#maybe use some poster board after I finish another project instead of just paper

[raeofgayshine]

I’ve been itching to do some crafting lately but I had no real ideas on what to make and I guess my brain got tired of that because I spent several hours today creating stencils, covering them in tape to protect them, tracing them, cutting things out and coloring four different sizes of question marks.

You know, because like a normal person I want my room to look like Riddler fucking exploded all over it. And I am so tickled by the idea that I can make a few of these at a time and put them up, so that it’s like a slow takeover. And also that they will probably look different over time which furthers that they didn’t all go up at once. And of course I am thrilled thinking about Riddler spending days upon days locked up in his apartment hand making question marks for every riddle room, because of course he is extra like that. And as I make mine I get to be just like him for real.

[5-secondsofcolor]

Much Ado About Nothing || A.I

Prompt: office!Ashton, ‘I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I have no idea what I’m doing. I almost never do.’

Length: 1.4k word

Warning: reference to body image issues. Swearing(?)

Event Masterlist

A/N: I want to close this out by saying a thank you and to @h0tsos and @maluminspace who put this all together! I love you both.

———

“You’re still here?,” standing in the doorway, Beatrice is unsure if she’s bothering Ashton a moment. His smile beacons her in. Letting her know the distraction is appreciated.

“Yeah I’ve got this deadline and I don’t think my coworker would appreciate me missing it.”

“No. Something tells me she really needs you to finish,” she jokes.

“Want to check out what I’ve got so far?”

With that she commits to entering the makeshift office he makes himself when he visits Messina headquarters. His visits becoming more and more frequent even as a freelance hire for them. She didn’t think he’s stay as long as he did. Especially with the start of a rocky professional relationship.

It’s insane to her to remember the days when she was up to her throat with his bullshit. His lack of email responses giving her heartburn as she tried to pin down the odd graphic designer they’d hired. It took a few visits over a before there was an understanding of peace and even more before there was an understanding of friendship.

Her emails were care. Her way to show support for the one employee far away. The one who she could never offer a cup of coffee to or a quick walking break. Meanwhile his silence was as necessary to him as air. He needed his space for work and for self care that he held ever sacred.

She sits in the chair closest to his, looking over the endless sketches he’s produced since settling into his seat. Picking out one in particular, “This one’s amazing. I like that you incorporated more colors. It catches the eye really well.”

Ashton's eye is caught by her arm instead, a small trio of leaves tattooed there first caught his attention the night they met. A simple outline of an olive brand, it felt ironic on someone who seemed to always be fighting. He reaches out, expecting her to recoil but instead she lends him her hand, holding the poster in the other as she feels his fingers trace the tattoo.

“I still don’t understand how you pick a color pallet.” She mulls over the balance in his work. His talent, however late and stressful to her, was the one thing she could never argue against.

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I have no idea what I’m doing. I almost never do,” as usual it’s nearly impossible to tell how serious he is. Instead she puts down the sheet, picking up his notes scribbled onto sketching papers. “Honestly, I let the colors tell a story. Can I color these in?”

“Sure?” With that Ashton grabs a few green markers off the desk, she can feel the cold marker as he slowly adds colors into the outlines. She’s too focused on his notes, seeing the progression of his sketches until he begins to reach a final illustration for the magazine and accompanying video.

“Don’t you have anyone to get home to?”

“No. Not much has changed in a while,” She admits. “I try sometimes but other times it’s just insecurity taking me out.”

His brows furrow in confusion, “What do you mean?”

He looks up a moment, his face much closer than she expected. From this angle, she can’t help but see how long his eyelashes are, the light freckles settling on his nose, the steep shape of his Cupid’s bow. They are silent as he looks on, still confused. She exhales heavily realizing she needs to spell it out for him.

“It hasn’t always been the easiest to be confident in my body. Of course now, it’s better. I just wear the clothes I like and I learned to say fuck it but that wasn’t the easiest.”

“Is that why you got an olive branch?”

“Yeah actually. It’s a little olive branch to my body,” she’s taken aback by his understanding. It feels silly saying it out loud, to admit she’s hated her most basic self, and that she’s learning to make peace. Some of her time spent wishing it didn’t feel so necessary yet she stares at the proof she needs a reminder.

“Took more work than I’d like to admit to get to neutral ground.” She admits. “Why am I telling you this?”

“Because you care very little what I think. Which is good.” He says pulling out a second marker. It’s blue this time, he layers it on her skin with green before picking up a black black marker again and connecting the branch further down to a freckle on her forearm. The liberty he takes on his sketch only growing her tattoo.

He takes in what she said. He doesn’t argue or try to tell her she’s wrong. He won’t try to explain how he sees her. Instead he sits in silence a moment, absorbing her reality and understanding what she said. “Thank you for sharing with me.”

“Can I ask you something?” something in her tone tells him she’s serious. This isn’t a guise to be smart with him or a stupid rebutal.

He answers with a short nod, too focused on filling in the leaves he’s added.

“Do you ever think you’ll stay? If Leon offered you a perminant position here?”

“Maybe. I like working with you and Nova too. I loved the first few articles you put out and was sad I just kinda had to hope we crossed paths again after we met at those conferences. I don’t know. I love being my own business. Working as I please but I do miss having office mates and the job protection this provides,” he says as he inspects the last of his work on her arm, running a thumb over his final addition before capping his pen. “When you have your own company, you’ll understand, a lot of them just use you to get on top.”

The smirk is immediate. She can’t help but till her eyes at him as he dramatically feigns heartache.

“I’m sure it’s not hard to get on top of you,” the joke lightens the odd mood, shaking off some of the seriousness that’s befallen them. It halfway works as she gives him a quick one over glance before she walks out of the conference room. He can’t help but watch the easy sway of her hips as she walks away, only turning his attention back to his work once she turns the corner into her own office.

She stares down at her little leaf, expecting him to have drawn something inappropriate. Instead there’s now a full olive branch to stare at. She packs her bag with a smile plastered on her face, enamored with the way he’s filled in all the leaves with blues and greens and extended the branch further, and for a moment she thinks, maybe there will be peace. With a sigh, she collects the last of her things from her office for the weekend.

“Have a nice night.” He shouts when she finally walks past the door again.

“I’ll see you Monday.” she shouts back. She watches the elevator numbers change slowly. Counting up to her floor slowly but she’s gone by the time the doors open.

In another circumstantial, maybe they’d have gotten along but Beatrice adjust. They get along. For now. That’s all she needed anyways and Tuesday, he’s gone just the same.

____

Beatrice comes back into the office on Monday, her weekend gone all too quickly. First order of business stays the same— check on Leon’s weekly update, usually a drag, today there’s a thing of sadness as she thinks about the end. Leon gave the same goodbye to all visitors ‘Our warmest goodbye and best wishes to our visitors Ashton and Luke.’

The subject line alone brings her joy “Leon’s Monday Update. Delivered 7:23 AM” She skims the opening, well aware of everything at the company. Her eye’s don’t stop until she sees, “Thank you for welcoming our visitors Luke and Ashton. As you know we’re pushing for a revitalized marketing strategy and in bringing them in, we’ve learned a lot and will continue to learn a lot. I’m very pleased to say our partnership will continue. As both Luke and Ashton have agreed to stay on board as advisors.

It has been a great time having them collaborating with our lovely marketing team. So much so that we’ve decided to extend their stay through the end of the month to explore additional projects.

Best wishes,

Leon”

Before Beatrice can get a word out, finishing processing what his email says, Nova’s response comes through, “Thank you for the update, Leon. We’re over the moon to have them here for the rest of the month. We’ll confirm that an office is set aside for the remainder of their stay. Thank you.”

Beatrice slowly puts her head down on her desk. Unsure why there’s a twinge of excitement in her heart with the extension of their stay.

[a-very-fond-farewell]

The forbidden crack! Untamed prompts: 18/?

University AU: “Negative Space”

[ok so, self projection is a bitch, but I am petty to myself on a regular basis so it’s ok]

[title is from the Japanese concept “ma”, which Wikipedia describes as:

“a Japanese word which can be roughly translated as ‘gap’, ‘space’, ‘pause’ or ‘the space between two structural parts.’ In traditional Japanese arts and culture, ma is more carefully defined as the suggestion of an interval. It is best described as a consciousness of a sense of place, with the ‘intervals’ suggested often being more than simple gaps, instead focusing on the intention of a negative space in an art piece.

Ma is not necessarily an art concept created by compositional elements, such as the literal existence of a negative space. Instead, the intention is often to create the perception of an interval in the viewer experiencing the elements forming an art piece, making maless reliant on the existence of a gap, and more closely related to the perceived experience of a gap.

Ma has also been described as ‘an emptiness full of possibilities, like a promise yet to be fulfilled’, and as ‘the silence between the notes which make the music’.”

Fun fact: “ma” also means “but” in Italian, which is what usually follows whatever intrusive thought may plague my mind. Eg: “I may be useless now, BUT just you wait until I get some dopamine to get me through this shitty times.”]

*

Wei Ying never asked for much in his life. He’s content with cleaning classrooms and toilets and nobody can beat him at wiping the marble floors if he works hard enough. Granny Wen, his supervisor, is slightly impressed with his ability to make the wood shine for ages to come. His nephew Jin Ling sometimes comes to check on him when he’s done with senior classes or cram school in the evening, and together they sit down and listen to whatever his older friends in music production came up with during the day. Jiang Cheng occasionally would ask him to keep him company while he grades papers and they bitch about ZiXuan and his inability to dote on their sister. The cafeteria ladies are always nice to him and they give him extra congee because they worry for his questionable consumption of spice products.

He’s fine, really.

So why can’t he stop wandering over to the science building these days? Looking for a clean board to use, for an equation to finally solve? Even if in the end he just takes the chalk in hand and simply stares down at the inky surface in front of him, unable to write. His mind working on a software too advanced for the hardware that constitutes his brain.

Thirteen years. It has been already thirteen years and yet it feels like yesterday, or like it never happened at all. Like it has yet to be. Time blindness is a bitch to deal with, yet dyscalculia and ADHD makes a joke out of you when you love math on a visceral level... but you burned too bright too fast and now you function on no data and with an even shittier signal. Having a burnout at 23 should have taught him humility instead of pride, but Wei Ying has always worked out of spite and certain habits are difficult to forget.

Couldn’t put the number in the right order, switching digits left and right since he was young? Fine. Numbers were concepts anyway, entire civilizations working their magic without even knowing what “zero” stood for. A brain steaming with a million ideas per second? Good. New connections brimming with ideas he could use to better the world.

It worked fine until he let himself down. Until he became a useless empty lighter, a wet match tossed out, carbon monoxide in the air.

Dropped out before finishing his very ambitious, highly dangerous for his psyche, thesis project. Aunt Yu never forgave him for that, not after paying for his advanced classes, not after trusting Uncle Jiang and supporting him despite his many flaws. What good is being first of your class every year, poster child of a teaching system done right, graduating bachelor at 21, if you can’t finish your master at 23 and get your PhD at 25 and start teaching by 27 and drive yourself insane in the process?

Wei Ying dropped out and didn’t finish his master, didn’t enroll in the teaching program, and let everyone down. His Uncle and Aunt looking down on him, whether out of pity or shame. Jiang Cheng may have been the one leaving him behind, but he used to be the one saying “you should have tried harder”. YanLi worrying over him when she should have focused on her career first. Jin Ling growing up with stories of his uncle “not being worth the money put into his education”, taught to not disappoint and make his family proud. The Jin side, that is.

And now the kid comes crawling in defeat to him instead of Jiang Cheng after bombing a test in high school. And they chat of what he would like to do and how much he likes sports and how much he despises the idea of getting a scholarship for that and being called stupid or something by his classmates. And he cries when he thinks Wei Ying cannot see him as he leaves the campus late at night.

Wei Ying didn’t even want to solve that impossible theorem he fixated on in his early twenties. His thesis project was inconsequential in the great scheme of things and his professor only wanted him to be his one trick pony in the end. No. Wei Ying wanted to teach math in elementary school, hell... even in kindergarten. He wanted to change the approach to the subject. Because numbers cannot be taught like language is and there are many ways to teach how to sum up digits and divide quantities and there are no rules on how to make sense of space either.

But how can he teach when even time eludes his senses?

Something that nobody can define, but certainly most perceive as linear... but not him. Not since his brain fried up in his attempt to function like a normal human being.

After thirteen years nothing has changed.

Until one day he hears something else aside from his usual intrusive thoughts and burdensome memories. A melody so quiet he almost mistakes it for the wind, coming from the music building.

He walks slowly, night surrounding him like the embrace of a friend as he makes his way to the traditional musical instruments room. The one where Jin Ling’s friends meet sometimes as they wait for the younger boy to join them. Wei Ying holds his breath as he spies through the gap of the door left ajar, neon light slicing his face like moonbeams as he peeks in and recognizes Jin Ling’s friends and another figure sitting on the ground, guqin on their knees.

But before he can lean in and breathe in the vibrant sounds all around, the door opens and music theory Professor Lan finds Wei Ying clutching his mop for dear life.

They said the man could see colors within the notes, that he despises language outside of his class or office and that only his brother, the history of art TA, could convince him to talk every now and then.

If numbers were created to measure space, Wei Ying firmly believed music had been invented to make sense of time and count its seconds in rhythm and notes, pauses and beats. Yet, time seems to stretch to a stop as the janitor focuses all of his attention on professor Lan’s stern face and his heart quickens its pace.

Wei Ying takes a rushed breath and dives right in with a weird sense of hope pumping in his veins. A small, timid voice whispering that life is not made to be atoned, but to move on and grow.

One step at a time.

“I’m Wei Ying, Professor Lan. May I listen while you play?”

Yes, maybe it will be enough just to let time flow at its pace.

Whatever rhythm that may be.

*

[some hcs down below]

WWX does not magically solve the math theorem. he may or may not help kids figure out how to use numbers on the long run tho. no, he will still work as a janitor and there’s nothing wrong with that.

yes, LWJ is autistic and stimms and finds WWX’s honesty soothing. yes, you can add your hcs on the matter. he has synesthesia, but more on the grapheme-color side of the deal than anything else and he sees certain letters/numbers/notes in different colors. people think he can see colors in music, but they misunderstood and thought he could recognize different hues while listening to music instead of reading it.

JC has grown since his uni years and doesn’t resent WWX anymore. he teaches astrophysics as a TA and doesn’t pressure his brother to pick his studies up anymore. WWX has mixed feelings about this: he feels he’s a lost cause, to the point not even his brother spurs him to best himself anymore, but he is grateful for the patience anyway.

LXC is the official LWJ translator of the campus along with their cousins SiZhui and JinGyi. he bonds with WWX and JC over how tired they are, seldom staring at flies roaming above them in the cafeteria bc none of them can even move. he lives on caffeine and regrets, but he’s getting better as he develops a love for his plant babies and tries to not let them die on a daily basis.

Wen Ning and Wen Qing are little overachievers and adrenaline junkies, hence their competitive streak on their way to their third master degree just for funsies. they scare people with how driven they are, but the juniors love them.

NMJ is the one to go to if you need to get away with murder, but JGY will actually be the one helping you dispose of the body. the fact that they both work in criminal law is somewhat both reassuring and disquieting. they hate each other and yet cannot stop hang out, they are close to 40 and need the rivalry to keep going anyway. nothing beats a good nemesis. not even sex. maybe.

NHS has failed his entrance exam to become a nurse too many times to count, but he is determined to see the end of it. even if he could potentially work in the family business, but he doesn’t know anything about managing an empire of bricks and he doesn’t care. if NMJ could run away, well, so can he.

MianMian is Wei Ying’s bestie and has the biggest crush on JGY’s sister A-Su the kindergarten teacher, but since they are childhood besties she doesn’t know how to approach her. she is Jin Ling’s idol and a certified boxer and refers to herself as a useless bisexual. Wei Ying boxes with her sometimes, she always win.

YanLi is an equestrian mum, but in the best way possible: she coaches children for shows and teaches them horses should be loved and feared equally and that if you want to shoot arrows from a running horse you should always, ALWAYS let go of the stirrups the moment the beast gets too unhinged to ride. JC fears her, WWX is only glad she didn’t train police dogs for a living.

ZiXuan actually loves his wife, but WWX and JC question his career choices and the fact that he’s a retired lawyer spending his family fortune while he’s a stay-at-home dad and does all the housework. WWX and JC believe he should give their sister a better life and work his ass off to deserve her, but he does make amazing rice cakes and keeps up with Jin Ling’s studies and is very supportive of his dreams.

A-Qing and Song Lan are siblings and sometimes bring JC food from the campus cafeteria where they both work at, while Xiao XingChen and his carer Xue Yang work with LXC for a project on accessibility for visually impaired visitors of the local museum. JC and LXC work to make Song Lan and Xiao XingChen fall for each other, but the youngsters are too protective to let them play matchmaker so easily.

[this is all for now. please, if you want, add your own headcanons!]

[marvelgbt-posts]

Projects

{Photographer! Peter Parker x Bigender! Artist! Reader}

Warnings: i dont know much bout the bigender community, and so i did my research. So you identify as two genders? I dont know what ‘genders’ exactly you’d want here, so i’ll put they/them pronouns if thats okay :)

Summary: ‘can i please get a bigender reader who goes to art school with peter, that has like, “god like abilities” and always compliments/draws/tells peter hes amazing. ((tag @give-you-the-sxn please?))

Ofc my beautiful valid child <3

A/N: i decided to change it up a bit and have the art class as a club after school instead. Also I hc that tom hollands peter parker is into photography. I hope you like it >///<

I listened to ‘youth’ by Shawn Mendes and Khalid while doing this.

*not edited*

“Welcome class,” the teacher greeted you all brightly, “I’m glad you could make it after school today, what with all the rain and all I assumed only two or three of you would have shown up today. Anyways, you know what to do. Best get to it.” She clapped her hands, before turning her heel and moving to write on the board, writing ‘Integrated Arts Club’ in a cursive calligraphy font. That was her contribution to the club. Calligraphy.

You sighed. This was a way for you to escape the harsh reality of the outside world. Half the students in this club were members of the community, no scratch that, the majority of students were gay. There was maybe only one or two straight people apart of this club.

You took out your paints, paintbrushes, pencils, and then got your canvas from inside the supply closet where you had left it yesterday. It was your newest project, a painting of a woman in white, with bright red lips and a black dress that blended into the black background of your canvas. You were inspired by a woman you had seen one night on the streets of Queens.

Taking a seat by yourself- taking up the whole table with your paints and brushes spread everywhere- you began painting. Everything was already finished, you just needed the details. You heard the door open and close, only choosing to look up when you finished an eyelash stroke.

“Yeah, this is where I go after school. That over there is Mia- the one spray painting the poster paper- and the dude over there with the guitar is Jay. That over there is (y/n), their bigender so I’d just use androgynous pronouns for them. Over there is Ms. Burningham, our club sponsor, and the dude in the corner is Max, he’s a comic book artist. You’d fit right in, Peter.”

The voice belonged to MJ, a close friend of yours. She often helped give you inspiration, letting you paint some of her sketches to life. You heard her walk behind you, leaning down so her hair was in your peripheral vision. You looked up, “Yo, MJ.” You smiled at her, then up at the newbie.

He was short, about an inch or so shorter than you, with brown eyes and hair. He wore a sweater over another shirt, jeans, and ha a camera in his hands. He was trembling, probably nervous.

“Hey, ahh, who’s this?” You asked MJ, who looked at Peter. She leaned back against the table, her palms getting paint on them from the splatters that had fallen off your plate of paint.

“Parker- Peter. Peter Parker. Nice to meet you.”

He went to shake your hand, you lifted yours up to show him you had gotten black and red all over them, “Sorry, dont wanna mess up your hands. That camera looks expensive.”

Peter made a small ‘oh’ noise, looking down to his small Canon camera. “Yeah, it- its almost completely brand new. I sold some of my old stuff to get it. Useless stuff, shirts and books and stuff.”

“Cool, cool. Uh, MJ, could you tell Jay to keep it down over there? Can’t hear my own thoughts over his wanna-be indie music,” you said, completely disregarding the boy in front of you now. It wasn’t that you were rude, you just wanted to get this painting finished hole everything was still wet, otherwise it would make problems later on. MJ rolled her eyes, but nodded. You flashed Peter a smile, before turning to you painting.

After about a minute of silence, you heard a gasp behind you, “Holy shit- that’s really good!” You looked up, seeing Peter next to you with his camera turned on. He blushed, “Sorry! It’s just you looked so calm and pleasing, I snapped a quick photo while you weren’t looking- sorry.”

You half-smiled, standing upright, “Thanks, and it’s okay. This class is freedom of expression. Just not expression, ‘kay? As in, no swearing,” you laughed and pointed to the lady at the front of the class, her hands busy grading the Latin worksheets. Peter nodded, surprise clear across his face, “Oh- sorry.”

“Can I see?”

“What?”

“The pictures, can I see? I mean, they're of me, right?”

“Oh- yeah! Totally!”

Peter pushed a few buttons on his camera, and he scrolled through some of the photos until he found yours. “Here-”

“Wow, i look hot!”

You moved closer to Peter to get a better look, gawking at the aesthetic that was put into one simple photo. You did look good in this photo. “Mind sending me this? Not just this, other stuff, too. I’d love to make a piece from these- oh, if that’s okay?”

“Uhh- yeah! Sure!”

***

You flopped onto the bed, curling up next to a pillow. It was cold from loneliness, making you snuggle closer to it. You looked at your nails- paint ad managed to get wedged between the nail and the skin, and no matter how hard you tried it wouldn’t wash away.

You sighed, ready to turn off the light until your phone went off. You checked it to see there was a message from MJ, asking you if it was okay to give Peter your number. You texted back, ‘Yeah. Totally.’

Three minutes later, your phone went off again and it was Peter.

Unknown

Hey (y/n) its peter

Parker

Peter parker

Um

I just wanted to know if you wanted the photos to be on a hard drive or through gmail or something?

Hello?

-11:13-

You

Yeah

I’m here hi

A hard drive would be nice thanks

-11:15-

You took a moment to change Peter’s ID to his name. About five minutes later, Peter responded with more spam

Peter

Okay cool

Yeah okay

Yeah i can do that

Sure

Yeah

Okay

Cool

-11:32-

You

Lol

Imma sleep

Night peter

-11:35-

Peter

(…)

Night

-11:45-

***

The next day, you bumped into Peter in the hallway, “Oh, hi Pete. Can I call you that?”

“Hi, (y/n)! Yeah, totally cool!”

“Cool, got the hard drive?”

“Yeah, right here,” Peter patted his jean pockets for a bit before pulling out a black and red hard drive, “It has maybe 20 or 25 pictures here. Their mostly just random pictures of places around Queens, hope that’s okay?” You nod, “Thanks Pete.”

***

That night, you went home and changed Peter’s ID to ‘Pete’. After that, you plugged the hard drive into your laptop, opening the file titled ‘images’ and scrolling through the photos. Most of them were taken at impossible angles, and you wondered how Peter was able to capture photos like them. One was at the top of a building and looking down onto a busy interstate. Another was of the stars, a bit of the background trees getting in the frame. They were beautiful. Another was of MJ, her back towards the camera, a backpack strap in her hand, looking to the left at the sky with a sunset background. You saved that image as ‘Michelle_jERKFACE.jpeg’ on your computer. The photo Peter took of you earlier was amongst them as well.

You went to bed that night with a smile on your face and ideas fresh in your mind, ready for tomorrow's Club Meeting.

***

“Hey (y/n)! Like the pictures i sent?”

“Holy Shii-shhh! Peter! That sentence can go two ways!”

“OH! Sorry...”

“Its fine, and yes I did like them. They were really good! How come you never joined before?”

“Never thought i was good enough.”

“Not good enough?! Peter, those photos are professional level photos. They are wonderful and beautiful and deserve to be in a museum.”

“Oh, wow, thanks...” peter blushed, looking own with a small smile on his face.

***

You looked at the scenery before you, trees brown and crisp from the fall air. Peter sat next to you, his camera ready to snap a picture at any moment. MJ sat opposite Peter, sketchbook in hand and sketching the trees and people. Ned was posing by a fountain as Peter playfully took photos of him. You started sketching Peter into your own book, smiling when you finished and began shading.

MJ looked over at you, “Damn, you’re gay for Peter Parker.”

You looked at MJ with a shocked expression, before looking at the sketch and at Peter, who was now out of ear shot.

“Totally,” you smiled, before both of you went back to your drawings.

***

“Peter,” you looked at him seriously from your spot on his bed, “Ever think about kissing dudes before?”

Peter blushed, “I- ah, um...” His eyes widened, before looking down shamefully, “Y-Yeah… more than a few times...”

You smiled, “Cool, so what? You’re… bi?”

“More pan, I look for personality more than gender.”

“Cool, same. I’m (sexuality).”

“Oh, cool!”

***

“Peter, where are we going?”

“Behind the school. There’s something I need to show you.”

Peter had your hand tight in his grip, pulling you through the almost empty hallways. His voice didn’t stutter, which worried you.

Finally, you made it. Peter pulled out his camera, “Stand in front of that street art Mia did yesterday.” You did just that. Peter moved your arms to move in front of your sweater, telling you to tug at it a bit and look up at the sky. He moved some hair in front of your face to cover your eyes. He knelt down, snapping the photo.

“Cool, now stay there.”

“Do you always get like this for a photo?” You asked as Peter pressed record, moving next to you, “What do you mean?”

“Nothing, um. What are you doing?”

“Its for a project. I’m gonna screenshot part of the video later. Please, this is important.”

You watched Peter as he took control of the situation, taking your (smaller/bigger) hands in is own, intertwining them as he leant up.

“Kiss me.”

You coughed, moving back. Peter moved his arms around you again, “Please?”

“Why?”

“The project- please (y/n).”

You slowly gave in, letting Peter wrap his arms around your waist as you looked down into his eyes, your hands cupping his cheeks softly. He leant up to kiss you softly. Both of you stayed there, afraid and unsure of how to move.

“I’m sorry,” Peter said after a while, moving away. You were quick to react, taking the back of his head and slamming it back onto yours.

“Mph-!”

He was taken aback by the action, soon melting and whimpering into it.

Yep, you were so gay for Peter Parker.

[kurathemonster]

Mask of Memories - Chapter 1[Deltarune Fanfiction]

Heyo guys! I am now able to proudly present to you, the first chapter of my Deltarune fanfiction! This story is gonna go on for a few chapters, I'm not sure how many yet. And I'll try to update weekly as well.I'll be uploading this fic on Amino and probably Ao3 as well. So with all that out of the way, let's get right into the story! I'm super excited. It begins during the morning following the events of Deltarune, where the player's soul is still trapped inside the cage. The same events of Deltarune occurred, this story is just a continuation.

Time Taken - 5 hours for art, 2-3 hours for writing

Word Count - 2,526(holy heck)

Programs Used - Clip Studio Paint, Google Docs

WARNINGS

Somewhat strong language, Referenced suicide, Mental illness, Sorta long story(not really)

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Silent, Kris sat on their bed, watching the player’s soul trapped inside the cage. They had woken up earlier than usual, with the sun barely rising to greet their town and light up their room. The soul sat still in the cage, almost intimidated by what happened the previous night. Perhaps the soul had given up by now. It realized that it was never the one in control. Kris thought that it would be determined to fight back, but it seemed so limp and lifeless, almost as if there was nothing there to control it anymore.

After staying in bed with their empty thoughts for far too long, Kris dragged their exhausted body off the bed and walked downstairs to greet their mother. They wondered how different it used to be whenever Asriel and Dad were still home. Their brother was often up earlier than Kris was, usually helping Mom with breakfast or Dad with watering the flowers. Dad always loved to decorate the house with plants. He knew all kinds of different things about the ones in their house. Ever since he left, all of the flowers were left unkempt and eventually wilted.

Kris saw their mother, Toriel, gathering her things to get ready for school. Their mother was a teacher at their school, and Kris knew how much she loved her job. Kris thought they should’ve been woken up by their mom by this time, seeing as she was already gathering her things. Had it really been that much earlier? Toriel noticed Kris’s presence and smiled as she stuffed small items into her handbag. “Oh, good morning Kris! I didn’t think you’d be up at this time. You wouldn’t happen to know where the keys to the car are, do you?”

Kris nodded their head no, and looked towards the stove for breakfast. They then turned back towards Toriel as if to ask if she made something like she used to. “Kris, if you want to go ahead of me and walk to school on your own, that’s fine with me. I’d really rather me be late, then the both of us,” Toriel said as she opened a drawer of the table next to the door. Kris gave their mother a hug and opened the door without saying a word. Toriel turned towards Kris and said, “Be good, my child. I love you.” It wasn’t unusual for Kris to stay so quiet, but some days were more so than others. They dragged them self to the front of the school, ignoring most everyone’s greetings toward them. It was a hard thing for Kris to do by now. It was a very small town without many people leaving or coming in. Everyone knew the Dreemurr kids, especially after the family separated apart.

Kris saw everyone going inside the school, which made them confirm that they weren’t late like usual. They didn’t bother to go inside yet, though. Kris looked down the street, hoping to see a purple-haired girl in her old jacket and ripped jeans, ready to greet Kris with a nice smile. She wasn’t coming, and Kris was about to be late to class. Maybe another day, Kris thought. They walked into the school alone, down the hall, and to the classroom at the end. Everyone was still waiting for class to start, some people not in their seats and talking to their friends. Everything just seemed normal to the rest of the world. Something felt off for Kris. They went to their seat and sat down without saying a word. Some of their classmates turned to stare at Kris. Noelle turned towards them, a worried look on her face. “Is everything alright Kris? You were gone all day after you left with Susie.” Kris panicked to try and come up with something to tell Noelle. They couldn’t just tell Noelle about the Dark World. She’d never believe them. “I… uhh, well we-”

In a fit of surprise, Susie was behind Kris with her hand on their shoulder. “We had a hard time looking for the chalk is all. I guess we got a bit distracted and started to goof off in there. Don’t worry ‘bout it.” Kris looked behind them and up towards Susie’s face. She was smiling for once. Kris could even see her eyes beyond her thick hair. “Susie?” Kris said, almost whispering to her. Berdly suddenly jerked his head in Susie’s direction and gave her a proud look. “Now that all still seems too suspicious to me! How is it that you two could go missing all day looking for chalk?” Susie turned her head towards Berdly as her expression changed to become irritated. “What’s it with you? It’s not like it’s any of your damn business anyway.” Berdly made a disgusted face as Alphys walked into the door. “Uhh… M-morning everyone. Could you guys p-please take your seats?” Everyone sat down and Berdly peeked a look towards Susie with a suspicious face. Susie kept a straight expression as Alphys started class.

“Well uhh… today we’ll be doing something similar to yesterday. I know K-Kris and Susie were uhh… out the o-other day, so I just printed out a p-paper with the instructions on it for you two.” Alphys looked towards the chalkboard and pointed at the neat drawing of a labeled poster. “You’ll be making a poster for th-this project and you’ll need to work together in o-order to finish.” After Alphys finished telling the class instructions for the day, she sat at her desk and watched as the students shuffled around the room with their poster boards.

Kris sat in front of Susie and turned their head around towards Susie to look at her staring down the instructions paper. “Umm… Susie?” Susie looked up quickly to stare at Kris. “Yeah, Kris?”

“Are you alright?” Kris asked, almost a bit worried to see how different Susie was acting. Susie looks a bit confused and laughed nervously. “What kind of question is that supposed to be?”

Kris looked down at the paper in Susie’s hand, then looked back towards her eyes. They were clearly seen, even behind her bangs, where as Kris had their eyes barely showing from view. “Nevermind. What are we doing for this project?” The rest of class dragged on for hours as they worked on their projects. Susie was acting a lot different than yesterday. She seemed to care a lot more towards Kris and acted more violent to those who tried to hurt them. It was so strange to see Susie like this, considering how different she was yesterday. Kris didn’t think that the Dark World could change Susie so much. It was as if Kris had taught Susie compassion and love for others.

Kris threw away that thought as soon as it appeared. They knew that couldn’t possibly be the case when it comes to someone like Susie. She was known to be selfish and cold-hearted. She couldn’t change to become so caring for someone she despised so quickly. It felt wrong to change her this much. Kris admitted to themselves that they liked Susie better this way, with her caring smile and outgoing ways. Yet Kris still couldn’t help but feel guilty for doing such a thing. They dragged her into something she doesn’t need to see. Something only Kris could know about. Only Kris should know about.

Lunchtime finally arrived as all of the students shuffled their way to the school cafeteria. All of the tables were usually filled, leaving Kris and Susie to sit on the stairs next to the hallway. Kris opened their lunch bag to see all the usual things their mother would have packed for them. A sandwich, some vegetables and ranch, sliced peaches, and some juice. This was the first time they’d ever seen Susie during lunch. Usually, she would hide somewhere, away from everyone else. She didn’t even bring anything to eat. Kris looked over at Susie and asked her, “Do you not have anything to eat? You could get a school lunch.” Susie turned her head towards Kris, surprised. “I uhh… never eat lunch during school. Don’t wanna get a school lunch ‘cause it’ll add to my school fees.” Kris looked down at their lunch, grabbed their sandwich container and handed it towards Susie.

Susie looked shocked as she stared back and forth between the sandwich to Kris’s face. “I uhh… Kris, you know you don’t have to. It’s normal for me not to eat lunch, you know?” Kris made a gesture towards her to take the sandwich. Susie slowly raised her hand and looked back at Kris. “Thanks, Kris,” she said as she took the container from Kris’s hand. As everyone finished lunch and migrated toward the halls, Kris and Susie stayed where they were. Susie finished the sandwich without anymore hesitation, being thankful that her friendlier nature was proving to be rewarding. Kris quickly ate the rest of their lunch and packed everything up. They never finished their entire lunch, which was good considering they could share their leftovers with Susie instead of discarding them. Susie turned towards Kris as they packed the last container back into their bag. “So I was thinking we could sneak into the unused classroom after everyone leaves from school. We should wait for us to be alone so we could get in without anyone noticing.” Kris looked towards the large doors they entered yesterday. “Fine with me.”

“Great!” Susie replied, a ready smile shining on her face. “Man, I can’t wait to see how Lancer’s doing. I know we’ve only been gone for a day, but it still feels like forever.” Kris smiled faintly in return when they saw how happy Susie was to think about Lancer. Although this was something Kris would rather not have happened, they felt somewhat glad that Susie was able to come along with Kris on their journey. It made Kris feel something they haven’t felt in a long time. The bell suddenly rang and they finished off the school day as normal, without any dark fountains, magic goats, or spade kings.

Susie and Kris stood at the end of the hall, silently waiting for the crowd to disappear. Once most people were gone from the halls, Susie looked around the corner to make sure no one was watching them. They snuck towards the door and opened it silently. Kris looked behind them before entering the room and saw their mother talking to Alphys. She had her back turned, but still, Kris panicked and took only a split second to jump inside and shut the door. They walked into the darkness and saw the same thing as they saw yesterday. The floor seemed solid enough. Susie looked around the room and saw nothing but darkness. “Hey Kris, do you even know how to get back into the Dark World?” Kris looked behind them and could still see the door, light coming from underneath it. That’s strange, they thought to themselves. “It should be here,” Kris then said to Susie. They walked around but to no avail. Kris knew something wasn't right. They thought that they should've been able to just fall into the Dark World like before. Kris pondered about how they were able to do it the first time, but couldn’t remember. They remember it just happening. Almost like they imagined it so vividly that it became true. But Kris couldn’t do it anymore.

“Why isn’t it here?” Susie turned back towards Kris with a worried look. “Kris?” Kris tried really hard to imagine the Dark World, but all that came were faded memories. Anything that they could remember felt strange and blurred. The thought of the Dark World even made their head spin and hurt. Kris started to panic at the thought of the Dark World vanishing forever. All of their memories, their happiness, their sanity for so long, just gone. Kris depended on the Dark World as their only way of staying happy. When the player entered their body, all of the happiness and playful personality they used to have seemed to be at a loss. Kris knew that they would have never become friends with Susie if it weren’t for the player, but then again, that meeting wasn’t exactly how Kris would have liked it to be. They were silent most of the time, without feeling or energy. All of their cheerful and daring personality faded away with their control over their own body. They didn’t have any choices of their own while the player was in them. They felt helpless. Tears started to form in their eyes. Subtle, it was, but full of pain and doubt.

“I… I can’t. It’s gone and I... I don’t know how!” Kris’s eyes were watering with tears, almost to the point of falling. They were kept covered by their bangs as they’d like to keep them. Even though Susie couldn’t see their face, she knew they were crying because of the desperation in their voice. “Kris, it’s okay!” Susie tried to comfort Kris, but admittedly wasn’t the best at doing so. Kris sat still and silent. They stood up straight and wiped up the tears with their sleeve. Kris turned around to Susie looking straight at them. Even in the darkness, Susie could still see the features of Kris’s face, stressed and disappointed. “Everything’s alright, Kris. We can find another way to get in,” Susie said as she put one hand on Kris’s shoulder. Kris was breathing heavy, but silently, the slow movements calming them.

Susie didn’t know how else they could enter the Dark World, but she thought that there must be some way to get in. She didn’t even know that it was some place for Kris to cope with their feelings. Susie barely knew anything about Kris, just that their family was split up not too long ago. Susie honestly thought that Kris’ life was perfect, and that Kris was as happy as they come. Kris was so good at playing the role that sometimes they even make themselves believe that things were that way. Kris thought about what they would do if Susie left them. They would… they would give up. No point in living in a world where you’re alone, right? Kris thought that if they were gone, no one would worry anyway. Susie snapped Kris out of their conscious and looked at them with a serious face. “Kris, I promise we’ll find some way to get there. You just need to relax right now.” Kris stayed silent and looked back down towards the ground. The tears went away and Kris felt a bit better. Susie looked towards the end of the room. Nothing. It was all just black. Susie then turned towards Kris again with a determined look. “Let’s go in further. Maybe we can find something then.” Kris looked down the long corridor and felt nervous. They don’t know what they’d be able to find in there. There could be anything in there. Kris knew that this was better than nothing, so they took a deep breath and looked up at Susie once more. “Let’s go.” Susie smiled a daring smile and they both walked deeper into the darkness.

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Thanks so much for reading and I hope you stick around for more to come! I'm so excited to show you the next chapters! :3

[couldnt-think-of-a-funny-name]

PLEASE TELL THE CHILDREN THE STORY OF MS. STUBELS

Grace fuck, why would you invoke her name like that???

Okay, fine, gather round children, buckle up because we’re going on a bumpy ride back to everyone’s collective least favorite place: 7th grade.

Some background: I went to a very small Catholic school. One class per grade (we were the largest with 19 kids), everyone knew each other whether they wanted to or not. Despite basically every teacher and faculty members insistence that we were The Best And Most Special Class In The School and that everyone loved having us, the longstanding 7th grade teacher Mrs. O’Hara decided to retire in the summer of 2008, meaning the school had to find us a new teacher for the upcoming year. This would be like, the first new teacher in the school in a while, and as she was getting the ‘best class’, it was viewed as a Big Deal. Somewhere in like July or August we got a letter announcing Mrs. Stubel, and it came with a list of books to pick for the summer reading, and that was basically all the information we had.

So…the first day of class. She seems nice enough. Very…ditsy, I guess? It was very easy for her to get herself off topic while talking. She constantly paced around the room, never staying in one spot for longer than a second, complaining she has restless leg syndrome. Which like, I’m sure she did, but she was in the middle of introducing herself and then went on a 20 minute tangent about restless leg syndrome without anyone prompting her. It was almost like you could see her scattered thoughts flying around her head.

So anyone, she eventually gives somewhat of an introduction- she had only taught in public schools before, and kept worrying she ‘didn’t know’ how to teach in a Catholic school despite the entire class insisting literally nothing was different, you just teach the curriculum, twice a week we have religion class with Sister Mary King, that’s literally it (she still talked over us in worry), she told us about her kids, she told us about her obsession with Emily Dickinson, stuff like that.

And then she hands us this worksheet.

She’s like, “Oh, these are just some basic questions for you to answer! Just so I can get to know you guys better!” like in lieu of an icebreaker game, which is fine, but…the questions. The questions were all “What is your most haunting fear?”, “What is your deepest regret?”, “Have you ever experienced the pain of loss?”, “What was your worst injury?”, “What was your worst nightmare?”, all questions like that, and then on the back she wanted us to draw a gravestone and write out what we wanted our epitaph to be.

We were twelve year olds, mind you.

Oh my God and one girl missed the first day because of her grandmother’s funeral, so when she came the next day and saw what the teacher was insisting she do for homework, she almost had a panic attack? And the lady still made her do it? Literally who wants to think about death anymore at a time like that omfg.

Okay, so then we get to the summer reading book reports, right? Now, she had given a list of maybe, 20 books that you could pick from, read it, and then present an oral report on it. You had to have notecards and you had to be able to answer questions from the class at the end. All in all, I’ve had worse projects.

So, on this list, she apparently put Madeleine L’Engle’s entire book series on the list…only she did not make it known that this was a series and not multiple stand alone books, so when reports started up it caused mass-panic of kids trying to put together plot points and make connections on what the hell they had read.

I was the only kid in the class who had chosen to read “A Wrinkle In Time”, and that has since lead to a series of events that…really actually scares me, I’m still incredibly freaked out, I’m not going to get into it right now because it’ll take away from the current story, but just know that I’m not above wondering if it only happened because I read the book for Stubel.

Anyway, so like, I got through the report okay. The class asking questions about it was fine, but the teacher kept asking questions that didn’t make sense, like, at all. My friend Angie has always had super neat handwriting and Mrs. Stubel got like, obsessed with her notecards and asked if she could borrow them for something. When we got our grades back a few weeks later, Angie had points taken off for not having notecards.

And then her teaching just…didn’t happen. She’d never stay on a topic, she’d always get herself distracted! We were not learning anything. And like, this wasn’t a class of advanced smart kids that loved to learn. By all accounts we should’ve been thrilled. But it got out of hand. It got to points where we had to start teaching lessons to ourselves, asking teacher from other grades for help, always coming home in tears, complaining constantly to our parents and the principal because this woman wasn’t teaching us anything. There were two kids who asked her multiple times for extra help, and she told them each time to ‘talk to me after school’, but then she’d leave immediately after school so they wouldn’t be able to talk to her. They finally brought up the issue in the middle of class and she had a breakdown, yelling about how nobody ever thinks that maybe the teacher has a lot of work to do, and maybe she’s entitled to taking off early, but when we tried to argue she shouldn’t schedule meetings and then break them off in the name of relaxation, she stormed out of the room and tried to get the principal to give us detention. (Which, like, our school didn’t even do, and she was the only one in the wrong during this situation) We are still in September at this point, and already at least ten kids have parents considering transferring them to another school. (And remember, there was only 19 of us, and most of the class had been together since preschool, so that was a big deal).

Then, she starts coming in with all the weird bruises. All the Moms™ immediately started gossiping that her husband had to be beating her, and that’s why she was so screwy in the head. But the way she talked about her husband made it seem like he *might* be dead, and we actually did witness her fall and smack her head into a doorknob once, so no one really knew what to believe. (Also, I’m not trying to imply that abuse would make someone crazy or ‘damaged’ or anything, this is just what was being said. I think they were trying to turn her into a more sympathetic character, because if you feel sorry for her you don’t have to hate her for frustrating your kids so much, and Hate Is A Bad Emotion.)

Also…this woman and Emily Dickinson.

She talked about Emily Dickinson every chance she could get. None of us knew who Emily Dickinson really was before she got there and you could see in her mind it was a capitol offense. She found out the curriculum didn’t have room to cover her (because like, we had a text book), and was way too upset about it. She started reading her poems whenever she found the time (usually somewhere in history class), and always gave us very detailed accounts about her dressing up as Emily and reading her poetry at the library.

Now, two things to note here:

The library did not hire her to do this. She would literally just get in the mood, put on an Emily Dickinson costume that she made by herself, drive to different libraries, and just read poetry out loud to everyone there until someone eventually asked her to leave.

The way she described these events…her tone, the look on her face, her posture…you could just tell that she was getting some sort of sexual gratification out of this? Like dressing up as Emily Dickinson in public and reading her sad poems is really what got this lady’s jollies rocking? Got her all hot and bothered? Which is…a lot, but why would you tell a bunch of seventh graders about it holy shit. What about that sounds like a good idea! What about that turns you back on!

So anyway, we learned a lot about Emily Dickinson against our will.

One of the Davids™ was reading a book for pleasure- which shouldn’t have been a shocker, a lot of kids always had books on them, but Stubel got really interested and asked if she could borrow it from him. He was like ‘sure, after I finish it?’ but she took it that day. He asked her for it back for like five weeks straight.

And…the strudels.

Okay, so the school was trying some dorky thing to promote ~togetherness~ or some virtue or something, I don’t remember the specifics of why, but each class had to make a huge themed poster and hang it on the wall outside the classroom. Which was like, whatever, not the most thrilling project but at least it allowed us to be productive vs just sitting there as the teacher runs about the room rambling about her family vacation from four years ago. Mrs. Stubel decided we needed a quirky nickname and after like three days of deliberation we were christened “Stubel’s Special Strudels”!

(points for alliteration or whatever, but no one actually voted for that and what exactly do strudels have to do with Catholicism? It became a big running joke amongst the kids)

Also, in case you were wondering, she didn’t explain the assignment correctly to us- so every other class had like these beautiful, artistic, well-themed and put together posters, while ours was just…literally a bunch of shit thrown together on paper. Nothing fit with each other, it was literally embarrassing to look at.

But then…she wouldn’t drop the strudel thing. Like she kept bringing it up. She got really into strudels and would just tell us random shit about them. Finally, someone jokes that we should get strudels one day for a party (like instead of a pizza party), and she’s Freaking Out and On Board. She really wants to buy us strudels and have a breakfast party now. She talked about it for like two days straight.

So like… you know in school when you would have a pizza party, usually the teacher would buy it? That’s how they always happened in my experience (not counting the last day of 10th grade when some kid had pizza delivered to the school for lunch but it didn’t get there until math class lol). But especially in grade school? Like if it wasn’t a PTA made party that’s super organized, the school would buy the food, right? Right?

Yeah, so she was like, if this is happening you guys need to give me the money. Just give me the money and then I’ll pick them up on my way to work!! And after some arguing some kids are on board. Strudels should only cost a couple dollars right?

And she’s like, oh no, I’m gonna get them from this high end bakery near my house so it’ll be special, but they’re not cheap and it’ll be a big order! I’m gonna need like fifteen dollars from each of you!

And at this point I’m just like…lady. Come on. 

But she keeps insisting. She’s not gonna go until every student in class pays up.

And I’m like…I’m poor. I don’t even like strudel.  And some of the less-naïve kids are siding with me.

And then she pulls that “you guys are just spoiling all the fun for your classmates” shit, like the naïve kids who already paid up, so it gets to the point where we just gotta cave and give her the money.

(I ended up stealing it out of my Crazy Bitch Aunt’s wallet so it’s whatever, I guess.)

And then of course, shockingly enough, every morning she was met with “where are the strudels?” and every morning she went wide eyed, slapped her forehead and yelled in embarrassed horror “I totally forgot! Tomorrow, guys, I promise!”

Honestly, with how scatterbrained and confused she always was…like to this day I can’t tell you with 100% certainty whether she hustled us or was just actually forgetting about the damn pastries, I choose to lean towards the hustled us side because that’s just the type of people I’m used to, but if I found out it was innocent forgetfulness I wouldn’t exactly be surprised.

She couldn’t handle more than one person talking at a time. Like, we’d have break periods, or group work, or something and all the talking made her go wide-eyed and batty. She’d look overworked and anxious and would be darting around the room trying to do work or something but she couldn’t focus and she’d yell at anyone who tried to talk to her directly. I remember one time she was using this boys desk for something so he asked “where am I supposed to sit?” and she snapped “Sit on the ceiling for all I care!”. And this kid was the Class Clown™ , so he immediately grabbed a chair in one hand and started climbing the bookcase to try and reach the ceiling. She’s standing right next to this and doesn’t even notice. He got all four chair legs planted on the ceiling and was trying to somehow maneuver his way into the chair (I really don’t know what the plan was exactly- he was really tall and it was a small building, so I think he probably had the idea that if he can get his body upside down and in the chair, and stretch out his arms like a hand-stand to hold onto bookcase, he could arguably sit on the ceiling.) but he slipped. Crashed into my desk and the two desks next to me, knocked over the book case, broke the chair in half and hit the desks with enough force to knock them down lower. It was hilarious. Everyone was loosing their shit cracking up (he was fine) and it still took Stubel like five minutes to notice his lying out across the desks right in front of her eyes. She was pissed but how did she miss any of it in the first place? She was barely being helpful in whatever it was she was trying to do.

This was the year the Phillies were going to the World Series, and all the grades were having a Phillies Rally in the cafeteria so a news crew was coming to the school and each class was supposed to come up with fun little cheers for them to broadcast. Multiple cheer ideas were presented to her and she vetoed all of them, someone even suggested just singing the damn eagles theme song with replaced words and calling it a day but she vetoed that too, she was very adamant that she could come up with a cheer all by herself and it’ll be the best one (whoever had the best cheer was winning like an ice cream day or something idk). And then like…literally five minutes before the rally she just hands us signs with the letters and was like ‘we’re just gonna spell out Phillies it will be cute won’t it my strudels???’. We were the weakest class there, predictably. I think we lost to the kindergarteners. There might still be a video online of me yelling “ i “ passionately at the top of my lungs. It was online bc our cheer was so bland the news crew cut it out of the broadcast.

I literally can’t say enough about how she never taught us anything. She’d be going on some tangent about how she doesn’t understand the science behind skiing, and I’d be like “Okay yes but please can you just tell me where Romania is on a map???” And she’d start fights whenever someone actually wanted to learn. It was so easy to get her angry but so hard for her to stay on topic. Kids started teaching the class themselves! Like seriously, she’d be rambling and one of us would just go up to the podium, open the teacher’s guide textbook and just start reading out loud and talking over her. By the time she noticed we’d be halfway through a lesson. And we understood it better than when she tried! You know something’s wrong when pre-teens are more qualified for a job than an adult who supposedly went to school for this.

We were in the church having run-throughs for our upcoming Confirmation and she almost set the church on fire…fifteen different times. In less than half an hour. How hard is it to hold a candle?

Okay, and here’s when stuff starts kicking up. It was October 28th, a Tuesday, and it was our last day of school that week because they were having parent-teacher conferences the rest of the week. So we were just hanging out, watching movies in class and reading (lord knows we weren’t learning), and Stubel calls me over to her desk.

So like, she had given everyone little bags with candy for Halloween, but I get up there and she hands me an extra one. And she’s like “Molly I know your birthday is tomorrow and I bought you a present but I left it on my coffee table this morning by accident! So just have the candy for now!”

And I’m like….”Ma’am I’m like, the sixth birthday this year. You didn’t give anyone else presents?”

And she goes “Oh, I know but this is a special secret surprise. I just know you’re gonna love it! Do you wanna stop by my house later this week to pick it up or should I just give it to you Monday after school?”

And like…In writing this sounds like a non-threatening exchange, and like, it was, but I felt so uncomfortable holy shit. I’m looking over my shoulder and shooting my friends SOS signals. Something about this felt so weird in my gut omfg. I told her thanks and I’d just see her Monday.

So we flash forward to Wednesday- my 13th birthday, the day the Phillies won the world series, and also the day my mother innocently strolled into the school for her meeting only to be met with screaming, the sound of heavy destruction, and the school secretary Mrs. Daily running at her in a panic, waving her arms and yelling “YOUR MEETING IS CANCELLED YOUR MEETING IS CANCELLED GET IN MY OFFICE NOW!”

So my poor mother, who thought she could handle this whole meeting in a few minutes and barely be an hour late for work, is now barricaded in the front office with the school secretary, as the noises from down the hall get louder and louder. The woman explains that they had gotten so many complaints about Mrs. Stubel that this morning, when she got to the school, the principal Sister Patricia called her in and said “Listen, we need you to be professional and still have the parent conferences, but we have to let you go. We just don’t think you fit in well here, and the kids need to come first and feel comfortable in their school.” and like, I’m paraphrasing because I wasn’t there, but we all know she was very polite and professional about it.

Mrs. Stubel, however…was not.

She flipped her chair and stormed out of the office, and locks herself in the seventh grade classroom. She started wrecking the shit out of that place, screaming obscenities and the top of her lungs, they had to call the cops on her! She was locked in there for almost an hour! And let me just give you a nice little list of everything she did in that classroom:

Smashed three windows.

Threw everything off her desk and carved swear words all over it.

Got cleaning fluid that she knew would damage the chalk boards, smeared it all over.

Cracked the chalk boards by repeatedly smashing chairs against them.

Wrote swear words all over the walls and on desks

Went into students desks, ripped up their books.

Stole my glasses. (which were in my desk bc I only used them in class at the time)

Threw some desks around.

Carved swear words into the boards. (there was so much carving I’m assuming she just had a knife on her person, which has to lead to the question, did she have a knife on her while she was in class with us?)

Physically ripped the hooks to hang backpacks on out of the wall.

Knocked the closet door off it’s hinges.

Ripped up all the books in the bookcases and threw their pages all around the room.

Wrote lewd phrases inside student’s desks.

Broke multiple chairs.

Used her podium as a battering ram against the wall that’s in front of where the backpacks go. (the wall won but Damage Was Inflicted)

Set a fire in the trash can.

When the principal and other teachers started trying to get in, she tossed her rolling chair at the door to scare them off.

She was screaming curse words at the top of her lungs the entire time, and cursing the school and the kids and the principal and the church in general, and the school building was small, so all the parents and the smaller children that had to come to the meetings (who were locked in their respective classrooms in fear) heard everything.

So much more? But it’s 4:30 in this morning and this list is already long.

So my mom is in the front office and deadass the

entire police force

shows up, running down the hallway to the classroom yelling at her to stop, and it takes a while for them to get her out holy shit. They knocked down the door and she tried to escape out of one of the broken windows! But they got her and dragged her out.

So of course, in such a small school with very involved parents this shit spread like wildfire. The entire town knew within the day. The poor principal called the newly retired old-seventh grade teacher and was like “So we…need some help” and the lady was like “I already heard I’ll be there Monday” omfg. I remember I got a text from one of my classmates saying “if your birthday wish was for us to be set free from the beast I love you” omfg.

So, we eventually go back to school on Monday and everyone’s buzzing. The principal has us go to the cafeteria and she ‘delicately’ explains the situation, and that the old teacher is coming out of retirement for us, the school has a restraining order against Mrs. Stubel now and that she’s sorry we had to deal with this mess. Our classroom had to go under some heavy reconstruction before we could be let back in there, so for like two weeks we alternated between the cafeteria and the preschooler’s classroom, we had no books or anything, just provided loose-leaf paper and pens. It was like, surreal, but everyone was just so happy to be rid of her and to be in the presence of a competent teacher omfg. We eventually were able to get back into our usual classroom.

It took a while for things to go completely back to normal, though. After the big spectacle she made, for weeks after she was fired we were all very scared of the possibility of Mrs. Stubel returning to the school with a gun in hand. It was always a topic we whispered about at lunch with wide eyes and shivers. Like…genuine nightmare scenario.

About two weeks after she was fired, a boy in the back of the classroom gasped loudly during SSR, and when we all looked at him, he whispered in anger “She never gave us our freakin’ strudels!”

About three months after she was fired, we were lined up at the door to go to Library when a few of us looked through the windows and saw something darting through the trees. It was fast and we couldn’t make anything out, so we let it drop. When the class and teacher returned half and hour later, the book she had borrowed months before from one of the boys was sitting on his desk. It was just laying there, the room was silent, nothing had been disturbed…but I have never seen a book look so threatening. People were freaking out. Someone kept insisting that she turned the book into a bomb. No one figure out how she got in the school, and no one could figure out how she got it on the right desk, as we had switched the seating arrangement since she had last been there.  

A full six months after she had left, it was nearing the end of the school year and our class was dicking around during our last computer class. Someone found a website (that we weren’t allowed to be on) that pulls up any police records attached to whoever’s name you enter, so someone decided to search Mrs. Stubel as a joke. We ended up finding out she had like six DUI’s.

Aaaaand that’s the story of the horrendous teacher I had for two months in 7th grade. One of my favorite party stories but tbh she still haunts me™ .

[kotoriqueen]

Hello, @twunkadelia​!! I am happy to say that I was your Heith Secret Valentine! 

It took me a while to actually write this, but I was able to finish this for Valentine’s Day! I tried to make this as fluffy as possible so I hope you enjoy this! 

1 – Candy Hearts ( High School AU)

He lets out a huge yawn as he walks down the school halls, going for his locker. Though when he stops at it, there’s a huge piece of poster board taped to it, with a bunch of little hearts making up one huge heart. Keith rubs the sleep out of his eyes to get a better look at it, realizing that the smaller hearts are those candy hearts that are stupidly popular during this time of year. Keith’s eyes wander over each candy heart, each one saying a different thing. For how big the paper is, and how big the heart is, Keith’s pretty sure the person who made this took them forever to do it. There’s basic ones like ‘XOXO’, ‘HUG ME’, and ‘BE MINE’ and then there’s ‘SEXY MOFO’, ‘I LOVE YOU’, and ‘MY BABY’ that make Keith’s face go twenty different shades of red. And while he’s looking at this whole little art project this person made, he can’t put this to a name because there’s no fucking name on it! Keith thinks he could get lucky by taking it down and look behind it, but he still gets nothing to point him to the person to do this.

His eyes narrow in frustration, and sighs, putting the candy heart picture under his arm as he opens his locker. He’s lost in thought for who could have done it, and he’s so lost in thought, he doesn’t realize someone coming up next to him.

“Hey, Keith,” and his name being spoken snaps Keith out of his thoughts, nearly jumping a few feet in the air. He glances over, where Hunk stands next to him, with an amused grin on his face. “Did I scare you?”

“I don’t get scared, Hunk,” Keith denies before turning back to his locker, switching out a few books and setting the candy heart picture inside his locker. “Just.. I was lost in thought.”

“What were you thinking about?”

“Someone left me a piece of poster board with candy hearts all over them, but there’s no name on it.” Keith says, shutting his locker with a slam. “So I was trying to figure out who it was, but what kind of person would use the candy heart ‘SEXY MOFO’ when referring to me? That’s just embarrassing.”

“Hm, there’s thousands of people in this school, with more boys than girls, so I think that narrows it down because you don’t really flaunt your gayness,” Hunk says with a shrug. “I’m sure the person will show themselves on Valentine’s Day.”

“Well, if it’s a girl, they got some disappointment coming,” Keith says. “Or even a guy – I like someone else.”

Hunk’s eyes raise up, but a tinge of disappointment goes through him, “Really?”

“Not ready to out that, though.”

“Understood, dude.”

‘Maybe I shouldn’t have made that after all,” Hunk thinks to himself. ‘I knew I was going to get hurt in the end..’

2 – Roses ( Domestic AU )

Hunk comes home late from work one night, finding the apartment he shares with Keith empty and dark and strangely a little cold, as if Keith hasn’t been there all day. Hunk pats the wall for the light switch, and turns on the lights in the house. He looks around, a concerned look on his face, and calls out for his lover and roommate, but receives no response. Hunk continues calling out for Keith on the way to their shared bedroom, but when he gets there, there’s a vase of red roses sitting in front of their floor mirror. Hunk raises an eyebrow and picks them up, plucking the card from in between.

“If you stand with this bouquet of roses in front a mirror, you’ll see thirteen of the most beautiful things in the world,” Hunk reads aloud, and after the words process, his face turns red and he lets out a small squeak. “What the hell, Keith.”

“I wanted you to know how beautiful you were,” comes a voice from the doorway and Hunk turns fast, seeing Keith in the doorway of their bedroom. “I kept waking up to you running your hands over your body, and even the past, you told me that you were worried about me accepting your feelings because ‘Look at you, and then look at me. Why would anyone like me?’”

“Keith--”

“And I think you’re beautiful,” Keith continues on, walking over to Hunk and wrapping his arms around him. “Not just think, but I know, for a fact, you are beautiful and perfect and the right guy for me.”

“Oh, Keith..”

“I love you, Hunk,” Keith says, squeezing Hunk’s sides. “All of you.”

3 – Blind Date/Set up by friends ( Modern AU )

Keith doesn’t know what he’s doing here.

Oh, well, honestly? He does know. Shiro and Matt had set him up with a guy Matt’s little sister knew, and arranged for the two of them to meet at a coffee shop. (Could you say cliché?) All Keith could think about is how dangerous blind dates could be, because, really – what does Matt know about this guy? He knows Matt is protective of his little sister, so whoever Pidge hangs out with, they’d have to get by Matt, too. But a murderer could seem nice too at first glance, but give time, and they could fuck things up.

So now Keith is sitting at a table for two at a coffee stop, index finger swirling around the brim of his glass of water as he waits for his blind date. He hears the door chime open and Keith looks up, watching as a server points the customer to where Keith’s sitting. Keith sits up straight, getting a better look at this guy. His big – big enough to bench press Keith if he wanted to. Keith swallows, suddenly his throat feeling dry.

“Hey,” the stranger greets. “Sorry if I’m late. Have you been waiting long?”

Long enough to wonder where you’ve been all my life.

“Uh, no. I haven’t. Just got here myself,” Keith says instead of what his brain tells him. “Have a seat. I’m Keith.”

“I’m Hunk,” stranger says and all Keith could think is Oh, you sure are. “Uhm, I never have been on a blind date before. My friends arranged this.”

“Same here.” Keith agrees. “But we might as well order something and get to know each other. Unless you prefer to leave.”

“I mean, I’d like to get to know you at least? Even if this doesn’t work out, we can still be friends, yeah?”

Keith blinks, then a smile forms on his face, “Yeah. I’d like that.”

4 – Chocolate ( Canon )

“Did you seriously find a planet that has a plant for you to make chocolates?” Keith asks Hunk, not able to believe it when Hunk mentions it. “If so, I call dibs on being the guinea pig this time.”

“I’ve never seen you so excited before. It’s kind of cute.” Hunk teases, making Keith’s cheeks go a little pinkish. “Yes, I did. And you’re lucky you did. Lance and Pidge would have fought over it.”

“I just haven’t had chocolate in a long time, okay? It used to be my comfort food.”

“Comfort food?” Hunk questions, a little confused at first but then he remembers of all that Keith’s been through and his face softens. “Aw, Keith – know what, hold on. Wait here.”

Keith blinks, but does as told as Hunk runs around the kitchen, opening the cabinets and going over the stove. He’s unable to watch fully on what Hunk’s doing, but the scent fills the air and it smells cocoa-y – like hot chocolate, to be more specific. Keith’s eyes light up and watches as Hunk nearly breaks the Altean glasses rushing to grab one, and within minutes, there’s a steaming cup of chocolate coloured liquid in front of him. (Well, it feels like minutes went by, but it took a lot longer than just a few minutes to make this.)

“Have this,” Hunk says and Keith takes the cup in his hands. “Careful, it’s--” And then he watches Keith take a sip with no hesitation but doesn’t yelp from the heat either. “..hot.”

“Holy crap, Hunk.”

“Is it good?”

“It’s fantastic,” Keith replies and he takes another sip, practically chugging it down. “It tastes so much like hot chocolate it’s unreal.”

“Good!” Hunk beams at this, glad he was successful in making Keith happy. “I’ll make you some small chocolates, too, and stick them in the freezer for them to chill and turn solid, so you can have your comfort food anytime.”

“Thank you, Hunk. I appreciate it.”

“No problem.”

5 – Movie Night ( Canon )

“So this is an Altean movie.” Hunk says as he sits right besides Keith on the couch. Keith hums as a response. “Wow. Do you even know what they’re saying?”

“Not in the slightest. I’ve been making my own dialogue,” Keith says. “At least in my head.”

“Really? I want to hear some.”

Keith looks over and then figures why not, so he rewinds the movie and turns it down a little. A scene with a princess and a prince appears.

“Oh, Princess, I have always longed for you. Won’t you please come with me?” Keith recites then clears his voice, trying to sound like the Princess in the movie. “Oh no I must not! Father will never allow me to go out with someone like you!”

“Like me? What’s wrong with me?” Hunk adds in with a grin and Keith looks over, his smile wide.

“You didn’t show up with flowers! Or candy! Or anything! Not even a white horse! How could I go with you?”

“Because you don’t need all those things for true love,” Hunk says. “If you come with me, I will forever love you.”

“That sounds so cheesy.” Keith says, bumping Hunk with his shoulder. “Just right out of a fairy tale.”

“Hey, I like fairy tales. Disney movies are my favourite.”

“And yet if you read the morbid ones, you’d never like them again.”

“Let’s not and say I did.”

6 – Late for a Date ( Domestic AU )

Hunk’s panicking. Hunk’s panicking and driving a crazy speed to the hospital. When he got the phone call that his boyfriend was there because of an accident at work, he dropped everything to go there. He and Keith were supposed to have a date, and ten minutes before they’re supposed to have their date, is when he gets the call.

He parks and rushes into the ER, asking right away to see Keith Kogane. It takes a moment, and a nurse comes out to guide Hunk to Keith’s emergency room, where at the door, he sees Keith fast asleep, with a bandage wrapped around his arm and scratches on his face. Hunk pales from seeing his boyfriend like this, and he rushes to his side, grabbing the bandaged arm and kissing Keith’s knuckles. From the nurses explanation, it seems like Keith was doing his job as security and tried stopping a guy because he was stealing to only slam him through a window and ended up like this. It’s not too much longer until Keith opens his eyes, grunting from the bright lights in the emergency room.

“Nn..”

“Keith.. Oh my god, Keith.” Hunk sobs, hanging his head. “I was so worried about you! How do you feel?”

“Like shit,” Keith grumbles. “I missed our date.. all because I was chasing a stupid guy.”

“You were doing your job,” Hunk tells him. “I’m not mad. I’m more glad that you’re okay.”

“But you were looking forward to this date..”

“It’s fine. It’s fine.” Hunk leans over, pressing kisses to Keith’s face. “All that matters is that you’re safe. I love you.”

“Love you, too..”

7 – Wrong Restaurant ( Domestic AU )

“What do you mean our names aren’t on the list?” Keith’s getting snappy, and Hunk’s panicking. They’re going to get kicked out of this restaurant in like five seconds. “I made this reservation, like, weeks in advance! Look for our names again!”

“I’m sorry, sir, but your names aren’t on here. I’ve looked five times now, and our tables are either full or reserved for other guests. I cannot just give you a table.”

“That’s bullshit--”

“Uh, Keith?” Hunk interrupts, his lover looking back with a glare. “..I think we’re at the wrong restaurant.”

Immediately, Keith’s face goes red from embarrassment and croaks out an ‘oh’.

“We’re so sorry for the trouble.” Hunk apologizes before grabbing Keith by the wrist and drags him out. “Oh my god. Now we won’t make it to the other restaurant in time.”

“..Maybe we can just go home and order Chinese.” Keith mutters, still embarrassed. “I’m sorry for not realizing it sooner.”

“No, Keith, if I was you, I would have gotten angry, too. It’s fine.” Hunk takes Keith’s hands and rests his forehead against the others. “We can go home. Snuggle and watch television. Date night is still a go.”

8 – Strangers Alone on Valentine’s Day ( Coffee Shop AU )

The coffee shop is dead on February fourteenth. There’s only few people there, and two people are sitting together at a table for a date. Keith’s sitting alone, laptop in front of him, staring at the couple with disgust. He figured it would be better to get work done on Valentine’s Day seeing as how he had nobody and most coffee shops would be dead with no couples, but no, he thought wrong.

The door to the coffee shop chimes open and Keith looks up, seeing a man walk in alone and go to the counter, order something, and then sit down at a table next to Keith.

“Alone on Valentine’s Day, too, huh?” the stranger says, trying to make conversation.

“Mhm. I don’t care. I’m not interested in anybody anyway.” Keith shrugs, deciding to talk to the stranger seeing as how he’s not going to get much work done if he’s too stressed to get anything done. “What about you?”

“Eh, not me either,” the stranger says with a shrug. “I’m Hunk, by the way.”

“Keith. What brings you here?”

“Wanting to get some writing done. I need coffee to wake me.”

“Same. I have a deadline in a few days and I barely started on it.”

“Story of my life.”

“Heh.” Keith laughs a little, a smile on his face. “Good luck, Hunk.”

“You, too,” Hunk says, his smile wide. “Keith.”

9 – Friends on a date ( High School AU )

“Aw, aren’t you two a cute couple.” Lance teases as he walks past Hunk and Keith having lunch together at a diner. “We have studying to do, and you two are on a date?”

“We’re not on a date, Lance.” Hunk insists. “We’re studying. And we’re not a couple--”

“I thought this was a date,” Keith interrupts, eyebrow raising. “Guess I was wrong.”

“Wait-- Keith-- you know it could be--”

Keith’s grin is wide and teasing, “I’m joking, Hunk.”

“O-oh.”

‘I’d very much like to date you,’ Keith thinks. ‘But you’re too good for me..’

10 – Rained out Picnic ( Canon )

“Well.. going to a planet that had a seventy-five percent chance of rain, may have been a bad idea.” Hunk admits, feeling down as he and Keith take shelter from the rain under a tree. “I was really thinking that twenty-five percent would come through.”

“We can have a picnic in Yellow?” Keith offers. “Would she mind?”

“I don’t think so. She’s been itching to get us out on a date, but at the cost of our picnic being soaked and us getting sick? She’ll welcome us to eat there as long as we clean up.”

“Race you to your lion, then.”

“What-- Keith! That’s not fair! I’m holding the picnic basket!”

11 – Low on money/homemade date ( Modern AU )

A date didn’t have to be going to a fancy restaurant or buying your significant other nice things. No matter where you are, and what you do, a date is still a date and still amazing when you’re with the person you love and care about. And Hunk didn’t mind it when Keith admits he doesn’t have the money for date night because bills came up. And even though Keith minds, Hunk is more than fine with sitting with Keith, playing games and eating pizza rolls. Or even snuggling and watching Netfix. Which is what they are doing now after they had eaten microwavable chicken nuggets, with Keith laying on top of Hunk and Hunk’s hand running through Keith’s hair.

“I love you,” Hunk whispers and Keith hears it, raising his head. “This date is great.”

“..I love you, too, Hunk.” Keith says with a small smile. “Next date will be better though.”

“Having a chill date is the best date I could ask for, Keith. Honest.”

“If you say so, but I’m going to spoil you rotten next time.”

“I’ll hold you to that.”

12 – Surprise Date while Working Late ( Florist Hunk, Tattoo Artist Keith )

Hunk enters the tattoo shop late at night, holding a vase of flowers and asking where Keith is at. He’s told Keith’s in the back cleaning up, and Hunk walks back there, nearly startling his boyfriend in the process.

“What are you doing here, Hunk? I won’t be off for another hour or so.” Keith admits. “I have a lot of cleaning up to do.”

“I know! I know! I just.. wanted to give you these,” Hunk says and hands over the vase. “I set up the arrangement myself. Figured it would cheer you up when we can’t go out on dates because of our work schedule. But also.. I’m off tomorrow and so are you and we’re going to go out on a date once you get off.”

“Hunk.. you didn’t have to come here for this..”

“I wanted to. It was a surprise.” Hunk says with a grin and leans down, pecking Keith’s lips. “I’ll wait in the waiting area for you.”

Keith grins wide, returning the kiss, “Alright. I’ll see you soon.”

13 – Forgot to get anything ( High School AU; post-Heith )

The first thought Keith has when he walks into school on February fourteenth is god, there is so much red and pink and so many hearts and love spread around. He pushes through couples hugging in the hallways, gags at the couples kissing at their lockers and ready to make love with all the students watching them, and he feels a headache forming when he hears girls screaming with joy when they get their Valentine’s gifts. He sighs and makes way to his locker, opening it up and grabs what he needs for his first half of classes. He has a lot of time to kill, but he’ll probably go to his first class anyway to get away from all the gross, mushy, couple-y things.

“Good morning, Keith,” Hunk greets as he passes Keith on his way to his own locker, which is only a few lockers away from Keith’s. Keith groans and slams his head on the metal, making Hunk look at him with a concerned look on his face. “..Everything okay?”

“No.” Keith grits through his teeth and slams his locker shut, which makes Hunk jump and makes Keith forming headache only worse. “I hate Valentine’s Day.”

“Hate is a rather strong word--”

“Then I’ll use a stronger one: I despise it.”

“Oh.”

Keith blinks, looking up at his boyfriend, eyebrow raised. Now Hunk’s facial expression reads he’s upset about something, and Keith panics a little because fuck, he said something wrong, didn’t he?

“Uhm.. I’m sorry you feel that way. I got you something for Valentine’s Day.”

Keith’s eyes widen at this news, and the second thought that runs through his head is: Keith you jerk. You may hate, or despise Valentine’s Day or whatever, but you still should have gotten your boyfriend something! And with all the hate, you never did think about that, did you? Nope!

“..Hunk, I didn’t.. I didn’t get you anything.” Keith mutters, now feeling guilty. “I’m not-- I’m not used to having relationships like this, so I normally just try to ignore Valentine’s Day.”

“It’s fine, Keith. I know how you feel about holidays, especially ones like this.” Hunk shrugs it off, but Keith can read that something is still bothering him. Hunk digs through his book bag and pulls out a small box, handing it over to Keith. “Here.”

“No.”

“..No?”

“Not until I get you something,” Keith tells him, to make himself more clear. “It’s not fair, Hunk. Tell you what-- come over to the house after school today. I’ll make you dinner. Sure, you’re a better cook than me, but let me make you dinner. And then this weekend, we can go on a Valentine’s day date and you can spend the night. We can cuddle all night.”

“You don’t have to do all that, Keith..”

“But I can tell it bothers you!” Keith raises his voice, and he knows Hunk hates it, but he has no choice. “Let me do this. Please. I care about you, Hunk. A-and I love you. And I feel bad if I don’t at least do something. So please..”

Hunk goes silent for a moment, and slips the box back into his bag, then walks over to Keith, his arm going around Keith’s waist and leaning down to place a small kiss on the top of Keith’s head.

“Okay. I expect candles, though.”

“Of course, big man.”

14 – Babysitter Canceled/Family Date Night ( Domestic/Future AU; where Heith adopts )

They had adopted twin daughters five years into their marriage. They decided it had been a great idea now they were financially stable – at least somewhat – and had a nice house with a dog and a cat. And it seemed like the two girls did not want to be torn apart, so Hunk and Keith were fine with adopting both. And after two weeks of foster care going through their file to find out if they were able to be parents, they got the girls. They were about three years old at the time, and attached at the hip. Their names were Melody and Ruby, and they were so pretty. Hunk and Keith spoiled them rotten when they first got them, and continued doing so for many years.

The girls are now going on nine years old, their birthdays just a couple days after Valentine’s Day. Hunk and Keith made plans on February fourteenth, and arranged a babysitter, but at the last minute, the babysitter canceled on them so they decided it would be a family date night. It has been for the past years since they’ve gotten Melody and Ruby – the tradition would never change.

Besides, free dessert for the girls when they tell people ‘oh it’s their birthday’ when their birthdays are just a couple days away. But a little lie never hurt anyone.

So here they are, at a family restaurant, the restaurant covered in Valentine’s decorations. The girls are picking at their food, while Hunk and Keith are eating, but the two fathers can tell something is bothering their daughters.

“Everything okay with you two?” Hunk questions. “You barely touched your dinner.”

“..Did we mess up Valentine’s Day for you two?” Melody asks, taking after Keith and being straight forward and the ‘wild child’ of their family.

“What?” Keith’s eyebrows shoot up. “What gave you that idea?”

“Because Valentine’s Day is meant to be shared between couples!” Ruby says. “And you two always seem to give up date nights to be with us.. We feel like we messed things up.”

“No. No no no.” Hunk puts his fork down, the tears already building up in his eyes. “You didn’t ruin anything, girls! Honest! Tell them, Keith.”

“What your daddy means – before a waterfall starts spilling from his eyes -” Keith teases before turning back towards the girls. “you girls mean the world to us. You do not ruin Valentine’s Day – you make it better. Valentine’s Day is filled with love, not just for couples, but that love is for anybody. So we are more than happy to spend Valentine’s Day with you two.”

“..You mean it?” Ruby looks up, pouting, but Keith smiles wide and nods as a response. “..Okay. But when we get home, Melody and I are making you two a giant heart with lots of glitter!”

Keith chuckles at this, while Hunk is ready to start sobbing. Some things never change.

15 – Secret Admirer/Confessing ( Canon )

There are no secret admirers on the castle ship. When Keith keeps finding little cards, with ‘from your secret admirer’ written on them, there’s only a small handful of people that these could be from.

Coran’s too old; Allura doesn’t look at him in that way.

Lance doesn’t like him; Shiro and him are best friends, perhaps closer than brothers.

Pidge doesn’t like love; and Matt and him were friends at the Garrison but there’s nothing between them.

All there is left is Hunk, and Keith is pretty certain Hunk doesn’t like him, until he keeps getting notes, leading Keith to the dining area on the castle ship, finding the lights off. He tries turning them on, but they seem to be broken – or at least, that’s what he thinks. Then he hears a couple of claps, and the room lights up with candles surrounding the dining area, and flowers in the middle of the table, and two silver looking domes on the table. Keith raises an eyebrow and approaches the table, finding a card with his name written in cursive writing on it.

“What on Earth..”

“We’re not on Earth, Keith,” comes a familiar voice and Keith turns, seeing Hunk in the doorway. “..Do you like it?”

“Uh.. it’s.. nice, yeah,” Keith is at loss for words, still trying to take all this in. “Why did you make the dining area like this? And where are the others? There’s only two domes here--”

“Keith,” Hunk interrupts him, stepping forward. “I was the one who left you all those notes.”

..Oh.

“I’m your secret admirer.” Hunk says. “I know, secret admirers aren’t a thing in space, but I couldn’t find a way to show you my feelings and.. this was the only way? I’ve.. liked you for a while, even if that didn’t show for how I treated you when you told us you found out you were Galra – and I still feel bad for that! But.. honestly? I have feelings for you, and it’s supposed to be Valentine’s Day back on Earth, so this was.. the only way for me to confess to you.”

“..Wow.” Keith breathes out, eyes wide and his heart pounding. “Uhm.. I don’t know what to say? I mean-- I’ve liked you too? So the feeling is mutual? I just.. I never had these feelings for anyone before? So I never knew how to react to these feelings I’ve had.”

“Well..” Hunk approaches him slowly, until they are just a foot apart, his cheeks flushed brightly. “do you want to try it?”

Keith looks at Hunk, his own cheeks bright, and then he looks at the lovely set up Hunk prepared for today. He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t scared of how Hunk may feel when he learns more about Keith and his past. Keith bites his lip, knowing Hunk wants an answer right away. He takes in a deep breath and looks back up at Hunk.

“Y-yeah..” Keith says slowly at first. “Yes. I do. I’d like to try it.”

Hunk blinks for a moment, not believing that Keith actually agreed. He beams brightly at this.

“Great! That’s great!” Hunk grabs Keith by the wrist and pulls him to a chair, pulling it back. “Good. Have a seat and we can eat and.. talk.. I suppose.”

“You’re nervous, Hunk. Your hands are sweating.” Keith points out and Hunk pulls his hands away. “It’s.. fine. I’m nervous, too. But we’ll work on this.. together.. okay?”

“Y-yeah.” Hunk smiles wide. “Together.”

[ghosthunthq]

Homework Help

written for: @csakuras

written by: @beejinki

Mai tapped her pencil repeatedly on the table.  She was sitting in the school library, trying as hard as she possibly could to finish her project for her AP Aquatic Science class.  Despite her effort, she had no idea what she was doing and could not keep her attention on her reading.  She found it hard to read what she didn’t even begin to understand.  Her feigned focus was interrupted by a text message from Eugene Davis, the friend that had talked her into taking this stupid class in the first place.

Eugene: hey how’s your part of the project going? -G

Mai and Eugene had paired together for an Aquatic Science project that was due after the upcoming weekend.  Mai had not even begun her part of the project, as she had yet to finish the reading to understand what her project was even about.  She sighed as she drafted a text back.

Mai: Truthfully… Not wonderful.  You? -Mai

It only took a few seconds for Eugene to reply.

Eugene: same :^/ want to come over to my house this weekend and work together? -G

Mai stared at the message, deciding her reply.  She was not at all bothered by the idea of spending all weekend with Eugene.  In fact, she even welcomed it.  They were good friends and she quite enjoyed his company.  However, going to Eugene’s house meant the possibility of spending time with Eugene’s twin brother Oliver, who was much less agreeable.

Mai had two classes with Oliver this year.  Physics, where he showed off every chance that he got, and Speech, where he never missed an opportunity to disagree with Mai’s debate thesis.

He was intelligent, Mai would admit, but he was also prideful.

Eugene had a good laugh when he found out that Mai had taken to calling him Naru, short for narcissist.  He was convinced that she and Oliver would get along if they were able to put aside their initial grievances.  For this reason, Mai suspected that Eugene had an ulterior motive for inviting her over.  She quite hoped that she was wrong.

Mai: Sure! I’m in the Library now, would you meet me? -Mai

She huffed, setting her phone down, only to have it buzz immediately.

Eugene: sure thing! -G

Mai packed up her school supplies and had just stood up when she saw a head of black hair duck into the library.  She waved him over, calling.

“Gene!”

The figure straightened and scowled at her.  He was not Gene.

“Oh!” Mai corrected herself, “Not Gene.”

Her smile faded.

“Oliver, hey,” she said, brushing invisible wrinkles from her skirt.  “I’m sorry, I’m supposed to be meeting Eugene here, I thought you were him.”

Oliver grunted, nodding to dismiss her apology as he passed her by.

She shouted at his retreating figure, “Sorry, again!”

Mai was promptly shushed by the school librarian.

“Right.” She frowned, sitting back down.  “Sorry, sorry.”

As she was seated, she saw Eugene push through the glass library doors.  He caught her eye and beamed at her.  If he and Oliver weren’t twins, Mai would wonder if they were even the same species.

“You okay?” he asked as he came to stand next to the table where Mai was now slumping, half hiding behind her backpack.

Mai peeked out from behind her bag.

“Ask your brother.”

Eugene laughed, taking a seat across from her.

“What did the idiot do this time?” he asked, gently.

“I thought he was you, for, like, half a second,” Mai lamented.

“Oh, that’s annoying.”

“I know!” Mai cried, “It was a mistake!  I had just gotten through talking to you and he came in the door.  His head was down, how was I supposed to know it was him?!”

Eugene nodded, standing up again.  

“Where is he?”

Mai pointed dramatically to the poetry section where Oliver was lurking.

Eugene walked in the direction she indicated until he met his brother.

“Noll!” Mai heard him exclaim.  “Good thing you’re here, I was just about to call you!”

Oliver’s reply was either nonexistent or too quiet for Mai to hear.

“You ready to go?” Eugene asked.

A moment later Eugene was back at the table, dragging Oliver behind him.

“Mai is coming with us,” Eugene explained.  “We have to finish a project for our Aquatic Science class.”

Noll gave a vague nod as he pulled his arm from his brother’s grasp.

“Didn’t you take that class last year, Noll?” Eugene asked, throwing Mai a sideways glance.

“Yes,” Oliver answered gruffly, “Why?”

Eugene pushed the library door open and led them into the school commons.

“No reason.”

“You want my help don’t you?”  Oliver directed his question at his brother but quickly turned to include Mai in his accusation.

Eugene laughed, his laugh sounding more high pitched than usual.

“Depends,” he said through a sly grin.  “Are you willing to help us?”

Oliver did not even begin to entertain the idea.

“Absolutely not.”

The group was now leaving the school, walking outside towards the twins’ shared car.

Oliver snatched the keys out of Eugene’s hand.

“I’m driving.”

Eugene laughed, “Are you now?”

“I do not want Mai to be scarred for life,” Oliver reasoned, “And I’d rather not die.”

“Fair enough,”  Eugene smiled at Mai’s scared face.

“Eugene is a terrible driver,” Oliver said, by way of explaining.  “I’m doing you a favor.”

Mai chuckled, “Thank you, I suppose.”

Oliver unlocked the car and climbed into the driver’s seat.

“Welcome.”

There were a few moments of awkward silence in the car before Eugene broke it by attempting, once again, to recruit his brother’s help with his and Mai’s project.

“So about the Aquatics project…” Eugene piped, leaning up between Oliver and Mai from the front seat.

“Gene, I told you I’m not going to help you.” Oliver scowled, not turning away from the road.

“But,” Eugene argued, “It’s due this Monday!”

“Well you should have thought of that earlier!” Oliver sounded almost exactly like a nagging Luella.

“Um,” Mai squeaked, interrupting the twins’ banter.  “We do really need your help, and Gene asking nicely for that help is not unreasonable.”  Her voice sounded more and more confident as she went on.  “Must you really be so stuck up about it?”

Oliver sighed, sparing a quick glance in Mai’s direction, but did not say anything.

Eugene took Oliver’s silence as a sign of resignation.

“Will you please help us?” he pleaded, grinning at Oliver’s reflection in the rearview mirror.

Oliver sighed again, “Fine.”

He quickly interrupted Mai and Eugene’s celebration, however, by quickly adding some conditions to his surrender.

“I expect you to both actually help and I always work more efficiently with tea.”

Mai laughed, “So as long as we keep you in tea, you’ll help us.”

Oliver was not laughing as he pulled the car into the front drive of the Davis’ house.

“Precisely.”

Eugene addressed Mai in a loud stage whisper, “Noll never jokes about tea.”

Mai unbuckled her seatbelt and made to get out of the car, giggling.

“Right,”  She opened her door, realizing that she was now feeling more at ease around Eugene’s aloof twin.  Maybe this weekend will be more bearable than she originally imagined.

Oliver opened the front door and let Mai and his twin through.

“My supplies are up in my room, make yourself at home, Mai!” Gene began trotting up the stairs.  “Enjoy yourselves!”

Oliver started towards the kitchen and Mai rocked back and forth on her heels, wondering if she should follow him.

“You can follow me,” he called back at her over his shoulder, as if reading her mind.

Mai scurried towards the kitchen after Oliver, trying to think of something to say to make the situation less awkward.

“Thank you,” she smiled at him, trying to catch his eye.  “For helping us with the project.  It really means a lot.”

Oliver turned away, feeling heat rushing to his cheeks.

“Eugene would get me to sooner or later, I really don’t have much of a choice.”  He cleared his throat.  “Tea?”

Mai shrugged, giggling.

“Sure, thanks!”

This was followed by another awkward silence and Mai couldn’t help but feel like this was becoming a pattern.

“I’m sorry,” she sighed after a moment.

Oliver chuckled, “What for?”

“Earlier!  I thought you were Gene!” Mai huffed.  “I know that annoys you so I’m sorry.”

Instead of accepting her apology, Oliver just laughed, “Maybe you should learn to be more observant.”

Really! What was wrong with this guy?!

Mai was just coming up with something to fire back at Oliver when Eugene came bursting into the kitchen, carrying a large poster board and nearly a whole ream of colored paper.

“Here you are!” Eugene exclaimed from behind the large stack of supplies he was balancing.  “Thought I’d lost you!”

Oliver rolled his eyes.

“Do you want tea?” he asked, addressing Eugene.

Eugene set the supplies on the kitchen table and shrugged.

“If you’ve put enough water in the kettle, I’ll have some.”

Oliver’s eyes narrowed.

“Would it kill you to give a straight answer?”

“Nope, but it annoys you not to,” Eugene laughed, “That’s why I do it.”

Oliver turned wordlessly back to pouring the hot water into three cups.

“You’ve certainly gotten the supplies together,” Mai sat down at the table and began looking through the different colors of paper in the stack.  “At least there’s that.”

Oliver set the three cups of tea on the table.

“And you have a brother to do all the work for you!” Oliver added sarcastically.

“Yep!” Gene laughed, “That’s the idea!”

Oliver took a seat at the table across from Mai.

“So, which project is this again?”

“We have to make a poster board with information about our assigned ocean creatures and the zone they inhabit.” Gene explained, showing Oliver an instructional paper.

Oliver nodded.

“Mai and I were assigned sea anemones and sponges, which live in the Benthic Zone.”

“So you’ve done at least that much research,” Oliver took the page from his twin.  “So we have to draw the creatures and then post the information?”

“Yes, and then Gene and I will present it.” Mai leaned across the table and pointed at the bottom of the instruction page.

“Can you draw, Mai?” Oliver looked up at Mai, who was still leaning across the table.

She shrugged, sitting back down.

“I suppose I can give it a go.”

“Okay, so I will draw the anemone and you can draw the sponge,” he directed, “And Eugene, who I am certain cannot draw, can be in charge of writing the information down for the poster.  Sound good?”

Mai and Oliver set to work, drawing and cutting out pictures.  Eugene wrote information on alternatingly colored cards so that the end product would end up looking like a rainbow.

The three chatted quietly about school occasionally, but for the most part, the conversation was kept to things like ‘pass the scissors’ and ‘do you think that I should color this more orange or pink?’.

They were hard at work when the front door opened to reveal Luella carrying three boxes of carry-out pizza.

“Hello!”  Luella beamed at Mai.  “I’m Luella.”

Mai stood, nodding her head in a slight bow.

“I’m Mai Taniyama, it’s nice to meet you!”

“I brought pizza,” Luella said, setting the boxes on the counter.  “Spinach, cheese, and hawaiian.”

Oliver and Eugene both called, “Thanks, Mum!” in unison, with only slightly varying pitches.

Mai’s thank you followed closely after the twins’ as the three stood up from the table to get the pizza.

Luella handed each of them a plate from the cabinet and then leaned on the counter with a hand on her hip.

“I’m going with your father to dinner tonight, so I trust you three will be okay on your own?” she asked, looking at her boys and then at Mai.

Eugene nodded, taking a slice of hawaiian pizza.

“We’ll be fine,” he assured her, “We’re just working on our project.”

“Alright,” Luella picked up her purse and jacket from where she had placed it by the door.  “It was nice meeting you, Mai!”

As quickly as she had arrived, Luella was gone, so Mai struggled with not being able to call back a polite reply.

She shrugged, taking a slice of spinach and ricotta pizza.

“Spinach is my favorite!”

Oliver nodded.

“I told Mum to get some for you,” he told her matter-of-factly.

Mai’s face reddened.

“And how did you know it was my favorite?”

Oliver shrugged, taking his plate back to the table.

“You mentioned it in your introduction speech for our speech class.”

Mai knitted her eyebrows.

“But…” she faltered, “That speech was at the very first of last semester.”

Oliver shrugged again.

“The great Oliver Davis does not forget!” Eugene said in an exaggerated voice, waving his hands about to emphasize his sarcasm.

“Well, thank you.” Mai sat down across from Oliver, still blushing madly.

Eugene made a point of moving the Aquatic Science project aside, accusing Oliver and Mai of trying to ruin all of their hard work with grease and tomato sauce.

The group ate their pizza in relative silence, making only occasional conversation.  For some reason, Mai realized, this instance was much less uncomfortable that the other silences.  She was beginning to realize that Oliver and Eugene were comfortable in silence, that it didn’t have to be awkward.  Before, she had felt like the twins’ silence was excluding her, now it felt like she was a part of their solitude.  It was a good feeling.

When they had finished eating, Eugene took their plates to the sink and rinsed them before stretching.

“I think it’s time we take a break!”  He yawned.

Oliver glared at his twin.

“What do you reckon that was?” he argued, inclining his head towards the pizza boxes.

“Dinner!”

Oliver rolled his eyes.

“I’d much rather get finished with the project before I rest.”

Mai pouted at Oliver.

“I kind of want to take a break too…” she spoke quietly.

“Come on, Noll!”  Eugene clapped his brother on the back.  “Let’s take a break.”

Oliver sighed, “You two can rest for a while, but I’m going to continue working.”

“But it’s not even your project!” Mai complained.

Oliver smirked at her.

“Would you rather I not help?” he asked.

Eugene laughed, “Okay, okay! Have fun doing work, Mai and I are going to watch something.”  He waved for Mai to follow him into the living room.  “Be back in a few.”

Mai followed Eugene out of the kitchen and to the couch.  She could practically feel Oliver’s glare on her back, but she chose to ignore this as she took a seat next to Eugene.

Eugene put on some situational comedy show that Mai had never seen and sat back.

Nearly an hour and a half later, Mai and Eugene were on their fourth episode, and Oliver had yet to say anything about it or try to get them to come back to finish the project.

Mai felt the seat on the couch next to her depress and she glanced over to see Oliver sitting down slowly.

“Noll?” Mai’s voice was cautious.

“I’m done.” he replied, staring forward at the TV.

“You finished the project?”  Eugene sounded incredulous.

Oliver nodded.

“You’re welcome.”

Mai lept up from the couch almost shouting, “You totally saved our grades!”  She beamed.  “I could kiss you!”

For once, Oliver was the one who looked shocked.  However, he quickly recovered.

“This is nothing against you, but please don’t.”

Mai laughed, her face burning red.

“How about a group hug?” Eugene said, pulling both of them into a tight embrace.

Oliver mumbled, “Myu drdn eveh do tha wormf.” into Eugene’s chest.

“What?” Eugene loosened the hug but did not let them go just yet.

Oliver pouted, leaning out of the hug.

“You didn’t even do the work!”

Eugene pulled Oliver and Mai back into his arms.

“We love you, Noll!” he said, chuckling, “So, so much!  Oliver Davis is the greatest brother on the planet!”

Oliver struggled out from his brother’s tight hold.

“You’re too kind.”

[5hfanfiction]

mean girls pt.4

IV.

Camila is never late. You can’t get far in life without planning ahead and therefore she always makes a point of arriving at least five minutes early to wherever she needs to be. It’s not her fault that Sofi had decided to throw a temper tantrum this morning and, by the time Camila had managed to calm her down, they only had ten minutes to get to school. She always needs to drop Sofi off first, which is why she’s now running through the hallways, trying to make it to AP Government on time.

She somehow manages to walk inside the classroom as the second bell is ringing, so there are no consequences for her tardiness and she just gives the teacher a quick apology before taking her seat on the row by the window. Pulling out her notebook and her pencil case, she places her phone between her legs to let the girls know she’s alive and is surprised to see she has more texts than she’d expected. Both Normani and Dinah have blown up her Whatsapp notifications.

China Jane [8:16] are u here yet??

Mani [8:21] Where are you?

Mani [8:22] Did something happen?

China Jane [8:24] ok bish we headin inside c u after 1st period

Mani [8:25] Is everything okay? You should be at school by now

China Jane [8:26] where tf r u walz

China Jane [8:26] GURL U NEVER GONNA BELIEVE THIS SHIT

China Jane [8:27] YOU GOTTA SEE THIS

China Jane [8:28] get yo ass to the lockers rn!!!!!

Mani [8:29] Shit. Did you see it?

China Jane [8:29] DA FUQ U AT

Camila stares at the screen in disbelief. Of course the girls couldn’t have been kind enough to drop a photo or a snap of whatever they wanted her to see and now she’ll have to wait until class is over to catch up on the latest gossip.

With an annoyed sigh, she grabs a pen and starts copying the notes on the board.

Camila doesn’t notice anything out of the ordinary as she leaves AP Government, sending a quick message to the Clique’s group chat so they’ll meet at her locker. She’s vaguely aware that there are people watching her and pointing and muttering under their breaths, but there are always people doing that and she’s learned not to care about it.

After all, it’s much better to be the one people talk about than to have nothing better to do but talk about someone else.

She saunters up to her locker and opens it to pull out her Psychology textbook. A folded paper falls to her feet and she lowers down to pick it up, keeping it between her index and middle finger as she finishes what she has to do. It isn’t the first time, nor will it be the last, that someone leaves random messages through the slit of her locker. She shuts the door and leans against the wall of lockers, hoping the girls won’t take too long.

Camila isn’t quite prepared for what she sees as she unfolds the paper and her chin drops before she can regain control of her muscles and facial expressions. What she has in her hands is a very poor excuse for a student president campaign poster, limited to a printed out color photograph on A4 photocopy paper with a slogan underneath in what looks like a bland Arial font. She would be appalled at the unprofessionalism of it all if it weren’t for the shocking content.

It’s a photograph of Lauren fucking Jauregui. And sure, the photograph is flattering, but Camila couldn’t care less if Lauren had plastered her face all over school or decided to hand out nudes at the cafeteria. No, what really gets to her is the slogan:

No cliques: for a fair high school experience

Camila sees red in that moment. She’s gritting her teeth so hard, middle-school Camila would be worried those two years wearing braces had been for naught.

She knew Lauren would come for her, but there is a difference between coming for her and attacking her friends. This is personal.

“There you are!”

She snaps her eyes up to face Dinah walking towards her with Normani in tow.

“I see the hottest news has found its way to you,” Normani says, wincing. She places a hand on Camila’s shoulder and softly allows it to travel down to her wrist. Camila feels some of the tension inside her fade at the gesture and tries to give Normani a smile. She fails.

“That bitch,” she breathes out instead. “I’ll fucking kill her.”

“I’m kind of impressed, actually,” Dinah says, prying Camila’s fingers open to grab the poster and check it out. “Girl legit pulled this outta her ass from one day to the other.”

Camila glares at her, not wanting to hear anything even remotely positive about Lauren. “Did you even read the stupid slogan, Dinah? This is not just about me, she’s coming after us!”

“Yeah?” Dinah shrugs. “I’m 100% Team Mila but I can’t say it isn’t exciting to have someone challenging us.”

Normani snickers at that and Camila struggles with her instinct to stomp her foot like a spoiled toddler.

“You have to admit this school isn’t exactly home of the brave material,” Normani prods, hand moving to entwine their fingers. “I don’t think this is a big deal, it’ll be just like in freshman year when Richard Baker tried to run against you for class president. It was more of a formality to pretend there was some sort of race going on when, lol no.”

Camila squeezes Normani’s hand, grateful for her words and for how her presence helps relax her.

“I’m still going to kill her,” Camila announces after a long moment of silence, lips quirking up in a dangerous smirk.

“I can’t wait for that.” Dinah grins triumphantly, putting her hand up for Camila to high-five.

“And I’ll be right there to step over the bitch’s dead body.” Normani’s eyes are glinting, bright with mischief.

On second thought, Camila says to herself, this could turn out to be a lot of fun.

Camila spends most of her Psychology class obsessing over the poster. She can feel the weight of it inside her blazer’s pocket, even though it’s just a piece of paper folded in four.

This is an affront she can’t let slide, and while she wants to confront Lauren about the whole thing, she doesn’t want to come across as angry and hysterical. Lauren doesn’t deserve the satisfaction of feeling like she has affected her in any way.

She tears out a page of her notebook and starts listing possible scenarios so she can both calm herself down and come up with a viable action plan. She scribbles several brilliant lines of monologue and memorizes them right away, feeling quite pleased with herself. She doesn’t know how Lauren will react but she trusts her quick wit to present her with some decent retorts. As long as she keeps her cool, everything should be okay. The idea is to make Lauren lose her cool.

Now she only needs to think of the perfect setting to enact her little speech. A confrontation in the hallways is out of question because she doesn’t need any more attention placed on the two of them together. There’s already plenty of that to go around. Checking her schedule, she realizes she has AP Lit next and smirks.

That’s something she can work with.

Camila enters room A012 three minutes before the bell rings and is satisfied to see Lauren is already there. Unfortunately, so is her table partner, which forces Camila into a less smooth approach.

Standing next to him, she offers a saccharine smile. “Scram.”

The boy looks up at her, eyes open wide, and hurries away, finding another seat. It’s a good thing Mr. Keating doesn’t care about fixed placements - never a time when that hadn’t been convenient.

Camila beams at Lauren and sits next to her without asking for permission, ignoring the incredulous stare Lauren is throwing her way. She removes the poster from her pocket and unfolds it, placing it on the middle of the table. “It has come to my attention that this is a thing that is happening.”

Lauren just raises one eyebrow, not bothering to reply.

“I’m actually glad you’ve decided to run against me” Camila continues, counting a victory point when confusion flashes across Lauren’s features. “It does get a bit tiresome to have the world bow at your feet without question.”

“Oh please,” Lauren huffs, with an eye-roll.

“But, Jauregui, if you’re going to run against me, at least give me the pleasure of a challenge?” Camila tilts her head to the side, smiling lazily and enjoying the turmoil behind Lauren’s eyes. “Here.” She points at the poster, her finger falling between the photograph and the slogan. She thinks it’s very kind of her. She could’ve easily just tapped one of Lauren’s eyes with her fingernail, which is closer to what she would like to do to the girl. “Photocopy paper, seriously? How cheap.”

“I would like to see you bringing a campaign to life overnight, Cabello,” Lauren counters, swatting Camila’s hand away from the poster. “In the last twenty-four hours, I’ve signed up for student body president, studied the students’ council regulations and policies of the past three years, wrote down a draft of the plan for my presidency and created a campaign from scratch. All by myself.”

“Photocopy paper makes the photographs look pixelated and scrunched up, so unpleasant,” Camila carries on, disregarding her in spite of the somewhat impressive list of achievements. “And Arial for the slogan’s font? What is this? The first group project for middle school?”

Lauren is seething at this point and Camila’s chest swells with pride. She’s doing this. She’s the one aggravating Lauren and she’s loving the hell out of it. “I’ll give you kudos for the slogan though. That was… brave. It will get you attention, for sure, which will last you for today and maybe until the end of the week. But it isn’t memorable.

"I mean, if you’re this bad at posters alone, how do you expect to hold up against me when it’s time to present your campaign video in homeroom? Or for the debate before the election?”

Mr. Keating arrives in that moment and Lauren fixes her with a glare that would probably be considered intimidating if Camila were someone else. “Are you done with the lecture? Can you go now?”

“No,” Camila answers, surprising them both. “You smell nice. I think I’ll stay here for today.” She grins, delighted by Lauren’s startled expression and her obvious loss for words as she shifts her attention back to the lesson.

Camila didn’t think it would be possible, but if she enjoyed messing with Lauren’s head over her subpar poster, she’s now overcome with glee, arguing against every single interpretation Lauren has for the poems they’re studying today.

Mr. Keating notices it but doesn’t stop them. The man has strange ways and he seems to value intelligent discussion over appeasing the belligerent tension in the room. Camila appreciates it.

She’s on a winning streak anyway.

When Camila finally makes it home that evening, after spending two hours in the library finishing her History essay, she falls face first on her bed with a groan. Her phone beeps from somewhere in her bag and she shoves her hand inside to try and find it without having to change position. She succeeds after a very frustrating minute and looks at the screen to see Normani had texted her.

Mani [6:33pm] I have a feeling this presidential race is gonna be more interesting than we thought

Camila blinks and then frowns, unsure of what Normani is trying to convey.

Mila [6:34pm] what do you mean?

Normani sends her a link to a tweet and Camila opens it, a feeling of dread coursing through her veins. 

Her first reaction is relief because she was expecting much worse, but then she clicks on the twitter account, realizes it’s been created earlier that day, sees a tweet with a picture of her campaign poster side by side with Lauren’s and a few other incendiary tweets, and she lets out an undignified wailing sound.

Great. This is just what she needed in her life.

* * *

Camila doesn’t think too much about Lauren for the next two days. Or rather, she doesn’t allow herself to, forcing her mind to drift somewhere else as soon as the obnoxious girl pops up in her thoughts. She smiles inwardly when she notices that most posters have been replaced with classier versions of the original, taking her suggestions into account. The slogan is still the same but Camila doesn’t believe that will stick for long.

For all her effort to remain collected about the events of the past week, Camila’s also aware that, for the first time in her high school experience, a person that she’d condemned to ostracism had bounced back from it like it had been nothing.

Social media had played a big part in that, what with the stupid @sipthegreentea twitter that keeps people obsessing over the campaign and that rat Zayn Malik interviewing Lauren for the school blog. She thought no one followed that thing, but apparently a six-minute video of Lauren being charming and eloquent, and making sense in a few of her points, had been enough to gather it some attention. Lauren Jauregui had gone from persona non grata, from the absolute bottom of the social hierarchy to somewhere… slightly above that.

Camila would be lying if she said that didn’t unnerve her a little bit.

In all fairness, most of the school is still avoiding Lauren like she has the plague and she knows some of the popular kids have fun throwing insults at her every now and then - which, kind of makes her uncomfortable but she has done nothing to prevent. However, Lauren’s become a champion of sorts for the underdogs and the wallflowers, the kids too weak to make a name for themselves, and so she isn’t alone by any means, as had been Camila’s original intention. And if Lauren isn’t alone, if she’s defied the school’s natural order and survived, Lauren is dangerous.

That’s why Camila is keeping track of what’s going on with Lauren by ensuring some underdogs remain loyal to her. She may be willing to act as if Lauren is beneath her and nothing she does phases her, because that both irritates Lauren and allows her to be perceived as the still reigning president, influential and untouchable. But smart people keep their friends close, and their enemies closer. Being two steps ahead is not enough of a waypoint as far as Camila is concerned.

And thus, she weaves a web of nerds and drama kids and almost pretty girls, people she’s always been nice to and who’ve always liked her. One should never underestimate people’s willingness to betray their own in exchange for the approval of the powerful majority.

It’s Friday and Camila’s lost in thought in one of the bathrooms of the second floor when she’s approached by a girl with long, copper-colored hair.

“C-Camila?” she stutters.

Camila fights the urge to roll her eyes because in these times of political need, she can’t afford to act however she wants. “Hi,” she says, turning to give her attention to the girl with a smile on her face. Camila knows she’s the current sophomore class president until election day but can’t remember her name even though she should. This girl is one of those who would sell her soul for popularity. “Can I help you, hum - what’s your name again?”

“Katie,” the girl replies, not at all offended that Camila didn’t know that. She checks the stalls before she speaks again. “I thought you should know that Lauren is planning a campaign event.”

“Oh, is she?”

“Yeah. I don’t know when it will happen but there’s been talk of getting a catering service so they can give away cupcakes while handing out flyers and buttons.”

Camila narrows her eyes, studying the girl. “Catering service?”

“Some kid’s mom owns a bakery and he said he could get a few batches of cupcakes for free. To help with the campaign, I mean.” Katie keeps shifting on her feet, nervous energy coming off of her in waves.

“What kid?”

“Jacob Sartorius.”

“Jacob Sartorius?” Camila shakes her head. “Who even is that?”

“He’s a freshman,” Katie says, shrugging. “Skinny, wears those thick-framed type of glasses, hair makes up half of his height?”

Camila snickers. “Do you know this boy?”

“Yeah, like, we say hi in the halls and stuff?”

“Good.” Camila places both her hands on the girl’s shoulders and stares deep into her eyes. “Tell him to meet me behind the gym at 4:30.”

Katie nods, and Camila finds it a mix of cute and sickening that she looks like she’s been given a life-changing mission.

“Will do, Camila!” she says, bobbing her head up and down until Camila releases her shoulders and signals for her to leave with a thanks. “Bye!”

“You’re late,” Camila drawls when she spots a lanky boy with his hair two inches up in the air walking towards her. She repositions herself so only her shoulder is leaning against the wall as she faces this Jacob creature.

“Sorry,” he mumbles, blushing. “I thought this was a prank.”

Camila smirks. “I can see why you would think that but no, this isn’t a prank.”

“Am I in trouble?”

“Not if you help me.”

“I don’t see how I can help you, I’m sorry.” To his credit, Jacob looks genuinely rueful. The poor thing has no idea what he’s doing, talking to Camila Cabello in secret.

“I hear your mom owns a bakery, is that true?”

“Yes.” He moves closer and stands next to her, hands behind his back as he also leans against the wall. “You need a catering service too?”

“Too?”

“Well yeah, Lauren Jauregui–” Camila cringes as Jacob mispronounces the surname but he doesn’t notice, “–is doing some campaign event next week and she asked if I could get her some free cupcakes so I figured you were after the same thing?”

“If I ever need cupcakes from your bakery, I’ll make sure to pay your mom for her excellent service,” Camila informs him, smiling sweetly. “In fact, do you have a card or is there a website I can visit?”

“Place is called Baked Bites,” Jacob says, returning her smile. “You can look it up on Facebook or Instagram.”

“I will,” she assures him. She’ll order a box of goods to take home to her family, at least, and make sure that reaches Jacob’s ears. Favors are paid with other favors. “Now there is something I would like you to do for me, if you’re up for that?”

“Sure. What do you need?”

“Those free cupcakes that Jauregui is getting for her campaign…” She pauses on purpose, gauging his reaction. “What would have to happen for them to be… less than perfect cupcakes?”

“What are you getting at?” He squints his eyes, suspicious. “This is my mom’s business we’re talking about. I don’t want to cause her trouble.”

“Oh, you wouldn’t, don’t worry!” Camila cuts, eyes wide with innocence. “Ally Hernandez loves baking, I’m sure she’ll do her own batch for the event. We’ll blame it on her.”

Jacob laughs at that, his hair shaking with his movements. “Alright. I guess I could be persuaded then. What’s in it for me?”

Camila’s lips curl up smugly. “Name your price, Jacob. I’ll make it happen.”

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A/N: slytherin!camila: rise

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