#like not long after my grandad passed we moved into a new flat and in a part of wall that got replastered his face dried into it

[elysiumcalled]

Would you find it weird & creepy or comforting if you knew the spirit of a loved one was still lingering and was doing stuff to make themselves known to you?

[writingithink]

Tangled Timelines Chapter 2 Rated: T Chapter Wordcount: 4,402 Chapter Summary: Visiting Jackie definitely doesn't go according to plan. Notes: I know it seems like I planned the update to be this way, but I really didn't.This fic is giving me grief, but I'm powering through, and for that you all should def give it up to @hey-there-juliet , my wonderful beta ♥

<-- Ch1

Ch3 -->

Read it on AO3

The landing was relatively smooth as they materialized in the middle of the playground next to the Estates. Rose grabbed her bag but then just stood there, staring blankly at the time rotor.

What if she hates me?

Her projected terror and anguish hit the Doctor with the pain of a physical blow. He raced around the console and pulled her into a hug that was probably a bit on the side of too tight in his attempt to hold her as close as possible. She dropped her things back onto the jumpseat before wrapping her arms around him and balling his coat in her fists.

“Rose, your mother will never hate you. If I know one thing for certain about Jackie Tyler, it’s that she loves you more than anything else in the Universe,” he informed her, willing his sincerity to find a way to make it through their connection, with the way his bondmate’s emotions were seemingly attempting to take it over.

“It’s just going to be so much for her to take in. How’s she supposed to deal with that?”

“I’m definitely not saying her initial reaction will be at all pleasant. I think it would do you some good, memorizing this face. Appreciate it. It’s a nice face, and who knows what I may end up with once she’s done with me? But that being said, overall I’m extremely confident that your mum will still know that you’re you, no matter what’s happened to your body.”

“I hope so,” his wife sighed, resting her head on his shoulder.

“I know so,” the Doctor whispered in her ear before pulling back slightly. “In fact, let’s just stay here for a bit. That way you don’t have to immediately get into everything, just enjoy spending time with your mum. Then after we tell her, we’ll stick around so that she has to get used to the idea. I mean, we have wedding things to do still, if that growing list on your nightstand is any indicator.” Plus, it will hopefully get me some points. While it seemed unlikely that he would get into Jackie’s good books anytime in the near future, he’d take anything that would swing things in his favor.

“That would be nice.” Rose finally managed a smile.

“Alright then, it’s settled. Now that we’re here, let’s just have tea and takeaway with your mum. We’ll watch some telly, figure out the whole of London’s business, and while she’s at it, she can explain to me exactly why she enjoys doing laundry so much.”

At that his wife laughed. The Doctor leaned down and kissed her, sending love and happiness across their bond and was inordinately pleased to have it returned. He did such a good job cheering her up, in fact, that he was now feeling quite good about this whole thing. Spending weeks at the Powell Estates wasn’t exactly what he’d prefer to be doing, but he’d managed it over Christmas and New Years, so he was confident that he would survive it again. All too soon Rose pulled away, once again grabbing her laundry and then quickly making her way to the door.

“C’mon, then. You’re gonna regret parkin’ all the way over here, if we’re staying for so long.”

“Nah, we’ll just move her later. Shove all the furniture in your old room out of the way so that she’ll fit,” he decided as he followed her out of the TARDIS.

Once Rose got her arms through the straps of the bag, he took her hand and they meandered through the playground.

“I have missed mum,” she said, taking in the bustle of life around them. “How long have we been gone? For her, I mean.”

“Oh, only about two weeks.”

“Really? Do you think she’s even gotten the postcard yet? How long do they usually take, it being international and all?”

“Should have gotten here by now. Can’t know for sure, though, too many unknown variables.”

“I bet you’re tryin’ to do the maths now,” she teased, swinging their arms back and forth as they got closer to Jackie’s flat. With their future discussion pushed back a bit, Rose was becoming more and more excited about this trip, and the Doctor could feel how much she had missed her mother. While it would only be two weeks for Jackie, it had been over a month for them.

“I’m doing all sorts of maths right now, so what if some of them happen to be related to customs services? Keeps me occupied.”

“If doing calculations and things could really keep you occupied, we’d do a lot less running for our lives,” his bondmate oh so helpfully pointed out.

The Doctor didn’t bother responding to this as they made their way up the stairs.

“Mum, it’s us! We’re back!” Rose called as she unlocked the door.

“Oh, I don’t know why you bother with that phone, you never use it!” Jackie exclaimed, quickly meeting them at the door.

“Aw, c’mere,” his wife smiled, opening her arms.

He squeezed past them both as they hugged and said their ‘I love yous’ in the tiny hallway, only to get dragged back by Jackie.

“Oh no, you don’t. Come here!” his mother-in-law said, pulling him into a sort-of hug that trapped both of his arms to his sides, for some reason finding it necessary to rock him back and forth. Rose had no pity, quickly getting out of their way.

You’re a bad wife, he mentally chastised as Jackie planted a much too wet kiss on his cheek.

All he got in return was a buzz of telepathic laughter.

“Hello, Jackie!” he squeaked. “How are things?”

“They’d be better if you managed to fly that spaceship of yours proper! It’s been three months! You said you two’d be back ages ago. I was starting to wonder if you’d be a year again!”

What?!

He winced at Rose’s telepathic shout. Really could have sworn he’d double checked the date.

“I’ll, er, check the TARDIS in a bit. Been awhile since I’ve done a full systems check. Lots of delicate machinery, you know. Speck of dust on the wrong circuit and then bam, end up in 1546 instead of 2546, and let me tell you they have two completely different dress codes,” he rambled as he finally escaped her grasp.

Is that really what you think, or is it something else? his wife asked over the bond. She was of the opinion that the TARDIS always had a reason for landing them somewhere they hadn’t intended on going.

“I get this postcard in the mail,” Jackie went on, “from bleedin’ Alaska, then nothin’. Phone goes straight to voicemail, you don’t answer any of my texts. Lucky the hall was booked so far in advance when you set the date. But now you’re back, that’s what matters, I know.”

Could go either way, he admitted. It is true that I’ve been doing a lot less maintenance than usual.

Her concern was quickly forgotten as she shrugged her rucksack off of her shoulders and refocused on her mum.

“Yeah, calls didn’t go through because the flight went wrong. Still, I’ve got loads of washing for ya,” she said, passing Jackie the bag and really, he couldn’t understand why her mother was smiling about being handed a bunch of laundry. 

The Doctor rolled his eyes and looked around for a moment before deciding that the stack of freshly opened mail on the table was probably the most interesting thing in the room (he was wrong - dead boring).

“And I got you this,” his wife continued, “it’s from the market on this asteroid bazaar. It’s made of, er, what’s it called?”

“Bazoolium,” he replied, speed reading through all the bills one more time and trying to make sense of exactly why it cost this much for all of these incredibly basic things. He couldn’t understand why neither Rose nor Jackie would let him upgrade the flat so that there would be no need to pay some company for electricity or gas or television. As someone who constantly complained about how expensive these things were, you’d think her mum would be all for him making some improvements. It was all a lost cause, though, so he switched to one of Jackie’s tabloids.

“Bazoolium,” Rose repeated. “When it gets cold, yeah, it means it’s going to rain. When it’s hot, it’s going to be sunny. You can use it to tell the weather!”

“I’ve got a surprise for you and all.”

“Oh, I get her bazoolium, she doesn’t even say thanks.”

He turned and gave his bondmate a smirk. While he had also been hoping that her mother would appreciate the present, the Doctor also wasn’t surprised. Jackie Tyler never did tend to act predictably. When they don’t come back with trinkets, she asks why they didn’t think of her when they were gallivanting around. They do, and she doesn’t have the attention span to appreciate it. Just their luck, really.

“Guess who’s coming to visit? You’re just in time. He’ll be here at ten past. Who do you think it is?”

“I don’t know.”

“Oh, go on. Guess.”

“No, I hate guessing. Just tell me.”

“It’s your granddad.”

The Doctor had been mostly focused on the gossip magazine (while mostly rubbish, they did have a knack for reporting on alien matters that the general public had been conditioned to not believe), but at this he snapped his head up. He’d never met a grandfather of Rose’s, and the alarm that shot through their bond had him very curious to learn why that was.

“Grandad Prentice,” Jackie continued. So, maternal grandfather then. “He’s on his way any minute. Right, cup of tea! I’ve told him all about the upcoming wedding, you know.” She disappeared into the kitchen, presumably to make tea. He was quick to drop the magazine and see what exactly had his wife so upset.

“She’s gone mad,” Rose told him in a low voice. How could this have happened?

“Tell me something new,” he quipped, trying to lighten the mood as images of an older gentlemen played through their connection.

“Grandad Prentice, that’s her dad,” she continued, “but he died, like, ten years ago.” Now she shared images of the funeral, open casket, no question as to whether the man they were burying was indeed Jackie’s father. “Oh my god, she’s lost it.” How can she have gone so crazy in so short a time?! I know that it’s been months instead of weeks, but she was fine when we left!

We’ll figure it out, he assured her as he followed her into the kitchen.

“Mum? What you just said about granddad …”

“Any second now,” Jackie told them, looking thrilled.

The Doctor took a deep breath and looked around, activating senses that he usually kept blocked off so as to avoid the constant distraction. Something was off, but it was just, just a tickle. He couldn’t possibly explain the slight deviation from normal, and knew without trying that the sonic wouldn’t be able to isolate it. The TARDIS might be able to, but still, he would probably need a better idea of what to have her look for. Narrow it down.

“But he passed away,” his bondmate calmly explained. “His heart gave out. Do you remember that?”

“Of course I do.” The manic gleam still hadn’t left her eyes, though.

Was it some sort of gas? Chemical? No, couldn’t be. He’d be able to taste it in the air. Telepathic influence? Unlikely, since there wasn’t anything brushing up against their barriers.

“Then how can he come back?”

“Why don’t you ask him yourself?” her mum countered as all of his hairs began to stand on edge. She checked her watch. “Ten past. Here he comes.”

Even before the spectral figure emerged right in Jackie’s kitchen, the Doctor’s mind was blaring a mauve alert, his time senses flailing, unable to compensate for whatever it was that had just appeared. The timelines of everyone at the Estates, of everyone in London, maybe even the whole of the United Kingdom for all he knew, tangled and cut off and back on again, on and off in an unsustainable state of temporal flux. All the while the spin of the Earth jolted slightly off kilter. This was bad bad bad bad bad.

“Here we are, then,” Jackie went on as if this was all completely normal. The Doctor’s eyes never left the ghostly figure and he knew that Rose was just as fixated. “Dad, say hello to Rose. Ain’t she grown?”

That is not your grandfather, he managed to project even as the rest of his brain was focused on trying to parse out what exactly could possibly be causing this.

Yeah, no, I know, came his bondmate’s panicked response as he grabbed her hand and pulled her out of the flat as quickly as he possibly could.

Every instinct the Doctor possessed was telling him to get away from the planet as quickly as he possibly could, but that wasn’t going to happen. Like countless times before, he was running toward the danger. Soon enough they were out of the building, finally pausing when they reached the narrow street between the different blocks of flats.

“They’re everywhere!” he exclaimed, baffled as everyone around them went on with their days as if nothing out of the ordinary was happening at all even as it seemed like every sense he possessed was screaming wrong wrong WRONG. And he knew that he was projecting it all through the bond, it would take immense concentration to stop it and he needed to focus all of his energy on figuring out what it was that was causing it, on parsing out exactly what his body was trying to tell him.

Time was in flux, but also tangling and breaking but coming back together. It was as if whatever this was truly wasn’t corporeal enough to properly influence the timeline … yet. But they still had possible futures in which they did.

“Doctor, look out!” Rose yelled, and he barely had a moment to figure out what he was looking out for when one of the ‘ghosts’ walked right through him.

Cold.

Death.

Nothing.

It felt awful. Both he and his wife shuddered at the shared sensation, and a horrible metallic taste lingered on the Doctor’s tongue. Whatever these creatures were, he knew without a doubt that they weren’t good.

What are we gonna do?! Rose panicked across the bond.

He didn’t know. But he would figure it out. Before he could properly articulate that, Jackie finally caught up with them.

“They haven’t got long,” she told them. “Midday shift only lasts a couple of minutes. They’re about to fade.”

“What do you mean, ‘shift’?” the Doctor asked, hating that Jackie Tyler knew more about the phenomenon than he did and ignoring his bondmate’s exasperation about this fact. “Since when did ‘ghosts’ have ‘shifts’? Since when did ‘shifts’ have ‘ghosts’? What’s going on?”

He tried to think again about how it had physically felt, his thoughts moving so fast that he had to have missed something important. So much information coming in, but the horrid feeling drowned a lot of it out. It definitely wasn’t natural - nothing about them was. They didn’t belong here. Not on this planet, not even in this galaxy. But yet there was something familiar as well. A wrongness that he’d felt before? But he’d never felt anything like that before, so how -?

You’ll figure it out, Rose assured him.

“Oh, he’s not happy when I know more than him, is he?” Jackie commented, cheekily catching onto exactly what he’d been thinking earlier. His wife nearly laughed despite the dire seriousness of the situation.

“But no one’s running, or screaming, or freaking out,” the Doctor continued as if she hadn’t spoken.

“Why should we? Here we go, twelve minutes past.”

They all watched as the so-called ‘ghosts’ slowly faded out of existence. The timelines around them became more stable, but still with an ever so slight flicker. Probably because whatever was making it possible for these things to press themselves onto the Earth was still happening, still intended to do it again. After all, apparently there were shifts (of all the rubbish things).

Calm down. Rose sent a soothing wave of comfort over the bond as they headed back toward her mum’s flat - and it did help, but only a little.

I need more information, he told her (also reminding himself).

Once inside again, he took his wife’s hand and pulled her into the sitting room, all but dragging her onto his lap when he sat on the sofa and turned on the telly. It was years ago that he’d last done this, sat in Jackie Tyler’s flat attempting to figure out what alien phenomena was happening via channel flipping. Her mum sat down with them and thankfully didn’t comment about the way he was nearly clinging to her daughter.

One of the things he’d quickly flipped through when they arrived was the TV guide, so the first program he turned on was ‘Ghostwatch’, which he’d assumed was one of those fake ghost hunting shows with subpar night vision and poorly altered technology that really only picked up and enhanced the latent low level psychic radio waves of the people in the area, who of course were imagining the machine would say something spooky. Obviously it was something different.

So those ghost hunting things really are rubbish? his bondmate commented, sounding a little disappointed.

Sorry, he replied, even though he wasn’t feeling apologetic in the slightest. I could make one of those ‘ghost’ voice boxes and sit in this room and your mum would be able to hear everything we were saying right now. It actually is impressive technology, telepathic vocalizers. But it’s an accident that the human race hasn’t realized yet.

It was a good distraction, talking to Rose about this, because the actual Ghostwatch program was beyond unsettling.

“What the hell’s going on?” he muttered aloud, as the host of the program was obviously adding to a story that had been in development for some time and not telling him anything helpful (not that something resembling a military formation around Westminster Bridge wasn’t worth noting, but still). He changed the channel.

The weather wasn’t about weather, it was about ‘ghosts’.

Good thing I got mum the Bazoolium, Rose tried to joke, but the thought was accompanied by waves of stress. The Doctor wished that he could help, could make her feel better, but he knew that his own anxiety was just compounding it, making a feedback loop. He flipped the channel again.

Ghost drama.

Do you think this is why the TARDIS landed us here, made us skip months ahead? His wife wondered as he navigated away from the reality show.

Nothing important.

Must be, though you’d think she’d land us right when it started. Where we could have done something about it before they had a chance to affect the timelines this much. He quickly hit the channel button, refocusing on what he’d noticed about the timelines around them when they were outside.

Ghost advertisements.

There was something familiar about those as well. He just needed to think. And skip the commercials.

Ghosts in France.

Worldwide, then? Rose hazarded a guess as things began to click. England. France. A glimpse of a time storm at the 2012 Olympics. He punched in a channel this time.

Ghosts in India.

Yes, that was what was so familiar! This is what he’d caught when they were watching the fireworks. He punched in another channel.

Ghosts in Japan.

At first he thought that the slight shift in his bondmate’s mood was just because Rose (and her mum) loved watching Japanese telly, but then he focused in on her thoughts and she was remembering the time storm as well. Not just the chaotic timelines, but what he had said about theirs. He wasn’t meant to see their timeline, it should be impossible, but it had been there, cutting through the storm and continuing on.

It was hope.

Regardless, he wasn’t about to take any chances. Everything was still in flux. Just because he had seen that didn’t mean it was fixed. Not with the way the timelines around them continued to swirl and change based on variables he still had no real knowledge of.

“It’s all over the world.” Planetwide catastrophe. Definite invasion. An invasion he’d missed. He didn’t want to stamp out the tenuous hope Rose was beginning to feel, but it was hard for him to not feel bleak about his chances of fixing this. Why would the TARDIS land them so late?!

The Doctor blindly changed the channel.

Eastenders.

Eastenders with ghosts.

He turned off the telly, tossed the remote onto the coffee table, and held his wife tighter for a moment before shifting them a bit so that he could more easily talk to Jackie. It wasn’t so bad, really, that he needed help from his mother-in-law. It was fine. If he repeated that enough, he’d eventually believe it, right?

“When did it start?”

Jackie leaned forward, obviously thrilled to get into things. “Well, first of all, Peggy heard this noise in the cellar, so she goes down-”

The Doctor rolled his eyes, already regretting asking. “No, I mean worldwide.”

“Oh. That was about two months ago. Just happened. Woke up one morning and there they all were. Ghosts everywhere. We all ran ‘round screaming and that. Whole planet was panicking. No sign of you, thank you very much. I tried calling, texting - nothing. Worried sick, but then it’s always been hard to get ahold of you in that ship of yours. Then it sort of sank in. It took us time to realize that we’re lucky.”

Two months ago. Those were the coordinates he had punched in. That he knew he had entered in. But the TARDIS had changed them. Why?!

Rose shifted off of his lap to sit closer to her mum.

“What makes you think it’s granddad?” she asked, rubbing Jackie’s shoulder, sympathy and compassion coming off of her in waves.

“It just feels like him,” his mother-in-law began to explain. “There’s that smell, those old cigarettes. Can’t you smell it?”

No. No, there definitely was not. And he would know. Superior olfactory system.

“I wish I could, mum, but I can’t.”

“You’ve got to make an effort,” Jackie insisted. “You’ve got to want it, sweetheart.”

And that, that gave him some real insight to what was going on. A psychic connection. Much more subtle than telepathy. Belief.

His wife turned to look at him as he confirmed his suspicions. 

“The more you want it, the stronger it gets.”

“Sort of, yeah,” Jackie replied.

“Like a psychic link,” the Doctor explained aloud, for her benefit. “Of course you want your old dad to be alive, but you’re wishing him into existence. The ghosts are using that to pull themselves in.”

Not that they were actually ghosts, but one thing at a time.

“You’re spoiling it.”

None of it was real, but Jackie’s heartbreak obviously was. Still, he couldn’t let her live in the illusion. Whatever the ‘ghosts’ really were, they were dangerous.

“I’m sorry, Jackie, but there’s no smell, there’s no cigarettes. Just a memory.”

“But if they’re not ghosts,” Rose chimed in, “what are they, then?”

The Doctor turned away, trying to think. The way the timelines react to them, the various possibilities, they must be corporeal in some context.

“Yeah, but they’re human!” her mother exclaimed. “You can see them. They look human.”

There’s shifts. Can’t have shifts without someone being in charge of the timing. So they don’t exist in the world all the time. Just some of the time. And without their proper form.

“She’s got a point,” his bondmate conceded. “I mean, they’re all sort of blurred, but they’re definitely people. Or humanoid, y’know.”

“Maybe not,” he pointed out, turning back toward them. “They’re pressing themselves into the surface of the world. But a footprint doesn’t look like a boot.” With that, he stood up. There was work to be done. “Let’s get back to the TARDIS. I have some scans I want to run.”

“You’re not takin’ off again, are you?” Jackie asked, alarmed.

“No, no. At least, not yet. Right now I just need the equipment.”

“How ‘bout I meet you there in a bit,” Rose suggested, standing up just to give him a hug.

He really wished her mother wasn’t in the room. It wasn’t that he was feeling particularly, er, romantic, but still. It would be nice, comforting to just be able to hold her for a moment, maybe a quick snog, without prying eyes. His wife smiled before standing up on her tiptoes and giving him a peck on the lips that he wasn’t quite ready for. When she went to step down, the Doctor pulled her right back up and gave her a proper kiss.

If he had his way, they wouldn’t be separated for a moment. His instincts were screaming against it. In the end, it made having to listen to Jackie scoff a very minor inconvenience. They were all in incredible danger, he could at least get a farewell snog.

“I’ll be home soon,” Rose promised as she broke the kiss.

Home.

Somehow she was always able to make him so ridiculously happy, even when the rest of him was gripped with fear. The Doctor didn’t trust his voice, so he simply nodded.

I love you, he projected over the bond.

I love you, too, she replied, even as she released him, stepping back towards her mum.

He noticed Jackie roll her eyes, but she also had a bit of a smile - he wasn’t going to forget that later.

“Right,” he finally managed. “Off I go, then. Oh! By the way, you might want to push some things aside in Rose’s old bedroom. Unless you want the neighbors to start complaining about ‘my constant comings and goings’ again. Planetwide invasion aside, we figured we’d stay a few weeks.”

Then he was out the door, though he still heard Jackie’s excited screech of, “Really?! Why didn’t you say so before!”

The Doctor couldn’t help but smile as he walked toward the TARDIS.

[whiro-sh]

I don't want to keep going if it's not with you~

So basically I had this idea for a one shot and I thought, why not share it? I don't know if you'll like it but I had fun imagining and writing it so here you go !

Tw self-harm/ suicidal thoughts

>angst with a happy ending

Summary: The Doctor finally come back to Sheffield after escaping the Judoon prison. It has been six hard months for Yaz, will the Doctor be too late to save her favorite companion ?

(angst with a happy ending, cause I'm a sucker for a happy ending)

It had been six months, six months that the Doctor sent them back to earth. Forced to go back for their own safety. Yaz knew that, Graham and Ryan told her enough. She knew the Doctor just wanted to protect them. The boys had understood it and accepted it and if at first it was hard to go back to normal life, after a month or so they seemed to be okay. They were still missing their amazing alien friend of course but they had moved on. Graham had started seeing other friends more often and Ryan started dating Sonya.

The only one who hadn't moved on - who didn't want to - was Yaz. She had tried at first, truly tried. She went out with some friends, got a promotion at work and even tried having a date with someone but it didn't work out. Truth was Yaz was not accepting this situation, she couldn't forget the Doctor and the life she had with her, she couldn't imagine that the Doctor really died that day on Gallifrey. She had constantly this hope of hearing the engines' noise of her favorite spaceship, of seeing a blue box parked in front of her flat. She dreamt countless time of the Doctor coming back and each time waking up was awfully painful. The harsh reality was painful.

As weeks passed she slept less and less at night, not wanting to see the familiar face of the blond in her dreams. She focused on her job to forget how she hated being stuck on earth, not knowing if the Doctor was still out there or not. Her family did see at first that Yaz wasn't well but soon she learnt to hide the bags under her eyes and the trace of a night spent crying silently under her makeup . She began to live in a lie, putting a great amount of effort to hide how broken she was.

One night worst than the others, she cut herself on her right wrist to ease her pain. She hadn't done that since highschool but right here and right now she felt relief in the pain. So she did it again and again, taking care to hide it well too. Yaz knew she couldn't keep up like that, she needed help but who could understand her ? They would force her to stop if they found out. Yaz didn't want to stop, this was the only thing helping her to cope.

Graham was in his room when he heard the familiar sound of the TARDIS in his living room. It had been so long that he first thought that he dreamt it but when he saw the blond coming out of the blue box he realised all this was real. The Doctor was there, smiling shyly at him. She looked skinnier than the last time he'd seen her, her hair had grown too. She seemed fine though a bit tired.

'Hey' said the woman timidly

For only response she received a hug from the old man.

'I thought we'd never see ya again doc !'

She froze for a moment she'd forgot what it was to feel someone against you. It was soothing, reassuring.

'Are you okay ?? What happened !'

'Long story but I'm fine had a little nap of 2 or 3 days in the TARDIS and a good meal.' her smile grew wider as she felt more comfortable. 'Where are the others ? How much time as it been ? I hope they are okay, how is Yaz ?'

Graham smiled at all those questions, he'd really missed this crazy woman.

'Six months only' he said but could see the worries on the Doctor's face. 'Ryan is fine, Yaz is... Coping in her own way, I haven't heard a lot from her recently'

The Doctor could remember like it was yesterday the girl's face when she left her. It had broken her hearts but she had to leave, she had to save her fam even if that meant dying for it.

The sound of a door opening interrupted the duo.

'Grandad we have to go, Sonya just-' he stopped abruptly when he saw the Doctor. 'Oh my god, no way !'

'Hi Ryan' said the Doctor amused by Ryan's surprise. The boy instantly gave the woman a big hug just as did Graham a few minutes before.

'I'm so happy your alive doctor !'

'Glad to see you too.' she answer truly happy. 'Yaz isn't with ya ? I missed her, I'd love to see her'

Ryan's smile disappeared as he suddenly remembered why he was here.

'Sonya just called me, Yaz is in the hospital...'

'What ? What happened son ?!'

'Apparently she collapsed while on duty and was very pale so they decided to call an ambulance.'

A few minutes later all three of them where in the hall of the hospital. Nadja was there too, she'd just finished her conversation with a doctor.

'Nadja !' called Graham.

The woman turn to them and was very surprised to discover the Doctor by the boys' side. She wanted to ask her where she was during all those months but right now she was more preoccupied by what she had learnt from her daughter's doctor.

'Is she okay ?' asked Ryan.

'They said she collapsed because she was weak and tired, I knew she wasn't sleeping well but I never imagined it was so serious...'

'She going to be okay...' tried to reassure Graham

'That's not... That's not all. She also has marks on her wrists and thighs. How could I not see them ? He said judging from the cuts that she had been doing that to herself for a few weeks now.'

The Doctor felt a rush of culpability and sadness, Yaz's state was her fault and she knew it. She had hoped the girl would move on from her, build her life but it appeared to be quite the contrary. Yaz's was drowning, what would have happened if she didn't come back ?

'We saw nothing either Nadja but we're gonna help her now, everything will be alright' said Graham.

'Can we see her ?' ask the Doctor, she felt the urge to see the brunette with her own eyes and be with her.

'She's sleeping, the doctor said we can visit her tomorrow.'

The Doctor wanted to insist but knew it was useless, she would have to wait and she hated that. Her brilliant, amazing Yaz in such a poor shape because of her. The blond hated herself for not escaping sooner. Yaz kept her alive and gave her a motivation to get out when she was in the judoon prison, now she needed to save and protect her.

The boys went home for the night, the Doctor parked her TARDIS in a street nearby the hospital ready in the morning to run back and find the girl she had dreamt of for months. It was around 1 am when she received a call from Nadja.

'Doctor I need your help ! It's Yaz, she ran away from the hospital, no one knows where she is !'

The Doctor didn't wait a second, she ran a scan of the area for trace of artron energy. Yes it had been six months since Yaz had travelled in a time machine but she should still have some trace left on her. Indeed she found out that the girl was only a few box away from the TARDIS position. The blond stormed out of her ship and ran as fast as she could.

She finally saw the brunette, she was in the middle of an empty street only wearing her hospital gown. She seemed lost and scared like a little girl, looking frantically around her like something was chasing her.

'Go on kill me you stupid machines !' she yelled.

The Doctor wasn't sure who the girl meant by machines but decide to slowly come closer, hands up to show she wasn't a threat.

'Yaz.' the girl froze

'No... No it can't be... It can't be you !' the brunette wasn't trusting her own eyes. If the Doctor was her it must meant that she was dreaming. The blond took a new step toward her.

'Hey Yaz, it's okay I promise..'

Yaz took a step back.

'No ! You said that the last time, but you disappeared, you left me like you always do ! I wake up and you're not here' she said now sobbing.

This broke the Doctor's hearts.

'Oh Yaz, my beautiful Yasmin Khan, what did I do to you.'

'The Cybermen I heard them, they are coming.'

'What do you mean ? Is that why you ran from the hospital ?' the Doctor asked taking her sonic to scan the area. No trace of any alien species. No Cybermen. 'Yaz it's okay, what you heard must of been some machines in other rooms next to yours. You're safe I swear.'

'How are you really here... You're DEAD ! You're-You're...' she cried harder falling on knees. She was exhausted, body trembling in this cold night.

The blond came closer and fell next to Yaz and she noticed the bandages around the girl's wrists. She was so angry at herself for letting that happen. She pulled Yaz in a tight hug.

'I'm so sorry Yaz, so sorry. I'm real I promise. I'll be here tomorrow when you'll wake up, I want to be by your side and never leave you again.'

This felt real thought Yaz, she wanted to believe this was real. Tomorrow she'd be sad again but for now she just enjoyed the warm embrace.

The Doctor took out her coat and put it on Yaz shoulders, she also noticed the girl was barefoot and decided to scoop her in her arms.

'It's okay now...' whispered the Doctor.

'I miss you so much... I love you Doctor.' the brunette whispered back before falling unconscious.

Yaz woke up the next morning in her hospital room. The first thing she felt was sadness as she opened her eyes to see the bedside empty. That's why she didn't like to sleep but before her thoughts could go farther she heard a familiar voice.

'Hey you...'

The brunette turn her head and saw the Doctor.

'So it was real...' she said softly, genuinely smiling for the first time in months.

'Pretty much yeah...'

'You've come back, you're here.' the girl stroke the Doctor cheek gently like to make sure the woman wasn't an illusion.

'I'm here Yaz and I love you too.' said the Doctor gently but serious.

Yaz's smile grew wider and she did what she didn't that day in the TARDIS just before the blond left her and the other humans. Yaz leaned forward and kissed the Doctor.

They didn't hear Graham, Nadja and Ryan enter the room.

'Seems like things should alright for those two now' said Graham glad and relieved.

The End

[sabraeal]

Rarely Pure & Never Simple, Chapter 6

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5

The last entry in the 600 Followers Gift-a-thon! I meant for this to be out the last weekend in December, but dude to both illness, kiss-a-thon, and this fic turning out well over 7.5K...it just didn’t work out. Thank all of you guys for following and voting; hopefully this year I’ll actually get to finish all the 500 follower raffle fics too...

Despite the glut of graduation media Shirayuki’s been binging, trying to brace herself for-- for all this, nothing quite prepares her for what it will be like to wear her cap and gown.

“It’s plastic,” she says dully, rubbing the waffle-weave between the tips of her fingers. “It feels like a tablecloth.”

“You look great,” Nanna assures her, eyes shining, giving her arm a good squeeze.

“Besides,” Grandad adds, fiddling with his camera. They got him that two years ago, for Christmas, and even still he doesn’t know quite how it works. “At least you and all your friends will be wearing tablecloths together.”

That fact that doesn’t seem to assuage Kihal in the least.

“This is a disaster,” she wails as Shirayuki approaches, waving her hand to encompass both their gowns. “They’re practically see-through!”

Shirayuki blinks, and-- yes. At a glance, she knows that Kihal’s dress is blue beneath her robe, and Kiki’s is purple. She stares down at her own, and through the cheap plastic, the hazy pink splotches of the roses dotting her dress give the vague impression of period stains.

“Oh,” she murmurs, dropping the fabric. “Oh.”

“We’ve agreed, as whole, to aggressively ignore it,” Kiki says rationally, though by the round of her shoulders and the tense line of her jaw, it still rankles. “I’m going to warn the Junior Student Council that they need to ask for blue robes for all genders.”

“Or black,” Kihal suggests, “ditch the whole school pride thing altogether.”

Kiki nods. “Classic. I like it.” Her gaze hooks on to Shirayuki. “You’re doing a speech today, aren’t you?”

Butterflies races sickeningly in Shirayuki’s stomach. “Um, yeah.”

“Feeling prepared?”

Not at all. “As much as I can be,” she settles on. It earns her one of Kiki’s rare smiles, which at least gets the micro-fauna in her gut doing a more pleasant set of maneuvers.

“Good.” She reaches out, giving Shirayuki’s shoulder a solid squeeze. “I’m excited to hear it. Obi said it was, and I quote, ‘killer.’“

“Oh.” She knows they’re friends, of course; she met him through Kiki and Zen, and she hangs out with both of them on the regular, it’s just--

They talk about her. He talks about her, in a way that is, well, boyfriend-like. And she’s never...

Shirayuki has never been someone people talk about. At least, not without some rumor to go along with it.

“Um.” Her eyes sting, even as her mouth curves into a smile. “Cool.”

Kiki’s gaze flicks over her shoulder. “I better go check on Zen. It looks as if he might have some sort of apoplexy if he doesn’t get more help than Obi getting everyone into line.”

Shirayuki’s head whips over her shoulder, gaze fixing to where Zen stands in the gym, cheeks so red he might as well have been slapped. Right beside him is Obi, mouth hooking into his customary smirk, and something that’s been knotted in her breast since this morning loosens.

“That boy needs to get laid,” Kihal decides with a snort. “Or pick up yoga, or meditation, or something.”

A guilt heat sweeps over Shirayuki, head to toe. “W-what?”

“Wisteria.” Kihal jerks her head at him. “He’s going to pass out if he keeps walking around like a pot with its lid on, you know?”

“O-oh,” she says, now more mortified. “R-right.”

“Obviously not Obi. You’re already--” her eyes narrow-- “aren’t you already doing something about that?”

“Um!” Shirayuki casts about for anything that will keep her from having this conversation. “Looks like...we better go line up. I’m with the Ls so...I’ll see you after the ceremony!”

“What?” Kihal squawks, hands fisting on her hips as Shirayuki hurries away. “This conversation is not over!”

Tragically, Kihal is correct.

“I can’t believe you haven’t blow him.” Shirayuki glares down at where Kihal rests her elbows on the back of her chair, staring down the opposite row to where the ‘N’ section sits. “Like not even a little?”

The rehearsal was hardly three days ago, but somehow Shirayuki had forgotten the crucial fact that the ‘T’ section sat just behind the ‘L’ one after they file in.

“I don’t think this is really the time to be talking about this,” she hisses, glancing at the girl next to her, buried in her phone. To her other side is the aisle, thankfully, though when Mitsuhide throws her a small wave she can’t help but think if he was here, on this side, his staid presence might discourage this particular conversation.

“Just look at him.” Kihal gestures with the flat of her hand, right to where Obi sits, grinning, in front of Zen. “His dick is probably gorgeous. Like if I had to say who had the best dick out of everyone we know, I’d say--”

“Kihal.”

“--Probably Mitsuhide,” she admits, “but Obi would be a close second.”

Shirayuki sighs, and, well, maybe if she indulges this line of questioning, it will be over sooner. “We just...haven’t gotten there yet.”

Kihal gives her a dubious look. “It’s been what? Three months? And you expect me to believe he hasn’t mentioned it at all?”

She blinks. “No, actually.”

It hadn’t seemed odd to her-- after all, the only person thus far in her life that had mentioned her getting on her knees was Raj, and that had gone...not well, for either of them-- but now that Kihal has mentioned it...

Obi is nineteen, twenty in a month, and from every movie she’s ever avoided watching on the subject, he should be, well, more actively campaigning for an end to her dickphobia. Or at least, mentioning how he’d like her to be touching him, often and well.

“Maybe he doesn’t like it,” she suggests, at a loss. After all, she knows there’s, um, a reciprocal position, and as nice as it sounds when he suggests it, it doesn’t excite her in a, ah, intellectual sense. It’s not anything she cares about doing any time soon.

“Fake news,” Kihal grunts, “all boys like having their penises touched. If you asked him what he’d like to do to celebrate--” Shirayuki grimaces at the suggestive nudge-- “tonight, he’d say, hands down, that he wants you to blow him.”

Her menagerie of intestinal insects takes flight at the thought. “I don’t know...”

“Scientific fact,” Kihal insists, “given the choice, a dude will always want to be blown.”

“Well--” Obi meets her gaze, giving her a wink that is somehow both saucy and supportive-- “good thing there’s going to be no time for any of that tonight.”

Kihal’s gaze darts between the two of them, her mouth curling slyly. “Oh, I’m sure you’ll both find a way.”

If there’s one thing to be said for Kihal’s dogged determination on the subject of Obi’s penis and what Shirayuki should be doing with it, it’s that while she’s worrying about just how glacially slow she’s moving in her single serious relationship of her lifetime (and whether the local access cameras are near enough to pick up this entire conversation), she had absolutely no time to worry about her speech.

Which is why she nearly faceplants into the aisle when Zen announces, “Shirayuki Leon,” from the podium.

With a recovery that is as removed from smooth as she is from cool, Shirayuki shuffles up to the stage, trying not to stumble on the kitten heels Nanna insisted she wear. Distantly, she’s aware that there had to have been more lead up, that by Zen’s cheerful smile and the interested applause of the crowd, he must have said something complimentary enough to get her into heaven. But she can’t find it in herself to worry about that; instead she thanks him woodenly as he steps back, taking his seat on the stage as the Student Council President, and lets the cold breath of fear wash over her.

“Hi,” she begins eloquently, eyes scanning over the crowd. Goodness, this is a lot of people. “I’m Shirayuki, and I’m new.”

To her surprise, the crowd chuckles, fond smiles spreading across a few faces, and--

She can do this. She really can.

“I think I said that a million times my first week here.” It’s not anywhere near an exaggeration; she’d been searching for friends, anyone to make a senior year transfer seem like less of a punishment, and she’d been what she liked to term aggressively friendly. “I’d thought nothing could be worse than having to leave my old school right when I was going to graduate. How could I replace eleven years of friendship in less than nine months? How could I even become part of this school, when even your colors are weird?”

They laugh at that too, and it’s strange-- she’d thought she’d feel naked saying these things in front of a crowd, in front of classmates who had whispered behind her back, or even asked her bald questions in the hall about blowing Raj Shenezard. But it’s all so far away now, another lifetime, one that existed before Honor Society, before Mathletes, before--

Well, before Drama Club, certainly.

“But I didn’t feel that way long.” Zen and Kiki are on the stage behind her, but Mitsuhide and Kihal are were she left them in the crowd, smiling as she meets their eyes. “I made friends, good friends. The kind of friendships that last beyond homework. The kind of relationships--” her knees quiver under the podium as she glances at Obi, as she says the words she wrestled over last night, trying to make perfect-- “that last beyond a play, beyond high school, into whatever comes after. Together.”

He holds her gaze, and oh, she is-- she is not going to make it through this if she keeps looking at him>.

“I’m changed because I came here. We’re all changed because we came here,” she says, lifting her gaze to the crowd. “My Nanna likes to say that we’re not stone, but clay, constantly being shaped by what’s around us. Being here has shaped us, but it’s also shown me that we can shape ourselves if we choose to. When we leave here we’ll change again, and again, and for some of us, we’ll lose this shape entirely and becomes something new. And for others, we’ll carry pieces of what we became here our whole lives.”

With a single, steeling breath, she continues, “A few months ago, I couldn’t imagine fitting in here. And now I can’t imagine ever having been anywhere else. So as much as this speech is a celebration of all we’ve achieved together, it’s also a thank you.” She smiles, letting her gaze scan over the whole of her class, realizing she knows a name for every face. “Thank you for my senior year.”

“I cried,” Kihal informs her, fanning herself with a program as they wait for their families to find them on the field. “So I hope you’re happy about that.”

Shirayuki frowns. “That wasn’t really the point--”

“Hey!” Zen holds out his arms, wrapping her in a hug that’s only slightly stilted. “Great speech!”

“Thanks,” she says, gripping his arms as she steps back. “I was nervous. I don’t really know how much that would, um, resonate for people.”

“It’s a small school,” Kiki drawls, cutting between them to wrap her arms around her. A thrill shoots up her spine, all the way from her toes. “And you’re one of us now.”

“Oh.” Her eyes sting, like she worried they might on the podium, but this-- this-- “Thank you.”

It’s fine.

“You did an amazing job, Shirayuki!” Mitsuhide tells her, bounding up with a grin and a hug strong enough to break a moose’s back. “The best speech today!”

“Thanks,” Zen deadpans.

“Oh, I--” he grimaces, rubbing at the back of his head-- “I forgot you gave one. But It was good too!”

“Don’t hurt yourself,” Zen laughs, shaking his head. “You’re right, Shirayuki’s was much better than mine.”

“I thought that, um...” If only she could remember any bit of the ceremony that wasn’t her speech or Kihal’s opinion on oral sex, this would be a much easier compliment. “It was very good!”

“Doesn’t hold a candle to yours, though.” Obi’s arm slings around her shoulder, drawing her tight against his side. “Though maybe I’m biased.”

Zen grins at that. “You are kissing the competition.”

Obi waggles his eyebrows. “You’re always welcome to come over here and bias me yourself, Chief.”

He flushes, bright pink against the platinum of his hair, and coughs, “I’m-- I’m good.”

“Do have to say, kid,” Obi continues, dropping his chin to tangle the amber of his gaze with hers, “there was a part in the middle there I don’t remember practicing.”

“Mm.” It’s good he didn’t look at her like this when she was talking; she’d never have gotten a word out around the tangle of her tongue. “I found out I had more to say about all the, um, future stuff.”

“Future stuff?” he asks, breathless.

It would be inappropriate to kiss him here, at least the way his eyes are promising. Her grandparents are talking to Kihal’s parents just a few feet away, and all their friends are watching them, and a peck might be in order but--

But his chest rumbles under her hands as he leans in, half a purr, and as much as she knows this is more fit for a dark corner instead of right next to the bleachers, she pushes up on her toes--

“Hey, Obi, are you coming tonight?”

He steps away, hazy-eyed. Her lips still tingle with thwarted anticipation. “Hm?”

Zen darts a glance between the two of them. “My graduation party. I know you have, uh, a competing engagement.”

“Oh right.” He nods, tucking her into his side. “Yeah, I’m gonna come for about an hour, and then ditch out for Shirayuki’s. As long as that’s okay with you, Kid?”

She blinks. “Yeah, of course. I’m sorry I can’t make it, Zen, but--”

“Don’t worry,” he waves her off. “I know how it is. I might try to pop by after Kiki’s dad opens the liquor cabinet though.”

Kiki grimaces. “Me too.”

“Glad that’s settled.” Obi presses a kiss to her forehead. “I’ll stuff myself on canapes for an hour, and then I’ll come just in time to eat Grandad’s cooking.”

Shirayuki feigns a pout of disapproval. “Well, now I know where your real priorities lie.”

Kiki barks out a laugh. “You can’t be surprised that it’s his stomach.”

Obi grins at that, but his eyes grow serious. “Aw, c’mon kid,” he says, softer, pressing another kiss between her eyebrows. “You know you’re what matters to me.”

She wraps an arm around his waist, enjoying the way his breath skips as she squeezes him. “I know.”

In all her anxiety-watching of graduation movies, not one of them had managed to show a graduation party, opting instead for moonlit moments on picnic blankets beneath the floodlights of the school’s football field. Thus, Shirayuki is thoroughly unprepared for how chaotic it is.

“Shirayuki!” Nanna calls out, waving at her from across the room, “do you remember Mrs Kino?”

She doesn’t have many relatives; her mom was an only child, and her whole paternal side is shrouded in a mystery she’s only even half-interested in solving, but the party is filled to the brim with her grandparents’ friends and business associates from the pub, as well as a handful of old teachers Nanna managed to track down as a surprise. Her own friends have been filtering in and out all night: the Mathletes started here and left after the first round of chafing dishes were finished, leaving to go to another party across town; at least a handful of drama club members here since before even she managed to arrive, ever-changing, though always clustered around the refreshment tables; Kihal has been aggressively greeting everyone that walked in the door as if it were her own party, making sure that Shirayuki gives everyone at least a cursory hello and an outline of her post-graduation plans. Even Ryuu puts in an appearance around dinner, looking as if he’d like to melt into the floor as his mother gushes about what an excellent influence Shirayuki has been, how she’ll be sorely missed next year.

Still, she hasn’t seen Obi.

“He’ll be here,” Kihal promises as they take a breather in the den, scarfing down a entire plate of chicken marsala with an intensity that makes Shirayuki concerned about her future gastric health. “You know he will. And if he doesn’t I’ll kill him.”

There’s a half dozen thing she could say to that, but she settles for, “Thanks.”

“Do you mind checking to see if there’s anymore chicken?” Kihal holds out her plate with wide, pleading eyes. “It’s so good. And I know you want to see if the desserts have come out.”

More like Kihal wants to know if the desserts are out. “Can you not make it there yourself?”

“Nope.” Kihal lounges against the couch’s arm. “I’m like a California condor. I’ve eaten so much I won’t be able to fly for another hour.”

She lifts a brow. “And you still want more?”

Kihal scoffs. “Your grandpa made it. Of course.”

Technically, the staff of the pub made it, and it’s just Grandad’s recipe but-- Shirayuki takes her point and her plate. For a minute, she contemplates cutting through the party, which fills up the living room and spills out onto the back deck, but then elects for the longer, quieter route around the stairs.

“Hey, kid, there you are.” Obi’s smile lights up the kitchen, plates in both his hands stacked high with appetizers. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”

“Me too,” she admits, breathless, frozen in the doorway. He’s still in his dress shirt and slacks, sleeves rolled up to the elbow, and haah, she has never been more tempted to tell him that if they’re quiet, no one will know they’ve snuck up to her room.

Obi grimaces. “Sorry about that. I meant to only go for an hour, and then Zen wanted to play a quick pick up game, and it turned to two, and then I got here and...” He shrugs, shaking his head.

“It’s packed,” she agrees, “but I should have known to check the kitchen.”

His lips tick up into a grin, and he turns, leaning his hip against the counter in a way that only heightens the length of his limbs, that reminds her how good they feel around her--

“You did great, by the way,” he says, suddenly earnest. “If I didn’t say already.”

“You did.” She flinches at how awkward and hostile the words sound, but there’s no easy way to say, Kihal has reminded me you have a dick, and even though it abjectly terrifies me, I really want to make out. “I mean, thank you. Again. I’m glad you liked it.”

His mouth quirks at the corner. “Not a dry eye in the place.”

Shirayuki almost says, that wasn’t the point, but what falls out of her mouth is, “Not even yours?”

Obi lights up. “Definitely not.” His cheeks flush as he continues, “I got you a graduation gift.”

It’s on the counter just behind him, conspicuously placed away from the food: a small bag with crumpled up tissue paper, done so artlessly that she knows it couldn’t have been gift wrapped in-store, that he had done it himself. He had picked out that tiny bag, had crushed that paper in his huge hands-- his face distressed, like he’s afraid he’s doing it wrong, like he might break it just by trying-- and there’s something about it that is so sweet, so heartbreaking that she-- she--

Gosh, she really wants to kiss him.

“Me too,” she says, setting her plates down. Kihal may be waiting on the chicken marsala, but she’ll understand the delay. Probably all too well. “I left it upstairs. Should we--?“

“Oh, yeah!” Obi recoils with a grimace. “I mean, yes. Mine’s probably better given in private anyway.”

She blinks, wondering what he could give her that he wouldn’t want other people to see--

I was thinking of one of those little egg ones, the kind that just sit here–

“Obi!” she gasps, scandalized. “You didn’t...”

“What?” He catches her wary glance at the present, and his eyes pulse wide. “No! I mean, I didn’t--”

“Obi!” Nanna bustles in behind her. “You’ve finally made it! I was getting worried I’d miss you.”

With an ease that clearly comes from sixty years of practicing shamelessness, her grandmother closes the space she hasn’t managed to, enfolding Obi in a hug so tight he squeaks. It would warm her heart, normally, but all Shirayuki can think of is that bag, not two feet from them, that may or may not contain a gift that will definitely see her grounded until she’s thirty.

Shirayuki could live with that though-- after all, no one is more eager to not repeat history than her-- but-- but--

The very thought of Nanna standing here, in this room, sharing air with something at least vaguely phallic shaped that Obi would have every intention of putting inside her for the purpose of like, sex stuff and orgasms is just-- wrong. Super wrong. She tastes bile at the back of her throat just contemplating it.

“Have you had the meatballs yet?” Nanna asks, pulling away with a smile. “Colin put them on the menu for you especially.”

Pink flares high on Obi’s impossible cheeks. “Oh! I--” he blinks, gaze fixing over her shoulder-- “Lata?”

“Obi!” Shirayuki presses to the jamb to let him pass, and there’s something about the wildness of his eyes and the mussed mass of his hair that reminds her that the professor is a narrow man, but a tall one, looming over even Obi as he stumbles into the kitchen. “There you are. This place is a zoo.”

“It’s a party,” Nanna offers, wry.

He stares at her, uncomprehending. “Did I not just say that?”

“Lata.” Obi’s voice is strained, every line of his face etched with worry. “Is something wrong?”

Professor Forenzo doesn’t answer, not with words, but instead he reaches into his coat, thrusting out his hand, and--

And he’s holding an envelope. A large envelope. A golden lantern glitters under the kitchen light. “This came for you.”

Obi only stares, gaping, hands dead at his side.

“Oh!” Nanna gasps, eyes wide. “Oh, why don’t you-- you should--” her eyes meet Shirayuki’s around the professor’s shoulder-- “I’ll make your excuses, honey.”

She blinks. “But...”

Obi still hasn’t moved, and neither has Forenzo. Even from where she stands, she sees the professor’s hand shakes.

“Right.” She sets down her plates, taking the envelope from his hands as she slips her fingers through Obi’s limp ones. “We should go open this, don’t you think?”

Obi swallows thickly. “Yeah. Yes. Open it.”

She tugs on him, yanking him a single staggering step. “Come on, I know just the place.”

“Okay.” He stares at the envelope in her hand, following her woodenly. “Okay.”

Shirayuki glances at the plates on the counter. “Nanna, could you do a favor for me?”

She eyes Obi worriedly. “Anything you need.”

“Do you think you could bring a plate of chicken marsala to Kihal?” She grimaces sheepishly. “That was sort of why I came it here.”

Nanna's mouth twitches at the corner. “Sure thing. Have fun, you two.”

“Right,” Obi murmurs, every line of him tense. “Fun.”

The bleachers haven’t been broken down.

Somehow that’s the detail she hangs onto as they pull up to the field in Obi’s sedan, dew staining the satin of her flats. They’d been here only hours earlier, the afternoon sun burning bright and endless, but now fog hangs heavy over the grass with only the floodlights to break through it.

It’s strange how it only strikes her as she lays out a blanket with shaking hands, dew wetting her fingertips, that it’s all done now. Her whole life has been focused on graduating, on going to college, on not letting history repeat itself, and now it’s over, the work of a single afternoon. The moment she’s bent her whole life towards has passed.

Now she needs a new one.

“All right,” she says, settling onto her knees, feet crossed under her. “Is it time?”

Obi’s wide-eyed in the glow of the floodlights, mouth slack, his hands clenched around the edge of the envelope like he’s drowning and it’s the only thing holding him afloat. “Is it?”

“Obi.” She folds her hand over his, feeling how he shakes right down to his bones. “Whatever happens, we’ll be okay.” She gives him a confident smile she only half feels. “There’s skype, remember?”

He nods, absent. “Right. Right. I know. It’s just...”

Shirayuki knows what it’s just. She’d had plenty of time to think of every single worst-case scenario on the way over in triplicate, and now she’s just-- she’s just--

She’s tired of being afraid that something good will happen. “What’s the worst thing that could be in there? They won’t accept you? We’ve already been planning for that.” Her thumb rubs over the bone of his, soothing. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“I know, I know. I just...” He sniffs, rubbing his face on his shoulder. “Sometimes hope is worse, you know?”

She doesn’t, not really, but she knows that deep down inside, he’s still that little boy hoping his mom would fight for him, hoping that he’ll get passed to someone that will finally love him. She may not get it, but she understands.

“Okay, this is-- it’s getting dumb.” he laughs wetly, turning the envelope in his hand. “Let’s do this.”

Despite the bravado, his fingers shake as he opens it, muttering curses to himself when the flap won’t come off with one clean pull. Every time he tries to do another tear, the paper feathers out of his grip, until the edge is thousand little finicky rips that flutter off to the blanket. Shirayuki bites back a giggle as he tips the whole thing over, trying to use the weight of the packet to break through the last of it, sitting up on his knees and just shaking--

A thousand flyers flutter out, covering the blanket between them, the grass beside them, everything. Student Dining she sees on one, Greek letters on a dozen more, financial aid-- but still the bulk stays stuck inside, its squared-off corners stuck where the envelope didn’t fully tear.

“You know,” he grunts, tearing the edges off wholesale, “they don’t show you this shit in movies.”

A laugh bursts out of her, scattering the glossy papers she’d already straightened. “I think that’s because most people know how to open mail.”

“I know how to open mail,” he protests, shaking harder, “this is just unnaturally--”

The packet slips out in a slump, hitting the blanket with a weighty thwap, like the calves they show being birthed in biology class, only without all the, uh, extra gunk, or cows, or anything being actually birthed at all. They both stare at it, wide-eyed, neither of them making a move, not for the large, spiral-bound book or the crisp letter on top of it.

When Obi does, it’s for that, picking it up between his fingers as if it’s made of tissue, like all he has to do is breathe and it’ll break. Her eyes fall to the thick manual beneath it, squinting to make out the words Prospective Student Guide. Just like hers. “Obi...”

“I did it,” he chokes out. “I got in. I got in.”

In the glow of the floodlights she sees the shine on his face, and she knows, right then, that whatever her new moment is, she doesn’t want it unless its with him.

She fists his shirt in her hand, dragging him down until she can press her lips to his, until she can taste the salt under his lips and the hitch of his breath.

“I knew you could do it,” she murmurs as she pulls away, sitting back on her heels. “I’m so proud of you.”

His breath rasps out of his throat, eyes wide and gold like dollar coins, and-- and maybe this is too fast, too much. Maybe she’s too much like her mom, thinking that her high school boyfriend is forever when he’s really just right now, just what’s easy, and she--

She stops thinking when his mouth covers hers.

He whimpers into her mouth, hands digging through her hair like he can’t get close enough, like nothing less than consuming her whole will be. Her hands fly to his wrists, holding him where he is, leaning into his touch, and oh, maybe she is like her mom, falling too hard and too fast, but Obi’s right there to catch her.

With a groan, he pulls back, resting his forehead against hers. “Well, I gotta say...this sort of fucks up the gift I got you.”

“What do you--?”

He springs for the bag, set at the edge of the blanket, and thrusts it at her. “Go ahead.”

Her brows furrow as she rifles through the tissue, plucking out wads of crumpled paper. There’s two layers at least, packed tight, and even if she hadn’t heard the broad strokes of his life before he came to Clarines, she’d be worried about just what sort of childhood he had if he can’t pack a gift bag.

She unearths a blister pack, pulling it out with a twist of her fingers. There’s a headset nestled inside, blue and white, clip-on instead of buds, with the packaging boasting microphone included!

“Oh,” she breathes, running her fingers over the bubble. The bulge of the mic is innocuous, a small thing, and it’s so easy to see the way it would have slipped subtly it under a hoodie, or how she could have just slung it around her neck as she moved from class to class, never bothered by the weight. She’d believed him when he said he was serious about her, that nothing about his feelings were casual, but still, still--

He wanted to fit into her life, as unobtrusively as he could. Hours away, he wanted her to know that he was there for her, only a quick phone call away.

“I didn’t want to get the earbuds since you always say they hurt your ears.” His grin goes wide, wicked. “You know, because you’re tiny.”

“I’m not tiny,” she says, wrinkling her nose, “my ears are tiny.”

“Sure, kid.” He coughs, mouth twitching, “it’s your ears.”

“It is!” she insists, swatting at his arm. “Anyway, thank you. These are wonderful.”

Obi shrugs, just a twitch of his shoulders, cheek flushing the pales pink. “You won’t really be needing them now, I guess.”

“I guess not.” She sets them aside, right next to his student guide, and-- and it’s all so much. Too much. “It was thoughtful, though. And I’m sure I’ll use them anyway, even if it’s not for, you know, three hour long skype calls.”

“Yeah, keep ‘em.” His grin pulls even wider. “I’ll just have to make sure to get you that other gift too, to make up for it.”

She surges forward with a yelp, clapping a hand over his mouth. “Stop.”

His lips shiver beneath her palm, and despite the burn on her cheeks, she can’t stop smiling either, can’t stop thinking about this is it, he is it. “Just sayin’...”

“Yes, yes, I think you’ve said plenty, thank you,” she laughs, dropping her hand. She’s so close to him now, half on his lap, her hand pressed to where his chest still shakes with laughter, and-- “We should celebrate.”

“Oh, are you going to take me out?” His arm cinches around her, yanking her close, and she gives out a shriek, hands bracing on his shoulders. “Going to drive me out to Olive Garden and treat me right?”

“I mean...if you want,” she blurts out, wishing that she was better at conveying...stuff. Sexy stuff. “I just meant that we could, um, celebrate here, too. Now.”

“Oh.” His eyes pulse wide. “Oh. You mean...here. Just the two of us. Like...” He swallows hard. “What were you, ah, thinking?”

“I thought I might, ah--” this should be easier than it is, especially when she can feel him twitch against her thigh, excited-- “leave that up to you?”

His eyes go impossibly wider. “You mean...anything?”

“Yeah.” It’s what’s fair; she asked him to touch her, to make her come, and he should-- he should also get the choice. It’s his achievement, not hers.

Scientific fact. The words still ring in her ears, reminding her what a terrible idea this is. Given the choice, a dude will always want to be blown.

He ducks his head, fixing his gaze on hers. “Are you sure, kid?”

Shirayuki braces herself. It’s fine. She can do anything for him, even if it involves penises. “Yes. Anything.”

“Okay,” he breathes, “okay.”

That’s all the warning she has before she spills back, air huffing out of her as she hits a particularly hard clump of earth. Obi’s there in a second, wrapping her legs around him, and oh, she’d thought maybe this would be a-- a blowjob, but-- but Obi has had sex before, after all, even told her he missed it--

So it’s a real surprise when he just kisses her, open-mouthed and wanting, and doesn’t do anything.

Not that she’s complaining. He’s got one hand snug against her scalp and the other keeping her hips firmly against his in a way that is...very exciting, especially when she can feel, um, him grind into her, right where she’s starting to ache. It’s just--

“You just want to make out?” she asks, incredulous, as he slips the strap of her dress down and cups the breast he bares. “That’s it?”

He pulls back, blinking. “Is there a problem with that?”

It’s hard to locate one when he rolls her nipple like that, right between two long fingers before his mouth closes over it wholesale. But still, still-- “I thought you’d want to-- to--” she takes a gasping breath as his hand snakes up her thigh-- “do something, um, new.”

“I do,” he rumbles, mouth grinning against her breast. “I just can’t really, ah, go for it.”

“Why not?” She squirms, lifting her hips as he hooks a finger into her panties and pulls. “I said any-- ohhh--thing.”

His fingers slip against her in just the way she likes, and oh, it’s getting really hard to protest any of this. His mouth is back on her neck, kissing down to her sternum, and her arguments turn mushy and indistinct as she tries to voice them, slurring into groans and sighs as he touches her, tracing her clit and teasing her folds.

“I know,” he murmurs against her skin as she arches into a particularly good thrust. “And I appreciate it, but...it’ll feel weird if you aren’t ready.”

That gets her thinking, as much as she can in this state, but all high function stop the minute he purrs, “Good thing you are now.”

His mouth leaves her skin, the hand in her hair skipping straight down to ruck up her skirt, and still she has no idea what he could possibly mean until he puts his mouth right on her clit.

“Oh!” she yelps, hips bucking so hard she nearly knocks his chin. “Woah!”

He blinks up at her, concerned. “Is this okay?”

Oh, it’s...it’s really hard to think when she can feel every puff of breath out of his mouth like a caress, deliciously warm against her. “Yes. I mean, yes, but I thought you would want, ah, something for you?”

“For me?” His pupils blow wide as he looks down at her, bare and wet beneath him, leaving only a thinnest ring of gold. “Kid, you don’t know how much I’ve thought about this.”

“O-oh?” The worst part about him being down there, touching her, is that she knows he can feel her get wetter, get hotter. “Just...recently? Or...?”

He laughs, tongue tracing along her slit in a way that makes her sure she’s about to come right there, if only he’d keep going. “Always.”

“Always?” she breathes, curious.

She can’t really see his cheeks, but his neck definitely flushes. “You were just always perching on things with, you know, skirts on and being cute. I’m only human.”

(”--and I think we may have to move this flat,” she hums, tucking a leg beneath her, pulling her skirt back down over her knee. “Raj keeps running into it when he exits through the door, and-- Obi, are you listening?”

“Huh?” he slurs, gaze jerking up. “Were you saying something?”

She rolls her eyes. “Yes. The flats.”)

“Oh,” she pants, “oh.”

Her fingers curl through his hair, and with a single shuddering breath, she urges him down. His laugh huffs against her, so warm, and then he’s on her again, only this time better, more.

What he’s doing is just-- beyond her. His fingers thrust between her legs, so good and yet not nearly enough, hitting the rhythm she knows will bring her to the edge, but it’s his mouth that has her full attention. She’d imagined this before, sure, but she’d always though it would be his tongue where his fingers were, poking in and out, and she just assumed that would feel...good? Goofy, but probably nice, if people were always talking about doing it.

It had certainly appealed when Obi mentioned it, I could put my mouth on you, though she’d often wonder why afterward. Something that would make sense in the moment, she assumed, but not when someone was thinking with their actual brain, after.

She could not have been more wrong.

His mouth latches onto her clit, the jolt of pleasure almost too much, too intense when he give it one, strong suck. The noise she makes isn’t anything sexy, half a yelp and half a grunt, but he readjusts, tongue flicking over the tiny bud instead and-- oh, that’s...that’s much better.

Maybe a little bit too much. She wants this to last, to enjoy the feeling of him down there, between her legs, stubble tickling her thighs and mouth so warm against her, but-- she can feel it building already, too quickly, his fingers moving with his tongue in just the right way, sending her right to the edge--

She comes with a strangled cry, head tilted back toward the stars, and for a long moment she’s one with the sky above her, weightless, before she plummets back down to earth.

“Oh,” she gasps, blinking away tears, “wow.”

Obi flops beside her, mouth stretches in a grin, and pants, “Good celebration.”

She stares at him. “Is that it?”

He jolts up onto his elbow, serious. “Di you not--?”

“N-no! I did. I definitely did. It’s just...” She braces herself, determined. “It’s your celebration! You should come.”

His mouth rounds into a surprised O as he stares at her. He shakes himself a moment later, laughing, “No, no, trust me, Kid. I’m fine.”

“Obi.” She rolls up onto her elbow, fixing him with her most stubborn look. “I’m not going to make you drive back with a hard on, and then sit through more of my graduation party.”

She presses her thigh against it, just to underscore her point, and he groans, eyes fluttering shut. It should be so hot, but, ohh, it is.

“See?” she murmurs thickly. “The celebration isn’t over.”

His breath pants out of him, harsh. “Kid...”

“I-I could...”

“Kid,” he laughs, “don’t put yourself out. I can handle it. I mean, if you don’t, uh...”

“Yes!" She winces at the relief in her voice. “I mean...yes. You should-- do it now. I just won’t look.”

“Right,” he laughs as she turns over, putting her back to him. “I wouldn’t want you to feel oppressed by my massive--”

“If I’m going to see it one day, you probably don’t want to give me unrealistic expectations,” she snips waspishly, folding her hands to make a pillow.

“Oh.” The word bursts out of him, like he’s been punched. “Yeah. I mean...right.”

She can hear each tooth of his fly as he unzips, so slow she squirms in anticipation even though she’s not doing a thing, just laying here for, uh, moral support. It’s strange to think it’s right there, that if she turned over she’d see his-- his--

Well, a lot more of Obi than she’s seen before. More than she’s prepared to see, no matter how much she’s thought about it.

He gasps when he takes himself in hand, and even though she knows the mechanics of this, of boys doing that, she’s surprised at how quiet it is, how it sounds less like comical wet slapping and more like... skin on skin. It’s soft, rhythmic, lacking the weird, almost violent jerking in the five seconds of every old teen comedy she’s seen before she covered her eyes. And the sounds Obi makes...

Ah, those are...nice. Really nice.

Her thighs clench at each soft sigh, at the way his breath hitches with every stroke. Obi always said that just watching her come did it for him, and she believed him, she had, but-- now she knows how true it is. She only came minutes ago, but the sounds of him alone is making her wet, slicking the inside of her thighs and reminding her how he’d sounded in the car, months ago--

--ah, yes, like that, god – fuck, Shirayuki, I–

He moans, long and pained, and she-- she’s curious. Enough to get her into trouble, Grandad says, and sometimes out again. So she can’t help it, she-- she peeks.

Not at his-- down there, of course, but just at his face, at the safe parts. Or at least, it would have been safe, if his head wasn’t thrown back like that, if his eyes weren’t wrenched shut, mouth slack--

Yes, god, the way you sound – god, fuck, that’s so good, please –

Shirayuki rolls back, fitting tight against his side, stomach thrilling as she feels the pace of his arm rubbing against her, as she watches the way his whimpers eke out of his mouth, unbidden. He must feel it, feel the difference, because he stops, a whine wringing from his throat as his eyes slit open to look at her, so dark--

“Don’t stop,” she tells him, breathless. “Keep going.”

His eyes widen, seeking hers, and as he starts moving again, breath rasping out of his chest, all Shirayuki can see is gold. It’s too much, too much, and she leans in, covering her lips with his.

Obi gasps into her mouth, whimpering as her tongue licks against his teeth. He arches into her, hand wrapping around her neck and dragging her closer, fingers tangling roughly in her hair until he cups the back of her skull, holding her to him.

“God,” he murmurs against her lips, pulling back with each press to suck down a drowning man’s breath. “Fuck.”

His elbow works against her stomach, and she’s too curious still, letting her hand trail down his arm to feel the corded muscle there, standing out in stark relief as he strains to meet his pleasure. Her fingers trail down further, further, following those lines to his wrist, to where she can already feel the heat from his--

He whines, writhing beside her, hips bucking into her thigh, and she realizes: he’s coming.

Shirayuki jumps back from him with a pop, eyes searching his face, but it’s too late, it’s over, his head dropping back onto the grass with a laugh. In the burn of the floodlights, his face is flushed, dewy.

“You don’t, um, have a tissue or something in that bag of yours, do you?” he asks shyly, looking like he’d appreciate if the field experienced a sudden, localized sinkhole.

“Oh!” She pops up, grasping blindly for where she dropped her purse. “Yes! Here. I, um, also have hand sanitizer.”

Obi lets out a weak laugh as he takes the packet from her. “It’s not that much of a--” he hisses-- “mess, god damn.”

She dares a glance over her shoulder, mouth dry as she watches his back work. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, just-- sensitive.” He casts a shy glance over his shoulder, before letting it skitter away. “It was just...really good.”

“Oh.” That is really not helping with her whole...situation. Especially now that she can see where her panties are, an arm’s length away on the grass, and she’s reminded that there’s nothing beneath her dress, that she could easily lay back and-- “Oh.”

“Yeah.” His zipper is loud in the silence, enough that she feels her own blush bloom on her cheeks. He lets out a sigh, scrubbing a hand down his face. “You know, I think it’s good you have your dickphobia, kid.”

That’s...definitely not what she’d though he’d say after all...this. “Oh?”

“Yeah.” He lays down next to her, hands raising up to grasp her by the shoulders and guide her down beside him, ear pressed firmly to his chest. His heart is beating loud, strong, and triple time. “If that’s what it’s like with you just being here, I don’t know if...” He coughs, squirming. “I’m not sure I’m ready to have sex either. With you.”

She shrinks. Of course, of course. “Oh...”

“No, no! That’s not--” he pulls back to look at her, so serious-- “I want to. I want to so bad. But, I just mean...”

He lets out a sigh, head hitting the ground with a thunk. “I’ve never done any of this with, you know, feelings too. It’s just been...stuff. That I did. To feel good. But now...”

He bites his lip, and it’s terrible how it only makes her want to kiss it, to take it into her mouth and sooth away the sting. “Like, my dick wants to have sex, all the way, all the time. Everything about you does it for me, and I just...” He lets out a frustrated groan. “I think that my...my heart...”

He presses a hand there, brows furrowed, like he’s not used to thinking about it. “Never mind.”

“No, I...” She lays a hand over his, squeezing it. “I get it.”

“It’s just that...” He takes a breath, clears his throat, and looks at her with eyes as warm as honey. “You’re not casual for me, Shirayuki.”

She can feel the smile on her face, almost too big to contain, and she leans down, pressing a kiss to his lips. “Good,” she breathes, curling fingers into his hair. “You’re not casual for me either.”

[chemicallycurious]

Father’s Day Time Lapse

The phone rang forever, the buzzing reaching out into infinity. There was sun on the grass as he looked out the window on a still life, the breeze seeming to slow so that the leaves on the tree closest to their side of the flat shifted against the air in a motion too slowed to be lazy, the type of pause in the world that Ulysses had experienced several times in his life. They were never good moments. While the entire universe might jog in place for a second on a particular kiss, it didn’t stop the air in his lungs the way anxiety-ridden moments like this did, didn’t halt the entirety of life the way fear and bad break-ups did.

The second before his father picked up the phone hung frozen like the second before someone telling him they weren’t in love with him anymore.

“Hello?”

Words dried up and Ulysses stared at a leaf that caught the sun. The universe had to catch up now; he took a sharp breath as the leaf shook in the afternoon breeze on the other side of the glass.

“Hi, Dad.” His own pause. “It’s Ulysses.”

In the sudden quiet on the other end of the phone, he became aware of the sounds on his. The antique clock ticked patiently, reminding him that time passed and that, yes, he had remembered to wind it up before bed last night.

“Hello there, son. Everything alright in London?” His father’s voice wasn’t cold, but it was slightly awkward, as though he didn’t know what to ask his son, as though his gay son didn’t talk about life, work, or weather as much as anyone else did. Or maybe he was worried about the answers to every question reminding him of his son’s flaw, something that wouldn’t be a flaw had he been a character in an ancient poem.

“Yeah, yeah! Everything’s greened up and somewhat warm. Busy days...I...we went to a kebab place the other night, new place. Ate at a little table that was set up outside, even though it was evening.” Ulysses felt the babbling beginning and swallowed, reaching for the glass of water he’d set on the kitchen counter for just such a moment. A pacing mechanism.

“Well, you’re one for finding good food, that’s a fact.” Another awkward pause. Ulysses rushed to fill it, water glass unsipped in hand.

“Mum called me. This week. She said you’d both been wanting to meet Cas.” Now he stopped and left a little space. His father left it also, so he continued. “My son.”

“My grandson.” There was something that sounded like pride, or surprise, or confusion, and Ulysses guessed that it was probably all three. Bryns were not good at feeling one emotion at a time. “You...thinking of visiting Cardiff?”

Ulysses felt the uncomfortable wording, the way his father didn’t refer to his birthplace as ‘home.’ It wasn’t coming home, it was visiting. He was right.

“Yeah, Mum said that in a few weeks, it would be a good time for Cas and Nathan and I to come.” The words all rushed together, making their little family unit one word by linguistically smashing them into something that must be taken together or not at all.

“Yeah...yeah, I suppose it would be.” His father’s voice hadn’t really changed tone, and Ulysses wondered for a painful moment if Owen even knew who Nathan was, if that name rang up anything specific in his head or if he just assumed one of a long line of men his son had disappointed him with. “So we’ll expect you then. It’s been quite a long time since we’ve had a baby in the house.” Ulysses was an only child, and really, they’d likely despaired of grandchildren. Was this the trade? Ulysses had some worth since he’d managed to provide another Bryn? Was it enough of a trade to make Nathan accepted too? Two for one, such a heavy burden to lay on baby shoulders.

“Well, he’s moving around pretty quickly, so it’s a bit like having a puppy underfoot who babbles things at you that he expects you to understand.” Ulysses’ heard his own laughter in his ears, the nervousness in it. He didn’t expect to hear it echoed on the other end of the line. His father’s laughter seemed surprised by its own existence.

“Ah, you were like that too. Giving us lectures before you were properly even calling us ‘da’ and ‘ma,’” Owen said, as though he’d forgotten not to be fond of his only child. His chuckle died away quickly, but Ulysses’ smile lingered. “So it’s your first Father’s Day then. Congratulations.”

“Oh...yeah. Yeah, I was calling to wish a happy one to you.” Even if I’m a disappointment, even if you feel that I was a waste of a good name, his mind continued. “I’ll see you soon though, alright, Dad? I’ll ring up Mum with the dates and all.”

“Yeah, yeah, she’s better with all that.” The awkwardness had returned, even though that leaf outside trembled on the branch. Ulysses took a quick sip of water and waited for his own time to catch up. “We’ll be talking soon then. Take care. Say hello to that boyo for his grandad.”

“Will do. Bye, Dad.”

“Goodbye, son.”

The click, the disconnect, the silence. Ulysses exhaled as he set his phone down on the counter, watching the leaf seem to move with his breath. Had that gone well? Had it gone badly? No one had yelled, he hadn’t cried, the word ‘disappointment’ hadn’t even come up. That seemed...good.

In the front room, he heard the piercing squeal of Cas’ happy laughter, and instinct turned him toward the hallway. Nathan’s laughter followed and drew him away from the window, away from his phone, away from the glass of water meant to keep him in check.

There was nothing Cas could do that would disappoint him. There would never be a time Cas could only call him, or only call Nathan, to pass news like it was spy intel. Hands tucked into his back pockets, Ulysses walked in to Nathan sitting cross-legged on the floor with Cas in his lap, weaving cats’ cradle between his fingers with rainbow-dyed yarn while the baby plucked at the strings and laughed at Nathan’s animal noises.

Fatherhood meant second chances, or new beginnings, or whatever it was supposed to mean. Maybe it was just a weak sort of plaster over old wounds, and then drinking to make you forget about the pain. Ulysses leaned over to kiss the top of Nathan’s head, smiling at him when he looked up.  Nathan’s expression was cautiously optimistic, though his fringe had grown in long enough to hide the exact tilt of his eyebrows. Ulysses pushed his dark hair off his forehead in a gesture that was practiced even upside down.

“How did it go?” Nathan glanced down quickly when Cas grabbed a fistful of yarn, but it kept him occupied. He looked up again.

“Not too bad. I guess our trip to Wales is still on.” Ulysses took a deep breath and leaned in to kiss his boyfriend’s mouth. Upside down. Spider-man style. He didn’t mention that detail because it would have been lost on Nathan anyway. God, he loved this man. “Oh, happy Father’s Day to you too, Rachmaninoff.”

“To me? Oh, but I-”

“Hmm? You try reasoning it out with that little man; when he believes it, then you can come try to convince me.” Ulysses felt time melt when Nathan smiled at him; it didn’t even bother to pause. “I need to jump in the shower. Have you got him?”

“Yeah, yeah, I have.” Nathan was still smiling, so time was probably still melting, Ulysses thought. He grinned back. Maybe this trip wouldn’t be hell after all. This time, he wouldn’t be going alone. “Go on!”

“I’m going, I’m going!” Ulysses laughed as he headed back to their bedroom. Hopefully he wouldn’t be alone for a long time.

[anakinsbugs]

The Blogfather

New Post has been published on https://walrusvideo.com/the-blogfather/

The Blogfather

He wasn’t an Arsenal fan, but he was at the 1971 FA Cup final. I wasn’t born yet (I didn’t arrive until September of that double winning year), but he saw Charlie George score that winner and lie flat on his back on the Wembley turf to celebrate.

Like so many of his generation, he came to England from Ireland to find work in the late 1950s, and I’m sure my love of football came from him. There was always a ball, always a kick-around in the garden, or on the front lawn of the castle we lived in for a while (honestly, it was a castle).

Back then you could just go to a football match. Rock up on a Saturday, and pay your way into the ground depending on who was at home. He lived and worked in West London, and nominally he was a Fulham fan. He loved Johnny Haynes, but he was a huge admirer of Jimmy Greaves too. He liked players who could do things with both feet, and he went to matches all over the city, just because he could.

Some of my earliest memories are of him playing football. He started life as a forward (like my brother), but by the time I came along and he was togging out for the village team in Bishopthorpe (near York), he’d moved back to centre-half (where I played my whole life). I’d stand on the sidelines with my mam. I don’t remember the games or the performances, just the fact that I was there and so was he.

..

He was pretty strict when we were young. I think it was because he had very clear ideas about what young men should and shouldn’t do. They should look smart, for example, and definitely not wear jeans. They really shouldn’t watch Grange Hill, because those children were basically juvenile delinquents and didn’t respect figures of authority sufficiently.

He worked a lot though, so it was often drive-by stuff. He spent most his working life in the hospitality industry – bars, restaurants, hotels. Long hours, late nights.

Once, in the back garden, I was winding my brother up, as big brothers do. He reached breaking point and unleashed a wave of expletives that would have made a sailor blush. Dad, probably trying to get a bit of rest upstairs, heard everything, stuck his head out the bedroom window and it was the most trouble any little boy has ever been in before or since. I felt bad, and I bought Tim some Cadbury’s Creme Eggs to say sorry.

..

In 1996 he was away on a golf trip in Spain and fell ill. Cardiomyopathy. The prognosis was not good. He needed a heart transplant. In the mists of time it feels like it happened quickly, but it didn’t. He spent months and months gravely unwell, in and out of hospital, but in the end they took his actual heart out and put someone else’s in.

It’s basically a miracle, isn’t it?

When you think about it, it’s absolutely crazy, but as I said at his eulogy, it changed his life and it saved his life. He became a fierce advocate for organ donation. He helped found the Irish Heart and Lung Transplant Association, and he went onto to chair the European Heart and Lung Transplant Federation. He wanted to ensure as many people as possible could benefit from the incredible medical advancements, and the work carried out by doctors and transplant teams.

As you might imagine, that kind of thing gives you a new perspective on life. He was certainly mellower post-transplant, but it coincided with us reaching a stage of adult life where your relationship with your parents changes anyway. We did a lot of stuff together. Golf, pints, dinners, holidays, even the Arsenal.

I don’t know if the trip we took to London was specifically to see a game, or if it coincided with something else, but he came with me to the Emirates to see us play in the Champions League. We played PSV and a late goal from on-loan Chelsea defender Alex saw us crash out. Not exactly a stellar night on the pitch, but it was still a good one off it. We had post-game pints in The Tollington, he met many of the Arseblog crew, and he often talked about how much he enjoyed it.

He loved Arseblog and what it became. He’d read most days. He’d say ‘Some of those chaps on the Arses are a bit fruity, aren’t they?!’.  He even listened to a podcast, impressed and somewhat astonished with how often, and with such variation, Ian Wright said my name.

..

He hadn’t been well for a couple of weeks. I took him to the doctors on February 1st. She told me she was worried about his kidneys. Years of anti-rejection and immuno-suppressant drugs take their toll. Blood test results came back that afternoon. He needed to be in hospital.

I remember him waving to us from the ambulance before it pulled away, his big overcoat pulled tightly around him on a cold evening. Over the next couple of weeks he was treated for the infection, he was getting there, but slowly.

On Monday February 15th I got a phone call from a doctor. He’d been unwell, so they ran more tests. One of them was for Covid-19. It came back positive. We spent a year doing everything we could to keep him safe during the pandemic, and somehow he picked it up in the Coronary Care Unit of a hospital.

Yet over the next week, he didn’t really develop any of the major symptoms. On Monday February 22nd he called from his bed, we spoke about him coming home. He couldn’t wait to get back to his chair, in front of the fire, to watch golf and CNN. We wondered how strong he’d be, what care he might need. How we might have to adapt the house. Downstairs bedroom, stairlift, that kind of thing.

Then … day 10. Covid hit.

Did you ever get winded? It’s scary, isn’t it? Those few seconds where you can’t catch your breath. Imagine that all the time. He needed oxygen, then more oxygen, then all the oxygen it’s possible to give someone.

We were lucky in that we were allowed in to see him. We got to talk to him. That will always be a comfort, but seeing your dad on his own in a six bed ward, surrounded by and attached to machines, struggling to breathe is brutal. You want to help somehow, but you can’t.

We were clad in so much PPE, gown, masks, goggles, gloves, that he thought we were doctors at first. Maybe that’s why he told ‘them’ he didn’t want to die in hospital.

He died in hospital … in the early hours of March 2nd.

He’d been through so much. The heart transplant, he beat a lung cancer situation, he had an ongoing prostate cancer situation, but he couldn’t beat this. He was 84 and he’d lived a good life, but it doesn’t make it any easier to see someone you love die like that.

I’m not going to preach to anyone, but I can only urge you to be cautious. I know we’re all fed up with restrictions and life being the way it is. I know there is light at the end of the tunnel as vaccines are being rolled out, but this virus is still out there and it’s still dangerous. The most vulnerable among us are still loved and cherished family members and friends. Please don’t lose sight of that amid frustration, we all have a responsibility to each other. Someone’s age or their underlying condition doesn’t make them expendable.

Be careful. Look after each other. Each one of those statistics released daily is a real person, with many more left behind. Wash your hands. Wear a mask – at worst it’s a mild inconvenience, at best it saves lives, maybe even your own. Get the vaccine when you can.

My daughter, who I haven’t seen in person for over a year now, couldn’t get home for her grandad’s funeral. The funeral at which only ten people were allowed. That’s not how we do things in Ireland. There was no wake, no telling of stories about the one just gone. The laughs you have at events like that seem incongruous to the situation, but they’re a big part of how get through it.

Like so many other families over this last 12 months, we were apart at a time when we needed to be together. Just a couple of weeks previously my big cousin Adrian, a Gooner and only a few years older than I am, was taken by Covid too. He wasn’t elderly, he wasn’t high risk. I had to ring my dad in hospital and tell him, and while the staff in there were so lovely, he had nobody to share that grief with in person.

The support mechanisms we have in place to cope with things like this aren’t there any more. There are very obvious impacts of Covid on our lives, but there are malingering ones which I don’t think we’ll come to understand for some time yet.

..

Whatever nurses are paid, they deserve twice that, and more. They are amazing. They don’t need to be clapped, they need to be paid properly. You might not need them now, so perhaps they don’t register, but there will come a time when you will, and they will be amazing for you and your family too.

They shouldn’t have to fight for the compensation they deserve. We should be fighting for them. We should be angry on their behalf. Fight for healthcare.

Pay them properly.

..

My dad was an amazing man. Really funny, kind, generous, a good person who was the linchpin of our family, and we’re going to miss him terribly. He was well cool too, I mean, look at that 1960s shades/rollneck action he had going on.

I’m experiencing a lot of emotions right now, and it’s going to take some time to process, as they say. Today though, I just want to remember him in a positive way. A man who had a huge influence on who am I, someone who – when I think of him – makes me smile.

It’s absolutely shit he’s not going to be around anymore, and the circumstances of his passing were deeply unpleasant. It’s been a really rough few weeks, to be honest. However, he gave me the strength to get through this, and on this Arsenal blog I’m gonna take the owner’s privilege and set myself up with a tap-in to finish.

Love you Dad, and as a wise man once said, you were f*ckin’ excellent.

The post The Blogfather appeared first on Arseblog … an Arsenal blog.

The Article The Blogfather First Appeared ON : https://arsenalweb.co.uk

The Article The Blogfather First Appeared ON : https://gqcentral.co.uk

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Go to Source Author: Goldie

[tenroseforeverandever]

Dear Father Christmas... Chapter 10: December 24, 2025

MASTERPOST

Characters:  Tentoo; Rose Tyler; Jackie Tyler; Pete Tyler; Tony Tyler; OC Hope Tyler-Noble; OC Charlotte Tyler-Noble; OC Wilfred Tyler-Noble

Rated: Teen

Tags: Family!Fic; Kid!Fic; Pete’s World; Letters to Santa; Christmas Fic; Family; Fluff; Hurt/Comfort; Angst; Romance; Love; gun violence; violence resulting in death; life-threatening injury; life threatening situations

Summary: When Rose Tyler was little, she always wrote a Christmas wish list to Father Christmas. As she grew older, the wish list became more of a letter to someone she could confide in once a year, but she fell out of the habit somewhere along the way. Now, as a new mum, celebrating her daughter’s first Christmas, Rose takes up writing her Christmas letter to Father Christmas once again.

Rose’s Christmas letters are excerpts from her life with her beloved Tentoo and their children in Pete’s World, written once a year, for each of 31 years.

Chapter Summary: For Rose Tyler, Defender of the Earth, there’s nothing quite like the adventure of saving the world, until one Christmas, the adventure becomes far too dangerous and puts Rose’s life in jeopardy. 

Notes: Trigger warning for serious, life-threatening situations, violence, life-threatening injury, and violence resulting in death.

My darling betas, @rose–nebula and mrsbertucci. How can I possibly thank you enough? I appreciate all that you do. You are wonderful!

Thanks to @doctorroseprompts for their 31 Days of Ficmas prompts. A reminder that I am using the prompts very much out of order, but I intend to use them all. The prompt I used today was Family.

Also read at: AO3; FF.net; Teaspoon

December 24th, 2025

Dear Father Christmas,

Rose Tyler, Defender of the Earth. That’s me! (Somehow it always sounds grander when the Doctor says it, though.)

It’s been so brilliant this past year to get back out in the field and feel like I’m making a difference. There’s nothing quite like that feeling of saving the world. Yeah, the Doctor and I have our TARDIS, and we go travelling all around the universe on the weekends, visiting all sorts of places and times with Hope, Charlie, and Wilfred. But it isn’t quite like it used to be when it was just the Doctor and me, yeah, living by the seats of our pants, leaping from one adventure to the next.

Don’t get me wrong. It’s still an adventure! Especially getting to watch the brood learn about all of space and time. When the time comes, the TARDIS will be theirs to inherit, and they need to be armed with all the knowledge they can possibly cram into those bigger-on-the-inside brains of theirs. It’s just… I know it sounds mental, but I miss the danger; the adrenaline rush; that thrill that comes of well… saving the Universe and barely escaping with your own life.

It’s strange really, because, of the two of us, you’d think it would be the Doctor who was missing experiencing that high. But it turns out he’s really enjoying tinkering and experimenting at Torchwood for the time being, and he’s so involved with the kids’ educations. Sometimes he comes on missions with me (those are the best missions, running with his hand in mine!) and the kids stay with their Gran and Grandad, but he’s mostly content to do the school run and go to work at Torchwood, these days.

I think a big part of it is him wanting to make sure that at least one of us is safe at all times. I get that. This spring, a laser from a skittish, crash-landed Jumjumut grazed my left shoulder as I was diving for cover. It hit very close to my heart. We actually lost one of our operatives on that mission, before we had a chance to subdue the alien. Isabel Stokes was a good woman, single mum of two. Fortunately, her parents were able to step in and look after her babies, but it really struck home: my job can sometimes be very dangerous.

The Doctor held onto me really tight when I got home the next night. He made love to me like he was etching the memories in his mind. Maybe he was. He never asked me not to return to work though, but in the morning, he passed me my travel mug of coffee and told me he loved me. Then he told me to come home safe. What could I say to that? I just kissed him and whispered in his ear, “I’m never going to leave you.”

That’s become our morning ritual since that day.

On my birthday, this year, he gifted me with my very own sonic. A gorgeous sonic wristwatch, programmed with all the settings of his screwdriver. He said it would make him feel better knowing I had it at my disposal, because you never know… I guess if he couldn’t be there himself, a sonic he had crafted was the next best thing.

Life’s been busy. Most of the missions weren’t dangerous at all. They weren’t even proper missions at all. A lot of the time, I was just checking in with pensioners who thought they’d seen a UFO. We had to follow up, of course, because you never know. Usually, though, it was the things hidden in plain view we had to watch out for. Tracking those babies down sometime took days. There were times when I had to miss some of our excursions on the TARDIS, which broke my heart, but the Doctor managed on his own with the brood.

But I had never yet missed an important occasion: I had made it home for birthdays anniversaries, concerts, recitals, holidays, the whole bit. I even booked a month off to spend summer hols winging through space and time with the loves of my life.

But here I am, Christmas Eve, stuck on a stakeout in Cape Town waiting for some well-known alien arms smugglers, the Dintashi, to try to make a deal with a rebel group of Sontarans who have been hiding out on Earth for the last month. They’d thought Earth was a dead-end planet with limited knowledge of extraterrestrial life, and for the most part, they were right. They liked it for its extensive communications networks, though: easy to tap into. Also, easy for us to trace once we figured out what we were looking for. They’d underestimated Torchwood and we’ve been watching, waiting for this deal to go down.

Unfortunately, I drew the short straw for the week over the Christmas period. I’m scheduled to be here five more days, which means, if I’m very lucky, I’ll be home in time to ring in the New Year at the Annual Vitex New Year’s Gala.

I have to tell you Santa, stakeouts are mind-numbingly dull. We know something is going to happen soon. It’s just coordinating terrestrial and extraterrestrial calendars can be a bit dodgy sometimes so, a lot of the time we have to wait, and play it by ear.

Me and my partner, Arjun Sreeram have worked together on loads of cases. We train together, so we know each other pretty well. We’re camped out in a vacant flat across the street from the Sontarans’ building. He’s just gone out for a coffee run, and I’m sitting here by the window dictating this diary. I have to keep this thing private, though. I’d never hear the end of it if Arjun ever found out I still write to Santa every year. Oh, I see him. He’s coming back. I gotta go!

--ooOoo--

December 30, 2021

Hi Santa, I’m back. I hope you didn’t think I’d forgotten or something. I just didn’t get a chance to finish my story until now. Hope you had a happy Christmas!

Where did I leave off? Right, I was waiting for Arjun to come back to our flat. It took him a bloody long time to come up the stairs, and by the time he got there, I was famished, hungry enough to down the lukewarm coffee and rather disgusting egg salad sandwich he brought me in a few gulps (better that way, anyway, so I could barely taste it.)

Right then, I got a ping on my mobile. It was the Doctor. Arjun said he’d be fine doing surveillance if I wanted to take the call. The best part was it wasn’t just a call! It was a videochat! From Yultidia, nonetheless! The kids and the Doctor were at the top of the snowtubing hill. They were just about to go down and had wanted me to join them very badly. They decided if I couldn’t be there in person, I could at least be there virtually. The Doctor shouted “Allons-y, Rose Tyler,” and we were off down the hill. It was wonderful to hear their shrill, little voices, screeching in delight, and see the big grins on all their faces as they went careening down the hill, but it was all I could do to hold back my tears. I wanted to be there with them more than anything!

“We’ll call back later,” the Doctor told me, “to say goodnight.” And then he said, “Rose Tyler−” And the line went dead.

I tried really hard not to dwell on the memories that that unfinished sentence dredged up, because I knew exactly what the call cutting out meant: something was about to go down.

Arjun argued with me. I told him to shut it and just keep an eye on things. Any people walking by, cars moving. Anything. Even a stray animal. He kept insisting he saw nothing amiss, no sign of a transmat anywhere in the vicinity. But I knew. I’d sonicked my mobile so it would drop everything at any sign of a transmat within a 50 kilometre radius. And that’s just what happened.

I don’t know why I did it (some instinct niggling in the back of my mind, I guess, that prickle of suspicion you just can’t ignore) but I surreptitiously peered out over Arjun’s shoulder just as two lean bodies slipped into the shadows around the side of the Sontarans’ building. It was the Dintashi, I was sure of it, even though they looked perfectly human. The Dintashi were well known for using Shimmers. Arjun had to have noticed, and he hadn’t bothered to tell me. Something was very, very wrong.

I confronted him, and he got this really scary look on his face. Accused me of messing things up for him, saying that I should have just kept my nose out of it. He even pointed his gun at me. I didn’t really have time for his crap, to be honest. I needed to catch the two the Dintashi and the Sontarans across the street. But now, I realized, I had absolutely no back up.

We had two other operatives in the flat below, but there’d been no communication from them since Arjun had come back from the coffee run… And then it clicked. It had taken him an awful long time to come up the stairs... I had to assume he had subdued them, and now I didn’t know if they were alive, dead, or incapacitated, or maybe even  involved in this scam somehow. Whatever the case, they certainly weren’t going to be around to help me.

Arjun aimed the gun at my head. I was so frightened, Santa! I just kept the images of my laughing children and husband replaying in my mind as I moved toward him. If this turned out to be the last thing I would ever do, I wanted that to be my final thought. Them. Always them. Only them. Forever.

Sorry, Santa. Give me a mo’. I’m crying again. I promised I wouldn’t do that…

Anyway, so he’s pointing the gun at my head, and I knew I had to do something unexpected. Arjun knows the way I fight. But there was one thing he wouldn’t be expecting. I activated my sonic, and pointed it at him. It shone an incredibly strong light in his eyes, temporarily blinding him. While he was reeling from that, I knocked him out cold with a solid lead punch right to the side of his neck, just behind his ear, and once he was down, I kicked the gun from his hand.

Of course, I confiscated all his weapons, but I just left him there, unconscious, ‘cause frankly, I needed to focus on apprehending the Dintashi and Sontarans. I called Dad as I ran down the stairs. Told him to mobilize anything in the area. But he said it would be a while before anyone could get to me. They were all a few kilometres out. He also ordered me to wait before engaging. Well, I’ve never been one to follow orders and if I didn’t act, the weapons exchange would go down, unhindered, and then where would we be? Earth would be getting a reputation for being a place for holding these sorts of transactions. It was dangerous and needed to be nipped in the bud.

Still, as much as I wanted to go in there and take them all down, myself, I do have a bit of common sense. I’m pretty good at my job. I can be tough and have good combat skills. Dad wouldn’t have given me the position of Field Commander if I hadn’t been good. But that also means I know when I’m in over my head. This was one of those times. I might have been able to handle just the Dintashi, but the Sontarans were another matter.

But I wasn’t just going to let this go. And there was only one person I could call on who I knew could help me, and be here right away. My Doctor.

I quietly snuck into the room where the aliens were negotiating the details of their transaction (they weren’t that hard to find with my sonic), and sent the Doctor a signal from there so he could easily lock onto it. They heard it, of course, and turned to face me. One of the Sontarans shouted at the Dintashi something along the lines of “…you assured us we wouldn’t be interrupted…” He had his rifle pointed at the arms dealers who looked like they were making to transmat out of there. I shouted for them to stop. They couldn’t escape now! Then, before I could react, another of the Sontarans fired at me with his disruptor rifle.

Unprepared, I went down. All I remember is the disruptor blast cutting across my torso, dropping me, and everything started to go black. I could just make out the sound of the TARDIS, and in my mind, I clung to my vision of the laughing faces of my family, smiling at me.

The next couple of days were hazy. I kept trying to fight out of the darkness but it kept sucking me back under, and always before it did, I would see my  family grinning at me as they snowtubed in Yultidia. I didn’t know why, but I just knew I had to hold on to that image.

Then I remember seeing the Doctor. It was only for a second. The lights were so bright and he was all back lit with spiky hair and his face in dark shadow, but I could see his eyes. They were full of the aftermath of the Oncoming Storm: so unsettled and sad. I was falling under again, the darkness claiming me, and suddenly his hand grabbed mine and his thoughts washed through me. I love you. Come home safe.

And I told him I’d never leave him.

I finally woke up properly yesterday in the medical facilities at Torchwood. I’d missed Christmas entirely, and ruined it for my family. They were all staying on cots in empty rooms nearby. They’d decorated my room with a tree and garland (even some of that garish stuff from Yultidia!) All the presents were tucked under the tree. No one had opened even one. I feel so guilty about that.

We’re going to open them tonight, though. I wasn’t up to it yesterday, but I’m feeling a bit better today. Turns out the disruptor broke several of my ribs and sliced open my abdomen. My intestines had to be stitched back together, but the doctors couldn’t do much for my uterus. They did a hysterectomy, saving as much as they could. We hadn’t been planning on having more babies, but now that the choice has been taken away from me, I feel a bit empty. I was told I had been very lucky that no other major organs were involved, though. So I’ll just have to keep focussing on that.

The Doctor had taken the Sontarans and the Dintashi to Torchwood for questioning and to be kept in detention there. The Dintashi, not unexpectedly, have a ship close by and a contingent is expected to arrive to negotiate for the release of the prisoners. Being a rogue faction, the Sontarans are on their own. Back in the Prime Universe, the Doctor would have handed them directly to the Shadow Proclamation, but he hasn’t done much research into that organization’s presence in this universe, yet. Until he does, the Sontarans will remain prisoners of Torchwood. Arjun is in lock up. He’ll probably be retconned after a thorough interrogation.  The other operatives he (thankfully) only incapacitated are back home, recovering with their families.

As for being Defender of the Earth… I think I’ll be quite happy to lead a quieter life for a while, not that I’ll have much of a choice until I’m properly healed up, which could take some time. Anyway, the title doesn’t seem so grand anymore, even from the Doctor’s lips. For now, the greatest adventure I want to have is spending time with my family, and always holding onto each memory as though it’s going to be my last.

Until next year, Santa. I hope Mrs. Claus and your family of elves and reindeer have a safe, happy, and healthy year.

love, Rose

[myselfinserts]

“And it was easy, because you see the real me.”

Elspie was a strange little island. It snowed on and off through the entire year. You never knew when it’d hit. It could last a week, or just an afternoon. 

That was one of the things Ceri loved about the place. 

It was rather fortunate, then, that it was one of those snowy spells that he’d gotten an invite out for coffee from a long lost friend. 

Okay, he thought. Friend was a little too cold of a way to refer to Skylar.

He hadn’t heard from him in years. And now Ceri had a chance to have coffee from him again. While he didn’t feel comfortable leaving Luci alone at the pub, he needed the break. 

So he decided to go meet up with his old flame at their favorite spot.

“Ceri? Ceri!!!”

“Ceri, are you okay?”

Ceri let out a gentle chuckle as Skylar helped him up. The ice patches were harder to see with the sky as glassy as it was. But he didn’t mind. Everything looked like crystals. The world was clear. 

For once, he felt peaceful. 

“I’m okay, Sky,” he assured. “Just a slip is all.”

“You sure?” Skylar asked. “You didn’t hit your head or anything, did you?”

Ceri chuckled. “No, just my ass. Then again, you did that a lot too, so-”

Skylar’s face went pink. “Ceri! We’re in public!”

“And we’re the only ones here.”

“I suppose...But still!” 

The two sat beside the fountain, holding their coffees close as they watched the clouds pass by overhead. An arm around Ceri’s shoulders. A head resting on Sky’s. The cold seemed far away. 

Ceri wished this moment could last forever. 

“Do you really have to go?” he asked softly. 

“It’s the job of a lifetime,” Skylar sighed. “I can’t just pass it up. I’m a hero afterall.”

“I know...”

Skylar looked at him, blue eyes soft with longing. “It’s not like we’ll never see each other again. I’ll be back to visit grandad and my office is located in Nesta. So I’ll be coming back.”

“But not for three years at least...”

“Yeah...that’s true...”

Ceri hated being so needy. So weak. So scared. But Skylar made him feel safe. He was the light that made him get up in the morning on his worst days. He couldn’t handle him leaving, let alone with the dread of possibly never coming back. 

But he had to let go.

“I’m really proud of you, you know,” he said. “You’ve been working toward this all your life...it’s admirable...”

Skylar smiled, pressing a tender kiss to his forehead. “I wouldn’t have gotten this far if it hadn’t been for your encouragement. You bring out the best in me.”

Oh god, why does he have to be so perfect?

“You know I can’t wait forever...”

“I’m not asking you to.”

“But-”

“Ceri.” Skylar set down his drink and tilted Ceri’s chin so they were facing eye to eye. “As much as I love you, I’m not going to force you to wait. I’d rather we end on a high note and with you finding happiness. That we avoid that cruel future where you wait for me and I never return.”

“What if I wanted to wait?”

“I’d still say find another future. Find another light beyond the sky.”

“...and if I didn’t want to?”

Skylar shrugged. “What you want and what will make you happy can be very different...but if waiting for me is what will make you happy, I won’t stop you...” He pressed their foreheads together, closing his eyes. “I just don’t want to leave you with some vain hope...you’ve suffered so much...you deserve the freedom that comes with not being held back by someone like me...”

Ceri reached up, gently caressing his face. “You don’t hold me back. You’ve pushed me forward.”

“...then keep pushing forward. And if by some miracle we’ve both reunited and nothing changes...we’ll see...Does that sound fair?”

He hesitated. He didn’t like uncertainties. He wished he could see what the stats said about them. If it was meant to be. But he knew that even if he could see it, he’d be too afraid of the results. 

Either way it wasn’t-

“Sounds fair to me.”

The two finished their drinks in silence and continued away from the park. Ceri began to shiver slightly, and Skylar offered his scarf. Once again, he declined. 

“Purple isn’t a color for people like me,” protested Ceri. “It’s meant for royal individuals like yourself.

“You look good in purple,” Skylar insisted. “You’re more royal than anyone else I know.”

“Well, you must not know many people then.”

“That’ll change soon.”

“I know. But until we both change, I’m afraid purple is off the table for me.”

When Ceri arrived at the park, Skylar was already there with their coffee. He didn’t look like he aged a day. His wavy hair was still as shiny as ever, his eyes the purest blue. And his face was still pink from the cold. The only difference was he wore a coat this time. 

Okay, just relax Ceri. This is just like before. Just two friends having coffee. Just talking. No need to feel all guilty and stuff. Just relax and don’t let yourself be a big embarrassment. 

Not two steps over and he slipped on some ice.

Yep, he thought. Just like before.

“Ceri? Ceri!!!” Skylar set down the drinks and came over to help him up, smiling brightly. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” Ceri assured. “Just a pain in my ass...Wait, what’s with that look?”

“The scarf.”

“What about it?”

“Ceri Aylward wearing purple. I guess we’ve both changed.”

“You don’t look like you have.”

“Says the man who hasn’t seen the new scars.”

“Don’t talk to me about scars.”

The two of them laughed as the snow continued to fall. They sat down at the fountain, holding their drinks close. An arm around Ceri’s shoulders. A head on Skylars. Not even two minutes and they’d fallen back into their old rhythms. 

“It’s like nothing’s changed,” Skylar said softly.

“Yeah,” Ceri muttered. “It’s the same as before...”

It was the same.

But it felt...wrong.

“I’ll be moving back to Nesta soon,” Skylar explained. “I wanted you to be the first to know.”

Ceri smiled. “I appreciate it...”

Skylar glanced at him, eyes soft. “What have you been up to since I left, anyway? Had any exciting adventures without me?”

“You could say that.”

“Care to tell me about them?”

“Swing by the pub and you’ll hear all about them.”

“...Or you could tell me about them back at my flat...”

Ceri smiled, gently pulling himself away. “You didn’t just ask me for drinks because you missed me...you wanted to see if I had moved on.”

Skylar let out a soft chuckle. “It was that obvious?”

“Don’t need Compatibilia to see your heart, Sky. You wear it on your sleeve.” Ceri took a long sip of his drink. “It’s one of the things I loved most about you. You were so genuine it let me be myself. And it was easy, because you see the real me.”

Skylar watched him quietly. Ceri could tell what he was thinking even without digging through his memories. 

“If I ask you if you’d be interested in going steady again, would you be interested?”

There it was.

“I don’t know,” Ceri admitted. “Right now...my heart is a little heavy. Like the Icarus I am, I flew a bit too close to the sun and it left a nasty burn on my wings.”

He watched his old lover carefully. His smile was still warm and inviting. Still genuine. And the gleam in his eyes was calm, almost relaxed. 

But the kind of relaxed you were when you knew it was over. 

“So it’s a no then?”

“May I have a day to think about it?”

Defeat flicked to hope. “As much time as you need.”

They finished their drinks and parted ways. Ceri opted to take the long way back to his pub and enjoy the snowy hillside. He felt horrible. Both he and Sky knew what the answer would be. Ceri loved him once. And it was one of the strongest loves he’d ever known in his soul. But like Skylar had wanted, Ceri had moved on. And though the fact that they were no longer together hung over him, it didn’t break him in the way Sky’s leaving did. 

No, this was something deeper. More unbearable. More pleasant. More bitter. More sweet. 

Something stronger and truer than he’d ever known. Something more hopeless.

Beep! Beep!

Without even breaking pace, Ceri pulled out his phone. A single text from R.A.I.N.E.E.

“Master Renegade and Master Allard are having dinner together tonight.”

Ceri smiled. 

Maybe there was hope left in the world after all.

[ofstormsandwolves]

Arkytior Flowers

Written for @legendslikestardust‘s fluffuary bingo square ‘Flower Shop AU’. I’d been planning on writing something like this for a while, but my initial idea was with 10, and it didn’t seem to be working.

Ninth Doctor, Rose Tyler, Donna Noble, Wilfred Mott.

All the answers to John Noble's problems might just have walked through the door of his sister Donna's flower shop, in the form of one Rose Tyler.

AO3 | Whofic

John Noble was grumbling behind the counter, his brooding frame ironically surrounded by cheerful sunflowers and daisies as he sulked.

“Oh, cheer up,” his sister Donna complained, slapping him on the arm as she passed him on her way to the stock room, “you’ll stare the customers off.” She disappeared into the stock room, before returning only a few moments later with a large block of oasis and carried it to the far end of the counter where she started work on the new window displays. “And can’t you take that leather jacket off? You look like a bloody bouncer. No wonder no one comes in here when you’re manning the shop.”

“Don’t let me man the shop then,” John suggested, before flashing his sister a sarcastic smile.

From the other side of the room, an elderly gentleman wearing a red knitted hat sighed.

“Do you two have to squabble all the time? You were thick as thieves when you were younger,” he reminded them, dropping his newspaper on the other end of the counter.

“Maybe we still would, Gramps, but this one seems to be entering the sulking world championships,” Donna groused, giving another look at her brother.

“You would too if you still lived with Mum.” John folded his arms across his chest.

Donna gave him a look. “Yeah, well, if you don’t start shifting flowers, I just might do. Even with Shaun working flat out, we’re not gonna be able to keep this place open much longer if you don’t pull your weight, John.”

“Me?” he spluttered. “Donna, look at me. What do I know about flower arranging?”

“Anyway,” their Grandad Wilf piped up from the other end of the counter, “I’ve already told you, I’ll happily help out!”

Donna sighed. “You are, Gramps, and I’m grateful-”

“I meant money.”

At that, both John and Donna turned to look at Wilf in amazement.

“What?” he asked. “Surprised your old man has some money tucked away? I moved in with your parents because they were convinced I shouldn’t be on my own. But I still sold the house, didn’t I? What do you think I did with the money?”

John shrugged. “Bought a new telescope?” he suggested.

Wilf blinked at him. “I sold a house in Chiswick, John. I could have bought a hundred telescopes! No, no, I’ve saved it. I was intending to leave it to you two anyway, after I was gone. Split it fifty-fifty. But if you need it now, Donna, I’m more than happy to help.”

Donna looked a little uncomfortable then, clearly torn between wanting to accept the money and not wanting to take the money off her Grandad.

“What if you need it, though?” she asked after a moment. “I mean, if something happens, and you need the money. Mum will go mad at me if she finds I took your money to save a flower shop.”

Wilf smiled at that. “You leave your mother to me,” he told her gently. “Anyway, you’re not saving a flower shop, you’re saving your flower shop, Donna. Arkytior flowers! I don’t want you to lose the business, sweetheart.”

Donna sighed again. “And I don’t want you to lose your money, Gramps.”

“I won’t,” Wilf insisted. “Even if the business goes under, I won’t have lost the money. The money doesn’t matter. At least I can say that I helped you. And frankly, that means more to me than that money does.”

Donna and John shared a look at that, unsure what to say. But before either of them could think to speak, the little bell above the door rung out, and there was a young blonde woman in the doorway, looking a little awkward.

“You are open, aren’t you?” she asked a little nervously.

“Yeah,” Donna nodded quickly. “Sorry, just a bit of a slow day. Were you looking for anything in particular?”

The woman came further into the shop then, looking around.

“I’m not sure,” she admitted. “I’m looking for some flowers for my place of work, just to brighten it up a bit, you know. Make the place a bit nicer. We’ve got clients in and out all day, and I figured nice flowers might brighten the place up.”

“Great,” Donna beamed, and John could almost see her mind working. She was thinking offices, large and open plan like the ones she used to work in as a temp. She was thinking dozens of flowers, a huge order for a huge office.

“Not roses, though,” the woman said suddenly, before letting out a nervous giggle. “Sorry, my name’s Rose, so loads of people think that roses are the way to go. I’ve sort of come to dislike them.”

Donna was still beaming, though, and John could almost see the pound signs in her eyes. Eventually, Rose settled on some yellow tulips, and left the shop with just one bunch, despite Donna trying to sell her more.

“Leave the woman alone,” John groused once Rose had left the shop. “If she only wants one bunch of flowers, she only wants one bunch of flowers.”

Donna huffed, and disappeared back into the stock room.

~0~0~

The next day, Donna had left John in charge of the shop while she went to the gardening centre to pick up some more oasis. Wilf was there once more to keep him company, and it didn’t take long for the conversation to get around to the latest argument John had had with his mum Sylvia.

“I heard you two going at it again last night,” Wilf said knowingly. “Is it still about the tattoo.”

John sighed. “What do you think, Gramps?” he responded, a little bitterly. “First she complained that I got it in the first place, now I want it covered up she thinks it’s perfectly fine as it is.”

Wilf studied his grandson carefully. “And you’re sure you want it covered up?”

John nodded quickly. “I’m sure. I’ve even got a few ideas,” he admitted. “Anyway, it was a stupid thing to get tattooed in the first place. We only did it for a laugh.”

“If it’s what you feel is right,” Wilf responded, “then you do it, son. It’s none of your mother’s business.”

“Thanks, Gramps.” John smiled gratefully.

“I can understand why you want rid of it,” Wilf sighed after a moment. “You weren’t all that happy in the army, were you? And having your army number tattooed on you is quite permanent.”

“Like I said,” John groused, “it was a stupid idea and me and the other boys in the squad did it for a laugh. Didn’t think about the consequences.” He sighed. “I just need to find a decent tattoo artist, who I’d trust to not mess it up. It’s bad enough now, but I don’t want another tattoo that’s just as awful.”

The bell above the door rung out then, and when the two men looked round, the woman from yesterday was there.

“Rose, wasn’t it?” John asked with a small smile.

“Yeah,” Rose smiled back. “Hi again. I was looking for some more flowers, actually. My boss thought it was a good idea, the flowers yesterday, and he’s sent me to get some more.”

Wilf watched with a knowing smile then, as John suggested some more bouquets- all ones that Donna had instructed him to try and sell- and he and Rose talked. And if Wilf noticed that John’s smile seemed a little brighter since Rose walked in, he didn’t say anything.

~0~0~

In the end, Rose came in nearly every day. Usually it was in the morning, for flowers for her workplace, but a couple of times just before closing to buy flowers to take home. She lived on a council estate with her mother, John discovered, but both she and her mum enjoyed flowers, and with the shop so close to her place of work Rose would pop in on her way home from work.

“Beats the ones from the supermarket,” Rose laughed. “Besides, it’s a bit of a treat, isn’t it?”

“And if you can’t treat yourself sometimes, what’s the point,” Donna responded with a knowing grin.

John was watching from a stool behind the counter, just grinning at Rose as Donna rung up her order. She spared a glance at her brother, and sighed.

“I think my brother has something to ask you,” Donna told Rose as money exchanged hands.

John jerked from his daze then, blinking furiously at his sister and spluttering.

“Oh?” Rose asked with a frown.

“I don’t- I mean, I-” John broke off and glared at his sister.

“Do I have to do everything around here?” Donna sighed, before turning back to Rose. “What my brother is trying to say is would you like to go on a date with him?”

Both John and Rose just blinked at her. Donna rolled her eyes.

“Oh, come on! You two have been flirting every time Rose comes in here! You like each other! Just go for a date!”

“I don’t know when I’m free,” John lied, flashing the two women an obviously fake smile that didn’t reach his blue eyes.

“Well, check your diary and get back to her,” Donna shrugged. “Go on. Besides, it’ll get you away from Mum for a while.”

John looked at Rose. She was biting her lip, looking a little nervous, but also a little pleased, and he couldn’t help but smile back.

“I suppose I could,” he admitted after a moment. “If you left me your number, so I can contact you.”

“If you wanna text me a date and time, then,” Rose said with a grin as she pulled a card out of her purse and slid it across the counter, “I can check when I’m free. Or, you know, you could just pop into my work.”

“Your work,” John echoed, blinking.

“Yeah,” Rose nodded. “I work across the road, at the tattoo place.” She pointed out the window. “The one right opposite.”

John followed her finger, out the window and across the road. The black sign with its silver writing stared back. Bad Wolf Tattoos.

He grinned. “Fantastic! See you soon, Rose Tyler!”

[a-lovecraftian-mind]

Who I Could’ve Been

This is going to be absolute word vomit of tangents and incoherent babble. writing stuff down helps someone figure it out, this is what this is. so i get it, this is stupid long, it’s stupid grammar, stupid concept and just downright stupid but this is to help me think.  

 I realised that there was something close to something I had thought about all the time but a part of it i never considered, and I enjoyed the little journey it led me on but since it was a thought process and this is the first time i’m writing it down it’s probably gonna take the same form with tangents and things in the wrong order of remembering something I can add to something from earlier.

This paragraph came from how I keep passing both the academy i went to and the one I could have gone to, they are both getting knocked down, it’s a time for recollection. I love to think about if I was brought up somewhere else or in a different time just how much would change, this is a fairly common fantasy people have. for example not just place but time, in academy I knew plenty of people in my own year group, I knew a fair few in the year above just individually and not their full social circle and I knew one or two in the year below, this is socially of course I still knew of people in each year group just not know them. Anyway it could be conformation bias or just luck of the draw of who I got to know, the year above seemed to be majority of stoners and the like, not just because they were older but all the way from year 1 to year 5 they seemed to have that personality around them the stoner archetype, there was also alot of hard workers like perfect pupils with volunteering and good grades as well as popular, our school was big enough that each year group did have a little bit of each personality types anyway, year above, stoners. Year below there were so many NEDs and chavs, and then my year i suppose is a little harder to point to as i at least knew everyone's name so there is so much to point at one majority as i’m sure in reality if i was in a different year group the same would go, the group i hung around i can only describe as every single one of them went into social studies that was my social group. this all has a big * by it saying after year 3 I never really had a real social group, with less and less each year finally declining into I had this social group, these friends i talked to in school, and then the weekend would come, i’d wait for Monday then i’d get to hear what they got up to on the weekend together. Anyway the whole point of this, again each year group had what i saw as majority archetypes, year up stoners, year down NEDs. If i was a year up or a year down would that change my personality, likely not, yes environment is a big part in social development but as my mum put it when I spoke to her about it “you’ve always been you” I’ve always been the way I am since I was a kid, sure there were some ways I could have developed that would be similar but different, she just didn’t think that if I hung around stoners as I was developing that the way I turned out would be so different. there is another thing to consider though, my friends.

I did say I had a few friends in the year above and I knew a couple of ppl the year below, what if we shifted that up one, my personality might not change but my relationships, my friends, maybe even my teachers we usually had a new teacher every year one in one out. say i’m in year 3 now, if my life changed and it all shifted up one, i’d go from knowing a couple of ppl in year 2, and knowing everyone in year 3 to knowing no one in year 2 and only a couple in year 3, and so  on and so on. so now i know everyone in the year above because I am in the year above, what’s different. Would the people that I was friends with individually but not part of their full social group, would I be, at least in the same way I was with the normal world, hanging out at school till Friday to hear about what they got up to together on Monday. would the person I dated for a short time be in my life more or less, I knew her through a friend in the normal world, would we still find each other, and if we did would not having the obstacle of a single year help, cause in academy a single year seemed to change a lot. I did think more on this but i’m kind of getting bored organising these thoughts, onto the next word vomit to try and make sense of what’s in my head. 

(auto correct really wants to change grandad to granddad i just let it do what it wants in this para) this thought started when I went to visit Helmsdale, I saw a stupidly attractive person there, and my first thought was I have no idea what her name is, if i lived here I would have probably went to school with her she looked my age, i’d at least know her name. My family, my mothers side, is from a small fishing village up north called Helmsdale, and if you ask anyone that talks to me they probably will say i talk about it too much. Every single holiday, every single long weekend even for part of it we would go up to Helmsdale, sometimes we’d go up to go camping or fishing or to at least DO anything, but sometimes we’d go up to just sit around the house as we would normally at home just the difference is there is a mountain out the window as the view not grey buildings. and Helmsdale is the dream for me, in my ideal life i’d get a job that means I have to travel so no matter where I live I can work as it only changes where I start from to travel to work, rather than a commute to work every day, it’s a travel every weekend for a work somewhere else for a while till I return home to Helmsdale. so this place is important to me, but it always was a holiday destination, it wasn’t grandads house I’d visit on the weekend it was a holiday, even tho it was the exact same thing as going to my granddads for the weekend it felt different, like i was out of my element and not home. If I went to my grandad here at home I felt at home, If i went to my granddad in Helmsdale i felt uneasy, the people there were foreign to me, I had one friend and I was too afraid to approach anyone else. every holiday, every long weekend i’d go up there and just relax with family and that’s not bad, the whole point of this is to think what could’ve been. So that’s the real world, what about in the theory world where I lived in Helmsdale born and raised. Like I’d at least know that chicks name, I’d know more than one person there that isin’t family (everyone i know in helmsdale since i was a kid was just introduced as aunts and uncles, i know a few aren’t blood family but I don’t know who is who for sure, either way they are all family) since I don’t know enough people there it’s hard to gauge anything, based on one person I've seen would i trade my life here for there. and then there is my education, i’d either have less or have to travel for it, college and uni. all that said, I look forward to making Helmsdale my holiday destination into my home at some point in my life. 

I even thought about what if i lived in a slightly diffrent area of where i do now, still in the same city but just somewhere else. this thought came when I went to the beach with my mum, we decided to go a little out our ways to go to the sand dunes rather than just the flat beach, seemingly i went there as a kid but i must have been too young to remember. as we were coming home i saw a chip shop with a park behind it, I thought to myself “if i lived here that’s probably where me and my mates would hang out”.  there is more to be said about my academy, like how i had the option to go to a different one that was further away but we had only just recently moved so i knew more friends at the farther away one and it was commutable but i think we covered academy enough there already, the only topic there is like again friends, my first kiss i had in like primary two would we bound over that or something or my childhood friend where we are at the point we can say “hey we should catch up” would me being who i am have messed that up and fought with him, fallen out where now in my adult life i can’t catch up with my childhood friend because i pissed him off. 

Finally, after piling all this together on the ride home from the beach, I was trying to figure this all out to pass the time, i realised something that i never considered, a scenario that never had popped into my head before, and if it had i’d forgotten, either due to me not dwelling on it too long or it being so unimportant. in every single scenario I considered not one did i think about a different family, not even a slight change like my asshole brother not being born. living in helmsdale, being in a different academy, even the times i thought about being born in another country as my friends on the internet. always my family were there and the same every single one of them just as they were no different accent, no diffrent personality due to their environment. I started trying to think and consider this, but i didn’t want to make up a family in my head so i considered how you see  in movies kids get mad at their family and say stuff like “you’re not my real dad” and how my brother likes to think mum ruined his life and if he had another mother his life would be better. I took a page out of their books and tried to think through every single other persons family i knew, not the fake nice you see when you’re a kid and you go round to your mates house. i’m trying to think of people that i was round so much their family couldn’t really keep the nicety up and they didn’t become assholes, just themselves.  I spent so long thinking as hard as i could, and nothing, not a single person stood out. I don’t know if that’s due to most of the peoples family i know well enough to consider them real are kinda shitty in their own right, fathers walking out, abuse, poverty. They all lived and they all were happy but why hadn’t i considered “what if i was this kid and they were my family” once, I started to want to think of a family better than mine, i’m sure there are plenty of opinions out there, but thinking as hard as i could for as long as i could there wasn’t a one. i really wanted to think of someone. it’s hard to explain, i’ll just quote what me and my mum said  mum;”so you think we’re so bad you’re trying to find someone worse” me;”no i’m looking for someone better” i don’t like being mushy so i wanted to be able to agree that i at least couldn’t consider any other family. i started thinking of fictional families, rich and famous. none in every scenario i have in my head of how my life turns outi can’t consider any of them without my full family. i have issues with my dads side of the family, they are alot more NED and cars, a DJ and the like, still wouldn’t trade one of them both when it was just my mind wondering “what if i lived here” they were there and when i started actively thinking “ok what if i had a different family” i could barely consider the thought, it all ended in there is no “if i had a different family” I wish there was a lot different in my life, my family isn’t one of them