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penfullofwordsaheadfullofstories · 4 years

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So We Refuse To Take it Tragically

A/N: I’ve just accepted my fate is to be obsessed with this man, so here’s yet another Obi-Wan fic. There will be a second part to this, and I’m thinking a mini series of in-between moments. I won’t give spoilers, but this is NOT my normal type of fic, but he’s an exception to every rule in my book, apparently. Thank you to @caffeine-in-an-iv for being my beta on this, I don’t know where this would be without you!

Thank you also to @beskars for her post here that birthed this. Always blessing us with fuel for the thirst.

And to the one I know IRL that found my tumblr, one I will refer to as Top Voice, this is your final warning to gtfo before feasting your eyes on unprecedented filth and sap.

Pairing: Obi-Wan Kenobi x Force sensitive! Fem Reader (no Y/N)

Warnings: SMUT!!! Cumeating, hair pulling, Comfort Sex, ANGST!! (It has a happy ending later, I promise, but it starts after ROTS, so it’s par for the course) If you’re gonna write not-particularly-pertinent-to-plot-porn, might as well make it unnecessarily detailed, right? As usual, too many feelings for porn, More warnings will be in the tags to prevent spoilers

Title from one of my favorite quotes:

“Ours is essentially a tragic age, so we refuse to take it tragically. The cataclysm has happened, we are among the ruins, we start to build up new little habitats, to have new little hopes. It is rather hard work: there is now no smooth road into the future: but we go round, or scramble over the obstacles. We’ve got to live, no matter how many skies have fallen.”

-D.H. Lawrence

Tatooine is no place for a baby.

There are no soft surfaces, nor comforts, nor surplus of anything. It’s desolate and deprived and oppressive, but you watch as Obi-Wan shields the child from its harsh, sand-pelting winds with his whole body, despite the fact the child fits in the space between his wrist and elbow. It’s overzealous, but you don’t say anything of it.

The past two days have ripped away nearly everything he held dear, insisting on devastating every tender place. Nothing sacred has been left untouched.

He broke the code long before he met you, and you know part of why his love for you came so easily, why he had no qualms with breaking his vows, was because he’d long since loved the man that became his family in every way that matters.

Love and Light so tightly knit together the fabric of his being one could not be separated from the other.

And you could take on the entire Force with your two fists for how it had rewarded him for it with Hate and Darkness coming from someone so close it shattered something foundational in Obi-Wan.

Yet even now, there isn’t Darkness surrounding his signature. There’s brokenness and his ever-present equilibrium has been replaced by jagged shards. But despite it all, those rugged pieces still reflect light erratically in their shine.

It’s a loss and betrayal that spans many different planes: on one level, there’s nowhere you look in the galaxy beyond just the two of you that isn’t marked by the Empire’s rise in power, marking the end of the Republic he fought for and the fall of the Jedi, his community, comrades, and only home he’d ever known. And on another level, you’ve seen the weight of war and worse in Obi-Wan’s eyes, but nothing, nothing like this.

The pain is panoramic, but it’s also profoundly personal.

Even still, his attention isn’t on himself, but on the fussy bundle in his arms.

You wonder: is it the galaxy that doesn’t allow this man time to heal? Or is it his own choice to throw himself into the need of others so he has a tangible reason to avoid his own torments?

When he places the baby into the arms of the young couple, you know the times ahead will give the answer to that.

Because there aren't the cries of the past few nights to wake either of you, there’s silence.

You long to fill it, to try to bridge this insurmountable void with something, anything you could say. But you know it’s bigger than you. So, so much bigger than you.

Monumental obstacles and tremendous loss find themselves standing in the threshold of an abandoned hut smaller than your flat was on Coruscant.

“Well… it’s not much to look at, certainly. But the moisture vaporator seems to be in repairable condition, and we’re just far enough from town to avoid any curious neighbors. What do you think?” He turns to you, and his eyes, dark circles under and all, turn sharp in their assessment of your response.

“I told you. I’m going wherever you are so long as you’ll let me.” Your voice is gentle but adamant as you remind him.

He walks up from the living room to the threshold of the kitchen where you are, wrapping his arms loosely around your waist. “Be that as it may, I’m asking your input on where we’re going, or living, as your happiness means a great deal to me.”

There’s still no smile, but it’s the brightest his energy has felt since the last time you saw him before he came to your door in Coruscant days ago, whispering a rushed, heartfelt farewell, which you quickly countered with an emphatic, unshakable, “I’m coming with you.”

You look up at him, gliding your hand across his cheek into the hair at the nape of his neck. There’s Darkness at the door of his soul that he’s fighting off every moment, and he has the audacity to speak of your happiness.

You don’t dare bring up his. It’s irony, at best.

So you smile, timid, knowing the gesture in itself might be blasphemous to the tone, but genuine all the same. “We can make a life here. I know we can.”

He scans your eyes, looking to find the authenticity in your statement. “Are you certain?”

He’s not asking about the hut anymore. Or, at least, not just the hut.

“Obi-Wan, I never had any delusion that any life I had with you would be easy. I thought I’d only ever be getting you in secret, sparse moments. Although I’d never, ever wish for it to be under the circumstances that it is, having you like this is better than I ever hoped.”

There’s silence as he processes your words, then a wry twist of his features. “How I wish that your expectations needn’t be so low.”

“No, no, that’s not what I meant.” You incline your head, trying to find the words to convey what you mean.

“Nothing any person or any planet anywhere has to offer me holds a candle to what I’ve found in you, nor will it ever. I’d never trade unshakable wholeness for the transience of materialistic happiness.”

You know this has to resound with him. Is it not within the core set of values he was taught to forsake comfort in any avenue for something far greater?

His eyes flick between yours, gauging, and you can feel him reaching out to feel at your signature to solidify the truth.

If you knew him any less, you might be insulted at his questioning of your trustworthiness. But it’s not you he doesn’t trust. It’s something good willingly giving itself to him that causes his wariness.

The Force can have your middle finger along with your fists.

Then he’s relaxing into you, letting out an exhale that seems heavy with more than just air, and burying his nose in your hair for his next inhale.

****

By the end of the day, you’ve gathered enough supplies for basic necessities and to start on the repairs of the hut. You both snarf down a ration bar before shortly thereafter clearing the blown-in sand off what must have been the bed of the home. It’s a half circle indenture in the wall, and it has a dip obviously made for a mattress or cushion of some sort, but as all that’s available are the blankets bought in town today, you set to fluffing them to some semblance of comfort.

Fatigue pulls you into it far sooner than the suns setting. Last night was your first night without Luke, spent in a room you rented in town. Today was spent traveling to and from the hut, discussing details on what needs to be done, and you? You are absolutely exhausted. You can only imagine what he must feel like.

Obi-Wan secures the lock on the door before sitting on the side of the bed, looking off into nothing for a long, long moment.

You push up to your side, placing a hand on his back. “Obi…”

His shoulder nudges toward your hand, but he cuts you off. “It’s going to get quite cold when the suns set, and since the stove isn’t properly ventilating yet, we’re going to have to work with body heat.”

“I’ll try to mask my reluctance,” you retort.

He turns his face to you then, and just a smidge of humor sweeps across his eyes before he sheds his cloak, followed by everything else until only his pants remain. You’ve long since stripped down to your own sleeping comfort level, so before he can fold his cloak along with the rest of his discarded clothing, you take it and cover yourself with it.

He shakes his head a little at you once he’s done, settling down next to you, throwing the covers over both of you.

“Tell me what you need.” You’re face to face with him, but his expression is unreadable.

“I… I don’t know.” He considers you as if you held the answer to the question you just asked him.

“What about want, then? What do you want, Obi-Wan?” You wish he didn’t have his shields perpetually raised these days. It’d be so much easier to just read his energy.

His hand reaches up so he can stroke your cheek with his thumb. “You’re tired, darling. Rest.”

Ah, there it is. If the answer to the question of desire is him counter offering his own response with the fact you’re tired…

“So are you. But you still want.” You press your body fully against his, dropping your voice down to a whisper. “And so do I.”

You won’t push anymore than that, letting him take or leave the invitation. For you, it’s not even a question. It’s been four months since you last saw him. Since you’d last felt his touch.

You’d spent the last few nights in each other’s arms, but between Luke's shrill cries and the deafening devastation of the events of the days prior, it’d been just that: sleep. Or, what tousled, disturbed counterfeit the circumstance offered you both.

For him, though, there’s an abysmal weariness that digs far beyond lack of sleep, and you don’t dare infringe upon him in any way.

But there’s still a longing present, and even without his Force signature to guide you into his feelings, he can’t hide his eyes.

You watch the moment he makes a decision solidify across his countenance right before he presses his lips against yours. You sigh into it, letting the draw of his skin on yours pull you into orbit.

Because that’s exactly what happens. It’s a kiss for a kiss’ sake, for flavor and fervency and the fullness of each other, but it quickly gains its own momentum when his tongue parts your lips truly.

It’s an acute absence. Not having his energy surrounding you with his shields so far up. But it also gives sharp attention to the press of skin against skin, makes it an anchor and an outlet for all that is still too tender to even acknowledge.

You find grip in his hair, purposefully running your hands the opposite of the way he combs it as he takes your face in both hands and pulls you into him all the more.

When you both need to breathe, he only moves so far away that his lips still brush against yours on every exhale. “I..” he starts, then stops.

The hand still in his hair rakes through it gently, scratching your fingertips against his scalp as you wait for him to complete his thought.

“Let me taste you,” he says at last. You know it's a question from the way he stills, waiting for permission, but it’s phrased as nothing like it.

You raise an eyebrow. “Is that a rhetorical quest…”

“Oh, hush.” He’s already nudging you over onto your back, situating his body over yours, claiming your lips again. You allow yourself to sink into it, cherishing his weight over you, his hand roaming your ribcage, before pulling back to speak.

“I’m sorry, are you now getting on to me for my sass? Because… oh!”

He finds a nipple through the thin fabric of your shirt, pinching softly with a small tug.

“By all means, continue. I was most intrigued.” His smirk is back, but it fixes you with a tinge of worry when it again proves to be a smile only skin deep.

You place two fingers just shy of his forehead, but he catches your wrist in an almost painful clasp. The alarm casted by his expression quickly is washed away by a carefully constructed impassiveness, and your heart sinks.

He has to see it, because he bows his head in apology. “Not tonight.”

And before you have any room to respond, he’s shifting himself down as he lifts your shirt up, placing a single taunting, wet kiss on each nipple before moving even further down, nipping at the skin right below your belly button.

He’s distracting you from what he’s not allowing you access to, and you know it, and you let him anyway. That’s what this is, isn’t it? Distraction from the barrage of the mind. If that’s what he needs, that’s what you’ll give.

As he toys with the hem of your underthings, and you lift your hips to assist their removal, you realize it’s exactly what you need too.

Except he apparently isn’t planning to remove your underwear at all. With a casual flick of his hand, your legs are parted and held like that with a no-nonsense sprout of Force energy. Then he’s simply pulling the cloth to the side and brings his mouth torturously closer, but stops just before contact.

You push up to your elbows to tell him you can’t take much of those teasing breaths he’s taking, blowing hot air against sensitive nerve endings. But when you hear his breath stutter as he just looks, unhurried in admiration, you decide against it, even as you flush at the undivided attention. Sprawling his palms out over your inner thighs, he dips down to press his mouth between his fingers, sucking not-so-gently into the soft skin, sending the flesh into tremors before he’s even really done anything to you.

He says your name as he opens you up with his fingers, parting your folds so everything is bared to his view. You start to squirm, the exposure starting to feel a little too heady, and you’re starting to appeal with the beginning of his name when he leans forward, straight away connecting his lips to your clit. You try to thrust up into it as some shameful noise leaves you, but there’s only so much movement you have with your legs still pinned.

He loves to tease, so you don’t expect him to retract the energy that constricted your legs at the first resistance. Instead, he slides his hands under your ass, pulling you on to his tongue and lets you push your hips into him unchecked.

He hums at your enthusiasm, the reverberation sending your hands into his hair again, which gifts you with even more noises from him.

It doesn’t take long at all, and you’re coming undone on his tongue, biting into your forearm to dampen your cry.

He doesn’t stop until you push at his shoulder, signaling your tender surrender. He obeys, looking up at you from between your thighs, absolutely besotted, eyes shining a shade brighter than before.

Then. Obi-Wan Kenobi keeps his eyes on yours before dipping his head and tilting his jaw, running his beard right where you’re still open and vulnerable, abrasion grating in a way you know you’ll be feeling all day tomorrow.

He licks his lips as he moves back up to kiss you again, letting you taste yourself on him.

He goes easily when you gesture for him to lie on his back so you can straddle him, carefully avoiding any contact where he’s throbbing for you. His hands fall right to your waist, stroking gently as he waits for you to initiate.

You focus your study on the section of his hair that’s fallen in his face, twirling a finger in it, happy to have anywhere to look but his eyes.

He’d normally at least be in your mind by now, and even though you understand it, well, the drought of it is as appropriate for the planet as anything.

You remember too late to raise your own shields against any accidentally too-loud thoughts, as Obi-Wan cups his hand on your chin, forcing your gaze to his, saying your name quietly in calling.

“You have to know, it isn’t anything to do with…”

You interrupt him. “No. No. I won’t have you addressing my insecurities of all things in light of…”

“Please listen, love. I need you to know, it hasn’t anything to do with the love I have for you. That hasn’t changed and never will. I think I need… “ He pauses, solemn in thought. “Time,” he finishes finally.

You knew this already in the pit of your stomach, but hearing him say it, hearing him affirm that it isn’t you insufficiency… you hate that you needed it as much as you did.

And if he needs time? That’s what you’ll give. But he also has a want, evidenced by the brush of him against you when you scoot yourself down his torso.

You take the hem of his pants with you when you continue down, ridding him of them and his shorts. But when you wrap your hand around him and begin to lower your mouth, he grips your chin again, shaking his head.

“I can’t… please, just.” It’s always an anomaly when he’s at a loss for words, usually ever-so articulate.

A gasp chokes out of you when you feel the phantom of his mind. Not in full, no. With barriers, and it’s projected out, not at all the same sensation to being within it.

It’s desperation. For how long it’s been, for how drained he feels, how he’s not sure how long this will last, and how much he yearns to be inside you.

There’s not even a second of debate in your mind as you take your position on his lap again, lifting your hips, intention apparent. He takes his cock in hand, holding steady so you can start to seat yourself onto the thick push of him.

The hitch in his breath is your only warning before he seizes the undersides of your thighs, halting you from taking him any further.

His eyes are tightly shut, and you know from watching him before that his facial expression is an attempt at borderline meditation, except it’s several long seconds before he achieves anything resembling calm.

It’s as good a time as any to push his hands off you and squirm around to take him a little deeper. You plan on rubbing your victory in, but your smirk is wiped away with a whine at the elation. Instead of stopping you again, he almost imperceptibly thrusts up, and it’s your turn to falter, slamming your hands into his chest, nails digging in, working against your weight trying to pull you down onto him.

It goes on like that, until you’re both bordering on hysteria before you’ve even fully taken him. You can’t figure out if it’s a worse torment to keep delaying or continuing.

Obi-Wan seems to have come to his own conclusion to that, as he finally opens his eyes, locking them with yours as he places his palms flat on the tops of your thighs and pushes down until your skin is flush with his.

You pull a hand up, biting on your fist, trying to stifle the exclamation in your throat.

He pulls it away, voice ragged as he speaks. “I want to hear you, little one. We needn’t hide anymore.”

It’s a dimensional statement. For one, no one is around for miles, a stark contrast to your quarters on Coruscant where you at least attempted to be considerate of your too-near neighbors when it came to noise. For another, it’s the irony of being in hiding from the Empire, but being allowed to be open in your relationship with each other finally.

And the deepest irony is that you both have your barriers up so firmly right now all you can concentrate on is bared skin.

Oh, but what a beautiful spanse of bared skin he is. Freckled and almost luminously pale, bending and curving with the strength of the form underneath.

He sits up slowly, generating a breathless plea from both of you at the new angle. A search of your eyes asks you a question, and you’re nodding, kissing him with the full brunt of your craving.

You slide up and then down again just as he drives up, and you’ve found your rhythm, just like that.

His hands push you onto him every time you pull up, and his tongue laves your breasts, sucking and biting along your collarbone, as you rake your nails down his chest, over the backs of his shoulders, his scalp, anything you can touch.

It’s enough to send him into a chorus of groans, shoving himself hard up into you.

He doesn’t even speak it aloud, just projects the apologetic warning that he’s on the edge.

When his thumb finds your clit, everything in you goes tense despite the relief. You clench around him, hard, and he instantly moves his hands to your shoulder blades pulling you flush against him as he lets out an unrestrained sound against your breasts.

You push his thumb away from where it’s stilled against you, replacing it with your own. His fingers twitch in their bruising grip, and you can feel him throbbing inside you.

You stay like that for a moment, just letting him ride out his bliss, whispering sweet affirmations into his hair.

When he looks up at you again, his eyes are glassed over. You wonder if it’s ecstasy that is the cause, or something from the bedrock boiling to the surface.

He doesn’t give you a chance to elaborate, flipping you over on to your back. The moment he withdraws, you can feel the mess dripping down your inner thighs.

It takes everything in you to not come at the sight alone as Obi-Wan dips further down your body, parting you and lapping his tongue right where you’re weeping evidence of desire.

You know you have to be making a mess of his face and beard, but he certainly doesn’t seem to mind, indulging on his own spill infused with yours.

When he adds two fingers in you and curls them strategically, searing heat shoots through your lower stomach as you arch against his mouth, his name a high whisper with absolutely no suppression, echoing across the empty stone walls of the home.

He leaves a final tender kiss against you before lying down next to you, pulling you into his arms, and you pull him into yours right back when your limbs remember how to function.

His head drops against yours, and his eyes flutter shut, taking a deep inhale, like he’s trying to fill his lungs with more than just oxygen.

Nothing is fine, and the world is crumbling. But right now, as the suns finally leave the house in dark, as you clasp each other in tight embrace, as sleep pulls you under, you can pretend it’s fine. If only for a moment.

*******

There’s a flash of feeling that startles you awake and into the disorientation that comes from waking in a new place. The sensation worsens when you feel the reverberations of the equivalent of a slammed door in the Force.

You sit up quickly and look over to Obi-Wan, who sits on the side of the bed, head in his hands, fingers brutal in their grip.

You move toward him, and he turns around at the sound. “Go back to sleep, darling. it’s nothing.”

When you fix him with a gaze that essentially translates “bantha fodder,” he just lies back down, pulling your back into his chest, and you doubt the fact you can’t see his face like this is a mistake.

The rhythm of his breathing betrays the fact he is nowhere near sleep, but you find yourself fading off soon again anyway.

****

When you wake in the morning, you’re alone in the bed, which is no surprise. He’s not one to lounge, and if the height of the suns peaking through the window has anything to say, he’s already been up for a while.

His cloak is still tangled in the blankets, though, and you wrap yourself in it, padding outside after doing something about your morning breath.

The hut is situated on a cliff, overlooking a barren valley. The suns glare with their unrelenting eyes of heat even so early in the day, and you stare back as best you can without squinting, daring them to do their worst. They know nothing of the misery that’s already visited this home. They have no hope of competing.

You find Obi-Wan cross-legged near the edge of the cliff. Cross-legged and levitating.

Of course, you know he can do things like this. It’s just such a different thing to see him doing it . You’ve never had a proper morning with him like this, seeing his routine. He was always up before the sun, you with him, gathering moments and soaking them in before he had to leave again.

He looks almost peaceful now, not at rest, but peaceful.

How?

How does he still have so much trust in the Force?

A more lighthearted thought emerges through the grim train, as you notice he’s opted to not put his tunic back on yet.

It doesn’t matter out here, you suppose, there isn’t any other living being for miles around. For that matter, you wonder why he even left the pants.

His voice damn near startles you, not even opening his eyes to address you.

“Although that may be the case, there are some locations more bearable to get sunburn than others.”

You blush at being caught, and gently ensure your thoughts aren’t accidentally projected again, but he doesn’t give you much time to dwell on it.

“Join me?”

As he opens his eyes and descends the couple inches down back onto the ground, you feel your heart do the same. He’s taught you little things, here and there, and you’ve enjoyed it, learning to tap into that constant humming you never had the tools to channel before.

But now?

What interest do you have with The Force that failed the man who served it without fail? You could burn it down for the atrocities it’s committed even in negligence against the man you love.

But there’s been enough burning.

Obi-Wan won’t speak of what transpired on Mustafar, but you’ve caught glimpses. Last night wasn’t the first night you’ve had him back, and it wasn’t the first you’d woken to a severe troubling in his aura.

You’re still not sure if Luke is a fussy baby or simply a very responsive one, as it seemed Obi-Wan was already awake before Luke started crying.

It was only mere seconds before his shields came slamming down, firmly in place, every time.

You can’t tell if he’s trying to shelter you from his feelings or blockade them away from himself.

Maybe both.

But those seconds? They’re long enough. For just a flash of a charred, severed body. Of hateful, pleading, golden eyes.

There’s been enough burning.

“I can’t ever be a Jedi, Obi.”

“That’s not what I’m asking of you.”

He knows your criticisms as well as your compliments over the Jedi. You’ve both discussed it at great length many times, always over a firm understanding and respect, but you’ve never really had long enough to have a conclusion. But you’re not going to push now, not with the fall of it all still so close behind him.

“I should think our relationship itself is testimony that I don’t inherently agree or adhere to all Jedi teachings.”

You drop your eyes, trying to ignore the sweat starting to trickle down your skin from the relentless heat. “I thought maybe you were with me in spite of your better judgement.”

His brow furrows. “At first, that’s what I may have thought too, but it made itself clear that although what transpired between us was forbidden by the Code…” he trails off for a moment, almost hesitant. “...the way Light was and is exemplified any time I have you in my arms presented a solidified case that not always is the Jedi way synonymous with the will of the Force.”

He says it wholeheartedly, but you can tell it pains him. It’s easy to never speak ill of the dead, either of individuals or groups. To glorify and wipe away any transgressions to ensure their memory sparkles as you grieve it.

The harder thing is to grieve everything, both the good you lost and the bad you experienced from the same source.

And there’s another level there. Something that has him patting the spot beside him and giving a heartbreakingly forced smile.

Even through it all, wariness of aspects of his own religion included, he seeks unity with the Force without reservation or resentment.

You don’t fight him anymore.

The war is over, but the battle has just begun, and so help you Maker, you’re going to fight for him to have the chance to heal.

So you sit, mimicking his position.

When he smiles again, it’s much smaller but not at all fake.

“First, clear your mind.”

*****

The days are afflicted with an underlying gloom, full of work that busies the hands but leaves the mind to wander, which wasn’t at all a luxurious thing.

But the nights are filled with unclaimed time, time in an abundance you never had with each other before.

Sometimes it’s shot with silence from the weight of the day, reveling in the presence of another as you work together on the supper dishes.

Or sometimes there’s almost an excitement, despite the labor ahead, of the plans for the place that’s now your home.

“Wouldn’t we have to have some sort of larger equipment to hoist that over the cliff edge?” You wonder aloud to Obi-Wan, speaking of the replacement unit for finally getting some very basic temperature control for the hut. “The way around back is too rough and would scratch it up, and I, for one, wouldn’t want to try pushing it up manu…”

You stop at his smirk he’s trying to hide with tilting his tea cup higher over his lips.

“...Or there’s a Jedi solution to this problem that requires neither, and you’re just letting me ramble on anyway.” You punctuate the end of your statement by tossing a pillow his direction, which just stops. Midair.

There’s so much legend surrounding Jedi, you haven’t really been sure what’s factual and what’s fairytale.

You certainly knew of some of his abilities, but he didn’t tend to elaborate on details of his missions before, and you never argued, knowing it was a liability for you to have that kind of information if anyone ever found out what you meant to Obi-Wan.

He chuckles, not even trying to look a little guilty.

Once you remember to shut your mouth, you get back to planning. “And that same principle just applies to objects of any size?”

He nods. “Same principle, just more concentration required.”

You tuck your feet under you on your chair as you think on that for a second. You’ll have to ask him to teach you that one next. Mediation alone could get rather dull.

“So, for instance, if a great amount of concentration is being spent Force-lifting an object up the cliff, it would leave a Jedi vulnerable to, say… projectiles thrown?” You throw another pillow at him, which just as easily halts next to the other, gravity defiant.

He could have lowered the first one by now. You raise a brow at the knowledge he’s putting on a show for you.

“You’ll have to do better than that, I’m afraid.”

More often than not, the time of the evenings are spent loving and lounging in sheets, savoring the difference of unhurried lovemaking, with no heart-wrenching farewell on the horizon.

But every time you gently ask to reach his mind, he pushes the request and your hand away.

*******

Obi-Wan’s visits to see Luke are met with a level of hostility. The man, Owen, seems wary of him, doing everything he can to cut the visit short as you and the woman, Beru, if you remember correctly, look silently to each other for some relief in the tension.

They already likely know his actual name, but you’re careful to only address Obi as “Ben” here, along with everywhere else that isn’t your hut. It’s precautionary, but if it’s for the sake of protecting Luke and Obi-Wan himself, you’ll do it without any further questions.

But Luke seems to be doing well, and that is ultimately what matters most. It’s hard to believe how quickly he’s grown in the mere weeks that you’ve been here.

The boy might be by far Obi-Wan’s greatest purpose being on this planet, but it’s not his only.

Master Yoda had given him Jedi texts, yes, but also another task for his time here.

You’re thankful to talk about either, as it seems to be one of the few things he’ll open up to you about as it pertains to himself.

But when he goes to meditate alone, calling for his mentor, his father in every right of the term, he comes back more empty than he left.

When you look at him with a too-knowing look, too infiltrating for his comfort, he easily slides into a quip.

“My old master, it seems, won’t appear unless on his own terms. I’m not sure what else I expected, honestly.”

******

You also learn that the man does not cook. Not that you consider yourself an expert, but at the very minimum, you know how to use spices, which on Tatooine come as hot as their weather.

“Is it a Jedi thing to have tasteless food, or is that just you?” You tease as he dices some sort of root at your direction while you sift through the cabinet.

His eyes are full of mischief when he’s quiet for a moment before speaking up. “I would argue there’s concrete evidence that I’m quite happy to indulge in the pleasures of taste.”

You can’t help your blush as his very pointed look.

Dinner is long forgotten after that, but the night is delectable all the same.

*****

Something has shifted in your own Force signature. Something you can’t put your finger on.

It doesn’t seem harmful or threatening in essence, but it makes you wary in a way that makes your skin itch with more than the dryness.

You try not to think much of it. After all, there’s plenty to do between tending to the vaporator, hunting, fending off the Sand People, and your learning to wield the Force.

After rumors of Tusken raiders being nearby, you ask Obi-Wan to teach you combat. This would be starting long before he normally would teach someone, he explained, but he does it anyway. It’s not exactly using the Force at first, having to start with how to even move your body in the event of attack, slowly enhancing those skills with the Force as you become more confident in them.

You look forward to it more than any other task. It gives you a strength you haven’t had before, and it’s a whole different level of connection to the Force when you trust it physically, not just in your mind.

It’s also another level of trust with Obi-Wan, knowing he’d never hurt you even as he enters the role of a potential threat, guiding you through how to handle it.

So you don’t know why today your stomach won’t agree to the way you want your body to move. You push through it anyway, despite Obi-Wan’s concerned questioning.

You lose your lunch into the rocks, and you really wish he wouldn’t pick you up to take you back into the hut, because the shift of what’s up and what’s down doesn’t help at all.

And you wish he wouldn’t dote over you the rest of the day, as if you didn’t feel useless enough already, as if the illness didn’t leave as quickly as it came.

You make a mental note to ensure you don’t let yourself become dehydrated again to that point.

*****

The trips into town are kept to a minimum, trying to keep curiosity away from the new couple. Also, there wasn’t much to do except barter and spend credits, something you both tried not to do a great deal of.

Obi-Wan was sent off with enough Republic credits to get you started here, but it was hit or miss if the vendors took them that day, and he also didn’t want to spend too much at once.

Nothing was more suspicious than surplus here.

The woman you brought the limited produce available from seemed… different this trip.

Obi-Wan was a couple of stalls down from you, negotiating with a man who had obviously jacked up the price on the items needed. Poor man didn’t know what he was in for.

You turned your attention back on to the woman in front of you, and tried to decipher what was different this time and why it felt so familiar.

As you pointed to a basket of hubba gourds, inquiring of the price, she gave you one that you knew for a fact was higher than last time.

You counter offered the same price as last time you were here, and she firmly stated her price again. Ready to stand your ground, you go to state your price again, she puts her hand to her belly, bringing her skirt in around, revealing a small bump.

“Can’t afford your low-ball offers with this one on the way, understand?”

The sky suddenly falls around you in thunderous clamor as the physical realm around you moves on, unaffected and unreachable. Almost mechanically, you place the credits she asked for on the table, not even capable of addressing the obvious manipulation.

Understanding drenches you in its brutal weight as you realize the source why she felt so different this time.

Your hands shake in their clasp on the basket as you pull yourself into a side alley, heaving your breakfast up.

Because you recognize the same difference in her is the exact same one that has changed your Force signature.

It’s because there’s a flickering light of another being’s Force signature within you.

Tagged as requested: @maybege

#obi-wan #obi wan kenobi #Obi-Wan Kenobi #obi-wan X reader #obi-wan kenobi x reader #obi wan x reader #obi wan kenobi x reader #obi-wan x you #obi-wan kenobi x you #obi wan x you #obi wan kenobi x you #Obi-Wan fanfic #tw: violence #tw: pregnancy #tw: trauma #obi-wan x reader #obi wan x oc

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popculturebuffet · 3 years

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Scottrospective: Scott Pilgrim and the Infinite Sadness

Welcome back my Scottaholics! We’re moving right along fun and fancy free just a few days later from Book 2 to 3. Which fits: As I mentioned in my review of book 1 I first encountered Scott, Ramona and Wallace in a free comic book story, and VERY intrigued, bought volumes 2 and 3 from the same comic shop after reading it in line.. or maybe I went there again later and bought them. My brain is a foggy sinkhole. Point is I was hooked from then on out, and bought the next three volumes as I came out, and through the internet because by then i’d leanred to use Amazon. Ironic given Ramona’s work for them is not only iconic to the series but plot important in volumes 1 and 2. As is Scott’s package toss in the movie. But the story of my long wait for volume 4 can wait for February. Point is it was these two and Free Scott PIlgrim are the ones I poured over again and agian, obessing over as a teen and the ones that stick in my brain the most. But even with that last time the exaustive process of covering it exposed a LOT of volume 2′s weakness: While it has a lot of iconic scenes, including Scott accidently convincing a man to skateboard himself to death, the Ramona and Knives fight, the envy call, the flashback, and is still very enjoyable..it also feels the most like a collection of loose events out of the books. Good stuff and character and tone wise better than last time.. but not quite as narratively strong. The series was GETTING there, the art was solidfiying into it’s final form, the characters were in the right place, SCott was more likeable.. but it hadn’t quite hit it’s stride yet. Three guesses when it did and the first two didn’t count. Infinite Sadness is one of my favorite volumes, along with 4 and 6. And while part of that is nostaliga and a personal connection.. the bulk of it is just this volume being even BETTER on the re-read. I picked up subtle bits that I didn’t notice before that only enritched the experince, the pacing is sublime, the character work is top notch and compelling, the art work is finally crystlalized into what the series is known for, and would only get even better as it goes, and the fights are some of the series best. This is one hell of a story and I warmly invite you to join me as I break it down after the break.

Previously on Scott Pilgrim: Scott defeated Lucas Lee, the second Evil Ex, met Luke Wilson, and prepared to go to his ex girlfriend’s concert despite this being a terrible idea to discuss a gig. It was there he and Ramona found out Envy’s base player Todd, the douchenozzle who she cheated on Scott with, is also the douchenozzle Ramona cheated on Lucas with.

So we open.. exactly from that moment, with Scott and Ramona starring wide eyed while the band plays in an utterly dazzling sequence that’s been brought up a notch in the color remaster. Also one of a handful of moments that was barely touched from page to screen, with only slight adaptations to make it better on screen, and the addition of Metric’s now iconic “Black Sheep”. And when reading the scene.. I couldn’t resisit turning black sheep on as it matched it perfectly.. so yeah have the Clash at the Demonhead performance from the film

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So while that worms it’s way into your head, let’s talk about the character designs for Clash Of the Demonhead, since volume 2 is the last time in the color editions O’Malley really talks about character origins and stuff. I could’ve missed something of course, we’ll see as we go won’t we. I just saved it for here as the Volume 2 review was running a bit long as is and while their shown on covers and on the back cover of the black and white edition, they don’t show up in person and in their full glory till the last panel, hence saving it for here where Envy and Todd are the main antagonists and Lynette is... plot relevant.

Envy was based on the front woman for the band Metric, Emily Haines, designed much like hanes to be a tough, confrotnational, sexy woman, his words not mine, who’d gone through a lot of change in a few years since according to him, and i’m willing to take his word for it since I don’t know the band outside of the one song he picked for the movie, a lot of the bands songs are about that. And honeslty it makes me want to check them out more, as does how awesome black sheep is I can’t belivie I took this long, and is supremely intresting as I hadn’t realized there was a good reason there wasn’t just an original song written for clash at the demonhead. I mean if you base your character on the frontwoman for a band why NOT use one of their songs.

Speaking of band, Plumtree’s drummer, Lynette Gillis, was the inspiration for Lynette Gycott, though the final version of her is more cold and robotic and less like Gillis than initially envisioned.

Finally Todd..was based on Scott, and while he evolved out from that a bit especially in powers.. the concept basically stuck as Todd is a stronger, dumber, more agressive and douchey version of Scott whose mistreatment of women is far more deliberate than Scott’s untetional douchebaggery.

So after some interview segments for some sort of documentary on the band with the crowd, we cut to our heroes after the show, all standing around and being nervous. Stephen’s first words are “Decent show eh, told you they were good”.

Admitely re-reading this one and answering a reader question, unrealted but it got me to thinking, made me realize Stephen wasn’t AS much of a dick as I thought: I didn’t think about the fact Scott and Envy’s blow up cost him their old band which was close to singing, and that Scott both as revealed in volume 3 and in bits here, was kind of a dick towards the end, intitating the breakup while drunk and belligernt and saying a facepunchingly dickish comment we’ll get to. So he wasn’t BLAMELESS and it’s understandable Stephen dosen’t hate her as much. She was friends with his horrible albatross of a girlfriend and didn’t break his heart.

However.. he’s still an asshole and deserve jeff blim’s theatrical fuck you up there. He still ignores Scott’s pain, or the fact that most of the breakup WAS Envy’s fault as we’ll see. We’ll get into it in full obviously but for the cliffs notes so I can yell at a fictional grumpy closted canadian man: She slowly drifted away from him, treated him like he had no say in a band he helped found or took his feelings into account in the record deal, and cheated on him with Todd and possibly another guy. And as seen here she used her fame to bribe her ex and friends into showing up just so, as we see, she can torture him and his new girlfriend a bit. Envy is not a good person and Stephen is ignoring that and his friends VERY obvious emtoinal turmoil. Especially dickish since by this point Scott has clearly swallowed his pride and agreed to a show with someone who really DEEPLY hurt him for Stephen and Kim’s sake.. and he’s not even remotely greatful for it clearly. The only reason he’s not the biggest asshole left in the building is because Todd, Envy and Julie, queen of bitches, is in there.

So after a save point gag that goes nowhere, Envy shows up to take the group back stage... awkward, uncomfortable and very intentional silence insues to makes Scott even more sweaty and nervous and Ramona visably and understandably annoyed. Knives tries to talk to her hero but gets ignored because Envy’s a bitch.. and so’s Julie who not only joins in the shunning of a fucking teenager who clearly loves this band, but also is clearly trying to conversationally surgically attach her lips to Envy’s ass. Her toadying is obnxoious as you’d expect and as transparent as you’d expect, trying to drudge up old nostalgia while Envy’s clearly barely intrested, and the only thing that makes it more tolerable than normal Julie is Envy clearly barely tolerates this and likely is only going with it because she could be a useful minon in the future.

Thankfully this is broken up. Unthakfully it’s by knives shouting her most iconic line:

Given Envy is shown to not be the best person.. her response is to have her cyborg goon belt knives in the face

Which leads to an even better line seconds later

Envy then to just .. complete the circle of being a bitch has NEil take knives out then mocks her when Julie explains why knives and neil were even here. And it’s VERY telling that even Julie, who was must minutes from humping envy’s leg and begging to go with her when she leaves, is visably put off by Envy’s attitude. So while Ramona is understandably fucking done with this, as even she has some shred of sympathy for the teenager who tried to stab her a day ago, Scott has to take a minute to have a flashback. We see two brief bits of Scott with Envy, at the start of their college band Kid Chamelon where they were all happy.. and shortly after the breakup where Scott is miserable, in the middle of the street, sadly saying their name while saying “I’m so alone”.. explaning that desert bit from volume 1.. and making it ten times more painful. Nicely done Brian.

So with Knives gone we get our usual character age intros and descriptoins, my favioritte being Stephen “wants a damn buritto dammit” which I can relate to and thankfully got it monday. He also does show a bit more of his noble self as, things have escalated to the point even he can see Envy has some sort of evil scheme planned and he walked right into it so he asks what her ulterior motive is. Julie pipes up with “She dosen’t NEED ulterior motives she was written up with in spin!”

So Envy grills Ramona a bit clearly trying to make her squirm..though at least when Julie TRIES to jump in she shoots her down, like some asshole pulling a yappy dog on it’s leash hard. Eventually Scott flips out and .. well I don’t want to overpanel this review but this is just.. quotes cannot do this justice.

The result.. is the reveal Todd is psychic due to being a vegan and he throwing scott through a wall with telkenisis, kyle!

It’s explained he has these powers because he’s a vegan and even was top of his class at the vegan academy. Citation... needed. Not because of his power but because Todd may be one of the stupidest beings that’s ever lived. And I once had a friend whose other friend told me, since they’d be going to diffrent high schools and he was trying to pass off his mummies curse of keeping him from destroying himself with his own stupidity, tried to run into a wall to loose weight. No I don’t get how this would’ve worked but having known the guy I guarnatee he was arrogant and dumb enough at the time to try it. Nowadays I assume he’s much better... I assume. You.. you’d have to be to have survived another decade.

Todd is also THAT kind of smug dickhead. Thankfully I haven’t met one in real life or online, as the two vegetarians I have known, one of my best friends micheal and my uncle drew, the former of whom now also eats fish and the latter of whom gave it up once he moved to places he could get meat that was raced humanely easier, but who I still respect for having that amount of self control. But Todd is a clear parody of the type of vegan and vegetarian who think their better than everyone.. by thinking he’s even BETTER than regular vegans because not every vegan can take the strain of psychic powers, with Kim naturally sniping at him.. then flipping him off when he says “don’t get snippy babe” and is very lucky he has psychic powers as otherwise he’d suddenly be wondering where his dick is and why kim’s holding a broken bottle.

Brian also pokes fun at the old 90 percent of your brain trope. You know the old one that claims you only use 10 percent..

But it’s only because your only ACTIVELY using it and the rest is simply other functions. But hey we got Deathstroke out of that claim so good enough. Todd claims it’s because the other 90 percent is curds and whey. This might be the greatest use of this outdated trope in human history. No.. no.. it is. It exactly is.

Envy brags that’s why he can’t beat him having clearly traded disappearing up her own ass for disappearing up todd’s, Julie was also crammed up there, it was getting crowded. Envy claims to have been with todd since age 11.. which.. is more.. delusion than anything and she brushes off Ramona rightfully pointing out that’d mean he cheated on her with Ramona as Rammy trying to distract her and trying to smack talk SCott more who has another flashback.

SOME YEARS AGO.. I DUNNO 5? 5 YEARS AGO?

We see Scott’s first meeting with Envy, who was rooming with Julie. Julie, it might shock you.. has not changed at all in 5 or so years. She’s seen bitching at her roomate Natalie V. Adams, the future Envy, for not wanting to get drunk and high and for hanging out in her room with all her anime posters and stuff. As you can tell, she’s a vastly diffrent person at this point, a nerdy interverted otaku and as you can probably guess now the flashbacks have started at the top, we’ll be seeing how she became the sexpot rockstar she is now and how that drove a wedge betwene her and Scott. Julie SHOCKINGLY does not take this well and as Stephen to kil lher if she ever becomes friends with her. I mean I would but If I could travel into fictional works I certainly woudln’t be wasting my time murdering Julie. I’d be asking kim out and trying to get into some cool video game ablities myself. I ain’t got time for that bitch.

Next cut Julie is ... even worse as she’s calling Scott some “jerky jerky ladykiller”, pointing out he’s hooked up with recurring background characters Sandra and Monique. Now GRANTED, Scott could’ve hurt them and Julie could be right for once.. we’ve seen he has a history of being an insenstive douche by pure accident. But.. from the sounds of it given his encounters with Sandra and Monique were both in seperate ladies rooms, as in casual hookups I assume are common in universities. As long as he used a condom and dind’t lie about being in it longterm, who the hell does it hurt. Same if he and Natlie ended up being that. He’s not a “ladykiller” if he got busy on a washroom sink. He just had casual sex in an awful location and given Scott is both horny and stupid freqently, I could buy he either inittated it clumsily and sandra and or monqiue went for it, or one of them thought he was cute and wanted a quick one with him and it just never went anywhere either due to lack of intrest or Scott being kind of a moron. I don’t buy he INTENTIONALLY hurt anyone, he MIGHT of hurt Sandra she seems kind of ditzy and might’ve not realized it wans’t serious.. but it just entirely sounds like a casual, consesual one time hookup with two seperate women. And as long as he wore a condom and repsected their needs what the fuck is it Julie’s buisness. BEcause their here freinds? I mean they told her but they weren’t expecting her to play dick sheirff with scott probably. And Natlie is not her buisness: their not really friends.. she’s just trying to ruin Scott’s day. I honestly get the sense she only hates Scott because she can’t get rid of him, Stephen won’t dump him as a friend and he fucked her friends once. Which makes me hate her MORE. Natlie/Envy however also calls bullshit and thinks Scott’s much too awkward to be a ladykiller. Accurate. I mean he’s good with women and gets dates easily, he’s just not inteitonally leaving them high and dry. He’s just not great with empathy.

Scott snaps back to the present and gets pissed.. and we get the real reason for the outburst as he shouts “You you ass! She USED to be NICE!”. It’s very clear that Scott blames Todd for Envy’s change into an cold and cruel person. But .. that’s not on him entirely. I do think Envy’s cattier, more cruel “play with prey like a cat with a mouse” personality at this point is due to Todd feeding into her worse impulses.... but the flashbacks make clear even before she saw him again she was slowly changing as a person for better, gaining a drive and passion for music.. and for worse, shutting scott out cheating on him and generally not carring about anything but her career, especially Scott. As much as he wants to belivie it she didn’t MAGICALLY change into a bitch overnight and beating todd won’t fix that. She became what she is as a choice. Todd just made what she became worse.

After the predictable result of Scott getting flung into the air and falling back down, he has another flashback and we see the next phase of their relationship: Scott, Envy and Stephen playing in a band for Stacey and Wallace (!), whose hair is certainly a... choice. And the two falling in love and julie grilling scott on if he and nat are a couple because why stop making me wish for a bus to hit you NOW Jules?

So we then get ANOTHER iconic line and another scene that was perfectly translated into the film

Comic gold no matter the medium.. Brandon Routh just nailed it and I watched the scene again before writing this just out of curoisty. Flawless stuff. Check it out

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I will say however that while Movie!Envy’s response of just quickly covering is pretty funny.. I prefer the comic’s envy’s utterly baffled and pissed off “What are you talking about Todd?”. Even she can’t fathom what the fuck just happened. But since it’s late and Todd’s brain is pretty fried, Envy calls for everyone to get some sleep and they’ll regroup tommorow at 1pm at Honest Ed’s. Honest Ed’s WAS a famous discount Store in Canada that sadly closed in 2016, making what ‘s about to happen to it here sad in hindsight. It was known for big sales, big spectacle and i’ts larger than life owner who sadly passed a few years after this volume. But god bless him for giving this series one of it’s best settings. More on that when we get there for now FLASHBACK

Back in College, we see Nat’s change into envy as she sells all her stuff for some bitching new boots and cd’s and during sex with Scott asks him to start calling her Envy. Their still somewhat happy, as the next flashback has Scott remembering their 8 month anniversary and her playfully mocking him as the girl.. before we get a much starker one of him telling her he loved her and her not responding.. and looking at him.. more.. bored than anything.

Back in the present our heroes try to wait out the rain under a bank thing, can relate to the times i’ve visted the city and came out to rain, and when that fails Kim says she’s off and will see them at practice and tells Stephen to blow her when he asks her if she’s going to Honest Ed’s, then seems genuinly confused if he pissed her off before heading home. Swing and a miss stevie, swing and a miss.

Scott is hungry and sorta drags Ramona, whose not in the mood for anything, over to Pizza Pete’s a nearbye eatery. It’s there they happen to run into Other Scott... Other Scott is another guy named Scott. He dosen’t do much in the books. But the name Other Scott is objectively funny and he is objectively nice so he’s fine in my book and I applaud the movie for using him as Wallace’s love intrest. Though I wouldn’t be REMOTELY suprised if they were fucking in the books too. And of course with him is Wallace himself, who really is just.. entering this volume in the most Wallace way possible.

A little drunk, eating some cheap but good food, with a million dollar style and in just the exact right place at the exact right time. If that’s not Wallace Wells, I don’t know what is. Wallace and Other Scott were clubbin, not a huge suprise given Wallace has his own deep and complicated social life we never see and Wallace is naturally a little bit absolutley livid when he finds out Scott went to see Envy’s show anyway despite you know, putting him in a misery coma. Who do you think has to clean you and feed you when your like that Scott? Elves? Well I mean .. Wallace MIGHT be an elf.. but he stilld soen’t want to do either of those things. He breifly gets sidetracked by the fact that Scott is wearing his shirt.. maybe. I mean he wore it the other day but given their living situation it’s honestly hard to tell. Ramona reminds him of his priorites

That’s part of the fun of rereading these again so soon after rereading them in december: I’m noticing tons of little moments like this I didn’t really before. The two explain things, including Ramona pointing out Scott’s extra stupid around Envy. I mean it’s a bit mean to point out given this is clearly a lot for him.

Wallace brushes it off and promises to help him train like a true pal before being prompted to talk about this new boy he picked up Mobile.. who we wont’ see in person for a while but Wallace is clearly head over heels for and begs Scott to let him have the apartment.. or more accuratley Ramona, whose clearly not in the best of moods with Scott, to take him. His sales pitch is immaculate

So she agrees and a friendship is forged based on mutual hatred and being someone’s dipping sauce bitch. I’ve forged longer lasting friendships on far less. Also Wallace forgot his keys but wisely banked on his Gladstone Gander esque luck to help him out.. seriously i’m convinced he has a lower yield version of that. Or God wants to bang him but can’t because his penis is so powerful it CAN SPLIT A MOUNTAIN IN TWAINNNNN. You make the call.

So they sleep it off, and Scott heads home early next morning.. and forgot he gave wallace his keys. Thankfully wallace finds him, and even got him donuts for when he came back, what a guy, makes you cry and I did. He also shows off a new trick about using your chi to dust rain off you. Turns out Mobile is psyhich which.. dosen’t come into play but for vallad reasons: Scott assumes Mobile can just.. give him psyhic powers and training but a) he and Wallace JUST met and while they’ll remain together for the rest of the series, it’s a big ask to have him help train his best friend to fight a man as dumb and chisled as a mountain, and B) “It dosen’t work that way” meaning scott’s probably not psi adept and even if he can be taught, there’s not NEARLY enough time for him to get good enough at shielding himself from Telkenisis in time given Todd’s already fighting him today and has two other oppprotunites afterwords to beat his ass to death. There’s just not enough time. So scott collapses with a donut in his mouth.. are .. are we sure this isn’t just a more attractive more sucessful canadian alternate me?

We flashback to when Wallace met Envy and since i’ts post-becoming envy, it dosen’t go well and he hates her immidetly, and expects Scott to break up with her asap.. which while bitchy.. actually woudl’ve been a good move in the long run. And “Bitchily phrased but a good move in the long run” has apparently always been Wallace’s go-to move.

In the present Wallace helps Scott , who thinks everything sucks, realize it does not, with the help of fresh bacon and perspective, helping him avoid thinking Envy is “back” when she’s just vistiing and somewhat forces him to admit it’s not happening again nor should it. And implicity your both with other people, you’ve moved on, stay moved on. ANOTHER Flashback, this time with Envy asking Scott how he and Wallace met after dinner with Scott’s parents. It’s the story we’ve been hinting at since.. uh last volume.

And indeed it is somewhat gay! Behold! The origin of a friendship to piece the heavens or .. something like that. I’m tired.

It’s a quick breezy story that honestly both explains a lot and is what you’d expect; Wallace taking an intrest, Wallace presumibly realising Scott is straight off screen but deciding fuck it I like this guy let’s be pals instead, and jjust sorta showing up at his house. But since it’s Wallace and he and Scott both love gaming.. it just stuck. And it’s easy to see why. Scott’s a bit of an introvert and Wallace is a ton of an extrovert. Wallce is nice, naturally charming and endlessly cool, and as you can see it took him probably just an afternoon to go from freaking scott out for showing up randomly, to Scott talking the guy up and clearly being the bosom buddies they are now. The two just ballance each other out well. Wallace need’s scott’s weirdness and general heart, and Scott needs Wallace to keep him from running into the brick walls of life via his own stupidity and conflict avoidance. It’s what they do, they make it a two player game.

So later that day, and some off screen training later, presumibly to the song Two Player Game despite the fact it didn’t exist yet, our heroes (Scott, Ramona and Wallace), Villians (Envy and Todd) and other not so much evil as just cretionus assholes (Stephen and Julie) arrive. It’s also clear that Envy just made up the challenge as she went and I fucking love it, just saying they’ll run to the back, try and kill each other and no psychic powers, with Scott’s own handicap being “He isn’t a surivivor” which earns a rightful you unebleiviable bitch from wallace and a just ast rightful “fair enough” from Scott.

Stephen wonders what the deal is and Julie’s answer is... I don’t.. I can’t unpack this.

Meanwhile Wallace says “I hate her so much” Which I THINK was meant for Envy, but as a teen I interpited as being for Julie. Then again it being BOTH is entirely possible given no one can stand Julie for more than five mintues other than Stephen. And that’s because he’s still in the closet and hasn’t come out as bi or gay and thus sees her as a safe option or he really sucks with his taste in partners. Or a little from collumn a , a little from collumn b. So yeah Scott wants a Strategy and Wallace has.. nothing other than “Well he can’t use his powers so.. use that. I guess.. I dunno. I’m hungover” though Ramona warns he can’t go long without using them without freaking out. So gooood? I’m starting to think Kim is the most useful member in his crew for this fight.. and she’s the one who decided to nope out of it because she didn’t want to watch his ex pick him apart mentally and her muscly new boyfriend pick him apart with MIND BULLETS. Wallace isn’t really helping this go round, though he’s still a treasure, Ramona is trying but dosen’t have much, and Stephen thought bringing Julie was in any way shape or form a good idea. Which really sums up their entire relationship so it’s not surprising, it just makes me question why the two are friends at all.

No really, out of Scott’s three close friends.. this friendship feels the most like two guys who just used to hang out but have no real reason too other than convience. Wallace would go to bat for scott.. with an actual bat.. to Envy’s skull. He just dosen’t want to go to jail.. again. Kim pines for him, pun intended, and also does care, she just dosen’t show it because scott’s kinda a moron parade and an insenstivity brunch rolled into one. So she sticks around even though it hurts to. Stephen.. lost his big shot in part due to Scott (Though Envy’s pushness and lack of consideration for his feelings didn’t help), his shrew of a girlfriend hates him and he’s not that good at bass... and I just got it. While Tornoto’s a big city , he’s probably not sure if Kim would be doing this without Scott. He’s.. entirely still his friend because he needs a bass player and kim’s a damn fine drummer whose hard to replace. I just got it.. it makes him a self serving douchecanoe for only being someone's friend because he needs a bass player even though he doesn’t like him, but I at least GET IT now.

So the rush into Honest Ed’s begins and.. my god this whole sequence is sublimely redelcous. It feels like what would ACTUALLY happen if two guys fought for the reasons scott and todd are fighting: just two idiots dinking around in a discount store. Scott dosen’t even last a few seconds before shouting in response to Todd’s taunts “We are all dead”, tripping while looking for eyeware and well..

Meanwhile Todd starts to break down while shouting FATHEERRRRRRR like all good psychics. As for how long this beautiful nonsense has been going on....

Oh and if you thought it hadn’t gotten redicously hilarious enough... wait till you see what’s next.

No words.. should’ve.. sent a poet.. got a tubby asshole who reviews comics, disney shows and disney comics instead....

So we then get a montage in todd’s head with his SHOCKINGLY OLD dad telling him he dosen’t have the willpower to be a vegan.. Lynette telling him she’s his for the taking and Envy will never know as she opens her shirt, and

Gideon.. showing he not only consults the league but confriming what the audience and scott realized: He’s behind these assholes.. but it also shows how much. He’s actively coaching them.. and granted we KNEW the exes were in contact with one another given Lucas was having an understandable sigh about Matthew.. but this shows Gideon isn’t just some player and this isn’t some automated service. He brought them all together. The how ends up being hilarious, and we’ll get to that but while it was obvious he was the final boss this is a nice and terrifying bit of clarification. As for what happened next.. well Todd freaks out with his powers from not using them

Really sad in hindsight.. but still really funny despite the horrifying concidence. So yeah our hero declares victory but dind’t really when and things just kinda end. This segment went basically nowhere and acomplished nothing. .but was still really fun, with great lines and is one of the most memorable and awesome scenes in the series. It also shows the series growth between volumes: Last volume had a lot of cool moments.. but no real plot structure, just a bunch of things that needed to happen to get here. With Volume 3.. things are VERY tightly plotted, and even a fun but kinda pointless diversion like this... still fits in perfectly, giving us a second Scott and Todd fight to build him up, showing off just HOW powerful Todd is, and fleshing out the tofu headed douche a bit. As we’ve seen this volume still has it’s little slice of life moments the series does well. their just well put into a very compelling and fast paced plot, one we’re fully invested in as we see Scott’s torment and Ramona’s mounting anger at envy’s bullshit. It helps that Envy and Todd are the second best big bads of a volume behind gideon himslef in the fimale, with Roxy close at their heels if you were curious. Envy just oozes ego and superiority and is fun to watch every time, while we see moments once in a while that show she’s still human underneath even if she acts like a goddes.. and is admitely one of my types but that’s enough of that. She provides a nice contrast to ramona, also being standofish and mysterious but wheras ramona is clearly mysterious out of shame for a past she’s not proud of Envy is out of a past.. she has no reason to flee from and was never that bad.The only part Envy kept was Todd which was an objectively bad decision.

Todd meanwhile like all the exes as I re-realized.. is a mirror to scott. Each one has a piece of his worse traits amplified and expanded. So far Patel has been scott’s dorkyness, expanded from

To being a giant showy hipster douche desperate to seem cool and important. Lucas is scott’s afabliity and laziness taken to just outright avoiding a fight.. not nearly as bad as the others given he still has one of Scott’s best qualities with no drawbacks. But Todd.. is probably the ex that mirrors scott the second most. Besides both being base players with shaggy hair, both are delightfully stupid, both have a lot of charisma besides that and both are extremley good in a fight. But noticably.. Todd zigs a lot where Scott zags and the simlarites sort of stop. While both are objectively attractive, Todd is more conventinually chisled while Scott is more adorable, expertly reflected in the movie by having former Superman Brandon Routh opposite former George Micheal, Micheal Cera. Todd’s ablities are mental while Scott’s are entirely in martial arts and later swordplay. Todd has a rough relationship with his dad who never supported him and constnatly doubted him while Scott’s parents fully support him and love him uncdoitoinaly and despite his protests and annoyance with them.. it’s clear he still cares about them and loves them. And most damingly.. Scott treats people like garbage sometimes.. but it’s because he’s oblivoius. He’s a finaical burden on Wallace, cheated on Knives, gave Kim no closure, blew up Stephen’s chances at the big time, and in general can be kind of a dick.. but NONE of that is intetnional. It dosen’t make it okay, the books make that clear.. but it’s why we can still root for him: It’s something that can be fixed. Scott hurts people a lot but he lacks gneuinely malicious intent. He leaves a lot of pain in his wake.. but it’s because he’s socially inept, and again and I say this as someone with atusitim myself, defintely on the spectrum , so he dosen’t GET he’s hurting people unless they tell him. Something that will probably not shock you but I relate to and has happened to me in the past, hence while i’ll clal him a douche or stupid, because he’s both, I do sympathize with the guy as the whilrwilnd of descrution is just him being so intent on being seen as a good person and moving past things he can’t see the wreckage in ihs wake, and the series is about him growing past that mindset.

Todd.. is just an entitled dick who KNOWS he’s probably going to hurt people but does the things anyway because he thinks as a rock star he can do whatever he wants. As a Vegan he’s superior so he’s allwoed to do WHATEVER he wants. He’s so obessed with making his dad not see him as a failure he’s developed an Ego that can only be visualized properly using well.. Ego

That’s what his ego has become. He’s so up his own ass his head is coming out of his mouth somehow. He’s so in love with himself he’s probably googled “How to make a sexy clone of yourself”. He’s scott’s oblivoiusness and selfishness, but with genuine intent. He’s scott if he KNEW what he was doing was wrong.. and said fuck it anyway i’m a rockstar baby. Todd, is EASILY what scott could’ve been at envy’s side had they not broken up.. successful.. but an utter bastard who only cares about themselves. Anyways we cut to practice that night were Stephen is spiraling and Kim declines going to the show.. not for the obvious reasons of wanting to avoid another round of “watch Envy tourture scott before Todd beats his skull in with his psychic powers”, but because she has a date. Lucky bastard. The guys are naturally as tactful as you’d expect about this and suggest she’s doing a collage or puzzles before she shuts htem down and they awkardly recover and I laugh my ass off.

So Scott and Ramona head out, trading some talk and what have you and having some Sushi, not going there often because they can’t afford it.. but it’s cool Scott swipied Wallace’s card. When pressed on his douchebaggery Scott assures her.

We’ll get more into this next time, but needless to say Scott’s mooching is finally becoming a plot point next time. Speaking of next time on the way to the show Ramona realizes “Wait why the hell are we doing this” and convinces Scott not to go as they can relax, have a night off, cuddle and stuff, and then Scott can fight Todd tommorow at the big show. Why DO they need to sit in with two assholes who are only inviting them to fuck with their heads some more. Well okay one asshole while Todd is okay with all this he probably just mubled some “sure whatevers” while trying to solve a rubix cube while Envy outlined her plans to him before rearanging the stickers so he could win.. I Mean with his mind so it’s sitll a little impressive but still.

So they TRY making out, complete with being in their undies.. but it just dosen’t work as both of them keep picturing Envy’s face and that’s not good for either of them.

AND it was at this point fucking tumblr.. ate an hour’s worth of work I just did. Probably not something you need to know or care about but something that pisses me off greatly as I was approaching the end of the review and now have to either retype or entirely rethink what I JUST spent a while working hard on.

And this time I mean it. The only reason i’m not giving up and shelving this review for a bit.. is ithat i’m a stubborn bastard who refuses to give up that easily and who needed to vent about this to somewhere.

So Ramona finally comes clean about Todd.. and in a nice moment admits to cheating on Lucas with him “It wasn’t very nice but I wasn’t a nice person”. It’s a small thing, something I didn’t notice before.. but it’s actually a big step given how guarded Ramona is to admit to doing something this bad. Last volume, just a few days ago time wise, she lied entirely about this and probably has no idea Scott knows already. But she’s being honest, telling him the truth so he’ll be prepared for what’s coming and know the full story. The full story is they were both little shits who raised hell together till Todd disappeared for a while. He shows up as you’d expect, dickishily interupting class before explaning Dairy Scientests kidnapped and experimented on him. He also says this

So he proves his love. in the most badass and horrifying way possible: BY MAKING ONE OF THE TWO BIG NOTICABLE CRATERS ON THE GODDAMN MOON.

One of the series best jokes. Ramona also takes a hard pass to learning about envy and asks about Kim... not for any reason.. just thinks sh’es nice. It’s not like she wants to make out with her face.. a lot. Just.. girl things. SHUT UP. She’s also unsatisfied with Scott’s piss take version of his relationship with her. Closing out the chapter, Knives.. has somehow climbed a huge pile of billboardsi n the middle of tornoto.. which would be awesome.. if it weren’t such a beautifully sad image.

Whelp my heart just exploded with pain at this poor girl whose lost the love of her live, which is a goood thing mind you but dosen’t mean it dosen’t hurt less, her faviorte band and her highlights all in the span of a month. Moving on as we approach the final act, we get a brief scene as Todd orders some Gelato, which is itallian icec ream, very not vegan and Envy does not relaize this. Todd however rants about being a rock star, being so above people and as for the rules

We also get this lovely bit

And then they make out and i’ts treated as a big shocker despite.. us.. finding that out several dozen pages ago. We know already.

Back at Scott and Wallace’s place, Ramona shows up with cool new blue hairdoo, which I agree with Wallace is awesome and admits she changes her hair up every couple of weeks.. someething that in the color version we do see better. We also get a gag that no longer makes sense as he asks if that’s her natural haircolor and she says yay and the caption admits this was funnier in black and white. Eh one or two jokes for some really pretty colors is a fair enough trade.

Scott however once again bitches about his hair, despite Ramona pointing out to him and Wallace that.. there’s like dozens of haircut places within walking distance. I remain unsuprised thier that oblivous. But to shut her boyfriend up she agrees to cut his hair and while they do asks what Envy’s actual name is.. scott’s response .. is pretty heartbreaking “Natalie. She stopped liking it. Then she stopped liking me. So Scott shows up with his NEW HAIR CUT.. aka his old one just trimmed up a bit, but the one you see in modern merch and the game. A bit shaggy but not as long. Scott reassures Stephen whose spiraling with panic that it won’t be the same as last time and they’ll have fun. Kim, understandably and having not been told anything, wonders what “last time was”. After everyone chimes in Kid chamelon i’ts time for another FLASHBACK.. as you were probably expecting by now.. but this time I added some proper effects to spice it up.

So we find out more of whta drove a wedge between the two: Envy slowly but surely took a tryanical death grip on the band, adding some guy named Joel on the drums, possibly the same guy from Crash and the Boys, and bumping Scott to bass, without asking him or Stephen about this and just sorta.. demanding it. While her intetnions are understandable, she just wants the band’s best sound.. her actions are still head tiltingly obnoxious, and clearly show she had not studied rock history yet as usually taking absolute control of the band and ignoring your band mates is the easiet way to destroy a band. Sometimes it’s just envy, pun unintneded but welcome, but yeah.. it’s no wonder they didn’t last. Scott is also shown to be more and more uncomfortable with the band going from a fun thing he did with his friend and girlfriend.. to something that could make him famous.. something he’s very transparently not ready for and dosen’t want. And it makes sense: he was just a dumb college kid in love.. he didn’t start the band for fame or glory.. he just wanted to have fun. Same with his current band. And while in the PRESENT his lack of ambition can be obnoxious and will be a problem in the next volume, here.. he’s still in college and sudeenly got thrust into a career he dosen’t want with a person who no longer loves or respects him. It’s understandable that he’s a nervous , miserable wreck.

So in the present, Stephen is throwing up and asking for julie and Scott.. is a dick and ignores him. Were it anyone else and any other relationship currrently int he books I would actually give a shit. So he wonders around a bit, running into some teens who are intrested in him, word travels fast apparently, Julie, who for once displays a human emotion of concern for Stephen or the closest she can, and thankfully Wallace, Stacey and Micheal,who now has a spooky skeleton ring from the future and badly needs his own spinoff. Stacey TRIES to pump her brother up.. but it’s clear he’s in no good mental place for that and trudges off while Wallace, man of the year, worries about him. One GOOD THING about the astronomical setback that happened is in the orignal draft of this.. I forgot to talk about Stacey. Despite promising to. So here it goes: After this Stacey.. just sorta vanishes from the series. She’s still around and while not super promient gets a decent amount of screentime in the finale, she makes cameos before then. But from this book on she’s no longer a main character like she was in the first two books. There she had several scenes, lots of focus, and her own mini arc in the first one about Wallace stealing her boyfriends. There’s. an actual reason for this as O’Malley regretted naming her after his sister and thus basically stopped writing her unless he had to, sticking her in once in a while to assure fans he hadn’t forgotten her but removing her from the main plot. That being said while his reason is weak.. I dn’t think it’s the ONLY reason she slid into the background. The main cast already had 6 characters, and on top of that this volume heavily focuses on Envy, the next adds Lisa Miller to the mix, and every volume frmo this one on has increased focus on the ex of the week, building them up more as characters and giving them way more screen time. Stacey.. really didn’t have a unique niche or roll in the sotry the other 5 non-scott leads didn’t: Knives filled out the position as the baby of Scott’s friend group, Ramona and Wallace served as better voices of reason, Kim and Wallace had better chemistry with Ramona and thus worked better as her friends, and Stpehn. did nothing she did but still at least had a part to play as band leader and the only one of Sex Bomb-Omb with ambition. Stacey is not a bd character and DID deserve to still be way more prominent.. but her move to the back let Kim take her place and rightfully so. And not just because of the crush on kim thing, Kim’s just more compelling and tha’ts an objective fact. Still would’ve been nice to learn more about Stacey though.

Scott then frees his girlfriend from a conversatoin with Sandra and Monique, as Julie bitchily told both about Gideon which Envy told her about, because as your every couple of paragraphs reminder, Julie is a piece of shit. Scott then orders them some alchols, breaking his usual teetotling and runs into kim, hollie and joseph. with Hollie here to see the band and .. Joseph here to see todd. At least h’es honest.. for this volume. Anyways, our happy couple soon split off for a bit and while we bounce back and forth.. i’m just going to cover what hapepned with each seperately as SOMEHOW tumblr once again ate a good hour’s worth of work, this review is already a day late, and I have both abother one and a dental apointment today. So in short

Ramona and Kim: Kim fills Ramona in on her past.. via tone down, seemingly contridctary, and as we’ll find out later the true version of what happened: She was with Simon, he was a dick, Scott showed up he was also a dick, things happened. I guess. Ramona is disapointed, though Kim does provide some crucial info on her moving to tronto.. and reuniting with scott.

It honestly.. explains a LOT of why Scott is the way he is what happened with Envy. He saw Envy change entirley as a person.. and thus feels changing as a person , and smoking, is a sign of something bad.. when really it just means.. your changing. Sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worst but we area LWAYS changing and it took me a lont time to realize that. The two are distracted from this though by Todd sloppily making out with Lynette in front of everyone.

We’re also reintroduced to Crash and the Boys, now redubbed the boys and crash, and seemingly playing music without intsturments. The thorughly lovely and rediculous explinaton for this and their new gloves and goggles, i’ll save for in a bit.

Scott and Envy, Scott and Knives: Scott goes out to get some air.. only to find Envy, who despite menally tourturing him for a few days insits they talk like regular people.. Scott wisely counters with “Nat when did we ever talk like real people” and while saying he won’t get to call her that again, it still chips down her walls for a second and shows that a bit of who she used to be, loath as she is to admit it, is still there.

Scott then spots knives... and has a moment of truth. And a hell of a series of reaction panels

It’s a VERY good scene.. that i’ve written about TWICE now but regardless, it shows Scott.. genuinely changing. Ignoring his past actions, running away from them and trying to pretend he never fucked up once... that’s been his go to. It’s his main flaw and hte one that takes the entire series to deal with as we’ll get into. And it’s here.. he faces it for the first time. He’s scared of knives at first.. but realizes.. he genuinely hurt her, and she’s where she is, cold, alone, and huddled in an ally lost and confused, because of him. Sure Envy hurt her.. but so did he.. and what’s worse. he did it just like Envy hurt him. Not thinking of her as a persona nd throwing her away when he didn’t need her. And so after books of build up.. he finally takes some responisblity and talks to her. It’s WHY the books work: Sure scott’s a dick, and remains a bit of one throughout, but.. he means well, isn’t inteitonally a standoffish prick, and slowly grows PAST this, and tries to be better, for Ramona.. and just because it’s the right thing to do.

So Knives reflects on the past few weeks, admitting that it’s been unbearably painful.. but she can’t and won’t go back to who she used to be. She’s lost her innocnce and all that, been dumped by the “love of her life”, been punched in the face by her faviorite drummer and treated like dogshit by her faviorite artist. Todd did nothing for once but gets no credit because of who we’re dealing with here. Point is.. it was a lot and while sh’es not HAPPY.. she’s greatful for it. Scott however.. steps up, saying what Envy did was wrong, she deserved better.. and finally, after how terribly he broke up wit hher.. apologizes for how he hurt her. And while Knives takes this as hope they’l get back together, Scott continues to be very mature, especially for his usual behavior, telling her no, it won’t happen, to give neil a try as whle she is dating him because he looks like Scott he’s not all bad, and that wallce was right: she was too good for him. And while Knives isn’t ready to accept it.. Scott did the right thing. Good for you man.

So while he, and later kim and stephen seperatly, get ready, Ramona.. runs into Envy. Whose oddly nice for ahlf a second.. before bringing up Gideon and giving Ramona a barrage of insults, clearly trying ONCE AGAIN, to knock her down and wreck her. Thing is while Scott clearlya nd understandably has baggage with Envy is easy prey for her manipulative elephant dung, Ramona. isn’t. All Envy’s done is piss her off more and more with each act of high school level mean girl bullshit... and sh’es done with it.

FIGHT’S ON. This Volume.. is honestly where Ramona really comes into bloom, pun intended, as the duetragonist of the books. While the book IS about Scott getting his life together and their relationship and he’s still her hero.. the books are also about RAMONA growing as a person, her own flaws and past, and the climax of all of them.. is just as much about her as it is scott. And this book has her own flaws come into play: Just like Scott she runs from the past, from who she was, and only faces it when needed, which will become more apparent as we go. But at the same time, we get to see far more of her personality as a result as her mysterious facade continues to drop. She’s prone to getting upset, but also clever and witty and knows her limits, knowing that going to that second performance would’ve just done no good and knowing herself very well, something Scott has genuine trouble with. She’s strong, sarcastic and knows who she is and what she wants and this volume finally brings that into focus. Not only that but her fight with Envy, is just as warranted, climatic and awesome as Scott’s fight coming up, as no one has stood up to envy due to her fame.. but Ramona.. dosen’t care. Someone’s gotta stop her, and Ramona’s taking up the job. And the awesome looking hammer.

That being said taking up a giant hammer against a beloved celebrity dosen’t win you any point, so Ramona finds herself discouraged, even if Envy can very clearly handle herself. Thankfully she gets some encouragment from exactly who you’d expect.

And Wallce.. turns out to be pretty useful. At least in this one fight. His shouting not only gives Ramona her fight back.. but keeps distracting envy, leaving her wide open. The tide turns though when Wallace has to pee, and Envy uses the distraction to knock the hamme rout of Raona’s hand and prepare to flatten her. But once again.. someone save sher in the knick of time.. and this time it’s the LAST person you’d expect, as Knives gives the hammer a flying kick.. and then crashes into a wall, and when Ramona, understandably not getting this since she tried to turn her into swiss cheese earlier this week, asks why, Knives admit’s she just wants Scott to be happy. Knives has grown too, and while she’s still obessed with Scott and waiting for themt o break up.. she’s no longer going to try and wedge her way in. If Ramona is what Scott wants, tha’ts what he gets.

All three are distracted by well.. this...

State of your outfits mates. Though that line is iconic. But serously the outfits are hilaroiusly and reaslitically mismatched. Kim’s home made and overdone gothica lolita outfit that dosen’t match her AT ALL, goth yes , poofy goth no. Stephen’s johnny cash outfit he clearly had lying around and Scott’s Dad Suit.

That being said.. still the best looking one of the three. But Envy takes advantage to regrab the hammer and try and murder the two of them.. but Scott sees this.. and well... you get it by now, one more time. Bake me away toys!

So we get the final weeks or days or whatever of the relationship. In a nice parallel to Scott playing Ramona a song he does the same for Envy.. who both questions what this is for then is confused why he’d do something so sweet. Next scene is her getting a call while their cuddling in bed from some guy she idntiefies as Jason and.. barely disguises is clearly cheating on Scott with. and could possibly be todd I dunno. After that we get to Kid Chamelon preparing to sign a deal and Envy.. trying to press Scott into sginging it, ignoring his obvious discomfort, and then casually threanting to replace him. While Scott does give us a face punchingly dickish comment about “How he started this band to meet chicks and maybe he met the wrong chick”... he’s still somehow in the right as while he’s being a manic dickhead... Envy has ceased seeing him as a person or even something she cares about and tells him to get a hair cut and leave.

We then get the breakup itself as Scott goes up to envy.. and she tells him to get out of her life. ack in the present, Scott’s grown enough to realize he has to stop her and does so.. by touching hte back of her knee which.. uhhhh.

So yeah.. he beat her with an orgasm, and that looks oddly hot. And i’m moving on before that last part of the sentence sinks in. Envy, once she recovers, orders Todd to do a murder on them, but Todd’s not there and Ramona, naturally, brags about him having cheated on her. Envy.. denis.. this.

I .. don’t have time to unpack that. This review is late, I have two other reviews to get to today. Time for ANOTHER flashback.

This time it’s Envy teling a story bok verion of her and Toddd’s relationship. It’s a real poetic and well done sequence. In a nuthsell: Envy and Todd were best friends and deeply in love as kids until todd moved away i’m guessing sometime in middle school. Deeply depressed, Envy sailed through life as sort of a ghost, TRYING to find another connection like that, but failing. Todd returned after she graduated though, and gave her a symbol of his love.. a hole on the moon. Yes another one. And they both promised to never waiver as he went off to the vegan academy. Clearly Envy did with Scott... but it paints her ambition in another light. One where she wanted to be big and bold enough for him.. but slowly carved out her old self to do so.

And as is obvious it was pointlness: not only did Envy love someone else.. but Todd never cared as much as she did. As Ramona points out, and relcutnantly because even she feels a little bad about this one, he did the moon trick with her.. and this time Envy CAN’T deny it.. becaue the evidence is right there.

And of course Todd.. makes his case even WORSE by picking that moment to come out of the bathroom, sipping up his pants, with panties on his head, and with Lynette following right after him. Envy.. tries to murder Lynette, her go to, but LYnette teleports out. Because she can do that. Though Envy does hit her cyborg arm so she looes that and the panties and Ramona offers to mount it at her place if Kim takes the panties, but kim admits she wasn’t scrapbooking, she said she was and was just making the dress. Horay, as ramona puts it “Col se can still be friends. Right.. FRIENDS.

Envy TRIES to cave Todd’s skull in, get some therapy woman, but Todd naturally tk’s it away but despite being the king of all assholes DOES care enough not to fight her. Envy... plays nice then knees him in the nuts like he fucking deserves. Todd then returns to being the once and future douchebag by TK’ing her into the crowd and bragging about it.

Scott dosen’t take this well, even after everything and the final fight begins. They have a bass fight.. but like the game i’ts redicuously one sided since Todd both is a skilled bassist compared to Scott.. and is still using his psychic powers lest you forget he’s a bastard man.

The Boys and Crash however show up to even the odds.. and their trainig is the reason they can play music without insturments as they can now manipulate pur sound. Fucking beautiful. But even they aren’t enough and Todd swats them aside.

While poorly is a bit harsh.. the vegan police show up, which is awesome, though the movie got thomas jane for one of them and had that high five so they win. But yeah.. while this is hilarous.. and the scene with them is great.. it’s also the weakest part of an otherwise near perfect book. It just feels a bit anti clmatic that after all this build up.. Todd is just.. beaten with a sloppy depower. The boys and crash would’ve still been a cop out, but it would’ve been a freaking cool cop out. The thing that saves it is afterwords Scott still gets an epic finish: after they devganize him for the gelato earlier, scott headbutts him epicly and wins. He gets money and.

A 1-up, which understandibly terrfies him but will come in hand in a few volumes. Trust me. Scot checks on everyone. Ramona’s fine, Envy is not and breifly blames scott before he points out Todd was a no good cheating dickwad, and Kim is obviously fine as nothing happend, but him asking is a nice bit of charcter growth. Kim asks about kinves but she’s okay and neil is helping her. But theshow must go on and since the headliners are dead (don’t worry he’ll respawn), in parts unknown and in emotoinal apocalypse, someone’s gotta play.

So our heroes have the show of their lives, and crowd reaction is mostly positive with Jospeh noticing htier levels were horrible, a hint for next time, and the crew interviewing everyone.. including a mysterous gentleman having a beer, who has no commenta nd walks away.

Gideon.. was here the whole time,but he’s not ready for Scott JUST yet. Still a really damn cool tease for the final boss.

So we close the next day, Scott and Envy sorta make up, with both apologizing for their behavor and while Scott gets no closure, envy promises to return.. and makes good on it. But.. that’s for the finale. For now Scott’s girlfriend and best buddy give him a moment to baste in his pathos, before heading off. And in a nice bit of metaphor, the clouds part, and our three amigos walk off into the sunset and a bright future. Three down 4 to go. Next time: Lesbian Artist Ninjas! Side Stories! Scott Gets A Job! The Band gets a producer! Kim gets a decent apartment and a boyfriend! Lisa returns! See you in feburary.

Until then if you liked this review, spread it around andi f ther’es a comic you want me to cover, my comissions are open. Until the next rainbow, it was a pleasure.

#scott pilgrim #scott pilgrim and the infinite sadness #ramona flowers #wallace wells #kim pine #stephen stiles #neil nordgraf #envy adams #todd ingram #lynette gycott #julie powers #other scott #monique #sandra #college #comics #Brian Lee O'malley #oni press

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bytheangell · 4 years

Text

Getaway Car

Flufftober Day 29: Cars (Read on AO3)

Maia can remember the last time she felt the urge to just run the way she does now - it was the night she first turned, scared and alone and overwhelmed.

She may not be alone now, she hasn’t been since Luke took her in, but she’s plenty overwhelmed.

Leading a pack under normal circumstances would be more than enough pressure for Maia, but rebuilding a back is a lot. It’s too much.

She manages to hold herself together the best she can, which must be better than she thinks because no one seems to suspect she’s one more question she doesn’t have the answer to away from snapping…. No one other than Simon.

Maia catches the little things here and there that Simon’s been doing - offering to grab her food, asking if she’s alright even if she lies through her teeth in response, even asking after some of the issues she’s been pressing with the Council when he’s with Alec and the others.

Today she barely has the energy to exist let alone fake any amount of cheer, so when Simon asks her how she’s doing she shrugs and manages what she hopes is a convincing deflection of “I’m managing.”

Simon’s face immediately turns serious, his brows pinching together in concern, a frown replacing the smile of his friendly greeting. “What do you need me to do?” he asks.

It’s such a simple, harmless question, but it feels just as overwhelming to answer as all the others on her plate right now.

“I need to get away,” Maia says instinctively. If there’s anyone she can safely vent to it’s Simon. “I just… I just need a break. Honestly, if I had a car, and I guess technically a valid license, I would’ve been long gone by now.”

She feels guilty just admitting it, like she’s letting down everyone relying on her - Luke, the pack, Alec, Simon… herself.

“Good thing you know someone with both a license and a car. Well, a van, but still,” Simon points out. “Consider me your personal getaway car, let’s go.”

Maia could laugh at how simple he makes it sound, and she does, the laugh only making Simon frown more.

“I can’t. There’s too much to do,” she reminds him.

“If there’s one thing I’ve learned since I joined the Shadow World, it’s that there’s always too much to do. Someone can cover for a day or two. We’re getting out of town,” Simon presses.

Maia hesitates. She doesn’t have any meetings she physically needs to be here for until Thursday… theoretically, she could…

“I can see you overthinking this,” Simon cuts off her thoughts. “You deserve a break, Maia. The wolves will survive one day without you.”

They will. She knows they will, but still…

“I can’t afford a trip right now,” she excuses. She’s put all her funds into the pack and into building Taki’s. “Maybe next month.”

“Who needs money?” Simon asks. “We can… go camping. Or I can ask Luke if we can go up to the farmhouse for a night or two.”

The idea sounds nice, actually, and no matter how hard she tries she can’t think of any other valid excuses to say no.

“Okay. Ask Luke - I think I need my escape to include a proper bed, not a forest floor,” she suggests.

Simon does, and a few minutes later he’s hanging up the phone with a grin on his face and a timeframe for them to throw an overnight bag together and go pick up the keys to the farmhouse upstate.

Bat agrees to watch over the pack stuff for a day and thanks Simon profusely for getting her to agree to a day off, something Bat’s been trying to do lately as well.

It’s perfect. They drive with the windows down, singing to songs on the radio at the top of their lungs, laughing and sharing ridiculous stories after making a strict ‘No Business Talk’ rule.

The fall is starting to shift to winter with a bit of a bite to the crisp late November air. They spend a lot of time walking around the property, with Simon telling stories of the times he and Clary would spend here during their childhood summers growing up, and Simon takes her to a favorite local diner for dinner before they retire for a movie. It turns out her ‘proper bed’ request from earlier wasn’t necessary, since they both fall asleep curled against each other on the sofa.

Maia feels more refreshed than she imagined possible when they return to the city - and with a clearer head and a calmer mind, she actually feels capable of tackling the onslaught of work ahead of her.

The next time she feels like she needs a break, Simon's there again, this time with two train tickets for a snowy mountain getaway (because, to quote Simon, “we will absolutely die if I try to drive this van in actual snow up a mountain). Neither of them knows how to ski but Simon convinces her to try snow tubing, which is equal parts fun and terrifying, complete with warm cocoa by the fire after she overturns and faceplants into the freezing cold snow.

There’s a moment where Simon shifts closer to her and their conversations falls quiet. She thinks just maybe he’s going to kiss her - but then he leans away again. Maia bites down on her lower lip as she considers her next words carefully.

“You know,” she starts. “I don’t regret the way we ended things. It’s what I needed, back then, but-” she hesitates. “But I think maybe we deserve a second chance.”

It’s a gamble, and she can only hope that if he doesn’t agree it doesn’t ruin the friendship they’ve kept going through it all.

“That isn’t why I’m doing this,” Simon tells her. “You don’t owe me anything more for being a good friend.”

It’s so like Simon too, even as she’s the one making the suggestion, check in on her own feelings and motivations, to be the one reassuring her. She wonders why she ever let him go in the first place, honestly, because he’s damn near perfect as far as (potential) boyfriends are concerned.

“I know,” she says. “And I don’t feel like I owe you anything. I know you’re only doing this because you’re a good person, and a great friend, and you don’t expect anything in return. I’m not- that isn’t why I’m saying it. I’ve been thinking about it for a little while now. I mean, we ended things on good terms, right? And we were good together. It wasn’t the right time for me, but now…” Maia trails off, wondering if she’s totally off-base here.

When she looks back up from where her gaze drifted down towards her hands while she spoke, she sees Simon grinning that wide, contagious grin of his that wrinkles the skin along his cheeks.

“We were, weren’t we?” Simon echoes back. And this time he does lean in, giving her plenty of time to reconsider, not that she’s going to. She meets him halfway and as their lips touch again she melts into it, into the calming, grounding presence of Simon, and it feels like coming home.

#saia #simon lewis #maia roberts #shadowhunters #did i mention cars once then never again #yes maybe #but we're stretching today okay it's my birthday let me have this #elle writes a few deadbeat lines #flufftober 2020 #long post

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lucastheunlucky · 4 years

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Admissions | Jared&Lucas

Location: National Park TWs: It soft, none Summary: Luke and Jared have a few things to confess, and Lucas, with the looming threat of Gotch always on his mind, wants to be sure Jared knows he’s thankful for having him in his life. @themidnightfarmer

Luke had told him not to worry, but like hell was Jared going to let himself miss the obvious trouble in the words ‘should something happen to me’ again. Not after how serious last time had been. The nymph sat on the outer gate of the farm and looked down the dirt track in the direction most people approached the place by car. Luke had said he’d pick him up after all. Jared sat with one arm crossed across his chest, and the other resting on top so that he could chew on his thumbnail nervously. He plastered on a smile and made a show of waving both arms when he spotted Luke coming however, no use in looking worried if he was going to find out anyway. Maybe it wasn’t so bad? Maybe he was thinking too much into the words like Luke had suggested he had. “So, socks or toes? Where are we at with shoes?” He grinned when the other was close enough to call out to.

When Jared got in, Lucas took them towards the National Park for some rock climbing. Jared’s easy going smile was a nice thing to see, but Luke’s stomach was in knots. Something had struck him hard when he got back from the full moon, his thoughts darker than usual and he knew the ghost that was attached to him was probably amping it up. She would soon be dealt with, hopefully. Lucas pointed to the few pairs of shoes on the floor at Jared’s feet. “One of those might fit you, I have a couple pairs now since some of my other friends like to come with me,” Lucas said easy, and tried not to make the mood heavy like the weight on his shoulders was. “You doing okay? Haven’t seen you online much. Was wondering if you decided the farm didn’t need wifi.”

Jared almost bonked his head on the dashboard leaning over to inspect the shoes at his feet. He crossed one leg over the other and started to untie his boots in preparation for trying on a pair. “You mean I’m not the first ever friend you've ever taken to climb? I’m hurt.” He said dramatically, throwing his wrist up against his forehead with a smirk and a small laugh. Luke asked about his last few weeks and Jared couldn’t hide his grimace. “It was a bit stressful, I won’t lie. But I think things are going to work out. I’m hoping at least that they’ll think about working out.” He supplied before managing to remove a boot and shifting to the other. “What about you bud? Out of town for something good?”

“No, you are not,” Lucas chuckled at the dramatics. The scent of Jared in the truck was extremely nice, and with the window down, it calmed Luke down a bit. Having worked himself up after he got back and realized that he was falling so easily into life. Not accounting for what that always meant for him. “Stressful? Shit. Life does that crap, if it rains it pours kinda deal sometimes. I’m glad it will or might work out for you, whatever it was. I’d say I’ll help you, but I’m not in any position for that right now.” Lucas clearly meant it, he never wanted his friends in trouble, and his shoulders seemed heavy while he held the wheel. “I was out of town for the full moon.” Lucas simply answered, but sighed. Jared would either get it or not. If he played it like he assumed Regan would, Luke would turn the convo around. “That’s part of what I wanted to talk to you about.”

The others words held a lot of weight and Jared abandoned his shoelaces in favour of looking at Lucas fully. The gears in Jareds head were turning, but he was slow on the uptake, it took him a few minutes to put together the tone of voice and the implication. And yet, even connecting the ‘full moon’ to some of the more supernatural stuff in town Jared still managed to get it completely wrong. “For a….ritual?” He asked hesitantly before trying to gauge how Luke reacted to that question. “You thought I’d be...angry?”

“What? No,” Luke’s brows wrinkled, not sure what that meant in anyway. Lucas wasn’t ashamed of being a werewolf in any way, if anything, he was quite proud and loud about it with those who knew, but he also always wanted to be sure people didn’t lose their minds over realizing supernatural things existed. It wasn’t entirely fair to them. But Lucas has definitely eaten a small handful of Jared’s ‘children’ and Luke couldn’t imagine Jared was stupid enough not to know they weren’t normal. He offered a sharp smile, and the faintest amber to his eyes. “I kinda know your children aren’t typical livestock, Jared. I didn’t put it together until I saw you again. But I was the one that broke into your farm. Didn’t realize anyone was there over the winter, seemed empty at the time, and I can’t entirely help a good hunt when the moon is up. I always set something up to keep me occupied, I’m quite dangerous.”

His initial guess was out the window as Luke denied one of the two choices Jared had in his head. Spellcaster was out. So werewolf it was. And maybe it should have been more shocking. But Jared had been finding out a lot about people he’d grown up with lately. This spring when he’d returned to the farm he’d not stopped being surprised by someone else from the past. But he did look at Luke with new eyes. Curious eyes of his own, and eyes wondering how long Jared had been blind to the facts. His stomach did jolt however at Luke’s admission. On one hand he was livid. Hunting. His kids. But on the other he had to rival that with logic. It was a choice to protect others. A choice that hurt him, a choice that went against what he believed in. But given what he protected and everything that had happened recently how could he be angry? A werewolf had an instinct to hunt, and wasn’t that just what he defended his kids from doing as well? Would he be a hypocrite? He was at war and every emotion flashed across his face unimpeded. “I… that’s… uh.” He didn’t know what road to take. He was torn.

“I know it’s a lot, which is why I wanted to do it in person.” Lucas could tell Jared was struggling and he really didn’t blame him. This kind of stuff could be overwhelming for anyone, and there was a piece of him that was waiting for Jared to tell him to ‘stop making shit up’. But Lucas wasn’t sure if he would be alive in the next month or so, and the low point he had yesterday over his mortality and being a liar to those he cares about-- the weight of knowing that those people he called friends, so many didn’t know the real him. It made it important. Jared had to know. Luke couldn’t face Gotch without saying his sorry. “I’m not human man. Never have been. I was born a wolf and it’s challenging during that time of the month, but it doesn’t entirely mean I’m not apologetic over it. So-- seriously, I’m sorry I killed your kids.” Lucas pulled into the parking lot just near where the trail was and turned the truck off. He leaned on the steering wheel, giving Jared more of his attention now that the road wasn’t important.

One shoe on, one shoe off. It was exactly his reality at that moment as well as where his mind was. “Oh.” Jared settled on as the truck engine ceased and the two of them could make full eye contact. “I didn’t know...you could be born a werewolf.” He admitted after a moment of quiet trying to comprehend it all. “Thought it was all-” he made a mouth with one hand and mimed biting his other arm with it, it was the movement of a child trying to speak before they could properly vocalise but it was what he managed finishing with a helpless shrug. “My kids...I… I suppose I can’t fault you for doing something you felt you had to. Something...natural to your kind? I’ll admit I don’t... “ He took a breath. “I mean if we’re coming clean I can go next?” Jared paused a moment before adding his own admission to the mix. “I’m not...well human either?”

Luke expected that. “We are kinda rare, but my entire family is. Makes for good training though, it’s why I can appear human so easily and why I can reassure you I won’t bother your barns again. I have excellent control, it’s why I left town. Found a different hunt.” Luke didn’t mention the harpy nest Miles and him took out. Jared attempting to justify Luke’s actions which clearly were hurtful to him, had Lucas’ heart aching. He reached out, squeezing his thigh, his expression soft and trying not to appear anything but worried about Jared’s feelings. “You don’t have to do that. To you, if it’s wrong, then it was. I’ll try to make it up to you.” When Jared presented the last bit Lucas could only smile. “I mean, I figured. It’s the only reason I’m even telling you anything. I don’t like to involve humans into supernatural business.”

“I… yeah, I’d ask you to leave my kids alone.” Jared was so much more closely connected to the charges on his farmland, he would still be distracted by the idea that somewhere else more of his charges were in danger, but truly that was pedantic and even he could agree with that. Werewolves were a part of this world, this natural world he quoted often. Not taking any of his direct charges was more than he could hope for. “…I’ll try to forgive Luke. I’ve been on a bit of a ride recently concerning my kids. I'm...trying to be more understanding that not everyone sees them like I do.” It still hurt, it would hurt. But Luke hadn’t known. So truly Jared felt it was unfair to blame him. He patted the hand on his leg and returned the smile as best as he could. “You’d be surprised at the humans that are running around town in the know. I’m a nymph though I’d say born that way as well if I uh...had technically been born? Bit of a weird one. Josie isn’t my actual twin, but we did arrive on the same day I suppose.”

“Did someone else hurt them? Is it normal for you to fight so much to keep them safe? I mean, I don’t know exactly what they are, but-- shit,” Lucas was more worried about someone coming for Jared if he was honest. Did he get threatened? He could be a soft guy, and Lucas didn’t want to see him hurt ever, which is why this was a conversation that was so hard. Lucas had to reel that overprotective energy real fast before he spiraled. “I see. I’m not overly familiar with the Fae, but I’m not ignorant about it. I’m a little relieved we could tell each other this. I didn’t want such a big secret between us--” Luke trailed off, not finishing the sentence about why. “Come on, let's get to the rock site,” Luke got out, grabbing gear from the back of the truck. “So tell me something interesting about your kind. You are safe on the farm right?”

“It’s not normal. I glamour them all to look normal, or as normal as I can manage if I know someone regular is coming around. The farm is so far down the track it’s not usually an issue. The only people who know are trusted. But recently I had someone come try to steal one. I uh fixed it though.” He’d shot the guy, taken him hostage and forced him to promise never to tell anyone or return. How did you tell a friend that? Jared glanced at Luke and figured he’d tell him at some point. The secrets were ending. Luke could be trusted completely with every little thing now he was confident in that. The nymph finished changing his shoes quickly and rounded the truck to help. “Interesting? OH I have horns bud! Like real horns, grew in while we were in school. Absolute nightmare at the time, but I think they’re pretty cool!” He tapped Luke on the arm and pointed into his hair, where 4 horns emerged from glamour for a moment. Focusing on the exciting parts of this revelation was a lot easier than dwelling on the other bits. “But hey what about you bud! Growing up werewolf and all?”

This all felt good, and the pressure on Luke’s chest from anxiety, didn’t ache as much. It would always be there, worried, and concerned over the people who wanted him in their lives. Lucas having been told by the worse of people that he couldn’t be loved. Luke was genuinely surprised by the horns and the falling of the magic or illusion keeping them hidden was really interesting. “You know, it’s you. It really suits your face. I am so naive with magic, fae or not. I always joke and say I’ll take on a dragon before attempting to get it.” Luke started walking them to a place he frequented, and kept him in decent shape all around. “Growing up werewolf,” Lucas huffed a laugh. “Shit, man. I dunno. I was a troublemaker. Hormones are no joke, and while dealing with first changes. It was awkward, sometimes I’d be somewhere and I could hear someone’s private conversation or the gym locker room would reek so badly I’d throw up. I was so confused when I was younger. All the time. I had all this information and couldn’t really tell anyone I knew it.”

Even with the comment Jared covered his horns back up again. It was safer this way, and it was always good practice. With so many more emotionally stressful situations happening since he had gotten home in spring he’d found that he needed all the practice he could get just in case he at some point had to cover a whole lot more than just himself. “I mean if dragons ever decide to become real I will be right behind you in wanting to meet one.” He joked. A childhood like that sounded on par with his own. Growing up was hard when you were something different. Especially when you felt like the only one that was. “But hey. Made it to be an adult despite it all.” Jared chirps, trying to bring the mood up. His elbow pops out to nudge Luke playfully as they walk the trail. “And no more secrets. Us not normies have to stick together now. The good the bad and the musty.”

Luke could leave it there. He jokingly pushed him back then took off running, taking them to where the rocks jutted from a hill and made for some fun low climbing or high bouldering. It would be so easy to let this be the moment Jared remembers, right? Let this memory overlay the issue with his farm, and maybe, if Lucas didn’t survive it, he could think on this and smile. Knowing Luke a little better, enough to make them feel closer. Gotch’s voice was heavy in his mind, saturated with words that made him second guess why he did things. Jared’s statement is stale on his tongue. He put his stuff down, and faced Jared proper. “Hey man, I have to tell you one more thing. If I am not around at any point, like-- if something happens, just know that I really appreciated this little bit of time, and just being friends as kids too. Having you-- period, making me smile and shit. I’m thankful.”

Jared grinned as Luke shoved him back before taking off after the man. It was fun to act like kids again with each other after so much time apart. LIke nothing had happened. Like they both hadn’t just admitted to lies and identities that they’d never shared with one another.

Luke had some heavy stuff on his mind but Jared was feeling light, his secret was held so close to his chest for so long. But lately, finding people to deem trustworthy was getting easier. And he was glad that him and Luke could be so open. This mood shifted rapidly however when Luke spoke again. “Is something going to happen?” He asked. Luke had said something similar over the phone and it had set off alarm bells in his mind, it was so similar to the talk Nell had tried to have with him before she’d left to potentially die getting her sister back. “Is something wrong?” He wasn’t going to let another moment like that pass in stupidity on his part by not picking up on it.

“Yeah man,” Lucas sighed, scratching the back of his head. Along his forehead and into his hairline a rounded scar from getting shot years ago, and the newest one up his forearm that almost cost him his arm and a long stay at the hospital. Not included, the multitude of other ones, all in age, all the same. Starbursts under his shirt, raised lines. “These scars aren’t there because of some fun. I’ve got a hunter problem, and it’s a personal vendetta and it’s not good. I have people looking out for me, but I’ve dealt with this guy since I was young. He won’t let me live peacefully for long. I’m waiting for the shoe to drop. I don’t know how it will end. It’s why I wanted to be honest with you. I just wanted you to have a good memory with me, just in case it goes badly this time.”

Climbing was completely forgotten by the nymph. Jared turned to look at Luke, his eyes flickering over the scars being gestured at before his face screwed up in worry. “I have loads of good memories with you.” Jared said trying once again to process a horrible truth coming to light about his friend. “And we’ll have more. Don’t be…..saying goodbye okay it makes it seem like you’ve given up. Don’t give up.” It came out a little like a plea. But Jared didn’t want to upset Luke, he just wanted to know Luke wasn’t planning on just resigning himself to what he thought was coming. “Can I do something? You could… we could do something?”

“I’m not giving up, that might be the problem though,” Lucas smiled softly, reassuring and knowing he has good memories with Jared meant a lot to him. He couldn’t always remember well with his old head injury, and the confirmation was pleasing to know. Even if it was all grim around it, and he could tell Jared didn’t like how it all sounded. Luke knew it felt like a goodbye, but in a bad way, it was a small one. Just in case. “In the past, I just let him have his way with me. Even a few months ago, he attacked me and put me in the hospital-- I let it happen. Just sat there man, stuck in my head. He’s fucked me up mentally, I’m a mess around him.” He admitted, and it was rancid on his tongue. He sighed. “I’d rather you not be anywhere near this man. He kills brutally, and without care. The pack will handle him. I know its heavy, I just was alone for so long, and now having you all back in my life, I was desperate for you to know how appreciative I was of having you. Friends don’t say that enough.”

Jared’s emotions always ran a little higher when it came to his friends. Especially considering Luke in particular had come back into his life all of a sudden and not that long ago. Jared had memories of them in school, but the newer ones, where they so easily fell back into friendship wanted his heart the most. So hearing his story was hard, hearing his struggle, and knowing that it was only today he was being granted the knowledge when Luke had clearly been struggling with it a long time. Jared never claimed to be a strong man, he always had and always would be soft to the core in situations like this, and it reflected in how glassy his eyes became. The tears stayed in his eyes but the blonde didn’t hesitate to wraps his arms around the other. “Friends don’t say that enough. You’re important Luke. Don’t hesitate to ask me for help, if I can I would want to know you’d ask.”

Lucas huffed, accepting the hug and wrapped his large wingspan around the other tightly. The unique scent of Jared was easily marked this close, and now knowing that he wasn’t human made their friendship feel even more special. Luke didn’t have to lie as much, and he wanted to learn more about Jared’s life that was just as hidden as his own. But these moments, small pockets of hours filled with friends, and laughter, and feeling like he was living-- made Lucas feel happy. That was what he was after more than anything. Lucas could see Jared’s watery expression, even if he was holding it in, it made a bubble of emotion hit his chest and he matched. “Don’t cry, I’ll win--” he promised softly, neither were in fact crying but close enough that it seemed like he was telling himself not too as well. The slightest of growls vibrating down his chest and in his lungs. “I’ll fucking win and I will ask you, alright?” Though Luke didn’t want to pull him anywhere near this, knowing the violence that wrapped around the hunter, he understood why Jared needed that reassurance. “So, phew, I feel so much better getting that off my chest. Emotions are crazy.” He tried to joke, letting go of Jared. “Ready for fun now? Or you have something you need to work through with me? I’m all ears if so, bro.”

Too many of Jared's friends were in danger, and so many of them had some sort of idea in their head that he wasn’t strong enough to hear it. And maybe he was soft, a little too emotional at times too, but he wanted to keep them safe. He wanted to keep Luke safe. No matter if he’d unknowingly been hunting his charges. How could he fault a werewolf for natural instinct, trying their best to not hurt people? He hadn’t known about Jared, and had already promised to leave the farm be now that he did know. Sniffling, the nymph pulled back from the hug and nodded his head a few times firmly. “Emotions are crazy.” Jared agreed before shaking his head. “I accidentally kidnapped someone once, but they’re fine now.” and with that, said quickly like ripping off a bandaid, all was out in the open. “Lets climb.”

#x: admissions #x: jared

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tran5rightsos · 3 years

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Tomorrow Might be Good for Something - Chapter One

Word Count: 1873

Leave Kudos?

Michael sighed irritably, glaring at the clock on the wall. Even after a month of consistent school attendance, he didn’t seem to be getting any more used to the way time tended to drag in boring classes.

“Twenty minutes,” Calum commented.

“This is bullshit,” Michael replied.

Calum looked at Mr Barnes, but luckily he hadn’t heard. Before Michael’s dad cracked down on his attendance, he would have just walked out of class the moment he felt bored, which was often. It was genuinely shocking that he was keeping up in class, given that he’d barely been there last year.

Personally, Calum was grateful for Mr Irwin’s intervention. Actually spending time with Michael in class meant that they’d slowly become friends. Their teachers were worried about Michael being a bad influence on Calum, but so far the most he got in trouble for was talking to him in class.

“You wanna go to HJ’s?” Michael asked a little loudly.

“I’d love to,” Mr Barnes replied, giving Michael a pointed look before turning back to the whiteboard to explain the quote he’d written on it to the class.

Michael rolled his eyes.

“Sure,” Calum said quietly.

The nearest Hungry Jack’s was a twenty minute walk from school and thirty minutes from Calum’s house, the perfect detour for when he didn’t wanna go home right after school. As they walked, Calum wondered if Michael was putting off going home too. They made conversation about movies, Michael suggesting that Calum come over to watch Mission: Impossible since he hadn’t seen it since he was little.

“Have you done the Maths homework?” Calum asked as they ate.

Michael scoffed. “The deal was that I go to school, not do schoolwork at home.”

Calum said nothing. He hoped Michael wasn’t that much of a smartass to his dad’s face. Calum’s would kill him if he tried something like that. He started having second thoughts about going over for a movie, but ultimately decided that he’d rather watch Michael get his ass beaten than go home.

Calum didn’t know how far Michael lived from him yet, he’d never been over before today. He lived in a pretty normal-looking house with a sleek silver muscle car parked in front of the garage.

As they approached the front door, Calum heard faint sounds of impact from the garage. They became louder when they got inside and he realised there was a sort of uneven rhythm to it. Four impacts, then a pause that varied in length, though sometimes there were fewer impacts before a pause.

Noticing Calum’s curiosity, Michael explained. “We have a gym in the garage. Shouldn’t be too loud, though.”

The entryway opened up to a combined kitchen, dining room and living area. Michael headed straight for the TV cupboard to look through the movies while Calum looked around. The door by the kitchen looked like it went to the garage and a sliding door in the dining area led to the back veranda. Calum guessed that the rest of the house was through the archway at the other end of the dining area.

“Make yourself comfortable,” Michael invited as he turned on the TV.

Calum didn’t know if he could do comfortable, but he took a seat on the couch as Michael went to the kitchen to get a bag of chips. He started settling in when Michael offered him a chip from the bowl he’d brought them.

“Tom Cruise is hot, huh?” Michael commented after a while.

Calum glanced at him and gave a non-commital grunt. Leave it to Michael to say something like that. Even to people who didn’t know him, the eyeliner, piercings and bright red hair should have made it obvious that he didn’t really give a shit about acceptable behaviour.

“Are you… into him?”

Michael scoffed. “I like dudes, yeah.”

Calum nodded. “He is kinda hot,” he eventually agreed. He didn’t want Michael to think he was weird about gay people.

Just then, the kitchen door opened and Calum froze. Shit.

A small kid from school, probably a year nine or something, walked in looking sweat and exhausted. He stared at Calum, seeming nervous about his unexpected presence, but Calum was more concerned with the man that followed him in.

He was somewhat aged, in his forties by lines in his face and the maths Calum guessed with, since he was probably a relative of Michael’s. His outfit consisted of shorts that showed off curvy thighs and a black singlet that clung to his body, showing off everything. He was in really good shape. His hair was black, curls dangling around his hawk-like eyes and filling out his heart-shaped face.

He ruffled the kid’s hair lightly. “Go shower, I’ll get lunch on.” There was a slight American twang in his accent, as if Calum needed to find the man any more intriguing.

The kid scampered away, which unfortunately left the man to focus his attention on Calum and Michael as he filled a glass at the kitchen sink.

“Haven’t seen you before,” he commented, “I’m Michael’s dad, Ashton.”

“‘M Calum,” Calum replied weakly. He cleared his throat in embarrassment, pulling his eyes away from Mr Irwin’s pouty lower lip.

“Calum.” Mr Irwin regarded him for a moment and Michael pulled his attention away from the movie to return the look. Mr Irwin grinned, showing dimples Calum hadn’t expected. “My boy behave himself in class?”

“Ash,” Michael groaned, flopping back against the couch in annoyance.

Mr Irwin chuckled and finally turned away to rummage through the fridge.

“Why do you call your dad by his name?” Calum whispered during a loud action sequence.

Michael glanced at him. “He’s- Me and Luke are adopted.” He didn’t bother keeping his voice down and Calum cringed, throwing Mr Irwin a glance.

“See the resemblance?” Mr Irwin joked as he put a capsicum on the island bench.

“Sorry,” Calum mumbled to Michael.

Michael shrugged. “It’s fine.”

Calum felt slightly less weird about finding his friend’s dad hot, but he would still rather die than admit it out loud. He focused on the movie and Michael’s commentary as much as he could while Mr Irwin cut vegetables in the kitchen, but couldn’t help the occasional glance. It wasn’t Calum’s fault that the man had fucking amazing arms.

“Mikes,” Mr Irwin called after a while.

Michael looked over at him.

“Can you finish lunch?” he asked, holding up a flip phone.

“When are you gonna be back?”

“I’ll let you know when I know,” he replied as he headed to the archway, “Don’t forget Luke’s peanut butter.”

Michael sighed and stood.

“You want help?” Calum volunteered, pausing the movie.

“Sure. It’s just stir-fry.”

The vegetables and tofu were already chopped, so Michael had Calum rinse the leafy greens in the sink while he put a wok on the stove and took out several bottles of various sauces. Mr Irwin reemerged as they were putting the veggies in, dressed in black jeans, a red button-up and a leather jacket, his shower-wet hair pushed back. Calum flinched when he walked straight at him and Michael, but all he did was pull Michael in for a quick, one-armed hug on the way out.

“Don’t wait up. I love you.”

“Love you too,” Michael replied easily before turning back to the stove.

When Calum’s heart rate had slowed somewhat, he asked if Michael needed any more help.

“Could you put some toast on? Bread’s in the fridge.”

Once the stir-fry was done and Michael had spread peanut butter on the two slice of toast, he put all the knives in the sink and filled it partway.

“Dinner!” he yelled, making Calum flinch.

The kid, Luke, slowly emerged from the hallway.

“Why are you dressed like that?” Michael asked with a frown as he took the wok to the table.

Luke shrugged, eyes flickering to Calum.

“Calum’s not gonna care.”

“Care about what?” Calum couldn’t see anything wrong with how Luke was dressed; he was just wearing shorts and a red flannel.

Michael shrugged. “Can you get the forks, Luke?”

They set the table, Michael putting the plate of toast in front of Luke before serving Calum a helping. He was shockingly well-mannered, given his behaviour at school.

“This is Calum, by the way.”

Calum gave Luke a smile, but he kept his eyes on his plate. “Were you exercising with your dad earlier?” he tried.

Luke nodded shyly.

“Boxing,” Michael said, gesturing for Luke to serve himself next.

Calum stared at Michael, wondering if that was just what they told people, if their “exercise” was closer to Mr Irwin taking his anger out on them. Michael didn’t seem scared of his adoptive father, though. Was that just part of his rebellious personality?

“Ashton wanted us to be able to protect ourselves, so he started teaching us when we were little,” Michael continued. He gave Luke’s hair a fond ruffle, Luke making an indignant noise in response. “Our little guy’s been getting strong recently,” he cooed in the kind of voice one might use when talking about a puppy.

Luke pouted in annoyance for a moment before taking a bite from his peanut butter stir-fry toast as Michael snickered.

“Where did your dad go?” Calum asked.

“Work,” Michael replied, “He gets called in for emergencies sometimes.”

“What does he do?”

“He’s a mortician.”

Calum frowned. “Morticians have emergencies?”

Michael shrugged.

When they finished eating, they took the dishes to the sink.

“Do you wanna watch Mission: Impossible with me and Calum?” Michael asked Luke.

Luke chewed his lip and glanced at Calum, eventually nodding.

Michael gave his shoulder a pat. “Go wait for us.”

“Where are your knives?” Calum asked when they were washing up, holding up the one he’d just dried.

Michael hurriedly lowered his hand, glancing at Luke on the couch. “That drawer.”

Calum opened the drawer he’d pointed to, finding all their knives sitting in dividers, including the dinner knives that Calum would have expected to belong with the normal cutlery. He put the knife in an empty spot and closed the drawer, wondering if it was appropriate to ask. Maybe it was to keep them safe from children, but there wasn't a lock and, as far as Calum knew, Michael didn't have any siblings aside from Luke.

When they were done, Michael grabbed a bag of cheezels from the pantry and poured them into a new bowl and took it to the couch. Luke snuggled up to him as he sat and Calum took the seat on his other side. As they unpaused the movie, he found himself distracted by Luke, who kept pawing at Michael’s side, looking up at him urgently.

“Later,” Michael hissed to him, “A few hours won’t kill me.”

“A few hours?” Calum asked.

“Don’t worry about it,” Michael replied, flicking Luke’s head.

Luke grumbled irritably, but didn’t actually say anything the whole time Calum was there. Mr Irwin didn’t come home either, though Michael assured him that he was usually stuck at the morgue for hours at a time when he was called in. Calum didn’t have a lot of close friends, but as he walked home he started to wonder if the Irwins were kinda weird.

#au: tomorrow #my fic

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peterjakes · 5 years

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Sam x Grizz Fanfic - ‘Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth’

Third part and possible last of ‘The sun is but a morning star’ series - grizz meets eden and its cute x

also posted of ao3; https://archiveofourown.org/works/21281282

It had been a week since Eden was born and she was thriving. Being constantly showered in affection but not only her extremely tired parents; but her extended family which included Kelly, Gordie, and Bean. Little did she know the biggest disaster of the small world of New Ham she had been born into. Things still hadn’t mellowed down; even with many trying to figure out what they were going to do to try to fix the mess they’d been landed in. This was something that was extremely worrying for Grizz. He hadn’t seen Sam since they reunited; he thought it best to give him a little bit of space, especially as he still technically had a new-born to look after. Grizz ached to see Sam but he didn’t want to disturb him or Becca. Although the tension between him and Sam had finally disappeared; he still felt as if he still couldn’t barge in on Sam and Becca. It was as if he’d ruin their little family of bliss, and that was the last thing he wanted to do.

It was his third day back since arriving from the expedition and he’d spent most of that time in his room, hiding. Anyone else who had been living in his house had already cleared out when he first arrived, which was actually a blessing. Back when Allie was in charge, as part of the guard, Grizz spent most of his time at Allie’s, rarely going home (only to change or shower). He remembered how after a few weeks of Allie being mayor, Grizz and Gordie started their own little book club, just to past the time. Soon enough Bean and Becca joined in, just to listen. Then Sam. They’d all try to least have breakfast together at least once a week, like a family ritual. Gordie made coffee, Grizz the tea, Sam the toast (even though it was burnt almost every time). They’d take about menial, mundane, meaningless things. Life before New Ham. What they were going to do after graduation, how much they all hated Mr. Cam and his dumb moustache, missing their families, the normality of their lives before. Grizz took charge of watering all the plants, whilst Bean and Becca would go around the garden picking out the prettiest flowers to decorate the house. Will changed all the light bulbs whenever they broke, even though he seemed to smash most of them. If anyone was having a rough day; Grizz would leave a small but inspiring quote on their pillow or pin it to the fridge. Daily group naps became an important part of everyone’s day. They all took care of each other. But all of that was gone now. Cassandra dead. Luke, a traitor. Allie arrested. Will arrested. Becca, a mother. Sam, a father. Bean scared. Gordie alone. Grizz alone.

These thoughts floated around Grizz’s mind whenever he wasn’t thinking about Sam. Sam’s lips. Sam’s freckles all dotted perfectly on his face. Sam’s soft, soft hair. Sam’s sparkling, vivid blue eyes. He wanted to touch him again, all of him. Even just to be in his presence, Grizz pined for him. The space between them was almost becoming too much. It was as if there were oceans between the two. Grizz was being pulled down by the weight of his need for Sam. He knew he’d have to talk to Sam again. No, not ‘have to’, he wanted to. He wanted to see that special smile, the one that seemed to make Grizz forget anytime he wasn’t with Sam.

Once again, Grizz knew he’d have to be the one to make the first move, Sam had a new-born to take care of after all. He moved along his bed, reaching for his phone which was placed on the bedside table. Before typing, he quickly scrolled through the texts he and Sam had sent each other, nothing special, nothing incriminating but every single word held so much more than it first appeared. Grizz typed out the message and hit sent before he could think otherwise, not wanting to waste a moment longer.

Grizz: Hey

He flicked off the message, not wanting to see the non-existence of the three little dots and scrolled down to his last conversation with Luke. Again, meaningless. Luke had taken Grizz’s varsity jacket by mistake when they were on duty one night and was offering to swap. Grizz’s slender fingers started to type up a message but quickly deleted those words. No real words could be sent. No real words could describe the hurt Grizz felt when he realised what Luke, his best friend, had done. Yes, he felt betrayed. Luke, who’d Grizz had known since he was 7 years old. Luke, who’d Grizz had stuck by through all of those years. Luke, who was popular with everyone, but never seemed to let it go to his head. Luke, who loved Grizz like a brother. Luke, who Grizz couldn’t tell who he truly was. Luke. This intense thought was interrupted by a slight vibration coming from Grizz’s phone, to which Grizz scrambled to pick up and dropped the phone 4 times before opening up the message.

Sam: Hey; sorry I haven’t been around much. Are you okay?

Grizz: It’s fine, I’m fine. Are you? How’s Eden?

Sam: All she does is cry and poop; like Becca 😂

Sam: I want to see you; can I see you?

Grizz: Haha, I’ll tell her you said that 😉

Grizz: Of course, you can.

Sam: Come to Becca’s house later. 6?

Grizz: I’ll see you then x

As soon as Grizz sent that kiss, he regretted him. Not completely sure why, especially as he and Sam had done far more to warranty a simple ‘x’ on a text, but still. Sam and Grizz had seemed to move so fast, something that at the time Grizz wasn’t aware of. At first, it definitely wasn’t something to complain about. But the day Grizz and the group left for the expedition, only moments after he said goodbye to Sam, that bittersweet departure, he wondered how they’d gotten to where they were.

Becca’s house was the other side of town, and unfortunately for Grizz that was a sure set for him bumping into someone he really didn’t want to see. The last time Grizz had around Becca’s, it was the first time he’d been properly alone with Sam. After meeting in the library, to his Grizz’s delight, Sam had invited him round to practise some ASL. It had only been for a few hours, but Grizz had actually learned a lot. Not just about ASL.

Upon arriving at Sam’s, Grizz contemplated knocking or just walking straight back home. His nerves had started to kick in once again, something that was becoming a regular occurrence when it came to Sam. He doubted Sam even knew what he did to him. Brushing those thoughts aside, he lightly tapped on the door, as if there was a small part of him that hoped no one could hear it. Of course, he wanted to see Sam, but it had been a few days and that meant time to think. And in his current state, thinking wasn’t particularly wise.

Only a few seconds passed before the door swung open as if Sam was eagerly waiting for the other boy. Grizz was greeted by those beautiful, blue eyes, the ones that made him feel all giddy inside. When Sam looked at him with those eyes, it was as if they were made especially for him and only him. Grizz didn’t care if he never looked at anything else.

“Hey,” Grizz quickly signed to Sam, before being pulled into a big bear hug by the smaller boy, something he’d missed in their few days apart. Sam seemed to grip tightly on Grizz’s shoulders as if he never wanted to let go. Grizz was wearing his hair in one of his tight buns; a look that made Sam go absolutely crazy.

“I missed you.” Sam looked up at Grizz, his eyes glistened with complete and utter despair, which was something Sam didn’t like to see. He hadn’t expected things to go back to how they were before; that would have been stupid. It would take some time. But all they had was time.

Grizz raised his eyebrows, “It’s been two days, Sam.” to which Sam shrugged and led Grizz to the kitchen, which Grizz hated to say was a complete tip. The table was covered in a variety of different baby essentials; baby wipes, a breast pump, nappies. Parent life he supposed.

“You’ve been busy, huh?” Grizz said, whilst picking up a loose baby wipe, frowning at the sight of it.

Grizz didn’t know much about babies. How many 18-year olds did? Grizz had never had much to do with babies or other children. Being an only child and living away from any cousins or extended family made sure of that. Grizz liked to think he was pretty good with kids, he and Luke helped out with the junior football team sometimes and he enjoyed it. He liked to think he’d be pretty good with younger children too. But he never got the chance.

“Babies,” Sam answered and yanked the baby wipe out of Grizz’s hand, throwing it aside.

“You look tired.” Grizz signed hastily, to which Sam gave a ‘no shit’ look.

“I am exhausted. All I want to do is sleep.” Grizz chuckled at that comment, edging closer to Sam, closing the gap between the two. He wanted to touch Sam again, even if only for a moment. Skin on skin. Something. Just something.

Sam waited a moment before asking his next question, unsure whether it would be too raw still. “Do you want to meet her?” Sam couldn’t think of anything better, than seeing Eden in Grizz’s arms. That was what his dreams were made of.

“What?” This had caught Grizz off guard; something that had happened quite a lot when it came to Sam. Grizz couldn’t explain what he did to him, but he wasn’t going to deny that he enjoyed it. The natural path for this meeting to go would likely have included meeting Eden, but this thought hadn’t crossed Grizz’s mind. It wasn’t that he hadn’t thought or didn’t care about Eden, but there had been more important things for Grizz to worry about. Firstly, figuring out how the fuck everything had turned to shit so quickly. And how he could protect Sam.

“Eden. You wanna see her?” Sam cocked his head, not wanting to pressure Grizz into anything, but making it pretty clear that he would absolutely love to see it.

Not wanting to disappoint Sam, Grizz slowly nodded, trying to seem as eager as he could at that moment. “I..uh…yeah, yeah.”

“Sure? You don’t have to.” Sam knew this was still difficult for Grizz. Sure, Sam wasn’t the biological father, but he was Eden’s father and he would be for the rest of his life. He never wanted to hurt Grizz or make life hard, but he didn’t want to separate the two sides of his life. And Grizz holding Eden was something he had to see. Desperately.

“Yes, Sam. I want to see her.” Grizz signed carefully, wanting to make sure that Sam understood that he wasn’t going to be awkward. How could he? It wouldn’t be fair of him.

Sam nodded, “Okay.” And pulled Grizz towards the staircase near the back of the house, Grizz hadn’t paid much attention to the interior the last time he was here. He obviously had other things on his mind at the time, which had been on his mind ever since he’d spoken to Sam properly. But the house was quaint, relatively small and had that ‘homely’ smell Grizz could only dream of when he was growing up.

The two entered Sam and Becca’s room, which is occupied by a very exhausted sleeping Becca and gurgling Eden. Grizz stopped dead, like a deer in traffic lights when he first saw Sam pick up Eden. He looked so natural, cradling her in his arms. This image, such a perfect image, still brought some sadness to Grizz.

“She’s beautiful.” Grizz signed this, putting special emphasis on ‘beautiful’, unsure if he’d actually signed it right. He’d been practising this sign specifically after last seeing Sam. He had a feeling he would be using it more often.

“We think so too, perfect little angel apart from when she starts screeching. Loses her charm a little.” Sam whispered this, obviously not wanting to stir the small child. He moved closer to Grizz, delicately placing Eden in Grizz’s strong arms.

“Oh, she could never,” Grizz mused, looking down at Eden, giving her a small smile. She was so small, so tiny, so soft, so clean. She seemed to stop stirring as if she felt so calm in his arms. Looking down at this perfect being, Grizz couldn’t understand how anything could be bad again.

Sam gave Grizz a tired smile and motioned to take Eden back. Grizz complied, carefully handing Eden back to Sam, cradling her head as he did. “She has her eyes, Becca, don’t you think?” Sam nodded again, his eyes started to droop ever so slightly, whilst placing Eden back in her crib. He stared down at her for a few seconds, as if he was in his own little world, waiting for her to drift off once again.

“You need to sleep, Sam.” Grizz interrupted Sam’s thoughts, whatever they were, placing his hand on Sam’s right shoulder, wrapping his fingers down, slotting in perfectly with Sam’s skin. Sam brushed him off, physically and mentally, frowning. Of course, he needed sleep. Understatement of the century. But everyone needed sleep. Grizz doubted anyone slept a goodnight’s sleep the day the expedition group came back. Everyone was filled with worry. Gordie had visited Grizz after dinner that first night back, briefly filling him in on the events. That had scared Grizz. But that wasn’t the main thing. People had stopped going to the cafeteria, only a handful turned up for that night’s dinner. This just reminded Grizz of when Cassandra died; they had just managed to sort it out before it got any worse. But Grizz didn’t think they’d be so lucky this time.

“I’m serious. You look like shit.”

“Is that how you charm all your boyfriends?” Sam muses before realising what he said, quickly looking at Grizz, a worried look started to appear on his face. “I didn’t-“stuttered Sam, wondering why he ever said anything when he was around Grizz. It was like his brain didn’t work.

“Right…” Grizz couldn’t help but a chuckle a little but tried his best to keep it in, not wanting to embarrass Sam. Quickly changing the subject, Grizz interjected, “But seriously, if you don’t go to bed right now, I’m gonna have to carry you.” Now that was a threat. Grizz wasn’t even sure if that was possible. Sure, Sam wasn’t the biggest guy in the world, he was quite a few inches shorter than Grizz, but who wasn’t? From his 13, Grizz had always been the tallest in his class, that’s what made him so good at football. It was just easy. But that world seemed so far away, and nothing in his life now was easy.

Inching away from Grizz, Sam started to pick up some of Eden’s things; a baby pink blanket that had seen better days, the raggedy elephant plush that Gordie had gifted them and a single dummy. Grizz could tell Sam was doing his best to ignore him, but it became obvious that he was failing.

“Come on, sleepyhead,” Grizz said this more sternly, he was genuinely concerned about the amount of sleep Sam was getting. No one was sleeping properly, but still, Sam looked like he was about to collapse.

Sam shook his head, moving away from Grizz once again. “I need to keep an eye on Eden.” That’s all he had done for the past few days. It was the least he could do for Becca, who had carried Eden all that time, and was so damn exhausted. It wasn’t like it was a chore though, Sam relished every moment he spent with her. He never knew anything could be so precious. So precious but so loud. So, tiring.

Grizz knew this tactic; he’d himself used it before when blocking Sam out. This was one of the things he’d regretted. He never wanted that, quite the contrary actually, he wanted them to be honest with each other.

“Nope. No way. Bedtime.” Grizz only signed ‘bedtime’, placing his right hand onto his left eye, and tapped the top of his wrist, where one of his hair ties was wrapped around.

“But-“

“I’ll look after her. Least I can do.”

“You’re tired too.” Sam sighed, he didn’t want to ever put Grizz out or make him uncomfortable. Sure, Eden was adorable, and no one in their right mind could resist her. But Sam knew it was still a delicate subject and he didn’t want to force that onto Grizz. Then again, it was becoming very clear that Sam could not work with next to no sleep. And who was he to argue?

“I’ll come join you, later. When she’s settled. Deal?” Grizz signed all of this, allowing his fingers to move swiftly and smoothly, once again unsure whether he’d done it right, there still seemed so much he needed to learn. That was something he wanted to request from Sam, but in his current state, thought it best to wait until Sam could actually stand up without his eyes drooping as if his eyes would roll out of his head.

“You. Are. So. Annoying.” Sam enunciated these words, poking Grizz’s chest with his index finger each time. He knew he’d might as well give in, Grizz didn’t seem to be wavering and Sam never wanted to fight with him again, that had been far too exhausting.

“Yeah, yeah. Let’s go, before I have to pick you up and carry you there.” Grizz started to manoeuvre Sam towards the door, giving him a slight push, to which Sam complied. If he was being completely honest, going to sleep was something he’d wondered if he’d ever experience again. He never knew babies could be so demanding. Cute, but demanding.

“Bossy.” Sam signed, placing his index finger on and off of his chin three times, almost aggressively. This quite new to Grizz, he’d only ever seen Sam sign with an almost calmness, even when he was angry, he never seemed to raise his voice. Which was something he loved about him.

“Stop winging.” Grizz scoffed just as Sam directed them to the only other bedroom in the house, which Grizz quickly realised must have been Becca’s moms’ room. The remnants of a middle-aged woman living there were still quite clear; the odd photo of Becca and her mom, a single David Bowie vinyl and a plush velvet throw sprawled across the king-sized bed. Even though Becca’s mom had likely never even been in this version of her room, Grizz felt slightly uncomfortable, as if he was invading her privacy.

Sam flopped down on his bed, star fishing across the sheets. Grizz turned to leave the room but was quickly pulled down on top of Sam. Sam let one of his hands go from Grizz’s wrist, placing it on the back of his neck, slowly caressing it. He gave him a little smirk, before crashing their lips together, almost in slow motion, like a blurred dream. This kiss was fuller, Sam seemed to have complete control, moving his tongue around Grizz’s mouth, wrapping it perfectly against the other boy’s. his hungry mouth melded into the other. Making sure he didn’t pull away, Grizz slid his body down beside Sam, holding tightly to his head. Their lips magnetised with each other; they were naturally attracting to each other like a type of force of nature. Meant to be. Sam quickly moved his hand up towards Grizz’s head, pulling out his hair tie and gripped onto a lock of hair, pulling it slowly. Moans escaped Grizz’s mouth as the kiss developed and Sam could feel his breathlessness against his own mouth. Grizz hungrily pushed back, working his mouth against Sam’s, their tongues battling with each other, trying to pin each other down. Grizz could feel the heat rising in his cheeks and removed Sam’s other hand from his wrist to feel his face. The kiss started to slow down a little, Sam’s muscles were tiring. He slowly pulled away, but placed a short, sweet kiss on Grizz’s lips before laying back down on the bed. The two boys laid there quietly, both breathing hard.

“Now, I’m tired.”

#sam x grizz #grizzam #grizz x sam #the society #the society fic #the society fanfic #the society fanfiction #rather than love than money than fame give me truth #*mine #*my writing

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okimargarvez · 5 years

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FEW HOURS IN LUKE ALVEZ’S MIND - 1

Original title: Few hours in Luke Alvez’s mind.

Prompt: Luke’ POV, memory of war.

Warning: quote of 12x1.

Genre: comedy, family, angst, friendship.

Characters: Luke Alvez, Penelope Garcia, BAU team.

Pairing: Garvez.

Note: oneshot.

Legend: 🔦🐶.

Song mentioned: none.

Few hours in Luke Alvez’s mind- Masterlist

GARVEZ STORIES

Part 1-

I spend the whole evening thinking about what Rossi has told me. I was happy to receive that call. Being among the first to know that Daniel Cullen, aka the Crimson King, had participated in the great escape, was very positive. From that cursed day I couldn't take the image out of my head of that monster while was quartering my partner, and, what I never say when I tell the story of his capture, even my best friend. It's something that will haunt me for a lifetime. And of bad things, with the work I do, it's not that I have no way of seeing them.

Is not even to be discussed if I'll collaborate with the BAU, the answer is obviously yes. I want to capture Cullen as much as, but what I’m saying, far more than them. The only thing that kept me going in this period was knowing him right behind bars. But I don't want to definitively join the Behavioral Analysis Unit. I'm not a profiler. I don't see myself trying to penetrate the perverse minds of people like Cullen, or worse. And what I do now, I like it. I can't say I adore it, no, but I feel good and in the end, it's not that you can always expect the best.

Roxy enters the room, in all her splendor. As usual, she manages to make me stop thinking about work and tear me a smile. -Come here.- I say, making a sign her to sit on the couch next to me. And she does it, in a rather stormy way. A pillow falls on her head. I stroke her, and she reciprocates me with a kiss.

-What do you say, let's go to bed?- she seems to nod and so we get up, heading towards the bedroom, one next to the other. Another of the things for which I didn't completely lose my mind is her. She stayed near me, during this period. I love her more than my life.

I don't think I will be able to rest seriously, but I must at least try. Tomorrow will be a long day. Wake up early and go to Washington. Roxy certainly will not like the idea of moving. She adores the landscapes of this area, the long tree-lined avenues, the fragrant bushes. But at least until Daniel Cullen goes back where he has to stay permanently (on the other side of the bars), I'll have to go to Quantico very often, so I think it's better that we have a place to stay, so we don't have to come back and forth. And surely, I couldn't leave her here alone, I miss her terribly.

The alarm rings while I'm finishing to get dress. I anticipated it for a full fifteen minutes. As I had imagined, I could hardly close my eyes. I've traveled through several mini dreams, I don't even know if I can define them, I don't remember most of them, but I seem to remember the atmosphere, dark, absurd, properly dreamlike. Some of those were vaguely related about a sort of interview to be hired as a profiler, although it isn't something I want, in reality. Some people all the same, both as clothes and as a physical appearance, indistinguishable between men and women, they asked me quickfire questions, not even I was under questioning or they were making me the test of polygraph. And my answers were always wrong or inaccurate. Only the fact of returning to the real world, panting, sweating and with an extra weight on my heart, convinced me that I had slept at least one or two hours altogether.

Fortunately, the plane lands without a minute's delay, ignoring the fact that, predicting the worst, I booked to get to Quantico an hour earlier. Here I am in front of the headquarters of the Bureau: immense, very high, reminds me of certain buildings filmed in the poetic documentaries of the avant-garde (the influence of my brother is felt). It certainly helps to instill in those who are about to enter, a certain sense of authority and smallness by contrast. But I'm only here as a collaborator, what tormented me is just a dream and it doesn't come close to reality.

As soon as I set foot inside, I am shocked by the number of stairs that branch out in every direction and the counters with beautiful secretaries, apparently available. But I don't need to ask for any information, Rossi has already told me what I needed to know. And so, I take the elevator (normally I wouldn't do it, but I don't want to get sweaty right the day I get to know the other members of the unit, with whom I'll have to spend some time anyway...). I arrive in a flash, too quickly, and I'm immediately punished for this lazy choice: my head is now turning, and a certain sense of nausea is rising... Reminder for the future: don't take the elevator any more.

I risk of bumping into a blonde woman, busy carrying a lot of cards. It'll be my gaze, which despite my efforts is still disoriented, or it'll be her precarious position, the fact is that she raises her eyes to mine a moment before our bodies are likely to collide and this is enough to recognize me as the newcomer, the exterior.

-Hey, you are Luke Alvez, the man of the task force?- her voice isn't exactly as I guessed, it's decided and transmits a great determination. Apparently, she looks like a pretty, sweet woman, but I think she'll reserve more surprises. I nod.

-Exactly, I must have right a lost air, for being caught on the first shot...- I throw one of my friendly smiles. She gives me her right hand, I squeeze it. From the corner of my eye I notice a beautiful wedding ring in the ring finger of the other hand.

-Jennifer Jareau, but you can call me JJ.- it sounds good, it sounds good for her. -I imagine you're here for the case of the Crimson King...- just hearing that nickname make me nervous, but if her notice it, she doesn't seem to give it much weight. -Wait that I place these folder, then I'll show you the way.- she starts heading to a door, I follow her. -We were just about to make a meeting to talk about the progress made so far. Thanks to you, less than half of the escapees came back inside.- in saying the last sentence, she turns to me and gives me a very warm and sincere smile.

-I only did my job...- a lines that seems extrapolated from a classic Hollywood police film. JJ giggles anyway. She opens a locker, throws inside everything she has in her hands, then she closes it.

-Well, we can go.- I nod, without saying anything and I follow her, looking around intrigued, hoping that at least it won't be notice, everything: it is very different from the place where I work, is full of desks, each "decked out" personal way, higher up there must be the offices of the "big bosses". We arrive at the door, this is transparent but so that those on the other side can see us, but not us him. It turns out to be a fairly small room, in the center a round table, chairs, a screen, a blackboard directly attached to one of the glass walls. Sitting on one of them there is just Rossi, next to him a dark-haired man, completely focused on the documents he is reading, but even so it seems to convey a shady air. The Italian-American looks up at the sound of someone entering and realizes that besides JJ there is also someone new, me.

-Luke!- he stands up and reaches us. -I'm glad you managed to get there on time. I see you've met JJ...- we both nod. Even the other man, who should be the boss, is approaching. -Hotch, this is the boy- this term makes me feel extremely young -that helped us to take those criminals...- I feel a certain embarrassment or perhaps it is more awe, when I meet the gaze of the boss.

-Well, it's a pleasure to meet you. Aaron Hotcher.- the tone in this case fits perfectly to his person, but also reveals that behind that armor in one piece there is a man loyal to duty but that puts the whole heart in everything he does. Maybe I should really do the profiler, I do nothing but shoot judgments on anyone starting from nuances of the voice and ways of doing, as I have set foot in Quantico. He holds out his hand and for the umpteenth time, certainly not the last, I find myself doing this formal ritual.

-Luke Alvez.- at the same time a tall, slender, professional-looking brunette woman comes.

-Excuse the delay, the damn coffee machine has decided not to cooperate...- she notices me early enough, not that it is a very complex operation. Probably they didn’t explain to all members of the team the possibility of a collaboration on my part, because she appears confusing. I don’t know whether to resolve the problem directly or if I have to wait for the boss to introduce me. In the end, luckily, Rossi thinks about it.

-Tara, remember that we asked for someone who could help us to capture the escapees?- after a few seconds, she nods. For a moment she seems lost in who knows what memory. -Here, he is our trump card- if he continues like this, he will make me blush -Luke Alvez , task force.- I approach her, shake her hand, her is a very delicate hold, perfectly matched with the tone of her velvety voice.

-Tara Lewis.- I hope that for now the pleasantries are over, but it is a rather utopian desire. I seemed to remember that they were more, of course, a few months ago they lost one of their member, some voices have come in my house, he was kidnapped him and then someone had shot his pregnant wife... logical that he decided to move on. However, they still seem to me too few.

-Unfortunately we can’t begin, we must wait for our computer technician.- Hotchner explains, probably turning more to me than to others. I nod, everyone sits down, so I do too. A few minutes later the door opens (apparently for the last time) and, stumbling, hidden by a pile of yellow folders that remind me of the years in the police, and a computer, enters a woman, a spot of various shades of pink and yellow, the color of her hair. Of course, when the boss told "our computer technician", I thought he was referring to a man, but it was a masculine thought, the result of a legacy still present in our society, however much we would deny it and affirm the opposite. Resting the material on the table, finally she reveals her figure, even if for a few seconds. She quickly distributes the folders, one in front of me and I can’t help but notice the amount of bracelets and the variety of shapes that adorn her arm, as well as the colored nails in a very creative way. OK, the nerds are pretty eccentric, but I could never have expected a similar computer scientist. Rossi tries to get her attention, but she clearly ignores him, preferring to dedicate herself to the screen, which suddenly comes on.

-We can start.- Hotchner says solemnly. Nobody replies anything, only the blond woman, the only one left standing, who nods and handling what looks like a common remote control, starts the presentation of the case.

-As you all know, not the all evaded have yet been captured. Last night, in Durham, a man was sighted whose description corresponded exactly to that of the wanted number one: Peter Lewis, aka Mister Scratch.- first a map appears to locate exactly the detection area, next to a picture that I remember, one of the worst serial killers that America has known. Yet a part of me is distracted by the thought of how much the analyst's voice is sweet. Sweet, I can’t think of another adjective that can describe it well. -...unfortunately there are no cameras in that area, so we have only the testimony of a woman who was walking with her dog.- I try to go back to concentrating on serious things, even if it is a complex matter, because the gaze is attracted , willy-nilly, towards those bright colors that completely contrast with the things we are talking about in this room, with the photographs projected on the screen behind her (many victims of Scratch, almost used as a reminder to have one more reason to find him) and with the atmosphere in general.

-We have any kind of identikit?- Tara asks, sitting next to me. The woman, of whom I don’t even know the name, nods and here appears what is required. There is no doubt that there are significant similarities with the killer who enjoys not killing, preferring to push others to do so, prey to nightmares and dark visions.

-Unfortunately the situation remains virtually unchanged.- the comment seems to close the question, it’s the oldest in the room who has talking.

-Dave is right.- the boss is in agreement. -We can move on to the second topic of the day, the main reason why agent Alvez is among us.- I feel the lights of the spotlight on me. Without having to add anything else, every data about Lewis disappears and in its place, peeks out the seemingly normal face, perhaps even more frightening, of the criminal that I more hate, of the man who has ruined Phil's life and by reflex also mine, ripping off whole nights of sleep and serenity, that I will not get back...

-Daniel Cullen, also known as the Crimson King.- I realize after a few seconds that my hand is tigh in a fist. I try to relax, with poor results. -There is no news from the escape, but an anonymous source, a call from a telephone booth, to be exact. He told Durham police he had seen Cullen with Mister Scratch. This is the only thread we can follow to get out of the maze.- the joke rips out a few laughs to the colleagues, but not to Hotcher, who remains serious.

-If there are no other comments- he even says, almost scolding the blonde, who raises her eyes to the sky (probably they are used to it, among them will be a kind of game or ritual) -I would say that for today we can conclude. Agent Alvez, do you feel like joining us in the search?- is the simplest question someone could ask me. -We do not know exactly when the track on Cullen will open again.- he adds, but I have already made a decision.

-Sure.- he nods, satisfied.

-Ok, then if there isn’t other news, we will update tomorrow morning.- and repeated what looks like a formula now standardized, the meeting is dissolved, all stand up, JJ reaches the other blonde and exchange a few words with her, I can’t distinguish enough to understand the logical sense. And it should not interest me. I see Rossi and Tara coming out and, in a moment, we are left alone. It seems to me the right moment to conclude the presentations and finally to give a name to her too, which launches an almost painful and desperate look in the direction where her colleague has disappeared. Then I'll stop calling her just the blonde or computer technician.

-Hey, we haven’t be introduced yet, I'm the agent of the task force, Luke Alvez.- she seems to hardly direct the eyes in my direction and takes much longer than normal to allow them to cross with mine. Her are brown, but not dark, of various shades of hazelnut, framed beautifully by a pair of pink glasses (rightly matched to the clothes) and long and refined eyelashes.

-Penelope Garcia.- the tone is very different from the one she used during the meeting, absurdly it seems darker at this moment, than when she was intent on commenting horrible images. The name is interesting, certainly not really common, yet truly mythical or mythological. And the surname makes me think of a background that is closer to mine, and yet her appearance does not seem that of a Latin, American or not. We exchange a hasty close, which gives me the time to just guess the freshness of her skin. Even her ring finger, like that of JJ, is occupied by a ring, but unlike the other blonde, is in good company. You don’t need to be a profiler to say that she likes all kinds of wearable accessories. -Now I'm sorry, but I'm very busy.- said this, she takes her computer and virtually without even looking at me, leaves the room. That's why I could never be a good profiler: from the way she is dressed, she has talked and even from her tone of voice, I would have imagined anything but a woman as cold and detached as she seems now.

As I mull over, I look up and find myself in front of a tall, very young man, definitely more than me, lightly long and long brown hair, a particular look and a briefcase in one hand.

-Luke Alvez?- he asks and I wonder if by chance I don’t have an ID sticker printed on the front. I nod. -I’m Spencer Reid.- that name reminds me of some detail provided by Rossi (of course).

-Ah! No handshaking, right? Your reputation precedes you.- the other is pleasantly impressed and smiles.

-I just came back and we already have a case.- he goes to a desk, collects something, some sheets, a book, then closes his bag with a click. He turns in my direction and seems to be about to say something but is interrupted by the entrance of the three ladies of the BAU, two blondes and a brunette. The smallest accelerates the pace and reaches us.

-Spencer!- she exclaims with great joy, and then hugs him with a lot of transport. I move away a few inches, partly embarrassed to be unwittingly the third wheel in what seems like a private moment. Here comes the other two, Tara greets the young man with a smile, while Penelope takes the place of JJ, hugging him with a lot of tenderness.

-How are you, my boy wonder?- the voice takes with more force those sweet nuances that I had guessed while she was explaining the case and that has not had only with me. She doesn’t give him the time to answer. -And how is your mother?- but maternal is the adjective that I would use to describe her attitude, in general, towards Spencer. The way she scrutinizes him, apprehensively, her gestures, precise and delicate.

-She is much better.- he exclaims, opening his serious face in a big smile.

-JJ, where can I find your archive? I would like to see all the material you have about... Daniel Cullen.- the blonde nods, but glances at the computer technician.

-If you are looking for information, of any kind, she is the woman to whom you must address.- this phrase comes out with an almost complacent tone, even if I don’t understand the reasons. The other realizes that she has been called into question and turns towards us. -Garcia, could you help Luke find the complete file on the Crimson King?- she asks, before I can do it, leaving me a bit confused. I don’t understand why she seems to want to be an intermediary between us. Garcia nods, snorting and throwing a look that I would call homicidal, just directed to JJ, who smiles strangely once again. Something is happening that I'm completely unaware of. But for now, I decided to pretend nothing happened.

-Follow me.- says Penelope, without even looking at me, start to walking regardless of whether I'm behind her or not. I quickly greet the others and reach out to her. It makes me feel strange, that she is the only one that uses this formal tone. Even Hotch immediately talked to me in another tone and practically demanded the same from me. And after have seen her interact with Spencer, I don’t think she is a super formal type, but... maybe it's better to refrain from judging, for today. We enter a room surrounded by lockers, like those in the libraries where the old catalogs were kept. The rest is made up of files and rows of tables, each equipped with a computer that doesn’t seem to last generation at all. She approaches one, turning it on, typing in a password (even if I don’t have time to follow her fingers flickering on the keys) and the screen lights up. -Here, it is enough that you type the name you need in this space and you will see a list of everything you need. In part it will be directly present in the system in electronic format and if you want you can print a copy. Otherwise, an acronym will appear that corresponds to the location of the document you are looking for. At this point you will have to turn to one of the archivists.- she explains in a calm voice, totally devoid of those pretty inflexions she had just a moment ago. -Good work.- and she goes away.

-Thank you.- I reply, too late.

TAGS: @arses21434 @kathy5654 @martinab26 @reidskitty13 @jenf42 @gracieeelizabeth27 @silviajajaja @smalliemichelle99 @charchampagne14 @thinitta @myhollyhanna23 @garvezz @mercedes-maldonado @shyladystudentfan @cosmicmelaninflower @kiki-krakatoa @pegasus-scifichick @ leftlamphumanfestival

#garvez #criminal minds #cm #penelope garcia #luke alvez #roxy #aaron hot #david rossi #spencer reid #tara lewis #jennifer jareau #penelope x luke #luke x penelope #garcia x alvez #alvez x garcia #the crimson king #12x01 #luke POV

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kitgilmore · 7 years

Text

TWO // I WILL FOLLOW.

"So you're just leaving," Thomas said, Thomas Knight was her piano partner, on more than one occasion they had been forced together during a concert, and sure he was a great piano player and often kept up with her, but he was also a minute man. Track to be more specific. Thomas was typically handsome they kind of guy when his hobbies are described you think sure that sounds right. It wasn't in until one night both high from the spring recital, the two shared a very heated kiss that Kit began to notice the finer details about Mr Knight that he could quote blade runner backwards or how he always smelt like the ocean, that he hated being called Tommy. Beginning the first romance of Kit Gilmore, as her mother had grown to call it, short as it was only lasting 3 months before they both agreed, their professional relationship was far more interesting.

"I'm moving school, Thomas not countries, I'll promise you'll survive." She told him, grabbing the notebook, textbooks, an old sweater and makeup bag out of her locker and dumping them into the box the tall boy was holding.

"Yeah I know" he replied, Kit just raised her eyebrows at him trying to be cool, slamming the red rusted door shut for the last time. She tried to take the box from him but he just shook her head and motioned her forward.

"I'll still be around for Miss Patty and recitals and we can even do that Christmas Hanukkah Winter medley you were talking about the other night," she told him as they walked down the hall and out the door, Kit turned when she heard the sound of her sister's voice.

"30 Minutes with traffic." Rory was walking towards the town centre with the new boy, Kit remembered someone mentioning he moved here from Chicago during her French class.

"Okay, then I guess it alright that you're leaving," Thomas said, returning her attention to the dark haired boy beside her she sniggered, wondered if he heard what he just said.

"Thank you, kind sir, for your permission, how will I ever repay you." Kit said with extreme gestures.

He just shook his head at his friend and the two of them made their way towards her house.

❊❊❊❊

That night, at Luke's dinner the three of them we're all picking their food, Kit was worried about her cello audition, about catching up in her classes, while Rory was now unsure whether she wanted to move schools and Their mother, her big secret was, that she'd asked her parents for the money to pay the tuition of the girls new school.

"I forgot to tell you both, that we're having dinner tomorrow night at your grandparent's house," Lorelai told them, breaking them out their own thoughts the twins exchanged a look.

"We are?" Kit asked

"Mhmm" she replied before taking a sip of coffee.

"But, it's September," Rory asked her.

"So"

"So, there are no national holidays in September, expect National fortune cookie day but i don’t think grandma knows that." Kit told them with a smile, taking a sip of her own.

"Look, it's not a holiday thing. It's just dinner, okay?" Their mother told them.

"Fine, sorry," Rory told her sheepishly.

Luke brought their burgers to the tables and conversation stopped, pulling the check of the pad he said "Red meat can kill you. Enjoy."

"So, I finished hemming your skirts today"

"Thanks, mom" Kit said as she started to enjoy her food, while her sister was stabbing her burger with her folk.

"A grunt of acknowledgment might be nice," Lorelai said, directed at Rory.

"I don't understand why we're going to dinner tomorrow night. I mean, what if I had plans? You didn't even ask me." Kit couldn't help but snort at her sister's words which earned her a slide glance, boy her sister was in a mood tonight.

"Well, if you had plans I would have known." their mother said completely missing the point Rory was trying to make.

"How?"

"Well, you would have told me." She stated

"I don't tell you everything. I have my own things." Rory snapped back.

"Fine, you have things".

"That's right. I have things."

"Hey. I had dibs on being the bitch tonight" Their mother said, Kit watched as she took a breath and tried to calm herself it was a habit Kit herself had picked up, I didn't always work.

"Just tonight" Rory muttered.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Kit joined raising her voice slightly.

"I'm not sure I want to go to Chilton," Rory told them, her eyes refused to catch theirs.

"What?" Kit roared, where had this come from.

"The timing is just really bad." She began to explain.

"The timing is bad?" Lorelai repeated.

"And the bus ride to and from Hartford, it's like thirty minutes each way."

"I can't believe what I'm hearing."

"Plus, I don't think we should be spending that money right now. I mean, I know Chilton's got to be costing you a lot."

"Oh, you have no idea." Their mother said Kit knew it was a loaded statement but was too shocked by her sisters change in attitude.

"All of your money should be going toward buying an inn with Sookie."

"Except the part that's paying for me to go to Chilton because I'm still going". Kit said turning to her sister who just let out a breath.

"What about college? What about Harvard?"

"We don't know that I can't get into Harvard if I stay where I am, you don't even want to go Harvard." she said to her sister.

"You don't have enough diversity for that, and maybe I don't but how about I take your spot." Kit retorted.

"Okay, enough. Enough of the crazy talk, okay? I appreciate your concern but I have this covered."

"I still don't want to go." She said with a huff.

"Why?"

"Because I don't."

"Rory!" Kit exclaimed.

"I have to get out of here," Lorelai explained, getting up from her sit in the dinner and starts to leave, Kit followed after her opening the door into the cool night streets.

"We have to pay first," Rory stated as if that was the problem.

As they walked home in silence they saw, Lane on her awkward hayride date, sandwiched between two Korean boys, when they reached Miss Patty's dance studio, Kit was recreating not finishing her dinner.

One-two-three. One-two-three. One-two-three. It's a waltz, ladies. Susie, do you have to tinkle? Then uncross your legs, darling.

"Oh, Rory, good. I think I found a job for your male friend." Miss Patty said standing the door way, light silhouetting her, as she smokes a cigarette, looking as fabulous as every.

"What male friend?" Lorelai asked, and now Kit understood. STUPID LEATHER JACKET BOY.!

"They need a stock boy at the supermarket. I already talked to Taylor Doose about him. You just send him around tomorrow."

"Okay, thanks."

"What male friend?"

"Oh, he's very cute. You have good taste."

Miss Patty turned back to her dance class she said.

"Hands in the air, not in the nose"

For someone who wasn't athletic Rory sure moved fast, Kit was so mad at her sister, maybe it was more disappointment than anger. Why would she do this?

"Oh, you're gonna have to walk faster than that. You're gonna have to turn into friggin' Flo Jo to get away from me."

Once they reached their house Rory walk in and slams the door, not caring that her mother and sister were behind her.

"This is about a boy, of course. I can't believe I didn't see it. All this talk about money and bus rides. You got a thing going with a guy and you don't want to leave school." The mother said as she walked through the house into the living room, normally if one twin was arguing with their mother the other was stay out of it but this was the exception.

"I'm going to bed."

"God, I'm so dense. That should have been my first thought. After all, you're me."

"I'm not you," Rory said gathering her book bag from the sofa.

"Er yeah you are, turning in to some high school cliche, throwing away your future for a boy, that doesn't sound like my sister." Kit said, before turning to her mother and saying "No offences."

"Whatever."

"So who is he?"

"There's no guy!"

"Dark hair, romantic eyes? Looks a little dangerous?"

"No.. His move the boy next door type right?" Kit said.

"This conversation is over."

"Tattoos are good, too!"

"I don't want to change schools because of all the reasons I've already told you a thousand times. If you don't want to believe me, that's fine. Goodnight.." Rory closed her bedroom door, their mother continued.

"Does he have a motorcycle? 'Cause if you're gonna throw your life away, he better has a motorcycle!"

"He was carrying her books." Kit scoffed her eyes widen before she shook her head. "I have to go figure out what piece I'm going to play for my audition at.. Chilton". she said a little too loud, her mother kissed her forehead before she followed Rory into her room.

"Well, I think that went pretty well, don't you?" "Thanks for the knock."

Once in her room Kit kicked off her boots, pulled out her journal from her book bag, before she began to shuffle through her closest looking for an appropriate dress for dinner at her grandparents.

All three Gilmore's were standing outside their grandparents house, They were all nervous, not Kit so much she liked her grandparents, she didn't think that they were unrealisable for them to want, Lorelai and Christopher to get married then they got pregnant at 16 but also understood why that was the choice her parents took. In the end, she went with a peace blouse and black shirt, tights and ballet flats.

"So, do we go in or do we just stand here reenacting The Little Match Girl?" Rory said she was still sulking, about Chilton.

"Rory, stop."

"Okay, look, I know you and me are having a thing here and I know you hate me but I need you to be civil, at least for dinner and then on the way home you can pull a Menendez. Deal?"

"Fine."

"You guys are ridiculous" Kit breathed out as she rang the door bell, and her grandmother opens the door right away. Kit wondered if she heard the conversation they previously had and blushed slightly in embarrassment.

"Hi, Grandma," The twins said in unison.

"Well, you're right on time." Their grandmother said as she leads them through the door into the foyer.

"Yeah, yeah, no traffic at all," Lorelai explained as she took off her coat, looking for a place to throw away her coffee cup.

"I can't tell you what a treat it is to have you girls here." Their grandmother looked nothing but elegant with her silk blouse and pearls, she took the girls coats and hung them up.

"Oh, well, we're excited, too." Kit said, she didn't feel the same discomfort regarding her the 'Gilmores' that her sister had, he mother had her own reasons but in Kit's eyes her grandparents had always been nothing but kind and generous to the twins.

"Is that a collector's cup or can I throw it away for you?" Emily comment.

"Oh." Lorelai begins to toss her empty coffee cup into the trash can located next to the door frame. Kit wondered what if would ever be used for.

"In the kitchen, please" her grandmother retorted, before turning to the twins and saying.

"So, I want to hear all about Chilton."

"Well, we haven't actually started yet." Kit said as walked the twins through the house, through the hall way and into one of many sitting rooms in the Gilmore's grand Hartford home.

"Richard, look who's here."

"Rory, Kit.... You're tall." their grandfather said looking up from their paper to view the twins properly, both girls were the hair down so it framed their face, the blue sweater Rory was wearing brought out her eyes. Kit had convinced her to add some blush to her usual makeup.

"I guess," Rory said, Kit looked at her grandfather and thought he was adorable.

"Well, what's your height?"

" 5'7"." the girls said again in union

“That's tall. The girls are tall." he said to himself and their grandmother, Kit didn't think that she had grown that much since Easter but maybe they had.

"Hi, dad," Lorelai said, entering the room behind them.

"Lorelai, your daughter's are tall."

"Oh, I know. It's freakish. We're thinking of having them studied at M.I.T." Kit shook her head slightly she knew she mother was nervous, her witty commentary was proof of that.

"Ah" he responded slightly deflated.

"Champagne, anyone?" Emily asked, bringing a silver tray, with crystal glasses, each of the girls took one.

"Oh, that's fancy." Kit said.

"Well, it's not every day that I have my girls here for dinner on a day the banks are open," Emily said slightly bitter.

"A toast - to entering Chilton and an exciting new phase in your lives."

"Here, here. " Both Kit and Richard said together, Kit smiled, before she sipped her champagne, oh how sweet those bubbles are.

"Mmm. Well, let's sit everyone." Rory sat next to her grandfather, while Kit took the seat next to her grandmother, taking another sip of her drink.

"This is just wonderful. An education is the most important thing in the world, next to family."

"I couldn't agree more grandma" Kit said looking at her sister, who quietly looked down.

"And pie," Lorelai said, and no one laughed.

"Joke, joke."

"Ah," Emily said, Kit finished her champagne, as her grandfather handed Rory a section of the paper.

An hour later the Gilmore family was seated around the dining table, candle light filled the room as they ate of china plates. Rory sat next to her sister, opposite their mother.

"Rory do you like the lamb?" Emily asked her granddaughter trying to fill the silence with polite conversation.

"It's good". Rory answered taking another bite.

"Too dry"

"No, it's perfect."

"Kit?" Emily turns her attention towards her youngest grandchild.

"Lamb's my favourite grandma, the gravy is wonderful."

"Potatoes could use a little salt, though." Their mother commented. Kit just tilted her head as if to say was that really necessary.

"Excuse me?"

"So, Grandpa, how's the insurance business?" Rory asked and Kit was thankful for her sister's good timing.

"Oh, people die, we pay. People crash cars, we pay. People lose a foot, we pay." he said sounding rather crass. Kit just continued to eat her dinner, it really was rather delicious.

"Well, at least you have your new slogan."

"And how are things at the motel?" Richard grumbled at his daughter, Kit could feel the tension that was building in the dining room.

"The inn? They're great." Lorelai said proudly, hating that she had to remind him of her career path.

"Lorelai's the executive manager now. Isn't that wonderful?" Emily said, both the twins smiled at their grandmother as she gushed over her daughter's success.

"Speaking of which, Christopher called yesterday," Richard stated, taking a sip of his red wine.

"Speaking of which? How is that a speaking of which?" the conversation of the twins Father was slightly awkward one, their mother never denied them their father, and every time she spoke of him or saw him there was nothing but love and warmth.

"He's doing very well in California. His Internet start-up goes public next month. This could mean big things for him." Richards returned before turning to the girls.

"Very talented man, your father."

"He's also got a new motorcycle" Kit said under her breath. Kit had a stronger bond with her father than Rory did, the two of them talked all the time at least once a fortnight, he was more honest with her than with her sister. They were both wanderers, wanting to try lots of things before deciding what they wanted, what they liked.

"They know." Their mother said slightly more angry than before.

"He always was a smart one, that boy," he said "You girls must take after him." added quickly, "Speaking of which, I'm gonna get a Coke....Or a knife." their mother said leaving the table, after a minute Emily went after her while the twins and their grandfather sat in awkward silence, the conversation behind the wall a little too loud to be private, started out well enough with her grandmother trying to calm down her daughter but soon took a turn.

Why would he bring up Christopher? Was that really necessary? He likes Christopher. Isn't that interesting? Because, as I remember, when Christopher got me pregnant, Dad didn't like him so much. Oh, well, please, you were sixteen. What were we supposed to do - throw you a party? We were disappointed. The two of you had such bright futures. Yes. And by not getting married we got to keep those bright futures. When you get pregnant, you get married. A child needs a mother and a father. Oh, Mom. Do you think that Christopher would have his own company right now if we'd gotten married? Do you think he would be anything at all? Yes, I do. Your father would have put him in the insurance business and you'd be living a lovely life right now. He didn't want to be in the insurance business and I am living a lovely life right now. That's right, far away from us. Oh, here we go. You took those girls and completely shut us out of your life. You wanted to control me. You were still a child. I stopped being a child the minute the strip turned pink, okay? I had to figure out how to live. I found a good job. As a maid. With all your brains and talent. I worked my way up. I run the place now. I built a life on my own with no help from anyone. Yes, and think of where you would have been if you'd accepted a little help, hmm? And where the girls would have been. But no, you were always too proud to accept anything from anyone. Well, I wasn't too proud to come here to you two begging for money for my kids' school, was I?

The Twins exchanged a look at that piece of information, Kit saw a look on Rory face that she knew meant she changed her mind about Chilton, knowing how difficult it must have been for their mother to ask her parents for the money to provide an education for her children. After saying goodbye to their grandmother, they walked out the door.

"Mom?" Kit said as they stood outside in the doorway

"I'm okay. I just. .do I look shorter? 'Cause I feel shorter." she joked, leaning her head on the shoulder of her youngest.

"Hey, how 'bout I buy you a cup of coffee?" Rory said pulling her coat to stay warm or because she was nervous about the upcoming conversation she knew she needed to have. "

"Oh, yeah. You drive, though, okay, 'cause I don't think my feet will reach the pedals.”

Kit drove them back to Stars Hollow, parking at the house before they took off towards Luke's

"So, nice dinner at the grandparents' house," Rory said breaking the tension.

"Oh, yeah, her dishes have never been cleaner." the mother replied.

"You and Grandma seemed to have a nice talk." Kit asked nudging her mother slightly.

"How much did you hear?" she asked her children.

"Not much," Rory said

"Snippets," said Kit.

"Snippets?" Raising her eyebrows, the three of them stood in the doorway of Luke's this was becoming a habit of this evening.

"Little snippets."

"So basically everything?"

"Basically," Kit said opening the door.

"Well, the best-laid plans." the mother said taking off her coat and sitting down.

"I think it was really brave of you to ask them for money," Rory told her.

"Completely" Kit added.

"Oh, I so do not want to talk about it." she dismissed.

"How many meals is it gonna take 'til we're off the hook?" Kit asked.

"I think the deli spread at my funeral will be the last one." Lorelai looked at her eldest daughter who just smiled.

"Hey, wait, does that mean..."

"Can't let a perfectly good plaid skirt go to waste." she smiled.

"oh.. We're private school girls." Kit exclaimed, raising her eyebrows suggestively at the sister, who sniggered in response.

"Oh, honey, you won't be sorry."

Just then Luke Danes arrived at the table both Kit and her mother had to do a double take, instead of his usual backward baseball cap and plaid shirt, he was wearing slacks and a blue collared shirt.

"Wow, you look nice. Really nice." Their mother commented.

"I had a meeting earlier at the bank. They like collars. ... You look nice, too." The twins exchanged a look, both laughing lightly.

"I had a flagellation to go to."

"So, what'll you have?" he asked the table.

"Coffee, in a vat."

"I'll have coffee also. And chili fries." Rory ordered.

“Yes coffee and do you have any pie, cherry maybe." Kit asked.

"That's quite a refined palate you got there." he said before walking away.

"Behold the healing powers of a bath....So, tell me about the guy?" Lorelai asked Rory.

"You know what's really special about our relationship? The total understanding about the need for one's privacy. I mean, you really understand boundaries."

"So tell me about the guy."

"Mom!"

"Is he dreamy?" Rory blushed while Kit just nodded slightly.

"Oh, that's so Nick at Night."

"Well, I'm gonna find out anyway."

"Really? How?"

"I'll spy. Kit will tell me" she said as if it was the most obvious thing.

Minutes later Luke returned with their order

"Coffee. .fries... pie"

"Thank you, kind sir." Kit spoke politely.

"...I can't stand it. This is so unhealthy. Girls, please, put down that cup of coffee. You do not want to grow up to be like your mom." Luke commented look at the twins who smiled at each other.

"Sorry, too late." The twins answered before tucking into their food.

#Kit Gilmore #Gilmore Girls #Gilmore Girls OC #gilmore girls fanfiction #The Adaptation of Kit Gilmore #I Will Follow #Rory Gilmore #Lorelai Gilmore #Luke Danes

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babylon-bitch · 7 years

Text

Just Friends ~ Solitary Tear (part 27)

Harper White is best friends with Luke Hemmings, they always have been. Not only is she friends with the rockstar, but with the rest of 5 Seconds Of Summer, as well as a really nice girl named Erika

Harper has a few secrets, she can play all the instruments the boys play and many more. It’s a talent she has kept hidden, only very few people know.

What will happen to the six teens, wondering around the world together?

***

Harper’s p.o.v.

Last night was, eventful I guess you could put it.

Luke and I had a little lover’s tiff. Luke was mad at me because I didn’t tell him anything about my plans for university, he wasn’t even aware that I was going. A few colourful words and hurtful things were exchanged. I don’t know why he got so angry, it’s my life. He is the one off touring and being away, so why should I wait for him? Does he expect me to do nothing whilst he is living his dream?

Meanwhile all the guys and Erika were watching. I ended up storming out and hearing Luke shout ‘I still love you’, I responded by being mature and flipping him off.

I can see where he is coming from, but he didn’t need to overreact like that.

Needless to say I didn’t come and watch the show. That I know hurt Luke a lot, but I didn’t care. I didn’t sleep very well, knowing I’d upset Luke, but he upset me too, I also didn’t sleep well because he wasn’t there with me.

Sad really, it’s was our last full day, we decided that we will go back today, instead of staying four days. We fly out this evening though so I’m hoping I can make amends with Luke before we leave. If he is willing to talk to me that is.

He tried to call and text me but I ignored him, so did the others, I ignored them too, even Erika.

We’re currently on our way to the next city, not on the same vehicle, we took a taxi.

If we went on the tour bus you could probably cut the tension with a knife. “Are you and Luke gonna talk anytime soon?” Erika asks.

“Stop, I don’t wanna talk about him.”

“You’re going to have to at some point.” She warns.

“Yeah, well that’s not now.” I snap.

I’m so done with this shit.

My phone buzzes and I look down at it seeing a text from the one and only Luke Hemmings.

Hemmotron: I love you ya'know, won’t stop. Ever. Will you please forgive me? I’m sorry, last night was hell. Please text me back xxxxxxxxx 💕

He isn’t making this easy for me.

I won’t forgive him through text, I want to forgive him face to face.

We’ve made it to the next city, I’m in my hotel room, which is probably useless because I’m not sleeping in here tonight. Maybe a round with Luke could be a possibility…

I’ve still ignored Luke, which he replied with: it’s okay don’t reply, I was just exercising my thumbs x

He still managed to put a kiss on every text.

Deciding that I should make amends, I pick up my phone and start texting him.

Me: hi, meet me at the hotel lobby ❤

Hemmotron: okay, be there in ten x

Sighing, I put my phone down and put on a t-shirt. Passing the full length mirror and checking my outfit: some light blue jeans, a thin almost see through white tshirt, which has a small navy blue pocket, the same colour is around the hem line of the sleeves and neck, it’s also ever so slightly cropped, finishing off with some white converse.

Opening the door and walking through the corridors.

Stepping off the last step I see Luke just coming into the building. He gives me a small smile as he walks towards me. “Hey,” I huff.

“Hello.”

“Do you wanna go up to my hotel room?” I offer.

“Sure.” He shrugs.

I turn around and head back towards the stairs. “Are you okay?” Luke asks.

“What do you think, Luke.” I snap.

“Sorry.” He says with wide eyes.

We walk up two flights of stairs in silence until we reach my room. “Here.” I push the door open and Luke walks in.

“Do you ever just wanna gently place your hands on someone’s cheeks and hold their head in your hands, look right into their eyes, then violently twist their neck at a right angle and snap their neck?” I question in a serious tone.

“So you’re still mad.” Luke looks down at the ground.

“No, I’m just fucking dandy.” I sarcastically reply.

“Look Harper, I’m sorry please forgive me.” He pleads as he holds my hand.

“I can’t just do that. You said some really fucked up things, and they hit a little close to home.” I pull my hand away.

“I know, you did too. So could we please just move on?” He asks.

“You know that’s not how I work.” I sigh.

“Well then function like a normal human being!” He exclaims, a sudden burst of anger coming out.

“Like you’re any better,” I spit.

“For fuck sake Harper, just grow up! You could at least pretend to be happy.” He sternly raises his voice.

“Luke you can’t say that, you’ve gone through this, how dare you. Out of all the people, I would expect you to understand the most.” Hurt laced in every word I said.

“It’s probably some attention seeking act.”

“Is that what you think of me? Some fake bitch?” I question.

Luke sighs and sits down on my bed, rubbing his hands over his face. “No, of course not.” He calms down, now speaking with a soft voice.

“I didn’t choose to be unhappy, I know you’re hurting and you’re angry, but that doesn’t give you the right to say things like that.” I tell him, my voice shaking.

“You’re right, I shouldn’t of. But this isn’t about your depression, or whatever you want to call it, this is about you not telling me that you’re going to uni.” Luke states.

“I’m sorry, but you can’t expect me to just watch you live your dream. I mean, yeah, another couple of years of school isn’t my dream but it’s better than just not doing anything.” I claim.

“But why didn’t you tell me?” He shouts.

“It has nothing to do with you! I don’t even know if I’m gonna get into the university of my choice.” I match his tone.

“I don’t know if you know this Harper, but we’re in a relationship,” he gestures between both of us. “Of course you’re going to get into your university of choice, you’re smart as fuck, they would be stupid to not let you in.”

“Of course I bloody know we’re in a relationship, everything I see reminds me of you! You can’t control my life. If I want to go to a university in England, then I am. Am I supposed to just watch you have a career, if I don’t?” I frustratedly argue.

“No, Harper, that’s not what I’m saying.” He sighs.

“Then what are you saying?” I run my hand through my hair.

“I don’t know.” He groans and runs his hands through his hair.

“If you don’t know, let me go.”

A solitary tear runs down my cheek.

Luke’s eyes widen and he walks over to me, gently placing his warm hands on my cheek, him shaking his head.

“Harper, no, don’t do this.” He begs.

“Lets just have a break.”

“Yeah, um where do you wanna go?” He asks.

“No Luke, a break from us.” My voice cracks.

Some tears fall, Luke wipes them away with his thumb. “Harper, we can work this out.” He says.

“Luke, don’t make this any harder than it already is,” I groan and place my forehead on his chest, “I don’t know how long it will last, but I need a break, from everything.”

“Please, don’t do anything stupid.” He pleads.

“I won’t, I promise.” I sit down on the bed whilst Luke still stands where I left him.

“So what do we do now?” Luke questions, his eyes watering.

“We take a break Luke, what’s there to say?” I shrug, tears streaming down my face.

“Rules, or whatever, like no sleeping with anyone else.” Luke gives an example.

“Well I wasn’t planning on sleeping with anyone.” I mutter. “Yes that’s a thing. We’re taking a break, we’re still together to a certain extent. We’re just not going to see each other. I might talk to you occasionally.”

“Its not just a relationship we’re throwing away, it’s a friendship too.” Luke points out.

“We’re not throwing this all away. You and I are going to get back together, or at least I hope.” I claim.

To be honest I’m not too sure if we are going to get back together. Some lines have been crossed, by both of us, and I’m not okay with that.

“Yeah,” he nods, “what are you going to do now? Are you staying for the rest of the day?”

I drop my head my head into my hands and cry. Not just a couple of tears, full-blown sobs. I’m going to be broken without him.

Luke sits down next to me and runs his fingers up and down my back. “It’s okay.” He soothes.

“How is it okay Luke? I’m losing the love of my life here.” I claim.

“You’re not going to lose me, you said and I quote, that you and I are going to get back together.” He tells me.

Luke’s phone starts ringing and he pulls it out, declining it and putting it back in his pocket.

“Why didn’t you answer it?” I ask.

“It was just Ashton.”

I nod and wipe away the mascara that has fallen down my cheeks. “Come here.” He says and pulls me in for a hug.

“I still love you, I haven’t done this because I don’t love you anymore, I do, more than you’ll ever know.” I claim.

Luke presses a kiss to my forehead and let’s out a shaky breath. “I love you too.” He says.

We just told the fans and the next the we know we’re taking a break.

“Do you wanna go do something?” Luke asks.

“Um, sure, what have you got in mind?” I question.

“I don’t know, whatever you want.”

“Lets go get some lunch.” I suggest.

“Lunch it is.” He sighs and we stand up.

Luke grabs his wallet and phone off the tv stand and meets me by the door. I put on my leather jacket and we walk out the door.

***

We’ve had lunch and now we’re on our way to the venue, I’ve received multiple text and calls from the guys and Erika, but ignored them, as has Luke.

Luke and I just talked everything through, I cried again, whilst Luke had tears in his eyes but they didn’t fall.

“What are we going to tell them?” I ask Luke.

“Oh my God, it’s like when we revealed we were together to them all over again, instead,” Luke sighed “It’s just the other way round.”

I kept my eyes trained on the floor, because I know that if I look at him I will just cry.

Walking into the dressing the dressing room, everyone is in here.

“There’s the happy couple.” Michael beams.

“Did you guys have sex?” Ashton smirks.

“No they didn’t Ashton, well maybe earlier on but they went to lunch.” Calum points out.

Luke places his hand on the small of my back, guiding me to the sofa.

I feel like we’re telling our children we’re getting divorced. “Everything alright?” Erika warily asks.

I look up towards the ceiling, refusing to let the tears fall. “Harper a-and I have decided to take a break.” Luke tells them.

The room goes dead quiet, all having shocked expression on their face. “W-why?” Calum asks.

“Some lines were crossed. We’re going to get back together, but not right now.” I explain.

“Are you still staying here?” Michael asks me.

“Yeah, our flight leaves at like 10:30.” I answer.

(Btw there is no airport around where they are right now, but just imagine there is)

“Are you guys okay?” Ashton asks.

“What do you think Ashton?” I snap. “Sorry, it’s just hard right now.” I sigh.

“It’s okay.” He gives me a smile.

“We need to do sound check now, you can come if you want, but if not you know where to find us.” Calum tells me.

“I’ll stay here thanks.” I slump further into the sofa.

Luke walks over to me and presses a kiss to forehead. “Be back in a while.” He sports a small closed lip smile.

“Bye.”

Once they leave the room I break down, sobbing into my hands. Erika rushes towards my side and hugs me.

“I forgot,” a voice speaks and I look up seeing Michael and Luke at the doorway, “my phone.” Michael carries on.

“Could I talk to Harper alone please.” Luke asks Erika.

I sniffle and wipe my eyes. “Yeah, of course.” She smiles and leaves the room.

“Are you going to be okay?” Luke asks.

“I will be.” I answer.

Luke sits down next to me and pulls me onto his lap, me straddling him. “Babygirl.” He groans and rests him forehead against my shoulder.

“What, Luke?”

Luke hooks his finger underneath my chin, forcing me to look at him. “I am still hopelessly in love with you it hurts.” He chuckles.

Luke’s eyes trail down to my lips and then back to mine. Without warning he softly attacks my lips, something I’m going to miss. Luke’s tongue swipes across my bottom lip and I part my lips.

We explore each others mouths, although its not really exploring because I’ve done this many times before. Feeling his warm lip ring every now and then, it’s warm from all the times he’s brought it into his mouth nervously.

“Mm babe,” I groan and reluctantly pull away.

“What?” He asks, hurt covering his face.

“We’re on a break, this is just going to make it harder.” I tell him.

“Yeah of course, sorry, I wasn’t thinking,” Luke nods and pulls me in for a hug, his arms firmly wrapped around my waist. “I love you.” I whisper.

“I love you too.” His voice muffled because his bottom half of his face is pressed against my shoulder.

I press my lips to his one last time and ever so slowly move, as if we know we shouldn’t do this but can’t help it.

“Luke,” Michael calls Luke by the door way.

“Right, yes, on my way.” Luke pulls away, and pecks my lips one final time before getting up.

Luke’s p.o.v.

I am hurting so much right now. If I’d of known this would come out of that silly argument last night, I would have stopped the second she replied. I know we haven’t exactly broken up, but she doesn’t sound very promising when she says we will get back together.

I will fight with all I’ve got to get back together with her, I’m going to give her some time because that’s what she needs. Probably when I get home from tour I’ll try again.

Harper is just so special to me, I can’t afford to lose her. I’ll be nothing without her.

“So what was going on there?” Michael asks.

“Um, uh, nothing.” I stutter.

“Really Luke? Is this just some cruel joke on us?” He questions.

“You think this is a joke? I’m hurting so much right now, I wish it was a joke.” I snap.

“Sorry, man, it’s just you guys were kissing, and usually people who kiss are in love, and people that are in love are in a relationship.” Michael claims.

“We are inlove, we are still in a relationship, we’re on a break.” I state.

“Okay.”

***

We’re half way through sound check when Harper comes along. She doesn’t sit with Erika, who is right at the front, but right at the back, putting her feet up on the chair in front of her.

I watch her whilst Michael sings, I can’t see her that well because she is quite far away.

Harper stands up and walks towards the stage, but she’s most likely going to talk to Erika.

She whispers something into her ear and she laughs. They continue laughing and smiling for a while. How could she be so happy during this time?

Harper’s hand goes behind Erika’s back and all of a sudden Erika lets of a loud shriek and cups her boobs. Seeing part of Erika’s bra fall out of her crop top, and Harper laughing hysterically. I take it Harper unclasped her bra.

They do that a lot, the amount of times I’ll be speaking to Harper or Erika, and one of them walks passed and unclasps their bras.

Harper does it back up and whispers something in her ear again before leaving.

“You okay Luke?” Calum asks.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.” I dismiss and carry on playing.

Once it’s all over I jump off stage and we head towards the dressing room. Hearing the sound of rapping, it sounds like Harper, but she can’t rap, I remember her trying when we were younger, but she failed miserably. We were only 13 then though, she could’ve gotten better.

Walking in to find Harper on her phone rapping to Lose Yourself by Eminem, the song is playing in the background, but her voice is louder than it. She’s doing it as if it the easiest thing in the world, typing on her phone whilst smoothly rapping, it’s so clean.

Her phone starts ringing so she stops and answers it, her eyes finally meet ours and she gets up, starts walking down the hallway, talk in down the phone.

“Woah.” I breathe.

“Luke you’re go in out with Eminem!” Calum claims.

I’m on a break with Eminem.

“Damn.” Ashton laughs.

“I’m gonna go to the tour bus, I’ll be there for a while.” I tell them and walk out the room.

Without thinking I kiss Harper’s cheek as I pass by her, but she doesn’t look as if she regrets it because she smiles at me. Throwing her a little wave as I continue making my way to the tour bus.

I came here to write a song, I’ve had a few word come up in my head and I need to write them down before I forget them completely.

Picking up the acoustic guitar that is on the little bench and creating some chords.

***

It’s a while later now, we go on stage in an hour or so and I’m just talking with Harper.

“So my mum was really shocked when she saw us kiss at the airport.” I laugh.

“I’m now realising that we never really told our parents, we only told the boys and Erika.” Harper says.

“Guess we never got round to it, it did kind of take you a long time to finally tell the others, imagine what it would be like to tell our parents.” I take a jab.

“You’re never gonna let that go are you?” She questions.

“Nope, it was just so unnecessary.”

“Well it mattered to me.” She sighs.

“Anyway… she called me up, bombarding me with questions, so I told her about it all, and she was so happy, she said and I quote ‘my dreams have come true, I knew this day would come’.” I tell her and she smiles.

“You know, it would be a bit weird if we didn’t get together, or at least kiss, during our friendship.” She muses.

“Really?” I raise an eyebrow.

“Well yeah, we spent all that time together, someone was bound to fall for someone at some point.” She continues.

“In a way, yeah. Honesty hour, you and I were having a sleepover/movie night and you you used to cuddle up into my side. I was just staring at you for a couple of minutes, totally amazed by your beauty, I needed to do something so I kissed you, not fully make out with you, just a simple peck. As I pulled back, you smiled, and I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face.” I confess.

“I don’t know if that is creepy or cute.” She laughs.

We’ve just finished the show and I’m kind of dreading this moment, the girls leave in a while.

Walking into the dressing room tiredly and laying on the sofa, with my face facing down.

Turning my face, because I couldn’t really breathe and notice the piece of paper that I started to write my song on. I wrote a quarter of it and stopped because I couldn’t get the right chords to fit the song.

Picking it up I notice that it has all been finished, chords and all. Trying to trace the handwriting, it doesn’t look like any of the boy’s. It’s got a hint of something I can recognise, but I can’t quite put my finger on it.

I decide to play it and see how it sounds, the lyrics are really good, I just need to find out about the chords. Seeing the chords written down I can imagine what it sounds like, and it already sounds great.

I start play in the guitar and soon go into the lyrics.

“That sounds amazing, Luke.” Michael complements.

I didn’t realise the boys were listening as I was too concentrated on reading the music.

“Oh, thanks, I started the song earlier but stopped because it wasn’t flowing well enough, and I came back and I was all done.” I explain.

“Who filled it in?” Calum asks.

“That I don’t know.” I sigh.

“Let me have a look.” Ashton says and I pass it to him.

He shakes his head and puts it down. “No, I don’t know.”

Calum looks at it and nods. “Got it, it’s Harper’s.” He confidently claims.

“How can you be so sure?” I ask.

“When she did my homework, she tried to copy my handwriting, but it turned out like this. So this is her fake handwriting.” Calum explains.

“You see, normal people have fake names, but Harper has fake handwriting, because she is a fucking weirdo.” Michael says.

“But she can’t write songs, unless that is another one of her secret talents.” Ashton replies.

“I’ll ask her when she comes in.” I shrug.

“Ah, speak of the devil.” Michael chuckles as Harper and Erika walk in.

“What’s up?” Harper asks.

“Do you know anything about this?” I ask her and show her the piece of paper.

It even has things that we said in the argument in it, as well as the things we used to do.

“Um no, why would I?” She innocently asks.

“Because it sounds like the things we said.” I tell her.

“I honestly haven’t got anything to do with it, plus, my handwriting isn’t like that.” She responds.

Harper grabs a piece of paper and writes:

Fuck off Hemmings x

“It doesn’t look anything like it.” She states.

“Eh, okay, but thanks for the free song.”

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