp, as you give him a small apologetic smile.

“Oh yes, very pretty,” you smirk at him.

He rolls his eyes as he attempts to sweep the tarp off in a dramatic reveal, but in reality, it gets stuck. The man scrambles to uncover it, and as soon as it peeks out, you gasp.

“A theremin!”

You gaze at the ordinary-looking wooden cabinet in awe. It must be old, seeing as they were mostly compact now.

“You haven’t had one in ages,” you marvel, locking eyes with Jeff.

“Which means it’s been a while since I’ve heard your ambient screeches plaguing these walls.”

Your finger points to him in protest. “Hey, I was getting better until you sold the last one on me!”

“Well, I didn’t see you making a bid for it,” he playfully shrugs.

“Let’s hear those screeches!” Eddie yells out. Rich claps his hands excitedly beside him. You poke your tongue out at them, but your eyes catch John’s, and you quickly close your mouth. Still crouched, he looks on with mild curiosity wrinkled on his brow. He lightly raises them at you in silent encouragement.

You slowly make your way behind the instrument as Jeff plugs it into the wall. Turning one of the knobs, it hums to life as you check the metal attachments protruding from the wood frame. It really is old. You have no idea how to even begin to calibrate it. Taking a deep breath, you timidly bring your hands up in position.

It lets out a high pitched wail that burns your ears from being so close, and you yank your hands away from the field of current. Eddie and Rich erupt into cheers while John slowly stands, moving a bit closer to see the mechanism properly.

Jeff lightly pushes you back towards it in a gentle coax. This time you slowly bring your curled hand a reasonable distance away from the pitch antenna, keeping your other low on the one for volume. Squeezing your eyes shut to focus on the tone, you slowly move until you find your starting note. It was all about sense memory and your ears to fill the gaps with nothing to physically touch.

Uncurling your fingers, you begin the opening notes of Moonlight in Vermont - the one song you had somewhat taught yourself through hours of painstaking practice. You fumble a bit, eliciting a squeak or two while trying to remember the hand placements that produce the proper notes. While you might “play” many instruments, you were middling at many, master of none. You make it through the first verse before your head starts to pound from your jaw-clenched concentration.

“Fuck the mandolin, let’s get that for the next album!” you hear Rich tell Eddie.

“Ah, yes, you’ve heard Pet Sounds. Now prepare your ears for The Limb’s sophomore attempt, Ghost Sounds,”

Their banter is drowned out as John chimes in. “How on earth did you learn that?” You meet his struck expression and shrug lightly.

“Don’t downplay it, Bun. It’s pretty fucking cool,” Rich assures you. “And her knowing ASL also helps,” he explains to John.

“Sign language?”

“Oh yeah, Y/N’s mom is deaf,” Eddie reveals bluntly. You shoot him a look.

“Sorry, hard of hearing,” he holds his hands out in defense.

John is silent for a moment as he mulls the information over, causing a speck of tension in the room.

“Your mother’s never heard you sing?” he asks incredulously as if he can’t possibly imagine it.

You give a small smile. “No, I guess she hasn’t. But I was in the car with her the first time I heard us on the radio. I turned the treble down and the bass all the way up and she bopped along to the beat pretty well.”

Rich chuckles lightly at the story. “She’s always been hoot, hasn’t she?”

You nod gently. “Aptly put. That’s how she describes herself as a matter of fact.”

John shoves his hands deep in his pockets as he takes a look around the room, his cheeks a light pink. You're unsure of why.

“I’m gonna head out for a quick smoke,” you decide, patting Jeff on the shoulder. “I know how you hate it.”

He gives your hand a light squeeze before you make your way upstairs, hoping to catch John’s eyes, but he avoids yours yet again.

A pleasing blend of harmonies can be heard as you hit the landing. You peek your head around a large assortment of bongos to find Brian strumming a small acoustic on the other side of the store. Roger, Steve, and Lawrence all crammed around, the four of them singing a rendition of Blues Run the Game.

Your heart warms at the sight, remembering the times when you and the boys would sit around a campfire and croon out the same sad tune. Eddie and Rich will be pissed they missed this. Steve notices your presence and silently ticks his head for you to come join. You hold up your pack of Marlborough’s in response to him before finally slipping out the front, trying your best to not jingle the adorned bells too much.

A cool breeze promptly passes through the knit of your sweater. It’s late September, and New York has begun to really cool off. You pull down the sleeves to cover your hands as you light your cigarette, wincing a bit on the first inhale. It was a leftover habit from your college days- scarcely used, only in social situations, or to get out of awkward ones.

Taking in the familiar street, you can’t help but giggle at the day you were having. To be showing Queen around your old hangout still felt absurd. No matter how genuinely they seemed to like the company of your band, you couldn’t fathom them wanting to spend the day with you all. Weren’t there bigger and better musicians in this city to be hanging out with?

The sound of a lighter flicking to life comes from your left, and you turn. John leans against the faded wall as he takes a drag, his eyes trained on the dirty sidewalk.

“I’m sorry, i- if I offended you with my comment about your mother,” he professes quietly.

Your brows shoot up in confusion. “What?”

“We have a friend whose father is deaf. A lovely man. I shouldn’t have been so insensitive.” He sighs, finally turning to face you. “It’s just that the memory of hearing your voice for the first time isn’t something one can easily shake. I mean that in a way that- it’s just a shame really. For her to not be able to share in it when it’s something so...” he looks as if he’s racking his brain for an appropriate word. “Well, singular.”

You suck in a breath at his words. In all your years, you had never gotten that as a response to your mother’s disability. It was mostly a polite, “Oh, really? I’m so sorry to hear that.” His honesty and consideration for your feelings knock the present hum of your body up to 100.

You flinch as gentle burning hits your fingers, and you look down at your forgotten cigarette, quickly flicking it to the ground before crushing it under your heel. John shifts his weight from side to side, never taking his eyes off of you while he waits for you to collect your thoughts.

“I write out my lyrics for her so she can read them as poems,” you state simply, smiling up at him. “Sometimes she makes up her own melodies and sings them around the house. It’s not the easiest on the ears, but she’s pretty inventive.” His eyes crinkle as he returns your grin - his first genuine one of the day.

“So she’s heard music before?”

“Oh yeah. She has nerve deafness, which didn’t start till her late twenties. She actually spent a lot of time around here when she was younger. Bitter End and The Gaslight are just a few blocks away.”

He hums lightly as he stares at you- like you’re a puzzle whose pieces are just beginning to fit together.

“Can you teach me something in sign language?”

Once again, your brows shoot up, shocked by his response. You blink a few times, trying to think of what to say. Going with the only thing that pops to mind, you sign out a phrase as he watches your hands intently.

“And what does that mean?”

You smirk, “You are a cheesy cow.”

“I’m sorry?” he laughs out.

You repeat it back slowly while signing along. “You. Are. A. Cheesy. Cow. It’s the first thing my mother taught me how to sign.”

He runs his hand over his jaw as he chuckles. “Rich was right. A hoot she must be.”

“I’m pretty shit, to be honest, and she read lips, so it’s mostly used for snide comments during extended family gatherings.”

You watch as he puts out his cigarette and carefully takes a step closer to you. “I’m assuming your colourful vocabulary extends to those instances as well.”

“Right you are.”

“Freddie will love that,” he snickers. “He always seems to collect vulgarities in other languages wherever we go.”

Your attention is torn away as a sleek black car rolls up to a stop at the curb. It’s out of place in the middle of the street filled with old and worn buildings, which can similarly describe the people who mill about.

“Speak of the Queen herself,” you laugh as a sunglass-clad Freddie steps onto the sidewalk.

“Oh, isn’t this quaint!” he exclaims, peering into the shop window. He straightens as he turns to you, hands-on-hips.

“Deacy. Thumper. Are we fans of freezing our tits off, or shall we go inside?”

You give John a small smile and push yourself off the wall, making your way over to Freddie, who immediately pulls you into a bone-crushing hug. The bells against the door ring out as you all enter the shop.

“Ah, Deacy,” Brian pokes his head out from one of the narrow aisles, still in a constant crouch to avoid the instruments above his head. “I was looking for you. Found these adorable teeny guitars I thought might be good to bring back for the kids. What do you think?”

“Kids?” you mumble to yourself as John makes his way over to inspect them.

“Brian has two, and John’s already up to 3. Maybe we should’ve nicknamed him Bunny.” Freddie laughs, nudging your arm. “You know… fucking like rabbits,” he expands due to your lack of chuckling.

He leans into your field of vision as he studies your statue-like expression, eyebrows knit in confusion. His eyes take in your ashen face and your lifeless expression. You weren’t even sure if you were breathing. When you lock your eyes with his, you know he understands from the sheer size of how big they become. He straightens up, glancing around quickly as if looking for something to put out a fire.

“Freddie!” Steven dances over, clicking a pair of castanets in his hands. “I wanted to show you thi-”

“So sorry, love, we can’t. Y/N promised to come to a fitting with me, and we’re already late," he announces loudly, pulling you by the arm and out the door before anyone can react.

- - - - - - -

You blankly stare at your reflection in the long mirror. Freddie had instructed his stylist to pull some outfits for you to parade around in as he tried on a bevy of metallic coats.

“You’re an idiot,” you tell the girl staring back at you.

Freddie sashays over, a shag jacket swaying with him as he places his hands on your shoulders, surveying the strappy dress you were currently squeezed into.

“Oh yes, this will do for the after-party,” he instructs.

“I’m not going.”

He heaves a deep sigh. “Darling, you already refused the ticket I got you for the show. You’re coming to the party,” he declares, turning away to look at more options.

“This isn’t really me…” you mumble, gesturing to the dress.

He regards you with a small smile. “Exactly. I say this with love, but you need a look, Y/N. Something that makes you feel unstoppable,” he gestures to his body as he twirls towards you. “Don’t you want to shock them?”

You chew your lip as you ponder that sentiment. Dawn usually just shoved you into whatever ensemble she had picked for you - leather jackets, monochromatic sets, tight jumpsuits. She kept hoping you’d find a style you fancied, but you had yet to find anything remotely likable under the lights of the stage.

“To be honest, I just want to be able to feel comfortable out there," you sigh. "But I can’t strut around in flashy outfits or conduct a whole crowd like you do." Huffing as you collapse onto one of the white couches around you. He perches beside you, throwing an arm around the back of the sofa.

“Then don’t,” he says simply.

You snort a response as you cross your arms over your chest.

“I’m sure you’ve heard this before, but have you tried showing them a bit more of yourself?”

“I can’t do that.”

He turns to you now, grabbing your attention with his eyes.

“And why not?” he questions.

You gaze down at your hands, which you’re now wringing together in your lap. “What if it’s nothing spectacular?” you whisper out the criticism that you'd drilled into your mind for the past year.

Freddie laughs lightly as he stands. “Let’s not start lying to ourselves, shall we?” He moves in front of you and kneels, now at eye level, making so you can’t look away.

“Sometimes people go to a concert for an escape. A big bloody show with dazzling lights and petite men galavanting around a stage in spandex tights,” he smiles.

“But most of the time they just want to find a piece of themselves in it, don’t they? Commonality. They want to hear you, see you, and feel just a little less alone than we all know we are. I saw just a slice of it at your concert, and it was indeed something spectacular. So take that as you will.”

You’re not one to cry much, but your eyes soften as you take in the icon of a man in front of you. A man loved by millions, who was currently filling in as your personal rock n’ roll fairy godmother.

“You’re a fantastic person, you know that?” you tell him genuinely.

“Yes,” he quips as he gets to his feet. “Now, are we done scurrying around the real problem at hand?”

You sigh as you look away, firmly willing yourself not to break the dam of bottled emotions threatening to spill out. Why couldn't you just feel numb? It would be better than the wave of childish self-pity you found yourself in.

Freddie huffs at your reaction. “Oh, you brat. Sorry to tell you, but you’re an open book, my dear. And not one of those big pompous things Brian reads. A bloody children’s book. One filled with pictures.”

You're sure you’ve now bitten through the entire top layer of your lip as you contemplate how to even begin.

“I’m an idiot,” you shrug to yourself yet again.

“No,” he points a finger at you. “You’re decidedly not. Though I am curious as to how someone who’s as big of a fan as your friends say you are, missed out on that detail.”

“I’m not sure either. I mean, I listen to your albums and go to your show, but I guess I didn’t pour over the tabloids or press interviews or anything like that.”

Freddie nods along as he sifts through another rack of jackets, choosing an incredibly tight white leather number.

“I assumed you knew,” he answers while glancing at his reflection. “And I would say Deacy should know better, but he’s not quite himself at the moment.”

“What do you mean?” you press, suddenly much more interested in the conversation.

He turns to you, palms up in explanation. “It’s not that he wouldn’t normally be charmed by your shy presence and occasionally crass mouth… But I’m a bit worried he’s finding comfort in your smiles for the wrong reasons.”

“Huh?”

Sighing heavily as if debating if he should keep skirting around his words, he holds your gaze. “An impending divorce is crippling lonely, even if it is somewhat amicable.”

His mouth is brought into a pout as you suck in a sharp breath.

Divorce. All your previous interactions play through your head from a different angle. Pity sneaks up on you as you remember John’s advice he’d given you. The concept of home is a funny thing. You scoff out loud at how your childlike crush had skewed your interpretation of your relationship with the man.

“I’m usually the one singing his praises,” Freddie muses, breaking you out of your inner monologue of resentment towards yourself. “But he seems more lost than usual at the moment.”

He gently lifts your chin. “I don’t normally meddle in- well, actually I do. Just don’t want to see you get hurt, Bunny. Not when the world is soon to be at your feet.”

"I'm fine," you lie, gently brush away his gesture. "I barely even know the guy. I was just shocked to have my silly fascination with him interrupted. Stupid, really."

"Don't do that," he exhales. "Don't put it on yourself. You'd have to be blind to ignore the fact that he's quite taken with you."

"I'm fine," you repeat, making your way into the back to change out of the ridiculous dress that suddenly felt even tighter now.

Shutting the door slowly, you let out a deep breath. It's all good, you tell yourself. Of course you got caught up in the attention of a world-renown musician. Who wouldn't? It's nothing special. As Freddie said, he's not even acting like himself. Although you were indeed in true form- getting caught up by the slightest of interactions. Unconsciously playing them as a loop in your head. You can't help but cringe at your own escalation of the situation.

Squaring your shoulders, you take in the image of yourself in the dress again. Perhaps it was time for you to shock them all.

- - - - - - -

“And so my grandfather goes out to the alley and sees her just wailing on this scrawny man. I mean, really going to town. So he pulls her off him, and the dude’s got a black eye and a bloody nose. And he’s like, “Thanks mate, thought she was gonna kill me there.”

Roger ruffles your hair in response to your poor attempt at a British accent. The group of cast and crew around you chuckle at the gesture.

You had decided that if you were going to be forcibly dragged to this after-party by your bandmates, you would at least aim to make it worthwhile. A debut of your new mentality. One where you weren't just acting the part of a rising rock star, but living it.

Which is why at the moment, you found yourself the center of attention, surrounded by the cast and crew of SNL laughing along to your amusing story. But this was all hinged on you carefully, avoiding the presence of John Deacon at all costs. Which, in reality, wasn't very hard to do- you had yet to see him since arriving an hour ago.

“Oh my god, who was it?!” the young cast member beside you presses. You think her name is Julia, but the sheer amount of people you'd been introduced to was dizzying.

"That's exactly what we asked him when he told us. All he said was that it was some man with big lips who was in a fur coat and looked like he hadn't eaten in a month..."

The cam op across from you gasps, "It was MICK JAGGER? God bless your grandfather, I would've wept if she murdered him."

"So would my mom AND grandmother," you laugh. "Give us each a glass of wine, and it's basically a Mick fan club."

"Who else?" Brian taps your leg, surprisingly urging you to divulge more gossip.

You can't help but smirk as the group leans forward intently.

"Robin Williams?" you tease as their eyebrows all raise.

"Horrible tipper, but he makes up for it by performing dirty puppet shows with the napkins."

"Sounds about right," funnyman Brad Hall confirms, offering you another drink.

You politely decline, determined to keep your wits about you this evening. "I'm gonna go grab some water. Anyone want anything?"

The group shakes their heads, but Lawrence jumps up to join you on your trek to the crowded bar.

"Wouldn't it be insane if this was us one day?" he exclaims as you weave your way through the mass of bodies littering the Capitol Grill.

You smile up at him, "Dream big, buddy."

"Oh, I intend to," he confirms you as you spot Eddie and Rich waving you over from a spot at the bar.

Rich promptly wraps his arm around your shoulders as you join them. He always had a stoic way of letting you know he saw through the cracks in your poorly constructed armor. Taking the role of a caring older brother, more so than your own.

"Have we lost Steve again?" Lawrence asks the group.

Eddie nods across the room. "He's exactly where you think he'd be," he scoffs as you catch a glimpse of Steve, trailing Freddie like a lost puppy.

"Um, excuse me?" a short girl mumbles from behind Eddies' denim-clad shoulder. He turns, glancing down.

"Hiya," he regards her casually, causing her a deep blush to creep across her cheeks. She shoves a napkin and pen at him.

"C-could I get an autograph? Please?"

Eddie smirks at her flustered appearance, making sure to brush her fingers as he grabs the items out of her trembling hand.

"And what beautiful name should I be making this out to?"

She lets out a jarring high pitched giggle as she stumbles over her words. "Oh, uh, Shelley."

"Well, here ya go, Shelley," he hands the napkin back to her, now adorned with his messy scrawl. "Maybe I'll see you later."

She squeaks as she hurries back to her shrieking friends who are huddled conspicuously off to the side.

"Gross," you state. "She's a child. Probably one of the executive's kids."

He rolls his eyes dramatically. "Gotta keep em' interested, Bun. As the heartthrob of the group, it's my sworn duty."

"Slow your roll there, Rob Lowe," Rich interjects. "I think Y/N's giving you a run for your money in this dress."

You glance down at the Freddie approved ensemble. It was eye-catching for sure, precisely what you were going for. It's black suede straps crisscrossed strategically against your body, giving peaks of the skin underneath.

"It looks good, Bun," Rich assures you.

“Guys,” you all turn your attention to Steve, who has just joined the circle clumsily. His pupils are blown wide from his current blood alcohol content, and he sways slightly on his heels.

"I- I have something to say," he announces to the group, getting your attention. You all wait patiently as he hesitates, clearing his throat twice before lowering his voice. “I just wanted to tell you that I’m gay.”

You glance around to the other boys whose expressions mirror your own warm smile. You’d all known Steve was gay since high school, not that any of you had talked about it. You had just assumed it was something unspoken. That he’d tell you whenever he was ready or met someone good enough to introduce to you all.

Steve gapes at your expressions. "Where is the shock? I was expecting shock and awe, people!"

"Steve, please don’t take this the wrong way. But I’m assuming we’ve all known for a while," Rich says gently. You all nod lightly in agreement.

"How?"

"Do you remember the types of girls who used to throw themselves at you? Like Becky Whale? Man, I would’ve killed for Becky Whale to throw something at me. But you never took them up on it," Lawrence elaborates.

Steve smiles around at all of you, his shoulders visibly relaxing.

“I had a crush on Eddie in high school,” he confesses.

Eddie pumps his fist lightly. “Fuck yeah.”

“Oh, c’mon!” Lawrence exclaims. “You just had to boost that ego, didn’t ya? I know pretty boys are great and all, but I’m the one with the big soft cuddles. People love big soft cuddles!”

Rich expands his arms as he brings you all in for a hug.

You kiss Steve gently on the cheek. “I’m proud of you, bud,” you whisper.

"Thank you guys, I just felt like it was time. And now that that's out of the way," Steve grunts as you all untangle yourselves. “I’m gonna go find Freddie. He said he’s taking me out to a club after this!”

He skips away with a grin, back towards Freddie, who catches your eye with a knowing smile and winks. It seems you weren’t the only band member who had found a fairy godmother in Mr. Mercury.

You all lightly laugh affectionately at your friend until Eddie and Lawrence wander off to scope out the food situation. You lean against the bar next to Rich, glancing around at the loud laughter erupting from the outgoing crowd. One person noticeably sticks out. A sullen John Deacon sits at the end of the bar, hunched over what looks like a glass of whiskey.

"Looks like he's in need of a friend," Rich surmises.

You tear your eyes away from the sorry sight to look at him. "They're around here somewhere," you shrug.

He rubs your arms up and down lightly before slinking into the crowd, knowingly leaving you alone.

You sneak a peek over at John. He runs one hand through his curls as the other absentmindedly stirs the straw of his sweating drink. You watch him sigh, bringing the glass to his lips and gulping down the spirit without so much as a wince.

Hesitantly making your way over to him, you rub your clammy hands over the expensive material of your dress. This is the opposite of avoidance, you scold yourself, silently willing your feet to change direction. But your willpower has seemingly left the building.

You carefully perch yourself on the stool next to his, as not to disturb his brooding. He glances over quickly, doing a double-take when he realizes who it is.

"Oh, hello there," he greets you with a small smile. "I didn't know you had arrived."

You nod your head lightly. "How could you? It seems you set up camp over here."

"Ah, yes," he breathes, straightening his posture. "Wasn't our best tonight, I'm afraid. Not much to celebrate."

You take a sip of your water as you continue to nod silently.

"Actually," he begins, angling his body towards yours, almost slipping off his stool as you notice his apparent intoxication. "I was thinking about that conversation we had. When I met your spritely grandfather."

"Oh?" you question. Keeping your face neutral even though your heart was already buzzing at the fact.

"Yes. Mostly about how naive I was—all that bloody nonsense about finding a home. Do me a favor and never take my advice, will you? You'll end up completely wrecking yours."

This was a bad idea.

"It's just- you draw these lines for yourself in the sand," he drawls, waving his hands about in front of him. "A stupid phrase, really. Where did it even come from?"

"The Bible," you tell him quietly.

He lets out a big sigh, rolling his head back to stare at the ceiling.

"Well, it's gotten it wrong before, hasn't it?"

You simply hum an acknowledgment, too scared to probe for fear of where this was going.

"Anyway, you draw these lines. Moral, physical, promises you make to yourself, things you swear you’d never do, dreams to accomplish," he lists out. "But sand moves about, dunnit? It blows all over the place. Makes a mess. Gets in your sandwich. And those lines blur. Or fade away. And all of a sudden, you've crossed them without even knowing! Broken those promises. Skipped right over those dreams."

He's too far gone in his rant to register the growing panic sweeping across your features.

"You were right. Sometimes you look in the mirror, and it's just a complete stranger staring back at you, isn't it?"

Trying to keep your breathing steady, you stare at the crumbling man before you. He runs his large hands along his face before ducking back into his former position, signaling for the bartender to bring him another drink.

This is precisely why you should've stuck to your original plan. What were you supposed to say to the man who was so obviously hurting from his failed marriage? So much so that it was pouring out of him. You know that if it weren't for the alcohol, he wouldn't be confiding any of this to you.

But there was a reason the boys called you the mom of the group, and it wasn't because you were the only female. You feel a pang of need to comfort him. You gaze at him, not with pity, but an overwhelming sense of empathy for the man and make up your mind.

You clear your throat to answer, brushing away your own warnings about how it would only sink you deeper into your fascination with him.

"I was wrong, actually," you start as he brings his head up to look at you. "And you know what phrase I hate? That people don't change."

He furrows his brow but remains silent as you continue.

"Maybe we're not made up of lines in the sand. Maybe we're the wind?" You try not to cringe at yourself and your poor use of metaphor. "And winds sometimes blow in different directions... but that's okay because it's where life is supposed to take them." Falling silent, you decide to quit while you’re ahead.

You're not ahead. You're not even out of the gate. What the fuck was that?

A slow smile inches onto his face as he holds your stare. "How did you get so wise for someone your age," he teases.

"And what age would that be?"

His mouth opens and closes as he studies your face. "Twenty?"

"Mm, close. Twenty-four."

"Really?" he ponders. "Freddie mentioned you dropped out of university."

"Ah, yes. The university I could only go to after working to afford it," you explain.

He continues to stare, the look in his eyes shifting slightly as he takes you in. A look that matches the color and intensity of uncharted, open water. You need to get out of here.

"Well, that explains your extraordinary use of analogy then."

Dragging your eyes off of his, you glance around at the party you were missing. Gladly missing, unfortunately.

"I should go check on Steve. He's having a bit of a night," you tell him as you stand. "Try not to drown yourself in those," gesturing to the new glass of whiskey in front of him.

"How can I drown myself? I thought I was the wind," he points out with a grin.

Before any more banter can ensue, you simply smile and make your way back to your friends. Thinking to yourself that maybe lines in the sand weren't so bad. And that perhaps it was time for you to start drawing some of your own.

#john deacon #john deacon fic #john deacon imagine #john deacon x reader #angelofmydreams

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nishinoya-is-baby · 4 years

Note

Heyyy! Just came here from Sugawara-sweethearts blog!! I was wondering if i could request a daichi x fem!reader where his s/o is british (long distance) and she comes to surprise visit him? (Fluff maybe smut?👀) they have met in person before but like its the first time in a while!

Hi!! Thank you so much for requesting! I’ll try my hardest to make you something you like! :) <3 (I’m sorry if this is too long for your liking, I’m a bit excited)

You could feel your heart pounding in your chest as you cheered for your cousin from the stands. You were visiting family while on vacation, and it just so happened that Watari had a volleyball game on the second day of your visit. This was just a practice match, but you knew how excited he was for it. You were decked out in Aobajohsai colors, making some students wonder if you were new since they had never seen you before. You weren’t new, though, you were from the UK, and would be returning in 5 days. You noticed that Watari would send you the occasional grin or thumbs up, but what you didn’t notice was the boy staring at you from the other team. Daichi had noticed you the moment you walked in. He didn’t know if it was your smile, your laugh, or the way you walked with confidence, but he knew he had to talk to you. His heart sank lower and lower throughout the match, seeing Watari send you smiles and thumbs-up, and hearing you cheer for him. Eventually, the match was over. You yawned as you walked down the steps, your jet lag kicking in. As you walked towards Watari to congratulate him, someone was pushed right in front of you, causing you to collide with his chest. You let out a soft “Oomph” and stepped back. When you looked up, you saw Daichi. He was stumbling over his words, trying to come up with an adequate apology. You giggled, and after about 30 seconds he finally managed to spit out, “I’m so sorry!” You laughed softly at yourself, the memory bringing a blush to your cheeks. That was how you and Daichi met 3 years ago. You asked him out after a year of flirting from both ends, deciding enough was enough. You still lived in the UK and he still lived in Japan. Long-distance for you guys had its trials and tribulations, but what relationship didn’t? You guys were in constant communication, and you even forgot sometimes that it wasn’t a long-distance relationship. You had visited him 3 times within your current 2 years of dating. The first, a week after you made it official, the second, to celebrate your first anniversary, and the third a couple months afterward to cheer him on during a match. Your second anniversary was just two weeks away, and you couldn’t have been happier. It had been months since you had seen Daichi in person. About 7-8 months to be exact. You tried not to count, since it made the time seem longer. Daichi had tried multiple times to visit you, but every attempt was shot down by either volleyball or school emergencies. You had been busy, too. Working hard to get yourself a well-deserved raise, while also keeping your grades up. You told Daichi everything. Except for the fact that you were currently stepping on a plane to Japan. You took a very much needed two-week break to visit Daichi, and to celebrate your anniversary. Daichi was under the impression that you were drowning in school work and would call him the next day when you were free. He was also under the impression that you had a major exam on your anniversary, and wouldn’t be able to make it. The plane ride was one of the longest trips you had ever taken. It seemed like time had been slowed down by 90%. When you got off the plane, your legs were shaking with anticipation and excitement. You had told Watari to pick you up at the airport and drop you off at your hotel room. Normally, you would’ve stayed at your aunt’s house, but being away from Daichi for 7 months, caused some rather...embarrassing frustration for the two of you. When you finally spotted Watari, you walked to him as fast as you could without falling completely on your face. “Long time no see,” you said, as you hugged him with as much strength as your arms allowed. “Yea, no kidding,” he chuckled. “Well, I guess we should get going,” Watari suggested. You simply nodded in agreement, your brain finally relaxing and letting your exhaustion set in. The car ride to your hotel was quiet but nice. “I assume you’re very excited to see him,” Watari said softly. “Yea, I love him. I’m going to be the happiest woman in the world when I finally get to hold him again,” you sighed happily. “I’m sure holding him isn’t the only thing you’re going to be doing,” Watari said suggestively, wriggling his eyebrows at you. “Oh, shut up,” you exclaimed, a blush gracing your cheeks. When you finally got to your hotel, you thanked Watari for the ride and promised to visit in a couple of days. You went through checkout as fast as you could, sleep wanting to envelop you. The moment your head hit the pillow, you were out. You woke up at around 9 am. You knew Daichi’s school and practice schedule, so you knew you had 3 hours before his practice started. After showering and getting dressed in your favorite outfit, you were ready. Normally, you’d be starving by now, but the butterflies you felt in your stomach filled you up enough. You got into a taxi and you were off. The ride was filled with your breathing techniques for when you’re anxious and the constant fiddling of your fingers. You knew you had to be careful, or else he would see you and the surprise would be ruined. After making sure the coast was clear, you stepped out. Luckily for you, the entire volleyball team was willing to help you with your plan. They had a simple job. Make sure Daichi doesn’t look at the front doors. You were near the entrance when your heart stopped. You heard him. “I’m so bummed that she can’t visit, man. We were both so excited, but then her stupid teacher had to assign that exam! She hasn’t texted me since yesterday, which I know isn’t a big deal, but...I just miss her so much.” Hearing him say that made your heart swell and deflate at the same time. You finally gathered enough courage to walk your ass around the corner and through the front doors. What you saw made you tear up. Daichi was finally in front of you. After 7 long months, you finally got to see the love of your life. “What are you guys staring at,” he asked, about to turn around. Before he could, he felt arms wrap around his midsection and a face press into his back. He looked back to see who grabbed him, and the recognition was immediate. He turned in your arms and scooped you up, your legs wrapped around his waist. He held you to his body tightly, his face buried in your neck. Tears fell from both of your eyes, no words being exchanged. Cheering came from the team, causing you to pull away from each other. Daichi kissed your face and neck quickly and softly before landing a real kiss right on your lips. After a few more minutes of holding each other, and just basking in the other's presence, you let go. The practice for that day had been canceled to celebrate your visit. You had spent a few hours catching up with the team and explaining your plan, all while sitting on Daichi’s lap. After bidding your goodbyes and walking out of the gym, you and Daichi were finally alone. “S/o? I have something to tell you,” he said bashfully, looking at the ground. You gripped his hand and asked, “What is it, babe?” He let out a sigh before saying, “I love you more than anything in this world. I know it may seem like volleyball comes before you sometimes, but you truly are the one owner of my heart. I’m not sure what I did to deserve you, but I’m sure as hell happy that I did whatever it was.” He left you speechless, so you just wrapped your arms around him. “I love you more,” you whispered. “Not to ruin the mood, but 7 months is a long time, and I’d rather show you how much I missed you,” he mumbled into your ear. Your cheeks immediately flush, yet you nodded eagerly. Daichi laughed lightly and led you to his car. There was tension between you, but you both had enough self-control to not go at it then and there. You dragged him to your room, giggling along the way. He had you pinned against the door in record time. You made quick work of taking his shirt off, rubbing your hands up and down his toned chest. Moans slipped past your lips as he kissed up and down your neck, his hands squeezing your hips. “Are you sure you want to do this?” “Yes. I want you, Daichi.” After that brief moment of speaking, nothing else was said. The pent up longing you had for him finally showed it’s true colors. The only thing on your mind was Daichi, and how much you loved him.

(1.5k words)

#hq imagines #hq #hq x reader #haikyuu!!#haikyuu imagines #haikyuu x reader #sawamura daichi #haikyuu headcanons #haikyuu match ups

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soobiniebaby · 4 years

Text

Angels & Devils Part VI : Slow Down

Tomorrow x Together Fanfiction

~ p a r t s : main post || prologue || part 1 || part 2 || part 3 || part 4 || part 5 || part 6 || part 7 || part 8 || part 9 || part 10 || part 11 || part 12 || part 13 || part 14 || part 15 || part 16 || part 17 ~ p a i r i n g : love triangle involving choi soobin and choi yeonjun ~ g e n r e : high school au | some social media au | some fluff & angst | childhood friends | love triangle ~ l a n g u a g e : English ~ w a r n i n g : contains swearing, alcohol, kissing (?) and may contain mature themes (angst, etc.) ~ a / n : This will be my first fanfic (go easy on me pls) and i’m just writing this as I go along, so bear with me juseyo The setting (place/country) of the story is up to the reader’s interpretation ~ s u m m a r y : What should she choose? Han Baby: the new girl with a troubled past MO Academy: her new high school Choi Soobin: student council president, member of the Ecosave club, volunteer at the Humane Treatment of Animals, member of the Honor Society, a vocalist in the Jazzed club, the school’s all around golden boy Choi Yeonjun: leader of the Dance club, star of the Jazzed club, the school’s it boy with a bad rep 5 best friends, 1 new girl, 1 childhood friendship, 1 epic love triangle? What will this school year bring?

B’s night was starting to turn hazy as she tried to lose herself in the madness of the party.

After her dare had finished, the people at the circle had already moved on from the game and started mixing in with the rest of the party. B was dragged away by the girls to play beer pong with some of their friends, while Yeonjun was dragged away by the boys to start a dance battle in the middle of the patio. Once their 7 minutes were over, the 2 of them never got another second alone again.

And Yeonjun’s question was left hanging in the air, occupying all the space in B’s head, which she tried to drown away with alcohol.

As drunk as she was, she just couldn’t get Yeonjun out of her mind. It was like his words were swimming laps through her alcohol-filled brain. Finally, she took out her phone and started texting, knowing that she’d probably end up regretting it the next day.

The rest of the night started to feel like a blur. She had played 3 rounds of beer pong, someone had suggested that every time someone mentioned school they would have to take a shot, Kai had pulled her away from the girls and dragged her with him to the dance floor by the pool even though they were both way too drunk to do much other than jump and sway their bodies and hold onto each other for support. At one point, she remembers Soobin walking out into the backyard with a big cake as Taehyun and Beomgyu stayed by his side, holding water guns and randomly spraying cold water into the crowd as they made their way to where B and Kai were standing, everyone starting to sing one big chorus of Happy Birthday.

As the 3 boys with the cake and water guns reach Kai and B, the crowd sings one more time until Kai finally blows the candles out, which is then followed by cheers from around 200 drunk teenagers. Just as the cheers start to die down, Kai surprises everyone by grabbing a fistful of cake and flinging it in a random direction, as it ended up landing directly on Beomgyu’s shirt.

Beomgyu looks down at his ruined shirt and back up at the birthday boy, who was too busy laughing his ass off to notice that Beomgyu was holding the water gun in his direction as he let it spray.

Kai’s laughs start to turn into horrified screams as he gets sprayed with cold water. He grabs B by the shoulders and attempts to shield his body with hers, even though he was more than a whole foot taller than her. With Beomgyu targeting Kai’s chest and B being much shorter than the intended target, the water ended up spraying her right in the face.

She sputters in shock, unable to dodge due to Kai’s tight grip on her shoulders. Beomgyu puts the gun down as he realizes that he just sprayed her face. He looks at her, horrified, as he says “Oh god, I’m so sorry B! I was supposed to just spray Hyuka cause he flung cake at me.”

She wipes the water from her face before giving him a suspiciously sweet smile. “It’s all good, Gyu.” she says, as she takes a small step forward, closer to Soobin and the cake in his hands.

“Really?” Beomgyu asks, looking nervous.

B’s smile widens as she reaches a hand towards the cake. “No.” she says, as out of seemingly nowhere, she flings a piece of cake in Beomgyu’s direction. However, in her drunken state, she misses and ends up hitting Soobin squarely in the face.

He stands there completely still, eyes shut and lips pursed, as Kai starts to screech with laughter and Beomgyu attempts not to laugh, with Taehyun just watching everything unfold amusedly.

Now it’s B’s turn to look horrified as she steps towards Soobin and stands on her tiptoes, trying to wipe the cake and frosting from his face. “Soobin! Oh my god, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do that at all. That was supposed to be for Gyu.”

“It’s okay.” He tries and fails to say due to the heavy amount of cake on his face, as she continues to wipe bits of it off his face, being careful not to get any frosting on his shirt or his hair. She cups his face in her hands and uses her thumbs to gently wipe the frosting away from his eyes.

Once he opens his eyes, he’s surprised to see how close she was standing to him. She was standing on the tips of her toes so that the top of her head would reach his nose instead of below his shoulders. She had her neck outstretched as she was looking up at him, her face full of concern, her palms on his cheeks and her thumbs resting on his cheekbones. When she sees his eyes open, her frown instantly lifts into a smile, and as her smile widens, Soobin could feel his heart rate quicken and his face go red. If it was out of embarrassment, drunkenness or something else, he wasn’t quite sure yet.

“Yay, there you are! Sorry again, for flinging cake in your face.” B says, standing back on her heels and retracting her hands from his warm face.

“Uh, it’s fine. Don’t even mention it.” Soobin says, struggling to put together coherent thoughts.

There’s a beat of silence as the insanity dies down before Taehyun decides to surprise everyone by grabbing a fistful of cake, shouting “Hyuka, catch!” and flinging it in Kai’s direction. Kai screams and manages to swat the piece of cake away with his arm, only for it to land on top of B’s head.

B could feel her face heat up as she turns around, a low rumble coming from her throat, and she faces Kai with a deranged look on her face. Kai gulps, recognizing the rare look. It was her look of death, which he hadn’t seen in over 13 years.

“Hue. Ning. Kai.” she says quietly, annunciating every syllable. Kai smiles sheepishly and attempts to apologize, but then B lets out a playful roar as she tackles him, and they both fall into the swimming pool.

The crowd erupts in cheers and laughter again as B attempts to wrestle Kai in the pool, which she fails to do so since they end up falling into the part of the pool that was 6 feet deep. She ended up clinging on to her tall best friend like a cat trying to claw its way up a tree.

“Tyun, why did you fling cake at Hyuka?” Beomgyu asks as everyone watches the 2 childhood friends struggle in the pool. “I mean don’t get me wrong I loved that you did it, it was awesome, but why?”

Taehyun shrugs as he says. “Guess I just wanted to be part of the fun. It was worth it. Too bad Yeonjun had to leave early, he would’ve loved it too.”

“Yeah, too bad.” Soobin says, the remaining frosting on his face was starting to feel uncomfortably sticky. “I think I’m gonna wash this frosting off and get changed. You guys good?”

Taehyun nods. “Yeah, I’ll stay here, watch the party die down. People are already starting to leave, so it shouldn’t be long now.”

Beomgyu puts an arm around Taehyun’s shoulders. “Same here. There wasn’t much frosting on the piece of cake that Hyuka hit me with, so I think my shirt will survive.” he says, as he looks down at his barely soiled shirt.

Soobin nods and hands the cake over to Taehyun before turning around to make his way into the house. Before he gets too far, he feels a soaked pair of arms wrap themselves around his torso from behind and start to rub his stomach, so now not only did he have sticky cake on his face, but also a wet shirt and a violated stomach.

“Soobinie, help me.” Kai says from behind him. Soobin turns around and sees Kai pouting and B following him, both soaked from their squabble in the pool.

He laughs at the sight of them, soaked and shivering, before saying “Alright, follow me.” and the 3 of them make their way into the house.

•°•

“Wow Soobin, your house is amazing!” B says, as the 2 of them follow Soobin into his huge house, through the backdoor into the kitchen, to the foyer, up the grand staircase, and through endless doors and hallways. “And you live here alone?”

Soobin nods. “Yep, no family members. I keep insisting that the help occupy some of the guest rooms up here instead of hiding out in the maid’s quarters, but they don’t seem to think it’s a good idea.”

“Well it does seem pretty lonely, having to live up here all by yourself.” B remarks, eyes wandering the halls. The house had a very modern feel to it and was very minimalistic.

“Don’t worry Soobinie, Hueningkai will come visit you everyday from now on!” Kai slurs, his arms still around Soobin’s torso. The older boy was practically dragging the birthday boy through the house.

Soobin laughs. “No need for that Hueningie.” he says, mimicking him. “Hosting this party was pretty fun, it’s nice to see other people around here.”

They stop when they reach a door at the end of the hallway. Soobin props the drunk boy against his body as he turns the doorknob. “Here we are. Uh, please take off your shoes and put leave them by the door if you can.”

Soobin leads them into the room, calling out “Alexa, turn lights on dim to 50%” as dim light fills the room, kicking off his shoes and putting them on the shoe rack right by the bedroom door before dumping Kai into a bean bag on the floor close to his entertainment system, which included a TV, some big speakers, and loads of videogames and gaming consoles.

“Wow, your room is huge. If I lived here, I’d probably never get bored.” B says, kicking off her black sneakers before twirling around the room as she looks around in amazement.

“I said it gets lonely, but I wouldn’t say it gets boring.” Soobin says as he wanders into his bathroom in search of towels. “And are you sure that’s a good idea? Won’t you feel dizzy?” he remarks as he walks back into the bedroom, watching her twirl around.

“I can’t help it!” B exclaims, putting her arms out as she continues to twirl around. “I feel so light and buzzy and—”

“Drenched and freezing cold?” he interrupts, holding out a towel towards her.

She twirls towards him then, attempting to grab the towel from his hand as she does so, but instead she loses her balance and ends up collapsing on a bean bag next to the one Kai was currently passed out on, the towel she attempted to grab landed on top of her, covering the whole upper half of her body.

“B! Are you okay?” Soobin calls out, rushing to her side and tossing the 2 towels on their passed out friend before kneeling by B’s side.

B waves an arm in the air above her in an attempt to get the towel off, but instead she ends up whacking Soobin up his chin, which he responds to with an “Ouchie, B what—”

Upon realizing that she had accidentally troubled Soobin for the second time that night, B sits straight up, not realizing just how close Soobin was as the top of her head ends up colliding with the bottom of his chin.

“Ouch! B what are you—?” he exclaims again, eyes squeeze shut as he tries to endure the pain, his hand rubbing his chin.

B’s eyes widen as she realizes that she hurt him yet again. “Soobin! Oh my god, I am so so so sorry! I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve apologized to you tonight, but I just can’t help it, I’m sorry. I’m not usually this clumsy, I think I’m just really drunk, I—” B starts to ramble on in panic, sitting up and attempting to comfort him, cupping his face in her hands for the second time that night as she tilts his chin up, trying to assess for any damage.

Soobin, surprised by her sudden close proximity, couldn’t help but sit there frozen, trying to will himself to say something, anything, instead of just staring at her and feeling the warmth of her hands on his face as she focused solely on his chin.

“Oh gosh, I think that’ll form a small bruise. I should go down to get some ice.” B says, pulling her hands away. As she starts to stand up, Soobin snaps out of it and immediately stands up, saying “I’ve got ice in the mini fridge right by my bed. I’ll get it.” and off he went to the other side of the room, where the bed and the entrance to the bathroom were.

“You have a mini fridge by your bed? Wow, that’s actually a genius idea.” B remarks as Soobin returns to her side with a few ice cubes wrapped in a face towel.

“It’s probably my favorite thing about this room.” he agrees. “By the way, I’m fine. No need to apologize, it doesn’t even hurt that much.”

B raises a brow as she grabs the ice from his hands and hold it up to his chin, which he tries not to noticeably wince to.

“Seriously, I’m fine. I’ve got this.” he insists, trying to take the ice from her hand but he ends up just cupping her hand in his, suddenly highly aware of just how small her hands were compared to his.

B pulls her hand away from the ice pack reluctantly. “Alright, if you say so. I’m still sorry though.”

Soobin laughs softly. “Wow, you’re stubborn, you know that?”

“I am very aware of that fact, yes. It’s how I get what I want.” she says, shrugging. She grabs the towel that caused the soon-to-be bruise on Soobin’s cheek and starts rubbing it against her face and hair. “Thanks for this, by the way. This is a very nice towel. Very soft, very warm, very absorbent. 10/10, would highly recommend.”

Soobin laughs out loud. “You’re so weird! And you’re welcome. You want to change out of your wet clothes, by the way? I can lend you a shirt if you want, or I think my sister still left some of her clothes in her room if you’d prefer that.”

B shakes her head violently. “No need for that, you’ve already done so much and I’ve already caused you so much trouble tonight. You just sit right there.”

“Are you sure? I can at least lend you a jacket to help stop you from shivering?” he offers, full of concern.

She sighs, knowing it would probably be a good idea. “Alright, I’ll give it back to you ASAP.”

He nods and stands up, once again walking over to the other side of the bedroom, rummaging through his wardrobe before returning to her side. He offers her his plain gray hoodie with single black stripes along the arms, which she gratefully accepts.

She finishes rubbing the towel against her wet clothes, drying her arms, legs and feet before putting on his hoodie, which smelled strongly of baby powder and vanilla. Soobin’s scent. B grabs another towel and kneels over her best friend then, who was passed out cold.

“Wow, I’ve never seen Ningning this drunk before. I wonder if he’ll remember any of this tomorrow.” she says, as she begins to rub the towel against his hair.

“I don’t think I have, either. We usually only drink when we’re celebrating something, and we only throw big parties for birthdays and other special occasions. It’s the first time we let him get this wasted, though.” Soobin says.

Just then, Soobin hears his phone ringing. He fishes it out of his pocket and checks the caller ID.

“It’s Yeonjun.” he says, pleasantly surprised. He smiles as he answers the call. “Hey, Yeonjun. What’s up?”

B turns away as Soobin talks to Yeonjun on the phone, focusing on Kai and rubbing the towel on his wet clothes. Just then, her hands freeze in place as she remembers the onslaught of drunk texts she sent out earlier that night. She quickly crawls to her purse, which was on the bean bag she fell into, and checks her phone in horror, re-reading the messages she sent.

“B’s here with me, right now.” Soobin says, which immediately catches B’s attention. She looks up at Soobin then, wondering what the 2 boys were talking about.

“Yeah, she and Hyuka had a little fun in the pool. I really wish you could’ve stayed, you missed so much.” Soobin says fondly. “I bet if you had stayed, you would have ended up with cake in your face too.”

“I said I was sorry about that.” B says quietly, pouting at Soobin, which causes him to laugh. He covers the bottom of his phone with his hand as he tells her “And I forgive you.” before uncovering his phone and saying “Yeah, it’s a long story. I’ll tell you all about it tomorrow during clean up.”

“Clean up?” B mouths at him.

Soobin covers his phone again as he explains, “Yeah, the guys all agreed to come over tomorrow at 10 AM to help with cleaning up, though most of them will probably be too hung over to really help out. You wanna come? It’ll just be us 5, plus you if you wanna.”

B nods. “Sure thing, I’ll try to be here as early as possible.”

Soobin smiles before turning his attention back to his phone. “Oh, B says she wants to come over for clean up tomorrow.”

B focuses on Kai again, knowing it was pointless to try to dry his clothes. His pullover and jeans were too thick and heavy to dry with just a towel. Instead, she tries shove the towel under his pullover and wraps it around his torso so that the cold water wouldn’t be touching his back or chest.

“You wanna talk to her? Sure, hang on.” Soobin says, reaching his phone out to B. “Yeonjun wants to say hi.”

She smiles as she takes the phone, and Soobin takes B’s spot in front of Kai. “Hi, Yeonjun.”

“Hey Baby, how are you feeling? Are you still drunk?” he asks.

B’s face begins to heat up, knowing he was referring to the drunk texts she sent earlier. “Yeah, no, I’m fine now. A quick dip in the pool sobered me up a bit.” she says sheepishly. “Sorry about earlier, I didn’t mean to.”

She hears him chuckle through the phone. “No way, they say drunk thoughts produce honest words, or something like that. So, you think I’m cute?”

She felt like her face was burning up now, and prays that Soobin wouldn’t notice. She quickly looks over at him and sees that he’s managed to get Kai out of his wet pullover and into a dry shirt, and he had a pair of clean blue jeans by his side ready to be worn. He was in the process of trying to pull off the younger boy’s pants when his eyes meet hers, and there’s a beat of silence as they realize how awkward the sight of Soobin taking Kai’s jeans off was.

“It’s not what it looks like! I’m just getting him into warm clothes!” Soobin says defensively as B turns away, giggling.

“What’s so funny?” Yeonjun asks.

“Oh nothing, Soobin’s just trying to get Ningning into some dry clothes.” she says.

“Ah, I can imagine how that would be funny.” he says, chuckling. “By the way, how will you get home?”

“Oh, I was thinking I could call for a cab with Taehyun or something since we live in the same building.” B says.

“That’s good, where’s Tyun right now?”

“Uh, I think we left him with Gyu before we came inside? I’ll text him in a bit, I should probably head home soon anyway.” B replies.

“Alright alright, I’ll check in with Tyun and Gyu as well. Goodnight, Baby.” Yeonjun says.

“Night, Yeonjun.” she responds, before handing the phone back to Soobin, who had successfully gotten Kai changed into dry clothes.

As Soobin takes the phone, B crawls back to Kai’s side, running her fingers through his hair to check if his hair was already dry. She pulls out her phone and sends Taehyun a text.

She frowns, staring at the screen, as she notices that the boys’ contact names and photos had been changed.

“What the heck? Who did this with to my phone?” she wonders out loud.

“Oh, Hyuka messed with your contacts and spammed your camera roll with random pictures while you were in the shed with Yeonjun.” Soobin answers, his phone in his hand as his call with Yeonjun finishes.

“You know, I was starting to feel a bit guilty about tackling him into the pool, but I have 0 regrets now.” B says, hitting Kai’s arm playfully, which was met with no reaction. “Wow, he’s really out cold. How will he get home?”

“Ah, he can sleep here. Anyone who’s too drunk and can’t make it home on their own is welcome to sleep over, though most people usually end up sober by the end of the night or catch a ride with sober friends.” Soobin explains. “It’s how house parties around here usually work.”

B nods. “I see I see. Well, I’ve texted Tyun and he says he’s good to go. I’ll just call for a cab and we’ll be on our way.”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to drive you guys home? Or I could ask one of my family’s drivers to take you, since I don’t trust myself enough to drive with alcohol in my system.” Soobin offers.

B shakes her head. “No, I couldn’t. I don’t want to put you through any more trouble than I already have tonight.”

“I insist. You and Tyun are 2 of my closest friends, so I wouldn’t mind at all. I’ll just let the driver know and he’ll be ready to drop you off. I have to stay here and watch over everyone.” Soobin insists.

Sensing that Soobin wouldn’t let her off the hook, she finally agrees. “Alright, thanks, Soobin. You’re the best.” she says, smiling at him gratefully.

He smiles back at her warmly. “No problem.”

•°•

B wakes up in bed the next day due to the sound of her phone being spammed with text messages. She rolls over in bed is instantly hit with a wave of dizziness.

She groans as she reaches for the glass of water she prepared in advance on her night stand, taking small sips of it until her mouth didn’t feel like it was lined with chalk anymore.

She puts the glass down and grabs the bottle of Gatorade she left in advance as well, trying to drink as much of it as she could, hoping that the electrolytes from the energy drink would replenish her body’s needs.

Finally, she grabs her phone and checks her messages only to see that it was from the boys.

Soobin smiles to himself as he puts his phone down and stares down at the 2 boys passed out on his bedroom floor. He had gotten used to taking care of his friends whenever they’ve had a little too much to drink, but he knew that having them pass out in the bean bags on his bedroom floor was the easiest part. Once they’d wake up with inevitable hangovers, he knew that it would be harder for him to nurse them back to sobriety. He was hoping that there would be no vomit this time, though at least he could ask for help from his household staff if any vomit would be present.

With the rest of the group on the way to his house, Soobin figured it was time to face the horror of dealing with the 2 hungover boys. He kneels down and says, as loudly and brightly as possible “Huningie! Beomie! Rise and shine!” while putting one hand on each boy’s thighs and shaking them as furiously and as violently as he could.

The 2 boys instantly start to groan dramatically, Hueningkai burying his face in Beomgyu’s chest and the latter covering his ears with his hands.

Soobin repeats the procedure until Beomgyu finally snaps, randomly kicking his legs in the direction of the noise and sitting up, eyes squeezed shut as they adjusted to the light flooding into Soobin’s bedroom.

“Jesus fucking hell, Choi. Why are you torturing me?” Beomgyu says, his voice cracking as dryness burns his throat, his head throbbing from dehydration.

Soobin smiles widely at him, glad to get a reaction out of him. “Good morning to you too, Choi.” He hands Beomgyu a bottle of Gatorade, which the boy accepts as he desperately downs it all. “B and the boys are on their way here for clean up, so you and Hyuka have to get up soon.” he says.

Beomgyu wipes his mouth as he finishes the last of the Gatorade, blinking his eyes until the room stopped spinning. “Ah yeah, clean up. Almost forgot about that.” he says, his voice still hoarse. “I didn’t know B was coming, though. I thought we were gonna practice for our Club Recruitment performance?”

Soobin’s mouth drops open a bit as he realizes that he completely forgot about their final rehearsal. They were set to perform a special number that Monday for club recruitment day, and they had agreed to have their final rehearsals on Saturday afternoon, which was today.

“Oh wow, now that I forgot about.” Soobin admits. “I was actually the one who invited B to join us for clean up, I completely forgot that we would be rehearsing this afternoon.”

Beomgyu shrugs. “She can watch us practice, I wouldn’t mind, and I’m pretty sure the other guys wouldn’t really mind either. We’re having rehearsals here anyway, so she can just hang around if she wants to.”

Soobin nods. “Yeah, I guess. I didn’t get to tell her that we’d be rehearsing later though. I hope she won’t mind.” he says, suddenly overthinking the whole thing.

“I’m sure she won’t, don’t sweat it.” Beomgyu says, noticing how worried Soobin looked. “Actually, why are you sweating it? You seem really worried.”

“I’m not sweating it.” Soobin says defensively. “I just—I’m used to performing on stage in front of faceless audience members. I’m not used to performing with someone watching right there in the room?”

“Soobin, are you…shy?” Beomgyu asks.

Soobin starts to feel his face heat up. “Kind of, I guess? When we rehearse for performances, it’s always just us and the other club members. I guess the thought of 1 person watching from such a close proximity just makes me feel different.”

“Aw, it’s okay Binnie. You always look great when you perform, and I’m sure B’s not the kind who would judge or criticize.” Beomgyu says comfortingly. “I don’t get why you’re getting all shy anyway, it’s just B.”

“Yeah, it’s just B.” Soobin says to himself. Why was he getting so worked up over it?

“My head’s pounding like crazy, jeez.” Beomgyu says suddenly, groaning as he grabs his head. “What time is it?”

Soobin looks at the clock on his desk as he answers “It’s 10:03.”

Beomgyu chuckles. “Ah yeah, we were supposed to meet up at 10AM. Shit, I didn’t mean to get so drunk, I was trying to avoid a hangover. Please tell me that there will be breakfast waiting for us downstairs.”

“Breakfast? Always. The sooner we get Hyuka up and running, the sooner we can eat. C’mon, help me.” Soobin pleads, which Beomgyu gamely accepts.

The 2 boys kneel over on each side of their unconscious friend, looking at each other as they prepare to wake him up.

“On the count of 3.” Soobin says, and Beomgyu nods. “1…2…3!”

The 2 boys put both of their hands on Hueningkai’s arms and legs, as they shout “Rise and shine, Hueningkai!” and violently shake him awake.

Hueningkai shoots up screaming in panic, then slowly lies back down, while groaning and holding his head, as the 2 boys roar with laughter.

“I hate you.” Hueningkai groans, his palms squeezing into his temples.

“We love you too!” the 2 boys respond cheerfully.

•°•

“Is it just me, or does Soobin’s house look a little different in the daytime?” B asks Taehyun as they step out of the cab and walk up to the front door of Soobin’s house.

“What do you mean?” Taehyun asks, before ringing the doorbell.

“I guess it looks less like a spoiled rich kid’s party mansion and just more…cold?”

Taehyun raises a brow at B, confused. “Cold?”

“Not cold like in a bad way.” B says, trying to explain express her thoughts. “More like, it looks like the house of a lonely bachelor or something.”

Taehyun looks up at the house again and says “Yeah, I guess I see what you mean.” just as the front doors open in front of them and they’re greeted by Soobin himself.

“Tyun! B! You’re here!” Soobin says cheerfully, looking nothing like the lonely bachelor one would picture living in the house. “Come in, everyone else is already here.” he says, letting them in and closing the door behind them. They follow him down the hallway until they reach the dining room.

Beomgyu, Yeonjun, and Kai were all seated at the round table, which looked like it could fit at least 12 people, and was full of an extravagant breakfast menu that looked like they could be props for a tea party scene in a movie about royals. The dining room had glass doors and windows that overlooked the entire side garden of the house, where B and Kai had passed through the night before to get to the backyard.

Beomgyu looked much better than he did in the picture Soobin had sent to the group earlier, almost like he wasn’t hungover, as he was stuffing his face with food. Yeonjun was sitting back in his seat, his phone on the table, as he sipped out of a teacup. Kai, however, was wearing a pair of sunglasses and had his face resting on his hands, his elbows up on the table and food untouched.

“Good morning, everyone! Wow this food looks amazing!” B says in awe as she and Taehyun take their seats between Kai and Soobin.

“Baba? Is that you?” Kai croaks, his voice still hoarse.

“Yup, the one and only. How you feeling, Ninging? Did the birthday boy party too hardy last night?” B asks teasingly.

Kai groans, covering his ears with his hands. “Ugh, shut up. Your voice sounds like it’s searing into my brain.”

“Well good morning to you, too.” B says, leaning over to ruffle his hair teasingly.

“Gyu, you’re looking better. How are you feeling?” Taehyun asks as he begins to fill his plate with food.

“I’m feeling good. The hangover wasn’t too bad, I think it would’ve been a lot worse if you hadn’t made me chug all that water before you dumped me in Soobin’s room last night.” Beomgyu says, recalling how Taehyun practically drowned him with drinking water before he passed out.

Taehyun laughs pleasantly. “That’s good to hear. It was for your own good, you know.”

“Yeah, I honestly thought you were trying to kill me last night, but now I know you were just trying to save me. Thanks, Tyunnie.” Beomgyu says in a teasingly cute way.

“Don’t mention it.” Taehyun says, laughing again.

“Too bad I had to leave early last night, sounds like the party really began right after I left.” Yeonjun remarks.

“It was pretty fun, but there were good moments while you were still there too!” Soobin says, taking his seat between Yeonjun and Taehyun. “Remember, you gave me that lap dance? I thought I was gonna burst from embarrassment.” he recalls, cringing at the memory.

“Shut up, you know you liked it, Soob. You’re welcome, by the way.” Yeonjun says teasingly, watching as Soobin’s face started to turn red again.

“Let’s not forget those 7 minutes between you and B, I’m sure that was fun.” Beomgyu remarks, looking back and forth between the 2 of them. “What did you guys do for 7 minutes?” he asks curiously.

“Uh-huh, we agreed that whatever happened in the shed stays in the shed.” B says, sticking her tongue out at Beomgyu. She was hoping that everything that had happened in the shed would be locked away forever, and that she wouldn’t have to face Yeonjun alone again.

“You’re the one who said that, and technically I never agreed to it.” Yeonjun says slyly, with a cheeky grin on his face.

B’s mouth hangs open in an O, and Kai seemingly reanimates back to life as he sits straight up, whips his sunglasses off, and exclaims “What did you do to my best friend?!” looking at Yeonjun suspiciously.

“No no, nothing like that, get your mind out of the gutter, Hyuka.” Yeonjun says, putting his hands up in front of him defensively. “We just talked, it was all innocent, I swear.”

“Yeah, don’t worry Ningning it was nothing like that at all!” B says as well, flustered that Kai would think like that. “We just talked. Really.”

Kai remains suspicious, looking at the 2 back and forth. “Alright, what did you talk about then? Is there anything I should know about?”

“No! Nothing at all. We just talked like the 2 friends that we are. Plus, we had an agreement that nothing would leave the 4 walls of that shed.” B says, her face starting to flush red. She looks at Yeonjun pleadingly, hoping that he would help her out.

Yeonjun nods. “Yup. Just talked. Like the 2 friends that we are. Nothing will leave the 4 walls of that shed.” he said, repeating what she said.

Kai glares at the 2 of them for a bit longer before finally letting it go. “Alright, let’s say I believe you. But if there’s something I should know about that you’re not telling me, I better not hear it from someone else.” he says pointedly at his best friend.

“Yes, I promise.” B says, crossing her fingers under the table. Technically speaking, there really wasn’t anything to tell him yet. Yeonjun had asked her out, she never got to respond, and the question would forever be locked away in the shed, never to be spoken of beyond those 4 walls. It wasn’t like she was dating anyone or anything, so there wasn’t anything that Kai needed to know about.

They move on from the topic then, their discussions ranging from the amount of clean up they had to do to do the rehearsals they would have that afternoon.

“Oh, I didn’t know you guys were performing this Monday! Are you all members of the Jazzed club?” B says excitedly.

Taehyun nods. “Yeah, I think we were all drawn to it from the start. The club mostly focuses on music, such as singing, writing, producing, playing instruments, and even performing which sometimes requires some dancing. But to make the Club Recruitment showcase more interesting, we decided to incorporate a little bit of rap to our performance as well, which is a bit of a challenge.”

“Oh my gosh, I could hardly imagine the 5 of you singing and dancing together, but rapping? That is definitely something I’d wanna see.” she says, getting more excited by the minute. “Can I watch you guys rehearse? Please, pretty please?” she asks, giving puppy dog eyes at everyone around the table.

They all look at Soobin to see his response, and he just nods cheerfully. “Yeah sure, why not? We’ll be starting rehearsals at 1PM, just here in one of the rooms. You’re welcome to stay if you want to.”

B grins, giddy with excitement. “Yay, thank you so much! I can’t wait to see what you guys have put together. I’m sure everyone will love it.”

As everyone finishes up with their brunch, their empty dishes being taken away one by one, B excuses herself from the table to go to the bathroom.

“The nearest bathroom is down the hall, the first door on the right.” Soobin says, directing her.

She quickly makes her way to the bathroom then, trying to be as quick and clean as she could. As she finishes and closes the door behind her, she’s surprised to see someone waiting outside.

“Yeonjun, jeez! You scared me.” B says, feeling her heartrate pick up.

“Why would you be scared?” Yeonjun asks, chuckling. “C’mon, come with me for a moment. I just wanted to show you something.” he says, grabbing her hand and pulling her with him.

B let him pull her, praying that he couldn’t feel her pulse racing through her wrist.

He leads her down the hall, passing by the doors of the dining hall and straight to the kitchen, which led to the backyard.

“Where are we going?” she asks him, shielding her eyes with one hand as the sunlight poured down on them out by the pool.

“I think I left something in the shed last night, I was hoping you could help me with it.” he simply says, leading the way to the shed.

He opens the door and steps inside, pulling her in with him. The heavy door closes behind them, and they find themselves in the dim light of the shed once again. She notes that while last night it was pitch black, this time there was at least a little bit of light, just enough so that B could make out the outline of everything in the shed.

B starts to look around the shed, her eyes struggling to adjust from the searing brightness to the dim light. “Alright, so what did you leave here? What are we looking for? Is it a wallet? A ring?” she asks as she looks at the ground, trying to spot what he might have left behind.

“We’re not here to look for anything.” Yeonjun begins slowly. B looks at him, confused.

“So what is it? You said you left something here last night, right?” she asks.

“I left a question, and I was hoping you could help me with the answer.” Yeonjun reveals, looking at her intently. “You said last night that whatever happens in this shed stays in this shed, so here we are, back in the said shed.”

She could hear her heart pounding through her ears as she forces herself to meet his gaze. She couldn’t escape it now, especially since they were in the shed. Even though she already knew what he was going to say, she asks “Alright, so what’s the question?”

He smiles at her then, amused. He knew that she knew what he was talking about.

“Baby, will you go out with me?”

She holds her breath, knowing she wouldn’t be able to avoid this forever. Technically, she had the whole night to think about what she would answer, but now that the moment was actually here again, her thoughts were scrambled.

She counts her breaths, 1 2 3, before exhaling and giving him her answer.

“No.”

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xvangoghssunflowerx · 5 years

Text

Anemone Estrella Profile

Credit for template: @hogwartsmysterystory

Identity

Name: Anemone Estrella (Nickname: Ann).

Gender: Female

Age: 18

Birthday: August 12, 1973

Species: Human/Siren

Blood Status: Half-blood (father is a Siren, mother was a pureblood witch. I am using the fish-like sirens of Greece, not the bird-like ones).

Sexuality: Pansexual

Alignment: Lawful Evil

Ethnicity: American

Myer Briggs Personality Type: INFP

The Mage

Wand:

Cedar Wood

Dragon Heartstring Core

10″

Quite Bendy Flexibility

“Whenever I meet one who carries a cedar wand, I find strength of character and unusual loyalty. My father, Gervaise Ollivander, used always to say, ‘you will never fool the cedar carrier,’ and I agree: the cedar wand finds its perfect home where there is perspicacity and perception. I would go further than my father, however, in saying that I have never yet met the owner of a cedar wand whom I would care to cross, especially if harm is done to those of whom they are fond. The witch or wizard who is well-matched with cedar carries the potential to be a frightening adversary, which often comes as a shock to those who have thoughtlessly challenged them.“

Animagus: None, but can grow fins and gills if near a body of water.

Misc Magical Abilities:

Pescatongue: She has the ability to speak to any fish or water mammal.

metamorphmagus: She can only change her hair color and turn into a Siren form. Though she rarely changes her hair color, unless she’s in a bad mood.

Bogart Form: Fishing nets and spears.

Riddikulus Form: The fishing nets turning into bubbles and the spears into fish.

Amortentia: She would smell like salt water and driftwood, the kind of smell after taking a nice long walk on the beach.

Amortentia: She would smell owls. And then she would smell flowers from herbology class.

Patronus: Siren (she doesn’t use her patronus as she hates being associated with them).

Mermaids/Sirens are known around the world as half human half fish creatures. Muggles know them only from folklore that can lead humans to their death through song (by distracting them), or by simply drowning them. But a mermaid patronus will only drown out the Dementors, luring them in by their sweet songs.

Patronus Memory: Playing with her father and mother at the beach.

Mirror of Erised: At age 10, she would see her mother braiding her long hair. At age 18, she would see her lover and her holding hands.

Specialized/Favourite Spells:

Singing: Her father taught her how to use singing as a weapon against humans for protection, not necessarily to kill them.

Caterwauling Charm: Learned to disarm opponents.

Nebulus: Used among sirens to trap sailors.

Ventus: Creats hurricane like winds.

Appearance

Faceclaims: None.

Game Appearance:

Height: 5′04″

Weight: 160lbs.

Physique: Chubby, pear-shaped.

Eye color: Brown

Hair: Blue and pink, thick long hair. She always has it down. Her fishtail is baby blue.

Skin tone: Light skinned.

Body Modifications: Ear piercings.

Inventory: Has a gold seashell pendant around her neck, and has her wand with her at all times.

Allegiances:

Hogwarts House: Slytherin

Affiliations/Organizations:

Slytherin

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry

Ministry of Magic

Order of the Phoenix

Professions:

Spy for Order of the Phoenix

Ministry of Magic

Auror

Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures: Merpeople and Siren Division (Not of her choosing).

Hogwarts Information

Class Proficiencies:

Astronomy:★★★★★★★★★★

Charms: ★★★★★★★★★★

DADA: ★★★★★★★★★★

Flying:★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

Herbology: ★★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆

History of Magic: ★★★★★★★★★★

Potions: ★★★★★★★★☆☆

Transfiguration: ★★★★★★★★★★

Electives:

Swimming: Though not actually an elective, Hogwarts allowed her to take it up in her spare time. (There’s an indoor pool somewhere in Hogwarts, I just know it! XD). She avoids the Selkie in the lake.

Quidditch:

Hates quidditch, would rather watch two people beat each other with sticks than play or watch.

Extra Curricular:

None.

Favourite Professors:

Minerva McGonagall: One of the only professors who knows about her father. She admires her and her strict approach in lessons.

Professor Flitwick: She does find him a little annoying, but enjoys the spells that are taught.

Least Favourite Professors:

Professor Silvanus Kettleburn: She feels uncomfortable around him, and how he treats magical creatures. (Letting them escape, etc).

Relationships:

Father: Taras

Merfolk: Sub-category: Siren.

Height: 6′5″

Blue and pink hair long and thick. Ice blue eyes. Light skinned. He has a blue tail.

Was next in line to succeed his father as king, but was disowned for involving himself with a human witch.

He’s soft-hearted. Over protective of his daughter. He despises humans, except his deceased wife. He gave up living in the ocean to raise his daughter when she was 3. His feet are in constant pain from being on land for so long.

When Anemone went to Hogwarts, he went back to the ocean, returning only during the summer.

When he was younger, he was cold and kept to himself. Not letting others see how kind and considerate he was.

Mother: Valda Estrella

pureblood witch from America

Height: 5′6″

Blonde wavy hair and brown eyes. Tanned skinned.

She was sorted into Thunderbird whilst in Ilvermorny.

Patronus: Sting-ray

Fell for Taras at 18, just after graduating from Ilvermorny. She had decided to venture around the world in search of magical creatures. She was exploring near the ocean of Tsigrado for sea dwelling creatures when she came upon a beautiful voice. Losing herself in the voice she hadn’t noticed she was about to step off a cliff leading to a rocky ocean below. The song stopped before she could fall. She kept coming back to the spot, hoping to hear the voice again.

Taras was annoyed by this, as the spot was one of the least frequented by humans, so he confronted her with a self-made spear. To which Valda only smiled and said: “You’re beautiful.” Taras fled there after.

She still kept coming, over and over. This time venturing into the open waters (like the daring idiot she was), not knowing that the reason for there basically being no humans around, was because the water was treacherous. She almost drowned, but Taras, having been watching from underwater, saved her. Taras had yelled at her for being stupid, but she smiled again, “I found you.”

She fought in the first wizarding war in 1970. But stopped fighting when she got pregnant in 1972. In 1975, she wanted to go back and help, but Taras wouldn’t have it. Saying that humans should be left to their own demise. Pissed off, she left for a walk. She never came back. Her body was later found near the docks of a nearby village.

Love Interest: Talbott Winger

First met in their Second year, both wanting privacy. Talbott was annoyed to have her around, as was she. After a while, they both realized they just wanted to be away from large crowds of people. So they became friends.

Anemone tried her best to keep her siren form a secret. However, she saw Talbott transform into his Animagus form, he kept his distance from her there after. She confronted him one day, dragging him to the Black Lake. Once there, she dove head first into the water, not resurfacing for a good minute. Talbott panicked, until she peered her head out of the water. “Can you keep a secret?” Talbott could only nod. To which she raised her tail out of the water. Since then, the two became inseparable.

Talbott asked her out on a date in their fourth year. Then they went steady in their fifth year.

Taras, her father, was largely against it. Always glaring at Talbott when he came over in the summer of their fifth year going into sixth year. At one point telling him that he could kill him if he wanted to. Talbott wasn’t too afraid, as he shrugged it off as a father(beast) being overprotective of his child, and knowing full well how much merfolk hated humas.

They both became aurors and helped fight in the second wizarding war. After the war, they continued to work for the ministry and had twins (a boy and girl). Both gaining the ability to entrance with their singing and being able to turn into sirens, though for a limited time.

Best friends:

Andre Egwu

Tonks

Beatrice Haywood

Rival:

Penny Haywood: Annoyed by her. She feels a fakeness emanating from her persona.

Enemy:

Sirens of Tsigrado Kingdom

Voldemort

Death Eaters

Dormmates:

Liz Tuttle

Ismelda Murk

Merula Snyde

Pets:

Bottlenose Dolphin: Named Bluefin. Found her trapped in a resort, her and her father helped free her.

Sea turtle caretta-caretta: Named Viridescent. She helped rescue him when it was a baby from local muggle teens who were torturing it.

Closest Canon Friends:

Talbott Winger

Beatrice Haywood

Tonks

Background/History

Anemone was born and raised near Milos, Greece. Often visiting the Tsigrado beach. Her father and mother would take her to the beach as often as they could. Sometimes she would stay in the ocean with her father for days at a time, while her mother stayed in town. It was the happiest three years of her life.

She hated the muggles and witches/wizards in Milos because of how poorly they treated the animals and ocean. She would always find trash, plastics around the beaches. At age five, her and her father rescued a dolphin from an “aquarium”. Not so much an aquarium as a small pool, the size of a jacuzzi.

The following year, she almost sang a couple of muggle teens off a cliff to their death for torturing a turtle, before her father interfered.

That same year, she had befriended a wizard who could turn into an eagle. They never told each other their names, and he left the area after only a month. He was the only human that she found trustworthy, since he helped save some birds.

At Hogwarts, she kept to herself, and minded her own business. Only Dumbledore, McGonagall, and the ministry knew of her lineage, Which was kept secret for her safety.

She made friends with Talbott, in second year. She then realized it was her old friend from years ago, so she confided her secret to him.

Beatrice began to hang out with her, to spite her sister, to which Anemone protested, but at the same time, didn’t care. Beatrice found out about her siren self, when she followed her one day to Hogwart’s underground pool. She thought it was amazing and promised to never tell a soul.

Tonks became her friend in first year, loving that they were both metamorphmagus. Anemone accepted her being around, as it was easier to ignore her than to avoid her.

Personality

Introverted, when she needs to be. She would rather be lost in thought among the relaxing waves of the ocean than to be near humans.

She loves music. She hates to admit, but she loves lots of music made by muggles. (Favourite bands being: The Beatles, Abba and Queen).

Misc

Is half siren, half witch. Was being hunted by the Tsigrado Kingdom of Sirens, now they search for her as she is the only heir left, besides her father.

Her mother was pureblood, but was orphaned at age 12. She left her daughter a gold seashell necklace.

Her theme music is: Chiquitita by ABBA and How I Became the Sea by Owl City.

#hphm #Hogwarts mystery #oc #character profile #anemone estrella #harry potter hogwarts mystery #harry potter: hogwarts mystery

27 notes · View notes

its-norea-wong · 4 years

Text

Yall don know crap about me so here:

1: when you have cereal, do you have more milk than cereal or more cereal than milk? More cereal than milk. I don like to have a bowl full of milk after.

2: do you like the feeling of cold air on your cheeks on a winter-y day? Yes.

3: what random objects do you use to bookmark your books? Random pieces of old sketch paper I have lying around everywhere.

4: how do you take your coffee/tea? I drink green tea as is. I’ll have that or cocoa, with milk and sprinkles.

5: are you self-conscious of your smile? Yes, I don smile often.

6: do you keep plants? Yes, I have a small sunflower in my window.

7: do you name your plants? Yes, her name is Vivi. Don fuking judge me.

8: what artistic medium do you use to express your feelings? I use oil paints.

9: do you like singing/humming to yourself? Yeah, I hum to the music I play when I draw, sketch and/or paint.

10: do you sleep on your back, side, or stomach? Sleep? Hah, I don’t, but If I take my sleeping pills like I’m suppose to, usually on my side.

11: what’s an inner joke you have with your friends? Er allein, dem die Jugend gehört, gewinnt die Zukunft.

12: what’s your favorite planet? Saturn.

13: what’s something that made you smile today? Watching Shiloh trip and fall.

14: if you were to live with your best friend in an old flat in a big city, what would it look like? I’m not going to live in the city once I finish school.

15: go google a weird space fact and tell us what it is! It would take nine years to walk to the moon.

16: what’s your favorite pasta dish? Ramen.

17: what color do you really want to dye your hair? I want to get rid of the blonde patch at my routes.

18: tell us about something dumb/funny you did that has since gone down in history between you and your friends and is always brought up. When I learnt German only to give our Jewish history teacher wwII flash backs. Nate was mad. I didn’t care.

19: do you keep a journal? what do you write/draw/ in it? Yes and just small outfit ideas.

20: what’s your favorite eye color? Blue, purple or orange. Why? Idfk.

21: talk about your favorite bag, the one that’s been to hell and back with you and that you love to pieces. My hello kitty little backpack that I brought with me from japan, I now use it as a purse when I go shopping. It confuses people.

22: are you a morning person? hell. no.

23: what’s your favorite thing to do on lazy days where you have 0 obligations? Lay in bed till 4 pm.

24: is there someone out there you would trust with every single one of your secrets? Fuck no.

25: what’s the weirdest place you’ve ever broken into? The boy’s dorm room.

26: what are the shoes you’ve had for forever and wear with every single outfit? My black and pastel coloured converse.

27: what’s your favorite bubblegum flavor? bubblegum.

28: sunrise or sunset? sunrise. I’m not a morning person but it looks nice.

29: what’s something really cute that one of your friends does and is totally endearing? no.

30: think of it: have you ever been truly scared? yes, when? I wont tell, unless asked.

31: what is your opinion of socks? do you like wearing weird socks? do you sleep with socks? do you confine yourself to white sock hell? really, just talk about socks. They’re okay ig, yes?, no, no, and no thanks.

32: tell us a story of something that happened to you after 3AM when you were with friends. I can’t really hang out with friends at 3 AM.

33: what’s your fave pastry? dessert mochii.

34: tell us about the stuffed animal you kept as a kid. what is it called? what does it look like? do you still keep it? It’s name is Kuma. It’s a brown fluffy bear. yes i do.

35: do you like stationary and pretty pens and so on? do you use them often? not anymore, I used to write to my mom while I was at school.

36: which band’s sound would fit your mood right now? Bo burnham. That’s it.

37: do you like keeping your room messy or clean? Clean.

38: tell us about your pet peeves! JB. just JB hitting on. every. single. guy. That or Shiloh. Just Shiloh being Shiloh. Also Bae thinking he’s better than everyone else.

39: what color do you wear the most? Black.

40: think of a piece of jewelry you own: what’s it’s story? does it have any meaning to you? I own a small necklace with purple beads. It has meaning to me I guess.

41: what’s the last book you remember really, really loving? The One Safe Place.

42: do you have a favorite coffee shop? describe it! No.

43: who was the last person you gazed at the stars with? JB.

44: when was the last time you remember feeling completely serene and at peace with everything? When I was 11.

45: do you trust your instincts a lot? Yeah.

46: tell us the worst pun you can think of. uhhhhh. To the guy who invented zero, thanks for nothing.

47: what food do you think should be banned from the universe? Store bought ramen. It’s so gross.

48: what was your biggest fear as a kid? is it the same today? Thunder and Lightning, and yes.

49: do you like buying CDs and records? what was the last one you bought? The last CD I bought? Beetlejuice the musical.

50: what’s an odd thing you collect? Knifes. Pencils.

51: think of a person. what song do you associate with them? uhh. Jeremy with sad song by scotty sire.

52: what are your favorite memes of the year so far? Ugandan knuckles, i know its dead but it’s still my favorite.

53: have you ever watched the rocky horror picture show? heathers? beetlejuice? pulp fiction? what do you think of them? i love beetlejuice.

54: who’s the last person you saw with a true look of sadness on their face? idfk.

55: what’s the most dramatic thing you’ve ever done to prove a point? I climbed up a shelf at the library to prove that I could be tall.

56: what are some things you find endearing in people? no.

57: go listen to bohemian rhapsody. how did it make you feel? did you dramatically reenact the lyrics? im not answering this one.

58: who’s the wine mom and who’s the vodka aunt in your group of friends? why? uhh idk.

59: what’s your favorite myth? Any Japanese urban legend.

60: do you like poetry? what are some of your faves? uhh. no.

61: what’s the stupidest gift you’ve ever given? the stupidest one you’ve ever received? I once gave away some floppy hat that my step dad gave me.

62: do you drink juice in the morning? which kind? Yes, pineapple.

63: are you fussy about your books and music? do you keep them meticulously organized or kinda leave them be? Yes. I make sure they’re organized on genre and then in the genre it’s alphabetized.

64: what color is the sky where you are right now? blue.

65: is there anyone you haven’t seen in a long time who you’d love to hang out with? My mom, but in order to do that, i’d have to die. :)

66: what would your ideal flower crown look like? Pink daises and sunflowers, small ones, plus some bits of lavender.

67: how do gloomy days where the sky is dark and the world is misty make you feel? Happy, it’s nice.

68: what’s winter like where you live? no snow, it’s like 60 degrees.

69: what are your favorite board games? idk.

70: have you ever used a ouija board? ya.

71: what’s your favorite kind of tea? green.

72: are you a person who needs to note everything down or else you’ll forget it? No, i have an okay memory.

73: what are some of your worst habits? I bounce my leg around whenever i’m not moving, that or I flick my pencil around.

74: describe a good friend of yours without using their name or gendered pronouns. big ass hole.

75: tell us about your pets! I only have one and she’s a blind kitty. She’s white with spots and has a fluffy tail.

76: is there anything you should be doing right now but aren’t? My homework.

77: pink or yellow lemonade? pink.

78: are you in the minion hateclub or fanclub? uhh i really don’t care

79: what’s one of the cutest things someone has ever done for you? I was given a flower by some girl during lunch, i never got her name though.

80: what color are your bedroom walls? did you choose that color? if so, why? white, i didn’t get to choose cus I live in a dorm room.

81: describe one of your friend’s eyes using the most abstract imagery you can think of. northern star.

82: are/were you good in school? ya i am.

83: what’s some of your favorite album art? idk.

84: are you planning on getting tattoos? which ones? no.

85: do you read comics? what are your faves? Ya i guess, and deadpool.

86: do you like concept albums? which ones? no. not really.

87: what are some movies you think everyone should watch at least once in their lives? my neighbor totoro, kikis delivery service.

88: are there any artistic movements you particularly enjoy? not really.

89: are you close to your parents? I was close with my mom.

90: talk about your one of you favorite cities. tokyo. i don’t have to explain.

91: where do you plan on traveling this year? no where.

92: are you a person who drowns their pasta in cheese or a person who barely sprinkles a pinch? i don’t put cheese on my pasta.

93: what’s the hairstyle you wear the most? Shaved under my lil floof bangs.

94: who was the last person you know to have a birthday? Jeremy.

95: what are your plans for this weekend? Draw.

96: do you install your computer updates really quickly or do you procrastinate on them a lot? I update immediately.

97: myer briggs type, zodiac sign, and hogwarts house? INTJ - The Mastermind, libra, and huffle puff.

98: when’s the last time you went hiking? did you enjoy it? idk and no.

99: list some songs that resonate to your soul whenever you hear them. no.

100: if you were presented with two buttons, one that allows you to go 5 years into the past, the other 5 years into the future, which one would you press? why? 5 years into the past, and for reasons.

#norea wong #about me #ya'll don't know shit #so here we are #idk lmao

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unklarity · 5 years

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Critical Role: Fjord

“It is in our nature to adapt.”

Click “keep reading” for more pictures of my Fjord magic box and for an explanation of the contents!

So, this box was pretty challenging for my brain, content-wise, because I knew that I loved Fjord but couldn’t figure out WHAT I loved about him. It was difficult to name his qualities, because I feel like he’s a bit different than everyone else, both in lore and in the way we learn about him throughout the game. So instead of trying to make a list of what made him who he is, I decided to go a different way and mirror some of the questions he asks himself and others. I’m pretty sure I just made things harder for myself in the end, but I also think it was an interesting way to tackle a box that I’ve never tried before and I’m pretty happy with the outcome.

This box does contain spoilers, because as fast as I was trying to pin down something concrete about Fjord, he was changing - or maybe just showing more of who he really is - and things were happening TO his character that were forcing him to change and adapt as well. The most recent “spoilers” which aren’t super concrete but will be referenced here would be episode 76, as that’s when I finished the actual contents of the box. I promise I will keep things vague in my explanation, but you’ve been warned. :)

The box for Fjord is a vintage box with an awesome pirate ship on the lid. The second I saw it, I knew I needed to have it, and it was actually what inspired the box in the first place. Right after I got it, I immediately got the yellow eye and set it into the top lid to represent Uk’otoa watching Fjord in his dreams and the Cloven crystals. It is super creepy, because the eye totally looks like it follows you when you move the box around!

Stones:

To start out, I started accumulating stones, as I tend to do when potion contents seem intimidating and confusing. As a focus stone, I included a Kambaba Jasper sphere, which helps with dissolving overwhelming negative emotions and healing from trauma - plus it’s varied shades of green, which I thought would fit nicely.

The two crystal towers in the box are smoky citrine and pyrite. Smoky citrine helps to ground and to calm fear and uncertainty. Pyrite, on the other hand, is a Protector Stone, representing self worth, personal power, strength, willpower and focus. It helps overcome feelings of inadequacy and live your life to its full potential.

The tumbled stones included in the box are:

bloodstone for courage and freedom from captivity;

labradorite for help banishing fears/insecurities while enhancing faith and reliance in oneself;

moss agate for a new start and gaining confidence in oneself;

fluorite for seeking knowledge, changing negative behavior, revealing truth, and emotional balance;

black tourmaline for help when feeling trapped;

aquamarine for courage, freedom, and communication, and is used by sailors as a talisman of good luck;

vesuvianite (a type of greet garnet) for soothing emotional turmoil, help making peace with and adapting to new situations, and support through major transition and upheaval;

obsidian for protection;

dumortierite for help taking control of one’s own life

Finally, there’s a round, flat star ruby in the black sachet, meant for overcoming adversity, opening up and expressing true feelings, and some tiny red coral pebbles for confidence and courage.

Potions:

I felt like I anguished over the potions for ages, but really it took a few weeks of trial and error to get my thoughts to flow in a way that made sense. I started with 7 bottles and came up with 7 questions as loose themes for each one. This was a bit tricky, and I think I ended up making things more difficult for myself, but I’m happy with the results, so I’m going to pretend it was intentional genius all along.

After I finished the bottles, I did give them each a more succinct one-word theme, but I’m going to share both the questions and themes in an effort to show my process a bit. The first three potions are in the first photo above, in order from left to right, and the remaining four are in the next photo, also in order.

1. What is this pact I am in and what does it mean? (PACT) This potion is centered around Fjord’s pact with Uk’otoa, which is his most important conflict that’s both internal and external. He is initially confused about the pact and wants to learn more about it, and this curiosity quickly seems to turn to fear and uncertainty when he realizes just what he’s in for. There’s skullcap for making a binding oath or pact, bay leaf for prophetic dreams, lavender and coffee for disappointment, bitterness and regret; Anise and rosemary for preventing nightmares/disturbing dreams, aid in clear thinking, and help with memory, as Fjord doesn’t ever remember actually making a pact, he just washed up on the shore with the falchion next to him. There’s also vervain for protection at sea and protection from drowning, and thorns for feeling trapped and fearing one’s circumstances. Lastly, dogwood here represents regret over a specific decision or a situation that was beyond your control, and black represents a curse, or a boon that’s been warped into something negative. -Sealed with an anchor stamp and gold wax.

2. What is magic worth to me/Where does my worth come from? (DESIRE) This potion focuses on Fjord’s desire to learn about magic and understand his abilities. He seems to be searching for something he can’t name, and through learning magic he gains confidence in who he is and starts to accept himself (albeit conditionally). On the flipside, once he has this magic and this knowledge and it gets taken away, he has the realization that his magic and strength is intrinsically tied to his self-worth and isn’t sure how to deal with the possibility that it might not be permanent. This one contains fluorite and garnet pebbles, representing the search for knowledge and gaining strength. In addition, there’s cedar for confidence, strength and gaining knowledge; mugwort for building confidence; rosemary for difficulty with self-acceptance; jasmine for beginning a new life with new ideas/a new outlook, and hibiscus for finding passion, drive and insight. There’s also labradorite and violet for glamour magic and changing who you are both physically and mentally - for example, both gaining physical strength, filing down his tusks, and adopting Vandran’s accent. -Sealed with rosemary stamp and gold wax.

3. What am I willing to do for power? (POWER) This one deals with Fjord’s struggle of not wanting to be a burden or be cast out vs his impulsiveness and tendency to take risks. I had a lot of questions going into this one such as: How willing is he to deceive people/keep them in the dark? WHO is he willing to deceive? What are the means, what is the end? What was the goal in working with Avantika: just knowledge, or power? Cad’s quote of “Sleep well with your bad decisions.” really influenced this one in a big way. Fjord tends to make decisions and think about what they mean later, and ask questions of his friends without being willing to answer any about himself in return. On the surface it seems as though Fjord is trying to play both sides, getting what he wants by deceiving Avantika, and thinking he can fool his Patron as well, although as we know, that doesn’t turn out quite as well as he plans. For this one, we’ve got deer tongue for power; licorice root for persuasive powers/charisma and having advantage over others; lavender for distrust/disappointing others and yourself; hydrangea for pushing people away, and yellow rose for lies and suspicion. -Sealed with tiny ship stamp and gold wax.

4. How do I define myself? (SELF) This potion was super interesting and led to a lot of different questions. How does Fjord define himself? By his magic? By his past, or the people in his past (like Vandran)? How does he think of himself? As a leader, as an outcast, as part of the mighty nein? Who is he? Orphan, sailor boy, half orc, warlock, charming, intimidating? His tendency to act as teacher/mentor/protector/leader/ really stood out when compared to the lack of that figure in his own life. At times, he seems like he wants to fade in the background, but when no one else will, he steps up and becomes the voice of the group. For this one, I added cinquefoil for eloquence and acting as a leader; goldenrod for magic; cypress leaves for processing grief, anger and loss; pyrite for becoming a protector; poppy for trying to leave the past behind, and calendula for honoring the people we have lost, which I thought really fit with how Fjord adopts Vandran’s accent. I think Fjord defines himself internally by his past and is trying to scratch out one by one the things that remind him of his pre-Vandran life that he views as worthless, or as something he needs to erase in order to be worth something. He’s emulating a man that he respected, and trying to choose how he defines himself instead of having that decision be made for him as it was in his younger years. -Sealed with ship stamp and gold wax.

5. What am worth I without magic? (DOUBT) This potion focuses on Fjord’s uncertainty, loneliness, insecurity, self-doubt, and fear of being helpless/fear of failure. Because he’s given his new powers so much importance, it paints a really stark contrast when we start to see his really deep reserves of insecurity and self-doubt. His fear of being helpless again is a big motivator for most of his (poorly thought-out) decisions. He tries to stay self sufficient, and we start to see that fear of being abandoned by the Mighty Nein if he isn’t useful to them, likened to his previous abandonment by his family and by Vandren, the only other positive figure in his life. In this potion is black ink and purple goldenrod for trauma and imprisonment/being helpless/blaming oneself; heather for solitude and protection against violence; lemon balm for help with insecurity, calming, and self worth; yarrow for overcoming fear and self doubt, and dogwood for keeping things (his dreams, accent, past, etc) close to the chest. -Sealed with ship stamp and gold wax.

6. Where do I belong/where am I going? (CHOICES) For me, this potion was about Fjord gaining the agency to make his own choices instead of having those choices made for him. He didn’t choose the pact with Uk’otoa, and didn’t choose how he grew up, but slowly, he starts realizing the power he has to make decisions and change his own life, both alone and with the help of others. He has a ton of choices to make: Release Uk’otoa or not? Break the pact or not? Become a follower of the Wildmother or not? This potion is one of my favorites and is packed full of ingredients! There’s barberry for atonement, magic/sorcery, and for freeing oneself from the power/control/influence of another; mint for help getting the push needed to change one’s life, peaceful sleep, protection while sleeping, communication, and drawing good spirits; rue for freedom and breaking oaths, and for help seeing and understanding one’s mistakes; agrimony for overcoming fear, reversing pacts and spells and warding off evil entities. Like the first potion, there’s also skullcap in this one for making a binding oath/pact, but this time it represents both Fjord’s blood oath with Caleb and his newfound connection with Wildmother. It also represents the relief of disharmony. Lastly, there’s pink rosebuds for divine love, pink carnation for a mother’s love (the Wildmother), and peony for protection, breaking hexes/curses/bindings, and help dealing with feelings of shame, which Fjord definitely struggled with when his powers were taken away from him. -Sealed with symbol of the Wildmother and gold wax.

7. Can I reach my goals alone? Do I want to? (GROWTH) In my other CR2 boxes so far I’ve included a reference to the rest of the Mighty Nein, and for Fjord I wanted to keep it going. In this potion, there is one clove for each member of the M9, including Molly. Cloves represent camaraderie, and becoming better through the influence of those around you. There’s also thyme for attracting loyalty and the good opinion of others, providing strength/courage, and warding off grief/nightmares; zinnia to remember friends that are no longer with us; sage for renewal, and for grief/loss and being able to learn from them (grief for Vandren, Molly, himself, and for other losses the group has sustained). Lastly, there’s magnolia for loyalty, calming anxiety, peace and overcoming destructive/unnecessary behaviors. -Sealed with tiny ship stamp and gold wax.

Since the top inside lid was so simple with just the eye, I wanted to have a little fun with the bottom of the box and make it a bit more complicated. I got a silver sword and broke it, then carved out a space in the bottom so the sword would fit, using clay to fill in gaps so the sword was set flush into the bottom surface and it was still flat enough for everything to balance on it. Then, I covered it in resin, giving the bottom a “wet” look, which turned out even better than I expected and ended up looking super cool. To finish it all off, I added a piece of fishing net on the bottom as both a way to protect the resin and to give an interesting effect.

Lastly, I added a brass-topped tooth on a red cord in the little black sachet to represent the red rope on Fjord’s armor and his tusks, which have served as a metaphor throughout the campaign for his journey to self-acceptance, and carved a quote on the very bottom of the outside of the box. It says “It is in our nature to adapt.” I don’t want to spoil how and when it’s said, but I thought it fit really well.

This box was a wild ride, and I felt like I couldn’t see the end until I’d reached it. I’m glad I stuck it out and kept going because I love how it turned out! Thanks for reading this ridiculously long write up, friends, and until next time!

#cr fjord #critical role #critical role art #magic boxes #magic box #critrole #fjord #long post

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lachalaine · 4 years

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— BASICS.

▸ IS YOUR MUSE TALL / SHORT / AVERAGE ? A fair bit short, as she stands only at 5′1. She tends to wear wedge shoes though, so oftentimes that elevates her to more of a 5′4 or 5′5 depending on her shoe choice for the day.

▸ ARE THEY OKAY WITH THEIR HEIGHT ? Not really, no. She gets huffy if she’s teased about it, and will likely kick the taller offender in the knees if she’s irritated enough. She finds there are perks to being short though, like sneaking around taller crowds and being able to climb into vents and all that.

▸ WHAT’S THEIR HAIR LIKE ? Healthy, thick and naturally wavy, dyed mostly violet with some hints of pink and blue. The length of it is pretty long as even with the curls does it still brush along her waist, and suffice it to say, putting it in a ponytail can be a chore in itself. But she’s gotten used to it, at least.

▸ DO THEY SPEND A LOT OF TIME ON THEIR HAIR / GROOMING ? Yes and no. She’s not exactly vain, but she cares a lot about her hair and making sure it always looks good. She tries not to use too much heat on it for example, preferring to let it air dry. She always has a designated ‘hair day’ at least twice or once a week, so she can spend an hour or two using all the good stuff to keep it healthy. She attempts to bleach the roots only once a year if she can, since that’s pretty much the most damaging thing in her hair routine, although thankfully it seems that she’s stained the majority of her hair enough already that constant touch ups aren’t so much an issue. Beyond that has she also made it a point to dye all of her conditioner purple as well, just to make sure the color is getting replenished with each wash.

In terms of everything else, she practices good hygiene and cleans up nice, keeps her nails an appropriate length and at the very least, makes sure she looks acceptable.

What happens after she leaves the house however, tends to be both beyond her control and overall attention.

▸ DOES YOUR MUSE CARE ABOUT THEIR APPEARANCE / WHAT OTHERS THINK ? She used to, when she was still in college and still had black hair; when she was still somewhat demure and uncertain and still coming into herself. Of course, a huge part of why she even dyed her hair in the first place - and the reason why she dyed it the shade she did - was in an attempt to break free of those initial insecurities; to break free of caring of what people thought with regards to how she looked.

Once upon a time would she have hunched into herself and tried to hide with how the more conservative people around her would talk about her hair like it was absolutely garish and totally overdone. Once upon a time was she into the habit of wearing somewhat baggy clothing, shirts that were two sizes too big, conscious again of the way men would look at her frame like she was consciously trying to tease. Once upon a time, she cared.

Now however, she genuinely couldn’t give two fucks what anyone else could say about her looks. No matter if people might think she’s showing too much or too little, even if they think her hair was too wild and chaotic, and really, as far as they were concerned, she was just asking for attention. As far as she’s concerned however, she’d received about the same amount of criticism and unwanted attention when she didn’t look the way she did now, when she was unhappy and constantly trying to hide herself; so she figures, at this point in her life, she might as well just own it. Now she’s comfortable in her clothes, she’s happy with her hair. She likes the way she looks, and looks like no else as far as she can tell; unique and thriving and loving it.

And if anyone has a problem with it, it’s not hers to deal with.

— PREFERENCES.

▸ INDOORS OR OUTDOORS ? both, but she leans towards being outdoors for the most part. ▸ RAIN OR SUNSHINE ? both, but she leans towards rain a smidgen more too. ▸ FOREST OR BEACH ? beach. ▸ PRECIOUS METALS OR GEMS ? gems. ▸ FLOWERS OR PERFUMES ? both, with a mild preference to flowers. ▸ PERSONALITY OR APPEARANCE ? personality. ▸ BEING ALONE OR BEING IN A CROWD ? alone. ▸ ORDER OR ANARCHY ? she doesn’t trust order all the time, so she leans towards anarchy. ▸ PAINFUL TRUTHS OR WHITE LIES ? painful truths. ▸ SCIENCE OR MAGIC ? magic even if she’s terrible at it. ▸ PEACE OR CONFLICT ? she wants peace but she knows better then to trust it at face value, so quite often does she choose conflict when the need arises for it. ▸ NIGHT OR DAY ? night. ▸ DUSK OR DAWN ? dusk. ▸ WARMTH OR COLD ? warmth. ▸ MANY ACQUAINTANCES OR A FEW CLOSE FRIENDS ? few close friends. ▸ READING OR PLAYING A GAME ? playing a game.

— QUESTIONNAIRE.

▸ WHAT ARE SOME OF YOUR MUSE’S BAD HABITS ? She has a generally short temper, so quite often does she tend to punch first and then ask questions later. Curse words also tend to be her favorite words, and she can be remarkably stubborn and hard headed when she puts her mind to things, so focused on being independent and trying to figure things out on her own that she just shoves away any offer for help, not thinking of the consequences for when it comes to be too much.

She also likes to shove all of her pain and heartache deep down into an abyss where you can’t find them, so she tends to never deal with them and the problems they will inevitably cause to her slowly fraying sanity. :)

▸ HAS YOUR MUSE LOST ANYONE CLOSE TO THEM ? HOW HAS IT AFFECTED THEM ?

By death, no, she hasn’t, as all her closest family and friends remain alive and well. She did lose Garry though, and he was the closest to her once upon a time; although it was by her own choice that she lost him, as even though she didn’t necessarily want to make that cut, she knew it was necessary. His absence in her life has had an overall positive effect though, in far too many ways.

Like emotionally and mentally is she now stronger, more independent and comfortable in her own skin, enough to know what she’s actually worth and what she’s actually capable of vs what her shit anxieties used to tell her of the same. She has her freedom without him, to live as normal a life as possible, albeit with a few spots of danger that crop up every once in a while; oftentimes hailing from her initial involvement with him. More then anything however, has she learned to rely on herself - and while this is both good and bad, considering that means she also now refuses to let anyone close enough to take on some of her burdens - I have to say it’s brought her very far from where she used to be.

She’s better like this. Alone perhaps, but handling it on her terms all the same.

▸ WHAT ARE SOME FOND MEMORIES YOUR MUSE HAS ? Moments with her grandmother in France, where she used to give her a single chocolate truffle every day whenever she saw her. Another are these fond moments she had with her dad when she was just a child, curling up on his lap and playing her video games while he’d read his books. She has so many fun memories with Emilia and Alexander, as well - memories where the girls would try to skip town, or skip out on their parents, although Alex himself was usually just tugged along for the ride, even when he knew it was always a bad idea. But he kept the girls out of trouble. Then she has some good memories with Theo too, mainly they were when she’d just gotten back to Shibuya after her time with Garry, and he’d stepped in to help her get set up again.

▸ IS IT EASY FOR YOUR MUSE TO KILL ? ...yes. It’s simple, and it’s easy, and she can do it without so much as a blink. No hesitation, no apologies, just numb, numb, numb. Although she certainly feels it in the aftermath of things, when the world falls silent and she feels adequately alone. The numbness is still there for the most part, but it slowly starts to fade, coming to war with the quiver of guilt that now crops up too. Often times does she break down from it, a puddle of silent tears in her bathroom while she tries to scrub the blood off her clothes. Always silent, always quiet, even if she wants to scream, even if she’s alone and she knows no one will hear her - she can’t let a single peep out. It just stays stuck inside her chest, locked away and never to see the light of day.

It’s how she copes. She’d never be able to handle it otherwise.

▸ WHAT’S IT LIKE WHEN YOUR MUSE BREAKS DOWN ? It’s absolutely painful, more then anything. Hard to watch, hard to deal with. She breaks down --- slowly. Never coming at a snap, but more like watching her gradually drown instead. She just lets it build up, you see. Lets it build up, slowly strangling her, slowly dimming her vision and her mind, and even though she can feel it coming, she just continues to ignore it. Continues to pretend she’s not fraying at the seams. Until finally does it seem to catch up with her, finally does it sink its hold into her chest - where she comes to realize she genuinely can’t breathe, and all she can feel in her chest is -- absolutely nothing. An abyssal emptiness, with no heart or soul to speak of. Just utterly numb, in a way that it’s genuinely terrifying. Because she doesn’t understand how she could feel so empty.

And again, will she refuse to speak, refuse to make a single peep, even she’s curled up on the floor and clutching her head, crying and breaking and at risk of tearing her hair out. And she’ll push people away and tell them to leave, gasping behind her tears even as they fall down her cheeks. And she’ll try to hold it back as much as possible, but the moment she does yell - the moment she does scream - it means she’s nearing her final breaking point. It means something / someone is getting through to her, something that she’s using anger to try to counter, anger to try to bluff, but it’s weakness. And need. And an absolute and genuine desire for comfort.

And if her companion stays with her still even despite her yelling and her rage, she’ll eventually give in, eventually allow them to come close and try to care for her -- even if all it is just a touch. She’ll start to sob and cry in earnest, and likely throw herself into their arms and hug them tight, unable to hold herself back any longer. It is the one moment of weakness she’ll allow herself, and it won’t stop until she’s completely sated.

▸ IS YOUR MUSE CAPABLE OF TRUSTING SOMEONE WITH THEIR LIFE ? Yes, she’s capable of it. Although it really just does depend on the connection she has with that particular someone. If it’s someone she’s gotten close to, someone that has been with her through thick and thin and has handled her presence in ways she genuinely admires and appreciates, then yes, she would trust them with her life.

She would need to have that sense of stability from them though, that dependability that allows her to trust that they’ll be there for her whenever, for as much as they are capable of, to be comfortable in knowing they won’t let her down. She’s used to depending on only herself, after all, so someone somehow being able to reinforce that concept for, even when she herself constantly finds means and ways to push it back is a big thing to ask, and even harder to achieve.

But once she reaches that point, she makes sure to return that devotion tenfold, and there is nothing she wouldn’t trust them with, not the least her life.

▸ WHAT’S YOUR MUSE LIKE WHEN THEY’RE IN LOVE ? Soft. She’s very soft when she’s in love. Adoring and affectionate, teasing and playful, both entirely insatiable and supremely content. A Jackie in love is a Jackie unlike any other, and because romance for her is so remarkably rare, I have to say that it makes this side of her all the more precious because of it. Because when she’s in love, it’s like her whole worldview changes. She becomes co-dependent, and they become her priority. And she’s happiest when she’s by their side, for no longer is it just Jackie against the world, but she has someone she can consider her own now, to experience the world with them Together.

And gradually does she become more comfortable in letting her lover in, no longer pushing them away or being quite so tense, but rather just -- letting her walls down. She lets them see the parts of herself that aren’t so perfect, that aren’t so great, and she places those aspects up in full view for them to see, to decide if they really wanted to keep dealing with her in spite of it all. Not to say that she fully expects them to take her exactly as she is, for better, or for worse, but rather - she just wants them to know what they’re getting into. To understand that she’s not the best, no matter that they might think she is, to understand that she’s a mess, a disaster, and she’s hopeless on a good day, utterly impossible on a bad, and there are no excuses for it - but despite her faults would she still try her best, try for them, so that she could be better.

To be deserving of them. To be worthy of whatever it is that she puts them through, because she knows it won’t always be easy with her.

But she’d still like to try to make it so, as much as she can, no matter what.

stolen from: @heavcnlyone !!

tagging: @secrecykept for any of the boys !! 💕💕

#long post #&& chatelaine on the decks (jackie headcannon)#/ oooh this was fun!#/ hc's always help to get back into things #/ maybe i can try to do more tomorrow #/ maybe i can try to do a thread tomorrow i shall see dhbdsa anyway this is long and i hope it makes sense #/ i didnt reread it pls help me dahbshdbs

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cockbiteproductions · 5 years

Note

primed to scream PRIMES! PRIMES! PRIMES!!

f i just typed the answer to most of these questions and chrome crashed so christ i have to fucking retype all these but much condensed because i am lazy.

2. chocolate bars or lollipops?

chocolate bars. but only milk. my mom buys exclusively Very Dark Chocolate though so i usually just stare at those and Wish.

3. bubblegum or cotton candy?

well bubblegum or cotton candy flavored stuff neither they both taste nauseating. if we’re talking about the actual stuff then bubblegum because i can pop it. this actually reminded me i have gum in the pantry from the beginning of the semester i havent even opened yet so now my roommates have you to thank for popping noises the next hr or so

5. do you prefer to drink soda from soda cans, soda bottles, plastic cups or glass cups?

soda bottles because i dont like to drink soda quickly and so i want to close it and not let the carbon dioxide escape. soda cans a close second because it’s satisfying to open the tab.

7. earbuds or headphones?

wired earbuds because headphones are too big and clunky and you cant easily lay on your side with headphones on. but if my next pair of earbuds break within a month i might consider Switching because ive had 3 break on me in the past month and half and im at my wits end with earbuds.

11. what you have for breakfast on an average day?

i dont eat much for breakfast cause i want to sleep in until the last possible moment and i get stomachaches when i eat a lot in the morning but ill eat a piece of bread and yogurt maybe.

13. lanyard or key ring?

key ring but that’s just because i havent used a lanyard before. i think i would like a lanyard. im constantly looking for my keys in bags.

17. most frequently worn pair of shoes?

this pair of black sandals that i have tan lines on my feet from how much ive worn them

19. sleeping position?

ill sleep however... i like sleeping on my left side. on my stomach with my head to the right. on my back with my arms crossover my chest to keep warm. at the end of the bed with my head where my feet should be. i dont move at all when i sleep so freshman year when i had a lofted bed i think my roommate was a bit concerned in the beginning when i refused a bedrail because she thought i might fall. i never fell which was nice.

23. strange habits?

oh man idk i probably have a lot of those but nothing i can think about right now when im being put on the spot.

in elementary school i used to refuse to step on the yellow tiles at school.

29. best way to bond with you?

talk to me about the stuff i love!!!! and watch the stuff i love with me!!!! i am always down to [whatever the rabb.it replacement is these days] stuff with people and just generally both yell at each other and be passionate about stuff. currently what im passionate about is the stuff im screaming over at @winstonbillions so talk to me about that stuff!! please. i am always 3 seconds from screaming about ANY of that stuff.

31. what outfit do you wear to kick ass and take names?

idk about outfits to kick ass and take names but i have outfits where i get my ass kicked and name taken aka what i wear to exams. which is my tower of pimps shirt which ive deemed lucky. is it lucky in any way? no, but i’m hoping if i wear it enough to exams it might.

37. suitcase or duffel bag?

duffel bag. suitcases are so large and unwieldily. that reminds me i have a suitcase of winter clothes in my trunk i need to take out.

41. last person you texted?

as in actual texts on my phone? that would be my dad. asking him if i should drop my class im failing.

as for the last person i instant messaged, that would be one of my mutuals through my musical theater sideblog im currently yelling at about [musical theater related interest]. im not kidding guys talk to me about the stuff i post about on @winstonbillions PLEASE

43. hoodie, leather jacket, cardigan, jean jacket or bomber jacket?

2 months ago i would have said hoodie but im kinda becoming a cardigan kind of person now. theyre just Soft and and Long and Casual and i love them. hoodies are too hard to take off.

47. favorite type of cheese?

mild cheddar, american, and mozzarella. i actually only Recently started cataloging cheeses in my brain to their actual names so for my entire life i was like i just like cheese even though there are certain ones i hate like swiss and blue cheese.

53. what is the current state of your hands?

a bit cold and a bit tired from typing all the answers to all these asks tbh. but other than that good. i just cut my nails because they were atrociously long.

59. if you were a video game character, what would your catchphrase be?

“worm” or “fuck” or “no!” according to my roommate

61. favorite line you heard from a book/movie/tv show/etc.?

oh my ogdokh oym ogdos sd fdospohm to mo edf ucmign fugod mfyo uacant just ask me this im going to absolutely die

in absolutely no order, all from completely from memory, and favorite for a variety of different reasons

“fuck you, math man. if you’re such a genius why can’t you count to loyalty” - mafee in 4x11 lamster billions

“captain, he think, and feels that much more powerful” - luminousbeings in you don’t have to (say yes) the star trek fic

“more than you know, i understand wanting to walk away from the jedi”“i know.” - anakin skywalker and ahsoka tano in 5x12 the wrong jedi star wars the clone wars

“i won’t leave you, not this time.” “then you will die” - ahsoka tano and darth vader in 2x12 twilight of the apprentice star wars rebels

“there is nothing so pure as a man on a mission. when faced with the fire, never quivers or runs. there is nothing so noble as sticking together, for lonely is the life lead when sticking to its guns." - narrator in bloodsong of love by joe iconis

“now i’ve got myself a name and i’m ready to risk it with a battle cry disguised as a sing-along” - never heard nothing by joe iconis

“i’m frickin done with being the loser, the wuss, the underdog. being the misfit, the old school analog. being the oddball, the weakling freak. the failure, the sucker, the please-don’t-speak. oh i can’t hardly wait for the moment when i’m not the loser the geek or whatever, ever again” - jeremy heere in be more chill by joe iconis

“i’m tired of being the person that everyone thinks that i am” - various in be more chill by joe iconis

“q is for quantitative, baby!” - winston in 4x12 extreme sandbox billions

“the cheering is just as important as the song” - lisa and ms. werring in the black suits by joe iconis

“first, best destiny” - spock in star trek ii wrath of khan

“be proud of your place in the cosmos. it is small, and yet it is. how unlikely. how fantastic, and stupid. and excellent.” - cecil in welcome to night vale old oak doors part b

“are we living a life that is safe from harm? of course not. we never are. the questions is are we living a life that is worth the harm?” - cecil in welcome to night vale parade day

“as I turned and my eyes beheld you, i displayed emotion. i beg forgiveness.” - spock somewhere in star trek tos

“the sky collapsed without a sound. these broken pieces hit the ground. the rain fell down around me and i drowned, but i will save you.” - part of me from dear evan hansen

“this is, after all, the story of how i died” - epsilon in the rvb13 trailer

“and while the law has many punishments for the atrocities we inflict on others, there are no punishments for the terrors we inflict on ourselves.” - the director in the s6 finale of red vs blue

that was in no way an exhaustive list but all i could think of at the moment

67. good luck charms?

not really any tbh. i try to wear my tower of pimps shirt whenever i take an exam but that’s about it.

71. least favorite pattern?

what does this even fucking mean?????? i will say the observer design pattern in programming because i don’t understand it well despite having used it twice now.

73. favorite weird flavor combo?

oh god idk why are all these questions getting harder. nothing i can think of at the moment.

79. which looks better, your school id photo or your driver’s license photo?

i say school id tentatively, but neither of them looks great. my school id photo was a selfie.

83. writing or drawing?

writing. i wish to GOD i could draw and i probably could if i put in the amount of time i need to to learn how to draw but im a lazy bastard. but i’m not that great at writing either as i’ve found out. everything is way too short and out of character and too venty and i am weird about letting people i know read what i write (sorry @ all the people who keep asking me to let them read my writing. it’s not that great you’re not missing out at all and i hate the Mortifying Ordeal of Being Known) and i abandon ideas literal minutes after getting them.

89. who would you put before everyone else?

what the fuck kind of question is this?????? i GUESS the answer should be me but uh i am not even putting myself before myself as i am procrastinating on a shitload of homework with this. i guess my “close” friends. they’re pretty chill. but generally ill do anything for anyone all you have to do is ask.

97. how many phone numbers do you have memorized?

4, my own, my home landline, my dad’s cell, and my dad’s work.

#not rt #teresa answers stuff #long post #jesus christ sorry for the infodump #Anonymous

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tiny-maus-boots · 5 years

Text

The Knave

A/N: Part 5 of The Debt Collector Series. Omgosh we’re winding up to the end!!

A/N 2: TRIGGER WARNING FOR DOMESTIC ABUSE

Super big thank you to my bestie and beta @chloes-yellow-cup who puts up with me when I’m annoying (which is all the time), and STILL is kind enough to read and edit for me.

AAAAAND a very special thank you to @kate-harper because look at what she made!!! It is the greatest thing I have ever seen. It’s beautiful and I love and I have it saved as my lock screen so I can stare at it all day at work.

Stacie

“Give me twenty minutes? I want to get out of this dress while I’m packing a bag.”

Cynthia Rose gave a nod as she pulled past the gate. It was pretty late but she hadn’t wanted to stay at home for the night. Not after the incident with Phillip, she just couldn’t stomach the idea of being anywhere that reminded her of Weston or his friends. And as much as she hated the truth of it, her home was the last place that she would call safe. She just needed to grab a few things and some clothes and CR had kindly offered a ride home and then to Aubrey’s.

“It’s cool, Ashley will wait.”

Stacie shook her head at that with a soft chuckle. She was starting to suspect that Cynthia Rose’s side girl was a little more involved than just something casual. “Twice in one week, that sounds serious.”

“Pots and kettles, Stace. Pots and kettles.”

It was fair and she gave a laugh before sliding out of the car with keys and shoes in one hand, her purse in the other. It was dark inside but she knew the layout like the back of her hand, Stacie picked her way through the dark house intending to stop in her office to grab her planner before heading upstairs to change and pack. A pale glow from the under cabinet lights in the kitchen across the way bathed the hallway floor just outside her office but the room itself was pitch black. The dark didn’t normally scare her, not really, but her office felt like it was breathing malice and it made a shiver chase down her spine.

She should have let Aubrey drive her, really she should have, but the blonde had gotten a call she had to take and Stacie thought it would be just a quick trip to get her things. It shouldn’t have needed an armed escort for something so simple. But here she was, suddenly afraid to move. The tall brunette hesitated by her desk, reaching out for the warm leather of her planner when a voice came out of the deep shadows and it was the last voice she wanted to hear.

“I waited for you.”

Fear made her heart stop then beat triple time and she considered just running out of the room. But he would catch her, he always caught her. No matter how many times she’d tried to run away from him in the moment, he always managed to get to her just in time. Sometimes purposely letting her think she could get away before smashing her hopes with heavy hands. Stacie swallowed thickly and slowly stood to her full height as he clicked on the floor lamp next to the arm chair he sat in.

“Wes. Jesus Christ, you scared me.”

“I said. I. Waited. For. You.” His words were cold and the threat in them was clearly heard despite his low volume. It wasn’t at all the same reaction she got from hearing the menace in Aubrey’s voice, no this sparked a different type of response all together. “Where were you Stacie?”

Just for a moment rebellion flared up in her and she wanted to throw it in his face exactly where she had been and exactly with whom. She wanted him to know that Aubrey had treated her like royalty and then fucked her into oblivion in the back seat of her car because they just couldn’t keep their hands off each other. She wanted to get in every stinging jab that she could but she didn’t dare provoke him. Not when he was in an already perilous mood.

“I was at my fundraiser. I thought you were busy with work?” She knew he hadn’t left town, but Stacie thought it was better to let him think she was clueless as possible. He didn’t say anything and she reached for her planner again. It was wishful thinking that she could just grab it and walk away, and she knew it, but it was still disappointing when he stood and unfolded his long body from the shadows as he made his way toward her. It was hard to remember a time when she loved him, when she had thought that he loved her. Especially right now where every word and gesture was laced with danger and hate.

Of course now she knew he had never loved her, only her money, and the amount of punishment she could take. Stacie’s stomach turned and she wanted to run away screaming for help but she was frozen to the spot just watching him draw closer like every insidious nightmare she’d ever had. He grabbed her upper arm tightly and pulled her close to his chest. Up close like this even in the dark she could see that there was something wrong with his face. His mouth seemed…odd and when he spoke she realized why.

“Oh I was taking care of business alright.” His grip was bruising and he dragged her across the floor of the office toward the credenza. “Open the safe.” When she resisted being pulled along he brought his hand up and backhanded her so hard it left her ears ringing. “You know why you fight me don’t you?” He yanked her back into him before shoving her hard against the edge of the credenza, her hip connecting with it painfully. “You like the abuse Stacie.”

She didn’t. Not at all. Yes she could admit that she liked it rough and wild, and she definitely could admit that when she and Weston started seeing each other the sex had a lot to do with her attraction to him. But over the years the lines had blurred until there was no line left to cross. Now every touch was just wrong to her and she couldn’t help but recoil when his hands tangled in her hair to yank her head roughly around to face him. He smiled at the fear on her face but the smile faded to be replaced with rage as her revulsion replaced the fear in her eyes.

Aubrey hadn’t been playing games with Weston and even with dental implants or partial dentures his smile would never be the same. It gave her a deep sense of satisfaction and she was too slow to stop her lips from curling in a sneer. He slapped her again but his hand lingered and she knew he was enjoying it a little too much. Her guts lurched at the thought of him ever touching her like that again. “Open the fucking safe Stacie.”

She tried to twist away but he gave a savage yank, bringing her head against the wall hard enough to split the skin right at her hairline. A hot line of blood slowly trickled its way down her forehead and along the bridge of her nose as she raised a shaky hand to work the combination lock on the safe. When it was open he shoved her away from him roughly, swinging it open wide to look at the contents. It wasn’t anywhere near what she normally had tucked away but it was still 150 thousand in neat little stacks all nicely banded and counted already. Stacie swiped at her forehead and stepped back as he pulled the money out and started to shove it into a leather valise.

“Where’s the rest?”

“I spent it.” He turned to look at her and she took a step back instinctually. He had never asked her for money before even though he liked that she had it. Weston had his own money that he liked to throw around, and she was convinced his own apartment somewhere closer to his office. Somewhere, she suspected, where he could take the other women he abused. “Why do you need it? You make good money.”

“I don’t have a job right now.” He punched the wall in his anger and she flinched, trembling as he paced and stroked his jaw while he thought. “Those son of a bitches turned on me, Carlton, Walters…even Phillip. I need to pay it all back…I already have that shit bag cop Mitchell on my back. If I get it all back I can salvage it still before it spins out of control.”

It made sense now, Phillip’s behavior at Monte Carlo night, and his two friends so gleeful to see her there alone. They had already known he was in deep trouble and were there to take pleasure in Weston’s downfall. Stacie frowned at what he was saying, her mind not understanding the idea of cops being involved. There was suddenly too much information and not enough context leaving her in a swirl of confusion.

“Weston…Jesus Christ….what did you do?” Stacie could read his body language clearly and turned to bolt away but he was expecting her to and he lunged nearly taking her to the ground with his weight. They stumbled and she wiggled free of him for one victorious moment before he threw her into the desk making her topple and slide to the floor. The impact blinding her momentarily with the rush of pain. “Stop it Wes, please…”

“SHUT UP!” Weston turned his back and paced a few steps before going back to the bag to count what was there. “It’s not enough. It’s not fucking. ENOUGH! Okay okay okay. You’re going to get it. We’ll liquidate some of the assets for fast cash. This could work. I just have to strike a deal with that bitch.”

Stacie winced when she tried to sit up, everything suddenly hurting at once. She made the mistake of whimpering when she finally pulled herself to her feet. Weston turned on her, his gaze calculating and cold. She knew that only meant trouble for her. And she was tired of it. So tired of being hurt and scarred. She was tired of feeling afraid and worthless. She was just so fucking tired of Weston. She sagged against the desk, the edge of it pressing against her thigh along the edge of her forgotten thigh holster.

“You’re going to get me that money Stacie. Today.”

She could give it to him, she had the money, whatever the amount was that he needed. But she didn’t want to because she was over whatever this sick hell was. It wasn’t her fault and she hadn’t deserved any of it. Her mother’s voice tried to rise up and shout her into submission but another smoother, calmer voice drowned it out.

‘Whose girl are you?’

Stacie lifted her head and felt her shoulders square. Aubrey wasn’t there but the memory of her voice and her sure and steady gaze reminded Stacie that she didn’t have to do this anymore. She was a queen and she was done kneeling before him. “No.”

“What? Did you just say ‘no’ to me?” Weston started toward in her a towering tornado of rage and ill intent and her ears filled with the sounds of crashing waves. So loud and thunderous that it drowned out everything else in her mind.

It wasn’t even really a thought the way her hand went to the gun. It was ridiculously easy to draw even though she thought it would be awkward and clumsy. Aubrey had been right when she said that practice would make it fit better in her hand, make her movements fluid and reflexive. She had thought it was all so pointless at the time, the holster, the gun itself, the lessons…but she was grateful for them now. And God it hurt a part of her to raise the gun because she absolutely did not want to shoot and kill him. Yes she maybe wished he would die sometimes but she didn’t want to be the one to do it.

But if it meant saving her own life…

“Stop!”

Weston hesitated and he stared down at the gun in her hand, staring at it in disbelief. “You’re not going to shoot me.” He took a step and she fired, her finger jerking back on the trigger too roughly for a clean shot. Her hand went wide with it but she swung it back quickly, training the barrel on his chest. Not that she was aiming for him really, it was really more to show that she would pull the trigger if he forced her to. The bullet zinged past him and shattered the ugly Mikasa vase her mother had given her at her bridal shower. She always hated that vase.

He stopped dead in his tracks and held his hands up a little but she could see the twitch of his lip as he reigned in his rage. Another drop of blood rolled down her forehead and dripped off her brow. Stacie wiped at it with the back of her free hand and backed up a few steps. “I’m done Wes. I’m so done…”

Weston watched go but he didn’t advance to stop her, in fact he hadn’t so much as said a word as she limped to the door. She was almost out when he spoke again.

“You can leave now, but you’ll never leave me. Don’t forget what I have on you, don’t forget I own you Stacie.”

God. She wanted to throw up and she had to fight to swallow down the bile that rose in her throat. Stacie opened her mouth then closed it and backed out of the office, before she turned and jogged to the front door. He wasn’t behind her and she knew that but it felt like his presence was there running her down and she flung the door open desperate to get out of the house, desperate to get to the safety of Aubrey’s arms. Her bare feet pounded down the front steps and she ran to Cynthia Rose’s car.

It was hard to pull the door open with the gun still in her hand but she managed and shoved herself into the seat with a ragged sob. “Drive.”

“Holy shit, what the fuck happened to you? Why are you holding tha…” “DRIVE! JUST FUCKING DRIVE!”

Stacie covered her face and leaned forward trying to breathe past the weight in her chest as CR pulled out quickly down the drive to the gate. She couldn’t help but look over her shoulder expecting to see him but he didn’t give chase. As the gate chugged open far too slowly Weston finally came out to stand at the entry way, watching her with so much hate that she could almost feel it. Tears filled her eyes and she pulled her gaze away to stare straight ahead, forcing herself not to look back again.

“Stacie….what happened?”

“Please just take me home.”

Home. Home was where Aubrey was, not the mausoleum they were rapidly leaving behind. There was nothing there for her, nothing but pain and suffering. Cynthia Rose eyed her warily from the corner of her eye but she drove them west toward safest house in the city. For a long time neither of them said anything but Stacie could hear the leather of the wheel creaking as her best friend gripped in convulsively.

“She’s going to kill him for this. She has to kill him.”

Stacie didn’t bother to say anything to that, choosing instead to focus on not dissolving into a miserable mess of tears and heartbreak. She was going to lose everything she had worked for because there was no way she could ever go back to him. And she didn’t want to.

If he even survived whatever Aubrey would do.

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serenlyss · 5 years

Text

For the Sake of a Smile Chapter One

Rating: G Relationships: Teru/Shigeo, Ritsu&Shigeo, Teru&Reigen, Shigeo&Reigen Summary: Hanazawa Teruki is seven years old when his parents leave him to wait on a fallen log in the middle of a lavender field for them to return. He’s seven years old when a boy his age saves him from drowning and reminds him that there’s still light left in the world. Hanazawa Teruki is sixteen years old when he leaves home for the first time in search of a boy whose appearance he can’t quite remember and whose name he never learned, a nine-year-old promise yet to be fulfilled. Now, as he sets his sights on the bustling Seasoning City, he’s determined to do things right this time around. Chapter Summery: "Cooking is at once child’s play and adult joy. And cooking done with care is an act of love." - Craig Claiborne The prologue chapter, basically. Crossposted to AO3: Chapter One

Chapter Two (coming soon!)

Hello all! I've had this idea on my mind for a while and now that I'm out of school for the rest of summer I decided I can finally post the first chapter! As the tags state this is an AU taking place in the Kitchen Princess universe, but will not include any characters or settings from Kitchen Princess, so you don't need to know anything about it to read this. Basically it's a cute and very cheesy romance manga I read when like 8 or 9 years ago in middle school that I've gone back to over time.

As far as updates go, I don't plan to follow any specific schedule for this fic. The chapters are going to be relatively short (around 2-3k words for the most part, which is short compared to my 5-6k normal chapter length lol) and will update as I write and edit them.

Anyway, that's enough notes for now! I hope you all enjoy this fic, if you do be sure to leave me your thoughts in a dm or reblog this to let me know you're interested in reading more.

---

“Teruki, sweetheart, wait for us here, alright? We’ll be back soon.”

Mother ruffles his hair, long and blond and curly around his ears. Her touch is static and her words drip with honey as she speaks empty reassurances to him. He’s seven years old, old enough to use the little knives in the kitchen drawer to make himself a sandwich without calling for help, old enough to recognize that something is wrong, very wrong.

“Where are you going?” he asks. “When will you come back?”

“Mommy and Daddy have some work to do,” Mother responds, and neither of his questions are answered. “I know you’ll do just fine, you’re so responsible.”

The praise would normally make him smile, make him puff out his chest with pride, but now it just serves to make his heart fall further into his stomach.

“We need to hurry,” Father reminds Mother, holding his watch out for her to look at. “At this rate, we’ll miss it and have to wait even longer.”

“Miss what?” he asks, desperation seeping into his voice. He can’t wrap his head around what’s happening. Mother looks away, distracted, and her face lights up in melodramatic surprise when she sees how late the hour is.

“Oh, dear, you’re right!” she exclaims, straightening up from where she’s kneeling beside him. “We can’t let that happen, can we?” She doesn’t answer his question, doesn’t elaborate on what they might miss if they don’t hurry. Father doesn’t even spare him a glance as he turns on his heel and begins to walk. Mother follows him, waving and calling her goodbyes over her shoulder.

He stays sitting on the little fallen log, because that’s where Mother told him to wait. They won’t be long, he tells himself, and then they would all catch their train back home and he’ll pretend the discomfort and apprehension weighing him down were never felt at all. Mother will praise him for being so patient and Father might even smile at him when he sees how obedient he’s been. Those thoughts keep him firmly rooted. He can’t disappoint Mother and Father.

Hours pass. Mother and Father don’t return. The sun starts to go down, and he knows they’ve long missed their train home. He sits and sits and sits until his backside is numb and his stomach starts to growl from not having eaten.

The sun is nearly setting when a stranger finally happens across his path. She’s a few years old than him, maybe twelve, with badly-cut black hair that nearly falls into her eyes and a sharp gaze that seems to know more than she lets on. She introduces herself as Tome and takes him by the hand, and her touch is much softer and more tender than Mother’s had ever been. She leads him to her house, which is filled with kids of many ages whose parents are all dead or forgotten. “I don’t belong here,” he tells them, “my parents told me they’d be right back.”

The sun has long set by the time it sinks into his seven-year-old brain that his parents won’t be coming back for him after all. He lays on his side on an old futon in a bedroom that is too crowded with other children his age and cries into the early hours of the morning.

---

Teru hardly eats or sleep for days after he’s officially accepted into the orphanage Tome lives at. It takes a week of him insisting that his parents will come back and get him, that they must have gotten stranded or held back by something important, before he finally stops trying to defend them. He’s known all along that his parents don’t care for him enough to look for him too hard, but the thought still sickens him enough that his sour stomach won’t take more than the bare minimum. He knows that the sisters who run the orphanage, good women who always treat him with kindness and an infuriating amount of caution, are worried about his health, but he doesn’t care.

He leaves the run-down little house for hours at a time without telling anyone where he’s going. Sometimes the sisters send Tome to find him and bring him back, and sometimes he goes back all on his own, if he’s feeling particularly welcoming.

He doesn’t dislike the orphanage. His caretakers are kind and attentive, and the other children treat him nicely enough. He doesn’t know most of their names, but at least Tome doesn’t treat him like he might shatter if they don’t watch their words around him. Everyone knows he’s been abandoned, and while Tome knows the subject is forbidden, it doesn’t stop her from teasing him and sticking up for him and playing games with him as though she’s his own sister. It doesn’t make him want to stay in the house any more, but he appreciates it nonetheless.

One warm afternoon, Teru leaves the house like he always does, hands shoved deep into the pockets of his pants. His jeans are cheap and the dye is faded, handed down from an older kid who’d grown out of them. They’re not at all like the expensive ones his parents had once bought for him, but somehow he can’t bring himself to care. It’s a particularly bad day, one of the ones that catches him staring at the seams where two walls meet for minutes on end without blinking, the kind where Tome has to ask him three times in half an hour if he’s doing okay, if he needs a nap, if he’s hungry. He’s hardly eaten anything all morning, and his stomach grumbles incessantly, but he ignores the pangs in favor of walking down to the river.

It’s calming here, usually, listening to the rush of water as it rumbles past the rocky, muddy banks. He slips off his shoes and rolls up his pant legs, taking a few steps into the shallows and letting his feet sink into the soft clay of the bank. His hands fall out of his pockets and lay limp at his sides as he just stares down into the water, gaze half lidded and a perpetual frown on his face. He wades in a bit deeper, until he’s up to his knees. The water laps at the edges of his rolled-up pants, dampening their edges with its biting cold. He wonders, briefly, what would happen if he decides to walk out the front door of the orphanage one day and never go back. If he walks far enough, even Tome won’t be able to find him. He has no idea what he would do, though, or where he would go, so instead he just wades deeper into the water, letting the cold sap away the feeling in his legs for just a moment. His feet sink into the clay so far now that it’s hard to keep his footing, the mud slippery between his toes. His pant legs are soaked up to his mid-thigh.

He takes another step, crossing an invisible threshold, and the strong current in the center of the river pulls his legs out from under him. He doesn’t even have time to scream before he’s completely submerged, the icy water soaking through his thin shirt in an instant and sapping the heat away from his skin. He flails, scrambles for purchase, but his child’s legs are too short to find the slippery river’s bottom anymore and he can no longer tell which way is up or which way is down. Water rushes up his nose painfully and steals the breath from his lungs, which leaves his mouth in bubbles that float up uselessly and leave his lungs burning. For a frightful moment, he’s certain that he’ll die here, alone and unloved.

A hand closes around his wrist and pulls, hard. His head breaks the surface and his feet find solid ground again. He’s heaved onto the muddy shore, where he collapses onto his hands and knees and coughs river water into the grass. It dribbles out of his nose, which he sniffs loudly and rubs at with the back of his hand as he replaces the water in his lungs with air.

“Are you okay?” A quavering voice sounds near his ear, and he feels a small hand rest against his back. Teru manages a dumb nod and turns his head to finally get a look at the person who’d just saved his life.

It’s another boy. He can’t be much older than Teru is, and his wide, dark eyes are filled to the brim with worry and concern.

Teru opens his mouth to reply, but finds himself speechless. Tears come to the corners of his eyes and he hugs his knees to his chest, hiding his face as he begins to quietly sob. Part of him is glad to be alive, really glad, but the other, smaller part of him wishes he’d just drowned after all so he won’t have to face the sad reality of what his life has become anymore.

The hand stays on his back, rubbing soothing circles between his shoulder blades. Teru doesn’t look up until he feels the boy press something into his hand. When he does lay eyes on it, he sees that it’s a flan, carefully chilled in a pristine glass cup. There’s a tiny dessert spoon stuck into the top of it, one with an intricately engraved handle that depicts an emblem Teru’s never seen before.

“When you eat something good, you smile,” the boy says, and then offers him a small, shy grin as if to illustrate his point. “Go on, try it!”

Teru’s first instinct is to refuse - it’s not his food, after all - but the boy’s smile is incredibly soft and sincere, and his stomach aches from going too long without eating. He takes the spoon between his shaky fingers and lifts it to his lips, taking a bite of the flan. It’s sweet, with a subtle flavor that melts in his mouth and leaves him feeling lighter. It really is delicious.

The boy looks at him expectantly, eager to hear his thoughts. “It’s good,” he murmurs, and the corners of his mouth tug upward into a ghost of a grateful smile.

The boy’s grin broadens at this, relieved, but before he can say anything else, there’s a call from down the riverbank. Teru looks up, and sees another kid in the distance, waving his arms. He doesn’t quite catch the kid’s words in his distraction, but the hand on his back disappears as the boy who’d saved his life stands up abruptly. “Ah, I have to go!” he says, nearly tripping on the rocky riverbank in his haste.

Teru doesn’t even have time to call out to him, to remind him that he’d left behind his snack, to thank him for pulling him out of the river, to do anything. He disappears into the trees surrounding the river bank and leaves Teru, dripping, in the grass. He cradles the cold flan in his hands and stares down at the fancy-looking emblem carved into the spoon’s shining surface, and vows that someday he’ll make the boy the best dessert he’s ever tasted.

---

Years pass in a blur. Teru’s parents never come for him, but eventually Teru stops waiting for them, stops thinking about them much at all. He turns fifteen and discovers that the spoon he now carries with him at all times comes from a prestigious private academy in Seasoning City, the kind with a sprawling campus that accommodates kids from kindergarten to high school.

The image of the boy who’d saved his life all those years ago fades from his memory over the years until he can’t quite remember the color of his eyes or the shape of his hair or exactly how his voice had sounded. He does remember his words though, remembers his concern and his unwithheld kindness. He calls the forgotten spoon his good luck charm as he studies to take the transfer exam that will let him enroll in Salt private academy.

He learns to cook, too, through a combination of lessons from the sisters who take care of him and his own personal experiments. The sisters call him gifted, say his sensitivity to taste and flavor is beyond anyone they’ve ever seen, and Teru lets it go to his head, just a little. Cooking makes him feel confident, like he has a place in the world at last. He makes treats for the younger members of the orphanage, kids who have grown to become somewhat of a nontraditional family to him, while Tome steals spoonfuls of batter from his bowls when she thinks he isn’t watching. It’s gratifying, the way the younger kids light up when he announces he’s decided to spontaneously bake cookies, and whenever they do the words of the child who had saved him nine years ago flash in his mind: When you eat something good, you smile.

It takes a few months for Teru’s acceptance letter to arrive in the mail, but when it does he has to stop himself from crying out in excitement. He spends the next few weeks preparing for the move, packing everything he owns into a single suitcase and carry-on. Salt graciously pays for his plane ticket and transportation as part of his scholarship, and assigns him to the “special class”. Teru’s not quite sure what that entails, but he isn’t about to argue when he’s finally getting the chance to follow through on his vow.

Tome makes him promise to keep in touch three times over, and she double-checks that her phone number is in his contact list before she lets him leave for the airport. Teru just rolls his eyes at her and reassures her that just because he’s moving doesn’t mean he’s going to forget about her, and finally gets her to stop hounding him by promising to call at least once a week. He pretends not to notice the way she holds back her tears as he climbs into the taxi and leaves behind his childhood home, giving one last wave goodbye as the taxi pulls away from the curb and the long drive begins.

#mob psycho 100 #mp100 #terumob #hanazawa teruki #kageyama shigeo #kurata tome #kitchen princess au #fluff and angst #mostly fluff #eventual romance #child abandonment #implied child neglect #food as a metaphor for love #serendipitousfics

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writethiswaymaam · 5 years

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Love Undone

CHAPTER TWO

Summary: Andria finds comfort and solace at a Mayan's party, but her interaction with the club causes tensions to rise between her and Antonia.

Andria looked at the time on her phone before punching her pillow in frustration. She had been home for almost a week and sleep still evaded her. She rolled on her back looking around the guest room at her sister’s house. Her sister’s wife, Katrina, had went full on Joanna Gaines with this mother trying to make Andria feel welcome, and Andria had never felt more uncomfortable. She would much rather be back in her childhood home sleeping on a thin, worn out mattress on the floor with the cracked and peeling plastered ceiling than atop this Egyptian cotton covered pillow top mattress while staring at freshly painted walls that felt like they were closing in on her.

She wished she had the strength and stamina to go for a run right now, but her leg and side were still too far from healed. Even the light exercises at physical therapy left her in close to crippling pain. So short of popping a sleeping pill or maybe drinking herself into oblivion, there was little hope of sleeping tonight. Andria dreaded the idea of another night of counting down the hours until it was acceptable to exit the bedroom without drawing suspicion. Her mind began to wander back to her time spent overseas. She never struggled with sleeping in a combat zone. The continual physical stress and exhaustion with the added security of being around her brothers and sisters in arms often meant that Andria could sleep anywhere, in any position. A fact that often made her the butt of many jokes among those she served with. She missed them. She missed never getting the chance to be alone. This house left her entirely too much room to be with herself.

She sighed looking at her phone again. It was 2 am on a Saturday night. The only reason people were out this late was to party and most of the bars and clubs she would even think about going to would be winding down at this time of night. Unless…. The Mayan’s parties usually lasted till dawn. But it would be disrespectful to show up uninvited. The only women that did that were las mujerzuelas, and that is not what Andria had in mind. But, the idea of loud music, good food, and the general chaos of a bunch of drunken bikers sounded appealing. This house was way too quiet to drown out the noise in her head.

With that thought she soundlessly got up and got dressed. Running a quick brush through her hair and not bothering with makeup, she padded silently through the house and out the front door undetected. Starting Antonia’s or Katrina’s car had the potential of waking up her sister, but it was a risk she had to take, because there was no way she could make the trek on her bum leg. She reasoned that if she was taking the chance of pissing Antonia off anyways, she might as well drive the Lexus. That’s how she ended up parked in the road in front of the gated club yard, leaning against the expensive silver car, debating her next step. She could probably call Bishop and ask for an invite, but that could come with questions, or even worse, the possibility of interrupting his bedroom activities with one of the club’s putas. That did not sound appealing. That’s why when she heard a deep voice asking her if she was okay, she sent a silent prayer of gratitude into the universe, and turned with a smile on her face, “Hey EZ, I’m good. You?”

He took a moment studying her face before a look of recognition crossed his, “Andria Pena? A.P. Physics class, senior year.”

“Yep. I see that photographic memory of yours is still serving you well,” she laughed.

“It has its moments. So, what are you doing here?” he motioned to the yard behind her as he took a spot leaning on to the Lexus next to her.

“Couldn’t sleep. My hours are still all turned around from the time difference, so I decided to take a drive. You caught me having the inner debate of ‘should I take the chance of making an ass out of myself by walking into a club party uninvited, with the sole intention of eating a ridiculous amount of food’, or if I should just go back home.”

A smile spread across EZ’s face, “I think I can solve your dilemma. Come on,” he said with a nod of his head, “consider yourself invited.”

Andria followed him, both making a beeline for the buffet once they entered the gates. He placed his freehand on her back guiding her to the bar where he set down his plate before grabbing them drinks, then sat down on the barstool next to her. They barely talked while they shoveled food into their mouths. “Hmm, I hope you’re not judging me right now,” Andria said after downing half a beer, “I haven’t had real Mexican food in such a long time.”

“No judgement here,” EZ said between bites, “so how long have you been deployed?”

“I enlisted straight out of high school. This last stint was my longest, a 3-year deployment,” she shoved her fork into the rice and beans, “or, at least it was supposed to be. This med leave cut it 6 months short.”

“Are you planning on going back? After your recovered, I mean?” EZ pushed his now empty plate away.

“To be determined,” Andria sighed, “I’ve got to get med clearance before they would redeploy me with my unit. The way this leg feels, I’m not sure that’s going to happen anytime soon, and the Army isn’t known for its patience.”

“What would happen if the leg doesn’t pass snuff,” EZ turned in his seat.

“They’ll send me where they can use me. Training maybe, possibly recruitment, or a medical discharge,” she scooped the last forkful forcefully into her mouth.

“You don’t seem very excited about any of those options,” EZ looked at her inquisitively.

Andria took a moment to gather her thoughts, slowly peeling the label off her beer bottle, “It would be very difficult for me to admit that part of my life is over. I’m very good at what I do. I’ve built my entire military career proving that. I just…I want it to end on my terms, you know?”

She met his gaze and he nodded his head, “I definitely get that.”

Just then Bishop and Tranq walked out of the templo in the middle of a conversation headed toward the bar. Bishop stopped short at seeing Andria and EZ together, his brows furrowing before he yelled out, “Yo prospect, looks like the bar needs restocked.”

“Yes, sir,” EZ stood making himself scarce as Bishop came up to Andria.

“Hola Preciousa,” he said wrapping her in a warm hug, “what brings you here tonight?”

“Honestly? I think this place feels more like home than Antonia’s Barbie Dreamhouse,” she looked around at everyone laughing, dancing, and drinking.

Bishop looked at her with a knowing smile, “You know you’re always welcome here,” he kissed her forehead before sitting down in the bar stool EZ just exited.

His smell engulfed her. Leather, whiskey, and cigarettes surrounding her like a comforting a blanket. She really had missed the steadiness that Bishop seemed to exude over her life. Even her mind seemed quieter with him around. Bishop took swig if his drink, a smirk crossing his lips, “Barbie Dream House, huh?”

“Dios mio, what happened to my sister, Bishop?” she asked laughing, “Do you know they have a weekly game night with their neighbors? Fucking Monopoly, Bish. MONOPOLY. And don’t get me started on the ship lap.”

He laughed as she ranted. Her hands moving wildly as she described this new life she had been dropped into, and how often she humorously struggled and failed to fit into it. Just when they had finally reigned in their laughter, a woman approached them. It was clear that all this woman’s attention was on Bishop. She was dressed in a low-cut, blood red top and black leather pants. Her eyebrows were thinly painted on, along with a lip liner that was two shades darker than her lip stick. She was the epitome of a Mayan puta. Completely ignoring Andria’s presence, the woman pressed her body against Bishop, placing her hand on his chest, and leaning in to whisper something in his ear. Andria turned back toward the bar, downing her third beer and motioning a man they called Chucky for another. Bishop was a grown man who could do what or who he wanted, but Andria couldn’t help but feel a little disgusted at how desperate putas got around bikers. They’d spread their legs to anyone in a cut, just hoping to be one of the chosen few to stick around. Being El Presidente and unattached made Bishop a frequent target for las putanas. Antonia and Bishop had gotten in plenty of fights back in the day over women just like this, even though to Andria’s knowledge Bishop had always been faithful. It was still hard to see someone you love to get constantly hit on by other people. She spared a glimpse back over to Bishop, as he grasped the woman’s hand and brought it to his lips. Andria rolled her eyes thinking that she was about 5 seconds away from getting the blow off when she heard Bishop tell the woman, “Not tonight, sweetheart. I’m catching up with an old friend.”

If looks could kill, Andria would certainly be dead from the scowl the woman gave her before she stalked off. Probably in search of another biker for the night. “She seemed nice,” Andria deadpanned taking another pull from her beer.

Bishop just shook his head and laughed lighting another cigarette, “What about you, princesa? Got a special someone?”

Andria snorted, “Ummm, no. Turns out I’m pretty terrible at relationships, or so I’ve been told.”

Andria started peeling the label of her beer bottle again. “Whoever told you that sounds like a real pendejo who doesn’t know what the fuck he’s talking about, princesa,” Bishop tapped the ashes off the end of his cigarette.

“Eh, he wasn’t completely wrong. I was really focused on my career, and he never quite measured up to my idea of what the perfect guy would be,” she swiveled in the bar stool, absentmindedly running her fingers through her hair.

“Well, you’re still young. You’ve got plenty of time to find a guy that checks all the boxes,” Bishop finished his whiskey, “Speaking of age, I think I’m going to call it a night."

She stood gingerly, the prolonged sitting making her leg cramp and stiff. Bishop held out his hand offering assistance, but she shook her head, "I'm good. Just takes me a minute to work the kinks out."

"Do you need help getting home?" he asked wrapping his arm around her.

“Nope, I can handle it. Goodnight, Bishop,” she hugged him goodbye.

“Goodnight, princesa,” he kissed her hair keeping her tucked to his side until she reached the door.

She walked, rather stiffly, out to the car in relative solitude. The music had died down along with the dancing. Most of the people still awake were huddled around bonfires talking quietly or amid a sloppy-drunk, far-too-handsy-for-public-consumption make-out session. She smiled to herself. “Did you have a good time?”

EZ fell into step beside Andria. “I did,” her smile brightened, “thanks for inviting me.”

“Anytime,” he smiled back as he started walking to his trailer and she continued toward the Lexus.

“Hey Andria,” he called, and she turned back to him.

He looked like he was going to say something and then changed his mind, “Have a goodnight.”

“You, too, EZ,” she gave a slight wave before climbing into the car. She blew out a deep breath before starting the engine and driving back to Antonia’s.

She pulled into the drive and got of the car. She was still smiling to her herself when the front door flew open, and she came face-to-face with a very pissed off Antonia. “Where have you been?” Antonia questioned in a harsh whisper.

“I couldn’t sleep so I went for a drive, ended up at the Mayans party,” Andria shrugged walking past her.

“With my car?!” Antonia’s voice raised slightly in anger.

“Is that a problem?” Andria asked turn toward Antonia confused.

“YES! It’s a problem. Alexandria, I am the mayor now. What do you think my constituents would say if they saw my car parked outside an outlaw motorcycle clubhouse all night?” Antonia seethed.

“I’m guessing the answer you’re not looking for is ‘good for her?’” Andria snickered.

Instead of diffusing the situation like Andria had hoped, Antonia was even more angry, “You think that’s funny? You come here, and I do everything I can to help you, and you just mierda mi vida like it’s nothing?”

“If me going to a party on a Saturday night with some of our oldest friends is the equivalent of shitting on your life, I don’t think staying here is going to work out for either one of us,” Andria exclaimed, “I want to respect you and the life you have built Antonia, but I’m sure as hell not going to live my life by the rules you have set for yourself. Bishop, the club, that life might be part of your past that you want to keep buried, but you don't get to make that decision for me.”

“You’re right, Andria,” Antonia threw her hands into the air in exasperation, “this isn’t going to work out. I think you should leave.”

“Well, look at us, finally agreeing on something. Here’s your keys back. I’ll go pack my stuff,” Andria angrily hobbled her way to the bedroom.

Antonia stared down at the keys in her palm before following Andria to the bedroom. She took a deep frustrated breath. “Shit. Look, Andria, I’m sorry. You don’t have to leave tonight. We can talk about this in the morning and try to find something that works for both us,” Antonia tried to reason as Andria hastily threw stuff in her bag.

“I think we just need to realize that we’re too different now for this to work, Antonia. You’re the mayor, you’re married, you have a baby, and play Monopoly on Wednesday nights, and that just isn’t me. I don’t know what I am anymore, but this isn’t it,” she walked back to the closet grabbing a stack of neatly folded clothes.

Antonia rolled her eyes, “The only reason you hate Monopoly so much is because I always win.”

“Yeah, well you cheat,” Andria zipped her bag and put her hands on her hips the fight leaving her frame.

“I do not,” Antonia halfheartedly argued.

Andria sat on the bed, “The last time we played you offered your wife a sexual favor in exchange for Park Place.”

Antonia sat down beside her, “I already had Boardwalk. I like to think of it as an effective gaming strategy.”

“I wonder what your constituents would think about that,” Andria quipped.

“Ugh. I’m sorry,” Antonia laid down on the bed, “there’s a lot of outside pressure with my job right now, and I’m just trying to be extra careful. Sometimes it feels like this life I built is hanging together by a thread, and there are so many people pulling strings, it would be nothing for them to take it all away.”

Andria laid down next to her, “What kind of outside pressure?”

Antonia sighed again, “How much do you know about Miguel Galindo?”

#mayans #Mayans MC #mayansmc #mayans bishop #bishop losa

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artificialqueens · 6 years

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Just the Game We’re In - Chapter 12 (Ortega

a/n: I have honestly no idea how to start this off, and I’m aware I’m not accepting a fucking Oscar, so I’ll try to keep this as short as possible. Back in the summer of 2016, there was a crossover fic challenge posted to this blog. I was in the process of finishing MasP and, as someone who fucking loved The Thick Of It and knew how well Bianca would fit as Malcolm Tucker, I posted chapter 1 of what started as a lighthearted, funny Politics AU, Just the Game We’re In. Fast forward nearly three fucking years, me graduating from uni and getting a job, countless long-ass fuckin update gaps and 179,065 words later, this is the final chapter, and I have no idea what the fuck I’m going to do with my life now!! I know I’m not the first person to ever finish a fic in this blog’s history, i ain’t special sis, but I really do want to say thank you thank you thank you to anyone who has ever given any chapter of this a note, reblogged it with something lovely, made fucking fanart or a moodboard (still in awe at that), has read any part of it, or has simply been a friend I’ve made through the writing process. It would be criminal not to specially mention @purecamp- she has without a doubt been Game’s biggest cheerleader throughout it all and legit I may not have even finished this if it wasn’t for her. She is a fantastic person and an amazing friend. I’ll sound like a wet wipe, but Game has legit changed my life. When I was little my dream was to be an author and I loved writing stories. I had never expected my writing to get much of a response when I joined AQ but I can safely say that this blog has been so so amazing and has really allowed me to live my childhood dream of writing a story that people actually wanted to read (this is the definition of cheesy). I’ll shut up now, but here she is everyone. As always lmk what u think over at artificialortega, I tried so hard to make it the most absolutely perfect ending. Chapter 12 of Game, the final chapter. It has been some fuckin wild ride. Xxxxxxxxx

(p.s. phi phi ur a babe im sorry i made u the opposition in this fic and i know u don’t have shitty opinions like game phi phi)

The street was silent. Time had seemed to freeze completely, and even the sound of the car speeding away seemed to be on mute. Perhaps it was just the overwhelming ringing in Willam’s ears that drowned everything else out, which sounded eerily akin to a flatline.

Willam could only blink and feel her heartbeat through her chest, cruelly taunting her and reminding her that Sharon, lying on the concrete, might not have had that privilege. Was she moving? Was she bleeding? Was she alive?

It felt as if Willam stood there frozen for minutes but it was probably only seconds, as all at once she felt herself walking forward, two slow steps and then breaking out into a sprint where she skidded to a halt beside Sharon’s body.

Fuck, no, not her body, Willam thought. Beside Sharon. Sharon, the living human being.

“Sharon,” Willam felt her voice come out as nothing more than a hoarse, panic-induced whisper. She looked at the woman in front of her. Willam was relieved to find that there weren’t any horrific, horror-movie style streams of blood pissing out of her. Suddenly she remembered the phrase she’d gleaned from many hours of her Mum watching Casualty, “internal bleeding”, and her heart grew cold. There were some huge scratches on her head which were already taking on the greenish hue of a bruise underneath, and the friction of her body on the tarmac had ripped open the light Summer jacket Sharon had been wearing and opened a deep gash on the arm which sat ugly and unmoving, a stagnant red against her pale skin.

Her leg was bent at a gruesomely impossible angle.

“Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Willam hissed, shock pulsing through her like a thousand volts as she grabbed her phone from her jacket pocket and grew frustrated as it clung to the material and wouldn’t seem to budge. After some fierce tugs it finally emerged. Willam fumbled with her passcode two times then succeeded in opening her phone, and with shaky fingers she dialled 4 9s, deleted one, and hit the call button.

It rang once, then twice, then again. The ringing continued. Willam’s panic increased tenfold. How often do you need to phone 999 in your life, and when you finally do they don’t fucking pick up the phone?

Finally, the voice of the operator came down the line.

“999, which service do you require?”

“Ambulance, please,” Willam breathed out, the scared tone in her voice and the small, polite plea at the end making her feel as if she was about 5 years old.

“And the address please?”

Willam looked around, panic consuming her every movement and rendering her unable to see clearly. “We’re outside the Crown and Anchor in Chiswick, I don’t know the road name, um-”

“Can you see any road signs at all?”

Willam found her gaze focussing on a street sign a little further along the road. “Um. Belmont Road, I think? I’m sorry, I can’t-”

“Don’t worry, love, we’ve got it,” the voice replied soothingly, making Willam feel more like a child than ever. “And can you describe what’s happened at all?”

“My friend,” Willam began, then was suddenly cut off by a sob that unexpectedly welled up and burst in her throat, causing two tears to spring from her eyes. “She’s been hit by a car, it just came along from nowhere and it didn’t stop, she rolled right over it.”

“Your friend’s been hit by a car? Okay, my love. And you’re saying the car didn’t brake?”

“No,” Willam gasped, her breathing becoming more and more erratic as she sobbed. Fuck, where had all this crying come from?

“Was the car moving quickly?”

Willam frowned. It had been so long since she’d driven it was hard to give an estimate. “It seemed to be going pretty fast but I couldn’t say how much, sorry.”

There was a short pause. Willam looked at Sharon lying below her, then in panic around her as she realised she was still on the road. “I’m not being rude but is the ambulance coming?”

“Don’t worry, love, I know it can be hard when you’re waiting for someone to arrive. The ambulance has been dispatched, don’t panic. Keep talking to me. Is your friend conscious?”

Willam instantly turned to Sharon. “Sharon?” she shook her shoulder, lifted up an eyelid. “Sharon? Fuck, I don’t think so.”

“Don’t think so. Okay. Is she breathing?”

Willam knelt close to her chest and rested her hand on her heart. She felt the gentle rise and fall of her chest and wanted to cry with relief. “Yes.”

“Still breathing, okay. And you said the patient’s name was Sharon?”

“Yeah, Sharon Needles,” Willam stuttered, momentarily worried about the headlines then cursing herself for the priorities she automatically had.

“Is she bleeding?” the call carrier continued, seemingly not the least bit fazed by the famous invalid.

“She’s got a massive big cut on her arm, but nothing else major. Um…some scratches here and there? I don’t know what’ll need stitches or not…fuck, fuck,” Willam breathed, the seriousness and reality of the situation hitting her all over again. “We’re still on the road, should I move her?”

“No, don’t move her, love. There could be broken bones which might be made worse if you do.”

Willam sighed, taking Sharon’s hand absent-mindedly. The small gesture almost broke her heart and reminded her of how things used to be. Maybe everything would be different if she’d never accepted Sharon’s offer of drinks, this may never have happened. She sighed in exasperation as she suppressed another sob. “Is the ambulance nearby?”

“I’m sorry love, it’s on its way. I know the questions can be annoying but everything we get we pass on to the paramedics-”

“She’s my friend,” Willam said softly, bringing her other hand up to stroke Sharon’s cheek.

“I know, love, we’re doing all we can at this end. Can you describe your friend for me? Age, gender, nationailty?”

The questions seemed to go round in a circle. They were endless, and Willam could feel herself growing more and more irate as the minutes seemed to tick by. Finally, after what seemed like hours, an ambulance slowly drew to a halt on the opposite side of the road to Willam. She immediately hung up on the operator and sprinted to the paramedics who were on their way over to Sharon.

“Hello there!” one greeted her, as natural and cheerful as if she’d just asked him about the weather. “Right, so this is our patient over here. What’s her name?“

Everything passed on to the paramedics my ass, Willam cursed under her breath, then spoke. “It’s Sharon. She was hit by a car.”

“Hello, Sharon, love!” the other paramedic greeted her, lifting her eyelids and shining a small torch into them. “Can you hear us, Sharon?”

Willam wanted to hiss at them that they’d get more conversation out of Helen Keller but she remembered that she wasn’t in Dosac any more, she wasn’t at work, she was lying on a road with her friend crumpled in a heap and no matter how incompetent these people seemed, they were there to help her.

“No response. Okay, grab the gurney.”

What followed this may as well have been another language as the two paramedics spoke in terrifying terminology about IV drips, lacerations and bone fractures. The man brought out a huge metal trolley that Sharon was lifted up onto after some form of yellow styrofoam-looking cast was placed around her mangled leg and another one was placed around her head. As she was carried into the ambulance, Willam, who had been silent for some time save for answering the paramedic’s questions, spoke up.

“Can I, um. Can I come with you in the ambulance?”

‘Of course you can, darling,” the female paramedic smiled at her. Willam momentarily wondered why NHS staff seemed to speak solely in pet names. “What’s your name, love?”

“Willam.”

“Willam, okay. And you are Sharon’s…?”

Willam paused for a beat. “I’m her best friend.”

“Bestie, aw that’s nice. So you were out for some drinks when this happened then, yeah? Girls night out?”

“Something like that,” Willam sighed, climbing the steps up to the back of the ambulance then sitting in the small chair at the end of the vehicle and putting her seatbelt on. Sharon sat in the silver trolley opposite her already hooked up to various machines. Symbols and numbers flashed on a small screen, none of which Willam could tell was good or bad.

“Okay, seatbelt on,” the woman instructed her, sitting down in her own seat herself. “We’ll be at the hospital in no time. Once we’re there, we’ll-”

Willam barely heard her as her mind began to drift away, and all she could focus on were the sirens attached to the ambulance that seemed so far away. That all-too-familiar sound that she recognised from streets and junctions was her and Sharon, the pair of them racing through central London in an ambulance.

Soon enough they arrived at the hospital, and Sharon was being wheeled out of the ambulance, down a ramp and straight into the building. Willam followed awkwardly behind, past people in wheelchairs and others in beds hooked up to various beeping machines and parked, or perhaps abandoned, in corridors. The male paramedic turned to her suddenly as Sharon was wheeled behind a curtain.

“I’m sorry- she can’t have anyone with her at the moment.”

Willam frowned, helpless. “But-”

“She’s in good hands, I promise,” he smiled at her, his gentle eyes reminding her of a long-dead Grandpa she had loved dearly and making her want to cry all over again. His face turned conspiratorial as his eyes shifted around. “Look you shouldn’t really, but if you go to that desk over there you’ll get taken to a relative’s room. It’s not much but it’ll be a quiet room with a kettle and a sofa and a phone and it’ll be a hell of a lot better than sitting stressed in the waiting room.”

Willam gazed over at the desk in question, opposite which were hordes of people waiting to be seen- some looked fine, some had huge wads of kitchen roll wrapped around cuts, there were a couple of drunk men singing football chants and a child with a toy stuck to their foot. Definitely not ideal company.

“Thanks,” Willam summoned up a smile to return to the man.

“That’s alright. I know you must have had a stressful evening,” he said sincerely, frowning.

Willam nodded to him. “It’s appreciated, um…”

“Mattheiu,” the paramedic smiled, holding out a hand for her to shake. She took it gently, thanked him for perhaps the third time, and made her way to the desk where she answered a few questions in a daze and then got shown to a small room, just as Matthieu had described- small, windowless, with dim lights and a single sofa and a little tray with a kettle, teabags, coffee and a pot of milk. There was a landline phone too, and Willam wanted to laugh at it before she checked her phone and realised she had no signal.

She sat on the sofa and took one deep, shuddery breath. What would happen now? Should she have phoned the police too? Willam hadn’t known what to do, but at least Sharon was being taken care of now. She hoped to God she would be okay. Willam thought hard. What had the car looked like? Silver. Or was it black? Fuck, she couldn’t remember. Number plate? Willam was fucked if she knew. This was terrible. If the police did arrive she would be about as much use as a bottle of Becks at an AA meeting. Something inside Willam questioned whether the whole thing had been an accident. It was easily enough explained- or what if it had been planned? Anyone who ran someone over would have stopped and got out and checked to see if the person was okay, surely? Maybe it was someone who felt too guilty to stop, who was too terrified in case they got convicted- or maybe it was somebody who was satisfied they’d completed what they’d set out to do. What if they’d charged the wrong person for the death threats? What if they had still been at large the whole time?

Willam sighed. Her head was too full, and it was killing her not being able to talk the situation out with anybody. Suddenly, it struck her that people would need to know what had happened. Two people in particular, Willam thought- one in particular that probably hated her but who would come into the hospital to sit with her, and to be with her. After all, she still cared about Willam, she had said so herself. The second was worse, but she still needed to be here. Willam knew she would immediately come in, no matter how bad things had been between her and the woman currently lying on a hospital trolley. She needed to know before it got into the press, and Willam had horrific visions of one of them finding out from a BBC News 24 notification.

Her professional brain urged her to phone Bianca first, and Willam growled at it angrily as she picked up the landline, looked in her contacts, and dialled the number of the first woman in question. She could have been apprehensive or afraid, but not right now. Right now she was afraid of something much worse, and it wasn’t on the other end of the phone.

Courtney picked up after four rings. “Hello?”

“Hey. It’s me,” Willam began, her stomach sinking at having to do this over the phone.

“Willam…it’s two in the morning.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry. I didn’t know if you’d still be awake.”

Courtney’s voice wasn’t harsh or reprimanding as Willam had expected. It was as if she knew that something was up. Sure enough, the Australian accent came down the line again. “Willam, what’s happened?”

Willam felt her blood run cold. She didn’t want to have to bear the news. “Sharon’s in hospital.”

“Oh fuck.”

“She was run over by a car,” Willam said, completely unsure of where the conversation went from here.

“Oh Jesus. Is she okay? Fuck, sorry, what a stupid question,” Courtney’s voice was apologetic, and Willam could hear commotion on the other end of the line, and snuffling.

“Courtney, don’t be upset. It’s okay, it’ll be alright,” Willam found herself comforting the girl on the end of the phone, annoyed that there wasn’t much else she could do.

“Are you at the hospital now? Can I come in?” Willam could hear Courtney struggling with something down the line, perhaps a coat or a pair of shoes.

“Yeah, please. We’re at Charing Cross Hospital. Phone me when you’re outside- no, shit, I’ve got no reception. Just tell me how long you’ll be and I’ll go and wait at the main entrance for you.”

Courtney gave a small, helpless sigh. “Fuck, I don’t know, I don’t know how long I’ll have to wait for a taxi at this time of night.”

“Courtney, you live in London,” Willam said, unable to help herself as she snorted a small giggle.

“Fuck. Right,” Courtney matched her laughter, which quickly turned into a sob. “Fuck. Um, half an hour?”

“Okay. See you then,” Willam sighed, her heart hurting at Courtney’s panic. “Courtney, it’ll be okay. Don’t worry. She’s safe now.”

“Right,” Courtney replied with a sniff, which didn’t inspire any confidence in Willam. “See you then.”

With that, Courtney was gone. Willam deflated on the sofa, letting out what seemed to be all the air in her lungs.

That had been hard enough. Now for the phone call she really didn’t want to have to make.

***

Willam had decided to wait at the entrance a little earlier than she said she’d be, just in case Courtney was early too. Part of her was anxious about leaving the relatives room, in case somebody arrived with news about Sharon, but she’d said she would meet Courtney at the door. As she stood in the chilly night air, she watched as cars and taxis pulled up and people came and went, the hospital just as busy as it probably was during the daytime. Health didn’t sleep or take a rest, thought Willam, and she supposed anything could happen to anyone at any time. Life was scary, she pondered, and mortality was so fragile.

As she was wondering, she was suddenly distracted by a sudden, harsh pounding of footsteps on the pavement, and somebody sobbing. Willam looked up and saw Alaska running from a taxi and straight towards her. If it had been any other situation, Willam would have laughed- Alaska was wearing trainers on her feet paired with huge fluffy bedsocks, her outfit consisted of Winnie The Pooh pyjama bottoms and a huge, baggy hoodie, probably pulled on over her pyjama top. A huge parka topped off the look, and Alaska’s face was red and blotchy with puffy eyes which had tears streaming from them.

As Alaska finally reached Willam, she flung her arms around her in a hug and the girl’s body was racked with sobs. Willam sighed, muttering soft, calming words and rubbing Alaska’s back in circles. It had been a horrendous phone call even though it hadn’t lasted long- Alaska, just like Courtney, sensed something had been up, even to the extent that she’d known something had happened to Sharon. She had immediately broken down in tears, but Willam had hardly had time to say anything comforting to her before she was gone, presumably to phone a taxi.

“Is she okay?” Alaska squeaked out in between shudders and sobs. Willam gave her a squeeze.

“She’s in good hands. They’ve not given me an update but I think she’ll be okay. She was still breathing when I was with her so that’s a good sign.”

Alaska broke away from the hug slightly, horror on her face. “Oh my God, you were there? What happened?”

Willam sighed, not wanting to relive it all. “We had been for a drink and we were literally just saying goodbye. Sharon was crossing the road and we were mucking about, she was sort of walking across it really slowly. She stopped and paused in the middle of it and then the car just came at her.”

“She stopped in the road?” Alaska whispered. Willam could see her mind was going at around a thousand miles an hour.

“Alaska, it was 1am. The streets were dead.”

“But surely you could hear the car coming? Fuck, Willam, why didn’t you stop her or push her out of the way or something?” Alaska said, growing frustrated. Then, seeing Willam’s hackles immediately raising at the accusation, she stopped. “Sorry. Shit, I’m sorry, Willam, it wasn’t your fault, none of it was your fault. Fuck, it’s such a mess.”

Alaska began to cry again and Willam pulled her back into a hug. As she started to calm down, Willam took her hand and squeezed it.

“I’ve been put in a relative’s room- nobody’s updated me about Sharon yet but then I’ve only been here for 20 minutes. Why don’t we go inside and see if there’s been any progress?” she summoned a smile for her friend, not yet letting go of her hand. She led Alaska back into the hospital, past the initial shopping-centre facade of coffee shops and WH Smiths that lined the entrance hall and staved off the horrors of the fact that they were in an actual fucking hospital- a place where people bled and suffered and died, and Willam hated it.

She had only just managed to find her way back to the relative’s room and get a snuffling Alaska sat on the couch when a doctor who seemed entirely too young in an all-too-stereotypical white coat entered. Willam could have laughed at how much of a parody everything seemed, until the doctor spoke.

“Hello, ladies. I’m Dr Hall, I’ve been put in charge of Sharon for the time being,” he stuck out his hand, Willam following suit and shaking it while Alaska was unable to rise from the couch.

“I’m Willam, that’s Alaska. She’s Sharon’s girlfriend,” she responded as she shook. Semantics could get fucked for now- Alaska cared like a girlfriend, cried like a girlfriend and worried like a girlfriend so for the moment, that was who she was to Sharon.

“Good to meet you both. I’ve just been in triage with Sharon and I’ve done an initial assessment with the head nurse. It’s hard to say until we run some more thorough tests, but for the moment we believe Sharon has sustained a number of injuries and she’ll be in the ICU for her time here.”

There, the doctor paused as if to take in the reactions of the girls in front of him. Willam had been aware of a cry from Alaska, but she was motionless and felt completely sick. “Injuries like what?”

“Well, we’re certain she’s broken her leg. That’s straightforward enough and we’ll be able to fix that. She also has a laceration on her right arm that will need stitched up, but everything else seems to be internal. Her breathing is very laboured so we think there could be some sort of fracture to her ribs or alternatively a traumatic pneumothorax, what you and I would refer to as a punctured lung.”

Alaska gave a gasp as Willam took all of the information in. She knew Sharon was hurt, but she didn’t realise just how bad it was, as silly as it sounded.

“Apart from that, we’ll need to get her a CT scan to assess whether or not there’s any internal bleeding or any other fractures or breakages,” he continued, his face softening as his eyes settled on Alaska. “I’m very sorry, I know how hard this must be for you both.”

“Can we see her?” Alaska asked softly, her eyes filled with tears. Willam let a small breath go.

“Alaska, you heard him. Sharon will be waiting to go for scans just now, she’s not in a fit state for us,” Willam sat down next to her friend and pulled her close. Exhaustion seemed to overcome Alaska and her sobs fell quiet, choosing to look intently at the floor instead. Willam turned to address the doctor. “When can we see her, though?”

“It’s hard to say. Once she’s had her scans she might need to go into theatre and if so, she’ll be waiting for that. When she’s done, we’ll give her a room and you can go and see her. Until then you’re welcome to use this room as your base, and if you need me at all then please feel free to ask at reception for me,” Dr Hall smiled gently, nodding to the two women as he left the room and closed the door silently.

Once he was gone, silence filled the small room. Willam stood up slowly.

“Lask, I’m going to need to head back outside. I said I’d pick up Courtney. Are you going to be okay here?”

The other woman wordlessly nodded. Despite the uneasy feeling in her chest, Willam knew she had to go outside to see if Courtney was there.

As she walked back to the same spot where she’d met Alaska, thoughts swirled around her mind and poured over the top of each other like a whirlpool. A punctured lung, internal bleeding. All of it was so horrible. Willam couldn’t help but imagine the worst, and her stomach felt so tight and sick.

She didn’t have to walk all the way back outside, as she found Courtney as she turned into the small shopping area. She was leaving the little M&S food (capitalism at its worst, Willam thought, putting arguably the most expensive supermarket in a hospital so people have no other choice but to buy from them) with a small shopping bag and her face, similar to Alaska’s, was red and tear-stained. She was dressed in a sweatshirt, jeans and trainers but her hair was still curled neatly, indicative of her date just hours before.

She’d probably been having such a good night, Willam thought, and I’ve ruined it.

“Courtney,” Willam called her over, the other girl’s head turning at the mention of her name. Selfishly, Willam’s heart lifted at the brief light that shone in Courtney’s eyes when she saw her. As if everything that had happened between them had been forgotten, Courtney hurried forward and wrapped her arms around Willam in a hug. Willam could feel her breathing deeply as she sighed and her mind cruelly taunted her, the image of a rib piercing through Sharon’s lung springing to mind involuntarily even though she knew that wasn’t how a punctured lung worked. For a moment they both stood still in each other’s arms, the two women simply needing held, one anchoring the other.

Courtney pulled away first, like Willam knew she would. She fixed her red eyes on Willam’s and her face was full of concern. “How is she, Willam?”

“Doctor was just in, they’re doing a scan on her now but they think she’s got a punctured lung and maybe internal bleeding. She’s broken her leg and the road sliced her arm open too. She could have fractured or broken more bones but they don’t know yet,” Willam sighed, unable to break Courtney’s gaze. The other woman looked sick as she glanced down the corridor. Willam could see she was looking at all the different horrifying hospital signs, each as cryptic and foreboding as the last.

“Oh God, it’s horrible. Absolutely fucking horrible,” she said softly, shakily breathing in.

“She’ll be in the ICU once they’ve finished with her, but we don’t know how long that’ll be. Alaska’s here, and they’ve given us a room to wait in,” Willam explained, as she began to walk slowly forward, gently encouraging Courtney to follow.

Courtney walked a couple of steps silently, then gave a panicked laugh. “I’m an idiot. I just went and panic-bought a ton of hospital shit for Sharon. I doubt it’ll be much use to her.”

Willam looked down at the bag. “What did you get?”

Courtney gave a humourless bark of a laugh. “Grapes, Lucosade and Heat magazine.”

“The holy trinity of intensive care unit accessories,” Willam quipped equally humourlessly.

They walked the rest of the way in silence, Willam having to fight the urge to reach down and intertwine her fingers with Courtney’s as they walked down each corridor. She couldn’t believe she was having these horrible, selfish thoughts while Sharon was lying on a hospital trolley somewhere in the building but the whole experience had shocked and scared her, reminded her of how unforgiving and cruel fate could be, and that was enough to make anyone cling to the people they cared for.

The rest of the time in the relatives’ room passed in a blur. Courtney and Alaska were reunited and tears were shed as soon as they saw each other, Courtney clinging to Alaska and muttering how sorry she was over and over again whilst Alaska silently stood and let herself be held, tears alternating between streaming down her cheeks and dropping directly from her eyes onto Courtney’s hoodie. They sat and they waited. Willam made the three of them cups of tea, none of which were drank. They tried to talk about things, mundane things, anything that wasn’t Sharon. They sat still and isolated from each other, save for Courtney holding Alaska’s hand tightly, her knuckles white and curled around Alaska’s fingers.

It had been roughly an hour and twenty minutes when the doctor from before re-appeared in the room, and just before he spoke there was silence like Willam had never heard before, as if the whole world held its breath.

***

The beeping was monotonous and creepy and clinical, but to Willam it was the best sound she’d heard in her life because as long as the beeping continued, it meant Sharon was alive.

She didn’t look very Sharon-like, though, she supposed, as Willam watched in slight horror as her chest rose laboriously up and down. Tubes snaked in and out of various limbs and an oxygen mask was strapped to her swollen face, upon which had developed several green and blue bruises. She looked awful, but she was breathing.

The hours had both dragged and flown by. 03.40, Doctor Hall had explained that Sharon was in theatre as the CAT scan had uncovered internal bleeding near her liver. Their worst fear. Alaska had cried and Courtney had been shaken and Willam sat and stared at nothing, paralysed with fear. 04.15, another visit from the doctor after a tense and sickening half hour in the relatives’ room, which had begun to feel like a prison. The surgeons had stopped the bleeding and Sharon would be okay, although on top of the punctured lung she did have a broken collarbone, two fractured ribs and a fractured pelvis. Willam hadn’t known if she was supposed to be happy that Sharon wasn’t in immediate life-threatening danger or full of dread at all the horrible breaks and fractures she’d sustained. 04.50, another visit from Dr Hall, and just as tensions were running at their highest the three girls had finally been told they could see Sharon.

That had been the last update before they’d followed Dr Hall up to the intensive care unit and into a small, mercifully private room which housed a bed, two chairs, a bedside cabinet, a TV, and Sharon with all her tubes and machines. Willam hadn’t been able to stop staring at the woman on the bed since she’d seen her, and neither had the other two girls. Willam had given both of them the chairs and she’d chosen to stand near the door, which meant she could see both of their expressions. Courtney looked pale and blank-faced, Alaska looked mournful.

It was Alaska who spoke first in an entirely emotionless voice. “She doesn’t look like Sharon.”

There was a silence which Willam filled. “He did tell us that she’d look different. I know it’s freaky but all the stuff she’s hooked up to is all stuff that’s going to help her, Lask.”

Alaska nodded silently. She looked at one of Sharon’s hands, the one closest to the bed, which had an IV line attached to the back of it. Her mouth turned downwards. “I’m scared to even hold her hand in case something else goes wrong.”

Courtney rested a hand on Alaska’s arm. “Nothing’s going to go wrong. It’ll be fine.”

Alaska leaned forward, reached a hand out and awkwardly rested it over Sharon’s, lacing the tips of her fingers through Sharon’s own. Willam let out a breath she was unaware she’d been holding, akin to a sigh of relief.

“When will she wake up, do you think?” Alaska asked, her voice small.

Courtney sighed. “She’ll be resting for a while yet, I think. The pain meds will knock her out quite a bit.”

“Do you think when she wakes up she’d be able to get me some?” Willam deadpanned, without being able to help it. She watched as Alaska turned to look at her, then bit her lip as she stifled a laugh. Courtney first looked to Alaska, then at Willam before she let out a small giggle. Willam smiled. It wasn’t much, an unfunny joke about drugs, but it had lifted some of the tension from the room.

Suddenly, her phone buzzed once, then twice, then three times. A call. She took her phone out of her pocket, and she could see the other girls looking at her forebodingly.

Caller ID- Bianca.

Willam had known that the phone call would come, she just hadn’t expected it to be so soon. She looked at the other two girls, stepped out of the room, and took it.

“Hi, Bianca.”

There was a beat of silence on the other end of the line, which never ever happened in a Bianca Del Rio phone call. When Bianca phoned you she had shit to say immediately and she never wasted time. Now, though, Willam felt the seconds tick by. Her voice finally came. “Willam. What’s happened to Sharon.”

Willam cast her eyes through the glass to the three women in the small room, and her heart sank.

“Willam.”

Willam took a breath. “We were out together. She was in a hit and run. She’s in intensive care.”

There was some form of sound from Bianca that sounded both angry and anguished. Willam held her breath. “I’m sorry, Bianca, I should have phoned you earlier. I should have phoned the police-”

“Willam, you listen to me,” Bianca’s voice came down the line, hoarse and harsh. “Do not dare apologise. You weren’t to know. You got her to the hospital, which was the most important thing.”

There was a silence. Willam turned and looked at the pale, beige paint of the corridor walls. “It’s reached the press, hasn’t it.”

“Obviously.”

She hissed and let the silence linger. “Jesus Christ, Bianca, this is all a fucking hellscape.”

“I know. I know. And I can’t hold it from the front pages, Willam, they’re all fucking animals and they need to be fed. The Guardian have got a testimonial from a trainee nurse that knows all her fucking injuries and has leaked them all,” Bianca sighed. Willam had never heard her sound so hopeless. She was silent again. “You’ve been my first port of call. I’m going to phone the detective looking after Sharon’s case, because I don’t believe for a minute that this was a coincidence. Then I’m coming in to see her.”

“Bianca, don’t…” Willam began. How do you comfort a woman like Bianca? “Don’t worry about the press. There’s still a couple of hours before shit goes to print, we can figure something out.”

“I’m not worried about the press. I’m worried about Sharon.”

Silence.

Bianca’s voice came again. “I’ll see you in a bit. Take care, Willam.”

She was gone.

Willam walked back into Sharon’s room. Alaska and Courtney immediately looked up at her.

“The press have got it,” she said blankly. Courtney shook her head.

“Well, we knew it would only be a matter of time,” Alaska said softly, her face frowning.

“Bianca’s coming in. She’ll probably have police with her,” Willam said, then sighed as realisation dawned on her. “Which means I’ll get questioned. Can’t wait for that.”

Courtney caught her eye. She looked genuinely concerned for Willam and despite everything, Willam’s heart skipped a beat. Courtney rose slowly. “Well, we’ll all need coffee if we’re going to be awake much longer. I’ll get us some.”

“I’ll come with you,” Willam suddenly decided, Courtney’s eyes giving nothing away as she nodded her permission. Alaska simply looked up at them and then back down at Sharon. It was an unspoken fact that she wasn’t going to leave her side anytime soon.

Willam followed Courtney out into the corridor and then into the lift where they were both silent. Willam looked at the floor, then spoke.

“At least she’s alright.”

Courtney nodded. “True. I think we just need her to come to and then we’ll all breathe a sigh of relief.”

There was another silence as they walked into the small Costa. Courtney ordered three espressos with milk from a barista with purple hair and huge winged eyeliner, and they sat at a table and waited. Willam looked at Courtney’s face- the worried frown lines on her forehead, her glassy, tired eyes, her lips which were sore and bitten. She missed her so much.

“So,” Willam began, deciding to break the silence. “How was your date?”

“My date- oh!” Courtney looked confused, then enlightened. She gave a laugh. “Yeah…it was nice. Andrew’s a lovely guy and he’s a good old-fashioned gentleman.”

Willam wanted to laugh. What had she expected, Courtney to fall back into her arms? “Oh. Well, at least that’s-”

“But I think we’re probably going to stay as friends,” Courtney finished, interrupting her. Willam couldn’t help but feel her heart lifting.

“That’s a shame,” Willam frowned. Courtney looked at her for a beat, then spluttered a laugh.

“You don’t give a shit, do you?” she asked softly as she laughed. Willam snorted.

“No, I guess I don’t,” she smiled affectionately. Fuck, she’d missed laughing with her, seeing her eyes crinkle up and the way she’d tip her head back and let her hair cascade down her shoulders. “So what was the problem, then?”

Courtney raised her eyebrows. “He wasn’t really vegan. He just eats quorn sometimes. I took him to a vegan restaurant and he looked so horrified at the lack of meat.”

The both of them laughed quietly. Courtney looked awkward, as if she was about to say something else. Willam felt her heartbeat through her chest. She knew that Courtney was holding back on something and so she was almost afraid to say anything in case she backed off.

“Besides,” Courtney mentioned, her gaze firmly fixed on the floor. “He could tell…that I wasn’t over somebody.”

“Oh,” Willam said. It was as if her body couldn’t keep up with everything. One minute she was worried sick about Sharon, the next she was almost going into cardiac arrest because Courtney had basically dropped a massive hint.

Courtney had raised her gaze and fixed it on Willam. “Somebody being you.”

“Right.”

Courtney laughed. “I thought I’d spell that out for you, because you’re a massive fucking moron.”

Willam coughed out a laugh. “I am.”

Courtney smiled a little, looked at Willam expectantly for a beat, then looked again to the floor. Willam panicked. She couldn’t risk losing Courtney again.

“Well…I’m not over you either,” she said quietly, watching as Courtney’s eyes snapped up to face her. Maybe Courtney had been missing her as much as she’d been missing Courtney.

Courtney gave a little smile. “I know.”

Willam obviously looked taken-aback because Courtney burst out laughing, which made Willam start laughing too. As the laughter died down, all that was left was the pair of them looking into each other’s eyes. Just as Willam was about to speak and just as it looked as if Courtney was about to too, the barista yelled Courtney’s order. Courtney jumped up and grabbed the little cardboard tray of three coffees with one hand, then turned to Willam, smiled and gave a little shrug. Just then, her phone vibrated again.

“Bianca’s upstairs with Sharon and Alaska. There’s someone from Scotland Yard with her,” Willam explained as she looked at her phone. Courtney nodded.

“That’s the fun over then,” she quipped, moving towards the exit. Willam’s silence prompted Courtney to look towards her, her expression concerned. “Willam. It’ll be fine.”

Willam mustered a small smile as she walked towards the lifts. She was so lost in thought and worry that she almost didn’t notice Courtney transfer the tray of drinks to her right hand and silently curl her left hand around Willam’s own.

***

It was six o’clock in the morning, and Willam was exhausted. She’d never been questioned by the police before, and she never wanted to be again. They were sympathetic but relentless, and with each question Willam felt more and more useless. How much had Sharon had to drink? What was the precise time that it had happened? Whereabouts in the road was she standing? How fast was the car going? What was its number plate? What was the make of car? What was the colour? What did the driver look like? What did the driver do after they hit Sharon? Which way did they continue driving? Every question was one that Willam felt she couldn’t properly answer. They asked her some questions about the previous death threats, and who she felt might have been behind them- did Sharon have any enemies, and suchlike. Apart from blaming most of the UK’s far right population, Willam had said she wasn’t sure.

She and Bianca had been taken to a station nearby to the hospital, and she emerged from the small questioning room tired and simply wanting to go to bed, but knowing that she would return to the hospital to stay with Alaska and Courtney. She wasn’t really in the mood to speak much to Bianca, and for once Bianca didn’t seem as if she wanted to chat much to her.

“How were they with you?” Bianca asked, rising from the chair she’d been sitting on in the police waiting room as she saw Willam emerge.

“Fine. Didn’t feel very helpful, though,” Willam said, sighing as she walked with Bianca. “I should have written the number plate down, or looked harder at the car, or tried to get a look at the driver.”

Bianca frowned deeply. “Willam, you can’t blame yourself.”

They walked out of the station and down the small, quiet road which was starting to become bathed with morning sunlight. Willam turned to look at Bianca. In all her time working with her, she’d never seen her look so troubled.

Seeing Willam’s concerned look, Bianca exhaled. “I couldn’t keep it from going to the papers. There’s articles online now, and it’ll be on the front pages. We stuck the TV on in Sharon’s room and it was all over News 24. I’m sorry, Willam, I couldn’t protect her.”

“It’s alright, Bianca,” Willam sighed, stopping as she got to the junction. A big black car was waiting at a stop sign, presumably Bianca’s. The spin doctor looked troubled as she gazed to the car.

“It’s getting dragged into politics already.”

Willam cursed under her breath. This was all they needed, Sharon’s accident getting turned into a points-scoring exercise by different parties. “What are people saying?”

“Some of it’s nice. Most of the party have rallied round without me even having to give them a line. Latrice has given a statement, as has Trinity. Shea has tweeted support, so’s Sasha, Peppermint and Maxine. Ironically Sharon getting run over by a car is the most uniting thing she’s done for the party. If I’d known I would have hired her a hitman ages ago,” Bianca laughed bitterly. Her face turned grave. “It’s Mrs fucking Blind Man’s Crumpet herself.”

“Fucking Phi Phi,” Willam hissed, surprising herself with how much venom was in her voice.

“She’s spoken with ITV and she’s given the whole wobbly top lip expressing condolences thing, but she’s trying to turn it into an attack on immigrants.”

“Fuck, did she stretch before she reached? What the hell does that have to do with anything?” Willam complained, deeply irritated.

Bianca frowned. “Because The Sun, the paper we all love to line our cat litter trays with, is alleging that the hit and run was a terrorist incident carried out by an Asian man.”

Willam tore her hands through her hair. “But that’s bullshit, surely? Nobody knows who did it, the police don’t even know who did it!”

“They have a source,” Bianca said. “Which means that either it’s a bullshit source, their usual currency, or that the suspect has leaked it themself.”

“God, Bianca, this is fucking madness.”

Bianca looked at the pavement awkwardly, then at Willam. “Look, I wasn’t going to mention it to you today given the massive amount of stress you’ve already been put through, but we need something on Phi Phi’s party to distract from this mess. If you have anything…well, we’d all appreciate it. Especially Number 10, if you get me.”

Willam momentarily wished she was lying sleeping on a hospital bed instead of Sharon.

“Okay,” she simply nodded once, her mind too full of words to say anything else. Bianca nodded back in goodbye and walked towards her car. Willam watched her climb in and drive off before beginning her own walk back to the hospital. On the way she saw people walking to work, some of whom gave her funny looks. She wondered if they all knew what had happened, until she realised she was still in her clothes from last night- green fur jacket, black lace crop top, tight black skirt without tights and platform trainers on her feet.

Before long she was back at the hospital and in the lift up to the ICU. As she found Sharon’s room, it was almost as if the past hour or so hadn’t happened as the girls were still in the same position- Sharon unmoving on the bed, Alaska staring at her and holding her hand, and Courtney with her phone in her hand texting furiously. Alaska and Courtney looked up as Willam entered the room.

“Hey,” Courtney said, her eyes slightly wide in anticipation. “How was it?”

“It was okay. They asked me a bunch of things I couldn’t answer and then a couple of things I could. I just felt like a fucking failure, like I was no help at all.”

“Stop it,” Courtney frowned, chastising her. “You’re not a failure at all. I bet you were really helpful. Here, come sit. You must be shattered.”

With that, Courtney rose from her chair and beckoned Willam to sit. Too exhausted to protest, Willam slid into it. She looked at Sharon, then Alaska.

“Anything?”

Alaska sighed deeply. “Nothing. She hasn’t even moved.”

Worry churned in Willam’s stomach. Courtney piped up. “The doctor was in though, and he said that sometimes it can help to talk to them even if they’re not responding.”

“Did you try it?”

Alaska chuckled. “We read her some of Heat magazine.”

“Oh, good, she’d have loved that,” Willam said dryly, causing Courtney to snort. Willam thought for a moment, then turned back to Alaska. “Well, when she wakes up, you’ll be sitting there. She’s not properly seen you for ages. Why don’t you talk to her? Explain your side of everything that’s happened.”

Willam looked to Courtney for approval, who shrugged. “Worth a try, Lask.”

Alaska took a deep breath, laughed a little self-consciously, then turned to Sharon.

“Hey babe,” she began, looking at Willam and Courtney in embarrassment, then back to Sharon. “God, this is just…literal torture seeing you like this. Somehow I just feel like all of this is my fault, maybe if I’d stayed with you then you wouldn’t have gone out with Willam and none of this would have happened. I’m an absolute dick, really, because I’ve been ignoring you and every single attempt you’ve made at trying to contact me and then Willam phoned me and told me about what happened and all I could think about was getting here and being with you. It was the worst fucking moment of my life, Sharon. I kept torturing myself and wondering what if she never wakes up, that the last contact I had with you was over some fucking stupid USB stick that I didn’t even want to give to you in the first place? And I couldn’t even tell you-”

Willam looked up as Alaska sniffed. Tears were running down her face and welling in her eyes, and Alaska used the hand that wasn’t holding Sharon’s to wipe at her nose.

“I couldn’t even tell you want I wanted to tell you- that I wanted to just put everything aside and make up with you, to stop our stupid fucking fight, to tell you that I never wanted to end things with you and that the whole thing was a horrible, stupid mistake,” Alaska sobbed, snuffling and taking a deep breath in. “And I couldn’t even tell you that I loved you- that I love you- and when I got that call I was so fucking terrified of never being able to say it to you again. Do you remember when we first said it to each other, Sharon? It was the night we went out for dinner at that Italian restaurant at like, eleven o’clock after I’d gone with you to Newsnight, and you walked me back home and we watched a film- The Other Woman- and you hated it, and you were making all these jokes about it and I was joining in and we laughed so much that when it died down and we just looked at each other I couldn’t help but say it. And you said it back right after? Why can’t we go back to the way things were? Fuck, I would have kept our relationship secret for a lifetime if it meant we could have just stayed together. In fact fuck, if it means so much Sharon, I won’t pursue the whole MP thing. You’re more important to me than my job, you’re more important to me than life. I love you more than anything or anyone I’ve ever loved in my life so please…”

Alaska took a big gulp of air. “…please, fuck, get better.”

Willam and Courtney stood in a horrible, cold silence as they watched Alaska cry quietly to herself. Suddenly, Willam gave a slight jump as Sharon’s free hand came up to her face and slowly lifted the oxygen mask to one side.

“You are becoming an MP, bitch,” she croaked hoarsely, causing Alaska’s gaze to shoot up to look at her girlfriend. “There’s no way you’re giving up on that just because I’m in a hospital bed.”

Willam choked a laugh as she looked at Alaska, her face at once shocked and relieved. She looked slightly as if she didn’t know what to do for a moment, then elected to burst out crying, bringing Sharon’s hand up to her face to kiss it over and over again. Sharon laughed- tiredly, weakly, but it was a laugh nonetheless.

“Jesus Christ, you took your time there,” Willam smiled, part of her wanting to cry in relief too.

“How long have I been out for?” Sharon asked, coughing as she sat up.

“Since about 1. It’s like, 6.15 now.”

“Shit,” she said, her voice weak.

“How are you feeling?” Courtney asked, visibly relieved too.

“Like someone’s kicked me half to death. Pain meds do shit all, I feel like shit but also incredibly high,” Sharon wheezed, then turned to Alaska. Her face softened and judging by Alaska’s reaction, she had squeezed her hand. “Hey, stranger.”

Alaska laughed through her tears. “Hey.”

Sharon smiled affectionately. “Is this all I had to do to get you back, then? Get run over?”

“Don’t,” Alaska half-laughed, half-cried, then kissed Sharon’s fingers. “Sharon, I’m so sorry. Oh my God, I was so fucking worried.”

“Yeah, I know. I heard it all. I could have said something halfway through, I just wanted you to keep saying more nice things about me,” Sharon joked, still her old self despite the tubes and drips and machines. Her expression grew dark as she turned to Courtney. “Oh, by the way. Never read me fucking any women’s magazine ever again. Hearing about Natalie Cassidy’s fucking colonoscopy was more painful than getting struck down.”

All four of the girls laughed, happy to be together with everyone conscious and cheerful all over again.

“Bianca’s been round. And people have said nice things. Trinity, Peppermint, Latrice, Max, Shea, Sasha,” Willam mentioned, thinking it would cheer Sharon up. Sharon smiled in a lazy, drugged-up-on-pain-meds way.

“God. All that in five hours? Did Bianca leave flowers?”

“No, of course not,” Alaska sighed. Then she laughed. “She stuck News 24 on.”

The girls all laughed again, this time quieter. Courtney took a deep breath and stretched. Sharon narrowed her swollen eyes at her.

“Are we boring you, Act?”

Courtney gave a smile. “Listen, I’ve been up a long time. It’s hard to squeeze a date, a trauma and a relief into one night. Slash…morning.”

“Oh yeah, how did that go?” Alaska asked pleasantly. She’d still not let go of Sharon’s hand, Willam noted with a smile.

“It was nice. We’re going to stay friends, though.”

Sharon looked at Willam meaningfully. Willam gave her a look that simply said, behave.

“Fair enough. I think me and Alaska are going to stay friends too,” Sharon smiled lazily, laughing as Alaska’s face grew bashful.

“Stop it. I’ve suffered enough,” she leaned her head over to nuzzle it into the crook of Sharon’s neck, one of the few parts of her that didn’t have wires or tubes coming in or out of it.

“I know, baby, I’m sorry.”

Alaska frowned and lifted her head off of Sharon’s shoulder momentarily. “This isn’t the broken collarbone, is it?”

Sharon laughed. “I broke a collarbone? Oh, well, fucked if I know. Everything hurts.”

Willam laughed. She stretched and yawned. Life and normal routine seemed so far away. “I think I should go home and sleep, now that I know you’re alright.”

“Me too,” Courtney said, giving a yawn that Willam could tell was fake. Why was that?

“You guys go ahead. I’m going to stay here for a while,” Alaska smiled at Sharon, the other woman returning her smile and shrugging.

“You can go home if you want, babe. I might have another snooze.”

“Well, I’ll snooze with you,” Alaska said matter-of-factly, shuffling her chair forward and resting her head on Sharon’s side. Sharon smiled and used her other hand to stroke Alaska’s hair.

Willam looked at Courtney, taking her cue to leave. She cast her gaze back to the couple. “I’ll be back when I’ve had a sleep and something to eat. Bianca might be back, just to warn you.” She wondered if she should mention the shit with Phi Phi. She decided not to.

“Oh, goody,” Sharon sighed, re-adjusting her oxygen mask so that it was over her face as a goodbye. Alaska waved sleepily to her friends and then Willam left the room, followed by Courtney. They walked down the corridor silently for a minute, neither one of them sure of what to say. Courtney’s words from earlier swirled around in Willam’s mind, and the fact that the two of them were alone together again, with so much possibility and opportunity of things that could be said, made Willam’s skin prickle in excitement and optimism.

As if she could read Willam’s mind, Courtney gave a small sigh as they both walked into the open air. She turned to face Willam and looked her in the eyes. “I know it sounds stupid, but I could really murder a glass of wine.”

“Same.”

Courtney was still looking at her. “Well, I’ve got wine at my place, if you want to come.”

Willam didn’t hesitate. “Okay. Sounds good.”

They talked about trivial things on the walk to the tube, and on the tube itself. The elephant in the room (or train carriage) was enormous and almost suffocating, and the sound of the train against the electric charges almost mirrored the electricity that seemed to run through Willam’s veins - Courtney isn’t over me, and I’m not over her.

It was almost seven o’clock in the morning by the time they got to Courtney’s flat, but the sheer adrenaline that was pumping through her heart was keeping Willam awake. As Courtney opened her front door for Willam and slipped off her shoes, Willam looked around at the small hallway. It had been around four months since she’d last been here, but nothing had changed. It was somehow reassuring to Willam. She followed Courtney into the kitchen where the other girl had pulled out two bottles of wine- an unopened red with a somewhat dusty bottle, and a half-full white with that fresh-from-the-fridge wet glaze.

“I like either, so it’s your pick,” Courtney smiled easily, making Willam wonder whether or not she was feeling the same mix of apprehension and excitement.

“Well, white’s going to make us feel less guilty about the fact we’re drinking wine when we’re normally getting ready for work,” Willam shrugged, Courtney snorting a laugh and fetching two glasses from a cupboard below her breakfast bar. She picked up the glasses in one hand and the bottle in the other and made her way through to the living room, Willam following behind her. As they slumped down on the sofas and Courtney poured the wine out, Willam sighed.

“I’m so fucking relieved she’s okay.”

Courtney looked at her, an expression on her face that Willam couldn’t make out. “I just can’t believe it all actually happened. It’s like a horrendous nightmare,” she lifted up her glass. “To Sharon being alive.”

Willam smiled lazily and echoed the sentiment. “To Sharon being alive.”

There was silence for a moment as they both took a sip, Willam watching the early morning sun bathe the skyline out of Courtney’s French doors.

“Do you think…it was deliberate?” Courtney spoke quietly, Willam looking at her only to find Courtney was looking at the view as well.

“Fuck, I don’t know. The police think so. Could be, or it could be a jittery driver with a guilty conscience who didn’t want to stop.”

Courtney nodded, then narrowed her eyes. “Didn’t the doctor say she was lucky to be alive? Ten miles an hour more and she wouldn’t have made it. If it was a main road and the car wasn’t going that fast, it kind of sounds like someone was parked waiting for her. Do you not think?”

Willam rolled her eyes. “Or it was just someone that wasn’t driving very fast.”

“On a main road like that at 1am? Willam, come on.”

Willam couldn’t help but laugh. “What is this, CSI: Sydney?”

Courtney walloped Willam on the arm, then laughed with her. She sighed. “I’ve just been sitting waiting with Alaska for so long that I’ve had all of these thoughts running around my head, but of course I couldn’t share them with her. I’m glad you came back with me.”

Willam’s heart gave a jump. She wanted to say something in response, something flirty that didn’t come on too strong, but her mind couldn’t conjure anything up.

Courtney spoke again, and Willam noticed she had that same look on her face as before. “So how come you were,” she paused the tiniest amount. “…out with Sharon anyway?”

“She suggested it. Probably thought it’d cheer us both up,” Willam shrugged, taking another sip. She noticed Courtney still hadn’t taken that look off her face. What did she want from her?

Honesty?

“Court, you should probably know. And I probably should’ve told you sooner. Me and Sharon had this whole thing when we were at uni,” Willam felt herself just coming out with it and it was like jumping out of a moving vehicle. Courtney’s expression finally relaxed.

“Okay.”

Willam picked at a stray thread on a sofa cushion. “You don’t seem surprised.”

“Because I’m not,” Courtney said plainly, taking a small sip. She paused, then added, “You always had this weird tension between you when you started. Like you really weren’t keen on her and I couldn’t see why. She always seemed as if she was walking on eggshells slightly around you. It only really seemed to go away…gosh, I don’t know when. But I always wondered why you were like that with her.”

Willam looked out at the view again. “I tried to reset my own view of the whole situation. I told anyone who asked that I knew her from uni, and that wasn’t a lie, but just not the full truth either.”

There was a small silence. Courtney leant over to top up their glasses. As she was pouring, she spoke again. Willam noticed how level and nonchalant her voice was, as if she was making a particular effort not to sound too interested. “So what was it that went on between you?”

Willam exhaled. Even after she’d talked through it all with Sharon, she still didn’t know what they’d been. “A miscommunication. She thought we were just friends that fucked, which we were. I saw it as more than that. I was a young, naive little bitch and I just got too deep in my feelings. It’s fucked, though, because the whole thing just made me so scared of relationships. Like what if it ever happened again to me and I was into it but the other person wasn’t?”

Courtney nodded understandingly. Her eyes were soft. It was scary to Willam to be telling Courtney all of this, but she didn’t seem to be scared off by it.

“Wonder how that feels, to be really, really into someone only to find out that they weren’t on your wavelength about it at all.”

“It was-” Willam started, then stopped as realisation dawned on her. She looked at Courtney, who was trying to conceal a smile. Willam laughed apologetically. “Fuck.”

Courtney gave a soft laugh, reaching out and taking Willam’s free hand. She held it gently. The gesture almost broke Willam’s heart. All at once it hit her just how badly she’d fucked up with Courtney. Only now was she realising that she had put Courtney in the exact same position that she had been in with Sharon all those years ago. Looking at Courtney’s hand, she squeezed it tightly. “Courtney, I’m sorry. I mean it.”

Courtney gave a peaceful smile. “I know you are.”

Willam smiled back. A small weight on her heart noted that she’d not been forgiven, only acknowledged, but after the past fortnight or so, acknowledgement was better than nothing.

“What was Bianca saying anyway?” Courtney continued, sipping her wine again. Willam sighed deeply.

“Well, you know that Phi Phi’s trying to politicise everything already. Bianca wants something on her party to take the heat off Sharon.”

Courtney grimaced and shook her head. She still hadn’t let go of Willam’s hand. “Jesus Christ, it’s all so messy and gross and tasteless.”

“I know, Court, but it’s our career. It was bound to happen. Politician gets hit by car, it turns political. Politician does anything, it turns political,” Willam shrugged, taking a drink. The sun was higher in the sky now and it was illuminating Courtney’s hair so beautifully.

“What are we supposed to get for her? This situation’s already stressful enough as it is.”

Willam felt herself tense up. She allowed herself to confront what she’d been pushing to the back of her mind all this time. She still had those photos on her phone of Roxxxy and Detox from all those months ago at Alyssa’s ball, and Phi Phi had recently voted against an LGBT-inclusive curriculum in secondary schools. How would the media react if she’d unknowingly voted against a policy which showed disapproval towards her own two advisors?

“I have something,” Willam stated simply, causing Courtney to sigh in relaxation.

“Thank Christ. Just give it to Bianca now and she can get out of our hair and let Sharon recover. What is it, anyway? Oil dumping in the Pacific? Foxhunting?” she laughed gently, stopping as she saw Willam’s grave face.

“Roxxxy and Detox,” she said. Courtney’s face dropped, her wine glass tipping over a little and threatening to spill. “I got photos of them at Alyssa’s ball, together. It would make Phi Phi look like a massive idiot and would take her down more than a few pegs…” Willam let all the air out of her body and looked into her glass. “…but it also outs both of her advisors.”

Courtney looked sick. “Oh God. Willam, you can’t do that.”

“I know,” she shook her head and wondered if she could voice the other horrible thought in her head. Communication could be good right now, she supposed. “Although part of me thinks why not? Fuck them, you know? They were both absolute cunts to Alaska, they work for a fucking sycophant. And I just…ugh…I really want that Number 10 job, and Bianca heavily implied that any info on this could get me it.”

She looked hesitantly for Courtney’s reaction. It turned out there were a lot of them. First, she wrinkled her nose and scrunched up her face in a brief display of disgust. Then, her expression completely dropped as if she was considering something. Finally she put her glass down, reached out to take Willam’s hand in her own, and gazed at her kindly.

“Willam,” she began. “Why do you want this job so much?”

Willam gave a choked laugh. “I mean it’s…it’s my fucking dream, Courtney. It’s all I’ve ever wanted out of life, to get to Number 10, to actually say I work there. I’ll have finally made it…and not many people can say that.”

“Okay,” Courtney nodded. Willam could tell she was listening intently. “So…you get the job at Number 10, let’s say. And what then?”

Willam blinked. “What do you mean?”

“What then? What do you aim for, what do you aspire to be after that? If that’s your life’s dream and it’s already achieved? Bill, you’re not even 30 yet,” Courtney smiled gently, tucking a piece of Willam’s layers behind her ear. “If you complete your life’s goal and you’re not even at the halfway point…what happens then?”

Willam felt completely blank. “Well, I…”

Courtney continued. “I know you don’t want to be PM, because you’re happy in the background. I know you don’t have any designs on leadership for the same reason. So what else is there?”

Willam paused and thought, trying to summon up something. “Bianca’s going to have to retire at some point.”

Courtney barked a laugh. “And what, you take her job? You take the job that consumed Bianca’s life so much she ended up getting divorced and she now lives on her own with no family? You want that life?”

Willam felt as if she’d heard Courtney’s voice catch in her throat. She was looking at her almost pleadingly, hopefully, desperate for what she deigned the right answer. Her intensity unsettled Willam. Or perhaps it was the truth in all that Courtney was saying? She’d never once reconsidered her determination to get to Number 10, never once wavered in her decision-making, because if she changed her mind about the job she’d wanted for so long, what was left?

“What do you have at Dosac? You’ve got me, you’ve got Sharon, you’ve got Alaska and the other girls. You’ve got a considerable amount of influence, you’re a big fish in a small pond. Other departments know your name, you’ve got so many opportunities. And if you change now…all that will be gone.”

Willam looked out of the windows again. The sun was now directly at her eye level. She turned back to Courtney and frowned at her. “Why are you saying all this, Court?”

Courtney looked away as if Willam’s gaze had burnt her. “I’m not trying to stop you from going after what you want, Willam. That would make me a horrific friend and an even worse person. I’m just trying to get you to be sure that it really is what you want.”

Willam’s voice caught in her throat. She looked away from Courtney, drained her glass, then placed it gently on the coffee table in front of them both.

“I should probably go home-” Willam began, making to slide off the couch, but Courtney gripped tighter to her hand. Turning, Willam saw a need in Courtney’s eyes that she’d never once experienced before.

“Stay,” she said simply. It was so quiet but so strong, and the blood in Willam’s veins was freezing and icy but pumping so rapidly like an ice cold waterfall, and she could feel her heart plummeting with it.

“Why?” Willam asked, and as soon as it left her mouth she cursed herself for it, but a part of her wanted to hear Courtney say what was on her mind. Frowning and sighing a tiny, needy sigh, Courtney gently tugged at Willam’s hand.

“I just need to be…close to you just now. Because I’ve fucking missed you.”

Willam looked at her hand in Courtney’s, then met her eyes.

Now or never.

And in one fluid movement Willam was back on the sofa, both her hands fisted and tangled in Courtney’s blonde hair, melting and moaning into a kiss full of fire that Willam wanted never to end.

***

Willam woke up in the same bed she’d woken up in in December, with the same girl she’d woken up with in December. Except the circumstances weren’t quite the same. Instead of grey skies and pouring rain, the sun that poked through the blinds was golden and warm, lighting up the room. Courtney was still in the bed, her eyes shut with her dark lashes fanned out and framing them as she slept. Probably the biggest difference, though, was that both of them were completely naked.

Sex with Courtney was every bit as amazing as Willam had imagined it would be, and she was already sorry that she couldn’t remember every single second of the entire thing in detail. She could swear that nobody else, not even Sharon, could make her feel the way Courtney had made her feel last night. She had expected it to be good and for Courtney to know what she was doing, but what she didn’t expect was for Courtney to have a mouth like a phone sex chat line girl and she had actually almost laughed in awe of the stuff she was coming out with. She didn’t know if it was the intensity of the situation that fed into it- there were so many emotions that Willam had been put through last night (or this morning, she supposed) that she had almost cried once everything was over and Courtney was holding her in her arms, but she hadn’t. She’d been calm, and happy, like her life was finally at peace. Sharon was going to be alright, and Courtney had…what? Courtney had forgiven her? Courtney liked her again? Courtney wanted to be more than her friend? She didn’t know, but she got the feeling that whatever it was was positive.

Willam wondered whether or not to wake her up but Courtney quickly solved that problem as her arm reached out to grab Willam by the waist and pull her closer, Courtney nuzzling into her side sleepily.

“Hey,” she murmured through a yawn, kissing Willam’s skin and making her feel as if she was 19 years old with a melting, gooey heart all over again.

“G’morning,” Willam smiled, rubbing her eyes then remembering she hadn’t taken off any of her makeup from the night before. “Did you sleep okay?”

“Mm. Always sleep like a baby after sex, I think it’s some weird nympho-narcoleptic thing I need to see a doctor about.”

Willam’s heart hammered in her chest and instantly woke her up more. “So we’re just coming out and addressing that that happened immediately?”

Courtney hurriedly sat up in bed and looked her in the eye, exasperation on her face. She’d foregone pulling the duvet up to cover herself and her boobs were fully out. “Uh, we’re both stark bollock naked, dipshit. How much more addressing of the situation could there be?”

“Yeah I know, fuckhead!” Willam snapped, a laugh bubbling in her throat. “I just don’t…I don’t know what this means now? Like what are we?”

Courtney half-laughed, half-sighed then pulled a pillow over her face and yelled into it. “Fuck! I don’t know, Willam, okay?”

Willam was smiling, but she simultaneously felt as if she was hanging by a thread. She watched as Courtney pulled the pillow off her face then rolled over and pulled her close.

“Cards on the table, I really fucking like you. I’ve never stopped liking you. I care about you, and I want to see you do well, and I like us when we’re together. We just work, we fit. We squabble at times, but it’s never malicious. But this job…it’s a bitch, and I don’t want us ending up having to hide away or have our lives ruined by it like Sharon and Alaska. So I don’t…” Courtney sighed. Willam could see her pulse thudding rapidly under her skin by her wrist. “I don’t want to label us just now. I’m scared to. But can we just…can we at least be exclusive? Because I don’t want to share you with anyone else.”

Willam smiled and rolled her eyes. “As if I’d fucking want anyone else.”

Courtney nuzzled her head into Willam’s side, and Willam cast her eyes to the sun coming in through the blinds. She blinked quickly three times. “No, that sounds good. Exclusive but with no labels. I can do that. Does this mean I’m forgiven?”

“For what?” Courtney kissed Willam’s temple.

“For being a cunt to you.”

“You were a cunt to me?” Courtney pulled away, frowning. “Now that doesn’t sound like Willam Belli at all.”

Willam took that as a yes.

“No more games,” Courtney said quietly, gently stroking the palm of Willam’s hand with her finger.

“No more games,” Willam agreed.

It was 2 o’clock by the time they got back to the hospital to see Sharon, after they’d showered, dressed (Willam borrowing Courtney’s clothes again), had some breakfast and got the two tubes over. It was an unspoken plan- they hadn’t talked about whether they should stay at the flat, or go visit Sharon, or even go into work. There was only one place they really needed to be today. They’d talked and chatted and laughed just as they used to, but without any awkward tension and with extra added hand holding and light knuckle and cheek kisses. They’d wondered out loud whether it had been in poor taste to fuck within the 24 hours that they’d found out Sharon had been hit by a car, before deciding that it was probably what Sharon would have wanted and endorsed anyway.

When they arrived at Sharon’s ward, it was as if nothing had changed at all- Alaska seemingly hadn’t moved from her seat and was still sitting in it facing Sharon in her Winnie the Pooh pyjamas, while the other woman was still in bed but was propped up with pillows and had her oxygen mask on. She had a loving, dreamy look on her face and seemed to be listening to Alaska talk when Courtney and Willam arrived. Alaska turned around excitedly when they came in.

“Morning,” Willam smiled, moving to hug Alaska tightly and then Sharon markedly less so, in case Willam accidentally pulled a wire out. “Or afternoon, or whatever the fuck time it is.”

“Hey,” Sharon took her mask off and smiled gently.

“How are you feeling, Sharon?” Courtney asked as she took her turn to hug her.

“I’m holding up okay. I had a big sleep when you two left, woke up at like 9. Then me and Alaska had a massive chat which took about an hour and exhausted me, so I had a nap again. Woke up about an hour ago and Alaska had stuck on the news. It’s weird seeing myself on the news in a capacity which isn’t politics. I’m not in the mood for a lot of talking so Alaska’s just been telling me about her leadership campaign,” Sharon gestured to Alaska’s happy, excited face and smiled fondly. “Christ, she looks like she’s about to explode. I fucking love this girl so much.”

Willam made a vomiting sound as she pulled up a chair beside Alaska. “Gross. So your big chat. Did you both grow up and say sorry to each other?”

Willam saw Alaska squeeze Sharon’s hand. “Of course we fucking did. That was the first thing we said. Then we basically just cried and talked about how much we loved each other for the next 59 minutes.”

Courtney laughed, and Alaska gave a small giggle then shook her head as she looked at Sharon. “No, joking. Well, we did do that. But we also spoke about career stuff- what we wanted in the next five years, what we need to do to get there.”

“It’s doable for what we both want. We just need to support each other, make it two sided and communicate. I know that now,” Sharon piped up, smiling at Alaska as if it was for her benefit and not Courtney and Willam’s.

“Well, I’m glad you two have made up,” Courtney smiled softly, moving to perch on Willam’s knee in the absence of a chair. Willam pulled her close. She didn’t miss the look that passed between Alaska and Sharon.

“Um, on the topic of making up…” Alaska raised an eyebrow and looked pointedly at them both. “…what is this?”

“Courtney sitting on my lap?” Willam said sarcastically, resting her head on Courtney’s back.

“Yes…” Sharon said, waving a tubed-up hand to prompt more. “So…?”

“So…what?” Courtney asked, just as deadpan as Willam had been, and she loved her for it.

“Oh fuck, put a dying woman out of her misery!” Sharon coughed out in exasperation, earning her a furious look and a gentle smack from Alaska.

“DON’T joke about that!” she glared at her for all of two seconds, before she took her hand and turned back to Courtney and Willam. “But seriously guys, Sharon’s only got one properly working lung, can you just give us the information that we both already know but want to scream like babies at when it comes from you?”

Courtney turned and looked at Willam, suddenly embarrassed. Willam gave her a squeeze and spoke for her. “Well, we’re going to disappoint you, because we’re not girlfriends. We can’t all fall in love with our work friends and go balls-deep into a relationship. But no, we’re just…”

“We like each other, and we’re exclusive, and we’re going to take it a day at a time,” Courtney finished, Alaska giving a small, excited squeal. Sharon smiled and rolled her eyes.

“Bo-ring! I want to know if you’ve banged yet.”

“Yeah, we did,” Courtney shrugged, Willam completely shocked at her blasé display of honesty but also too tired to care much. Sharon let out a loud cheer, then immediately started coughing violently in a sobering display that reminded the girls why they were all together in the first place. Seeing Alaska’s concerned face, Sharon frowned.

“I’m fine, it’s okay,” she wheezed, waving a dismissive hand. “Don’t worry. Just coughing up pieces of old lung, they say the new one should grow back within 3-5 working days.”

Alaska snorted. Willam laughed and shook her head. “You’re so fucking unfunny it hurts.”

Sharon shrugged. “Blame the pain meds, I’ve been popping them like Smints.”

They chatted quietly after that, the four of them just enjoying each other’s’ company without having to talk about work or politics or anything like that. Often Alaska would talk for Sharon, the other woman wearing her oxygen mask and resting. Alaska had phoned Jinkx and texted the comms girls to fill them in on what had happened, after they all basically woke up, saw the headlines and immediately fired off about fifty texts to Alaska, Courtney and Willam (none of which Willam saw, her phone having long since died.). Sharon was annoyed that Jinkx wouldn’t honour her request to bring in her work laptop so she could work from her hospital bed, a request which all three advisors were glad she’d shut down. They were all going to pop in at some point in the evening to visit, Adore and Katya promising to bring what they’d termed as “huge, inconvenient, inflatable balloons”. Willam had told Sharon about the Phi Phi incident, Sharon rolling her eyes almost to the back of her head but refusing to allow herself to get worked up over it.

“That’s a point, actually,” she said, sitting up in bed and wincing slightly at some unseen pain. “Didn’t you say Bianca would be visiting me soon? She’s not been in.”

“Well, she still has to oversee all the other departments. Maybe something’s happened with them?” Courtney offered, Sharon shrugging and conceding.

Around ten minutes later, they had their answer. Bianca came in to Sharon’s room dressed in her usual work attire, ironically all in black. Her face was serious but she had a small, kind smile, and was holding a box of Guiylan pralines.

“Christ, Bianca, I’ve not died,” Sharon laughed by way of a greeting, as Bianca cracked a rare, genuine smile and handed her the chocolates.

“Shut it. Some of us still have to go to work. How are you?”

“Sore.”

“That’s crap, I’m sorry. And I’m sorry I didn’t swing by earlier. I’ve been at Number 10, I’ve been with the police, I’ve been into Dosac. This might be a bit of good news for you,” she said, addressing the room this time. “The police have apprehended a guy. Old woman who lives in the area had CCTV outside her flat. She came forward with footage of a car going well beyond the speed limit. Matches the time that the whole thing happened. They were able to get a number plate from it and traced it back to the fucker.”

Willam was in shock. She had no idea it would all happen so quickly. Looking at Bianca closely, she could see how puffy her eyes were and how her dark circles had been concealed with foundation, and how much her hands were shaking. It hit her how hard Bianca must have been working to help the police catch whoever had done this to Sharon.

“Thank you, Bianca,” she said, her voice coming out way more emotional than she’d meant it to. Bianca turned to her in surprise, as if she was taken aback slightly.

“Well, I mean, don’t thank me. The police did all the work. They’ll be in to question you, Sharon, but once you’re feeling a bit better. Maybe this evening, or tomorrow.”

“Oh, great. Reliving the moment a car hit me in all its horrifying detail, with the greatest hits of poison pen letters as a follow-up. All my fucky stars have come at once,” Sharon said. Her breathing was becoming laboured, so she put her oxygen mask back on.

“Just keep the damn thing on, you’ve had it off and on like a fucking lightswitch the entire time you’ve been awake,” Alaska chastised her, tucking the hospital blanket in around Sharon. “I’ll maybe see if there’s some way Jinkx can bring in your duvet.”

“You could always go get it for her,” Courtney suggested, Alaska laughing at the ridiculous suggestion.

“Yeah, good one Court, like I’m going to leave her side until she’s discharged.”

Bianca watched the whole exchange carefully, then opened her mouth. “So I take it…that you’re back together.”

Alaska looked at Sharon and nodded.

“You understand that I’m absolutely livid at the pair of you for ever beginning this in the first place and that if it had even got into the media you would have been out of a job?” Bianca said, pointing to Alaska. Alaska blinked and gave a small shrug.

“She would have been worth it,” she said, Willam noticing how Sharon squeezed Alaska’s hand. Bianca fake-gagged.

“Yes, well, in any case, I’m hearing you’ve got plans to stand in the by-election? Is that still happening?” Bianca asked. “Because if it is, then it would make my life a lot easier. There’s not nearly as many implications. In fact you could probably put you two into the public eye. Might be good for the party.”

Sharon wheezed a laugh and Alaska suppressed a smile. “God. Our relationship is literally politically correct. But yeah, I am standing. It’d be good to get some tips from you about that, actually.”

Bianca checked her phone as she spoke. “You don’t need tips. I’ll get you the support you need. Might as well start considering yourself an MP.”

Alaska smiled happily, bringing Sharon’s hand up to her face and kissing it in excitement.

“Although that does mean a position opening up at Dosac. Got anyone in mind, Sharon?”

Sharon sighed exasperatedly, ripping off her mask and gesturing to all her tubes and wires. “Funnily enough, no, I’ve been too busy being a human fucking colander!”

Willam smiled at Sharon knowingly. “I’ve got someone in mind. She’s young, and a bit fucking useless at the moment, but we could train her up. She’s got potential.”

“Well, that seems sorted,” Bianca shrugged. “Right, I’m going to have to make tracks. Flying visit. One of Trinity Taylor’s one night stands has gone to Closer magazine and we can’t risk that getting into the press. But take care, okay?”

Sharon waved a hand. “Thank you, Bianca.”

“No problem. See you later. Willam, can I borrow you for a second?”

Willam’s heart sank as she followed Bianca out of the room. She knew that Bianca was going to ask her if she had anything on Phi Phi. She knew that the photos were still in her phone, burning a hole in her pocket. She knew that Courtney didn’t want her to take the job at Number 10. She knew that her and Courtney weren’t at all official yet.

What she didn’t know was what she was going to do.

They stood at the side of the corridor beside the glass outside Sharon’s room, doctors and nurses hurrying past and completely oblivious to Willam about to make one of the biggest decisions of her life.

“So,” Bianca opened. “If you’ve got anything for me, now is the time to say, because the right-wing media are starting to lap up Phi Phi’s bullshit pretty fucking quickly. It would take a lot of the heat off Sharon if we could just…bury her.”

Willam felt pained. She had completely forgotten about the implications this would have for Sharon.

“So anything at all would be a saving grace,” Bianca finished, looking Willam in the eye and almost triggering a fight or flight response in her.

What would Courtney want her to do? What would Bianca want her to do?

What would Sharon want her to do?

“Um,” Willam swallowed. Her throat was completely dry. “You know, it’s been a rough 24 hours…I haven’t really managed to find anything.” Bianca looked visibly disappointed. “Sorry, Bianca.”

The other woman nodded understandingly. “That’s okay. It has been a rough time. Thank you for looking after her, Willam.”

Willam gave a small smile and without knowing what possessed her, she was speaking again. “Also, Bianca…take me out of the running for the Number 10 job.”

This was the first time Willam had ever seen Bianca look legitimately shocked in her life. Bianca always knew what was going on, she was always so plugged in and in the loop, there was so rarely anything that she didn’t know. So this information was clearly a bombshell. “I mean. I can, but I would also be asking why in the fuck would you want me to do that?”

Willam sighed. “I’m still young. There’ll be other chances to work there and besides, there’s other stuff I want to focus on right now. There’s more to life than politics, I guess.”

Bianca gave a harsh laugh. “Life is politics, Willam.”

“Your life, maybe.”

“Yeah, well,” Bianca exhaled. She had a faraway look in her eyes. “I suppose you’re right about that.”

Willam suddenly heard Courtney laugh through the glass and she involuntarily smiled. She looked back at Bianca, who was looking through the glass.

“Is this because of her?”

Willam looked back at the glass, then cocked her head. “Sort of. It’s for me first, and her second. People spend so much of their lives wishing for better, focusing so much on the future or on the past. Like…what’s wrong with what we have now? You know? Appreciate what you’ve got. Change is good. Except if it’s not. I don’t know, fuck, I’m so tired.”

Bianca nodded slowly, a tiny frown still present on her face. “You’re sure this is what you want?”

“Honestly, no,” Willam laughed. “But I’m sure I want things to stay as they are, for now. There’s going to be so much change in Dosac. It would be nice for me to stay a constant.”

Bianca gave a small sigh. “Well, I won’t say I’m not disappointed. But good for you, Willam.”

Willam shifted her weight from one foot to the other. “I’ll see you, Bianca.”

“See you, Willam.”

As Bianca walked away, Willam thought it was the first time she’d ever seen her look genuinely gutted. It made her feel slightly proud of herself, though she had no idea why. Watching her until she was out of sight, Willam turned back and went back into Sharon’s room.

“Back,” she said. Sharon looked up at her, puzzled.

“What was that all about?” she frowned.

“Wanted to know if I had anything we could use on Phi Phi.”

“And did you?”

Willam looked at Courtney, who seemed frozen. She paused. “No. No, of course I didn’t. Been too busy making sure your dumb fucking roadkill ass is okay, haven’t I?”

As Sharon and Alaska laughed, Willam watched as Courtney’s face lit up. She crossed the room and wrapped her arms around Willam in a hug. She didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to.

“Willam, I’ve been meaning to say. Thank you. For phoning the ambulance,” Sharon said, suddenly serious. Her voice was quiet and her face grave.

Willam reached out and touched her leg lightly. “That’s what best friends do.”

Sharon smiled in gratitude, then gave a yawn. “Sorry to be boring, but I think I need to sleep again.”

“Well, we’ll leave,” Courtney smiled, her voice gentle. “I kind of want to go for a walk round the park. It’s such a nice day. You fancy joining us, Lask?”

Willam barely had time to bask in the use of “us” before Alaska rolled her eyes.

“What part of I’m-not-leaving-Sharon’s-side do you not understand? Go,” she smirked, looking at Willam and Courtney hand in hand. “Be cute and gross.”

Willam smiled at Courtney sheepishly, and Courtney smiled back. She turned back to the other couple in the room. “We’ll be back around dinnertime. Want us to bring you anything?”

“Ugh, a Wasabi please. Lunch was mush, with mashed mush, on a bed of mush. It’s enough to turn me vegetarian,” Sharon shook her head before laying down on her pillow and closing her eyes. “Thanks for coming in. See you later, guys.”

“See you both,” Courtney smied, waving at Alaska as she opened the door and Willam following behind her. Once they were out the room, they had taken a few steps down the corridor before Courtney spoke again. “I’m proud of you.”

“Thanks,” Willam said as she pressed the button for the lift. She wondered if she should say any more, but thanks was enough, and she decided to leave it. “So. Park then home, then back to see Sharon?”

“Home,” Courtney gave a little smile as she looked at Willam. “Home sounds nice.”

And as the lift doors closed leaving them both sealed up together going down towards the bright Spring day outside, Willam had to agree.

***

Willam woke up in the same bed she’d woken up in in December, and in April, with the same girl she’d woken up with in December and April. Except the circumstances weren’t quite the same. Firstly, Courtney was out of bed before her, and Willam could hear her battering and clanging around in their kitchen together (their kitchen, Willam thought fondly to herself, it would never get old to say their like that). Second, Willam didn’t have any inner turmoil or panicked thoughts or insecurities running around her mind. She was peaceful and calm, and life was good. Sure, Sharon had a fucker of a TV debate coming up the next day, and Willam was afraid that her ribs might re-break at the sheer force with which she was going to shout at Phi Phi O’Hara, but apart from that everything was all just fine. She hadn’t felt this calm in forever. In fact, no, that was a lie. She’d woken up feeling this calm every single day for the past two months since the day she and Courtney walked out of that lift together. Sure, there were one or two blips- the day she’d asked Courtney to be her girlfriend she had woken up completely convinced she was having a heart attack- but that aside, she’d never felt this content.

“Bill!” came a voice from the kitchen. “Put it on!”

Willam sat up, groaned, and rubbed her eyes sleepily. “What channel?”

A frustrated sigh. “It’s Sunday fucking Politics, you know what channel!!”

Laughing, Willam fumbled for the remote on her bedside table, in danger of knocking over many half-empty cups of coffee, and switched the TV on. She hadn’t needed to find the channel as the TV immediately showed her what they were both looking for- Alaska Thunder, MP for West Central London, the first MP to take the seat from Phi Phi O’Hara’s party in 12 years, in her biggest TV interview so far.

“Court, it’s started!” Willam shouted through, hearing a thunder of footsteps in response. Soon enough her girlfriend, her beautiful, tiny, blonde koala girlfriend, emerged from the hallway in her huge flannel Snoopy pyjamas holding two cups of coffee.

“Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit,” she was saying, reaching over and almost spilling half the coffee on the bright white bedsheets as she half-handed, half-threw it to Willam. “I said to you it bloody started at 5 past 10, and you took the piss out of me!”

“No I fucking didn’t!” Willam cried incredulously, laughing.

“Yes you so did! Meh Courtney, why would a programme start at five past ten that’s such an awkward time, meh meh meh why do you think it’s going to start then, is it because of the time delay? Is it because you’re Australian? Mehhh,” Courtney imitated Willam. Willam went to retort but was immediately shushed by her girlfriend.

“Shut up! I don’t want to miss any more.”

Raja Gemini was asking Alaska a question, and she had her don’t-fuck-with-me face on. “Alaska Thunder, what I’d most like to know is- why were you so strongly in favour of the incarceration of young offenders until last week, when your fiancé Sharon Needles came out in support of rehabilitation? Is this what we can expect from you as an MP, to simply agree with everything your fiancé says?”

“That bitch.”

“Shut up!”

Alaska’s face was calm and amused. “No not at all, Raja, see my change of heart was based on a consultation I had with the Minister for Justice Sasha Coulee-Velour, where she actually presented me with lots of facts and figures as to why rehabilitation produces better results and contributes to a reduction of repeat offenders in society. I then conducted a focus group who pretty much agreed with the Minister, so I have decided to back what is clearly the more well-researched opinion.”

“But isn’t it true that Sharon Needles has held no such focus groups and has point-blank refused to listen to any opposing opinion on the other side? How must that translate to the public?”

Alaska smirked and narrowed her eyes. “I don’t know, Raja. If you wanted to ask that question you should have invited her onto your show. You asked for me, you’ve got me, and now you’re asking me about my fiancé? Is this Hello magazine or Sunday Politics?”

Courtney threw her hands up in the air and cheered. “Finish her, Lask!”

Just then, Willam’s phone buzzed. It was a message from Sharon. Willam knew she had taken the morning off to go into the studio and watch Alaska do the interview and was probably hiding behind the cameramen as Alaska and Raja spoke.

S: i say, that’s my baby and i’m really proud

Willam snorted, holding her phone up to show Courtney who laughed in response.

“Fucking hell, who keeps introducing her to memes?” she sighed, pouting as she looked to the TV and saw the interview was coming to a close. “Oh fuck, we missed pretty much the whole thing!”

Willam pulled her into a hug. “Doesn’t matter. We saw the best bit. There’ll be more interviews where that came from. I think Alaska’s making quite the splash.”

“I wouldn’t expect anything less,” Courtney smiled, sipping her coffee then sliding off the bed. “What’s our plan for today? We’re meeting Katya and Trixie for lunch, then Adore’s joining for drinks. She said she might bring her girlfriend along!”

“Oh, Aja?” Willam asked, scrolling her phone lazily. “That’s good, she seems nice.”

“Well, I’m going to shower if you need in before me?” Courtney offered, unhooking her towel from the back of their bedroom door.

“Nah, no need. I always just piss in your charcoal water. You’d never taste the difference,” Willam deadpanned, smiling as she watched Courtney laugh and throw a makeup sponge at her from the door.

Courtney was so beautiful, even in her old pyjamas and with her hair hanging messily over her shoulders. Her smile did something to Willam, something she’d never felt before and never wanted to stop feeling ever again. What was the something? Suddenly, it was as if Willam had been struck by a lightning bolt. She knew, but she couldn’t possibly tell her. Not today and not now. It was far too soon, surely?

Then a little voice in her head whispered to her. No more games.

Willam’s voice stopped her just as she was about to leave the room.

“Hey, Courtney?”

#just the game we're in #ortega #australia #crossover #witney #shalaska #twmentionsofinjury #willam belli #courtney act #sharon needles #alaska thunderfuck #bianca del rio #rpdr fanfiction #jtgwi

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thinkanamelater · 6 years

Text

Your Mother Should Know (MP100 fanfiction)

Serizawa visits his mom for the first time in many years, Reigen is there to support him, and they find more than they ever expected

Trans character, mention of deadnames

Also on AO3!

“Again, thanks for driving me”

“Don’t mention it” Reigen looked briefly at Serizawa at the seat next to him, deciding not to bring up how they had the exact exchange at least 5 times, all during a roughly 20 minutes’ drive; and parked the car in front of the house Serizawa pointed. “You sure you want me to come with? I can wait here, no problem” A part of him really wanted Serizawa to tell him to wait in the car.

The car ride already felt too… intimate, for him. It was hard to function around Serizawa when his professional role as a boss was clear, when they wore suits and ties; now, in jeans and shirt, when he was just a guy helping out his friend who was meeting with his mother after years… It was so much, it made him dizzy.

He’d do anything for Serizawa, he suspected, but he had no clue how to manage all the trust the other placed on him. If he could have a moment for himself, not having to worry about how weird he acted and if he was being too obvious… well, that’d be just fine.

“Please, come” Was Serizawa’s answer instead, with his gaze was fixed on his own feet as his hand searched the handle of the door.

Solemnly, Reigen nodded.

“Sure, of course”

As soon as they left the car, the house’s door opened and a woman stepped outside: an apron over his clothes, curly black hair tied back, and the warmest smile Reigen had ever seen. Serizawa’s mom, no doubt.

“Katsuya, my boy! Oh, sweetie…” The woman wasted no time in approaching them and engulfed Serizawa’s middle with her arms, burrowing her face against his chest. “My handsome boy…” She continued to mutter as Serizawa returned the hug; awkwardly, but not any less warm because of that.

Reigen turned his face, to give them privacy, but also to give privacy to himself, as he didn’t want them to see the tears that threatened to leave his eyes. He just couldn’t help picturing his own mom calling him “my handsome boy” as well…

“Oh, and you brought Arataka!”

He spun on his heels as soon as he heard it, his perfectly rehearsed smile successfully concealing the confusion of having his name called with such familiarity.

“Mrs. Serizawa, it’s my pleasure to-“

His polite greeting and professional extended hand were promptly ignored, as he was pulled into a hug as well.

“Ah, no, none of that “Mrs.” thing! Just call me Keiko, dear! Oh my, haven’t you grown into a fine looking man yourself?”

Now the confusion made its way into Reigen’s face, and Serizawa noticed it quickly.

“Uh, mom?” He caught her attention and she released Reigen, turning to her son with a wide smile. "“So, uh-“ Serizawa cleared his voice “This is- uh, Reigen… my boss…”

So his plan was to absolutely ignore whatever just happened, huh, Reigen mentally commented to himself, and resumed his previously frustrated handshake. This time, Mrs. Serizawa – Keiko - took his hand with a glint of amusement on her eyes.

“Boss, eh?” She repeated, and her face lit up “So you’re in charge of Katsuya’s office! Oh, to think you’d turn into a successful business man!”

“Um, what do you-“

“Ah, I left the oven on!” Keiko raised her hands to her face in alarm, and turned brusquely. “Good thing I made enough to share with Arataka- let’s hope he still likes my cooking!” Was the last thing she said before stepping into the side, leaving two baffled men at the porch.

“Is she alright?” Reigen had to ask, completely dumbfounded. Why did she keep talking like… she knew him somehow?

Serizawa stared for a few seconds, enough to convince Reigen he had overstepped, and then shrugged and mouthed a weak “I don’t know?”

“I-I mean, she’s uh, she’s very kind!” Reigen tried to backpedal “Very warm… I uh, I definitely can see where you got that from! Haha…” He threw in a forced laugh to hopefully distract the other from his reddening checks. God, he felt so silly, getting like this by just paying Serizawa a little harmless compliment…

“You really think so?”

“Huh?”

“A-ah, I mean, if you… really think I’m… warm…” Serizawa blushed up to his ears, and he couldn’t decide between looking right into Reigen’s eyes, and everywhere but Reigen.

“I-I do. You are. Uh. Warm” Reigen mumbled like hypnotized when Serizawa’s gaze finally settled on him. “A-and kind, too…” He coughed “… anyway, your mom is waiting”

“Oh! Right…” Serizawa took a quick hold of Reigen’s hand, squeezing it before letting it go. “Thank you”

With that, he walked into the home and, at loss of words, Reigen followed him.

Once inside, the inescapable smell of homemade cookies dragged them into the kitchen, where Keiko was bringing another teacup to the table.

“Ah, boys, come take a seat!” She called, and only Reigen did that. Instead, Serizawa subtly approached the oven, reaching out to the baking sheet on top of it, full of recently made cookies; as he was going to get his prize, his hand was smacked away.

“Don’t be naughty, Katsuya” His mom chided him, and Serizawa laughed.

“Sorry, mom, I couldn’t help! They smell so good!”

“Yeah, yeah, you’re just trying to get away with it” Keiko tugged lightly at his hair and smiled “And now for that, you’ll have to wait until Arataka eats to have a cookie. Now go sit down”

This time Serizawa did that, shooting a shy smile to Reigen, who was observing the whole situation in amusement.

True to her words, Keiko brought Reigen a plate full of cookies, watching him with a smile.

“Enjoy them! Ah, this really brings back memories, don’t you think?”

Reigen stopped in the middle of eating, confused again.

“I’m sorry, I don’t really…?”

“You used to come home all the time! Obviously not here, we moved to this house right before Katsuya…” She made an almost imperceptible pause, during which Serizawa went tense “… turned 12” Her mom finished and he visibly relaxed.

Puzzled, Reigen glanced at Serizawa. He attempted to tweak his features into those of a 10 year old boy, attempting to come up with a familiar face, with no success.

He tried once more, this time focusing harder into the man’s face, but soon that proved to be useless as well – mostly because he got too entranced by the strong jawline, the hint of stubble, the tug on his lips as they stretched to call his name…

“Reigen” Serizawa called again, and Reigen went back to reality.

“What?” He blurted out, agitated.

“How much sugar would you like?” Serizawa pointed to the cup of tea already served in front of him. Oh god, he had been staring. And not only Serizawa definitely noticed, but his mom as well. Thankfully, none of them commented on it.

Eventually they got all settled up at the table, and Keiko started asking her son questions about his daily life. Reigen knew they had been talking over the phone a few times; still, Serizawa went into a detailed description of his work and school schedules. Before he finished, his mom gasped and stood up brusquely.

“I had pictures of you guys! Somewhere…” She said, and Reigen looked at her in wonder “Now, where did I put them…”

“Mom. It’s ok” Serizawa sounded strained when he gestured for her to sit down again.

“But you we’re so adorable! Alright, alright, I’ll just search for them later. Oh, remember that one time, as we were preparing your birthday?”

Serizawa pretended to be busy sipping at his tea to avoid answering, but it was clear by the way his cheeks furiously blushed that he did remember that particular event.

“You were so happy because we were throwing you a “boy’s party”, with your robots stuff and all” Serizawa’s mom’s voice wavered slightly, but her smile only grew bigger.

“I remember. It was a nice party” Serizawa said sharply through gritted teeth, and for a moment Reigen mistook his attitude for anger.

“And you were all like “Now that I’m a boy, I can marry Akane-chan, right, mom?””

It was as if all the oxygen was punched out of Reigen’s lungs. It had been so long since he heard that name… He barely registered Keiko was still talking.

“I had to remind you it was Arataka and not Akane at that time, but you didn’t I guess you weren’t paying much attention – with all the emotion of your birthday, and your new name, and we were about to move as well… maybe I should have given you more attention, too…”

Her voice drowned down and, for a moment, the three of them went silent.

Reigen looked at Serizawa in disbelief, but this new information completed the puzzle. Seeing the man hunched over his cup, with his gaze fixed on what was left of his tea and tears twinkling in his eyes, he easily remembered her.

His childhood friend, the funny, intelligent, kind Katsumi who always made up games for the both of them to play, and scolded him when he didn’t want to do his homework. Katsumi was also the first person he came out to, and the memory of her going absolutely ecstatic as he told her that he didn’t care what his mom said, he was a boy and nothing else, always filled him with warmth.

He had wondered so, so many times what have been of her, in all the time he had lost contact… to think the answer was much closer than he ever thought…

“I’m so happy you found each other once more” Keiko added in a weak whisper, and excused herself out of the room.

Reigen and Serizawa immediately searched for each other’s eyes, without speaking a word. It was a lot to take, and they’d probably have to talk about it, sooner or later, but for now they just needed to make sure the other was there.

A couple of minutes later, Keiko was back with a new batch of cookies, and a renewed smile.

From that point, the rest of the evening was a blur for Reigen. He had another tea, ate cookie after cookie only to have something to do with his hands; and just watched in silence at the other two as they exchanged daily anecdotes and recipes, as Serizawa helped his mom with her smartphone and with some heavy boxes, and then as they sat down to talk a bit more.

Eventually Serizawa stood up and said, “Well, mom, maybe you can visit me next time!”, and Reigen took that as his cue to stand up and say goodbye.

The ride back was done in silence, each of them too busy incorporating what they just learnt to talk to each other. Once Reigen parked in front of Serizawa’s place, Serizawa started fidgeting with his hands.

“Hey, uh…” He took a deep breath “Would you like to, uh, hang for a bit longer? Maybe you can stay for tea, o-or…”

“I can’t drink any more tea, Serizawa.” Reigen sighed “I couldn’t stomach it.”

“O-oh, right, then what about-“

“Nothing to do with food. Please.”

Serizawa went silent and stared at his thumbs; and Reigen wondered, not for the first time that day, if he hadn’t spoken out of place. But he had no words to apologize, his brain feeling like it had been deep-fried.

“Reigen” Serizawa called softly and he turned to him, who continued with a too quiet “I’m sorry”

Reigen didn’t have the chance to wonder what exactly he was sorry for, as Serizawa was very quickly, very much in his personal space, taking advantage of his turned head to plant a firm kiss on his surprised face.

He missed his lips by millimeters only.

“Well. That did not work out like I expected” Serizawa had the guts to admit, even when his face had achieved a more intense red color than it had on the entire day. “If you excuse me, I’ll leave the car now and run to my apartment so I can yell at myself”

Reigen found this calmness extremely hilarious, but he couldn’t for the love of god let out any kind of laughter. Instead he stared incredulously at Serizawa, his own face burning hot, unable to make any move as the other man found the door handle.

“Wait!” He finally said, at the same time Serizawa opened the door and was stepping outside. “Wait” He repeated and Serizawa sat back again, tentatively closing the door, and looked at him with embarrassment. “Were you- was it- Did you tried to kiss me since- because of- to make up for the things we learnt today?” Reigen asked once he finished stumbling over his own words.

Fervently, Serizawa shook his head.

“No!” Was his resolute answer, though he still appeared sheepish “I… was already planning to confess to you today… since a few weeks…”

“Well why didn’t you?” Reigen found himself blurting the question, genuinely curious.

“I tried, alright! I tried! I just thought the car was not the best place, so I tried to invite you over, but you didn’t want to so I panicked and-“

Reigen’s loud snort made Serizawa cut his rant, confused at first, but in no time both of them were laughing uncontrollably at themselves.

“Alright, alright.” Reigen conceded when he managed to stop laughing “I’ll stay, you handsome mommy’s boy” He mocked.

“If you insist, you successful business man” Serizawa teased back, and they left the car.

“Hey, Mob. What do you got there?”

Reigen had returned from the street and was curiously watching at Mob, standing in the middle of the office with a paper on his hands.

“Huh? I don’t know, it fell from your desk, Master.” Mob turned the piece of paper around to show him “Who are these kids?”

He was holding a slightly unfocused photograph of two smiling kids mid-hug, not looking at the camera.

“Hm? That’s-” Reigen blinked through the tears that were welling up in his eyes. He had never seen that picture before, but he didn’t hesitate to answer. “That’s… me.” He pointed to the child with blond hair in a polka dot dress “And uh” He made a pause to look at the other kid – a radiant smile being the only thing visible through the dark mess of curly hair -, and to let a few tears to fall as well. “That’s Serizawa. I know! It’s hard to believe, huh? I mean, he looks way older than me! But even he was a child one time, just like all of us! So uh- Oh hey, Serizawa, speaking of the devil!”

Reigen was already sweating when Serizawa walked in, scrutinizing everything with a frown on his face.

“Oh” Serizawa approached Reigen “ H-hey, Arataka, I was searching…” He continued to look around, absentmindedly holding Reigen’s waist with an arm “My mom did find the picture after all, and she sent it to me but I can’t remember where it- O-oh, Shigeo’s right here…” He noted, embarrassed, and let Reigen’s waist go.

Mob, however, was not looking at them – not directly. Facing their direction, he had the picture raised over his eyes’ level, and a shining smile that grew bigger as he slowly lowered the photo.

“Master and Serizawa look as happy right now as they did on this picture” Was his final sentence before handing the picture and turning to do something else, unbothered by the happy-crying mess he had made out of his master.

#mob psycho 100 #serizawa katsuya #reigen arataka #serirei #trans character #fanfiction tag

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jeonsdear · 6 years

Text

It’s you - (IX)

↬ Parts: I , II, III, IV, V , VI, VII, VIII, X, XI

↬ Pairing: Jeon Jungkook x Reader (oc: female)

↬ Genre: college!au, noona!reader, soulmate!au, fluff, angst, smut

↬ Rating: sfw

↬ Warnings: salvia (lol)

↬ Accompanying song: HENRY 헨리 ‘It’s You’ (Live Ver.) (check out the spotify version too!)

↬ Chapter Summary:

Jungkook couldn’t help but to throw his friends a panicked look and his panic only grew as Yoongi’s face was plastered by a shit-eating grin.

“Y/n! We were just about to play a game in one of the rooms back there. Grab some bottles of beer, will you?“

↬ Notes: Hey! Here’s the 9h part. Hope you enjoy, loves. Also, have you seen the fake love comback stages? I’m shook. Goodbye wow. Also do the roman numbers confuse you or is it okay? ♡ And please let me know what you think, that’s a great motivation for writing - and I love talking to you. Likes and especially reblogs are always appreciated ♡ — Read this part on AO3 if that’s easier for you — English isn’t my first language so excuse any mistakes — I track jeonsdear fanfiction (follow the tag for updates)

↬ Word Count: 3.0 K

When you are not fed love on a silver spoon you learn to lick it off knives.

Starting your senior year at college you promised yourself to make the most of it. But after watching your best friend taking her boyfriend Jungkook for granted and your own soulmate drowning in despair, you find yourself caught in a web of lies and heartbreak. How can you believe in love when the one destined for you doesn’t want you?

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You could feel Jungkook’s glare from across the room. The tall boy leaning against the dark walls of Professor Lee’s office seemed to try burning holes into the side of your head. But you ignored his irritated huffs and instead focused on the insane plan Mr. Lee so enthusiastically rambled on about.

“You are going to dress up nicely. Mingle with the people and Mr. Jeon should use his charms for future connections. Miss y/s/n, you are a senior, everybody is going to expect you to set your foot properly into politics about now anyway.“

“And what about my charm?“

“What charm?“, piped up the annoyed voice from across the room. Your eyes shot daggers at Junkook, already deciding you wouldn’t share your favourite blanket with him tonight.

“Use your charm as well, Miss.“

“With all due respect, Professor. I don’t see how this is going to get us any kind of information about a possible soulmate archive.“

Ever since you had agreed to the old man’s plan, you knew why you were doing it. Essentially to protect Jungkook from his own stupidity. You still thought sneaking your way into politics would be no use.

“And I don’t understand why you involved Y/n in this, Professor.“

Mr. Lee let heaved a long sigh and rubbed the bridge of his nose that was decorated with the imprints of his round glasses.

“Because Miss y/s/n is a well-known figure in local politics already. “

“Don’t you think I should be involved when you decide to find out my soulmate’s identity?“

Crossing your arms over your chest you turned your body to Jungkook as he took two steps towards you.

“Besides, who gave you the right to dig into my business?“

Jungkook quite audibly growled at you and a guarded expression took over his face.

“The right of being your best friend. I have to live with your sorry ass every day. And just because you are not questioning the system doesn’t mean I don’t. “

“I didn’t force you to live with my sorry ass. You can move out anytime.“

Jungkook had the audacity to roll his eyes at you before he turned towards the old man who had watched the scene with interest while taking notes.

“She doesn’t even want to find out the truth. I’m sure we can find someone else with…connections.“

You stretched your arm to pinch the skin around his elbow.

“And who is supposed to protect you? You’re most likely going to get yourself evicted because of sticking your stupidly cute nose in business people get killed for.“

You didn’t expect his deep belly laugh and even Mr. Lee had his eyebrows raised at his student when he doubled over from laughing.

“Protecting me? You're a girl.“

The old man shot you an excusing look but you had had enough. You didn’t even fully understand his anger, but arguing with a sexist phrase wasn’t something you were willing to accept.

“Well, this girl is going to make sure you’re not drowning in an unfamiliar environment, and this girl is sleeping on the couch tonight.“

You grabbed the bag hanging over the rest of a very old velvety chair and threw it over your shoulder.

“I have a 5 thousand words essay to write, goodbye Professor Lee.“

The man only held up one of his hands and watched you storm out of his office.

The stupidity of men was visible in every generation, he mused as he watched his male student huff in annoyance.

At first he had tried to keep it a secret from Jungkook. The reason why he had brought you into the team at first didn’t seem too important and easy to disguise. But somewhere along the lines he had realized that his explanation of your presence had too many loopholes. So fearing his true attention with this project might be discovered, ruining all the work he had done so far, he had stuck with the surface truth of his motivations to bring you into the team.

And really, observing the two young people in a natural environment had proven to be extremely beneficial.

So with a small smile he stood up from the chair that was about to wreck his bad back forever, and motioned for Jungkook to leave.

“I know you have an evening class, Jungkook. You should go before you’re too late.“

And with a small bow Jungkook left.

It was quarter past 1 in the morning when you realized that you didn’t have to sleep on the sofa because Jungkook still hadn’t come home.

While a defeated sigh you shut off your laptop and rubbed your temples. You hadn’t meant what you said about sleeping on the sofa. Not only because you hadn’t had nightmares since sharing a bed with Jungkook, but because you adored falling asleep next to him. It just felt right. And you tried not to dwell on that too much.

But there was still Yeonseo, and as you stood up from the spot on the floor you had sat on you realized that that was where he probably was staying for the night.

You knew the coil in your stomach was jealousy. Not exclusively jealousy, but you had developed a certain kind of possessiveness towards your best friend. You had grown so close that it was only naturally to fear his loss. And that was the threat his girlfriend embodied.

At least that was what you’ve been telling yourself.

Without thinking about it, you picked up your phone to check whether you had any messages from him.

You didn’t.

For a hot second you thought about calling him but you growled in frustration at your hideousness. You had no right to demand him to be home and you sure as well weren’t a baby who needed their stuffed animal to sleep.

Despite your affirmations you didn’t sleep that night.

Over the course of the next week a new kind of tension found its peak between you two.

Jungkook’s grunts filled the gym as he worked his already sore back muscles. But the burn in his muscles overshadowed the burn in his heart and the irritation coursing through his veins. Apparently his soulmate was in a similar mood to him, making the fire inside him ten times worse.

So he tried working it out. With heavy weights and sweat coating his entire body. A few days ago he had tried letting some steam off through rough sex, but somehow it had left him even more aggravated.

He was pissed at himself and he didn’t even know why. But he can’t get the hurt in your eyes out of his head when he came home in the morning after a night at his girlfriend’s.

God, he felt dirty. Dirty and frustrated.

So when his hyung’s had suggested going to that terrible frat party, he had jumped on the chance to get you off his mind.

He realized that that was a hopeless wish when he walked into the crowed livingroom full of drunk college students just to spy you sitting on his classmate's lap.

What the hell.

You were dressed in a short skirt paired with knee-high boots and a red blouse. You looked absolutely gorgeous, but that didn’t make that boy’s hands on your thigh acceptable.

Jimin followed Jungkook’s eyes and he grabbed his sleeve to keep him from storming away.

“Don’t.“

“Let go of me, Hyung.“

“So you can rip her off that dude’s lap? She’s been looking at you with daggers in her eyes the whole week. She’s going to kill you. What the hell have you done?“

Jungkook growled and ripped his arm from his friend’s hold.

“Nothing.“

He felt Yoongi’s hand on his shoulder and his deep voice filled his ear when he moved his head closer to his.

“You two have been dancing around each other for weeks now. Fuck it out.“

“Yoongi!“

Taehyung sounded absolutely horrified and Jungkook was sure his face showcased the same emotion.

“He isn’t wrong.“, Jimin chuckled as he shrugged his shoulders and caught your eyes from across the room. A smirk played on his lips as he watched you making your way towards him and his friends. Jungkook, oblivious to your approach, rolled his eyes and huffed.

“Don’t even dare think this, Yoongi.“

“Think what?“, your sweet voice peeped up and the boys all turned around.

Jungkook couldn’t help but to throw his friends a panicked look and his panic only grew as Yoongi’s face was plastered by a shit-eating grin.

“Y/n! We were just about to play a game in one of the rooms back there. Grab some bottles of beer, will you?“

You raised your eyebrows at the older boy before throwing Jungkook a questioning look when you saw him squirm.

“Uhm Hyung, what game?“

“The kissing game. Collect some of your friends as well.“

It was almost comically how both your’s and Jungkook’s eyes simultaneously widened in presentiment and Jimin had to keep from laughing when his friend’s hand automatically found yours and suddenly all the anger between you two was forgotten when your eyes met in mutual understanding.

Yoongi apparently picked up on his friend’s intentions as well and before anyone could run away he had you both pushing towards the room he had been talking about earlier.

You struggled against his hold but it was no use – 7 minutes later you were sat in a circle on the floor with Jungkook’s friend and some of yours. The girls were buzzing in the prospect of getting to kiss the boys and especially your friend Sunghee couldn’t keep her eyes off Seokjin. You watched as he winked at her and almost scoffed as she turned bright red. You elbowed him into the side before throwing him a warning glance, but he only smirked.

Jungkook sat across from you and you could feel his eyes on you. You knew exactly how this would end and so did he. So why were his eyes glistening with anticipation?

“What game exactly are we playing?“, one of the girls piped up while handing around the bottles of beer. You wrapped your fingers around the cold beverage but otherwise didn’t bother to open it.

“Too hot.“, Yoongi said. “Do you all know the rules?“

He was met with collective head shaking so he started to explain: “We will let a bottle decide the couples. This couple has to kiss without stopping or touching each other. The one who touches the other first, loses. The winner?“, he smirked before continuing, “gets to do whatever he wants to the loser and get’s to exit the game. If not, the winner gets to play against the other winners. Resulting in one person winning.“

Yoongi made sure everyone understood the rules before he chuckled mischievously and added “Make it as steamy as possible. This is about being the best kisser in this group.“

“Fuck, I hope I get Jungkook. I’ve heard he’s fun to kiss.“, a girl whispered and another one giggled.

“I might lose willingly if that means I can touch those abs.“

Your low growl shut them up and you were busy killing Yoongi in your imagination. You were positive you were about to win this game, knowing there wasn’t a single guy you’d really enjoy kissing beside Jungkook. And the universe couldn’t possibly be that cruel, right?

But then again, one of these girls would get to kiss him and the thought alone made you angry.

“But some of us aren’t single.“, you randomly threw into the conversation and all eyes laid on you as you were being a party bummer.

“She won’t mind.“, Jungkook’s voice cut in and his eyes were challenging when you frowned at him.

You really, really didn’t want him kissing anyone but you.

“Alright then let’s get started!“

Yoongi laid a bottle in the circle and looked up. “Let’s see who the first players are.“

The bottle took four spins to land on you.

Your eyes were trained on the spinning bottle and the only noise came from Jimin who was distinctively murmuring Jungkook’s name. In the corner of your eyes you saw Yoongi leaning forward in anticipation and suddenly the room erupted in yells and laughter.

The universe, in fact, was cruel.

You didn’t even have to look up to know the bottle had landed on Jungkook but when you did, his eyes were widened in shock. Yoongi silenced the room as he smirked at you two before motioning to get it on.

“Are you gonna go through with it, Jungkookie?“

Taehyung’s words ripped him out of his thoughts and a certain kind of want took over his mind and body. Here was the truth: He wanted to kiss you. God, he had been dreaming about it for a while now. But when would he ever be able to get a taste without any consequences? This game was perfect to explore forbidden waters and he was planning on winning this one. He was damned if he didn’t manage to make you want him for once. But when he searched your eyes in consent he noticed the longing in them and his eyes dropped down to where you bit your lip.

“If y/n is okay with it.“, he said with a voice dropping lower in excitement.

You only nodded slowly before clearing your throat and sitting up upright, faking confidence.

“Sure.“, you said nonchalantly, but your emotions were running havoc. While you were dreading kissing Jungkook you were also longing to kiss him. And if his eyes were anything to go by, so did he.

You both looked around before shuffling towards each other while the others moved backwards to give you enough space.

You gulped as you felt Jungkook’s hand on your thighs pulling you closer to him, a light smile playing on his lips as he noticed how nervous you were. Then he placed his hands on either side of your legs, making sure he wasn’t touching you.

“Noona?“

He wet his lips with the tip of his tongue.

“Hm?“

“Have fun losing.“

The start of your protest was cut short when he moved his face close to yours and his dark doe eyes starred into yours. He was so close you could count his thick eyelashes and his breath fanned over your slightly opened lips. You gulped as Jungkook’s eyes fluttered shut and then you felt his plush lips brush gently over your own. Your eyes closed at the unfamiliar contact and your whole body shivered at the softness of his lips as he increased the pressure.

Since there was no time limit, Jungkook made sure to savour the moment of feeling your lips against his for the very first time. And he loved it. He loved it way too much. Your shaky breath had him moving again, placing another soft kiss against the swell of your lips before catching your lower lip between his teeth and slightly pulling at it. Then he caressed the abused lip with his tongue and suddenly you sprung into action, biting his lip and whispering his name before forcing his lips apart with your tongue.

The low whine that filled the room was unmistakenly male and both of you tilted your heads to deepen the kiss. What had started off as a careful and testing kiss, turned into a passionate one as your tongues battled for dominance. Your hands twitched at your sides, longing to bury themselves into his soft hair, but you wanted him to lose. You wanted him to moan. Just once you wanted him to moan your name, and not Yeonseo’s.

So you let go of your reservation and you kissed him how you had wanted to for a very long time. It wasn’t just lust but affection. And you wanted to him to feel it. But somewhere in that was also anger and the whole irritation you both had felt for the last week.

Your breaths were ragged and uneven as Jungkook leaned even closer to you. He felt like his head was swimming, he wanted to swallow you, taste you, mould together. A mewl escaped you as you pulled at his bottom lip, struggling with keeping your hands to yourself and your body flooded with heat as you finally heard his high-pitched moan.

Jungkook felt way too hot in his skin and it bordered on torture keeping his hands to himself. He wanted them all over your body. In your hair, on your waist, everywhere.

“Oh fuck.“, he murmured in realization and somewhere someone in the room laughed amused at the pained exclamation.

He didn’t stop kissing you. Even during his breathy moans and whispers, your lips kept on moving together and he could have sworn his heart was about to burst with all these emotions. He felt overwhelmed as if he could feel your emotions as well. He imagined he could feel the goosebumps on your skin as he sucked your tongue into his mouth, taking over the kiss. He didn’t want to stop kissing you, oh no, but he wanted to take this to somewhere else. With fewer eyes prying on you two.

And he was determined to win.

So he put all the dominance he had in his bones into the kiss and could feel you melt into him. And suddenly he felt your fingers in his hair and your body pressed against his and he was about to laugh in triumph when he realized that his hands were already grabbing your waist.

Coming up for air, you two starred at each other, slowly blinking away the daze and realizing that the only one chuckling was Yoongi. Jungkook couldn’t tear his eyes away from yours and just in that moment he realized what you two were doing here. But he couldn’t find it in himself to care. Neither of you could blame alcohol for the want in your eyes and you knew it. This wasn’t solely physical either, Jungkook realized, as your fingers drifted from his hair sidewards to caress his cheeks. The grip on your waist tightened as he almost purred under your caress, eyes fluttering shut before they bore down into yours once again.

“I guess you both lost.“, Yoongi teased with amusement latched in his voice as the air was pregnant with astonishment.

“No, Hyung, I think both won.“

Complications.

You have won tons more of complications.

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