#might have bended the rules as I added a play and a book I began in late 2023

[barbituratecongestion]

thank you so much @orlaite for tagging me to list either my top 9 favourite books of 2023 OR my tbr books for 2024

I am doing the latter (very late) since 2023 was less than… perfect (too many textbooks, not enough free time reading, not enough discriminating while choosing material …)

tagging anyone who sees this and wants to do it

[starswornoaths]

Prompt 1: Foster

The polycule finds themselves in the company of a stray kitten that Estinien fetched from a back alley from who-knows-where.

And they're going to rehome her. No, really, honest. They're not keeping her, or anything lol

Word count: 1,900

~*~

A rare rainy day off in Ishgard— on a rarer day off, no less— had left Serella happily cuddled up in bed, under the blankets. Joined by her betrothed, and their beloved Violet, what time wasn’t spent idly dozing, was a warm, floating haze of hands and lips brushing idly where they found skin. Though they were swathed in the overcast, pale light that spilled in through the curtains, its chill was far from them, the roaring hearth, gilding the gloom where it collided, its warmth reaching beyond its light. The perfect picture of coziness.

Which was why she was particularly miffed, when their dearest Estinien stumbled in through the door, soaked to the bone, and holding his bundled up jacket to his chest: it meant that she had to get up, to investigate.

As Estinien caught his breath from sprinting in the pouring rain, his paramours all collectively, if sluggishly, opted to disentangle themselves from the blankets enough to see what on earth had made him bluster in so.

Aymeric was the first to rise from their little nest of blankets, ambling over gamely. Serella wasn’t far behind, though stilled when she heard him melt over whatever it was that Estinien had bundled into his coat.

An animal, then.

Sure enough, she neared just in time for Aymeric to reach a hand out, and be met with a sooty paw reaching up to curl its little bean toes around his index finger. He cooed again, and his posture melted further toward the bundle—ah, it was a cat, then.

“Hello, little love,” Aymeric greeted, his voice turned sing-song, and pitched a few notes higher, as it always did when he greeted an animal.

Already, Serella knew this was trouble.

All the more, when Hyana gasped as she scrambled to free herself from bed fully, hissing and cursing as a blanket stuck stubbornly to the pointed ridges at the end of her tail. Freeing herself, she stumbled over eagerly, completely blowing past Serella as she did.

After giving the two of them a few more moments to coo, she and Estinien passed a look between them, and silently agreed that it was time to be the responsible ones. For a change.

“Alright, alright, what do we have here, then?” Serella called, gently nudging them away to give the little creature some breathing room.

“Creature” almost seemed an apt description for the cat nestled within Estinien’s coat: covered in rain water and mud, it was almost impossible to tell what the cat’s true fur color was. It trembled, even pressed against Estinien’s chest—must still be cold. Those large eyes squinted up at her, as the little kitten sniffed and sneezed at her proffered hand. The cat’s shivering made its purr sound tinny, like it rattled the poor thing’s lungs just to do it.

“A bath first, before we do anything else, I think.” She said aloud.

With a breath to steel herself, Serella accepted the bundle of cat and coat in her arms, when Estinien relented to her. Despite the shivering, and the wetness of its fur, the kitten felt warm against her chest, when it immediately snuggled up to her body warmth. Reminding herself that they already had two dogs and a cat—two cats, technically, if she counted Duchess back at Borel Manor—Serella rounded the corner out of their bedroom, and into the bathroom.

Her polycule trailed in on her heels. It was hard not to liken them to a gaggle of Scholasticate kids, all crowding around the door to watch. It warmed her, how even the most standoffish of her loves couldn’t resist the draw of a cute animal.

The bathtub would be too massive, for the little kit—the sink suited just fine. Hyana was kind enough to fetch their bottle of feline shampoo, and set it on the counter for her.

As she let the water run to get a bit warmer, Serella lifted the kitten, gently, to hold it—her, Serella realized, with a glance—at eye level.

“You won’t like me for this,” she warned the kitten. “But that’s alright, it’s only temporary.”

The kitten squirmed, and licked the tip of her nose. Ignoring the way her insides turned to softened butter, Serella dutifully set to work, carefully bathing the kitten.

Unsurprisingly, the water was, at first, most unwelcome, and the cat had no scruples with voicing her complaint and trying to clamor out of the sink. For such a small thing, her wailing meows of discontent were rather loud—good. That meant her lungs were healthy. Once the warmth of the water sunk into her skin, however, she relented, somewhat, though instead sat in the shallow, warm water, and vibrated from the intensity of her disgruntled, rumbling meows.

It was hard not to liken her to a rat, watching her quake with the effort of vocalizing her displeasure. With each careful massage of Serella’s fingers into the kitten’s fur to wash away the grime, however, her true coat began to shine through.

As it turned out, her fur was still mostly black—save for her white capped paws, and her underbelly, all the way up to her chin. All downy soft, thin fur, in a sleek coat. Once she’d gotten a chance to dry out, under the careful ministrations of Aymeric drying her down with the softest, fluffiest towel he could find, she was actually a rather beautiful cat.

When she still shivered, as she finished drying, Aymeric would brook no negotiation, and immediately bundled himself—and her—back in bed, with the blankets. It seemed to be exactly where she wanted to be, as she promptly loafed herself upon his chest, and shook with her purrs.

“We need a name for her,” he said, not taking his eyes off the little kit, as her eyes began to drift shut.

“Absolutely not.” Serella tutted. “It isn’t responsible for us to take in another cat—here, or Borel Manor—and no, she doesn’t look ready to be a road companion, before you even entertain suggesting it.”

“Act like you don’t want to keep her.” Estinien scoffed. “You didn’t even ask me how I’d found her—you do that, when you do something I don’t like. You ask questions.”

“She’s a stray, you found her, and brought her here. What else is there to know?” Serella huffed, and even to her, she sounded a touch defensive.

“We can’t just turn her out after a bath, either, though.” Hyana argued, in the gentlest tone Serella had ever heard from her, as she snuggled up to Aymeric’s side to offer her hand to the kit. “She’ll have to stay for a while.”

“Until we can responsibly rehome her, of course.” Aymeric hastily added on, unconvincingly.

Serella wrinkled her nose when Estinien made a noise of agreement, even as the both of them also crawled in bed.

Once they had hemmed him in on all sides, Aymeric piped up, “But we have to call her something, in the meantime.”

When Estinien reached out to pet her, both of her paws shot out, to wrap around his hand. Her claws pricked at his skin, as she tried to force his hand over to her head. He snorted.

“Krile, perhaps? The little snot seems keen on getting her claws in me.” He grumbled, with no real venom behind his words; he hadn’t even taken his hand back.

Alas, he had already been lost to this kitten’s wiles, it seemed. Probably was, the moment he found her.

“I’ll tell Krile.” Hyana replied in that same, cooing voice, not even deigning to look at Estinien, as the kitten wriggled across the broad expanse of Aymeric’s chest, to bump her forehead against Hyana’s.

It was fascinating, watching how all three of them—powerful, stalwart warriors, all—had turned to puddles under the might of this singular kitten’s cuteness. Danuja, Vardr, and Rhalgr were already getting jealous, she realized, when she felt their collective, agitated curiosity on the fringes of her focus.

“Menphina,” she suggested, before she could stop herself. When all present turned to look at her, she elaborated, with a wry twist of her lips, “She’s certainly charmed all of you enough to warrant it.”

“…Menphina.” Hyana tried again, speaking it to the kit instead. At the curious mrr the cat trilled in response, Hyana nodded. “She likes it. It’s settled, then.”

When the weather improves, I’ll put up signs, she resolved to herself, just as the kitten laid her paw atop Serella’s hand, over Aymeric’s heart.

To her credit, she did. But the problems that trickled in after that came threefold: there was little demand for a beautiful runt, all the more of an indeterminable breed of cat. What demand there was, was often in the interest of Menphina being a “practice pet,” for a child. Fearful that that would translate to unsupervised children treating her like a toy, until she was injured, Serella would be the first—and firmest—to rebuke such offers. Add to all of that, the kitten’s propensity for extended bursts of high energy, that demanded that she be played with, ruled her out for any of the elderly candidates that applied, looking for a calm housecat.

To say that she had no success finding a suitable home for Menphina, would be a gross understatement.

Every time, she would come home, and Menphina would have to crawl out of the collective fur of Vardr and Rhalgr, just to trill up at her in greeting. And every time, Serella would have to scoop her up, and tell her how sorry she was, that it wasn’t meant to be, for that applicant.

“There will be others,” Serella reassured her, every time.

A few moons down the line saw Menphina still very much fostered in their care—to the point, that she was tucked close, huddled in the bend of Serella’s knees, as she’d curled up on the couch with a book. She’d fallen into a sort of pleasant lull, where her focus was on her book, though she could still pick up on Aymeric and Hyana chatting amicably in the kitchen.

At the mention of the date, in the midst of their conversation, Serella’s ear perked; she couldn’t recall the exact date, that Estinien had hauled this scrawny little kit in from the cold, but as she looked down at Menphina again, now filled out on good food and loving attention, she realized, with dismay, that she had not been strong enough.

“You were never a foster cat, were you?” She grumbled accusingly at Menphina.

The kitten looked up at the sound of her voice, and gave a questioning mrr?

As though she didn’t know what she had done. Smiling wryly, Serella gave her affectionate scritches between her ears.

“No, I suppose you never were, at that.”

Taking this as an invitation, Menphina unfurled herself with a long stretch that morphed into a yawn, and scampered up Serella’s hip, and settled in on the curve of her side, as though it was just for her.

Groaning, Serella let her head hit the back of the couch, as she finally admitted her defeat loud enough for the household to hear: “We’re keeping the cat.”

Amidst the giddy celebrating, she swore she distinctly heard the clink of coin being exchanged—they’d gone and taken bets, on how long it would take for her to crack.

Gremlins. Hellions, all of them. Hers. How she loved them, as they were—Menphina included.

[blankdblank]

Ash Pt 6

*

The final day before the feast and tasked to organize the library you had once slept in found the King who simply strolled in and sat down on a chair not far from the shelf you had just started. “Yellow stones are given to intendeds, back in Nunieffe.” His eyes had darted to you from his hands clasped to dangle between his now settled thighs formerly shifting side to side. “Yellow is my favorite color, my question was out of habit, clearly the tradition does not carry on here. I am glad I get to wear a yellow stone that won’t bleed to emerald later.”

“Bleed, your stone changed colors?”

You nodded and said, “So you save money when you are wed it changes.”

“You have a heart that millions would march, clamber and crawl to catch a fraction of devotion to it.” That had your eyes on his revealing the beginning of tears you were on the edge of blinking away from embarrassment. “Title or no title you will be loved by thousands and adored and cherished, and one day should you choose someone worthy of your trust and affections in return it will not be out of cruelty or a trick of chance or malice. Eru our creator has granted each of us a One, the person who we are meant to find, and I have no doubt as he brought you here that someone will prove themselves worthy of a heart such as yours. Because you are so very much the one out of reach from mere fools and villains. Please do not doubt that.”

“You really mean that?”

You whispered and he shifted in his seat to angle his legs and body a bit more towards you, “With every fiber of my being. That is the truth.”

“Thank you, for telling me that,” you said looking to the books again you returned upright again in some means of organizing the titles you could not read at all or decipher any pattern between their order now.

“You are welcome, and not alone. Celeborn and myself our first marriages were arranged by others in means of an intended coup.” That had your eyes on him and he nodded, “My former wife’s father and uncle were plotting along with Celeborn’s and her uncle, with whom she was having an affair. It is all rather complicated and to be honest it was entirely humiliating upon its being uncovered by my people here. I am rather glad only my mother was aware of it as my father had passed on. We were still at war and I was informed upon my return that she had fled to the West while Celeborn’s former wife and her lover were bound and forced to sail under threat of execution.” Your eyes looked over his straight face void of any pain or fear in the simple stating of facts, “Celeborn has since fallen in love and remarried and conceived heirs since. She is half Hobbit as I have mentioned before so there is ample hope to bear many more.”

“And why haven’t you chosen a Hobbit bride then?”

That had him chuckle deep in his throat and he flashed you a playful grin, “I am not so fortunate to have a personality many Hobbits find a handsome trait in a partner. Not many if at all would choose a King. I tend to brood.”

“Now that’s a bold faced lie,” you said spreading his grin in adding, “Maybe it’s the angle they look up at you from.”

“Possibly,” he hummed back playfully.

“Why swans? If you don’t mind my asking, the apartment doors, the crown, the ring?”

“The apartment was by chance that it happened to be empty enough for you to decorate as you wished to. You had a chance to choose between our other apartments, do swans trouble you another could always be crafted for you.”

You shook your head, “Just odd, we had flying boat races when I was growing up and only sons can compete but I had been building one myself to try and bring the prize back home again since the last time my father had raced his ship the Emperor. I don’t think I’ve seen a swan up close in person, books sure enough, cygnets seem adorable enough to want to keep one.”

That had his grin creep out and he hummed, “There is a flower festival in Rivendell as our next holiday, the lot of us could travel there together and that time of year there should be ample swans and little cygnets there for you to admire.” You glanced his way and he said, “All of the Kingdoms are eager to meet you. I warn you now they will take no heavily as a blow and most likely enforce that we move the festival to where you are willing to travel.”

The arrival of a messenger however had him straighten up and ready to accept the letter that the Elleth grinned and passed over to you, “Thank you.” You said eyeing the envelope that rested on top of the books you had in the bend of your arm. Promptly you turned and offered the envelope to the again grinning King. “Fingers crossed it’s not more poetry.”

Softly he chuckled and broke the seal while you added the books to the shelves and shifted on your feet to face him in the ease of the letter inside out and open. “Good news, this is from King Thror, he would not spare a poem for none but his wife Niro, Dwarf tradition unless some sort of competition is afoot.” Subtly he wet his lower lip reading the letter he translated for you in a means of checking if you were feeling well and that they were eternally grateful and in your debt for having bested the beast bent on snatching their home away. “See, all good news. I did receive notice from Lord Girion as well yesterday in a means to thank you and pay his gratitude and apologize for his words. He asked if you might accept a letter to that effect from him or if he has burned that bridge, so to speak. It would appear he was dictating after having shared in a mushroom circle with his friends over a dinner which began a poetry circle resulting in ample letters and drama between clans in Dale and even a couple of confused Dwarves in Erebor.”

“Ah, well that would explain it. No burned bridges,”

“Well your response certainly by his account was the kindest of responses the group did receive, one had an ax thrown through their front window.”

You nodded then accepted the letter that was written in different markings than the one in Dalion and you softly sighed, “There is a great deal of languages I will have to learn isn’t there?”

“There are a great deal of Elves who have been reluctant or lax on learning the written word, we have ample scribes in our kingdom,”

“Oh,”

“I am not bothered to translate or dictate your communications. Two letters so far, far from strenuous work. Quite a welcome addition to my duties.”

“You would think a King wouldn’t want more work on top of running a kingdom.”

“One would assume so, but this was a welcome distraction.”

“What exactly do you do all day?” You asked and to himself he chuckled at the blind question as you got to focus on the books again.

“It varies. Checks on import/export reports, levels of our stores and goods produced, reports on weather and news from other kingdoms. News on patrols and word transcribed from Ents and animals on the movements of goblins, trolls and orcs. Then there are internal matters that must be discussed, territories and property rights cases between citizens who wish a neutral ruling in these matters that blend into the rare cases which result in judgments and imprisonment. I also oversee the public celebrations, alongside musical and choral groups and their planned performances I ensure are scheduled to be well enjoyed by as many of our people as possible.” His lips pursed a moment, “Other than numbers of our herds and care of steeds reports I cannot think of more tasks at the moment, past my son and charge of young Estel when he dwells here.”

“That’s not nearly as busy as I had imagined for running a kingdom.”

“I did warn you I am more of a public spokesperson between kingdoms. See, ample time to play your personal secretary. Some of our scribes have gathered learners booklets to gift to you later on. Our languages can be quite extensive to learn in a matter of years.”

“I am quite adept at languages, you may just be surprised.”

“Oh I am infinitely surprised with you, as I should be,” his words accented with a pop of his smile wider in your glance his way that had the corners of your mouth tick upwards again.

 .

Wine was needed. Stunning didn’t come close to the splendorous string of ballrooms connected by garden ballrooms lit by strings of lanterns and crystal lanterns. Two dances was all the King had secured for himself to open the Feast dances post opening speech and the first three courses. Three glasses half the size of his had been emptied by you and mirrored by his full glasses in watch of each interaction across the dance floor with those who you accepted as partners. Sure he had secured another dance five dances from now but every brush of hands or arms in the various touch starved dances left him with fingers tapping to the arm of his chair to mark each brush of skin and lift that kept him from his turn for an up close look at the dazzling Queen who seemed to be having one hell of a time. Just the smile split wide across your face would have been enough to cause a heart to skip. But the spread of a glittering glow on your skin and star speckled bead decorated hair topped with the swan crown also accented by your new jewels and the bright moonlight seemed to leave a wake of Elves in awe of the dark haired Queen who seemed to be infecting every Elf here with her smile and giggles.

Five dances and the bold King now on his feet strode in and with the offer of his hand accepted the smile he was now contracted with to guide the woman of the evening into place. Then he had to let go, for an agitating tease of a dance with only a couple lifts, which even after your wine still had your hands, however gracefully placed, on his shoulders or upper arms as if he could dare to drop you. Spins and woven patterns filled the next four dances accented by arm movements until a break for more stomach lining food was announced and around his elbow the King felt that same hand he’d been stealing brushes of his fingers against in every motion he could. There was something intoxicating about you when you relaxed, when you opened up. And as if starving the King who ensured you were on his free side as his friendship was arguably your strongest basked in the first glimpse of a truly dynamic woman who could command a room by means of a single smirk or playful glance.

Under the moonlight for air to break and steady himself from finishing off another glass of wine that would hinder his efforts of memorizing your debut to this elaborate side of their world. Yet in his lean forward to rest on his knees a sudden giggle had him upright and with a smile to the arrival of his friend who clearly had finished off yet another glass of wine. “I may need to play weakling and sneak off to bed. But do save me some more of that cake, I know there is some more somewhere.” The words were accented by obvious intoxicated giggles, a pleasant sight over the alternative of wine triggered tears. That was what you had said and in the haze somehow that was lost to a maze of a rant all he could do was chuckle and wade through in its evidence of a clear sign that your train of thought was spiraling towards a crash. Once on your feet you had settled on the bench beside him perhaps a tad closer than you would sober with a hint of your weight in a shift to use his white and silver clad self as an anchor.

The song was mentioned along with the dance you had looked to with a somewhat mournful stare to the dance for lovers and couples that included a trade off of a kiss. Not the action but that hint of pain that bubbled to the surface and the King readied to say something, anything, but you stopped him. Brief and unexpected a press of your lips to his, that seemed to be aimed there already in the turn of his head, completely emptied his mind. Then in your pull back from the two second stunner every emptied inch of his head flooded with questions and millions of rationalizations of what happened and thousands of proper things to do at this moment. Yet all he could do was chuckle in a sense of relief to your smiling statement of, “There, a first, no espionage in that for our shared freedom from our captors.”

Right where your hand had just been his moved on his thigh that had been used to anchor you onto your feet again in a rise that had his body up as well right after. “No, no espionage.” He hummed and to your every swayed step by your side without touch his body seemed to be in withdrawal from and screamed for more of it.

Giggled nonsense was his companion to the door that he opened for you to welcome you home and the spine tingling brush of your fingertips down from his wrist over the back of his hand on the door handle had his mouth open when you said, “Two weeks of nothing but freedom. Quite a crime in that. To have such fun and then be left to ourselves again. Enjoy your festivities, kind King, and bravo on guiding me home.”

Again there was nothing to do but chuckle and reply, “Sleep well Queen Jaqiearae.” There was so much more he wanted to say but in the magical twitch of your fingers he saw the buttons on the back of your neck loosen and to the hand that held the front of your gown the image of that bare strip of skin where that strap once was had been replaced by the sight of the door he shut in your stroll into your room. Clearly intoxicated, he kept repeating, nothing concrete could be taken of this trade of intimacy. Yet that kiss and the brush of his now tingling hand troubled the rest of his evening, dreams and wake to a breakfast cart alone that left him with just more plans on how to approach the cusp of courtship forcing contact that you had initiated. Hopefully before the second evening of the feast would begin and he was lost for words at how the next marvel of a gown would drape over your magnificent self.

“Magnificent”, he repeated the word to himself in a questioning mantra as to why he had chosen that word, at least until a tiny head popped out from underneath his breakfast cart to reveal the Prince tired of not being discovered who altered the mentality of the King instantly to focus on the small boy and his playful games.

 *

“Oh no,” you grumbled into your pillow underneath all of your covers as the night rolled back into your mind. Somewhere between the wine and your already awkward social skills around the infuriatingly understanding King, who had been accepting each and every flub that you had thrown right in his face to your own deepening ditch of embarrassment, you had gone and kissed him. As if the headache wasn’t enough from the wine you had been tasting the night before not evenly leveled with food to soak it all up due to the length of time spent dancing the mental memory of that kiss slammed around in your head to remind yourself at how stupid that was to even dare to touch his arm let alone kiss any King let alone this one you were trying to befriend. “I’m gonna have to move, simple as that. I can’t keep living here now.”

To a knock the arrival of a cook with a special drink to aid in relief from any hangover had you poke your head out to the Elf whose eyes shifted to your bare arms and collarbones over the blanket you held to your chest. With a grin you said, “I am in a towel. Apparently I fell asleep after a bath.”

With a grin he came closer and handed you the glass off the tray on his palm, “This will aid in any discomfort you feel, Your Highness.”

“Thank you,” bringing it closer to your lips you asked, “How long does it take to get used to the wine?”

In your sip he replied, “It depends. Grape wine usually takes longer however I find the darker berries are quite agreeable and taste finer upon many palates.” He motioned his hand to the doorway stating, “An undercook is here currently and your breakfast should be completed shortly. We have arranged rotations for these two weeks to aid in the recovery from each night of samplings while you adjust.”

“Thank you.” Upon being alone again you shook your head and finished your drink that did help at least with the effects of the wine but not the mental parade of thoughts on the kingdoms that had been shared with you and which you might prefer to be banished to when the hammer was surely set to drop. For the morning at least pants a tunic and vest were added for what you hoped to be a means of hiding in the forest to continue the plan of where to move next and how to leave gracefully after the two week festivity.

 *

“Ada,” Legolas with a wide smile said in his plop into his chair at their shared breakfast. The King’s eyes shifted to him from his glass of the drink to clear his head from the edge of the wine. “What are your plans today?”

After a deep breath the King looked down to lift his fork to start on the meal the thanked undercook had left once it was all set out across the table for them, “I have a few tasks to oversee then I wished to stop in on Queen Jaqiearae and see how she fared this morning.”

“Good, how do you plan on offering courtship?”

That had the King’s eyes snap up to him again, “Pardon me?”

“The offer of courtship after your moment of intimacy. How do you plan to offer it because Glorfindel and I have been compiling lists of ways that might be quite unique and vary in chance of surprise unless you have already discussed that upon escorting Queen Pear to her bed.”

Open mouthed Thranduil leaned forward into the edge of the table, “You witnessed, who else was with you that has seen us?”

“It was myself and Glorfindel, Estel was hiding in the gardens again as we were in search.”

“No one is to be told.”

Legolas smiled again, “Absolutely not, we would never spoil the surprise.”

“No, Little Leaf, Queen Jaqiearae was under the influence of the wine. There is no grounds for courtship as clearly there was no justifiable right for me to offer to settle a courtship from an accidental intimacy.”

“I saw the both of you Ada, there was no stumble into a lock of lips. There was intent.”

“Little Leaf,”

“Wine was involved, but surely, at least you have to present the trunk of your One token.” The King’s lips parted again and he said, “At minimum. You are solidifying into a firm friendship and clearly she did not show he would refuse an offer of even marriage. There is a bond there please do not doubt that, she could be your One! You have to show her your trunk!” Thranduil sighed and he added, “Or I will make sure she finds it.”

“I will bring my trunk into her path. For now there will be no talks of courtship. I will inquire as to her condition and try to ease out any wrinkles this encounter has caused upon our friendship.”

“She is bound to be your One. Simply has to be.” Thranduil from his fork and knife slicing a piece of his food looked up to his son curious of his reasoning for that assumption. “Has to be.”

 *

Atop a raised root you sat with view of a stream that a group of ducks led their ducklings towards a food source farther down out of view. Suddenly a blue jay landed in front of your boot then took off again with a pleased chirp, his absence however turned your head to the sight of the King who had apparently used the bird to track you down. “Hey, ducks.”

With a smirk he turned his head and nodded to the sight of the final family of ducks off towards food, “Yes, near lunchtime they will be back to their nests in our red garden.” Back to you his eyes shifted in the turn of his head asking, “How did you rest?”

“In a towel,” His brow arched up and you said, “Apparently I got out of my gown and then took a bath and went to bed to fall asleep. Maybe I was just tired, odd.”

To himself he chuckled, “I believe we all have had a morning of that nature when first dabbling with wine.” His eyes scanned over you and he asked, “How did you enjoy the opening night of the festivity?” Nerves at a peak to the question that was inching on what the relationship could turn out to be if he couldn’t ease any embarrassment from the kiss.

“It was fun. I certainly danced,” you paused and asked him at the puzzled expression on his face, “I didn’t do anything embarrassing did I?”

His brow arched up and he replied, “No, not that I can recall. Why would you assume you had?” He asked hoping to lure the answer out of you to begin talks of the night.

“I went from dancing to waking up in a towel.” You said and his lips parted in a mental whirl. You didn’t know, the wine had blurred that encounter. Only to bleed into questions of how could you not know, not remember anything. Instantly his chest tightened up in his body’s reaction to the fact that you didn’t remember the moment with him at all his mind could not stop replaying.

“That is quite a gap of time to miss.”

To the prickle of your cheeks you said, “I know we talked and you told me goodnight. You sure I didn’t do anything foolish?”

“No,” he replied uncertain if he was pleased or unhappy with this forgotten moment. “Nothing foolish comes to mind.”

“Did you sleep well?” You asked and his chin rose a moment then lowered in his body’s ease into the realization and try to relax again now he knew he shouldn’t talk about the kiss at all instead of the ploy to calm your nerves as he had prepped to do.

“Yes, fairly well, I usually do not dance in our celebrations beyond a few assigned dances with my eldest friends whose spouses prefer to skip those dances. So I was amply exhausted and able to sleep. I was wondering if I might ask your opinion on something.” You nodded curiously on his fidget of his feet under his weight, “There is a trunk of items I am curious if you might be able to make heads or tails of it.”

“Oh, sure,” you said in a shift of your legs off the root. Promptly his hand snapped up for yours and after a glance at it in pause yours laid on top of it and down you hopped to stroll at his side once his hand lowered to the retraction of yours. Aloofly, or with the impression of that the King managed to hold a steady stream of chatter all the way to his apartment where he took notice of the One trunk that his son had set up in his sitting room beside the table there.

“So you have no clue what is inside of it?” You asked in a glance up at him, “It doesn’t seem to be shaking or making any sort of alerting noise.”

Again your eyes fell to the trunk from his intense stare he couldn’t control while the electric feel of his fingers just a breath from his you had stroked the night before had his entire body in a fight to not just clutch onto it for dear life to feel that sensation again. “No. It does not make a sound or move. However I have had it for some thousands of years and still seem to be stumped on what it might yet construct, as it contains pieces to form something. An aggravating mystery all its own I cannot make heads or tails of.”

“Oh, well then,” you said in a glance around before to the motion of your hands over the table the table cover expanded to its full length and went rigid in a spell that would expand as needed depending on what was inside to the scoot of each chair to make room. “First thing first. Empty the lot.” The wide smile on your face to the adventure had his try for a response lodged in the back of his throat for what seemed to be a groan of sorts that melted into a cough that allowed him excuse to fetch some juice and glasses for the pair of you. The acceptance of which his arm just about fell slack to the glide of fingers along his in your blind, “Thank you.” The numbness from the shock of the touch left his arm in a tingling mess to your sip of the juice, “Mmm, lovely,” you murmured in the lower of the glass that was settled on the table to ease the open of the lid once lock latches were flipped upwards.

The largest piece, an intricately carved and detailed piece of wood was inspected in its three foot entirety until at the notice of a symbol and number had it set down to lift the next that would be added to another pile. “Aha, a pattern,” you said and over your shoulder he hunched with cheek barely an inch from yours and back kept from contact with yours for another jarring experience for the lack of distance for the seemingly touch starved King who now just yearned for more and more. “See,” you said avoiding the knot in your stomach to his closeness to point to the number and symbol, “The pieces have numbers and symbols, so if we match them then we can go by group and find out how they intermingle later.”

“These are from our Doriathian alphabet, actually.” He commented with a nod and around you he strode to grab a piece of his own to inspect them against the trio of piles he added that and each after to existing or new piles. Eventually the table was coated in piles of less than helpful progress of the parts, but progress all the same. He had inspected these pieces century after century and never had those marks been there before.

There was only one explanation, he had to be yours and you his, Ones. Meant to find one another to begin at the creation of this mysterious adventure of a trunk. Heavily his heart would thunder in his chest to the every detail his eyes took in of the adventure thrilled smile on your face. Unknowing. You didn’t know. You couldn’t remember. How could you not remember? Could you feel the same energy in each brush of fingers? Each moment of his being merely a breath away? When he could so easily just angle his head and kiss those same lips that parted for each tempting honey dripped word he clung to. He could, it would be so simple, so easy, you were right there. And looking at him. Ear to ear a smile split across his face in a bashful turn to the trunk to bring out more pieces including another smaller chest and one even smaller than that until it sat empty and he had to look, not stare, to you again.

“Hmm,” from the King who seemed to be nervous about something the more you had pulled out you looked to the medium chest that your brows furrowed in the stubborn latches that refused to rise from the press of your thumbs.

“Ah,” Thranduil said. And in a fumble of a chain from underneath his robe and tunic a chain was produced ended by a mithril glowing antler just over an inch long. That in a move to your side with arms around your shoulders he was able to slide a hidden hatch over to press the antler into the hole there lengthwise it fit perfectly to set off both latches that snapped up by use of the unique key. “Only the key opens that and the smaller,” around you he moved to collect the smaller box he opened the hidden hatch he turned to face you and asked, “You wouldn’t happen to have anything that might fit this one? Would you? Only you would.”

“Um,” from his pleading gaze to the hole you looked confused at the meaning until your brows furrowed at the shape that couldn’t be mistaken. Rectangular with what seemed to have a bite taken out of it. “Can’t be,” you murmured in a reach for your enchanted bag that from the side bag you pulled a salve tin that once in your palm the lid was wound off of it for the King to eye various buttons and small keys you had found through the years in an odd collection of mysterious origins. Though from the mix a purple sapphire now glowing on the end of what you had taken as a silver branch matched his key perfectly as a half inch antler on the end of an identical chain that you used to press the stone into the slot that opened the locks. Widely the King smiled to the box with pride at the ultimate proof while instead of putting the necklace away you simply looped it around your neck and put the tin away to bashfully try to focus on the chest in hand.

In his same velvety hum of a voice he stated, “These appear to be securing pegs and wooden screws.”

Curiously you felt around the chest until between your fingers a motor of sorts was lifted, “It’s a clock,” you said and his eyes were on you again with brows lifted in awe of an answer after he had failed all this time alone to have mastered this mystery.

“A clock?”

“Yes,” you said lifting the hands you found next also shaped like antlers, “Have to be, these are the hands. Odd,” again you caught his gaze that deeply seemed to be yearning to say something, “You don’t have clocks here, did you buy this from Dale or Erebor?”

“No,” he said with a wet of his lips, “We spoke of those who are destined for each of us yesterday by Eru?”

“Yes, but, the clock?”

“We were destined to meet, you and I. Our kin are granted trunks that only our Ones can aid in opening and constructing.”

“Ah.” You said looking to the chest you set down again uncertain of how to answer only luring him to sit beside you with his chest set beside yours in a lean in to lure your eyes back to his.

“It has been an honor to meet you finally. Among others this is a culture variance I would imagine and for now, perhaps you might kindly assist me in constructing this clock of ours. We have only one moon to do so.”

“Or?”

“Normally death occurs.”

“Ah,”

“Yes. However daily slotted times to focus on this and we may yet best it within the final eve of the feast.”

“Doubt it would take that long. I’m fairly good at puzzles.” You said and were grateful for the clock heart that could distract you from whatever parade of doubts and questions was exploding through your mind at the time.

“Ooh, these must be antlers,” he said. And chose the chair beside yours that had scooted forward to be used by you. Cunningly in a special careful and quiet maneuver to steal another inch closer to your side, to be both within chance of stolen casual glance of you and to be near enough to dare risk a brush of fingers or an acceptable graze of elbows in the midst of this yet to be mastered feat.

Master of puzzles indeed, he pondered to himself in his ninth lingered stare at the final snap of the round metal casing around the clock mechanics. The completed marvel now had a face etched with hoof prints glowing at the antler formed hour and scattered glittering elk grazing across the top half of the rotating face that would have a second view for the nighttime hours.

“Round,” he muttered in a rise to his feet now knowing what the round group of pieces must have been called for. In the area you cleared in the magically shuffling piles he lowered the pile and helped you to order each piece in that group to work around the clock casing. Each varied home for wooden pegs or screws he answered to help you form what you inspected to be a barrel to settle oddly beside the half a head he had been able to work together on his own.

“Progress report, barrel clock, and antlers.”

“This is a head I am certain of it. Merely these pieces are particularly obstinate to not want to fit together for me.” He said shifting a trio of pieces you had seen him fighting with earlier before his last break to stare at you.

“Hmm. Maybe it’ll make sense-,” the sound of the warning bell to two hours to the opening of the feast had both your heads turn to the door.

“Ah, yes. It would appear it is time to ready for the feast.”

“Right. Perhaps tonight I might skip the wine.”

“Nonsense you have no reason to skimp on imbibing tonight. Enjoy yourself this feast comes once a year.” He paused then couldn’t help but add, “Unless you have recalled an unwelcome event you would care to not repeat from last night before you were off to bed?”

You simply shook your head and stood leaving the clock on the table in the momentary furrow his brows to the continued uncertainty of just what you might be trying to avoid. “I will see you at the feast I suppose,” you said on the way to the door. “I’ll let you change or whatnot, make sure I don’t interfere with any more of your baths, King Thranduil.”

When you glanced back however he stood with a smile on his face in a nod of his head you mirrored, “You shall see me there, Queen Jaqiearae. I look forward to the masterpiece you shall be donning tonight.”

“Right, I’m sure you’ll look spectacular as always yourself.” You said then left the apartment and the King in a focused purse of his lips on his way to strip and bathe knowing his son would be in soon to question him on the progress of his request.

.

Under the surface of his hot spring Thranduil could hear the muffled words, “Clock!” and “-knew it!”

To the surface he went after granting the intrusive duo of not just his son but Lord Glorfindel as well to rest with arms on the edge of the spring to hear the latter say, “Congratulations! The Kingdom shall be so pleased to hear of this, the visiting Lords as well, you have found your One at last!”

Legolas smiled, “And now will you hear of our list of courtship surprise proposals? I have a few you may find especially exciting to prepare I thought up myself.”

His smile dimmed as Thranduil flatly stated, “There will be no proposal of courtship for the time being.”

Legolas, “But-,”

Glorfindel, “Surely, Mellon, Queen Jaqiearae will grow accustomed to our culture fairly quick as she has made herself quite the lively Queen, why last night nearly half the Lords remarked on how she made even the glummest of our kin spark up with glee, yourself included, and they did not even witness your intimacy!” He accentuated with a nod to send his point home only to make the King groan to himself.

Legolas, “We still have kept that point to ourselves, no one knows of it beyond us three.”

“Exactly!” Thranduil stated making their brows arch up to his now tensed shoulders he sank more in the water in a means to hide from their inspecting view.

Legolas, “Ada?”

“Queen Jaqiearae does not even know of the intimacy, so there is no need for courtship proposals or even inklings that one may yet be considered!” The King barked then turned muttering to himself in a sink to his nose that sent a few bubbles out into the spring he now glared at.

“WHAT?!” the pair asked then moved around the spring to be back in his stern view.

Glorfindel, “How could she not know?!”

“I don’t know!” Thranduil replied, “However from the dancing to her doorway for a goodnight her memory is conveniently absent! She has no recollection of having kissed me and I have made no mention of it to spare her the apparent embarrassment the notion of such a gesture made to me without the aid of libations!”

“Whoa,” Glorfindel said with his hand extended. “That is far too harsh,” in a sigh he crouched down with ankles crossing to match the Prince’s in a plop to sit in the now teary eyed King’s view after his sink to his nose again to hold back from the explosion of this uncertain storm that had now brewed inside his chest. “What did you say, about last night? Surely she mentioned something of it.”

Thranduil blew more bubbles from his huff and his mouth surfaced to say, “A towel was mentioned, that even the bath she had apparently taken was forgotten and she fell asleep in her towel.”

Legolas, “Nothing about you?”

“The question was offered as to concerning a possible embarrassing action was taken by herself while she was inebriated to the point of amnesia.”

Glorfindel, “You answered in the negative I presume.”

“I informed her no embarrassing act was committed in a means to goad her from her silence on the topic and yet there is no memory of what happened.”

Legolas, “Then she knows,” That had his father’s eyes on him again in a slightly pained stare, “No, surely. Nothing was embarrassing and yet she still is stunned to silence, either she is processing her own actions or possibly in wait for you to make your intentions known. Perhaps that is her culture, yellow stones for proposals, surely there must be subtle hints or a statement of some sort that may yet be added into conversation casually to settle this matter and assure the Queen that intentions are true towards courtship.”

“Little Leaf, we have discussed the matters of ignorance on one another’s culture, surely still she would not expect me to know proper phrases or gestures such as yellow stones from her lost lands.”

Glorfindel, “I agree with Legolas, the Queen must know,” Thranduil sunk again as his brows drooped in a look forward to ignore the hopeful duo. “And we will prove it to you!”

Before he could turn his head they were on their feet and hurrying to the door, and out in the hall when he could call out, “Do not confront her on this matter!” The front doors to his apartment opened then shut making him grumble again to himself and sink in the water, “Make her flee the kingdom is what they will achieve.”

Pt 7

@devilishminx328, @fandomsstolemylife00​, @lilith15000

[readerbookclub]

Before introducing our newest book list, I want to say sorry about this month. It’s been underwhelming to say the least. So far this year was very chaotic (packing up to move countries, having the plane tickets cancelled, and getting into Oxford?!). Between everything that happened, I neglected this club. But I’m very excited and well-prepared for next month, so it won’t happen again at least in the foreseeable future. We also have several enthusiastic new members who’ve messaged me, so hopefully our discussion will be even more lively this time!

Now back to our newest book list. Not to brag, but I think this is the best one yet. Time Warp is a collection of books that bend and play with time. It’s such an interesting topic that includes books from many different genres. Several of your recommendations also fit in perfectly. So let’s jump right in!

Typically stories play out over the span of weeks, months, or even years. But what if a writer were to shrink that timeline? Not to days or hours, but the mere seconds it takes to ride an elevator? Well, that’s what Jason Reynolds did in our first book, a story that lasts for a single elevator ride:

Long Way Down, Jason Reynolds:

A cannon. A strap. A piece. A biscuit. A burner. A heater. A chopper. A gat. A hammer A tool for RULE Or, you can call it a gun. That’s what fifteen-year-old Will has shoved in the back waistband of his jeans. See, his brother Shawn was just murdered. And Will knows the rules. No crying. No snitching. Revenge. That’s where Will’s now heading, with that gun shoved in the back waistband of his jeans, the gun that was his brother’s gun. He gets on the elevator, seventh floor, stoked. He knows who he’s after. Or does he? As the elevator stops on the sixth floor, on comes Buck. Buck, Will finds out, is who gave Shawn the gun before Will took the gun. Buck tells Will to check that the gun is even loaded. And that’s when Will sees that one bullet is missing. And the only one who could have fired Shawn’s gun was Shawn. Huh. Will didn’t know that Shawn had ever actually USED his gun. Bigger huh. BUCK IS DEAD. But Buck’s in the elevator? Just as Will’s trying to think this through, the door to the next floor opens. A teenage girl gets on, waves away the smoke from Dead Buck’s cigarette. Will doesn’t know her, but she knew him. Knew. When they were eight. And stray bullets had cut through the playground, and Will had tried to cover her, but she was hit anyway, and so what she wants to know, on that fifth floor elevator stop, is, what if Will, Will with the gun shoved in the back waistband of his jeans, MISSES. And so it goes, the whole long way down, as the elevator stops on each floor, and at each stop someone connected to his brother gets on to give Will a piece to a bigger story than the one he thinks he knows. A story that might never know an END…if WILL gets off that elevator.

***

Our next book warps time in a slightly different way. What if every time you woke up, you found yourself in the same day (a sort-of Groundhog Day situation)? But unlike Groundhog Day, you wake up in different bodies. This thrilling book was suggested to me by one of you, and I absolutely loved the premise:

The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, by Stuart Turton:

Aiden Bishop knows the rules. Evelyn Hardcastle will die every day until he can identify her killer and break the cycle. But every time the day begins again, Aiden wakes up in the body of a different guest at Blackheath Manor. And some of his hosts are more helpful than others. With a locked room mystery that Agatha Christie would envy, Stuart Turton unfurls a breakneck novel of intrigue and suspense. For fans of Claire North, and Kate Atkinson, The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is a breathlessly addictive mystery that follows one man's race against time to find a killer, with an astonishing time-turning twist that means nothing and no one are quite what they seem.

***

Now we move on to an exciting genre: time travel! This next book was recommended to me by @earphonesandquills​​ and I just had to put it on the list. A sci-fi love story between two people on opposite sides of a war:

This is How You Lose the Time War, Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone:

Among the ashes of a dying world, an agent of the Commandant finds a letter. It reads: Burn before reading. Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, grows into something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future. Except the discovery of their bond would mean death for each of them. There's still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win that war.

***

Typically, the protagonists of time-travel books are very intelligent people. But what would happen if someone wasn’t so competent? What if they fucked it up? That’s exactly what the protagonist in our next book does. Coming from a perfect reality, he messes up and finds himself in a horrifying dystopia (aka our world):

All Our Wrong Todays, Elan Mastai:

You know the future that people in the 1950s imagined we'd have? Well, it happened. In Tom Barren's 2016, humanity thrives in a techno-utopian paradise of flying cars, moving sidewalks, and moon bases, where avocados never go bad and punk rock never existed . . . because it wasn't necessary. Except Tom just can't seem to find his place in this dazzling, idealistic world, and that's before his life gets turned upside down. Utterly blindsided by an accident of fate, Tom makes a rash decision that drastically changes not only his own life but the very fabric of the universe itself. In a time-travel mishap, Tom finds himself stranded in our 2016, what we think of as the real world. For Tom, our normal reality seems like a dystopian wasteland. But when he discovers wonderfully unexpected versions of his family, his career, and—maybe, just maybe—his soul mate, Tom has a decision to make. Does he fix the flow of history, bringing his utopian universe back into existence, or does he try to forge a new life in our messy, unpredictable reality? Tom’s search for the answer takes him across countries, continents, and timelines in a quest to figure out, finally, who he really is and what his future—our future—is supposed to be.

***

Our final book is something I never knew I needed until I found it. I have spent way too much time day dreaming about a scenario where I find myself in the distant past. I imagine myself telling people about electricity and planes and modern medicine. But if they asked me to actually make something, I wouldn’t be able to. And that bothers me. This book is the solution. It’s a non-fiction guide on what to do if you were to find yourself in such a scenario (as unlikely as it may seem):

How to Invent Everything: A Guide for the Stranded Time Traveler, by Ryan North:

What would you do if a time machine hurled you thousands of years into the past. . . and then broke? How would you survive? Could you improve on humanity's original timeline? And how hard would it be to domesticate a giant wombat? With this book as your guide, you'll survive--and thrive--in any period in Earth's history. Bestselling author and time-travel enthusiast Ryan North shows you how to invent all the modern conveniences we take for granted--from first principles. This illustrated manual contains all the science, engineering, art, philosophy, facts, and figures required for even the most clueless time traveler to build a civilization from the ground up. Deeply researched, irreverent, and significantly more fun than being eaten by a saber-toothed tiger, How to Invent Everything will make you smarter, more competent, and completely prepared to become the most important and influential person ever.

***

That’s it for this month’s list. Hope you like these books as much as I do! As always, please vote here.

Member’s List (message me if you want to be added/removed): @solitarystudies​​ @adhyayana-v​​ @gordinmegan​​ @appleinducedsleep​​ @morphedphase​​ @lilian-evans​​ @bowieziggyfan​​ @calebprior25​​ @bluebellraven​​ @love-witch-magic​​ @badasthesun​​ @theeezoneee​​ @montaguest​​ @wanderlustingdreamer​​ @csloreen​​ @elfspectations​​ @astreamoflight​​ @engineeriblr​​ @chemistrybaby6-022x10-23​​ @pepperpaprikash​​ @bubblylion​​

[joaquinwhorres]

The Fool (Ch. 5) {Fred Weasley x F!OC}

SUMMARY ››››› After getting tangled up with the Weasley Twins during the events of the Quidditch World Cup, Wren Collings’ life takes a turn for the chaotic. It threatens everything she has going for her, but she’s not convinced that’s entirely a bad thing.

PAIRING ››››› Fred Weasley x Female OC

WORD COUNT ››››› 5,327

WARNINGS ››››› There is no depression or mental health issues in this story, but there are mentions of death, violence, abuse, some PTSD, etc. As most of the specific warnings revolve around major plot points or are found throughout most chapters, I’m just going to rate certain chapters on the movie scale. This is chapter PG-13.

A/N ››››› This ended up shorter than expected but posted sooner than expected. Since I’m needy, please let me know what you think via reblog, message, ask, etc.

Series Masterlist | Read on ff.net | Read on AO3

"That's it. You officially need a break," Alicia decided, pulling Wren's copy from Advanced Potion Making out from under her forearm. Wren made a noise of protest, reaching up to try to grab the book back from her dormmate, only for Alicia to hold it up out of reach.

"Alicia, I need that."

"Nope," Alicia answered back, popping the p. "You need to relax. You've spent the past two weeks with your nose in this book. Lee says you've already figured out the potion. At this point, you're just obsessing over answers you won't get until you make it."

Wren huffed, sitting up on her bed and glaring at Alicia. "I'm trying to keep the boys out of the hospital wing."

Angelina snorted from her bed, pulling Wren's attention to her. "That's going to involve several sticking charms and maybe a good Body-Bind Curse."

"The only adult they spend more time with than Filch is Madame Pomfrey," Alicia nodded with some finality. "Your potion's fine. You said you even had Cedric check it."

She had, and even he hadn't been able to spot any potential problem spots. Her face must have softened some because Alicia let out a triumphant Aha! which made Wren think she was spending a bit too much time with Nora. This was perhaps more dangerous than anything that could happen with the potion.

"See? You deserve a break."

"Get your mind off it," Angelina added.

"Easier said then done," Wren said, throwing herself back into her pillows. "Between this and classes, it's not like I'm brimming with opportunities to relax."

Alicia turned to Angelina giving her a very significant look. Angelina, for her part, returned the look with a very clear, stern, no. The two girls held each other's stares for a long moment as Wren looked between the two of them, her brow crinkling in confusion.

"For Wren?" Alicia's voice took on a slight pleading tone, and Angelina let out a long-suffering sigh, hanging her head.

"Fine."

The absolute glee on Alicia's face at Angelina's apparent defeat was almost laughable. In fact, it took just about all of Wren's self-control for Wren to keep herself from laughing.

"I'm missing something," Wren said, fighting to keep the corner of her mouth down.

Angelina looked up at Wren with an exhausted sort of resignation. "Apparently I'm having a birthday party on Friday." Alicia turned to Wren, widening her eyes with excitement. Wren smiled reaching out for her copy of Advanced Potion Making, and Alicia passed it over. "But nothing big!" she pointed an accusing finger at Alicia.

"How big can she make it in two days?" Wren asked, raising an eyebrow.

Angelina scowled. "You'd be surprised."

"I promise we'll keep it small and quiet."

"Small and quiet," Angelina repeated with a nod. "And if it's not--just remember I know a lot about you Alicia Spinnet. And I know there are certain things you might not want certain people to know about."

Interest piqued, Wren turned to face Alicia who had narrowed her eyes at Angelina. "You wouldn't."

"And you wouldn't throw me a huge birthday party, would you?" Angelina asked lightly, a bit of a smile turning up her lips as she began stacking her books on the bed.

"Well played, Johnson."

Angelina didn't respond, but there was a certain lightness to her movies as she slid from her bed, picking her books up before making her way to the door.

"Have fun with Katie. Don't forget to invite her!" Alicia called after her, and Angelina waived before exiting the dorm.

There was a beat of silence as both Alicia and Wren stared at the door. The moment stretched one breath, two, three…

"Fred and George are right, you are more devious than you look," Alicia said, spinning back around to face Wren. "You had me convinced you were going to have a breakdown."

Wren laughed. "I still can't believe Angelina needs to be tricked into having a birthday party."

Alicia rolled her eyes shaking her head. "You remember her birthday second year, don't you? We threw her that birthday party and Lee brought those enchanted balloons?" Wren couldn't believe she'd forgotten those balloons. They had filled the common room. When popped they cheered for Angelina, and when the air was let out of them slowly, they literally sang her praises. Not only had Angelina never been one to be the center of attention, but some of the compliments they sang about her were rather...romantic in nature. Wren remembered attempting to corral as much of the balloons as possible and pop them all at once to get it over with. The whole thing had been a complete spectacle leading to a common room had been full of laughter and an extremely mortified Angelina.

Alicia must have seen the memory dawn on Wren because she let out a sigh. "Ever since she hasn't trusted us enough to throw her a party."

"Tell me you haven't enlisted Lee's help for this one," Wren said with a smile.

Alicia paused, her mouth dropping open slightly before a sheepish look overtook her features. Wren laughed out.

"He's the only one able to get us some fire whiskey!"

Wren raised both of her eyebrows at Alicia who sighed, running a hand over her face. "I've made a huge mistake haven't I?"

Wren shook her head. "I'm sure we'll find out Friday."

Wren's eyes followed each jerk of the second hand.

Five.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One.

Two more minutes left.

Alicia had left a good twenty minutes ago with Lee and Katie, on their way to the Top Secret Location with the drinks and decorations. Wren and George were slated to come next with the food.

The boys had insisted on a phased departure so as not to draw too much attention to the fact that seven students had left the portrait hole all at once after hours. "A couple here and there the paintings turn a blind eye to," Fred had explained. "A large group at once? Someone's running off to a professor's study."

"Learned that the hard way," Lee chimed in.

So, they'd broken themselves up into groups each with a boy to guide them through the castle to the undisclosed location. Why the location had remained undisclosed was a small mystery that Wren hadn't been able to get a straight explanation for. But, seeing as it didn't really matter, and as George had guessed, she did rather enjoy the thrill of doing something she wasn't supposed to, Wren let it slide.

The second hand landed on 12, and Wren felt her stomach drop as if she were diving on a broomstick. She swallowed hard, standing up from her bed and wiping her palms onto her jeans.

It wasn't the first time she'd snuck out after hours.

But sneaking out to meet a prefect was a bit different than sneaking out to hold a clandestine birthday party. It felt more like a bend than a break of the rules.

She took a breath in and headed towards the door, careful not to wake up Genevieve or Fiona. She closed it behind her with a soft click before padding down the stairs and into the common room. She was halfway down before she noticed George, standing in the shadows close to the portrait hole, hands stuffed in his pockets.

"Where's the food?" Wren whispered halfway across the common room. George raised an eyebrow and then gestured to two bags. The closer she got, the better Wren could see that they were bulging with carefully wrapped foods. In the back of her mind, she wondered if they would be too heavy for her to carry inconspicuously through the castle. Rather than voicing the question, she reached for one and slung it over her shoulder.

It was bulky and fell oddly against her side, but she felt confident enough that she'd be able to navigate it through any tight spaces.

"Ready then?" George whispered back, and she nodded, following him out of the portrait hole.

The pair walked silently through the castle halls. There was far less pressing themselves flat against walls, peeking around corners, and freezing to listen for any sounds of movement. Instead, it was simply a silent stroll through a still and dark castle. As if they had every right to be going where they were going.

George stopped suddenly, and Wren almost ran into his back, instead taking hold of his shoulder to steady herself and keep some distance as she pulled up short. George looked over his shoulder at her. "Can't keep your hands to yourself, can you?"

It was a miracle the castle was dark because Wren was sure her face was scarlet. Instead, she settled on a scowl as she yanked her hands back. "A little warning would be nice," she hissed, and George's smile grew as he turned back around, brushing aside a tapestry. He drew a large arc with his wand against the stone, and as if he'd just drawn a doorway, the stones in the center vanished, allowing them passage through the wall. George started in and Wren went to follow when he pulled up short again.

"As a warning, the passage is like 50 meters and then there's a staircase. I'll be stopping to go down the staircase."

Wren glared at him. "That's actually helpful to know, thank you." she snapped lightly, and George grinned, disappearing through the dark doorway and Wren followed.

The tapestry swung closed behind the pair, leaving the passageway completely dark until both students illuminated their wands. It was a fairly straightforward passageway, no choices for turn offs and pleasantly wide enough and tall enough for them to easily walk through. As she always did, Wren wondered how the twins had managed to find this passage and go to class and have friends and do homework and work on their secret projects and manage Quidditch practice along with all of the other routine survival tasks wizards and witches did every day. If she had to guess, the two sacrificed a lot of sleep. And good marks in their classes.

"You might be happy to know that the hard part is sneaking out. Coming back in should be a breeze," George said from ahead of her. His voice was still soft, but it was above a whisper, and the fact that he felt comfortable raising his voice put Wren a bit at ease.

"I'm worried you're lying to me."

"When have I ever lied to you, Wren? Or anyone for that matter?" Despite her certainty that there had been a time, she could not, at the present, name one. George took her silence for what it was: an acquiescence.

"The beauty of it is that tonight's Astronomy for sixth years. They'll be gone past one, and we can just come back in with them."

It was rather ingenious.

The two grew quiet once more as they drew nearer to the staircase, the sounds of their footsteps lightly echoing against the stones. It was on the fourth wraparound that Wren spoke.

"So, where are we going?" Wren asked, gathering her bag up into her arms to keep it from bouncing against her leg any more.

George looked up at her from his lower stair. "The forest."

"The forest?" Wren repeated.

"I know. I had half a thought to leave without you. You've been known to do some impulsive things in forests," George quipped turning back around to watch where he was going. "Last time I brought you into one--"

"I thought we agreed we didn't need to talk about that," Wren said, her voice high and tight.

"I don't remember making any such agreement," George shrugged with a cheeky grin.

"Well let's agree to it now," she huffed.

"Alright, I promise to only bring it up around those who already know."

"Who already knows?" Wren asked, her voice taking on a panicked quality. George shushed her.

"Just you, me, Nora, Fred, and Ginny. Lucky for you it's a tight circle."

"Don't bring it up around Nora and Fred. Fred will just tease me mercilessly about it and Nora will use it to get on my case about Simon."

"Not a fan of his?" George asked, his voice taking on a careful quality.

Wren went quiet. It was hard to explain the depth of Nora's detest. Even Wren wasn't exactly sure what had happened between her boyfriend and her cousin. It had happened slowly over time going from polite greetings to faces pulled behind the other's back and now snide little remarks.

Wren had asked Nora once why she didn't like Simon and she'd given her a litany of reasons (his friends, how he always had to have the answer, his strong opinions), but none of them seemed to make sense as THE reason.

When she'd asked Simon the same question he'd shrugged it off as Nora's problem.

"They don't get along. They're quite different."

George snorted and Wren glared. "What?"

"Bit of an understatement is all," he shrugged. Still suspicious, Wren decided to let it slide as the end of the stairs came within sight.

"So, you agree? Not to bring it up anymore? To anyone?"

"Thought I still had Ginny."

"George!"

"Fine. I agree," his lips curled up into a teasing smile. "Which you should know is a huge sacrifice. You're wonderfully fun to tease about this."

Wren ignored him, hopping down the last step and George led the rest of the way out of the castle in quiet.

When the pair emerged from the castle, it was from under a bush. George reached up and pushed at the bush's trunk, swinging it over to the side so he could scramble out. He reached out a hand to Wren and pulled her out. Wren dusted herself off as George put the bush back before nodding with his head to the left.

Wren felt fairly grateful that when George said "the forest" he didn't mean "in the depths of the Forbidden Forest. They tramped along just at the edge of the forest, the castle remaining visible the entire time. It seemed there were some places even Weasley Twins recognized were forbidden for a reason.

A blue glow up ahead gave away the celebration's spot. As they grew closer, Wren could hear Alicia giving orders to Lee and Katie, and the soft hum of music playing.

"Who's that?" Katie asked above the noise, and all sounds silenced.

"Just us," George called out as he and Wren entered into the small clearing.

It was gorgeous. Small lanterns hung from the trees, luminescent purple, blue, white, and yellow flowers filling each.

Bottles of Butterbeer, Prosecco, and Firewhiskey were gathered on a large stump draped with a purple table cloth.

The music was coming from a small radio placed at the foot of the stump.

At the moment, Lee was looking up at them from where he was bent over a small pile of firewood. Alicia stood over him, rubbing at her arms while Katie finished tying a purple HAPPY BIRTHDAY banner with shimmering gold letters between two trees.

"Hey," Lee grinned before turning back to lighting the fire. His features contorted in concentration and then a small smark appeared

"Got it!"

"You would have gotten in three minutes ago if you'd just said the bloody spell," Alicia muttered, stepping around him and the fire to come up to Wren and George. "Well, what do you think? Think she'll like it?" she asked, rubbing her hands together. It was difficult to tell if it was her nerves or the cold that inspired the action.

"I can't believe you did this all in fifteen minutes," Wren said, looking around to admire the set up once more.

Alicia shrugged sheepishly. "I may have forced Katie and Lee to leave a little earlier."

Wren felt the bag lift from her shoulder and turned as George took both of the snacks and followed Lee to the fallen tree draped with a tablecloth.

"I don't know if anyone can undo what Lee did and make her love birthday parties again, but this has to come pretty close."

"I hope so," Alicia said, turning to watch Fred and Lee lay out the snacks. Lee took his wand from his pocket and pointed it towards the bag. "Oi! No wands, Jordan!"

He looked back at her with a cheeky grin and slipped it back into his pocket before bending over to take the snacks out.

There wasn't much to set up after that. Alicia, Katie, and Lee had done much of the work so that by the time the telltale rustle and snapping of branches could be heard, all of them were sitting on logs, eagerly waiting for Angelina to appear.

Fred came through first, grinning ear to ear, before revealing Angelina looking rather exasperated behind him. The look vanished from her face with one look around the fire at her beaming friends and the whimsical little clearing.

"Oh," she said softly. She seemed to lose her grasp on words as she looked around, blinking rapidly. Alicia let out an excited squeal and launched herself towards Angelina, throwing her arms around her. Katie was not far behind.

"You like it, then?" Alicia asked, pulling back to look at Angelina who was still being rocked side to side by Katie.

"Yes," Angelina nodded, smiling, and the joy was evident in every ounce of Alicia's being. She swiveled to face the rest of the group and twirled a finger in the air.

"Butterbeer all around!"

The last time Wren had been to a birthday party that was this much fun, she had been eight. Her parents had gotten a host of magical creatures and miniaturized them so she had her own petting zoo for the afternoon. She and Nora had gone through and named each one and created a backstory, personality, and relationships between the creatures. In the end, Wren's mother brought out a cake that Aunt Kathleen had made and the family sat around eating cake and sharing stories.

It had been intimate and grand.

Which was exactly how Wren would describe Angelina's birthday party. Although the sweet naivete of a child's petting zoo was definitely lacking as they had each taken to keeping Angelina continuously supplied with firewhiskey. After all, there was no class tomorrow.

This was the same excuse Wren used when stealing her own shots of the burning liquor, throwing them back as she watched George spin Katie around to the music as Lee attempted to dance with a more than slightly tipsy Angelina.

Next to Wren, a body sank down and she looked up to find Fred, holding a bottle of firewhiskey by its neck. "Enjoying yourself?"

"Very much," Wren said, twisting her shot glass into the soft earth so that it didn't tip over. "It's a good break from all that," she said, flailing a hand towards the castle.

Fred let out a low laugh. "The professors have been particularly dragon-like recently."

Wren let out an amused exhale. "And there's the tournament and just all of life at Hogwarts," she shrugged. "It's nice to get away from it for a few hours."

"Not to ruin that," Fred said, and Wren had the distinct feeling that he was, in fact, about to ruin it. "But I did mean to tell you that Charlie sent back a letter, and he will not be giving us any of his hair. For some reason, he doesn't trust us."

Wren laughed and hung her head, shaking it before turning her attention back to meet Fred's gaze. She could see the fire flicker in his eyes making them shine a bit more. "I can't imagine why."

"Beats me," he shrugged, a grin tugging at the corner of his lips. "You'd think we'd done something terrible to him before, like put itching powder in his clothes right before he went out for a date in Hogsmeade."

Wren clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle her laughter as Fred's grin grew. Once she felt moderately under control, she dropped her hand. "Well, I think we'll be close enough even without the hair."

"Careful Collings, that sounds dangerously close to confidence."

"Guess your plan is working then," Wren smiled, absentmindedly twisting the shot glass once more.

Fred looked back to the fire and their dancing friends, and Wren followed suit. Alicia had stolen Angelina away from Lee to dance with her and Katie, and Lee and George were amusing themselves, pulling out embers from the fire and making them dance or explode into little tiny fireworks. "They usually do."

If Wren had known what the week leading up to Halloween would look like, she might have tried convincing Alicia to push back Angelina's birthday party to this week. Although, if she had succeeded, she probably wouldn't have been the best of company. And George probably would have had to pry her work from her hands and carry her out of the common room.

So maybe it was best that they'd had the party on Friday.

Still, the tension within the walls of Hogwarts was bordering near unbearable. Not just from the short-tempered professors and the mountains of homework, but the impending test to see if Wren could really create a potion that outsmarted Dumbledore.

She, Fred, George, and Lee had finally settled on a variant that they felt confident would work. (A variant which included no human hair despite the fact that Lee had been able to get some of his father's hair, no questions asked.) Still, Wren continued to double check and triple check her equations and ingredients. No trips to the Hospital Wing. The small mantra rang throughout her head as she made her way to class, checking off her list of measurements.

A hand gripped Wren by the inside of the elbow, tugging her to the side of the hallway. Instinctively she yanked her arm away, whirling on the person who grabbed her. Simon stood with a look of amused confusion.

"Did I scare you?"

"Yes," Wren breathed out, clutching her books tighter, pressing her notes into her chest.

"Sorry," he grinned, looking anything but.

There was a beat of silence between the two of them, and Wren checked over her shoulders at the rapidly clearing hallways. "I don't have long, I'm running late to Herbology."

The grin slid off of his face as he studied hers. "I haven't seen you in over a week."

Wren shook her head and turned to start heading to Herbology. "I know. I'm sorry. I've just been busy."

"Too busy for your boyfriend?" The words came out light, but Wren could hear the line of tension underneath them. She could feel it radiating from his presence next to her as he walked her out to the lawn.

"Too busy to breathe, really," Wren said offering a quick, frazzled smile.

Simon was frowning at her. Not quite anger, not quite concern. More of a disappointment than anything else. "What's got you too busy to breathe?"

Wren shook her head, shrugging. "Sixth year."

"Sixth year?" he repeated, and Wren nodded. "That's it."

"Yes. You were right; it's crushing."

Simon let out an angry sigh and stopped suddenly in his tracks. Despite the fact that the greenhouse was in sight and Professor Sprout had been docking points for tardy students for the first time ever, Wren slowed. "What's wrong?"

"I'm trying to have a conversation with my girlfriend and getting one word answers," Simon said, gesturing at her. "You're not still mad at me about the potion are you?"

"No," Wren shook her head. "I just need to go."

He raised a hand to his brow and rubbed it, letting out an angry exhale. "I don't understand why you're punishing me for trying to help you."

"What? No. I'm just busy--"

"Busy for a week and a half?" He interrupted, raising both his eyebrows.

Wren shrugged. "Yes. You know what it's like. You have weeks like this."

"Don't turn this back on me," he argued.

"Simon--" A bell tolled, alerting students they were officially late to class. Wren winced. "I have to go."

"Fine. Go. You've made it clear I'm not a priority, so carry on." Simon gestured to the greenhouse, and Wren shook her head, reaching out for his hand.

"It's not like that--"

"Maybe I'll see you later, if I'm worth your time," Simon said, snatching his hand away from Wren's and turning back up the hill.

Wren breathed in sharply, taking a moment to compose herself and blink back the tears before turning around and heading to the greenhouse. Quietly, she opened the backdoor and shuffled to her place next to Fred.

"Five points from Gryffindor, Ms. Collings," Professor Sprout admonished from the front. Wren nodded, keeping her head down and fixated on the glowing blue plant in front of her.

Fred bumped her shoulder with his own. "You ok?" he whispered.

Wren nodded, giving him a quick glance. His warm brown eyes were fixated on her face, his mouth tugged down with concern. It made it harder not to cry.

So, she looked back down at the plant and gave a halfhearted smile. "Fine."

She couldn't believe the day was here.

The past week seemed to have passed by in a blur. One moment she was agreeing to make the potion with Fred, George, and Lee. Then it was Angelina's birthday party, the final day of classes the other week, and the arrival of the other schools.

When they found out that Impartial Judge was the Goblet of Fire and that all Dumbledore was doing to assure participants were of age was drawing an age line, she was certain she would burst.

It was the best possible scenario, especially since Charlie turned down the twins' requests for some hair. There were only so many failsafes someone could put into an age-line versus layered complex enchantments on the cup itself.

This could work.

This could really work.

When the four of them had brewed the potion last night, none of them could keep from grinning. Compared to the mess of figuring that part out, getting selected seemed a breeze.

Yet, in spite of obstacle after obstacle being overcome, Wren couldn't shake the feeling of anxiousness that buzzed through her. And that was why she sat alone in the common room while the rest had all gone down to the entrance hall to watch prospective champions enter. She decided that she'd simply wait up here to hear how it went. If it worked, the boys would be leading a triumphant parade back. And if it didn't...she didn't want to see it.

"Angelina told me I might find you here," Fred said, dropping into the seat across from her. "Said you were too nervous to come down."

Wren's cheeks grew warm. She wished she wasn't such an obvious read. Especially when it came to her nerves. She was in Gryffindor and nervous about someone else taking a risk. It didn't make any sense.

"Unfortunately, your presence has specifically been requested by myself, George, and Lee, so you're going to have to come."

She snorted. "Is that how it works?"

"That's precisely how it works," Fred said, leaning back in his chair and looking at her with an amused smile. "But I am glad to have caught you here because I also wish to collect."

Wren tilted her head. "Collect?"

"You owe me, Wren Collings," Fred said, meaningfully as if that were enough to clear it up.

"I believe you owe me," Wren said, crossing her arms.

"Ah, fair point," Fred said, taking a piece of candy from his pocket and handing it over. Wren took it. "Now I've paid up, and you owe me."

Wren's eyes furrowed a bit and she offered the candy back. Fred held out a hand to stop her. "Nope, I want equal payment for services rendered."

"What are you on about?"

He turned to look at her with eyebrows raised and an expression that made her stomach twist. “You owe me a kiss.”

“I—” Wren started and he cut her off.

“I also helped to pull Nora to the trees. I just wasn’t first because I had to make sure Ginny didn’t run after the other lot. And George's been holding it over my head for while so…” Fred puckered his lips and Wren laughed in spite of herself.

“Absolutely not.”

“It doesn’t have to be anything fancy. Just a quick one; no one's around for a show.“

“No,” Wren shook her head, the smile slowly fading. “Because that other one--it was just an act of irrepressible gratitude.”

“Interesting because it looked rather like a kiss."

She shook her head again as if he'd missed it the first time. "No, I just wasn't thinking. I mean my head was completely gone. One moment I thought we were going to die, and then we didn't and--"

"You don't have to explain," Fred said, holding out a hand for her to take. Wren slipped her hands on his, and he squeezed it reassuringly. "You just have to bestow an act of irrepressible gratitude on me," he grinned. Wren snatched her hand back as he laughed out loud.

"Shove off," Wren snapped lightly, standing up from the table. Fred stopped laughing as he joined her, walking towards the portrait hole. They had just exited when Wren spun on him again. "None of the jokes in front of anyone else, ok? I don't want--I don't want anyone to get the wrong idea and then...it didn't mean anything and I--"

"Don't hurt yourself, Wren," Fred said with a shake of his head as he led the way down to the Great Hall. "It'll stay between us."

There was a small cheer from their friends when Wren appeared behind Fred. Everyone else had their eyes fixated on the cup which stood in the center of a glowing golden circle. Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, and Hermione hovered near their little group, each looking rather skeptically at George and Lee.

"Ready then?" Fred asked, clapping Lee on the shoulder.

"Who's going first?" Lee asked, looking between the two twins.

"I'll go," Fred said, pulling a slip of parchment from his parchment with his name and Hogwarts scribbled on it. He walked slowly up to the line and paused just before it. Wren's eyes were glued on him as he took a deep breath and then stepped over the line. Her mouth dropped open and George let out a triumphant yell and jumped in after Fred.

And then it went wrong.

A loud sizzling sound echoed around the Entrance Hall and then both of the twins were flying out of the circle, crashing into the stone floor. Wren lurched towards them, stopped only by Angelina's arm looped through hers. Then, there was a loud pop and Fred and George had each grown identical white beards, long enough to rival Dumbledore's.

Everyone laughed. Lee was bent over clutching at his middle, Katie was wheezing like she couldn't breathe, and even Hermione was giggling loudly. The twins stood up, brushing themselves off and upon one look at each other broke out into laughter as well.

Wren didn't laugh though.

"I did warn you," said a deep voice laced with amusement. The whole hall turned to see Professor Dumbledore emerge from the Great Hall, his eyes on Fred and George. "I suggest you both go up to Madam Pomfrey. She is already tending to Miss Fawcett, of Ravenclaw, and Mr. Summers, of Hufflepuff, both of whom decided to age themselves up a little too. Though I must say, neither of their beards is anything like as fine as yours."

Fred turned to Wren and wiggled his eyebrows at her, but she still couldn't bring herself to smile.

Because she had sent them to the Hospital Wing.

[themilky-way]

paris {s.r}

gif credit: sincerelycalum on tumblr

pairing: spencer reid x female! reader

summary: while working on a case in paris, you and spencer realize that there may be more to your friendship than you think. how long until the city of love casts a spell on you? based on this song.

warnings: none i think it’s just fluff  (like everything I write lol)

author’s note:  this long af bc this was supposed to be a series and this would’ve been the second part but the first one i posted didn’t do well lmao. so instead, just enjoy this one shot and maybe i’ll post the first one again if u guys want but idk. also we a lil bold in this fic bc we love confident queens

grabbing your go bag and cell phone from the charging port, you quickly made your way to the jet that was already waiting for departure. the team was ready to make their way to paris, france on a case for a serial killer that migrated from california. it had been difficult for everyone, considering the unsub wasn’t leaving much evidence. 

despite it being for work, you and the team were excited to explore one of the most beautiful cities in the world. if you thought about it, it was kind of like killing two birds with one stone: the opportunity to finally catch a gruesome killer and a vacation. morgan was practically shaking with anticipation as he kept getting up from his seat and bothering garcia every five minutes and then going back. 

“just think about it, baby, all the smokin’ hot people we’re gonna meet. I mean, it’s called the “city of love” for a reason!” derek rambled to penelope as she typed away rapidly on her computer. 

“this isn’t a vacation, sugar, but yes I’m aware of all the potential babes we might encounter. and for that, I prepared another bag,” she giggled as derek started to laugh along with her. he raised his hand to high five her and she lifted hers too, lightly patting it. 

“oh you’re bad bad aren’t you,” he laughed, and they both continued to talk too rapidly for the others to understand. meanwhile, you had grabbed your seat next to emily and right across from you was spencer. you and emily were talking about god knows what, the range going from guessing the types of desserts paris had to perhaps renting a motorcycle for your stay. the banter between the both of you was endless, and you even started watching a french movie to get some pointers on the language. 

between the jokes and wondering remarks, you didn’t really notice that spencer was observing you the whole time. sure, he could play it off as if he were judging both of his coworkers for their lack of knowledge on french culture and linguistics, but he wasn’t really doing that, was he? no, in fact, he was watching you in such depth, the way he’d look at the pages of a book, and taking in every aspect that you had to present. he was, in the most simplest way it can be described as, mesmerized.

the day spencer realized that he looked at you this way shocked him. to be completely honest, it scared the hell out of him. he never pictured you as anything more than a friend, and he always thought you were too relaxed for a job like this. he told himself that he’d leave the matter alone, that their would be no thinking or second-guessing of any kind. but the second he’d lay his eyes on you, it’s like the rules he made up never quite existed. however, the more he looked back on it, there was one question that urged this matter forward: am I gonna find out why?

he shook out of his deep concentration to look up at the voice that was now speaking to him. his eyes focused again and he stared at you confused.

“reid, you okay? you’re spacing out on me, buddy,” you said, head turned slightly from the position you were seated in. you had shifted in your seat to face emily, your left leg bent on the cushion and your right giving you stability on the ground. 

“sorry, I was busy thinking.”

“well, try not to use that big ol’ brain of yours too much yet, we’re gonna need it when we land,” you said, giving him a small wink. he gave you a small smile while a tiny smear of rose-colored blush crept its way onto his cheeks. it was a friendly gesture; everyone on the team did it so you thought, “why the hell not?”

reid opted to read a little bit while on the plane so that he could get in some new interrogating tactics for when they met the unsub. you and emily continued to watch french movies and spot all of the hot actors and actresses you thought would be fake, penny and morgan, well they were on a whole different level of fun. the only ones quiet and doing some work was hotch, jj, and rossi. 

the plane slowly began to descend, butterflies erupting in your stomach from the fall, before the captain announced, “we are now ready to descend and are getting ready for arrival.”

when the captain finished, hotch began, “alright, listen up, team. the location of this case was by chance and we shouldn’t get distracted by anything or anyone. do your job quickly and efficiently as you’ve always had.” he spoke sternly, his shoulders were straight and his face emotionless and heavy with sleep. to any other person, hotch would be a zombie who helped solve murder cases, but to the bau team, he was their leader and they admired him. 

“oh, come on, hotch! if we work extra hard these few days and have enough time by the end of the wee-” you began before getting cut off. 

“yes, we can stay a while and explore the city. the unsub and the evidence altogether looks promising, so hopefully we can wrap it up quick. but don’t stray from your path in the meantime.”

everybody nodded and “yes, sir’d” before standing up and grabbing their luggage from the compartments at the top of their seats. everyone walked out in pairs and headed for the taxi cars that were waiting for them. you took emily, morgan took reid, jj and penelope partnered up, and of of course rossi and hotchner stuck together. at different paces, the team agreed at a nearby hotel closest to the paris police department that had called them. getting your bags in the car, along with the rest of the girls’, you made your way to the hotel to check in and drop your luggage off.

at first glance, it looked like a simple building; a cream color adorning the walls and some very intricate, sophisticated street lamps aligned on the perimeter of the parking entrance. before entering, there was a sort of roundabout you had to pass in order to reach to valet parking, and in the center of the roundabout, was a water fountain. it was simple, yes, but to parisians only. to outsiders, like the bau, it was already quite elegant. the ladies, including you, pitched in a little to pay for the ride and once you got out, there was a young man who offered to take your bags inside. 

“avez-vous besoin d'aide, madame?” the boy said. all of you looked at each other a little confused because even though you thought it might’ve helped, watching french movies for nine hours with emily wasn’t doing it. 

“he’s asking if you need help with these. here,” penny clarified before putting her tiny hello kitty handbag in yours, “let me handle it.”

she walked up to the somewhat tall boy, looked him over once, and said in the thickest french accent there was, “oui je fais mon doux muffin merci beaucoup.” she did a tiny hair flip to her blonde curls and came back to where the rest of you were standing.

“penny, uh, what exactly did you tell that boy?” emily said, stifling down a small giggle.

“nothing, i just said “yes” that I needed help and “thank you very much.”

“no, no, the other part. there must’ve been another part to it. tell us!” jj said, grabbing penelope by the shoulders and shaking them lightly. 

“what other part?”

“the one where you made a boy dressed in victorian era clothing blush like a maniac over some luggage,” you laughed. to this, garcia started to laugh too and then even harder. you and the rest of the girls had puzzled grins on their faces, but the inkling of seeing your friend laugh so hard was reaching your guys’ throats too. 

when she finally caught a breath to speak, she said, “I called him my sweet muffin!” at this, you and the girls broke into heaves of laughter, and couldn’t stop. you and jj had to bend down and place a hand on your stomachs’ to stop them from hurting a little. after a while, there was no words just the intake of small breaths and exhaling them out for control. when the fun comedy was over, you guys followed the boy and his friend inside the hotel lobby. `you took turns registering, and when you were all done, you saw that the rest of the team had beat you to it. they were sitting down in a cushion area near the front desk and were waiting for you guys. 

“okay, now that the rooms are ready, you all can pick a partner to dorm with. it doesn’t really matter, but just choose wisely. I know some people get too crazy when they’re together,” hotch announced, flashing a look at you and garcia before handing out keys. you and emily teamed up per usual, and the rest pairing up in the same order they had been in before. once everyone was ready, you started to make your way up to your rooms while making small chatter with the rest of the gang. emily inserted the key into the lock of the door, and as soon she opened the door, your eyes’ were met with the most delicate and luxurious room you both have ever encountered. 

on either side of the room were two king sized beds with victorian style bed sheets; the design on them were floral, the pastel shades of the roses tracing the outline of the bed beautifully. the ends of the sheets were long, but shabby, which added a nice, elegant, and almost romantic feel to it. 

in the middle of the two beds was a small isle that allowed one person to walk on it at a time. at the end of it, was the entrance to the balcony, which gave view to the famed Eiffel Tower. the small cities, parks, and lakes, that made up the ground portion of the tower were now completely lit up, giving way to an entire new feeling for you. you set your bags on the bed, pushing the cushion down with your hand to feel the softness of it, and made way to the balcony.

“i’ll be right out here, em, if you need me,” you said, waiting for the small “yup” that came from her before proceeding. as soon as your leg crossed the small threshold to the other side, the fresh, cool breeze of the night flooded your senses. you smiled and took in the emotion it gave you, fully crossing over to stand against the railing now. you took in the sights first. the trees that shaped the parks swiveled against the current of the wind, couples of all ages walking hand in hand, admiring how the moon and the stars matched so well to their love. the lights of the tower gleaming brightly and almost seemingly looking at you, as if they asked you, “don’t you realize, (y/n)? don’t you pay attention?” 

paris, and everything it was offering you at that moment, put you through a trance. one where you began to actually speak to the lights, the very same ones that millions of others had fallen in love under. “realize what? I do pay attention, i always have, but what is it I need to notice?”

you kept staring and looking around, if the lights actually were talking to you and this wasn’t a dream, and that you weren’t crazy. you looked around the balcony and walked on it to spy a tiny clue your instincts informed you about. soon enough, you noticed that the balcony was shared by the room next door. you placed your right hand on the rail to kneel down a bit and see if you could figure out who the room belonged to.  

“maybe it’s penny, oh god please be penny. i’m not in the mood to see rossi in scooby-doo underpants...” you whispered fairly. just when you saw a dainty silhouette about to exit the restroom, you turned around to your end of the balcony. 

“(y/n)? are you spying on- (y/n), we’ve been here one hour! our hot, paris boyfriends can wait until we catch the unsub,” emily, whose head was the only part of her body on the outside of the balcony, whispered. “come on, get changed into some comfy clothes. we can take a look at the victimology together.”

standing up, you made one quick glance at the room and the figure was already gone and so was the light. thanks for that, eiffel tower lights, you thought. you crossed to you room again and took a shower before arranging your clothes according to the days of your stay. you put your pajamas on and climbed onto one side of emily’s bed to wait for her to come out of the restroom, since you guys took turns brushing your teeth. 

after about a half and hour of rearranging victimology statements and connecting photos from the crime scene, the both of you were ready to go to sleep. emily turned off her lights and you took one last glance at the view before doing the same. 

and then you heard footsteps on your balcony. 

----------

“you guys think I can woo a french girl tonight?”

“honey, with those shoes? not a chance,” garcia pointed out. morgan made a pout at her response and then acted as if he was offended. the team laughed and then raised their glass in unison and took a sip. the case, overall, went well. you guys managed to catch the unsub in an isolated tunnel and brought him over to the parisian authorities. you and jj had taken the only victim left alive to the station to make one final statement to the news. the rest of bodies were given proper burial and the families were finally given closure. 

because the team had performed beyond excellent, and there were still a few days left before your departure, the team opted on celebrating on a night out. currently, you and your friends were seated around a small circular table inside a local bar, chatting away at whatever came to mind. 

you chose to only drink mineral water, mostly because you knew that you were technically still at work and you didn’t want to risk being drunk in case of an emergency. reid, in a similar manner, chose a glass of soda to toast with. but while doing so, he found himself looking at you in the same way he did on the plane. he hadn’t been able to take in your features that night, but as everyone was so deeply distracted, he began to notice everything. 

he looked over your outfit for tonight, a red, plaid mini skirt with a black turtleneck. the shirt itself was fitted to your body and allowed your angles and curves to be accentuated perfectly. the skirt permitted your legs to be highlighted in a decent, and elegant manner. your hair was loose tonight, and with every breeze that made its way through the bar windows, it caused small strands to caress your face lightly and some to stick to your lip gloss. the heels, oh god, the heels. it drove him crazy; the delicate way in which they clicked when you walked on the concrete, how they would sometimes cause you discomfort and force you to stop and fix it,  how your gentle hand had grasp his shoulder for balance or else you’d fall. 

everything about you tonight was immaculate. no matter how hard he forced himself to look away from you, to stop thinking of you in any other way than a coworker, and to just drink his soda which was becoming less carbonated with every passing second, he just couldn’t. and it was scaring the hell out of him. 

you on the other hand, were still trying to decipher what the tower lights had asked you. what was there to realize? you were here, in paris, the city where millions of people fall in love, to fight a serial killer. the chances of you finding love, especially on a balcony where you had spied on a stranger, were slim. 

by the time you finished your thought process, you noticed that hotch was looking at you with a puzzled expression. 

“everything alright, (y/n)?” he softly asked you. 

“yes, sir, just thinking. is it okay if I head back to my hotel?”

“yes, of course, you might even catch reid on the way there. he left a couple of minutes ago.”

“thank you, sir. good night,” you spoke and got up from your chair, adjusting your skirt as you did so. huh, he left? weird, you thought. you left a tip for the waiter and bid farewell to the rest of your companions before grabbing your coat and clutch and exiting the bar. 

it was rather close to your hotel, so within a few minutes you had reached your dorm and set your things down. sitting down on the edge of the bed, you bent over slightly to unlatch your heels and slip them off your feet. you set them aside and you laid on your back for a few minutes. the only light in your room was the bathroom’s as you didn’t like strong lights shining during the night, so these dimmed ones would do. 

you closed your eyes for a little while and just let the sounds of the city flow through you. you had one opportunity to experience paris, and you weren’t gonna take it for granted. for a while, only your small inhales and exhales of breath were audible, the aura of the room peaceful. 

it wasn’t until you heard footsteps, the very same ones from that other night, on your balcony. your eyes flew open and you pushed your body upward to look back at your window. this is my shot, my chance, you thought. could it be a super old man who was here on vacation? yes. could it rossi, who might’ve gotten the dorm next to yours? maybe. were the possibilities of who the hell was on your balcony in a parisian hotel endless? again, yes. 

but you had to see for yourself, figure out what exactly the universe, paris, was telling you. so you got up from your bed and creeped quietly to the window and slid it up. you crossed the threshold, and even though your light was limited, you were able to make out a tall, thin figure. you inched a little closer, hands crossed over your chest to appear somewhat like a normal human. you wouldn’t have figured it out until he spoke. 

“(y/n)?”

his voice sent shivers down every inch of your body, and no, it wasn’t the cold air of the city, it was him. it was spencer. it caught you by surprise, the feeling his voice gave you, but you tried to play it off. he never made you feel this way, why now? 

“(y/n)? you okay?” he spoke again. this time you lightly shook your head and walked closer to where he was standing so you could lean on the railing now. his body followed yours, and now you were able to make out the perpexled look on his eyes. 

“hi, yeah, I’m good. just didn’t expect to find you here, that’s all,” you spoke quietly, unsure of yourself. he noticed, obviously he noticed, it’s spencer. 

“yeah, same here. I heard footsteps the other night here but I had just taken a shower so I didn’t come out until later.” you glanced up at him when you realized that he was the figure that was in the restroom you’d seen. the one you had spied on and probably would’ve seen naked if emily hadn’t interrupted. a tiny blush made its way onto your cheeks, and you were quite thankful the dark covered the rosy color a little. 

but spencer wasn’t dumb, much less stupid, and if he noticed every little detail about you tonight, he saw how you became around him. and god, he sure did like it. “oh, well that’s good, i guess,” was all you could mutter. so you turned your body now to face the tower, elbows on the railing and hands folded together. he saw the shift in stance and he followed, so now you were both side by side and looking at a view that somehow resembled your emotions for one another. 

“hey spence?”

“yeah?”

“have you ever fallen in love?”

his voice hitched a little and he felt his throat tighten. he let out a small cough to mask the impact of your question, but he found the strength in his voice to retort.

“what makes you ask?”

“no, no reason, i was just curious, ya know. being in paris and all,” you answered. you began to feel intrusive for asking such a personal question, but it had seemed easy for you to do so because of your friendship. you were looking at him as you replied, but then looked back towards the view again. the both of you stood in silence for a couple minutes, your guilt seeping in more at this point. 

“only once. it didn’t end well for the both of us,” he broke the silence. you turned your head to look at him, and you were about to open your mouth to say something when he spoke again. 

“but it happened a long time ago. i don’t think about her anymore.”

you straightened up a little and you continued to face him, prying a little deeper than you should be. “so who do you think about now?”

he glanced at you, his face quickly returning back to the nature displayed in front of him and then looked back to you. a small grin began tugging at his lips, as if he meant to ask, “is this your way of playing with me?”

you gazed up at him and took this sudden swerve of confidence to glance at his lips, and then back up to him, your own smile forming. 

“she’s standing on a balcony with me in paris.” 

[thdorkmagnet]

Light of the Sun and Star Chapter 39: Once Upon a Starco

Summary: His whole life Marco Diaz has been raised by monsters, living under the cruel rule of their leader, Toffee. But one day Marco escapes into Mewni where he meets a magical princess and Mewman like himself, who begins teaching him all about her world. Together they will learn about life, love, and the lights within each of them, as they change their world forever.

Chapter Synopsis: While Marco and Janna are busy in the Impure village, Star tells the twins a bedtime story, one that happens to include a young couple that is quite a bit similar to another couple we all know and love. Just a cute mini-chapter for you all.

Check out my other stuff on Fanfiction! 

Index

Disclaimer: Star vs and all its characters are owned by Daron Nefcy and Disney. All rights go to them.

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Star sat on the floor with her young cousins watching as they played together with their toys, trying to fight back a yawn as exhaustion threatened to take over. It had been a very long day for her. After Marco and Janna had left for their "camping trip," Star and Jackie had spent a couple of hours playing and entertaining Daisy and Violet, trying to distract them from their pestering thoughts and questions about where the others had gone off to.

That was until the blond had been whisked away by a group of servants, telling her that the princes and princesses had arrived for their meeting. That had let to a strenuous few hours of peace talks (it seemed Star's Free Travel Act had done the trick on calming many of the more violent Monster's fears, giving them more free reign to come and go as they pleased in the other kingdoms all except the stubborn Johansen's but Star and Rocky were starting to get them to crack), dodging bits of pudding sent her way by the messy Glossaryk, and, of course, Pony Head's long-winded speech about how she was the prettiest member, leading to everyone collectively agreeing she was just to get her to finally stop.

But that had hardly been the end of it, practically the moment Star called the meeting to adjourn, Violet and Daisy had appeared (almost as if they had been waiting in the shadows for her this whole time) jumping in her lap and telling her to come play with them. Before the blond royal could even think to decline, they had each grabbed onto a hand and pulled her out of her chair, eagerly dragged her out of the room and straight into theirs. They had picked up their game right where they had left off which Star spent the rest of the day finishing with them. Jackie had joined in at some point (Star really couldn't say when) and had been happy and eager to play along with the three Butterfly's.

Now it was all Star could do to stay awake, her eyes threatening to close at any moment. The only thing keeping her going at this point were thoughts about Marco, wondering where he was and what he was doing. She'd be lying if she said she didn't miss him terribly and the only good thing about staying busy was that it kept her mind off of her boyfriend and friend's escapade into the unknown.

Still, despite her efforts, Star felt her mind beginning to drift, her body leaning heavily against Jackie, who sat on the floor beside her. "Star!" came a tiny yell and the blond royal sat up straight, snorting once as she was forcefully pulled from her sleep. She looked over with droopy eyes as the twins glared at her, Daisy shouting, "You're supposed to be helping us save the princess from the ferocious dragon!"

"Oh right," Star said, yawning into her hand. "Where were we again?"

"The princess was locked in the tower after being poisoned by the dark mage," Violet explained quickly.

"Dark mage?" Star repeated in confusion.

"Yeah, y'know Star, the one with the magic ball that can see the future," Jackie pitched in helpfully, giving Star an encouraging glance.

"Ah yes, that dark mage," Star said with a nod, trying to hide her smile.

"Okay than Star you can beeee..." Violet began, rifling through their toys for one that fit her cousin, frowning in concentration.

That was until they heard the dreaded call. "Girls, it's time for bed." Star and Jackie looked over to see Lily standing in the doorway, only to jump in surprise as the twins began to whine loudly.

"But moooommm," Violet cried. "We're in the middle of our game."

"Well you can finish it tomorrow," Lily replied, her face neutral despite her two grumbling childrens' best efforts to break her.

"But we won't remember where we're at," Daisy said, giving her mom a pouting look.

"Well I'm sorry but bedtime is bedtime," their mother stated fairly, showing zero signs of changing her mind on said subject. "Now go brush your teeth and get ready."

The two rose reluctantly, angrily stomping out of the room, still mumbling things about how unfair their mother was or how stupid bedtimes were. Star had been watching quietly, not wanting to risk jeopardizing her aunt's efforts, that was until she heard little Daisy whisper, "This stinks, Marco's not even here for our bedtime story."

This caused Star to pause, her mind wandering to her boyfriend for just an instant, and without thinking, she rose to her feet and said, "I could do the bedtime story tonight, y'know since Marco's not here to do it."

Everyone in the room turned to Star in surprise at this statement, but the girls quickly asked in elation, "Really?!"

"You promise?" Daisy added a second later.

"Sure, why not?" Star said with a confident shrug. "But you have to get ready super quick or I won't be able to."

The girls let out a cheer before racing down the hall to the bathroom, not wanting to miss out on an opportunity like this.

Lily watched her daughters go, before turning to Star with a worried frown. "Are you sure about this, Star?" Lily asked as she looked her niece up and down. "You look awfully tired."

"Aw, I'm fine," Star said with a wave of her hand, ignoring the stiffness in her body at the sudden motion. Or the fact that her brain was trying to desperately shut down for the night. A promise was a promise and she didn't break those, no matter what. "I can handle a simple bedtime story. How hard could it be?"

…

Star watched as Lily finished tucking Daisy and Violet into bed: kissing them on the forehead, pulling the sheets up to their chins, brushing the hair out of their eyes, the whole works, all the while, the blond was doing her best to look awake and alert, despite not feeling either. She made sure to sit up straight in her chair in the hopes this would somehow convince her aunt. Jackie sat beside her, her body facing backward on the chair with her head resting on its back as she watched the mother-daughter moment silently. If Jackie was tired, she didn't show it, her eyes full of energy and radiance even at this moment, but Star thought she could spot her friend's body drooping just a little bit more than usual.

Once Lily was done, she said softly to the girls, "Goodnight, my darlings. Behave yourselves for Star."

"Night mom," Daisy and Violet replied in soft mutters, sounding like they were already half-asleep.

Star smiled as she watched Lily exit the room, closing the door softly behind her. See, she told herself. Nothing to worry about. I'll be lucky to make it through one book before they're asleep.

The moment the door was shut though, the girls sprang up from the bed, instantly ruining their mother's efforts to tuck them in, bright and (more importantly) energetic smiles on their faces. Daisy hopped off the top bunk, using the side railing to help fling herself onto her sister's bed, landing on the soft mattress with a giggle. The two began jumping on the bottom bunk while chanting, "Story! Story! Story!"

Star's mouth dropped open, unable to believe the girls could have so much energy this close to bedtime, while her mind simply commented, Or maybe not. But luckily for her, Jackie was able to regain control of the situation. "Girls, if you don't calm down Star might not want to read to you two tonight," she said simply and the two instantly ceased their jumping. They laid back down on the bed, side by side, and now facing toward Star, their heads propped up on their elbows and their little legs kicking behind them. "Okay, we're ready," Violet said in a barely contained shout.

Star stared at the girls blankly for a second, until she felt a tap on her shoulder from Jackie and quickly snapped out of her stupor with a shake of her head. "Oh right," the blond royal said, bending down to look through the books she had grabbed from the shelf beforehand. "So what would you guys like to hear? We've got 'The Princess and the Peacock' or 'The Littlest Piggoat'. Oh here's one of my favorites from when I was a kid, 'The Year the Stump Stood Still'!"

"Star, Big Brother doesn't read us a bedtime story," Violet stated as if it were obvious.

"He doesn't?" Star asked, looking up at the two with confusion.

The girls shook their heads. "No. He tells us a bedtime story," Violet replied.

"Wait, he does," Star said

"Yep!" Daisy said with bright enthusiasm. "Big Brother's the best at bedtimes stories!"

Star wasn't too surprised by that. Marco was the best at everything he did, always putting his heart and soul into every task. But while normally she admired that quality about him, she now realized just how difficult it was going to be to try and take his place. How could she possibly follow in his footsteps when he was most likely leagues ahead of her on the story game? Especially since she had never done anything like that before. But she knew she needed to say something so she asked, nervously, "Okay, um, well, how does Marco usually start?"

"Once upon a time," the twins said as one.

"Right, uh, 'Once upon a time...'" Star began hesitantly, looking over to Jackie for help, but the skater girl just shrugged, mouthing, 'Make something up'.

"Once upon a time," the blond royal repeated, biting her lip as she looked around for any idea of what to say next. Her eyes landed on the small dragon toy sitting on the floor and she said immediately, "Once upon a time there were dragons."

The twins shared a look, before Violet asked, "Dragons?"

"Yes. Hundreds of dragons who lived in mountains and volcano," Star said, thinking on her feet.

"Were they nice dragons?" Daisy asked curiously.

"Uh yes, they were very, very nice dragons." The blond royal paused as she saw Violet starting to look bored, rolling her eyes. "All... except one."

This gained the creepy child's attention as she instantly perked up and stared at her cousin with a curious expression and Star felt a spark of inspiration, wanting to keep their interest longer, saying in a dramatic tone, "A horrible, bad dragon who would go around burning down people's houses and villages. The people hated the bad dragon but he was too powerful for them to stop."

"What a meanie!" Daisy shouted, her cheeks puffing up in anger.

"Why didn't the other good dragons stop him?" Violet asked.

"Because they were afraid of the bad dragon," Star explained, growing more and more confident with her story as it went on."But one day while one of the good dragons was out flying, he found something..."

"What? What did he find?" Daisy and Violet asked as one, their cheek marks glowing more than usual.

Star smiled confidently, knowing she had the two right where she wanted them, saying softly, "A young boy."

…

The dragon was in the middle of his morning flight, enjoying the cool morning breeze brushing against his scales as he soared through the endless blue sky, when he heard a cry from the world below. The dragon curious what the sound was began circling the area, listening intensely for any further sounds. After a few seconds, more cries were carried up to him by the wind as if warning him something was wrong and begging for his help. The dragon feeling his heart go out to whoever was in need decided to fly down and see what was making all the racket.

He descended quickly, the clouds parting as he finally was able to spot the source of the cries, a small baby lying in the soft grass, screaming its head off. The dragon was surprised to see the tiny soul, completely alone with no signs of any people nearby. It seemed like the baby had crawled away from his parents. The dragon raised its nostrils and sniffed the air, hoping to smell humans nearby but instead got a whiff of smoke and ash in the distance and turning in that direction he could see the dark pillar rising in the distance. It seemed that this boy was alone after all.

The dragon looked back down at said child, the lone survivor it seemed of the terrible accident and wondered what to do with him. He watched as the child continued to scream and cry, its tiny legs and arms kicking and waving wildly, and the dragon decided right then and there to help the child, knowing its heart couldn't take the sound of bawling much longer.

So, very slowly it flew closer to the child, waiting for its screams to turn to ones of fear, as did most things when they saw a dragon for the first time. But to the dragon's surprise, the child didn't scream or cry, it started to laugh, its chubby little hands reaching out to touch the dragon's snout.

"Wait! The baby liked the dragon?" Violet interrupted loudly.

"Yes," Star said.

"But why? Wasn't it afraid?"

"I guess the baby knew the dragon was friendly and wasn't going to hurt him," Star explained.

"Yeah Violet, that was obvious," Daisy added with a know-it-all tone.

"Was not!"

"Was too!"

"Ahem," Star said, clearing her throat. "Can I please continue the story now."

"Oh right, go ahead," Violet replied.

The dragon startled by the child's reaction stared at it in confusion for a second. But seeing its innocent, smiling face staring up at with no fear or concern, the dragon moved closer. It snuffled the boy's hair with its large nostrils, checking to make sure he wasn't hurt, making the baby laugh again. But seeing no damage to the child upon closer inspection, it very gently used its snout to push the boy over onto his chest so that it could grab onto the back of the baby's shirt with its massive fangs, being very slow and careful to avoid hurting him, before lifting off the ground again and flying away.

"Wait shouldn't the dragon check and make sure the baby's parents really aren't around, cause otherwise wouldn't he be kidnapping him?" Daisy suggested.

The dragon lifted off the ground again and flew away, but not before sailing over the burnt down village a few times to make sure there weren't any other survivors, eventually coming to the conclusion that the baby was indeed the only human around and flew him back to the cave he lived in.

…

"So why'd the dragon decide to raise the baby himself?" Violet asked, cocking her head to the side with a curious look.

"Cause it was the right thing to do," Star explained simply. "He saw the baby needed help and did what he could to help him."

"And he did it cause he loved the baby, right Star?" Daisy added, giving her cousin a bright grin.

Star nodded. "Uh-huh, that too," the blond royal agreed. "The dragon became the baby's dad and took care of him."

"Aww, that's so sweet!" Daisy cooed, squishing her cheeks with her hands as her eyes shimmered with joy.

Violet hid her own smile, finding that very sweet too but not wanting to show it. "So what happened next, Star?" the creepy child asked.

"Yeah did the bad dragon find out about the baby?!" Daisy exclaimed in fear.

"Well, you two will have to be quiet so Star can tell us," Jackie reminded them and both girls immediately covered their mouths with their hands to stifle any further outbursts. Star giggled at her cousins' antics before continuing the story where she had left off. "Now where was..." the blond muttered. "Oh right, so after that, the boy spent years living in the cave with his dad and the other dragons..."

…

Many, many years went by and the boy lived in peace with his dragon family. But with every passing year the boy found himself craving knowledge, curious about the outside world, and although he loved his family very much he wanted to leave to see the world. But the boy kept his secret dream to himself, fearing hurting his family's feelings by telling them his true desires, knowing he was safe so long as he was in the caves.

Or so he thought.

One day, the bad dragon found out about the boy and became furious. He knew this boy came from one of the villages he had burned down and was angry that someone had managed to escape right under his nose.

"I knew it was the bad dragon that burned the boy's village down!"

"Violet shhh!"

And not only had the boy survived but the others had kept him a secret from the bad dragon all these years. The bad dragon was so enraged that his roar shook the mountaintop, making the earth beneath the boy's feet rumble, causing him to shake in fear. The bad dragon then declared that humans were not allowed to be in the caves and that he should be cast out at once.

The other dragons said they wouldn't do this for he was their son and they loved him.

The bad dragon laughed evilly, a horrible, terrible sound that made the boy shake even more. "Love?" he fumed. "You fools actually believe in such a pathetic emotion. Love makes you weak, love makes you helpless. True strength comes from hatred and since all of you have forgotten this then you can stand aside so that I may dispose of this nuisance myself!"

The bad dragon went to gobble the poor boy up, who was too frightened to move, but before he could the other dragons did the unthinkable... they attacked the bad dragon!

The bad dragon roared in anger as his own kind fought him, shouting vile curses at them, but the others did not care, they no longer feared the bad dragon's evil. Then the good dragon, the one that had found and raised the boy, shouted to his child, "Quickly, you must run from here and never come back!"

The boy obeyed, turning and running from the cave as fast as he could, he never looked back but he shivered as he heard the bad dragon promise to get his revenge on the child for causing the dragons to betray him. The boy kept running and running and running until he was far away from the mountains, the cave he had once called home but a peak in the distance.

When the boy did finally stop, he was tired, his legs hurt and his lungs ached. He collapsed to the ground, gasping for breath, his heart still pounding in fear from the bad dragon's chilling words and threats. Only now, looking around him the boy realized that for the first time ever, he was all alone. There was no one to comfort him or take care of him and the boy felt sadness creep into his heart as tears spilled from his eyes.

…

“Aww, that's so sad!" Daisy suddenly said, her face full of sorrow for the imaginary boy. "He had to leave his family and everything! He must be so worried and scared!"

"Did the bad dragon find him?" Violet asked, her eyes full of intrigue. "And what happened to the other dragons? Where did-"

"Whoa, whoa, slow down," Jackie spoke up with a small laugh. "I'm sure Star's getting to that."

"Yeah, don't want to spoil anything before I get there," Star added, winking over at the twins.

"Okay," Violet agreed with a small nod. "So what happened next?"

"Wellll," Star replied, biting her lip in thought. "The boy met someone.”

"Who'd he meet?" Daisy asked curiously.

"U-Uhhh... h-he met," Star stuttered nervously, the pressure getting to her as she struggled for an idea.

"A dark mage?" Violet suggested.

Star nodded with a relieved smile, but she paused before saying, "A light mage."

"Oooohh even better," Daisy said, her eyes sparkling with joy.

Violet made a face of disgust, even going so far as to stick her tongue out and gag, before muttering under her breath, "Speak for yourself."

…

The light mage had been out for a stroll in the beautiful woods, enjoying all the simple joys the morning had to offer. She loved seeing nature and hearing the gentle call of the birds or feeling the wind breathing against her skin, it gave her more delight than all the magic in the world. At least, so she thought. For on that fateful morning she was about to meet someone who would become a new, even greater, source of joy in her life.

“The boy!”

“Daisy shhh!”

The light mage quickly picked up on the sound of sobs and sorrow and was immediately drawn to it, her heart aching and her kind nature seeking to soothe the troubled soul she could hear nearby. She made her way toward the sound, her steps quick and hurried, wanting to help him as soon as possible, but when she did finally emerge into the clearing, she stopped, her heart doing a double-take. The boy was quite adorable if she was being honest, even if the sight of him crying was heartbreaking to behold. He had soft brown hair that danced in the gentle breeze, a pair of gorgeous chocolate brown eyes that seemed to be endless the more the mage stared into them, which she found herself doing as tears poured from there with no sign of stopping. His clothes, which consisted of just a hoodie and jeans were a bit too big on him, making him look somehow even smaller and more delicate. Everything about him screamed innocence and the mage was taken aback that such a gentle soul could even exist.

The boy, meanwhile, had finally noticed the mage's presence and he found himself staring mouth-agape at the beautiful form before him. She had long, almost glowing blond hair that seemed to match the color of sunshine itself, vast blue eyes that looked like a piece of the sky had been captured and replaced with her pupils. Staring at her outfit which was a blue robe and skirt, a magician's hat, and purple boots, the boy realized she must be someone important if her fancy clothes were anything to go by. And if that didn't tip him off of how special she was, then the large magical staff he could see strapped to her back was a dead giveaway.

The mage quickly recovered from her shock, though, as she raced over to check on the boy. "Are you okay?" she asked, bending down and examining him closely. "Did you get hurt? Is that why you're crying?"

The boy shook his head, his cheeks flushing some in embarrassment. "No. I'm fine."

The mage let out a breath of relief, before asking him in concern, "Well what are you doing out here all alone? You're lucky you didn't get attacked by a beast or something?"

"I-" the boy began but tears burst from his eyes again, making it impossible for him to continue as he wept pitifully. The mage watched him for a second, before gently wrapping her arms around him in a hug, hoping to soothe his troubled mind. She brought him closer to her chest and he happily rested his forehead there, tears continuing to stream from his eyes as all his worries and grief flowed out of him.

The two stayed like this for minutes on end, the girl rubbing gentle circles onto his back, while the boy soaked her clothes in tears, but she didn't seem to mind. Finally, the boy was able to recover enough to chock out, "I lost my family. The bad dragon- he took them away from me!"

"What?" the mage said in confusion, pulling out of the hug and holding him at arm's length. "Bad dragon? What are you talking about?"

The boy sniffed a few times, rubbing at his swollen eyes, before he confessed to her, telling her his story, leaving out no detail as he laid his soul bare for her. And when he was done he burst into tears again as the pain of all he had lost came crashing down on him again.

The girl's heart plummeted as she listened to his story, finally understanding why this boy was so torn up. That sounded awful, he had been through so much in such a short time. "There, there," the mage soothed, pulling him into another comforting hug. "Everything will be alright. I'm sure the other dragons are fine, dragons are nearly indestructible, even fighting one of their own. "

"But what can I do?" the boy cried. "The bad dragon will be hunting me now, I can't go back if he finds me, he'll- he'll-"

"He won't!" the mage said firmly, squeezing his small frame in a protective embrace. "He won't ever find you or hurt you. Not on my watch!"

"Wait, what-what are you saying?" the boy asked his cheeks blushing a deep red.

"I'm saying I'm taking you with me," the girl said, leaning back so she could look into his eyes, giving him a warm smile to try and battle the coldness of the bad dragon's actions. "You can stay by my side and I'll protect you. I have magic, so even a dragon as powerful as the one you spoke about won't be enough to stop me. What do you say?"

The boy blinked, in complete disbelief by this girl's offer. Was this girl for real? Did she really want someone like him, someone who barely understood the outside world and all its complexities by her side? Was she really offering to protect him even though they had only just met? It seemed almost too good to be true.

"Um, are you sure you want me to stay with you?" the boy asked hesitantly. "I mean, we kinda just met and I'm not sure how helpful I'll be to you."

"Nonsense," the girl insisted, giving him a positive grin. "I wouldn't ask if I didn't want you to come with me. We may have just met but I can see you have a good heart. And I'd like to help you if you'll let me."

The boy paused for a second, before he nodded, a smile slowly growing on his face. "Okay, yeah, thank you so much. I promise you won't regret it!"

The mage squealed in joy, glad to finally have some company on her long journey. It could be very boring traveling alone. But she recovered quickly enough, clearing her throat as she stood, offering the boy a hand up which he eagerly took. "Then come on, let's go find you something to eat, I'm sure you must be starving by now," the mage said sweetly as she led her new friend away from the silent clearing.

Suddenly, a loud rumbling sounded and the boy blushed bright red as his stomach humiliated him at the worst possible time. The girl just laughed though and said with a wink, "I'll take that as a yes!"

"Uh, haha, yeah," he sheepishly muttered, his cheeks still a darker shade of red than his hoodie. But trying to quickly change the subject he asked, "So where are we going anyway?"

"Wherever we want," the mage replied, grabbing the boy's face and pressing it against her own while she did a cute little dramatic flourish to the world around them. "We do what we want, go where we want, and let nothing hold us back! What do you say?"

The boy's eyes glittered with joy at that. Go wherever they wanted. See the world. That was literally his dream come true! It seemed like he couldn't have picked a more perfect companion and protector. What were the odds of him meeting someone with the same desire to travel and explore as he did?!

"I say that's perfect!" the boy screamed, pumping his fists into the air, his heart practically leaping from his chest he was so excited. "Th-That's all I've ever wanted to do! I can't believe I'm actually going to see the world!"

The blond giggled. "Well since you're so excited, I'm gonna have to show you some of the wonders I've come across since I started traveling!" the girl said with a bright grin.

"Really? Like what? How many?" the boy asked, his curiosity beyond peaked at this point.

"Oh wow, there's kinda more than I can count actually," the mage replied thoughtfully, before putting an arm around the boy's small frame. "But don't worry, we've got all the time in the world to see them."

…

"Wow, that is so romantic," Daisy said with a wistful sigh. She paused letting out a tired yawn, before continuing, absentmindedly rubbing at her eye. "They are so perfect for each other. They should totally get married."

"They can't get married yet, Daisy. They just met," Violet pointed out, although there was hardly any emotion in her tone at all, showing the first signs of drowsiness, her head leaning heavily against her arm and her eyes just barely beginning to droop.

"Well that never stopped mom and dad," Daisy replied, her own head beginning to lull to the side as if fighting to stay upright. "Mommy said they got married after only two dates."

"Mommy also said that she and dad didn't get along and that's why he left," Violet argued weakly. Star and Jackie, meanwhile, shifted uncomfortably in their chairs, feeling suddenly awkward at the sudden turn in the twin's conversation, neither sure if it was a good or bad thing the way the two casually talked about seemingly terrible events in their younger lives.

"Then they weren't really in love," came Daisy's immediate response. "Unlike the light mage and her friend, right Star?" The two girls looked over at their cousin for conformation, hoping she could straighten this argument out.

"Uhhh," Star began hesitantly, the sudden pressure to say the correct thing causing her to freeze. A quick glance over at Jackie yielded no results as the skater just shrugged and gave her an equally lost look to the one she currently felt. A part of Star even debated on running to go get Lily in hopes of avoiding having to engage in this conversation herself, but seeing the quizzical looks on the girls' faces staring at her with such intensity, she knew there would be no easy way out of this situation. So she just sucked in a deep breath and told them in the most straightforward way possible, "Well some people are good for each other and sometimes they're not. Things don't always work out but that's okay."

Daisy and Violet gave the nervous Star a confused look, before the latter simply asked, "So do the light mage and her friend love each other or not?"

"Uhh they care about each other and sometimes that's the first step to falling in love," Star explained, feeling a little less uncomfortable now that the focus was off of Lily and her past failed marriage.

The twins nodded at that, before Daisy said, "Yeah, I guess that makes sense." Star breathed a sigh of relief, only to immediately freak out as the cutesy girl added, "I mean, that's what you and Big Brother did when you fell in love, right?"

Star let out an unexpected squeak, her cheeks flushing a deep red, in total shock by Daisy's out of nowhere question. "U-Um well, yeah I guess," the blond royal replied, still trying to will away her blushing cheeks as she stared off into an abandoned corner of the room in hopes of not having to meet anyone's eyes. "Only, I'm not sure if we're..." Star began only for her voice to trail off, not even sure where she was going with this conversation now.

Thankfully, Jackie became Star's saving grace, telling the twins, "They haven't said 'I love you' yet. Right now they just really care about each other a lot and that's okay too." The two girls nodded in understanding, before letting out simultaneous yawns. "But right now, I think it would be best to let Star finish the story before you two sleepyheads fall asleep on us," Jackie added with a grin.

"I'm not a sleepyhead," Violet said with a halfhearted pouting look, still struggling to keep her eyes open.

"Me neither," Daisy added, her head now leaning against her sister to try and stay upright.

Star and Jackie shared knowing smiles before the blond continued her story.

…

The light mage kept true to her word, showing the boy almost every inch of the beautiful world they lived on, the boy finally seeing exactly what he had been missing living in a cave all his life. And the boy was not disappointed, every day was filled with new adventures, new sights and wonders some of which he couldn't have thought up in his wildest of dreams, and every moment he spent on the new world was better than the last.

And it was all thanks to his new friend.

The boy couldn't thank his blond companion enough for allowing him to experience such wonders but whenever he mentioned such things the girl would just shrug and tell him it was no big deal. Even though, to the boy, it was the biggest deal in the world! And part of him felt bad that he had no way to repay the light mage, even if she insisted just having him there was all the payment she needed.

Which wasn't too surprising considering who he was dealing with, the boy didn't think he had ever met someone so nice before, this girl's kindness seemed to know no bounds, the boy witnessing first-hand how she used her magic to help others. She would cast spells to help get cats out of trees, or save people being carried away in a flood, or fend off dangerous beasts, or even just something as simple as creating a meal for a hungry family. And to the boy, it seemed like his new friend didn't seem to have a selfish bone in her body.

The more time he spent with her, the more he grew to care about her as she quickly became the most important person in his life. So much so, that the boy wasn't sure if he loved going on adventures because it was what he always wanted or because he had his blond friend there to experience it with him. Either way, he wouldn't want to change a single minute of their time together.

For whatever reason beyond either of their understanding, the two got along flawlessly. They laughed and joked with each other like they had been friends their entire lives, talking for hours on end about whatever was on their mind while being sure to pay close attention to what the other had to say, and just taking care of each other. Whenever the boy would cook meals he would be sure to give his friend an extra portion even if it meant losing some off of his own plate, while the girl would oftentimes give up her own blanket if she noticed the boy looking even slightly cold at night. The two were more than just companions or friends, they were each other's family and they depended on one another more than they could ever know and the two silently vowed to never part, to stay together forever no matter what.

Or at least, so they hoped.

One day the two arrived at a small town, one that even the light mage in all her travels had never come across and the thrill of a new adventure caused both of them to grow eager and excited. They rushed around the village, pointing and gawking at every new sight they saw, taking in as much of the town as they could at once. But as they ran around, brown and blue shining with fascinated interest, they made sure to hold hands so they wouldn't risk accidentally getting separated or lost. This was a pretty common thing for the two of them to do when they were out and about, after one particularly traumatizing incident where the boy lost sight of his friend in a crowd and had thought he heard a dragon roaring in the distance, curling up into a ball out of fear the bad dragon had returned to exact his revenge. Now the two were much more careful and aware of where the other was at all times.

But as the two explored the village, so lost in their own thoughts, they didn't notice a dark form descending from the clouds above, nor did they notice the citizens of said village pointing and muttering amongst themselves at the odd sight. But as the dragon slowly came into view, the people were entranced since none had ever seen a dragon before, most didn't wander out this far from the mountaintop and many began speculating why a dragon would journey all the way there.

But their curiosity turned to fear and then to panic as the dragon suddenly let out a hot breath of fire, lighting the tiny village aflame. The people screamed and scrambled to escape, finally alerting the two teens of the bad dragon's appearance. They looked over in shock as the dragon continued its assault on the town, flames continually shooting out of its mouth as it tried to coat every rooftop in its destructive heat.

The light mage immediately drew her staff, preparing to attack the creature, but the boy stopped her, putting a shaky hand on her arm. The girl watched as her close friend shivered and shook, despite the rising temperature, his eyes wide and full of fear as he told the mage between chattering teeth, "That's him. th-that's the bad dragon."

The light mage's eyes widened as she looked from her friend to the dragon and then back, asking, "Are you sure?"

The boy nodded. "Y-Yes. P-Please d-don't fight him. He's too powerful!"

The blond didn't reply at first, just watching as the dragon continued to burn the innocent village down, her grip tightening on her staff as her desire to help these poor people was almost more than she could bear. But looking into the pleading eyes of her friend, she knew she couldn't, she had to focus on the most important thing right then, getting him as far away from the horrible beast as she could. Then she could focus on actually fighting the thing.

So, without a word, she grabbed her friend's hand and began leading him away from the horrible scent of ash and screams of terrified villagers, swallowing down the lump in her throat as she did so. She never turned, keeping her eyes trained on the opened gate leading out of the village, which the other people were pouring out of, and she did her best to push her way through the crowd without hurting anyone. But that was before she heard the roar, one that made her bones rattle and her head spin, but it was what followed after that caused her heart to plummet as the dragon loudly called, "There you are, boy! You thought you could escape from me!"

The two turned and watched as the dragon dived for them, dark, sinister smoke rising from its mouth as he sailed toward the two. The boy screamed, clinging onto his friend in fear, but the girl just pulled the staff out from behind her back and shouted, "Crystal Shield!" Suddenly a barrier formed around them and the dragon bounced off it with a loud roar of pain. The two smiled in relief, watching as the dragon shook its head, letting out low groans of annoyance before its beady eyes fixed on them again.

Soon flames tumbled from its mouth, hitting the barrier but it held under the intense heat. The blond waved the staff around before shouting, "Winterstorm Hyperblow!" and the shield instantly dispersed as a blast of cold magic shot out toward the dragon, instantly diminishing it's flames as puddles of melted ice fell to the ground.

The dragon opened its mouth to shoot flames again, but the mage was just a little bit faster than it was, chanting, "Raspberry Ribbon Lasso!" Glowing red ropes shot out of the staff, wrapping around the dragon's mouth and sealing it shut. The dragon growled in anger, smoke shooting out of its nostrils as it strained against the magic ropes, even using its sharp paws to try and claw its snout loose.

The blond, knowing that wouldn't hold for long, turned to her friend and shouted, "Quickly, you need to run from here! Get as far away as you can!"

The boy felt tears in his eyes, as a feeling of deja vu over-powered him and he shook his head frantically. "No! No, I won't leave you!" the boy shouted, grasping the girl's shoulders.

But she shrugged him off, saying in the calmest tone she could, "You have to. It's the only way! I can't fight this dragon and keep you safe, too," Still seeing the hesitancy in his eyes she added, "I'll come find you once this is all done, I promise."

The boy didn't say anything for a second, just staring lost into his friend's crystal eyes but finally, he obeyed her wishes turning and running from the village while wiping the tears from his eyes with his sleeve.

The mage watched her friend go, before turning around to face the dragon with a glare. The dragon finally managed to free its snout, but to her surprise, instead of attacking the dragon began to laugh, a low, throaty chuckle that put the mage on edge. Its beady eyes narrowed on her as it bent down so it was level with the girl, its hot breath wafting against the girl's skin, making her shudder. But all it did was whisper, "You shouldn't have done that. Now the boy will be mine."

"No he won't," the blond snapped, raising her staff to cast another spell. But the dragon was for once quicker, using its long tail to smack into one of the ash-covered buildings causing it to collapse, the rubble crashing down onto the mage. Once the mage was buried under a mountain of rubble the dragon lifted off the ground, no longer interested in finishing off the village, not when his revenge was so close at hand.

A few flaps of his wings and he spotted his target below, the boy running as fast as he could, but he was no match for the speed of a dragon. The dragon smiled evilly, before swooping down, its talons opened and ready to snatch up his prey. The boy turned at the last second, barely having a chance to scream before the dragon's thick claws latched into the back of his hoodie lifting him off the ground, holding him easily in just one of its massive paws. The boy, of course, struggled uselessly, scratching and kicking in any attempt to break loose, while screaming noisily to be let go or for his friend to come rescue him, but it was all pointless, the bad dragon had him again and this time he wouldn't be letting him go anytime soon. With a steady beat of its wings, the dragon carried its hostage far away from the burning village, eager to get home and soak in its glory.

The pile of rocks were flung aside as the barrier the light mage had created expanded before disappearing, thus freeing her from her predicament. She panted looking around for any sign of her friend, calling his name as she began running for the gate, hoping to somehow save him in time. But then she spotted a dark form on the horizon, she came to an abrupt stop, her heart aching as she listened to the faded but still desperate pleas of her friend, screaming for her to help him. The girl collapsed to her knees, lacking the strength to stand as tears poured from her vision, watching in failure as her friend was carried away from her forever.

But her tears of defeat, soon turned to determination as she remembered the promise she had made to him. No, she couldn't give up. She would save him. She wouldn't let this be the end of her friend. She would find him and rescue him even if it killed her. And so, gritting her teeth, she forced herself to stand, her hands clenched so tightly around her staff it was beginning to rattle. She spun the staff around a few times in her grip, letting the magic she needed gather, before she shouted, "Summoning Cloudy Charm!"

A pink, smiling cloud with wings appeared next to her. The blond didn't waste a second as she climbed on, letting herself get situated in the fluff as she shouted, "Follow that dragon!"

"Aye, aye, ma'am!" the cloud spell said, before zipping off in the direction the dragon had went. The blond mage watched intensely as the dragon's form stayed far ahead of them. Although the cloud was fast the dragon was faster and his head start meant they wouldn't be able to catch up to him before it reached its cave. The blond let out soft breaths to try and calm herself, while whispering, "Please let me reach him in time. Please don't let me be too late."

…

The dragon's lair smelled of ash and decay, the stone walls coated in scratch and burn marks from whenever the dragon would become enraged (which was often). The ground itself was hot to the touch, magma and molten lava resting just under the surface, making staying inside it unbearable for anyone but a dragon. The area was fairly well-lit by a fire pit in the center of the space, currently being used to roast the dragon's dinner, a large slab of meat which was already beginning to burn and ruin in several places not that the large reptile minded. He preferred it that way.

The boy sat with his back up against one of the walls of the cave, hugging his knees to his chest as his frightened eyes watched the dragon wearily as it focused for now on its food and not its prisoner, which the boy was thankful for. The boy risked a look around, trying to think up some sort of escape. Despite his attention being elsewhere, the dragon still kept his body close enough to the exit that making a run for that would be a death wish and the boy shuddered to think what this creature would do to him if he did attempt such a perilous escape.

But then again he also knew staying would end up just as badly considering how many piles of bones he could see scattered about the cave, the boy guessing they were from either creatures hunted and brought there like the boy or had been stupid enough to enter the dragon's domain on their own, but whichever it was the boy dreaded coming to the same fate. Beads of sweat poured from the boy's brow both from his growing fear and the suffocating heat and he shifted uncomfortably.

This seemed to draw the dragon's attention and the boy nearly choked on a gasp of fright but did his best to keep his eyes level with the beast, despite wanting nothing more than to cower away. He licked his dry lips and asked nervously, "What do you want from me?"

"Revenge," the dragon said simply, poking at the cooking meat with a sharp claw.

"Revenge?" the boy repeated hesitantly. "Revenge on who?"

"On those fools who dared to defy me," the dragon growled, the rumbling low its throat causing the boy to shudder. "They thought they could keep you from me, but I found out, I always do. And then they attacked me! Nearly killed me. It took me weeks to heal, I will make sure they all suffer the same fate."

"What does that have to do with me?" the boy asked fearfully.

The dragon grinned evilly at the child, its beady yellow eyes full of dark promises as it replied, "You. You're the example. Once I'm done with you, the dragons will not dare to defy me again, lest they suffer the same fate."

The boy felt his heart stop, swallowing once in fear, both for himself and his family, while his body began to shake from head to toe. "You-You won't get away with it," the boy defiantly replied, but it was halfhearted due to the noticeable quiver in his voice. "My family will come and so will my partner. She'll save me from you."

The dragon laughed at that, its wings expanding as it rose to its hind legs, wrapping its arms around its scaled belly. Once it was through with its laughter, its front claws slammed into the ground, cracking the stone beneath it and causing the whole cave to rumble, loose rocks and dirt raining down from above. The boy whimpered and pulled his legs a little tighter against him. "That mage is buried under a mountain of rubble," the dragon hissed out, looking incredibly amused by the boy's fearful expressions. "She will not be saving you. In fact, I doubt she will ever see the light of day again."

"No," the boy gasped out, tears flooding his vision as the dragon above him just roared with laughter again.

"Think again," came a determined voice, a blast of magic cutting off the dragon's cruel laughter, striking the dragon's snout and causing the reptile to stumble back in pain and surprise. The boy looked over to the entryway and nearly cried with relief as the blond mage stood triumphantly on a floating pink cloud, looking more beautiful and majestic than the boy had ever thought possible. She leapt from the cloud, landing delicately on the hot stone as she twirled the glowing staff expertly around in her hands.

The bad dragon had recovered enough to notice the girl, baring its sharp fangs at her as it hissed, "How did you survive, mortal?"

The blond gave the beast a smirk, replying smugly, "Easy, I couldn't die yet." Her eyes met the boy's as she added, "I made a promise I need to keep." The two smiled at each other, a look of love and longing passing between them, before a loud roar interrupted the moment. The two turned just in time to see the dragon releasing a breath of fire at the mage, who quickly cast, "Cooling Confetti Cannon!" and a cannon appeared beside her, shooting off bursts of ice-covered confetti that exploded as they met the dragon's fire. The dragon did his best to hold the cannon off but was soon overpowered and hit by the colorful explosions himself, his body covered in the rainbow substance as he growled in fury.

The blond, seizing her opportunity ran to her friend's side. "Hey, you okay," she began, only to stumble back in surprise as the boy threw his arms around her in a tight hug, one that caused the mage's cheeks to flush bright red.

"You came, I knew you would," he whispered into her shoulder and she smiled before hugging him back tightly.

But the hug didn't last long as the dragon had finally managed to destroy the annoying cannon, a blast of fire causing the spell to undo, poofing from existence. The dragon satisfied that the device was now gone, turned its attention onto the two teens. As its beady yellow eyes met them, the blond raised her staff to cast another spell but the dragon's tail lashed out, knocking both of them to the ground. "I've got you both now," the beast declared superiorly and the mage heard the dragon draw in a breath, no doubt to burn them both to a crisp, and ignored the ache in her body as she reached for her fallen staff, her fingers just inches shy of grabbing it. "No!" she shouted in despair, feeling the heat on her skin as the dragon's flames shot towards her and her friend.

But the flames stopped just in time as something suddenly struck the dragon's snout, making it let out a sharp wail of pain. The blond looked behind her to see the boy picking up bones from the floor and throwing them at the dragon, most of them managing to hit their target who growled in pain and annoyance. The blond smiled before rising to her feet, snatching up the staff as she did.

While the boy was providing a necessary distraction the girl breathed in a deep breath, feeling the magic filling her being as she tried to remember the necessary chant. Although she knew of a spell capable of destroying a dragon, it was a long time ago since she learned it and she was having trouble remembering the exact wording.

But before the mage could get a word out the dragon roared, "Enough!" before raising his wings in a single violent flap, the gust of wind that followed striking the two teens and sending them tumbling, the staff bouncing against the stone floor, now far out of her reach for the both of them.

The two teens rose slowly, grunting in pain before they looked up fearfully at the dragon that now towered over their fragile forms. The two, fearing what would come next, rose to their feet and tried to make a run for it but a plume of fire appeared before them, effectively cutting them off from the staff and any means of escape. The two tried to double back only for a second wall of fire to spring to life in front of them, effectively trapping them and leaving them at the mercy of the dangerous reptile.

The stared up in fear as the dragon loomed above, smoky breath pouring from its lungs as it shouted, "I will not be bested by such pathetic creatures!"

It sucked in a deep breath, preparing to burn the two to a crisp again and the two teens did the only thing they could think to do in that situation, they hugged. As the dragon breathed a final, sentencing breath the final thought that passed through both of their heads was that at least when someone found their charred remains they would know that they were friends.

But to both of their surprise, there was no pain and the two peeked opened their eyes in confusion. Only for both of their jaws to drop open as a new large form stood protectively in front of them, blocking off the fire with its own scaled body and the boy gasped in recognition of the old dragon that had raised him.

The bad dragon barred its massive fangs as the newcomer, hissing, "Get out of my way, old fool, or else pay the price!"

"No," the other dragon said defiantly.

"What do you plan on accomplishing?" the bad dragon asked, the two now pacing around in circles, trying to size their opponent up. "You will die here, you cannot hope to best me on your own."

"Then it is a good thing I didn't come alone," the other dragon replied, before a dozen more dragons quickly filled the cave, flying in from the shadows it seemed, some even busting through solid rock or emerging from the ground, covered in molten hot lava and glowing a bright red."The other dragons!" the boy shouted in disbelief. "They came too!"

They all began circling the evil reptile, clawing at him or shooting him with flames, while the bad dragon did its best to hold its own against a new army of opponents. "Get away from me, fools! You will regret defying me! You will all pay!" it shouted, though its voice was now desperate and full of obvious fear.

The older dragon, turned to the two teens, asking, "Are you two alright?"

The two nodded dumbly. "Good," the dragon said in relief, before using his long tail to put out the wall of flame blocking their path saying, "Quickly, while he is distracted."

The two snapped out of their daze, nodding once in determination, before grabbing hands, running over to the mage's fallen staff, dodging the battling dragons along the way. Ducking and weaving to avoid being burned alive or crushed under massive feet, without ever letting go of each other's hands.

Finally, they reached the staff and blond was forced to let go so she could pick it up, holding it out in front of her with both hands. She made sure to keep her aim steady, her staff pointed at the evil dragon at all times, as she let out a few slow breaths as she recited the spell from memory, "I call the light upon my side, to vanquish evil and turn the tide." The girl closed her eyes as magical energy began to surround her and the staff which glowed with otherworldly power. "Brightest power do hear my cries, to save the heart of the one I prize." The boy watched mesmerized as the girl's body began to glow pure white, her form nearly floating above the ground as the magic continued to cycle around her. "Cleanse my soul and fulfill my might, by destroying this foe.. with unyielding light!"

With that final sentence, all the magic came spiraling out of the staff, a flash of light flooding the dark cave and blinding everyone within as a loud roar echoed off the stone walls. But as suddenly as it came, the light was gone again, leaving everyone blinking as they struggled to adjust to the dim lighting once more. The mage panted, collapsing to her knees, the last of her magical energy depleted, leaving her tired and sore.

The others eventually recovered from the unexpected spell, staring in shock at the state of the bad dragon, a large rock statue now standing in its place. The dragon's scaled body was now made of thick marble, its body reared up on hind legs as if in a final, desperate attack, and its once dark eyes now blank and lifeless. The dragons and boy stared at it for a few seconds more before all cheering in victory at the bad dragon's defeat. No longer would it haunt them or cause them to cower in fear. They were free.

"You did it!" the boy exclaimed, helping his friend to her feet. "You defeated the bad dragon! You protected me, just like you said you would!"

The blond smiled at her friend, before saying sweetly, "We protected each other." The two pulled into a tight hug, grateful and relieved to be safe and together once more.

But the boy pulled away as he saw the dragon's approaching. The old dragon knelt down, telling him softly, "Thank goodness you are okay. We were worried sick about you, my child."

"Well I'm okay, thanks to you guys," the boy said in a choked tone. The boy ran up to the dragon, throwing himself onto its large snout in a make-shift hug as tears streamed from his cheeks. "I thought I'd never see you again!" the boy sobbed and the dragon let out a purring sound, nuzzling its nose against the boy as the other dragons gathered around to do the same, making him giggle and sob at the same time as dozens of noses rubbed up against him.

The blond mage smiled at the sight of the boy reunited with his family. But it slowly turned to sadness as she realized that he was now where he belonged and no longer had any need for her. Her heart fell as she realized this was the end of their adventures together. She was now alone, once more. But, despite her sadness, she knew better than to get in the way of the the touching reunion and decided it best to just show herself out, walking slowly for the exit, her head down.

The dragons finally pulled away from their youngest as the oldest said apologetically, "I'm sorry you were forced to be alone for so long, my son."

The boy shook his head, replying, "But I wasn't alone. I had someone taking care of me the whole time I was away." With that, the boy ran over and grabbed the blond's hands, causing her to blush with surprise as she was dragged back over to the dragons. "She was always there for me when I needed her and when I was at my lowest she took me in," the boy continued, pointing to said girl, who smiled hopefully and lovingly at her friend. "I've learned so much about the world because of her and she's easily the most important person in my life and I don't know what I would do without her."

The boy turned to her with a vibrant smile, one that set the mage's inside aflutter. "She means everything to me."

The mage returned the smile with one of her own, tears beginning to form in her eyes."I feel the exact same way," the blond whispered as brown and blue continued to meet. And then working up the courage she added, "Because... I love you."

The boy froze while all around them the dragons fell into chaos all cheering and crying in surprise, some even bouncing around the cave in delight that their youngest had found his soulmate. But the boy's eyes never left that of the mage's and after a few seconds, tears spilled from his own eyes as he said in a choked tone, "I love you, too."

And then, as if by some unseen force the two moved towards each other at the same time, their lips meeting in a passionate and intimate kiss that sealed their love and bond forever. The world around them vanished, time falling away, as all that existed was the two of them. Just the two lovers and their kiss, signifying not the end of their journey but the beginning of a new one, one they would now share together as one.

…

"And so the dragons were freed from the evil dragon's reign, the mage and her adventurous friend continued to travel the world doing together, and they all lived happily ever after... the end," Star finished. She let out a long sigh, glad to finally be done, it had been fun coming up with a story on the spot but pretty mentally draining and her already tired body could definitely use some rest about now. Still, she put on a smile as she looked over at the twins saying, "So girls, what did you think?"

But Star blinked a few times in disbelief as she saw the two sleeping forms of Daisy and Violet, their bodies leaning up against one another as they snored softly. "Yeah, they kind of fell asleep a while ago," Jackie told her friend, looking like she was struggling to stay away herself, staring almost numbly down at her phone.

"When?" the blond royal asked her friend and the skater shrugged.

"Probably somewhere between the mage and boy going on adventures and the bad dragon showing up," Jackie guessed.

"So wait they didn't hear any of the ending?!" Star asked in disbelief.

The skater nodded.

"Why didn't you say something?" the blond exclaimed in exasperation, though making sure to keep her voice down enough to avoid waking the twins.

"I tried to but you were in your own world and didn't seem to notice the world turning," Jackie replied. "So I figured I'd just let you finish up on your own."

Star immediately buried her head in her hands, annoyed as she realized she could have been done half an hour ago and already be catching up on some much-needed sleep, instead of wasting time finishing a story that no one was even listening to. "I can't believe I just spent an hour and a half telling them a bedtime story," the blond groaned softly to herself.

"Well if it makes you feel better, I thought it was really good," Jackie tried and Star let out a quick breath.

"Thanks," she said, giving her friend a heartfelt if not tired smile. Star turned her attention back to the twins and ignoring her tired limbs she stood, saying, "Come on, help me get them tucked in."

Jackie obeyed, creeping over to the bunk bed with Star, the two moving slowly and carefully to not wake the sleeping kids as they went about their respective actions. Jackie gently picked up Daisy, before laying her back on her own bed, pulling the covers up to her chin, while Star scooted little Violet onto her pillow, wrapping her in blankets and making sure to place her Charles plushie at her side, so she could cuddle with it if need be.

Once both girls were properly tucked in, Star and Jackie tiptoed from the room, Jackie flipping off the lights on the way out, leaving the room completely dark save for the flower nightlight Daisy liked to have on in case of bad dreams. Star paused briefly at the door, whispering softly over her shoulder, "Good night girls. Sweet dreams," before slowly closing the door shut behind her.

Once the teens were on the other side, they both let out simultaneous sighs, Star leaning heavily against the door as they both fought back their exhaustion. "Well that was a lot harder than I expected," Star muttered, massaging her aching eyes with her hands.

"Yeah, I know right," Jackie agreed. "How does Lily do that every day?"

"How does Marco?" Star added, sounding genuinely impressed with her boyfriend. "I can't believe he comes up with a new story every night! I could barely come up with just one."

"Well, it is Marco we're talking about here," Jackie pointed out and Star nodded, a loving smile flashing across her face.

"True," Star said softly, clearly daydreaming about a certain hoodie-wearing teen.

"Speaking of, I couldn't help but notice your story seemed pretty familiar, don't you think?" Jackie said, pretending to be pondering this as she tapped a finger to her chin while shooting her friend a teasing look. "Almost like you were speaking from experience or something."

Star blushed bright red, turning her face away to try and hide from her friend's quizzical and yet knowing stare as she quickly denied, "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Uh-huh," Jackie said, a playful eyebrow raising as she crossed her arms in front of her chest. "Just like you have no idea about the hoodie you have hidden under your pillow right now, right?"

Star let out a startled squeak, turning to Jackie in surprise as she asked nervously, "How do you know about that?"

"I didn't," Jackie replied, before shooting her friend a wink. "Until just now."

The blond royal froze for a second, before her bashful look turned to one of annoyance, as she hissed, "Oh that was just mean!" Jackie laughed unashamedly at her clever trick, her playful smile never straying from her face. After a few seconds, Star smiled back, but added in a clearly forced, angry tone, "Y'know that seems more like something Janna would do, not you Jacks."

"Well, since you were filling Marco's role earlier, guess it's up to me to cover for Janna," the skater replied.

"I think we have enough of Janna as is without you copying her, thank you very much," Star said, doing a fake roll of her eyes.

"Come on you know you miss her Jannanigans as much as I do," Jackie pressed.

Star giggled once at that, before admitting, "Well, maybe a little." She paused before adding softly, "I hope they're both doing okay."

"I'm sure they're fine," the skater comforted.

Star smiled as she thought of her bestie/boyfriend, asking, "What do you think they're doing about now?"

"Probably getting some sleep," Jackie said. "Speaking of, we should probably consider doing that ourselves."

Star nodded, her eyes full of longing and fatigue. "Ugh, yes. Please," she slurred out, the promise of sleep causing her whole body to sway, her brain already beginning to shut down for the day. She yawned once, before adding, "I can't wait to get to bed."

"Me too," Jackie admitted. She put an arm around her friend, gently leading Star toward her room, the blond too out of it to even notice. The skater smiled before saying helpfully, "Then let's get you to bed." But another playful smile rose to her lips as she added more to herself than the drowsy Star, "After all, you got a hoodie to snuggle, light mage."

...

"When are Big Brother and Janna getting back?" little Violet asked for what had to be the fifth time that night.

"Star said they were on their way, they'll be here soon," Jackie reassured the girl, her and her sister groaning as they both flopped down onto their beds in boredom.

"But that was hours ago," Daisy grumbled in an over-exaggerated tone, causing Jackie to smile to herself.

It was the next night and the twins were once again in bed, though they had somehow coerced their mom into letting them stay up to greet Marco and Janna, promising to go immediately to sleep once they did, but the girls were quickly growing impatient with waiting. Jackie had offered to switch storyteller with Star for the night after the blond had seemed eager to get ready for her boyfriend's return and was doing her best to hold their interest with stories and legends she had could remember from her time on Earth but even that was starting to lose them.

Jackie calmly checked the clock on the wall just to see how much longer they would probably be, only to stare in shock at the startling amount of time that had already passed. It had been over an hour since Star informed her and the twins that Marco and Janna were headed back from their 'camping trip' and yet there was still no sign of them. They should have gotten back by now, the skater couldn't help but point out in her head. The skater did her best to shake these worries off, figuring the two had just got distracted or held up by something. Just cause they were late didn't mean they were in genuine danger, there was no sense in panicking... yet, at least. Though that didn't stop her from muttering under her breath, "Huh, wonder what's keeping them?"

"Maybe they got eaten by a multi-bear or a centipeedle?" Violet suggested groggily. It was getting late for them, after all, and the two were struggling to stay awake.

"Those are both just Earth myths, sweetie," Lily suddenly spoke up, nearly startling the skater. Jackie hadn't thought the older woman had even been listening, up till now she had seemed almost oblivious and stuck in her own world as she sat in the corner of the room, looking through the last bit of paperwork for the day and humming softly to herself the whole time. She hadn't even bothered to glance up as she spoke, her gentle eyes never even pausing to read the fine print of the document before her even as she corrected her daughter.

Though after a second, she too glanced up at the clock, frowned and said matter-of-factly, "Hmm, I do hope those two get back soon, the girls really need to get to bed."

Jackie nodded, although the twins grumbled and began arguing weakly about the fact that they weren't tired and their mom was being super unfair. The skater pulled out her phone offering, "I'll call and see where they're at."

"Good idea," Lily agreed, Violet and Daisy looking a little more awake and eager as they watched Jackie put the phone up to her ear, listening calmly to the ringing. After a couple of rings, the familiar voice of Janna spoke up, saying, "Hello?"

"Hey, Jan, it's Jackie."

"Yeah I gathered as much," Janna said in her typical sarcastic wit.

Jackie resisted the urge to roll her eyes as she asked, "Well, I was wondering where you are? Star said you and Marco would be back an hour ago."

"Yeah, its a long story but we kinda got held up," the creepy teen replied cryptically.

"Well do you know how much longer you'll be?" Jackie asked, trying not to let her impatience leak out of her voice.

"Actually it's funny you mention it, Jacks," Janna began. "Cause me and Marco are actually-"

"We're heeeerreeee!" Marco called in a sing-song voice as the door to the room slammed open, revealing him and the beanie-wearing teen, both grinning like dorks as they stared into the girl's bedroom.

"Janna!" Jackie shouted, jumping up from the chair.

"Big Brother!" both twins cried as one, all previous signs of exhaustion gone as they leapt from the bed and ran over to greet the two teens.

Marco, however, just turned to his creepy friend asking, "Did I do it right?"

Janna gave him a wink and a thumbs up, telling him, "Yep. Perfect timing! That was an excellent dramatic reveal."

The boy almost glowed with pride at his accomplishment, before being bombarded by hugs from Daisy and Violet, the two giggling as they said, "We missed you Big Brother!" Marco just laughed and swept them into an even tighter embrace, saying to them with a wide smile, "I missed you guys too!"

Janna was also hugged by Jackie, which she returned wholeheartedly, the skater saying, "Man, am I glad your back."

"What, don't tell me you actually missed me?" Janna said sarcastically, as the two pulled out of the hug.

Jackie rolled her eyes and playfully punched her shoulder saying, "Whatever, you goof." But she paused before adding seriously, "So how did it go?"

Janna flinched, her eyes filling with pain for a second, before she buried it behind a calm facade, whispering softly to her friend, "I'll... tell you later."

Lily, also moved to greet the two teens, walking over to them and saying, "It's good to see you two back, safe and sound."

"Thanks," Marco said sweetly, smiling nicely at the woman, who grinned right back. But he paused a moment, looking around the room, before asking, "Wait, where's Star?"

"She said she had some sort of surprise she needed to get ready for you in her room," Jackie explained.

Marco's eyes filled with wild curiosity his gaze drifting off in the direction of his girlfriend's room, wondering what crazy, amazing thing Star was cooking up for him this time. But before he could ponder too hard on it, he was suddenly pulled from his thoughts by Violet.

"Janna!" the creepy child suddenly shouted, switching from clinging to Marco to clinging to Janna in half a second, her small body practically hanging off the beanie-wearing girl's waist. "Did you miss me? Huh, did you?"

"Sure I did," Janna replied, ruffling the small Butterfly's hair. "I mean, how couldn't I miss my only apprentice?"

Violet practically glowed from the praise and attention her eyes shining brighter than a thousand diamonds. "Did you bring me anything from your trip?"

Marco and Janna shared a smile, before the creepy teen replied, "Actually, we did. In fact, we brought something for both of you."

Both Daisy and Violet gasped and began squealing at that, asking over and over again what it was while trying to peek around the two for any signs of the surprise, but saw nothing. After a few moments of searching the twins stared up at Marco and Janna with furrowed brows, Daisy asking, "Where is it?"

The two teens again shared a grin, before Janna suddenly gave a shrill whistle and said, "Come on out, Edith."

And from within Marco's hood, a small scaly head suddenly popped out, its beady eyes blinking tiredly as it had been asleep mere moments ago until she heard her master call. Violet screamed in delight, moving closer to examine the snake, while Daisy squeaked once in fright quickly hiding behind Jackie's leg. The skater just stared in disbelief of what she was seeing, "Uhh, what the heck is that thing?"

"Oh, this is Janna's old-" Marco began only to stop as Janna loudly coughed into her hand. "Uhh, I mean, this is a snake Janna found while we were camping," the boy quickly corrected himself, putting on the most believable smile he could.

"Is it... dangerous?" Daisy asked nervously.

"What, no way, Edith is a sweetheart, she wouldn't hurt a fly," Janna explained quickly, while Violet gently stroked her head.

"Wow, she's so pretty! Her scales look almost like diamonds or something," Violet breathed, her eyes incapable of growing any wider.

"That's because she's a Gem Feeder," Marco explained. "She only eats gems or rocks."

"Oh my I thought she looked familiar," Lily said, stepping closer to the snake. "Though I haven't seen one in years, she is quite remarkable!"

This seemed to finally get Daisy to move closer, as she asked hesitantly, "Can-Can I pet her?"

"Sure, go ahead," Marco said with a quick nod and watched with a bright grin as the little girl slowly crept closer, finally reaching out a hand and gently running a finger along the snake's scales. The girl giggled a little, before saying a bit more confidently, "She feels weird."

"Would you like to hold her?" Marco asked and the little girl nodded. The hooded teen gently lifted Edith out of the hoodie before handing her over to Daisy, who giggled as it slithered around her arm, Violet leaning over to pet her again. "She's sooo cute!" the cutesy teen cooed, causing the boy to grin brightly. He had expected Daisy to be way more afraid of Edith, but she had opened up to her almost immediately and it nearly brought tears to Marco's eyes for some reason.

"Can we keep her, mom? Can we, please?" Violet asked, hitting her mom with a pouting upper lip and glittering orbs.

"Well you will have to ask, Marco and Janna," Lily said, turning to the two teens.

Janna shrugged. "Well, that was kinda the general idea, figured these two would enjoy having her as a pet."

"Yes!" Violet screamed, before hugging her mentor again. "Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

"That was very kind of you, Janna," Lily said in her typical sweet tone and the girl froze for a moment, staring at her weirdly before looking away and saying in a voice barely above a whisper, "Thanks."

Jackie gave her friend a worried look, while Marco just stared on sadly, but the moment was quickly interrupted as Daisy asked, "Mommy, Edith sleep in my bed tonight?"

"What?!" Violet shouted, angrily turning on her heels to glare at her sister. "That's not fair! Edith should sleep with me!"

"No, she should sleep with me first, because I'm the oldest!"

"That doesn't have to do with anything!" Violet argued loudly.

"Yes it does, it means I'm more mature than you!" Daisy said, before sticking her tongue out at her sister, which Edith mimicked immediately.

"How about you both share a bed tonight so you can both sleep with her?" Lily suggested fairly. "And then you two can take turns from there."

The twins thought that over for a second before nodding in agreement, Edith again replicating their joint movements. Now that that was settled, Lily clapped her hands together and said, "Okay, girls, say goodnight to Marco, Jackie, and Janna, cause it's time for bed!"

"Awww but mom!" came the expected response, but Lily ignored them, shooing them over to the bed, as she said firmly but patiently, "No 'buts' bedtime is bedtime and you two are way past it right now."

The two grumbled but knew it was pointless as they reluctantly climbed onto Violet's bottom bunk and settled under the covers, Edith curling into a ball between them.

Marco seeing that he and his friends were no longer needed, whispered softly, "Come on, let's go find, Star," before tiptoeing out of the room, Jackie and Janna following right behind him, leaving Lily to tuck in her two tired daughters and their new pet.

…

Marco, Jackie, and Janna stood outside Star's door, the two girls chatting softly as Janna filled her friend in on what all had happened, the skater giving her sympathetic smiles and nodding as she listened intently to her close friend. With Jackie and Janna talking amongst each other, Marco turned his attention on his girlfriend's door, knowing that right now the only thing that stood between him and Star was a thin piece of wood stood. The boy gave a quick knock, calling, "Hey Star! We're hom-ahh!" His cry was cut short as, out of nowhere, the door was flung open and Star wasted no time in sweeping the boy into her arms and into her room without a care. Jackie and Janna broke off their conversation long enough to stare as the door slammed shut again, before shrugging and heading back to their room. They still had a lot to discuss.

Marco blinked, looking around in confusion, his cheek marks spinning as he struggled to understand where he was and what had happened. All the lights in Star's room were off, but several lit candles were placed all over Star's room, creating a romantic atmosphere that left Marco's heart thumping, the delightful aroma's drifting up to his nose making him feel lightheaded. He could also see a plate of freshly cooked nachos over by Star's beanbag chair and his stomach growled, reminding him he had gone two days without eating a good meal. But that's when he noticed the biggest thing right now he was in Star's arms, being carried bridal style, and his cheeks flushed instantly. "S-Star?" he stammered.

"Hey Marco! Welcome back, I missed you!" the blond cooed, rubbing her cheek against his own, making him flush even more and causing both of their cheeks marks to turn temporarily white.

"I missed you too!" the boy exclaimed, before throwing his arms around the girl in a hug, Star still holding him tightly against her.

"So what took you so long, expected you to be back like an hour ago!" the blond asked, sighing in contentment.

"It's a long story," the boy replied sheepishly. But it slowly turned to realization as she added, "Oh wait, hang on, I want to check on Janna first."

The door to Star's room creaked open again and Jackie and Janna stopped, turning to see Marco's blushing face appear in the doorway. "Jan, are you okay? Do you need to talk or anything?"

Janna shrugged saying, "Nah, I'm good."

"Are you sure?" the boy asked, needing to be completely sure his friend was okay first.

But Janna just scoffed, waving a hand at them as he said, "Marco, I'm fine. I don't need you to babysit me. Go enjoy your time with Star, I know you two lovebirds missed each other."

Marco still didn't look entirely convinced, so Jackie added, "Look, if Janna does need anything I'm right there for her, so you're fine."

Finally, Marco smiled in relief, saying, "Okay, but if you ever need to talk Janna, I'm here for you."

"I know," Janna said sincerely, before adding in a teasing tone, "Now go spend time with your girlfriend already!"

The boy nodded before finally closing the door back, turning to face his girlfriend once again, their faces mere inches apart as Star asked, "What was that all about?"

"Uhh, just one of the many things I have to tell you," the boy said with a shrug.

"Can't wait!" Star said, smiling sweetly. But it slowly turned into a playful smirk as she added, "But first... I'm gonna need like a billion kissed to make up for you being gone."

"Wh-What?" Marco began, only to giggle incessantly as Star began showering him in kisses, covering everything on his face from his blushing cheeks to his cute little nose to even his forehead. As she did, she lifted him up into her arms again, carrying him over to the beanbag chair, where she could continue peppering him with much-needed affection. Once the two were settled, Marco began to kiss Star back, the two sharing a passionate kiss as the length of time they spent apart shattered in an instant. Suddenly it was just the two of them again, and if the two hadn't been so focused on their kiss they might have noticed a soft red glow from outside Star's window.

Finally, Star seemed satisfied with her kisses for the moment, though she kept her arms wrapped around his waist as she watched her Marco pick up the bowl of nachos and quickly wolf them down his throat, trying to hold in her laugh at how adorable he looked. "What did they not feed you at the Impure village?" Star asked teasingly and the boy shook his head, his mouth too full to answer.

He swallowed down the last bite, before saying, "No, but all their food was really, really bad. Like realllly bad!" His eyes widened with horror at the memory of their horrendous food. "Like I think I'd rather eat at Babs' restaurant again than eat any of their food ever!"

Star nodded thoughtfully. "Wow, it must have been pretty terrible for you to willingly want pain-peppers again!" the blond royal said in an equally worried tone, her face matching her boyfriend's perfectly. But it switched back to a loving smile as she nuzzled Marco's face with her own, saying, "So what else happened, other than them trying to poison you, I want to know everything!"

"Oh man, where do I even start?" the boy pondered. "There's so much to tell."

"Well we got all night," the blond reminded him, before gently kissing his forehead.

The boy blushed as his girlfriend's lips brushed his skin, just barely managing to squeak out, "Maybe it'll be better if you start, Star."

"Me?" Star replied with a small chuckle.

"Well yeah, I want to know everything that happened to you too, Star!" Marco said the innocent look he was giving Star causing her heart to skip a beat. He was too precious sometimes.

"Not a whole lot to tell," the girl responded a bit shyly.

"What about that story you told Daisy and Violet, what was it about?" Marco questioned and Star flushed bright red.

"Oh, you don't want to hear that," Star muttered, suddenly avoiding Marco's gaze.

"Sure I do," Marco responded immediately, his eyes shining with wonder. "I care about everything you do, Star! You're my best friend."

"Aww, Marco, stop it!" the girl cooed, putting a hand to her blushing cheek.

But the boy just smiled and continued, pleased he was could praise his girlfriend enough to make her smile like that. "Plus, it's so cool you just made up a story like that on the spot, you're so amazing Star!"

"Come on, you're the amazing one, Mar-" Star began only to pause, her eyes widening in surprise as his words finally clicked in her brain. "Wait, what did you just say?"

"Uhh, your totally amazing," the boy tried but Star shook her head.

"No, about making up the story," Star explained, her head spinning in confusion. "Don't you do that for them every night?"

Marco shook his head, giving his girlfriend a lost look. "No I usually just read them a book or tell them one of the stories Buff Frog used to tell me," the hooded teen replied quizzically.

Star's startled face turned to one of annoyance as realization finally stuck her and she scoffed loudly, "Unbelievable! Those girls lied to me! I can't believe I fell for that!" She quickly buried her face in her hands, groaning in both disbelief and embarrassment at being so easily tricked by children.

Marco just watched his girlfriend quietly, before curiosity got the better of him again and he tilted his head toward her, asking as subtly as he possibly could, "Soooo what was the story about?"

Star froze for a second before just sighing in defeat and saying, "Okay fine... Once Upon A Time..."

[stratamuzak]

Interview with Voltagehawk

STRATA: What artists in particular you are drawn to (alive or deceased) that you listen to for particular moods? Such as happy/sad/contemplative/etc… Explain why you might listen to one artist for a particular mood.

CHASE AROCHA When I want to feel inspired I listen to a lot of the different projects of Mike Patton. Be it Faith No More, Mr. Bungle, Peeping Tom, or Tomahawk, the range of styles of music is so diverse that I’ve been listening for like 15 years and I haven’t gotten bored yet, haha. When I want to relax or chill, I love BadBadNotGood, an amazing jazz artist doing incredible arrangements all in a hip-hop context. It’s great! Or Ray Lynch, I really love his writing and use of counterpoint melody. Then if I’m getting hyped I put on something like Dying Fetus or Vitriol, or Maximum the Hormone. And any other time I’m blaring Kamasi Washington, Robert Glasper and Sturgill Simpson.

DAN FENTON I think a lot of the time music finds my mood. Sort of more a spiritual or cosmic connection. When I was a kid my mom would make us watch musicals if we stayed home sick from school. Jokes was on her because I hated school but I loved learning musical scores and how to write dynamic parts and movements. The fact that people like Bing Crosby and Fred Astaire, Frank Sinatra or Marlon Brand were also amazing actors only added to that unlikely education. I learned how to really feel music between that and the intense very bloody hymns we had to sing in church. I understand the sentiment but that shit is harder than a lot of black metal. “Are you washed in the blood of the lamb”. Hard core shit. Sorry, I digress. During the making of our most recent record which is called Electric Thunder and set for release later this year or early next (hard to navigate releases with all this pandemic shit) I listened exclusively to film scores, classical music and radio evangelists. I am not religious but I grew up in a preacher’s home and when I needed to get my creative push and anger at its peak, I listened to preachers who were clearly greed driven and motivated by the lust for power. It made my adrenaline rush in anger and it came out in the recording for sure. I am a huge fan of Hans Zimmer and Vangelis. Each of these artists move me in powerful ways. The juxtaposition of darkness and light both in traditional instrumentation and experimental synth based work. Just musical giants. When I am feeling frustrated about the social issues I see everyday in my East Nashville neighborhood I listen to KRS-One, Kamasi Washington, Outkast. A lot of protest music. I am in love with band IDLES from the UK. Such powerful lyrics tackling issues like the need for male vulnerability, equality for all and the  seemingly ironic brutal beat down of toxic masculinity. That band is great if you’re happy, mad, sad, whatever.

STRATA: Do you have a process you go through prior to writing, playing, and even performing?

CHASE AROCHA I do a lot of breathing exercises like the Wim Hof techniques. I have generalized anxiety disorder and I used to get horrible debilitating panic attacks, it helped me get into breathing and meditation. Anxiety will never go away but you learn ways to live with it and push through your panic. I think about how much this means to me and how long I’ve spent doing it, I try to see that I value myself as a person and then from that thinking I can just let go and play music. Only approaching it with love and not worrying about mistakes because that’s how we learn.

DAN FENTON The entire thing is one process. Like a heros journey of sorts. I listen and meditate everyday, I believe in a cosmic river of inspiration that flows from an energy that is and has always been. I believe if you listen hard enough and give yourself to the music the muse will send your mind transmissions that may only be a section of a song, or perhaps they are an entire album, but everyday I show up. A few years ago I read this book called The War Of Art, by Steven Pressfield. In this book he describes the invisible force he calls the Resistance. The Resistance may be things both “good or bad”, but they are anything that keeps you from showing up for your art. So I show up everyday, you can ask the dudes in the band, they receive a work tape maybe twice a week with new shit to try out. If I don’t feel that muse working I don’t force it, but I instead wait on further transmissions from the cosmic womb. All sounds crazy, but my story is crazy, so crazy makes the most sense. In the studio I have many processes. I found while recording vocals I perform better in complete darkness, I have realized how much I live inside my head and how active my imagination is and equally ADD my eyes are. So when I can’t see it brings to life the imagery and the passion of the song. I can see all those people I write about, all the landscapes, the love, lust, joy and pain. I also do some method stuff, keep things in my pockets pertaining to a character I may be portraying in a song. Wanna be Daniel Day Lewis shit.

STRATA: Your own current project, discuss the process your music went through as you built each layer. From beginning to the end of it. 

CHASE AROCHA This all started with our drummer Jarrad having a vision and going through trials and errors of finding the right people to execute that. Along the way Dan, Tyler, and I all came into the picture and that vision morphed into something we all felt was not even from us. Like we were an antenna receiving a signal and these riffs and lyrics quickly meshed into something I haven’t heard before. Part hard rock, part jazz, part punk and hardcore. All with this message of love and truth being the reason for living. To end the ones controlling our thoughts and dividing us or tribalism and greed. I feel like we made something worth listening to and that’s all I feel like you can really hope for.

DAN FENTON The self titled record that we have available now on all streaming platforms was two different profound stages in my life all in the making of one record. When we began, Jarrad and I partied a fuck ton, and I was descending into some serious personal shit with alcohol. It was bad, I couldn’t get through a day without way too high of a blood alcohol level. Before we finished vocals on the record, I stayed up one night working and drinking, perhaps I had never stopped from how many nights before, who fucking knows. Anyhow, I died for 9 minutes on the side porch of my house. Fully shut down, fucking dead. Mind you, I didn’t want to die, I just didn’t know how to lay off the bottle. Woke up in the ICU surrounded by my band, my wife and what few friends I had left. At that moment Voltagehawk became a complete family to me. I spent a stint in rehab (Jarrad drove me) and that was several years ago now. When I got out I went back to finish the record, make some amends and chase this thing out for real. So that was some info on the first record. The new Album which is a 13 song space odyssey named Electric Thunder, after our beloved Electric Thunder Studio owned and operated by our resident space wizard producer Geoff Piller, was not so dramatic. After I got my shit together and my mind cleared up I began to write everyday like a mad man. Song after song after song came like never before. I think we cut 15 songs out before we settled on the final 13. Our process as a band is often for myself or one of the other dudes to present a bare bones or often finished idea to the band and we run it through the Hawk Filter. The Hawk Filter is just the decomposition and reconstruction of every rough idea till it fits us. Which is silly to say because if we like, it we do it, not a matter of genre worship. Shit’s good, do it. Always do what’s best for the song.

STRATA: Can your music personally be an open door to breath and bend in the world of artistic exploration? In Other Words… how comfortable are you as an artist exploring other types of music and creating projects that might be totally  different than what you are creating now?

CHASE AROCHA There is so much great music in the world in so many styles, why shouldn’t we try to explore them all! I’m always trying something I haven’t done before, not always as a challenge, but I would hope it’s natural for people to do in art. We shouldn’t be the same people we were 2 years ago, let alone 10. I love jazz, Death Metal, and country music. If you can find a really fun and genuine way to blend those then that’s absolutely what you should do! Don’t be tied down to what kind of music you’re making and just make music.

DAN FENTON That’s all we do all day. Everything on this planet, and above it, and in it’s majestic seas and mountains, all these people of all the cultures of all the world and their energy and their culture all influence and musical inspiration is welcome. Our philosophy is never say no, and jump off the cliff, and pull yourself back up. Meaning: try all the musical options then settle on the one we believe is the most amazing. So much of our influence is from cinema and books, video games, you name it. I’ll pluck a support cable on every bridge I see ‘til I am dead just to see if it speaks to me. Sonically there are no fucking rules, and if you impose rules, fuck your rules. We love to create, to talk about creating and then to birth something new is beyond amazing.

STRATA: Are you open to change your style, genre even, and approach to how and what you create every time you enter a studio? Or do you find once you have a formula in place do you find it best to stay with what you know? Many times artists will change how they approach their songwriting and even their recording staff/producers.

CHASE AROCHA

Like I said before, I believe that you should just make music and with that should come constant experimentation. When we record we find sounds from all over the place. From children’s toy instruments, to skateboard wheels spinning to imitate rain. Our writing is kind of always evolving and changing. Dan is an amazing writer who literally has lyrics and melodies pouring out of his hands and face. Everyday he has new ideas and records and sends them to everyone. Jarrad is great at taking those riffs and making suggestions on how the structure could be of a song along with feel. I am obsessed with adding layers of guitars however I can, but I also write a lot and send tracks as well. Tyler is a tone junkie on the bass, filling in the bottom end and has such a great approach to being independent from the guitars with his lines. We send tracks back and forth to each other then we get in a room and flesh them out. The whole time in the process the songs are constantly changing and evolving into the sound we have. We are always open to change and never believe in the word No when discussing music and art. You try every idea and see what works and what doesn’t. Sometimes when one member has a vision of how a song should go and is trying to communicate that,  you should respect his idea and see it through. If it doesn’t work that’s okay, we tried!

DAN FENTON Voltagehawk is ever evolving. As it stands, we spend way too much time trying to pigeon hole what people will refer to our sound as. I don’t care what you call it as long as it moves you. I listen to everything from John Coltrane and Tom Waits to Napalm Death and Motorhead, Antonio Lucio Vivaldi to Kamasi Washington. IDLES and Bad Brains. If you refuse to evolve as an artist, experimenting, growing, trying new methods, all these elements then you cannot grow as a human being. Too many people are happy where they are, just okay, making the same music that their dads made and trying to cosplay some kind of yesteryear. We don’t do that shit, we’re us, that’s it. We grow, when you hear the Electric Thunder for the first time you will understand everything. If you burn some sage next to a photo of Carl Sagan while you listen to Electric Thunder, you will see the cosmic river in your minds eye. The world is full of people with a blockage in their brain. They cannot see that this bullshit we call a life is just a series of labor for hire gigs that leave us rapidly in the middle. We’re trying to break away from it all and follow our feathers, our truth, our search for enlightenment on our hero’s journey. I’ll leave you with this. Know Thyself.

[7r0773r]

The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson

I was leaving the South To fling myself into the unknown. . . . I was taking a part of the South  To transplant in alien soil, To see if it could grow differently, If it could drink of new and cool rains, Bend in strange winds, Respond to the warmth of other suns And, perhaps, to bloom.                            —RICHARD WRIGHT

***

Across the South, someone was hanged or burned alive every four days from 1889 to 1929, according to the 1933 book The Tragedy of Lynching, for such alleged crimes as “stealing hogs, horse-stealing, poisoning mules, jumping labor contract, suspected of killing cattle, boastful remarks” or “trying to act like a white person.” Sixty-six were killed after being accused of “insult to a white person.” One was killed for stealing seventy-five cents. (p.39)

***

Throughout the South, the conventional rules of the road did not apply when a colored motorist was behind the wheel. If he reached an intersection first, he had to let the white motorist go ahead of him. He could not pass a white motorist on the road no matter how slowly the white motorist was going and had to take extreme caution to avoid an accident because he would likely be blamed no matter who was at fault. In everyday interactions, a black person could not contradict a white person or speak unless spoken to first. A black person could not be the first to offer to shake a white person’s hand. A handshake could occur only if a white person so gestured, leaving many people having never shaken hands with a person of the other race. The consequences for the slightest misstep were swift and brutal. Two whites beat a black tenant farmer in Louise, Mississippi, in 1948, wrote the historian James C. Cobb, because the man “asked for a receipt after paying his water bill.”

It was against the law for a colored person and a white person to play checkers together in Birmingham. White and colored gamblers had to place their bets at separate windows and sit in separate aisles at racetracks in Arkansas. At saloons in Atlanta, the bars were segregated; Whites drank on stools at one end of the bar and blacks on stools at the other end, until the city outlawed even that, resulting in white-only and colored-only saloons. There were white parking spaces and colored parking spaces in the town square in Calhoun City, Mississippi. In one North Carolina courthouse, there was a white Bible and a black Bible to swear to tell the truth on. (pp. 44-45)

***

[In 1861] Florida heartily joined a new country whose cornerstone, according to the Confederacy’s vice president, Alexander Hamilton Stephens, was “the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery—subordination to the superior race—is his natural and normal condition.” This new government, Stephens declared, “is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth.” (pp. 58-59)

***

But the masses did not pour out of the South until they had something to go to. They got their chance when the North began courting them, hard and in secret, in the face of southern hostility, during the labor crisis of World War I. Word had spread like wildfire that the North was finally “opening up.” (p. 161)

***

When the people kept leaving, the South resorted to coercion and interception worthy of the Soviet Union, which was forming at the same time across the Atlantic. Those trying to leave were  rendered fugitives by definition and could not be certain they would be able to make it out. In Brookhaven, Mississippi, authorities stopped a train with fifty colored migrants on it and sidetracked it for three days. In Albany, Georgia, the police tore up the tickets of colored passengers as they stood waiting to board, dashing their hopes of escape. A minister in South Carolina, having seen his parishioners off, was arrested at the station on the charge of helping colored people get out. In Savannah, Georgia, the police arrested every colored person at the station regardless of where he or she was going. In Summit, Mississippi, authorities simply closed the ticket office and did not let northbound trains stop for the colored people waiting to get on. (p. 163)

***

Fewer than one out of five sharecroppers ever saw a profit at the end of the year. Of the few who got anything, their pay came to between $30 and $150 in the 1930s for a year of hard toil in the field, according to a leading Yale anthropologist of the era, or between nine and forty-eight cents a day. The remaining eighty percent either broke even, meaning they got nothing, or stayed in debt, which meant they were as bound to the planter as a slave was to his master. (p. 167)

***

Yet the hardened and peculiar institution of Jim Crow made the Great Migration different from ordinary human migrations. In their desperation to escape what might be considered a man-made pestilence, southern blacks challenged some scholarly assumptions about human migration. One theory had it that, due to human pragmatism and inertia, migrating people tend to “go no further from their homes in search of work than is absolutely necessary,” [British historian E. G.] Ravenstein observed.

“The bulk of migrants prefers a short journey to a long one,” he wrote. “The more enterprising long-journey migrants are the exceptions and not the rule.” Southern blacks were the exception. They traveled deep into far-flung regions of their own country and in some cases clear across the continent. Thus the Great Migration had more in common with the vast movements of refugees from famine, war, and genocide in other parts of the world, where oppressed people, whether fleeing twenty-first-century Darfur or nineteenth-century Ireland, go great distances, journey across rivers, deserts, and oceans or as far as it takes to reach safety with the hope that life will be better wherever they land. (p. 179)

***

Against nearly every assumption about the Migration, the 1965 census study found that the migrants of the 1950s—particularly those who came from towns and cities, as had George Starling and Robert Foster—had more education than even the northern white population they joined. (p. 262)

***

Overall, however, what was becoming clear was that, north or south, wherever colored labor was introduced, a rivalrous sense of unease and insecurity washed over the working-class people who were already there, an unease that was economically not without merit but rose to near hysteria when race and xenophobia were added to preexisting fears. The reality was that Jim Crow filtered through the economy, north and south, and pressed down on poor and working-class people of all races. The southern caste system that held down the wages of colored people also undercut the earning power of the whites around them, who could not command higher pay as long as colored people were forced to accept subsistence wages. (p. 317)

***

[George Starling] and his co-worker barely noticed that everyone else at the bar happened to be white as they regaled each other with stories from riding the rails. When it was time to go, they paid their tab and put their glasses down.

The bartender had said very little to them the whole time they were there. Now the bartender calmly picked up their glasses, and instead of loading them into a tray to be washed, he took them and smashed them under the counter. The sound of glass breaking on concrete startled George and his co-worker, even though this wasn’t the first time this had happened to them, just not at this bar, and it attracted the attention of other patrons. 

“They do it right in front of us,” George said. “That’s the way they let us know they didn’t want us in there. As fast as you drink out of a glass and set it down, they break it.”

There were not colored or white signs in New York. That was the unnerving and tricky part of making your way through a place that looked free. You never knew when perfect strangers would remind you that, as far as they were concerned, you weren’t equal and might never be. (pp. 340-41)

***

“Even in the North, refugees were not always safe,” wrote Arna Bontemps and Jack Conroy in the 1945 book Anyplace but Here. “One hard-working migrant was astonished when a detective from Atlanta approached him and informed him that he was wanted back home for ‘spitting on the sidewalk.’”(p. 367)

***

Contrary to conventional wisdom, the decline in property values and neighborhood prestige was a by-product of the fear and tension itself, sociologists found. The decline often began, they noted, in barely perceptible ways, before the first colored buyer moved in.

The instability of a white neighborhood under pressure from the very possibility of integration put the neighborhood into a kind of real estate purgatory. It set off a downward cycle of anticipation, in which worried whites no longer bought homes in white neighborhoods that might one day attract colored residents even if none lived there at the time. Rents and purchase prices were dropped “in a futile attempt to attract white residents,” as Hirsch put it. With prices falling and the neighborhood’s future uncertain, lenders refused to grant mortgages or made them more difficult to obtain. Panicked whites sold at low prices to salvage what equity they had left, giving the homeowners who remained little incentive to invest any further to keep up or improve their properties.

Thus many white neighborhoods began declining before colored residents even arrived, Hirsch noted. There emerged a perfect storm of nervous owners, falling prices, vacancies unfillable with white tenants or buyers, and a market of colored buyers who may not have been able to afford the neighborhood at first but now could with prices within their reach. The arrival of colored home buyers was often the final verdict on a neighborhood’s falling property value rather than the cause of it. (pp. 376-77)

***

[Martin Luther] King was running headlong into what the sociologist Gunnar Myrdal called the Northern Paradox. In the North, Myrdal wrote, “almost everybody is against discrimination in general, but, at the same time, almost everybody practices discrimination in his own personal affairs”—that is, by not allowing blacks into unions or clubhouses, certain jobs, and white neighborhoods, indeed, avoiding social interaction overall.

“It is the culmination of all these personal discriminations,” he continued, “which creates the color bar in the North, and, for the Negro, causes unusually severe unemployment, crowded housing conditions, crime and vice. About this social process, the ordinary white Northerner keeps sublimely ignorant and unconcerned.” (p. 387)

[indigodice]

START AT THE VERY BEGINNING, A VERY GOOD PLACE TO START

i’ll probably edit this gradually out of this being too much to read in one sitting maybe that means this should be more than one post what a mistake i’ve made its time to iron out some kinks in this blogging thing

For us the beginning was probably in high school. On and off games of Traveller and Shadowrun which weren’t overtly terrible, just unmemorable. I can only remember a handful of moments but they largely weren’t tied to a particular narrative. They were very singular drops in an ocean of wasted time. Maybe they were terrible after all. From early on there was a sense that combat was taking up hours while actual role playing was taking up minutes.

The most memorable thing in Shadowrun was the infiltration of a mansion by circulating rumors of a rave and party supplements. The plan had two parts, a coordinated dispatching of the mansion’s guard and relocation of the guards that hadn’t arrived yet. It was a largely successful, noisy, but bloodless smash-and-grab. We had time for another module which the GM then randomly generated using the random generation rules. We tried to replicate this plan with moderate failure, destroying a wyvern’s eggs then turning in look-alikes.

This form of random generation was most of what we did in Shadowrun, and probably the reason the experiences were unmemorable. We gathered to role play, and ended up wargaming. As things go on we have particular problems separating role playing from wargaming and expression becomes narrowed down to mechanics decisions on our character sheets. Compounding this problem is the lack of even binary choice in the narrative. When Mr. Shadowrun says we have a mission, it’s a single mission instead of a selection, so the extent of our choices are constricted within that predetermination. We’re our character sheets. And that means players rebel. Given our not-a-choice my character convinces another character that its suspicious a Mr. Johnson found our HQ so quickly, so we explode our HQ and have to find work elsewhere.

When Mr. Traveller is pushing us through events, we’re only given what he comes up with to work with, the narrative didn’t care about what our characters cared about. Eventually those games wound down as that groups’ GMs disappeared. We met someone willing to GM consistently, only we weren’t aware of his mental instability. And when we became aware of it, most of us recognized we weren’t equipped to handle such a someone. I didn’t share that thought because I was naive, but luckly I went with the group decision to cut him out and maybe we’re the better for it.

I might have brushed that aside, but that mentally unstable GM hosted an AdvancedDND module, Caverns of Chaos, which was meant to be an introductory look at ADND. During which we added players which the GM accepted in word, then rejected through gameplay. The game was a party and everyone was invited. Our complaints of the game moving slowly were responded to by accelerating rewards through a sentient reward room that responded to our whims. As my whim was suspicion it became a curse room. Our complains of the slow momotonous wargaming became an accelerated wargame where they were revealed by a wizard to be the machinations of a mind flayer. Then the wizard to transported us to another place where our skills were arbitrarily needed. Maybe a day had gone by in the game. But outside, months had gone by.

Then a combination of player drama resulted in the GM’s mental instability reaching a breaking point through rather violent expression. And so the group was reformed. Following that we had a few attempts to salvage that now lost campaign. Each player was given a chance to GM to salvage the game, and eventually we decided on restarting, scrapping the old characters for new ones. We picked up a new system called Pathfinder. Before our first moments role playing we’d looked at 3.5 books and heard Pathfinder was supposed to be better supported. So we began.

This worked for a while, as the new GM brought us though the Crypt of the Everflame. We reached the next town after a few months out of game. Crypt of the Everflame was intended to be a few sessions. The GM was experiencing burnout and never told anyone. From a personal standpoint I resent how that was handled, since it resulted in the group meeting, playing maybe an hour of combat, then everyone splitting off to do something else. Sometimes we wouldn’t be informed until arrival that nothing had been prepared, or that the GM wasn’t feeling up to it. Due to circumstances, this GM reached his own breaking point and was going through a kind of personal transformation, and dropped out of the group.

Those that remained tried to continue on. We hosted more one-shots trying to continue from those Pathfinder characters. After reaching the next town SEPIADICE creates one of my most memorable moments. The town had reached a breaking point because one of the partymembers was hellbent on creating mischief. Another decided the problems within the town were because of their systems of governance and took to trying to rally them against their leadership. The de facto town leader didn’t have the strength of his knights that usually kept the peace. We’d been sent here to retrieve them. He’d been trying to maintain the peace with martial law. And so he banished our party fearing more mischief. My character was infuriated that the de facto leader transgressed a rule of hospitality as he’d been on the road because of his own town’s leadership, and so my character confronts this town’s leader. He was steadfast in his decision since we were outsiders to him. We’d gained entrance because of a squire’s word. The fight first in words comes to blows. Another party member supported me with her magic, and the squire comes to the leadership’s aid. At that moment the fighting stops, and we make our escape.

The casters of the group splinter off, while those that remained travel presumably with the squire to retrieve the knights. The game ends and is never picked up again. We have a round of one-shots and eventually we decide we want a consistent game. We vote on the next GM. Notably I voted against SEPIADICE because the other would be GM was the more experienced, and I was hoping for something sustainable. So she wins four to three. It turns out her game has the same problems all the prior GMs had. Eventually SEPIADICE gets his turn to GM and does an adequate job. And I realize where I wanted to build on the other GM’s experience, she didn’t actually have the potential to change. While the muddle of one-shots never became anything particularly memorable. Sometimes we’d make decisions that felt meaningful, but then the one-shot would end and we wouldn’t get to witness the outcome of those decisions.

If SEPIADICE had continued I’m sure his game would have been enjoyable. As a GM he’d produced most of the memorable moments I enjoyed. But he’d become frustrated because I hadn’t managed to leave the headspace of the character I was playing, and consequently decided on playing that character in his setting. Causing two other players to also choose prior characters that had been there with him. So it became a cascade of insolence that I both didn’t see and didn’t dissuade by not seeing it. The difference was that I had asked and they hadn’t, but the result was the same. Old characters with old ties that didn’t fit the requirement he’d set down for character creation.

From the start of pathfinder up until the very end theres this looming question about what makes unable to role play, or why we’re bad as a group. There are answers ranging from “our group is too big” to “we’re probably just bad” to “its the ruleset we’re using.” Actually I’ve cherrypicked the ones I believe. I don’t remember the rest. From beginning to end our groups tended to be too large which muddled other problems. It was hard to role play because everyone needed some time in the spotlight and it was easy for us to get distracted either by the many bored players. Realistically the GMs shouldn’t have used combat as a crutch to stretch the time we were playing. It wasn’t fun. But it didn’t help that we were playing in a game that revolved around combat and the flow around actual role playing was snuffed out both by needing wait for long stretches of time for anything cohesive to happen. Things got gradually better after the Crypt of the Everflame because players started losing interest. But at the core we didn’t as a group understand what made role playing games good.

They certainly had potential, but most of what we did was wargame, and frankly video games were better for that. We couldn’t tap into what made role playing games good. Except for that moment where SEPIADICE banished our party. That was a damn good moment because that was a man with his back against the wall trying to give himself some more space, only he accidently makes things worse. The conflict they had against each other was not something they could resolve, it wasn’t either of their fault, and they both refused to bend. So they fight. And they fight because they refused to bend, and that’s how violence happens in reality. And so much of the violence in our role playing games has that weird circumstance of oh they show up while you’re travelling so you have to fight now. That’s not giving violence any respect. And any expression during that kind of violence falls flat when there’s nothing tangible at stake. Sure you could die, but you’re not really dying if you don’t have any connections to anything. Dying because you have too much pride feels better than the nothing of a random bear encounter. And to be honest SEPIADICE you should have died when you encountered that bear, instead you bit it and it ran away because the GM thought we would run, but adventurers aren’t reasonable people.

So maybe that’s one of our problems with role playing. Adventurers aren’t reasonable people, they encounter unreasonable things, and are expected to act unreasonably to resolve unreasonable things. Oh god there are so many paragraphs now and why is there only personality at the end who the heck is going to read all of this?

[unforgetabelle]

Lords, Lies & Ladybirds :LadyNoir July

part: 1

ao3

AN: This takes place in an altered version Shakespearean/Elizabethan England (think late 1500s/early 1600s) I’ve been watching the TNT series “Will” which is what inspired this, but you’ve all seen Shakespeare in Love, right? Basically, that.

First Impressions:

    Marinette perched on the edge of the fountain. In the center of the town square, it was the perfect location to watch the town drift by to the calm melody that was a Sunday morning. Usually, she was content simply to watch,  smile at the children playing or stare longingly at the outfits of the ladies as they passed, but today she had other diversions. Bending over the small bunch of bound papers her betrothed had gifted her the day before, Marinette’s charcoal stained fingers few across parchment. Her designs small and notations compact to conserve as much space in the precious booklet as possible, she was no less giddy at the prospect of having some implement to carry with her to document her ideas. They had paper in the bakery, of course. Despite it still being a luxury item to some, and certainly intended for men’s use, her father was a learned man and business owner who didn’t always follow the rules. Whether it was marrying her mother on a trip to the orient, teaching his only child to read, or indulging his little Ladybird’s “designing fancy,” Thomas Dupain was a prince among men, even if as second son he’d been relegated to a humbler life than what he’d been raised in. Still, even with her parents’ doting,  a blank book to fill with her ideas was a pleasure Marinette would not soon pass up.

    The clock bell sounded and Marinette looked up in shock, mentally recounting the number of tolls. Had it really been three hours since she left that morning?

    “Wipe that worry off your face, Birdy,” a voice called from her left and Marinette turned to find her best friend Alya, one of the few who knew her peculiar nickname, walking towards her with a small basket. “I came to find you after my meeting, only to be told you’d hadn’t been seen since dawn. But mama Dupain sent us sustenance, so here I am to insist on a picnic.”

    Alya stopped in front of her, waiting while Marinette closed her book and tried to wash her hands in the fountain. Drying them thoroughly on her skirt before slipping her booklet into a hidden pocket she’d added to her frock, Marinette stood and linked her arm with her friend before starting them towards the grassy knoll on the edge of town.

    “How did your meeting go?” She asked once they were away from the crowds of the square.

    “My suitor,” Alya began with a smile towards Marinette. “Thinks we have a very bright future ahead of us.”

    Marinette shook her head, but couldn’t help but smile back. Alya had plenty of suitors, with her curvaceous figure and connections to nobility abroad, men had been vying for the girl’s hand for as long as Marinette could remember. Luckily for the independent Cesaire girls, they had an overprotective father who had yet to deem a match good enough for any of his four daughters. But, in this particular instance, Marinette knew they weren’t really talking about any of Alya’s potential husbands. Her friend, along with being one of the few women in town who could read and write, was also profusely interested in politics, and as of late, had taken to writing anonymously for a local agency that produced pamphlets once a month. Her analysis on the facade of morality amongst the English lords last month had been so rousing the editor of the pamphlet had quickly commissioned her for the rest of the year. Marinette had never been prouder of her friend, and it gave her hope that maybe her own dreams weren’t so fanciful after all.

    “I’m happy for you,” she squeezed Alya’s arm. “You’ve been practically glowing since your first...meeting. And he’d be a fool not to recognize a gem when he sees one. You’re living your dream.”

    “You could too,” Alya prompted the old discussion, but Marinette didn’t change the topic like she usually did.

    “Maybe,” she allowed. Alya stopped in her tracks, eyes glowing, but as she opened her mouth to respond, they were jostled by a man nearly knocking Marinette over.

    “My apologies,” the man's hands grasped her forearms as he steadied her and their eyes met. Twin green pools stared back at her captivatingly for a moment, and Marinette was shocked at her own paralysis under his gaze. The man seemed equally frozen, and had Alya not placed a hand on her shoulder in concern, Marinette might have gotten lost in his captivating stare.

Then, a shout sounded from the plaza up ahead and the man seemed to startle out of his stupor. Hurrying a bow in her direction with furthered muttered apologies, he ran away,  disappearing in the maze of alleyways.

    Marinette looked away just as an imposing man barreled into the narrow street, heading in the direction her stranger had fled. Before she had a chance to question it, movement and shouts from up ahead caught her attention, and without a word, Alya was pulling her towards the increasing din in the plaza. Marinette instantly linked their arms back together, recognizing the investigative haze in her friend’s eyes and determined not to lose her in a crowd today. But even as they plunged into the crowd, her mind kept turning back, unable to completely shake the image of the blonde man and the hauntingly familiar quality of his emerald eyes.

[kitgilmore]

SEVEN / CINNAMON'S WAKE

Delight danced across as Kit's face as they sat at the immaculate table, the duck they were having was particularly delicious. The conversation had turned from how was school' to Nazis and that when Kit stopped paying attention to the blue nail polish she'd only been wearing on the weekends. Chilton did have a strict dress code, even though she'd seen a few upperclassman bend those rules daily. Kit was still the new girl and she didn't want to cause any more unwanted attention between Paris and her minions, Tristan the village idiot and Rory's audition for America's most crazed student the school was feeling crowded.

"Oh wait - Rudolph Gottfried." Their grandmother said.

"Another cousin?"

"No, a Nazi that we knew. I'd forgotten. We stayed with him once in Munich. Nice old man. Interesting stories."

Taking a sip of lemonade to stop herself from chocking at her Grandmothers comment, she took another to stop herself from outright laughing as she noticed the glint in her eye.

"Mom you socialized with a Nazi? That's despicable! That's heinous!" "No, dear, that was a joke." She smirked causing the twins to chuckle.

Kit could hear Rory before she entered the kitchen messenger bag slung across her shoulder.

"All of the parents pitch in so this is really really important. You know that, right?" Rory screeched.

"Your sister isn't freaking out.." she said as Kit grabbed a cup of coffee. "Why aren't you freaking out sweetheart"

"Because you can't bake!" She said taking a seat next to her mother, wondering why her sister was playing Rancid this early in the morning.

"You see one of the perks of having a mother who runs an inn is that it comes with a brilliant chef who makes the best sugar cookies."

"Smart child..," she said to Kit before turning to Rory.

"I try"

"I have it covered! Get your stuff and hit the stereo - we're late."

"It's not me." He sister said crossing the kitten to her bedroom. Opening the Gilmore saw a small Korean dancing.

"Where does your mother think you are?" Lorelai asked as Kit grabbed her blue peacoat, thanking God it was Tuesday so she didn't need Cello as much as she loved it lugging it to and from on a bus was becoming challenging.

"Oh, on a park bench contemplating the reunification of the two Koreas." Lane said. Their small best friend had been working her way through the catalogue of rock since 6th grade when she heard Metallica for the first time. If it wasn't for Lane Kit never would have found her love for Blondie, she would have stuck with Bach or YoYo Ma.

"So not skanking to Rancid?" Kit smirked.

"Wouldn't be included."

"School!" Their mother called out.

Saying their goodbyes to Lane as she ran off towards Stars Hollow High, they themselves ran into their neighbours Babette and Morey walked by pushing their cat in a carriage which honestly wasn't the strangest thing she'd seen them do it should have been though she sure of it.

"Wow, Cinnamon, riding in style," Rory commented while Kit just whistled along.

"Yeah, Morey made it. Cinnamon's not walking well these days but she still likes her passeggiatas. That's Italian for 'a nice walk.'" She short woman said of her overtly tall husband.

"Passeggiata," Morey said rolling his tongue in an Italian accent.

"Oh God, he makes it sound so sexy." Rory and Kit shared a look the couple was truly adorable.

"Come on."

"What's that?" Their mother asked pointing to the enclosed space in the gold covered wagon.

"Oh, it's Cinnamon's private area." She told them as if it was obvious.

"Sometimes she likes to be alone. She's just like Morey in that sense." She said before turning to her husband and asking.

"Say passaggiata again."

"I can't do it on command, Babs." He says, shades on cool as anything.

"Oh, he's blushin'. God, I love a man that blushes!" She says before they walked away pulling their cat in a wagon behind them.

"I love them" Kit smiled before kissing her mother goodbye.

"Okay, our town is just weird," Rory commented.

"Thank God."

"Bye," the girls said.

"Bye"

"I'll see you later at school," Rory said her voice a touch higher in her worried state.

"For what?" Joked their mother acting as if she didn't know what her sister was talking about.

"Mom, the bake sale!" Rory yelled, her eyes wide, her forehead creased.

"Ha! I got the vein in the forehead. Whoo!"

"Sadist," Rory called after her. Readjusting her bag, Kit grabbed hold of her sister's shoulders, pulling her towards their destination.

"Come on you little worrier or we're going to miss the bus." Her sister turned her, frowning before saying

"That's not funny!"

It took the twins about 45 minutes to get to Hartford from Stars Hollow. Seating on the bench at the bus stop Rory was reading one of the 3 books she always carried with her while Kit was nearing the end of Crime and Punishment, the Russian edition was a lot easier to read that she'd thought once she got into it, she did have to stop herself from skimming some of the longer passages but Dostoyevsky was beautiful in its original language. When the bus arrived the twins got on usually Kit stood up in order to lean against her cello but today she sat next to her sister, lucky the bus wasn't too crowded.

"Hey."

"Yблюдок" Bastard. "Aah! Morning." The twins yelled at the boy behind them.

"Good book?" He asked

"Sure"

"I don't know yet," Rory told him, Kit smiled at her sister as she blushed a little.

"I saw you standing in line so I thought I'd say hello."

"Hello," Rory said sheepishly.

"Hi, I'm Kit," she said offering him her hand over her seat which he shook "This is my twin sister Rory, which I'm sure you knew."

Rory was holding her bag tightly, not looking at either her sister or the boy.

"Yeah."

The conversation paused as the bus started to move, Kit watched as Rory blushing reached her ears.

"So how do you know Rory..?" Kit asked turning to face him. "Wait what's, what's your name?"

"Dean." He answered looking back at Rory who had yet to move.

"Oh, she helped me get a job at the store. I mean it's not a career or anything but it's got me solvent."

"Solvent's good." Rory finally added.

"Your the new boy" Kit said, not quite meaning it to come out as an accusation.

"Yeah, uh, are you always this serious?" He asked Rory, Kit smiled as she returned to her book.

"No" "Yes" she muttered under her breath.

"So, uh, how long does it take you to get to school?" He asked.

"Um...forty minutes if the bus driver's focused but longer if he's trying to win something on the radio," Rory said.

"Hey, this bus is going to Hartford!" she yelled.

"Yeah, I know."

"But you go to school here. You have to get off the bus!" Rory began to panic before calling out to the driver "Hey, he has to get off the bus!"

"Wait. You're forgetting something." He said leaning closer to her.

"Buses make stops. Good-bye Lorelai Gilmore." And with the cute boy in the leather jacket got off the bus.

"Oh god." Kit said unable to contain her smile. "You like him."

"No, I don't," She told her twin, shaking her head with a smile that was about to reach her eyes.

"You do, you did before.. you were all... I don't wanna got to Chilton, who needs read books when I can stare his cute face all day" she impersonated, as poked and prodded her sister's sides.

"I did not," Rory told her sister firm, blushing a little more than Kit had ever seen as she smoothed out her school uniform.

"He cute.." Kit told her trying back to Dostoyevsky "...he obviously likes you." Which caused the sides of her sister's smile to increase.

The school day passed relatively fast and before they knew it was bake sale time. Kit was a little surprised when she found out a school like Chilton was going to have a bake sale. The courtyard was littered with tables with a variety of different selection of cakes on them.

"OK- we've got our French fantasies" Sookie started "American treats and our Italian taste sensations. Well, what do you think?"

"Amazing."

"Brilliant"

"Incredible." The Gilmore girls commented.

"It is good, isn't it? Well, final touch." She smiled pulling out a blow torch to light the swan-shaped dessert on fire.

"Oh, can I do that?" Rory asked

"Whoa, honey, this is a more delicate procedure than you might think, OK?" Sookie told her lighting the torch.

"Ok" she replied, while Kit went in search of something with peanut butter in it.

"It takes an expert hand." she heard Sookie say as she turned around, walking backward a voice behind her called.

"Is that your mother"

"Eh, the one pouring lemonade on the desserts.." she said looking towards her mother and Sookie.

"Yeah that my mom.."

"So are your parents here?" She asked the shorter girl.

"No.. my father is in London and my mum lives in Chicago," Hazel told her. Kit and Hazel had become friends over the last couple of weeks. They only had one class together but it was nice having a companion in the orchestra.

"So. Are home alone?" Kit asked her as they walked past tables filled with deserts that didn't quite look homemade.

"No my brothers with me." Kit paused.

"You have a brother." She asked looking around.

"No... he doesn't go here. He has been kicked out of a few too many schools to go here." She told her.

"Oh... is he your only brother?" Kit asked. Once they found a table with what seemed to be peanut butter brownies, Kit brought three and one for Hazel.

"Yes.. we have same parents but I have 4 half sisters and a step-sister."

"Wow." Kit said.

"Yeah, my parents are worse than Ross Geller when it comes to marriage."

"That's good... or not" Kit said handing her a brownie.

"My mum has a set of twins."

"Really."

"They're identical though... so they have this whole creepy shinning thing going on." The freckled girl told her, playing with the bracelets stacked on her wrist, her shirt sleeves pulled up the elbow.

"We've done that.. it was fun.. well not fun but we got to scare Kirk." She said as they laughed their way back to her sister, Sookie and her mother.

"Whose Kirk?"

"He's.. unexplainable."

Lying across her bed, listening to Beethoven's Cello Sonata no. 3 she was putting off her chemistry homework. The afternoon light dancing across her bedroom floor, when Rory burst through the door. Kit sat up rapidly and shot her she looked at her with confusion.

"I brought a lettuce."

"Rad"

Kit blinked twice and was about to asked her sister why she brought a head of lettuce with such urgency when they heard a siren coming up the drive. The twins shared a looked before they raced to the window, trying not to disturb the small plant she kept there, as they opened it to get a better look. Out the window, a van from the Stars Hollow veterinarian clinic pulls up next door.

"Go get mum she's at Luke's." Kit asked her.

Inside Babette's house, Cinnamon's body lay covered with a sheet while the vet examined her. She had just finished when Rory and Lorelai arrived Kit was sitting with Morey.

"Oh, Lorelai. Rory Come in, come in." The small blonde told her mother as she adhered them inside.

"She's gone. Cinnamon's gone."

"I'm so sorry."

"Is there anything we can do for you, Morey?" Kit asked trying to comfort the fellow musician as Rory sat next to her.

"This is life, Girls," he told them "It breaks your heart." The girls both hugged him while Babette told them what happened to Cinnamon.

"She looked like she was sleeping. I thought she was asleep so I nudged her and she didn't wake." She told them getting more and more upset.

"I gave her a push and she rolled off the couch and since I waxed the floor she went shootin' across the room and then she knocked over the lamp and she still didn't move. I knew it was over." When she cried "Oh, God, my baby." Lorelai hugged her to comfort her.

"Tell me it wasn't the -." He started before clamming up with grief.

"Oh, Morey, don't do this to yourself. He thinks it was the clams."

"She saw me eating them and she gave me that 'hey, man, what's up?' look and -."

"It wasn't the clams. Morey, in human years this cat was 260 years old." The vet told them.

"That's a good, long life." Their mother told them

"Listen, why don't you let me take her out to the van and then I'll get out of your way." The vet suggested.

"Oh, no, stay," she said before turning to the rest of them

"All of you, please stay. Cinnamon would want you here.

"We'll stay as long as you want," Rory said.

"I'll never eat clams again."

"Me either." The twins said.

A funeral for a cat may not seem that strange, if you are eight and have need to say goodbye to your first pet but its more often than not a private affair in the backyard next to the oak tree, however in a town such as Stars Hollow with a Cat like cinnamon a wake is required. The Gilmore twins were trying to keep themselves occupied while their mothers organise ed greeting the mourners, calling both Luke and Sookie and comforting Babette. Kit was trying very hard not to think about the chemistry homework she had put off in favour of relaxation. What a stupid teenage mistake because you never know when your neighbour's cat will die, and you'll have to put it off in favour of a wake for said cat. She wondered briefly if 'my neighbour's cat died" was on the same par as 'my dog ate my homework. How did that phrase even start, Kit wondered who was the first to start it, was it a movie or a book. She swore to look it up later as she's pulled out of her thoughts by Lane who said

"They said that they rolled her body into a lamp." as they walked through Babette barn style house, Kit pursed her lips as Rory nodded in answer.

"Did you laugh?" Kit had to concentrate on not laughing at this moment, it not that she thought it was funny, Its just tragedy plus time equals comedy and one day this will be funny, probably sooner rather than later. Her mother had a terrible track record with pets including two hamsters and a turtle. How she killed a turtle Kit will never know. Rory being far more polite than her sister just shook her head at her best friend.

"Did you want to?" Kit sniggered at her, her hand quickly finding her mouth as she composed herself, Rory gave her a sharp look only for it fall into a smile as she nodded yes.

"But it's sad," Rory told them, as they walked into the living room.

"Yeah, it's sad."

"So sad." Kit said.

She lost Rory in the crowd of people, after a short conversations in which miss Patty informed her that birthday kissed are a special kind of magic, and only after Kit promised to always remember that she left the dance teacher in search of her sister and a mug of hot chocolate, if she played her cards right she could have it spiked with peppermint, because it never too early for something festive.

"Do you know him?" she heard her mother ask, Rory's ears flushing in the way they seemed to when leather jacket boy was around. Kit found her mother looking in the direction of the kitchen where he was headed, a creates of soda bottles in his arms.

"No"

"No"

"Yes." Kit said joining the conversation, Lorelai looked between her daughters one blushing, one smirking.

"Well, he goes to my old school, so I see him there sometimes," Rory told them quickly.

"but I.. we go to Chilton now." Kit giggled at her sister's misfortune.

"Thanks for the update."

"You're welcome."

When their mother left the leather jacket boy suddenly returned, before Kit could save her sister from her flustered lack of conversational skills, their conversation was over, when he smiled sweetly and said

"Oh, sure, ill see you later."

As she watched her sister watch him leave she pulled on her shoulder and said.

"Okay, we need to make a plan, otherwise that boy is never going to know how many triple word score words you know...I'm thinking step 1. Talking." It wasn't untill she was ready to click her finger in her sister's face that she noticed just what she was staring at, like Rory all words seemed to fail her, as her mother returned. It was Rory who asked.

"Mom? Isn't that -"

"Oh, no."

"That's Mr. Medina." Kit said as she pointed to towards the dark haired man standing on their front porch.

"Tonight's Thursday!"

"You were expecting him." Kit asked looking towards her mother.

"Well, am I in trouble? is Kit. Did the school call or something?" Rory asked just as confused by the sudden appearance of their English teacher.

"No, no you're great. Both of you" Lorelai started. She paused trying to find the words. "I - um - let me just come back in just one second."

"Wait - what's going on?" Rory asked.

"Let me tell you in a minute."

"Tell us now." Kit all but demanded.

"Max is here -"

"Max?... You're calling him Max." Kit staggered.

"Max is here to pick me up."

"Pick you up.." Kit repeated.

"Pick you up for - oh."

"I'm gonna go talk to him real quick and I'm gonna be right back." Both the girls walked inside faces far more appropriate for the occasion.

"Are we alright with this?" Kit asked her sister, as she was being pulled through Babette house and out the other door into the garden, Kit giggled as Rory sat amongst the circle of red-hatted garden gnomes as if she was conducting a meeting of the UN.

"Are we," she answered, Kit let out the breath she was holding and thought about it. Unable to come up with a quick conclusion she too sat down and joined the meeting.

The conversation had been laps with neither teen quite sure how they felt about the possibility of their mother dating their teacher, but more importantly, their mother who shared everything, too much some would say didn't tell them until he was standing right in front of them. In fact. She hadn't told them anything at all. Kit couldn't help but think about all the ways in which this could go wrong, they were new at Chilton, she just wanted to keep her head down and get through this semester not be known as the girl who mother is dating her English teacher.

"Hey." A voice called behind them, Kit watched as Rory jumped, a little startled herself. As soon as she saw who it was, a smile appeared.

"Jeez, you scared me."

"You just keep popping up, don't you." Kit said, as she picked up one of the gnomes, wanting to give them some privacy but now ready to leave the circle just yet.

"Yeah, uh, look. I just wanted to say that I'm sorry."

"For what," Rory asked.

"Well, I've been kind of bugging you lately. Uh, I thought - I don't know." Kit attention was now on the pair of them not they noticed.

"I thought that maybe you liked me. But it's obvious that you're not interested so I just wanted to say that I get it and I'm not gonna bother you anymore."

Rory looked hurt as she glanced at her sister in desperation, Kit eyes widen as she silently told her to say something, anything as he started to walk away.

"Wait! I AM interested," she yelled as she jumped up. Maybe not that Kit thought.

"You are?"

"Yes. I gotta go." And with that Rory bolted towards the house leaving her sister, the boy in the leather jacket and her meeting of gnomes. Putting the gnome who looked like he was named Samson back in his position the tall teen stood up and said to the boy watching her sister leave with a smile on his face.

"She's better when she had the chance to write a second draft."

"Goodnight leather jacket boy."

"Oh! Finally. I've been looking everywhere for you." Lorelai said as she found the girls on the front porch.

"Well, you found us." Kit snipped.

"Listen, I have some explaining to do. OK. Okay." she started.

"So sit down in that tiny little bench and I'm gonna do it right now." the twins looked towards each other and silently agreed to listen to their mother. They squeezed together on the little bench and waited for an explanation.

"That man on the porch was your teacher." she started.

"Fully aware of who he is Mom, we have him for an hour of English, 5 days a week."

"So?" Rory added.

"So - um - he and I were going to sort of hang out together," she told them

"On a date," Rory asked.

"No, on a" Kit raised her eyebrows at her mother

"Something that could appear like a date to the untrained eye."

"You mean like your daughters or the guy at the bank, or to anyone. Really." Kit added, the brand of sarcasm she only reversed for her parents dating choices, their father only slightly worse than their mother when it comes to the length of time their relationships last.

"It was a date." she defeated.

"How long have you been dating him?" Rory asked, her eyebrows doing their 'trying to be as sassy as her sister' thing.

"I haven't. This was gonna be the first time."

"Right." Kit mumbled trying to wrap her head around this.

"And when were you planning on telling us about this - your wedding?" Rory asked.

"No - by the rehearsal dinner at least." Their mother joked. Neither twin was amused.

"He's our teacher." Kit said after a beat of silence.

"I know."

"He teaches us things every day in a very small classroom with a lot of other kids who probably won't be high-fiving us when they find this out," Rory said as she stood up, her hands letting go of the sleeve of her jean jacket.

"I know, sweetie, and I told him this was one of the things I was concerned about," she told them.

"And?" Kit asked.

"And he thought we could be discreet."

"You do realize we're in high school. You remember that it was that thing you meant to be doing when we were conceived" Kit snapped.

"Are you mad?"

"Should we not be."

"Yes," Rory added.

"Alright. Because I'm dating him?"

"A little. I think." Kit said standing up, as she leaned against the house, she waited for Rory to speak.

"Because you lied to us."

"I kept information from you." She said, unable to meet her eye.

"Information that we should have had." Kit told her, standing next to her sister, her arms folded.

"Information that would have come out eventually," she said her hands waving in front of her as she tried to dismiss this issue, in a true Gilmore fashion. "Like the Iran-Contra scandal."

"So you're Oliver North." Rory huffed.

"No, I'm Fawn Hall."

"Mom"

"Well, she was much prettier." she joked.

"I just can't believe that you didn't tell us about this." Kit said, sitting back down, trying to work out if she was okay with her mother dating her English teacher and whether in the end, it mattered.

"Why wouldn't you tell us?"

"'Cause I thought you were going to take it bad. Thank God I was wrong."

"Its pretty justified." Kit snipped.

"OK, OK. Listen, I'm sorry. I won't date him. I promise."

"I'm not saying that you can't date him. It's just.." Rory started.

"Weird... It's weird." Kit finished.

"Yeah, I mean - there's a million guys in this world and you end up with Mr. Medina," Rory said.

"You think I don't get the weirdness factor? Believe me, the last thing I intended to do was date your teacher."

"I believe you," Rory said while Kit kept quiet.

"I really like him, girls. I can't help it. And it's been a really long time since I've felt like this. You can't always control who you're attracted to, you know." Their mother told them unable to control the smile on her face.

"I think the whole Angelina Jolie/Billy Bob Thronton thing really proves that. And I know you don't understand this now but you will someday. You'll meet some great guy and he'll make your head all foggy and you won't know what to do with yourself."

"Oh, girls, I won't keep anything from either of you again. OK? I promise. From now on every aspect of my life is an open book to you both."

"That's alright." Kit mumbled.

"Really, I'm not even going to get dressed until I tell you what I'm thinking of wearing."

"Fair enough."

"OK, tomorrow I'm thinking the purple tiger top, the black leather skirt, the panda bear underwear."

"Please. Stop."

"But of course I'm totally open to suggestions."

"Here's one: get some help." Rory integrated.

Once the goodbyes where said the girls made their home, the phone started ringing as soon as they opened the door. Their mother reached for it, while Kit stripped off her mustard sweater, as she listened to her mothers conversation.

"Hello."

"Mom?"

"Hi."

"But someone hasn't."

"There we go."

"Well, there are no messages on the machine, Mom."

"At a wake."

Both Kit and Rory looked at their mother with annoyance, shaking their heads and all but waving their arms.

"A wake...a funeral."

"It was for the neighbours -"

"-cat." Kit smacked her hand against her head, her mother looked at her and mouthed 'What', to which the girls just shocked their heads.

"Mom?"

"I just wanted to be honest with you, Mom. Silly me."

"Yeah, a cat. It was a cat's funeral." she continued.

"Not my cousin, mom. My father's grandmother's sister's girl who I've never -" the girls left their mother to her own mother.

"French and then Chemistry." Kit told Rory when she asked what Homework she had.

"Plus English."

"Plus English, which ill leave for last I think. I should probably start with Chemistry." Kit moaned as she filled the coffee filter.

"Aaagh! She's working for a sedative manufacturer. Keeping that demand sky-high." Lorelai moaned in the same tone as Kit as she entered the kitchen.

"You shouldn't have told her," Rory said, pouring herself a glass of lemonade.

"Well, I don't know what to tell and what to hide."

"Yeah."

"So we never did quite settle the whole dating-your-teacher issue." their mother started. Looking between her two teenagers as they stood on either side of the room.

"You're a grown up. You can date whoever you like."Kit said before turning back to her coffee.

"It's whoever we like."

"Well I'm certainly not going to go out with him 'cause that would be really weird," Rory said.

"But I mean it. I won't see him if you don't want me to."

"Huh." Kit mumbled as she poured her coffee.

"You know, if there's anything that makes you feel uncomfortable, big or small, then he's out of there."

"Good to know," Rory stated.

"Because you know it's not like I'm desperate. I mean, there are plenty of other guys out there."

"Plenty."

"And it's not like I have to ask permission from my teenager daughters. I mean, this is a courtesy."

"Thanks." Kit said as she reached the stairs.

"OK, so I'm going to be up for a while if you want to get back to me on this," Lorelai yelled so both she and Rory behind her closed door could hear.

"Got it." Kit yelled down the stairs as she reached her bedroom, put the cup of coffee on her messy bedside table, and fell on to it only for a second before she reached for her school bag and pulled out her homework.

[delicatelythoughtfulpatrol]

从《木兰诗》到《花木兰》：每个时代自己的女英雄 Mulan, a Most Adaptable Heroine: There’s a Version for Every Era

When rumors of a live-action, nonmusical version of “Mulan” began to trickle out a few years ago, many hard-core fans of the 1998 Disney original groused. No big musical numbers and soaring ballads? No Mushu, the wisecracking dragon, or Li Shang, the movie’s clearly conflicted love interest?

 No “Reflection”? Many felt that the filmmakers were being unfaithful to the Mulan legend — or at least to Disney’s own version of it.

几年前，当制作真人非音乐片版《花木兰》的消息开始传出时，许多1998年迪士尼原版的铁粉都表示不满。没有大排场的音乐剧曲段和高扬的歌谣？没有讲俏皮话的木须龙，也没有李翔这个片中明显的爱情线矛盾点？

没有《倒影》这首歌？许多人认为这是电影人对《花木兰》传奇——或至少是对迪士尼自己的版本——的不忠。

But Mulan has always been the most adaptable of heroines. Long before fans criticized Disney for taking liberties with their beloved animated heroine, poets, writers, playwrights and filmmakers had been creating scores of wildly different versions of the legendary woman warrior. In some, she’s a hardened army general; in others, she has magical powers; in yet others, she’s a crack shot with a bow. In one animated version, she’s a bug.

但花木兰一直是最易于改编的女英雄。早在粉丝们批评迪士尼随意歪曲他们喜爱的动画女英雄之前，诗人、作家、剧作家和电影人就一直在为这个传奇女战士创作出大量风格迥异的故事。在一些版本中，她是一位刚毅的将军；在另一些版本中，她拥有魔力；还有一些版本里她是个神射手。有一个动画版本里她成了一只小虫子。

Over the centuries, she’s been celebrated in stage plays and operas, in musicals and TV series, in picture books and novels and young-adult fiction. On the big screen, she’s starred in silent movies (“Hua Mulan Joins the Army” from 1927); a gorgeous, full-color musical by the legendary Shaw Brothers (“Lady General Hua Mu-Lan,” 1964); a gritty, action-filled war epic (“Mulan: Rise of a Warrior,” from 2009, with Zhao Wei) — as well as a certain Disney animated movie, featuring a tiny red dragon.

几个世纪以来，她在舞台剧和歌剧、音乐剧和电视剧、绘本、小说和青年题材虚构作品中都得到了赞颂。在大银幕上，她出现在默片里（1927年的《木兰从军》）、传奇的邵氏兄弟出品的华丽全彩音乐片里（1964年的《花木兰》）、在残酷而动作感十足的战争史诗里（2009年赵薇出演的《花木兰》）——也在一部有条红色小龙的迪士尼动画电影里。

In the latest “Mulan,” premiering Sept. 4 on Disney+, the Chinese-American actress Yifei Liu stars in a tale that blends stunning battle sequences (the film’s $200 million budget included a portion for 80 trick riders from Kazakhstan and Mongolia) with a story that makes much of the story’s gender-bending subtexts.最新一部《花木兰》将于9月4日在Disney+首播，这一由美籍华人女演员刘亦菲主演的作品将精彩的战斗场面（该片预算2亿美元，其中一部分用于拍摄来自哈萨克斯坦和蒙古的80名特技骑手）和充分利用了性别逆转潜台词的故事融合起来。

And while there’s no Mushu (“we really needed Mulan to face her own challenges and make her own decisions,” the director Niki Caro noted), there are several references to the 1998 animated film. There are also nods to various older versions of the story, most notably the “Ballad of Mulan,” the poem from the fifth or sixth century that started it all.

虽然不再有“木须”这一角色（导演尼基·卡罗[Niki Caro]指出，“我们确实需要花木兰自己面对挑战，自己做出决定”），但还是有几处改编参照了1998年的动画电影。片中还有对各种古老版本故事的致敬，最著名的就是《木兰诗》，这首写于五、六世纪的诗歌是这一切创作的起点。

“Ballad of Mulan” is a relatively simple tale, only six stanzas long: Mulan leaves her village to take her infirm father’s place in the emperor’s army. For a dozen years, she serves nobly, all while disguised as a man; in the end, she refuses rewards and honors to return home, where her former comrades learn at long last that, surprise, Mulan is female.

《木兰诗》是一个相对简单的故事，只有六段：花木兰离开她的村庄，代替衰老的父亲进入皇家军队。在十几年时间里，她恪尽职守，一直伪装成男人；最后，她拒绝奖励和荣誉回到家乡，在那里，她的老战友们才终于惊讶地发现，花木兰是个女人。The poem ends with an image of two rabbits (“how can you tell the female from the male?”) running alongside each other — a scene replicated in the new movie.这首诗以两只兔子（“安能辨我是雄雌？”）一起奔跑的意象结尾——这一场景也出现在了这部新电影中。

“Any time there was an image from the ballad, I wanted to bring it to the film,” Caro said. “Obviously, a lot of the international audience might not know the ballad, but for the ones who do, it’s nice.”

“任何时候，只要有来自民谣里的意象，我都想把它带到电影里，”卡罗说。“显然，很多国际观众可能不知道这首诗，但是对于知道的人来说，这会是很棒的编排。”

After the original poem, subsequent versions of the Mulan story added plotlines and details to flesh out the tale. In the 16th-century play “The Heroine Mulan Goes to War in Her Father’s Place,” she has bound feet. “At the time, women in the upper classes would bind their feet, and the playwright wanted to make sure Mulan was seen as the ideal icon of femininity,” said Lan Dong, author of “Mulan’s Legend and Legacy in China and the United States” and an English professor at the University of Illinois Springfield. “She had to be perfect.”

在原诗之后，花木兰故事的后续版本增加了情节和细节，使故事更加丰满。在16世纪的戏剧《雌木兰替父从军》中，她裹了小脚。“那时候上层社会的女性会裹脚，这位剧作家想确保花木兰被视为女性气质的理想象征，”《花木兰在中国和美国的传奇和遗产》(Mulan’s Legend and Legacy in China and the United States)一书的作者、伊利诺伊大学斯普林菲尔德分校的英语教授董兰（音）表示。“她必须是完美的。”

In the 1695 novel “The Romance of Sui and Tang Dynasties,” Mulan meets a fellow female warrior who becomes her sworn sister; in the end, Mulan takes her own life when the Khan summons her to be his concubine. “Many versions emphasize her virtue,” Professor Dong said. “Even after all those years and everything she’s put herself through, she kept herself untouched.”

在1695年的小说《隋唐演义》中，花木兰遇到了另一位女战士，两人成了结拜姐妹；故事最后，当被可汗召唤做妾时，花木兰结束了自己的生命。“许多版本的故事强调她的品德，”董兰说。“即使在那么多年里经历了那么多事，她仍然要保守贞洁。”

精彩的邵氏黄梅戏版《花木兰》中的一幕。 

The screen adaptations further expand the legend. In the 1939 Chinese film “Mulan Joins the Army,” the heroine is a skilled hunter, fighter and eventually, general; the film ends with Mulan as a blushing bride.荧幕上的改变进一步拓展了她的传奇。在1939年的中文电影《木兰从军》中，女主角成为一名熟练的猎手、武士，最终当上了将军；影片结尾，花木兰则成了一个害羞的新娘。  

The Huangmei opera film “Lady General Hua Mu-Lan” is perhaps the most exuberant of the pre-Disney bunch. In addition to flashy combat sequences, vibrant costumes and hot-potato-style drinking games (during which Mulan gets blotto), the movie features singing galore. Everybody sings, about everything imaginable: Dad’s asthma; the importance of filial piety; gender roles and the unequal division of labor in the home; those “reckless and pushy” barbarians invading our homeland, and so on.

黄梅戏电影《花木兰》可能是迪士尼改编前最精彩的一部作品。除了华丽的战斗场面，鲜艳的服装设计和“击鼓传花”式的喝酒游戏（花木兰在其中烂醉如泥），这部电影还包含了大量唱段。每个人都在唱，唱一切你能想到的东西：爸爸的哮喘；孝道的重要性；家庭中的性别角色和不平等的劳动分工；那些侵略我们家园的“蛮不讲理”的野蛮人等等。

When the Disney filmmakers first started work on the latest Mulan story, they turned to a range of versions for inspiration. There was the original ballad, of course, as well as regional variations, which they examined with the help of advisers from China. They looked at plays and films, including the drama with Zhao Wei. “We dug in fairly deeply to look at the arc of the story,” said Jason Reed, one of the producers, “to see what elements had stayed consistent over time, and which elements had been tailored to fit the time and the medium that the story was being retold in.”

迪士尼电影制作人第一次开始制作最新的木兰故事时，他们从多个版本中寻找灵感，当然也在中国顾问帮助下研究了最初的民间诗歌和不同地区的变体。他们观看各种戏剧和电影，包括赵薇参演的影片。“我们相当深入地挖掘这个故事的叙事弧，”制片人之一杰森·里德(Jason Reed)说，“看看哪些元素随着时间的推移保持一致，哪些元素被量身定制，以适应故事重述的时代和媒介。”

In many tellings, Mulan is a skilled fighter before joining the army. The animated version portrayed Mulan as a novice (before that hummable boot-camp sequence makes a “man” out of her), but in the latest outing, we learn that Mulan has been trained by her dad from the time she was a girl.

在很多叙事中，木兰在参军之前就已经是一名武艺高强的战士。动画版将木兰刻画成新手（之后是那段哼唱的新兵营戏份，将她塑造成一个“男人”），但在最新的版本里，我们了解到，木兰从她还是个女孩的时候就接受了父亲的训练。

Another central theme in the legend is filial piety, with Mulan getting her parents’ blessing before heading off to war. Filial piety also dictates that she return home to her parents after her tours of duty are over. Her cross-dressing is forgiven (there was a war on, after all), as long as she resumes her proper place as a daughter and wife, postwar. “That’s why, despite her transgressions, she was put on a pedestal even in premodern China,” Professor Dong said. “She’s breaking the rules without threatening the system.”

这个传说的另一个核心主题是孝顺，木兰在出征前得到了父母的祝福。孝道也决定了她在兵役结束后回到父母身边。只要她在战后能恢复女儿和妻子的正常身份，她的女扮男装就能得到原谅（毕竟是在打仗）。 “所以尽管她有过错，但即使在旧时代的中国，她也受人尊崇，”董兰说。“她在没有威胁到整个体制的情况下打破了规则。”

In both Disney movies, Mulan sneaks off under cover of darkness, hardly the obedient daughter. The new one, however, further tweaks the Mulan legend, even as it plays up the virtue of filial piety in ways unexplored in the animated original. “In every previous version we could find, she always ends up coming back and just returning to her old life, and we thought that that was not a satisfying ending for her journey,” said Amanda Silver, who co-wrote the screenplay with Rick Jaffa (they share credit with Lauren Hynek and Elizabeth Martin).

在这两部迪士尼电影中，木兰都是在黑暗掩护下偷偷溜走的，这可算不上什么听话的女儿。不过，新版进一步调整了木兰的传说，以动画原片未有的方式烘托孝道的美德。“在所有我们能找到的以前的版本中，她最后回来，总是回到旧日的生活里去，我们认为对她的旅程来说，这不是一个令人满意的结局，”与里克·贾法(Rick Jaffa)共同编写剧本的阿曼达·西尔弗(Amanda Silver)说。（编剧还包括劳伦·海尼克[Lauren Hynek]和伊丽莎白·马丁[Elizabeth Martin]。）

Silver and Jaffa were particularly inspired by the ballad’s emotion and scope. (“It very succinctly talks about what she goes through in battle,” Silver said.) But the animated original was always one of their primary inspirations, and you can see nods, and more than nods, throughout.

西尔弗和贾法特别受到民间诗歌的情感与空间的启发。（“它非常简洁地讲述了她在战斗中的经历，”西尔弗说。）但动画原作一直是他们的主要灵感之一，从头至尾，你可以看到许多致敬，而且不止是致敬。Everyone involved in the new movie had favorite scenes and elements from the Disney original, things they had to have in this latest effort. Jaffa loved the sequence where the soldiers discuss their ideal woman, although in this go-round, he said, “we thought it was super important to tell that more clearly from Mulan’s point of view.”

所有参与这部新电影的人都有在迪士尼原动画中最喜欢的场景和元素，这些都是他们一定要加到新片里去的。贾法很喜欢士兵们讨论他们理想女人的那一段，不过他说，在新片中，“我们认为从木兰的角度更清楚地讲述这一点是非常重要的。”

For Caro, it was the matchmaker scene, in which Mulan comically and spectacularly fails her “good wife” test, and the avalanche, a key battle scene in the original. “With all the technology at our disposal, of course we were going to do that,” she said.

卡罗最喜欢红娘那场戏，木兰滑稽而又精彩地未能通过“好妻子”的考验；还有原片中至关重要的雪崩战斗场景。“我们掌握了那么多技术，当然要拍这场戏，”她说。

And this being an action epic, there’s much more fighting than in the original, particularly by Mulan. The film has the look and feel of Zhang Yimou’s wuxia epics (think: “Hero” and “House of Flying Daggers”), with flowing robes and flashing swords, soldiers running across rooftops and sprinting up walls. Popular veterans of his films (Gong Li, Donnie Yen, Jet Li) even have starring roles. “I was hugely inspired by his work,” Caro said. (“The Disney brand is that you can’t actually show violence,” she noted, so there are no wuxia-style disembowelments or spurting arcs of blood.)

作为一部动作史诗，片中的打戏比动画原版多得多，尤其是木兰的打斗。这部影片有着张艺谋武侠史诗的风貌（想想《英雄》和《十面埋伏》），长袍飘逸，宝剑闪耀，士兵们在屋顶穿梭，在墙壁上奔跑。张艺谋片中那些受欢迎的老面孔（巩俐、甄子丹、李连杰）甚至也在这部影片中出演角色。“他的作品给了我巨大的启发，”卡罗说。（“迪士尼品牌的规则是，你不能真的展示暴力，”她说，所以这部片子里没有武侠式的开膛破肚或鲜血四溅。）

Not only did we have to see Mulan fight, said Caro, we had to see her fight as a woman — hence, all those shots of Yifei Liu sans body-concealing armor, her long flowing hair unrestrained by hat or helmet. “In this version, what she learns is that she won’t be truly powerful until she’s herself, until she accepts the power she has as a young woman,” Caro added.

我们不仅要看木兰打斗，卡罗说，我们还要看她作为一个女人打斗——所以在很多镜头里，刘亦菲没有身穿遮盖身体的盔甲，飘逸的长发也没有帽子或头盔的束缚。“在这个版本里，她学到的是，除非她成为自己，接受自己作为一个年轻女人所拥有的力量，否则她不会真正强大起来，”卡罗还说。

The film also added characters like Gong Li’s shape-shifting sorceress, a striking counterpoint to Mulan’s trussed-up soldier. 

There’s also enough longing looks and scenes of unrequited love to satisfy the most fervent fan of rom-coms. “I love the gender fluidity that’s inherent in the story,” Caro said. “And there’s a scene between Mulan and Gong Li’s character that’s literally directed like a love scene. It’s all conscious, and yet the movie can also live for a general audience quite happily.”

影片中还加入了一些角色，比如巩俐饰演的千变万化的女巫师，与木兰身穿铠甲的士兵形象形成鲜明对比。

还有许多充满憧憬的眼神与单恋的场景，足以让最狂热的爱情片粉丝满意。“我喜欢这个故事里固有的性别灵活性，”卡罗说。“而木兰和巩俐扮演的角色之间有一场戏，导演起来简直就像爱情戏。这一切都是有意识的，然而这部电影也可以让普通观众看得相当快乐。”

How will this version play to fans of the original — whether the ballad or the Disney animated one? “I know we’re not going to please everybody,” Caro said. “But I do think there’s a reason that the story has been so resonant and relevant for, what, over 1,300 years? And telling it in live action, my hope was that I would make it possible for everybody, including those who were so protective of the animation, to enjoy her again in a new way.”

这个版本会让原作的粉丝有何感受呢——无论是民间诗歌还是迪士尼动画？“我知道我们不会让所有人都满意，”卡罗说。“但我确实认为，1300多年来，这��故事之所以如此有意义，如此引人共鸣，是有原因的。在拍真人电影的时候，我希望我能让所有人，包括那些一直对动画原版呵护有加的人，再次以一种新的方式来欣赏她。”

[5hfanfiction]

Yes

Summary:  According to Dinah, Lauren is stuck in a rut after her break up. Dinah sets her a challenge: say ‘yes’ to everything for 24 hours. Lauren doesn’t expect that three letter word to lead her to Camila.

Or,

The one where Lauren is the worst co-worker ever.

You can also find this on Wattpad and ao3 (@HereNowReady)

Yes

“Lauren! Stop being a loser!” Dinah yelled from the kitchen, “Come help me.”

Lauren rolled her eyes, sighing as she got up from the sofa, book still in hand, “Seriously, I only have like 20 pages left to read. You have the worst timing.” She got up and wandered through to the kitchen, deciding to be nice and see what her friend needed help with.

As she strolled through the door, her eyes widened. It was chaos. Flour was coating practically every surface and ingredients were scattered haphazardly across the counter.

“So… I sort of messed up,” Dinah said while giving her sweetest smile, hoping her housemate would see the funny side and help her out.

Lauren smirked, “You don’t say.”

“I just want to get this right… It’s Mani’s birthday and I can’t let her down. This cake has to be perfect! I have no idea what I’m doing and I’m totally messing it all up,” Dinah sighed, running a hand through her hair and, in the process, adding yet another streak of flour into it.

“Hey, stop stressing!” Lauren smiled warmly, putting an arm around her friend, “Look… Mani will love whatever hideous cake you create. Want to know why?”

Dinah nodded and gave a small smile.

“Because it’s you. Dinah, that girl is so crazy about you. You could show up with the world’s worst cake, burnt to hell and she would think it was the sweetest thing anyone had ever done for her.” Lauren playfully pushed her friend, “Now, get your act together.”

“Okay, okay!” Dinah grinned, “Thanks for the ego boost.”

“You don’t normally need it… Need to take a selfie to make yourself feel better?” Lauren suggested, grabbing a handful of flour and smearing it on Dinah’s face, “There. Now, you’re looking perfect.”

“Screw you, Jauregui.” Dinah yelled, throwing a fistful of flour at Lauren, who attempted to dodge her way around the kitchen and out of Dinah’s aim, “You know what? I am going to take a selfie! I still look hot.” Dinah grabbed her phone and proceeded to take at least 10 selfies, “What are you reading anyway, nerd?”

Lauren laughed, “It’s called 'Yes Man’. It’s by Danny Wallace.”

“That’s a movie, right? With that person from New Girl?” Dinah said as she scrolled through her phone and looked at the cake recipe again.

Lauren nodded, “The book is way better though.”

“Doesn’t that guy decide he’s going to say yes to everything? Like, no matter what?” Dinah asked, grabbing an egg and attempting to crack it with one hand. After about a quarter of the shell joined the rest of the cake ingredients, Dinah looked at Lauren for assistance, “Added crunch?”

“Move it, Hansen.” Lauren said, fishing the pieces of shell out easily, “And yeah, that’s basically what the book is about. He’s gone through a break up and he’s sort of stuck in a rut. Anyway, he decides he’s going to start saying yes to everything. If he gets asked a question that needs a yes or no answer then he has to say yes. So, if someone invites him for a night out or a girl asks for his number, he has to agree. It’s a real story too and he did it for a whole year.”

“That’s dumb,” Dinah snorted, “Imagine how much of a pain in the ass that would be.” She grabbed the spoon and began mixing the dubious looking mixture in the bowl. After stirring for a few seconds, she dropped the spoon dramatically, looking at Lauren with excitement.

“Oh god. I don’t think this is going to be good,” Lauren said with uncertainty, knowing all too well that the look currently occupying her friend’s face was one that usually led to terrible ideas.

“You should do it!”

“Do it?” Lauren raised an eyebrow in confusion, smirking. “Dinah, if you mean sex, I hate to break it to you but I’ve already done it with Lucy, remember?” She laughed.

Dinah rolled her eyes, “So we’re allowed to talk about 'she-who-must-not-be-named’ now?”

“Don’t be so dramatic! It’s been months…”

“Lauser, you are the one who banned all discussion of her after you guys broke up,” Dinah smirked, “Anyway, back to the point. No, I don’t mean sex. I mean you should do it… Say yes to everything!”

Lauren shook her head dramatically, “Hell no. You literally just said it would be a pain in the ass!”

“Oh, come on! Since Laucy ended, you’ve been so boring!!” Dinah threw her hands up, causing some flour to fly through the air, “This is just what you need! You need to have some fun.”

“Saying yes to everything is really not my idea of fun…” Lauren replied, shaking her head once more.

Dinah rolled her eyes, “Whatever, Lauren. But you’ve been avoiding things way too much. Plus, you said that guy started doing it after a break up. It’s perfect. I’m serious! When you’re not at work or class, you’re stuck here like a loner. You never come out with us anymore. You need to have fun again!”

“Reading is fun!” Lauren insisted, picking up her book in an attempt to both stop the conversation and prove her point all at once. After a few seconds, she looked up and saw Dinah still staring at her, “What?”

Dinah attempted to use her best puppy dog eyes to break her friend’s resolve, “You know what. C'mon, Lauren… You just have to say yes!”

Lauren sighed and put her book down on the counter yet again. Maybe if she just agreed, Dinah would shut up. Dinah wouldn’t even know if she stuck to their stupid deal anyway. Maybe she’d bend the rules a little and just say yes to most things. “Fine. But I’m only doing it for 24 hours.”

Dinah squealed and punched the air in victory, “Yes! I didn’t think you’d agree. Okay, so your 24 hours start at midnight.”

“Why midnight? Why not now?”

“Because shit always starts at midnight in stories and stuff. Duh.” Dinah grinned and happily went back to her recipe, grabbing the ingredients with far too much enthusiasm for Lauren.

Lauren picked up her book, determined to finish it without Dinah interrupting once more. As she began to read, she wondered what the hell she’d just gotten herself into. Surely nothing too crazy could happen in 24 hours, could it?

—

The day started just like every other Wednesday. Lauren showered and got ready for her lecture, stopping off at her favourite coffee place on the way.

“Would you like to try our new blend of coffee today?” the barista asked after Lauren had ordered, smiling way too much for that time in the morning.

Lauren was about to say no, when she suddenly remembered her deal with Dinah. Did she actually want to try this new blend of coffee? No. She liked the one she always had. But she figured this was an easy yes, nothing too dramatic. Maybe the new blend would be better, she told herself unconvincingly, “Erm, yeah. Sure.”

“And would you like to upgrade to a large coffee this morning?”

Lauren cursed inwardly then attempted to relax herself. More caffeine might be helpful. After all, she was still pretty tired and her Wednesday morning lecture was one of her more boring ones. She smiled politely, replying with the only response she was allowed to use, “Yes.”

The barista smiled warmly, “Wonderful. Can I get you anything else? A breakfast bar?”

Lauren took a deep breath and prayed that this would be the last question the barista asked her, “Sure. I’ll take a breakfast bar as well.”

Lauren seized her opportunity to end the conversation, swiftly handing over a ten dollar note and waiting for her change

She wandered to the end of the counter, waiting for her order patiently and clutching the breakfast bar that she didn’t really want. She went back to the same thought she’d had last night when Dinah had suggested this whole thing… did she have to say yes to everything? After all, Dinah wasn’t around… She would never know. Lauren sighed at herself, she knew she was too competitive for her own good. Now that she’d started this deal, she knew she’d have to stick to it. After all, if she was going to do this, she was going to do it properly.

Anyway, Lauren reasoned with herself, it hadn’t been that bad so far. So she’d ended up with a slightly larger (and slightly different) coffee and a breakfast bar. That was no big deal. She took her first sip of coffee, smiling unexpectedly as she realised the new coffee blend was actually pretty good after all.

Feeling more positive than she had 5 minutes ago, Lauren opened the door and continued on the way to her lecture, taking a bite of her breakfast bar as she went. She had a good feeling about this whole saying yes thing. Maybe it wouldn’t even be that hard.

That thought had barely finished playing in her mind when her phone rang.

It was her boss.

���Hello,” Lauren said - her positivity only slightly ruined as she attempted to balance her breakfast bar and phone in one hand, while her coffee was clutched in her other.

“Hey, Lauren. Sorry to bother you on your day off but I was wondering if you could work tonight? Jacob’s called in sick.”

Lauren ran her hand through her hair in frustration. Wednesday was karaoke night at the bar and she hated working on karaoke night. As someone majoring in music, she found the whole thing frustrating. Anybody with any real talent sang on a Friday at Open Mic Night. Wednesday’s karaoke night saw so many songs being murdered that it was practically a crime against the music industry. Her boss knew how much she hated it and she knew that he wouldn’t be asking her to work unless he was desperate.

“Can you make it?” her boss’ voice rang in her ears, making her realise she was yet to answer.

Lauren took a deep breath and prepared herself for the answer she knew she had to give, “Yes. Yes, I can make it. Shall I get there for 9?”

“That’s perfect! Thanks so much, Lauren. You’re a lifesaver,” he thanked her once more before hanging up the phone.

Lauren was quickly beginning to hate her deal with Dinah. She decided to take out her frustration on the girl that had caused all of this in the first place.

Lauren: I hate you. Thanks to you, I had to say yes to working tonight. I thought you said saying yes would make me have more fun.

Dinah: HAHAHA!

Lauren: You’re an asshole.

Dinah: You love me really. Maybe something awesome will happen tonight and if not you’ll have extra money. It’ll be worth it, you’ll see. Any good yes experiences so far, Lauser?

Lauren: I have a large coffee instead of a regular… and a breakfast bar. Did I mention I have to go to work tonight now too?

Dinah: Ooh a breakfast bar. Damn. I’m hungry now.

Lauren: Oh my god, you’re so annoying.

Dinah: Love you too!

Groaning in frustration, Lauren shoved her phone into her pocket. She prayed that the rest of her day would be uneventful and devoid of more irritating 'yes’ moments.

—

It was all going so well. The most eventful moments of the rest of her morning consisted of Lauren having to lend someone a pen and move up one seat for somebody. She reasoned that, in the grand scheme of things, she’d got off pretty lightly. Her bad mood was fading and she was beginning to feel hopeful again that things wouldn’t be so bad. That was until she overheard a few of her classmates discussing where they were going to get lunch.

She made the fatal error of lifting her head in their direction, a subconscious movement as her head followed the new sounds around her. As she made eye contact with one of them, she instantly regretted it.

“Lauren!” Brad said, smiling far too much for Lauren’s liking. He’d been trying to get her to hang out with them since the year had begun and it was quite clear he had a crush on her, “Do you wanna join us for lunch?”

She vaguely knew Brad, and he was harmless enough, but she had no interest in having lunch with him and his friends, especially when she knew he had feelings for her. But now, thanks to Dinah Jane Hansen, she was stuck.

“Uh…” She took a deep breath and prepared herself as she wondered if there was any possible way to word her reply so that it wasn’t a definitive 'yes’. She knew she’d already paused for too long, “Actually, yeah. But, don’t worry if not. I’d hate to crash.”

Brad was clearly caught off guard, not expecting her to say yes at all. It only took him a few seconds to flash a smile at her, “Great! I mean, yeah, you can totally join us.”

Lauren smiled weakly then turned away, gathering up her things. She clenched her fist quickly, her knuckles turning white as she tried to relieve some of her aggravation. She had a tendency to get easily frustrated. That was just her temperament. She counted to three slowly in her head, unclenched her fist and tried to convince herself that this wasn’t so bad. After all, she was hungry. It had been a long time since she’d finished that breakfast bar. Food wouldn’t be so bad. She could make this work.

—

A couple of hours later, Lauren was smiling and waving goodbye to her classmates. Sure, Brad had been a bit annoying but the rest of the people there were actually really nice and, since there was a fairly big group of them, she’d successfully managed to avoid talking to Brad much at all. It occurred to her that perhaps she should have made an effort to get to know them sooner. She headed to her next lecture of the day, trying to forget that she had to work later on.

The rest of the day, thankfully, passed uneventfully. Lauren had a few more 'yes’ moments but nothing overly annoying. Grateful for her easy afternoon, she headed back to the apartment to grab some food and get ready for work.

Just as she was about to leave, she heard the front door open and Dinah’s voice echo through the apartment.

“Lauren! You still here?”

“Yeah, hang on, I’m coming,” Lauren yelled, putting her leather jacket on, grabbing her phone and heading into the main room.

Dinah smiled, “So, how’s it going?”

Checking she had everything in her bag, Lauren replied, “Actually, not that bad. I think it could have been worse. Apart from having to work, I’ve been pretty lucky. I had lunch with some people from my lecture and it was actually…”

“Fun?” Dinah finished her sentence, her face practically screaming, 'I told you so’.

Lauren rolled her eyes, “Just because lunch wasn’t awful it does not mean you’re right about this saying yes thing, Dinah. If I wasn’t doing your dumb challenge, I wouldn’t have to work.”

“I’m telling you, it’s all going to be good. I have a feeling about this.”

Lauren groaned, picking up her bag and heading towards the door, “You would. You’re not the one saying yes!”

“You’ve just gotta embrace it, Lauren, instead of being a grumpy old woman,” Dinah smirked, “It’s only until midnight. Embrace the yes!

"If anything bad happens tonight, you’d better sleep with one eye open, Hansen,” Lauren mumbled, closing the door and heading back out into the terrifying world of potential 'yes’ moments.

—

Lauren had only been at work about thirty minutes and she was already feeling frustration rising. Every little job ended up being completed by her, because - of course - she wasn’t allowed to say no. On top of that, her ears felt like they were bleeding due to the hideous rendition of 'Total Eclipse of the Heart’ she’d just had to endure.

About an hour into her shift, Ally arrived. Lauren breathed a sigh of relief. She loved working with Ally. She, Dinah and Ally had all gone to the same high school and had been friends for years. Although Ally was older than them, they’d reconnected after high school and found themselves working in the same bar. The older girl’s enthusiasm was infectious and she never failed to make Lauren smile.

Ally joined her behind the bar, practically bouncing as she walked. Lauren felt instant relief and happiness spreading through her body. Ally smiled as she took her spot at the left side of the bar, “Hey, Lauren! Can you pass me that bucket of ice, please?”

“Yes!” Lauren said happily. It was one of the few 'yes’ moments of the night that she hadn’t found herself annoyed about, “How are you? I wasn’t looking forward to this shift at all but I’m so glad I’m working with you!”

“You’re so sweet!” Ally smiled, grabbing the bucket of ice from Lauren. As she did, the phone behind the bar began to ring, “Hey, Lauren, can you grab that?”

“Sure,” Lauren said, a tiny hint of annoyance in her voice. Why did she have to get the phone? Dan was closer to it anyway. Regardless, she answered and was quickly done and back to the front of the bar.

As Lauren made eye contact with Ally, the older girl looked away quickly. Lauren furrowed her eyebrows in confusion. What was going on?

“Could you pass me some clean shot glasses, please?” Ally asked, pointing to the stack of glasses right next to her.

Lauren was confused. There were at least twenty clean shot glasses right next to Ally. Why did she need more right now? The bar wasn’t even busy yet. Feeling irritated, she grabbed some shot glasses (after all, she couldn’t exactly say no) and held them out towards her friend. She noticed that Ally looked nervous. Far too slowly, the cogs turned and everything clicked into place.

“Dinah fucking told you! Allyson, you’ve been making me say yes this whole time!”

Ally breathed a sigh of relief, “I am so glad you realised. I am so sorry! I tried to be obvious…”

“Yeah, yeah, Brooke,” Lauren narrowed her eyes but as soon as she looked at Ally’s face she couldn’t help but laugh. The older girl looked so worried, “Calm down, Ally! How could I be mad with you? You’re like a ball of sunshine. Besides, your shitty acting meant this didn’t exactly last long.”

“Dinah told me to do it but then as soon as I started I felt so bad!” Ally’s word blurted out at the speed of light.

Lauren laughed, “Well, you can relax. Rules are that people that know about me saying yes aren’t allowed to take advantage. So, we both win. I can actually say no to you, and you don’t have to feel bad!”

Ally breathed a sigh of relief and Lauren saw her friend visibly relax. She laughed to herself and carried on with the meaningless jobs she was doing. Although she hated karaoke night, she found herself wishing the bar was a little busier. At least then she’d have more to do.

Dan had asked if she’d mind re-stocking all the fridges and she found herself saying 'yes’ with far too much enthusiasm. Keeping busy would only help make her shift pass by quicker. About half an hour later, the bar was getting more crowded. Unfortunately, that meant there were more performances to endure.

Lauren inwardly cringed as, yet another, flat note echoed through the air. Fortunately, that particular flat note was the last note of the song and Lauren exhaled loudly (for what was perhaps the fifth time in the last minute) as the guy singing left the stage - although calling those noises 'singing’ seemed pretty generous.

“Thank fuck that’s over…” Lauren mumbled to herself, rubbing her forehead to try and ease the slight headache that was forming.

Suddenly, she heard a gentle laugh coming from behind her and she quickly turned around. Embarrassingly, the first thought in her mind was that the sound of that laugh was the best melody she’d heard all night. Her eyes found the source of the sound and the strange rush that was coursing through her veins only intensified. If she’d thought the sound of that laughter was beautiful, she had no words to describe the girl sat just a few meters away.

The most intoxicating brown eyes she’d ever seen were staring right at her. Lauren swallowed, unsure of why her body was reacting so strongly to so little. Her gaze lowered and she was met with an adorable grin. Her stomach flipped uncontrollably.

“Hey, Lauren, are you alright to stay over there and serve on that side?” Dan asked, motioning to the area where Lauren’s eyes were already fixated.

Unlike other times that day, Lauren had no problem with the word she was about to utter, “Yes.”

She made her way over and closer to those brown eyes that seemed to be staring straight into her soul.

“It sounds like you enjoyed that guy’s performance as much as me,” the girl said, smirking and gesturing towards the stage.

It took Lauren too long to even process what the girl had said. She was far too distracted by her voice, her eyes, her lips…

Mentally chastising herself, she cleared her throat and attempted to bring herself back down to Earth. She ran a hand through her hair, hoping her nerves weren’t too obvious. Why the hell was she nervous anyway? Why was she losing her shit over this girl?

She needed a distraction and grabbed a glass, cleaning it as she spoke, smiling as she finally responded, “I don’t know what you mean. It was the highlight of my day.”

“Wow. The rest of your day must have been terrible then.”

The girl laughed again and, once more, Lauren found herself feeling way too much all at once. She put the glass down and made her way over to the front of the bar until she was stood right in front of the girl. Instantly, she wasn’t sure if that had been a good decision. The girl was even more stunning up close. Lauren attempted to avert her gaze, aware that her eyes had already been focused on the stranger in front of her for too long.

Lauren was trying to verbalise a response when her eyes locked onto brown ones. She swore that those brown eyes had just glanced down at her lips, but she shook it off. After all, she had to be imagining things.

Before she had chance to even respond, the girl was speaking again and Lauren felt frustration that she hadn’t even managed to come up with a decent reply. Confidence wasn’t normally something she struggled with but something about this stranger had her completely thrown.

“Maybe I can help make your day better though,” the girl with the brown eyes said softly, a gentle smile playing on her lips.

Lauren’s mouth was suddenly and inexplicably as dry as the Sahara desert. She barely managed to stutter out her next sentence, “Oh… I mean… H-how will you do that, then?”

“Well, first, I’ll order a drink and that can at least distract you from the awful sounds that are coming out of the speakers,” the girl said simply, her fingers gliding smoothly across the surface of the bar and forming small circular patterns.

Lauren grinned, “How kind of you…”

She let her sentence hang in the air, hoping the mystery girl would understand her intentions.

“Camila.”

“Camila,” Lauren repeated, letting her tongue wrap around the name as she said it aloud for the first time, “Well, Camila, what drink can I get you?”

“A vodka and cranberry, please…” Camila smirked as she copied Lauren’s method and let her sentence hang in the air deliberately unfinished.

“Erm… Lauren,” she rolled her eyes at herself as she turned away from Camila to grab a glass. Why was she incapable of talking to this girl without stuttering and stumbling over her words?

“Thanks, Erm Lauren,” Camila said, taking the drink and handing Lauren a ten dollar note.

Lauren’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion but, after a few seconds, she laughed and shot a playful glare at Camila. She shrugged, “I’ve been called worse names.”

She turned away, retrieving Camila’s change from the cash register. Before she returned to the front of the bar, she took a deep breath, steadying her nerves, “So, since you’re enjoying these performances as much as I am, what’s your excuse for subjecting yourself to this? I mean, I have no choice. I have to be here.”

The unmistakeable sound of 'Skyscraper’ began to fill the air and Lauren inwardly cringed. She’d heard that song being sung badly at least 3 times already that night.

She passed Camila her change and her stomach flipped as their fingers softly brushed together. She pulled her hand away slowly, wanting to prolong the electrifying feeling that was dominating her body due to their contact.

“Maybe I’m just a masochist,” Camila’s voice was soft and low, her eyes fixating on Lauren’s as she spoke. She winked as she said, “You know, hearing Demi Lovato songs being murdered really turns me on.”

“Demi would be turning in her grave listening to this shit,” Lauren laughed, her head turning towards the stage briefly. It didn’t take long for her eyes to return to Camila.

Camila giggled, and, as the sound reached her ears, Lauren was entirely unprepared for the sudden surge that filled her entire body, “Lauren, you are aware that Demi Lovato isn’t dead, right?”

Lauren rolled her eyes, unable to hold in a smile as her name left Camila’s lips. This time, she was absolutely sure Camila’s gaze wandered to her lips and, as she looked back up, Lauren saw her gently bite her bottom lip. That was all Lauren needed to gain a sudden burst of confidence. “Anyway, Camila, how else are you going to make my day better? You said that the first thing was ordering a drink. Do you want another by the way? You’ve pretty much finished that one.”

Camila nodded, her fingers twirling the straw around in her practically empty glass, “That would be good.”

Lauren wasted no time, returning with the drink in record time. Her speed was mostly due to her desire to return to Camila as soon as possible but also because she didn’t want to be forced into any more 'yes’ moments by being around her co-workers for too long.

She placed the drink down in front of Camila with a playful smirk. She leaned against the bar, bringing herself just that little bit closer to the girl in front of her, “You didn’t answer my question, Camila.”

Camila raised an eyebrow, “Surely, my amazing conversational skills are improving your day, Lauren. This is a quality chat we’re having right now, you know. I don’t give those out to just anyone.”

Lauren laughed, “Well, I’m honoured, Camila.”

“You can call me, Mila, by the way… If you want. My friends call me that.” Camila said, bringing her drink up to her lips.

“We’re friends now?” Lauren deliberately widened her eyes, maintaining eye contact with Camila as she smirked slightly and ran a hand through her hair. This time it wasn’t out of nerves, but confidence.

As she stretched her arm upwards, she could’ve sworn Camila’s eyes lowered, checking out the hint of stomach that showed as Lauren’s t-shirt lifted above the waistband of her black skinny jeans. All too soon, Lauren’s hand was lowered and the moment was over. Lauren ran her tongue along her bottom lip before she decided to continue teasing the girl in front of her. Her voice came out lower than she expected, her raspy tones even stronger than usual, “We’re moving pretty fast here, don’t you think?”

A delicate shade of pink was suddenly present in Camila’s cheeks and Lauren felt her heart soaring at the sight. Lauren took advantage of Camila’s flustered state and spoke again, “Mila? Hmm… I don’t know. I might think of my own name for you. After all, maybe I don’t want to be like your friends. Maybe I’d like to be something different.”

It was evident that Camila’s momentary lapse of confidence was over as she locked eyes with Lauren’s green ones and began to run her thumb over her bottom lip. Her thumb was quickly replaced with her teeth as she gently tugged on her own lip. After a few seconds, which was more than enough to cause Lauren’s heart to hammer in her chest, Camila spoke slowly. Each word seemed to be spoken with utter precision, each syllable beautifully accentuated, “What exactly would you like to be then?”

Lauren stuttered slightly, too distracted by the way Camila’s voice had caused her body to feel as though it was burning up. If she were to spontaneously combust at this very moment, she wouldn’t have been surprised. How was it possible for someone she barely even knew to elicit such a strong reaction? Before she’d had a chance to contemplate the answer, she heard a voice calling out her name.

She looked over her shoulder to see Ally gesturing to the queue of people at the bar, an apologetic look in her eyes. She’d clearly tried to avoid getting Lauren’s attention before but there were now far too many people for Ally to serve by herself. Lauren wondered how she hadn’t even noticed such a large queue building up. Rolling her eyes at herself, she realised the answer was stood in front of her wearing a tight black dress. Camila.

“I have to…” she gestured at the queue before asking hopefully, “Do you… I mean… Will you still be here in a few minutes? I still have to come up with my own name for you after all.”

“That’s true,” Camila lifted her glass, draining the last few drops of her drink, “Maybe.”

Whilst Lauren had found herself getting fed up of the word 'yes’ earlier, she would’ve given anything to hear that one word leave Camila’s lips right now, “Maybe?”

Camila nodded, her voice practically purring out her words, “Maybe. You better get back to work, Lo.”

Lauren raised her eyebrow, “Lo?”

“I don’t waste time. Better get thinking of that name.” Camila nodded her head in the direction of Ally, who was clearly struggling to keep up with the crowd around the bar, “You really should go. I’d hate to get you into trouble.”

Lauren walked across to the other side of the bar to help Ally. She tried to focus on the customers as they gave her their orders but all she could really think about was how she really wouldn’t care how much trouble she got in as long as Camila was the cause of it.

It momentarily occurred to her that, if Dinah heard about any of this, she would never hear the end of it. After all, saying 'yes’ seemed to be leading Lauren down a pretty good path right now.

Between the two of them, Lauren and Ally managed to handle the queue of people with ease. After about 10 minutes of constantly serving, the queue was almost non-existent. Lauren glanced across the bar and found a distinct gap right where Camila had been previously. She was gone.

“Fuck…” Lauren muttered, unaware of why she was so bothered that Camila had disappeared. After all, she barely knew her.

Ally noticed her friend’s frown, “Are you alright, Lauren?”

Lauren rubbed her forehead, shaking her head briefly in an attempt to clear her mind. Looking at her friend, she nodded but she knew it was less than convincing, “Erm, yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.”

Another song ended and there was a small scattering of applause. Lauren hadn’t even registered what song had been sung but she was sure that it probably didn’t deserve the polite applause that was ringing around the bar.

She was about to ask Ally if she’d seen where Camila had gone when her attention was diverted as the next song began to play through the speakers. It was far too familiar and not a song that she’d ever expected to hear at karaoke night. The gentle sounds of Ed Sheeran’s acoustic guitar echoed in the air. This had always been one of her favourite songs but she was used to the fact that people usually didn’t know it. After all, it wasn’t one of his famous tracks.

A few seconds later, a voice began to accompany the backing track and Lauren was sure she had never heard anything so heavenly before. It was as though everything else disappeared as the voice filled her ears. She quickly spun around, needing to see the person who was singing. Her mind was racing, already forming a guess that she knew was far too hopeful. Surely, it had to just be wishful thinking…

Without even thinking, she stepped out from behind the bar, barely even hearing Ally calling after her. As she turned the corner, familiar brown eyes looked down at her from the stage and Lauren felt as though she was frozen to the spot. Camila smiled shyly at her as their eyes met and focused fully on each other’s. Lauren’s breath caught in her throat as the sound of Camila’s voice seemed to reverberate through her entire being.

You and I  We’re drifting over the edge

Lauren found herself fixated on the way Camila’s voice twisted and turned around the melodies, effortlessly rising and falling in what sounded like perfection. Her heart felt like it was beating so loudly that the whole bar was bound to hear it. If karaoke night was like this all the time, Wednesdays were Lauren’s new favourite day.

The rest of the song seemed to pass in a blur and it took Lauren far too long to realise the song had ended. The applause around her brought her back down to Earth and, as she crash landed back into reality, disappointment began to flood through her because Camila’s song was over and, if she had one wish, she’d ask to rewind and relive the last 3 minutes all over again. It was as though she’d been soaring through the clouds and she’d suddenly hit the ground with a loud thud. She’d give anything to fly again.

“Thank you,” Camila said as she stepped towards the microphone again, her gaze never leaving Lauren. She smiled before adding, “Hopefully that helped to make a certain person’s day even better.”

Lauren was powerless to stop the massive grin that she was sure was spreading across her face. Besides, she wasn’t sure she wanted to stop it.

It occurred to Lauren that with the physical barrier of the bar gone, this was her chance to get closer to Camila and actually talk to her without a huge structure in the way. She smiled as she realised that for the first time in a long time she had a rush of excitement coursing through her veins. Maybe Dinah had been right. Since everything had ended with Lucy, she hadn’t really allowed herself to make any new or meaningful connections. She’d stopped trying.

Maybe now was the time to fix that.

Camila had sparked something inside her and Lauren knew that she couldn’t end the night without at least trying to see if that spark was worth pursuing.

Lauren moved towards the stage, reaching the bottom of the steps just as Camila began descending them. Lauren pretended not to notice Camila’s brief stumble on the second step.

Brown eyes met hers and Camila laughed, “I can sing on a stage with no problems but apparently I can’t walk down stairs without almost falling on my ass.”

“It’s alright. It was actually pretty cute,” Lauren said quietly, although, judging by Camila’s smile, her words had been heard. Exuding more confidence than she actually had, Lauren walked up to meet her halfway down the stairs, holding out her hand, “Need assistance?”

Camila looked pleasantly surprised, accepting the outstretched hand quickly. Lauren’s first thought was similar to that of a feeling of inevitability or fate. Camila’s hand felt so right in her own. It was as though they’d been doing this their whole lives. Lauren felt a blush spreading across her face at the speed of light. She hoped Camila wouldn’t notice.

“You were incredible, by the way. I loved your song choice,” Lauren said softly, hoping if she continued the conversation that Camila wouldn’t mention the ridiculously obvious redness covering her cheeks.

“Thanks. It’s one of my favourite songs,” Camila smiled warmly, “I’m glad you liked it. After all, I did say I’d try and make your day better. It sort of would’ve sucked if you’d hated it.”

They left the final step and began moving through the vague crowd surrounding the stage. Lauren realised that there was no need for their hands to still be connected, but made no move to separate them. 'What Makes You Beautiful’ began playing and Lauren noticed a smile spreading across Camila’s face.

Lauren laughed, “Don’t tell me you’re a One Direction fan?”

“I’m not even ashamed,” Camila said, shrugging her shoulders, “Come on, you can’t tell me you don’t like this song! It’s so catchy!”

Lauren sighed softly, “I’m totally losing cool points but, yeah, it is pretty catchy.”

“What cool points?” Camila smirked, giggling gently.

Gasping, Lauren clutched at her heart dramatically, “That hurt, Camz.”

Camila raised her eyebrow, “Camz?”

“Yep,” Lauren nodded, “Camz.”

After a few seconds, Camila nodded her head in approval and smiled, “Not bad, Lo. I like it. Dance with me?”

Lauren looked back at the bar. It wasn’t that busy and her co-workers didn’t seem to need her but she definitely shouldn’t be abandoning them for longer than she already had. If her boss found out, he definitely wouldn’t be impressed. Then again, it wasn’t like she was actually allowed to say no… Dinah had made it very clear that their deal didn’t end until midnight and right now it was 11:45pm. Technically, there was only one response she was allowed to give.

Camila followed the direction of Lauren’s gaze and she spoke again before Lauren could reply, “I actually forgot you were working. Of course you can’t dance with me…”

But Lauren knew the rules. The question had been asked and she had to say yes. Besides, there was nothing she wanted more than to say yes anyway. If she got in trouble with her boss, she had a feeling she wouldn’t really care. Some things were worth it.

She gently placed her hand on Camila’s cheek, directing her gaze away from the bar and back towards her, “Yes, I want to dance with you.”

Lauren’s heart felt like it leapt straight out of her chest when she saw Camila smile in response. She tried to ignore how ridiculous it was that she could be so irrevocably drawn to someone she’d only met that night.

Suddenly, her hand was being pulled and she was following Camila into the crowd. Lauren looked back at the bar quickly and saw Ally giving her a thumbs up. Clearly, her friend wasn’t too bothered about her sudden disappearance. She knew she’d have to return to the bar soon though. There was no way she could get away with this for long.

Lauren couldn’t help but grin as Camila sang along and danced excitedly to One Direction (well, a karaoke version of One Direction). She was word perfect and Lauren giggled at how endearing she found this whole moment. If this was a movie, she was sure the main characters would be having some sort of slow and romantic dance right now. Either that, or the air would be filled with sexual tension and body parts would be pressed so tightly that there was barely room to breathe. As she watched Camila, she couldn’t help but smile and it occurred to her that, in her opinion, she’d take real life over the movie version any day.

Without warning, Camila grabbed Lauren’s other hand and spun her round, placing a hand on her hip to stop her after a couple of turns. Lauren marvelled over Camila’s ability to go from being ridiculously sexy with her lip biting and intoxicating eyes, to being completely adorable.

Camila smiled, catching her breath, before allowing her other hand to reach Lauren’s hip as well. Camila’s hands moved upwards a fraction and softly connected with the skin just above her hips and Lauren was on fire again.

Her head was spinning and she never wanted it to stop. Just like that, the entire room seemed to fade away and Camila’s ridiculous dancing and endearing smiles were a thing of the past. Instead, all Lauren could feel was an inexplicable force that seemed to be pulling her even closer to the brown eyed girl who was mere centimeters away from her.

Lauren was so close she swore she was about to get lost in the dark brown ocean of Camila’s eyes. She stepped forward reasoning that if she was going to drown in those eyes, she may as well do it properly.

The sudden sound of applause broke the moment between them and, as though she’d been temporarily transported elsewhere the moment Camila’s hands had touched her skin, she was instantaneously brought back to reality. Both girls stepped backwards slightly and Camila’s hands fell back and hung by her side somewhat awkwardly. Lauren ran a hand through her hair, this time because of the nervous feeling that was swirling around uncontrollably in her stomach.

Camila was first to break the silence, “Lauren…”

Looking up, Lauren was met with a tentative smile and eyes that were becoming beautifully familiar. She felt her nervousness melt away.

“I want to ask you something. I might have totally misjudged this but I was wondering if maybe…” Camila trailed off, her eyes darting downwards as she inhaled deeply. As she looked back up and met Lauren’s gaze, she opened her mouth to speak again but was cut off by Lauren.

It occurred to Lauren that perhaps, just maybe, Camila was about to ask her out. Of course, that could just be wishful thinking. But, if she was correct, Lauren didn’t want it to happen like this.

“This is going to make me sound completely crazy,” Lauren began, hoping that she wasn’t about to entirely ruin what was easily one of the best nights of her life. She saw Camila’s smile falter and quickly grabbed her hand, hoping it would reassure her, “but whatever question you were about to ask me, could you ask me it in 9 minutes time?”

Confusion filled Camila’s face, “9 minutes?”

Lauren nodded. She knew it was a risk, but she wanted there to be only one reason why she was saying yes if Camila asked her out. No stupid rules or dares. She squeezed Camila’s hand gently, “Yeah. I just… I’ll explain later, I promise.”

Lauren’s eyes glanced over to Ally and she saw her friend gesture towards the main door of the bar. Her boss had just arrived.

She allowed her eyes to meet Camila’s again, silently praying that the girl in front of her would still be around in 9 minutes time. She spoke quickly, knowing she didn’t have much time to get back behind the bar before her boss started asking questions, “My boss just got here. I have to get back to the bar but…” She paused, taking a deep breath before she finished her sentence, “Stay?”

“Maybe,” Camila smirked. Lauren’s face fell as she got the same response she had earlier that evening. She knew Camila could see the disappointment in her eyes. Camila grinned, “I’m kidding. 9 minutes. I’ll be here.”

“I think it’s 8 minutes now,” Lauren shouted over her shoulder as she darted back towards the bar, a stupidly large smile plastered on her face.

The clock seemed to move excruciatingly slowly and Lauren was sure that time had slowed down on purpose just to annoy her.

7 minutes.

She glanced around far too often, checking that Camila was indeed still there. Every time she was met with the same sight: Camila sat on the same bar stool as before, watching her intently, a small smile tugging at the corner of her lips.

6 minutes.

Lauren could feel the tension building inside her. It was as though her stomach was riding a roller coaster and she had no way to stop it.

5 minutes.

A customer asked for a cocktail and she found herself feeling grateful. That would waste a couple of minutes at least. She grabbed the various bottles she needed and set them out on the side.

4 minutes.

As if on autopilot, Lauren mixed the various liquids together. She had no idea how the finished cocktail ended up in front of her because thoughts of Camila were clouding her mind entirely. Nevertheless, she handed the drink over to the waiting customer.

3 minutes.

Panic began to set in. What if Camila hadn’t even been planning on asking her out at all? What if she’d just been about to ask for another drink and now she was sat there waiting for 9 minutes just to order a goddamn vodka and cranberry?

2 minutes.

Fuck. She’d totally fucked up. This was going to be so embarrassing. Lauren wiped her palms on her jeans and told herself she was being ridiculous… She only partially believed herself.

1 minute.

Camila was looking at the clock behind the bar. Lauren’s eyes darted between the second hand, which was ticking around teasingly slowly, and Camila who was miraculously still sat there waiting for her.

Midnight.

Luck was on Lauren’s side. As the clock struck midnight, Lauren looked around and found no customers waiting by the side of the bar. Well, except one.

Camila.

Running a hand through her hair once again, she took a deep breath and made her way over to the girl who had her completely and utterly enamoured.

“So… Are those 9 minutes finally up?”

Lauren opened her mouth to speak but words failed her so she settled for a nod. She took a sip of her water and attempted to speak again, “Erm, yeah. We’re all good.”

“Finally.”

Lauren felt a smile forming as her eyes met Camila’s. Suddenly, everything seemed better. She laughed softly, “Yeah, sorry about that. I promise I’ll totally explain everything.”

“Well, maybe, you could explain it on our date,” Camila’s words were so casually said that it took Lauren far too long to process them properly. During the silence, Camila spoke again, sounding a little more nervous this time, “Please tell me I didn’t wait 9 minutes to be rejected…”

Lauren’s eyes widened and, whilst before her words were non-existent, now they left her mouth far too quickly, becoming a jumbled mess, “No… Oh my god… That’s so not what is happening. Wait… Fuck…” Lauren inhaled sharply, willing her brain to allow her words to actually make sense, “Retake?”

Camila laughed gently, shaking her head in amusement at the situation unfolding in front of her, “God, it’s a good job you’re so beautiful.”

Camila glanced down at Lauren’s cheeks, noticing the soft shade of pink that was now settling there. She looked back up, fixed her eyes on Lauren’s once again and spoke softly, maintaining eye contact as she asked Lauren the question she’d wanted to ask her for far longer than the last 9 minutes, “Lauren, will you go on a date with me?”

Lauren knew that over the last 24 hours she’d had to say 'yes’ a lot. Sometimes she’d wanted to say it anyway, but knowing she had to still altered the intentions of it slightly. But now there were no rules forcing the word out of her mouth and she grinned at the knowledge that, this time, that 3 letter word was entirely her own.

“Yes,” Lauren said simply, taking a breath before continuing, “I’d love to, Camz.”

It was the best yes she’d ever said.

[newspaperburritos-forbreakf-blog]

Tutor Time || Tittie

A/N: This was probably like two months ago?

Tito, newly (secretly) back in school, needs help with his essay writing, but he definitely wasn’t expecting his tutor to be Lottie

TITO

It was no secret that Tito wasn’t the most educated guy in Swynlake, but what was a secret was that he was doing something to change it. In between shifts at the garage, he’d been taking a few Pride U classes working towards a degree. He didn’t know what it would really do, but he knew it’d keep him busy, distracted, and maybe he’d end up better than before, ya know?

Tito was doing fine. Engineering classes were cake with his hands on experience and math never gave him a problem. English? Core classes like history and writing papers and shit? That wasn’t any walk in the park for sure.

The New Yorker never really asked for help, but his professor told him it was get a tutor and make up as many points he could on the rest of the assignments and the final or fail. And he definitely  wasn’t about to fuckin’ let half a semester go down the drain to do it all over again next semester.

He was expecting some brainiac nerd to come in at any moment. Some chick who probably had as much social skills as a plank of wood and was about to start spitting all sorts of grammar shit at him. Whatever, he’d have to grin and bear it. Get through it and maybe learn a lil to help him get by in the future.

The mechanic sat back in his chair at one of the large tables in the library. His books piled up next to him as he scrolled through his phone at some dumb shit Dodger was talking about, just waiting for his tutor.

LOTTIE

Lottie had meandered her way into the library, two cups of coffee in hand (one already stained with her pink lipstick), bag balancing on her shoulder as she looked around the room for her newest friend for the next few weeks. Or semester. She didn’t really know how long she’d be around this guy.

She had received an email earlier in the week asking if she might be interesting in helping to tutor a first year leveled student with his English. Writing to be more specific. Which, for the record was a little strange considering Lottie had never taken English at PrideU, It was something she had actually taken while she was still in high school, but apparently had done well enough in it that they thought her to be more than capable helping this student. Regardless of why they asked her, Lottie happily agreed, the person on the other end of the email providing her with the name of the student (Ignacio…...something. He had a lot of names) as well as where the tutors typically met their tutorees.

Which is why she found herself looking for him that particular day, the coffee warm against her very cold fingers (Lord, did she hate English weather). She wanted to start their meeting off right, bringing him some coffee to hopefully warm him (ba dum tss) up to her and the idea of her helping him out. Considering you know, one look at Lottie would lead you to believe that she was not the brightest bulb on the Christmas strand.

She saw a guy though sitting alone at one of the tables, his back was towards her so all she could really see what his curly brown hair as she began to slowly approach. When she reached the table though, she offered the (woah, cute) guy a bright smile. “Hi, are you Ignacio?” Her southern accent absolutely butchering his name, but truly it was the best that she could do considering she wasn’t entirely sure how to pronounce his name.

TITO

Having forgotten where he was completely and busy texting Dodger about how stupid he sounded right now, Tito did not notice the person coming up behind him until his government name was used (and kinda butchered with a Southern accent) which sent him jumping in his seat.

He whirled around to see… definitely not a nerdy looking girl. Hell, she was fine. He could get used to this shit. Instant Tito charm turned on, his racing heart and phone (which was now on the floor) forgotten. “Yeah, that’d be me. Ignacio Alonzo Julio Fredrico de Tito. But you can just call me Tito, chica if that worst best for you. And you are…?” He grinned at her, leaning against the back of the seat like he was the smoothest motherfucker that didn’t just look like a spazz.

The mechanic turned back around and cleared some of his stuff into his area to make room for her to sit wherever. “You aren’t really the tutor I was expectin’ to be honest. Not that that’s a bad thing or whatever, I’m just sayin’ sometimes you like have an image in your mind of people and shit and… well, it’s a nice surprise or whatever. Plus like my professor set this up and I don’t really know her all that well so...” He shrugged, trying to keep his smirk from growing too big on his face. Blondes were his type after all, and with the way she dressed, he seemed to be falling right into old habits with the rich ones.

LOTTIE

Now being that Lottie was Lottie, she felt absolutely horrible for the reaction that Ignac...Tito had had. She hadn’t meant to sneak up on him, only wanted to make sure that she had the right person! Without even thinking about it, Lottie set the coffee cups down on the table, bending down to pick up the not so stranger’s phone. “Lord, I am so sorry,” Lottie spoke out, placing his phone in front of him as she sat down in the adjacent seat. “I didn’t mean to startle you like that, sugar!”

Again, probably shouldn’t call people you just met sugar, but Lottie never really was one to play by those sorts of rules.

She let out a small laugh though, “That certainly sounds a heck of a lot better when you say it than when I try.” Lottie mused, no, STOP IT LOTTIE. You are here to tutor this guy, not flirt with him. You need to stop. “But it’s a pleasure to meet you Tito. Did I say it right that time? My southern accent just makes it sound so wrong.” Which was true, she really felt like she wasn’t even saying it correctly still.

Her hand shot out next to her for him to shake, “My name is Charlotte Rose La Bouff, but you can just call me Lottie.” She lightly teased, giving him her full name since he had for her. “Oh! And I brought you a coffee.” She brought the cup without the lipstick stain in front of her a bit more. “I wasn’t sure how you’d like it so I just had them put a little bit of cream and sugar in it, but I mean, if you want more, you can always just have mine. So long as you don’t care about the lipstick.” Another small laugh. “And that’s alright, really. Don’t worry about it. Can’t say that I haven’t heard it before.” Lord knows she had played into that stereotype for long enough.  “Your professor had emailed me about it too, we’re workin’ onnnnnn….” Lottie began, pulling out her iPad to check her email but it hit her before she even had the chance. “Your writing? Right? Got an essay comin’ up here in a few weeks if I remember right.”

TITO

Her voice was so fuckin’ cute that it didn’t even matter that she fucked up his name (most people did, shit was long af and full of accent shit). He smirked at her slightly, was she flirting with him or just being really fuckin’ nice to get a good review? ‘Cause in his years of bein’ himself, he’d take that as flirtin’.

“Yeah, you said it real good, chica. Perfecto.” He chuckled and leaned back in his seat a bit, “Believe me, I ain’t one to judge on accents.” He poked fun at himself because well, if you ever heard him talk you’d know how much New York and then Mexico kinda fucked together to combine his way of talking.

Lottie. Chica was fuckin’ fine and had a cute name (and apparently was smart af or at least smarter than him). Tito was pulled out of his inner thoughts on how best to proceed with this attractive female when she offered him the coffee and then all the thoughts just kinda leaked right out like someone had punctured his oil tank right out from under him by giving him a coffee.

His eyes softened and he took it. It was a small act of kindness. And that’s what it felt like, kindness, and not some piece of charity or something because she didn’t even know him or see him before she got him the drink, there’s a difference right there, Ignacio Alonzo Julio Fredrico de Tito didn’t do handouts. His whole demeanor kind of changed from hormonal fool to focused pupil. “Nah, yeah, that’s good. You picked right.” Tito didn’t drink a ton of coffee in general (when you had as much energy as he did you just got shaky and hyper with the added caffeine) so he’d probably just sip on it.

The mechanic took a sip to appease her and grinned a small little grin before looking down at the prompt he’d brought on paper on top of his legal pad because well, he didn’t really grow up with laptops and fancy gadgets (even if he did there wasn’t a way for wifi to happen). So he liked to do outlines and stuff on paper first. Laptops just sorta distracted him.

“Yeah, I, uh, I brought the prompt. My professor said that I need like grammar and structure improvements on my last paper. Like the concepts are there, I just can’t communicate them well, ya know? Like I got the bullet points lined out but words get all messed up and mixed together and it turns into like a run-on rant or somethin’.” He scratched his head slightly and looked over at her, kind of feeling vulnerable telling her about all this weakness shit that he’d never admit to in front of people, but he couldn’t flunk out, not when he’d put in so much work. He let out a small huff of a laugh and shrugged,  “Guess I just got a lot of pasión when I write or somethin’ so my thoughts kinda all come out at once and don’t make a lot of sense to other people but make sense to me.”

LOTTIE

Okay, perfect. That meant perfect, right? See, Lottie could get down with this Spanish thing. All her years growing up learning French and a little bit of Creole hadn’t prepared her for a meeting like this, but well, that word was easy enough to get down and close enough to the English word that she was able to at least figure it out!

“Can I take a guess at where you’re from?” Lottie questioned, hoping that maybe the idea of getting to know each other to him would potentially get him even that much more open to the idea of her tutoring him. “Well, besides the Hispanic heritage of course.” She added with a bit of laugh. That much was obvious. “New York? Or New Jersey? No, definitely New York. That’s what I’m bettin’.” Her hand coming down to slap the table gently.

She watched him carefully as he took the coffee though. He had leaned up in his seat, not exactly leaning back and putting on that “cool” demeanor that he had first exhibited once Lottie revealed herself. (Which for the record, she thought was a little silly. If anything he just looked like he was trying a little bit too hard, but who was Lottie to judge?). Regardless, she had noticed the softened look on his face as he took the coffee and had wondered why exactly something as simple as a warm drink had affected his attitude so much. “Good.” She finally replied with a smile, “I was debatin’ on that my whole way over here. I was like, shoot, I shouldn’t have added any cream and sugar and just brought it with me because what if he didn’t like cream and sugar? Or what if he doesn’t like coffee entirely? It was a mess, I probably looked like a fool.” Another laugh escaping her.

Lottie arched her neck so that she could see the prompt that he had been assigned since the professor had not sent her that much. It looked easy enough, a simple essay from an intro level course. This wasn’t going to be too much trouble to get him all squared away! But she listened carefully as he spoke, turning back up to face him as she nodded her head. She imagined that it must be hard. Sometimes it was hard, and she imagined it must be especially hard for him if English was his second language. “Hey, no worries,” She smiled, quickly resting her hand on top of his as reassurance. “That’s what I’m here for. To help you. And it’s a good thing that you have passion, that’s what that word meant right? In your writing. It means that you have a lot of good ideas that you want to get down on paper. We just have to figure out a way to bring it in just a teeny bit.” Her hand coming off of his, her pointer finger and thumb coming very close together but not quite touching.

TITO

The mechanic quirked a brow at her when she offered to figure out where he was from. Most of the time people guessed right. It was sort of a specific accent and when people weren’t from the US, the first place they named was New York. (Not that she wasn’t from the US, that southern accent definitely gave her away). Shit, would he have to guess where she was from? Most Southern accents sounded the same to him.  

Sure enough, she guessed right the first time. Then went to New Jersey which wasn’t a huge hop from NYC but she corrected herself. He let out a chuckle as he pushed the coffee cup between his hands on the table. “You’re right. Born in the Bronx. Lived in Brooklyn. Regular New York City boy in Swynlake.” He squinted at her slightly, “I’m not too great with Southern accents but Imma have to say you’re from… Texas?” Really he was drawing a blank and she didn’t sound like some Alabama or Mississippi hick to him. Geography was not his strong suit either so he was glad he could name a few southern states off the top of his head to choose from.

Tito debated on telling her about his relationship with coffee, but after realizing she might bring him more in future sessions he decided it would probably be best. “I mean, I like coffee. It don’t necessarily like me.” He laughed slightly, looking down at his papers, “I don’t drink a lot of it. I already got too much energy in me so it just sorta supercharges me.” He looked back at her slightly with a small smile on his face, “But yanno, I was feeling a little tired today so I appreciate it, Lottie. You definitely aren’t a fool, chica. I’m the damn fool. You’ll never look like the fool when you’re around me, promise ya that.”

“Yeah, you got it. You learn any Spanish? You’d probably be good at it.” He winked at her before listening to the rest of her words, except he totally got distracted by her hand covering his. It was nice. A warm feeling he hadn’t felt in a while. Her hands were so soft compared to how rough his were from scraping them up as a kid and working on cars all day. No one touched his hands anymore. Oddly enough it was more personal than anywhere else on his body that got touched. It was a gesture. He couldn’t really read her too well, which was interesting because girls had become so easy to him. Lottie was a mystery so far.

“Sounds good, chica.” The dark haired boy pulled his hands back to him, not wanting to keep them in that spot anymore looking like an idiot. “So uh, where should we start? Like, what’s your process for this shit? You got some sort of like writing formula/guideline or something.”

LOTTIE

So yeah, maybe Lottie was a little proud of herself for getting the answer right, but really, shed have to be a little stupid to not put together the fact that he was from New York. It was as strong and stereotypical of an accent as it could possibly get, coupled with the Hispanic accent. It was cool though, Lottie enjoyed it. It wasn’t a pairing that she had expected to ever hear before, but that’s what made him unique!

She let out a bit of a laugh, her head bobbing around a bit. “Closeeeeee, so I’ll give it to you. Just go one state over and you would have had it. Born and raised in Louisiana. New Orleans to be more specific. But I’ve been up to New York a couple times. Of course, we mainly stayed in the touristy areas which I’m sure you steered clear from.” Her hand sweeping out in front of her as she let out another laugh.

Oh, this was awkward then now wasn’t it? He didn’t even like coffee and she had gone and brought him one! Stupid Lottie. She should have asked him somehow first. “Oh gosh, I’m sorry. You don’t have to drink it if you don’t want to then, I ain’t gonna be mad or upset.” She replied, offering him a smile. “Next time though you’ll have to let me know what you like so I can pick that up for you instead!” Another smile, but totally understanding the feeling of being supercharged with energy. Sometimes when she drank coffee she felt like she was bouncing off the walls. The following comment though had caused Lottie to smile even brighter. She hadn’t known if it was meant to be a joke, but it definitely was sweet to her and made her smile. “I don’t know if I believe that.” She teased before getting out a couple supplies of her own.

“Never learned, I just got lucky with that one I guess.” Her shoulders popping up into a shrug. “Only know French and a little bit of Creole. That’s what some of the people in Louisiana speak. Not a whole lot though, just a teeny bit. Hey! How would you feel about maybe teachin’ me a little bit of Spanish though? I help you with your English, you help me with some Spanish?” It was an idea that got her excited, the thought of learning a brand new language. She just hoped that he would be on board too.

Though she’d understand if he wasn’t.

Lottie nodded her head, “I do, yes! But it sounds like you’ve already sort of been doing the same thing. The first thing I start with when I get a prompt is I go back and look at it. Highlight the keywords that are gonna push me where I need to start. That way, when I’m pulling everything together, I know that I didn’t miss anything and won’t be losing easy points. Why don’t you go ahead and do that.” She replied, offering him one of her (pink, of course) highlighters.

TITO

Louisiana. It all clicked now. Shit, rich french blonde was apparently his type. He never learned did he. Only difference was that he wasn’t exactly in his prime Tito flirting self. He was more grounded. Probably because he was legit here asking this girl for help when he never asked for help from nobody. He did shit for himself. He’d been on his own longer than he’d had anybody so askin’ for help didn’t really come too easy for him. On the streets, asking for help showed weakness, showed you gave up on yourself. It was hard for his pride to sit here and have someone else (no matter who it was) help him.

He scratched the back of his head with a nervous chuckle, “Nah, I mean, you can’t exactly avoid Times Square or Central Park. But yeah, mostly Brooklyn and the Bronx were my stompin’ grounds, yanno?” Usually those were prime locations for pick pocketing. He and Dodge could make a fortune just by doing the old fake out, bump and sneak as kids. He shook his head, making sure to take a big appreciative gulp of the coffee, which did not exactly get swallowed correctly causing him to cough slightly and say between coughs and a small wheeze. “Nah, it's really okay.” He took another sip to clear his throat and then sat the cup down away from him giving her a smile like he hadn’t totally just fucked up being smooth.

Tito shrugged and looked down at his paper, “Guess we’ll find out then huh.” He gave her a little mischievous smirk before looking back down, trying to decipher the prompt a little bit better before she started asking him questions. He didn’t want to seem underprepared or something.  Unfortunately, she was pretty distracting so he read the same sentence about five times before looking back up at her and giving a chuckle, “Yeah, sure. Least I can do, yanno for you helpin’ me out. And hey, that’s pretty impressive, I mean… Je parle un peu de français” From Daisy. His accent was never quite right in French. Most of his words tried to lean towards his Spanish accent. “But I’m no expert in languages or anythin’.”

He listened to her, prepared to learn some new techniques and shit. He smiled at the highlighter. Of course it was pink. Right, key words. Figuring out what all this bullshit in this prompt meant. Good start. He started highlighting some stuff and immediately he could tell that he was highlighting too much. The whole paragraph mostly looked pink. He sheepishly looked up at her, his voice kind of quieter, “How do you know what things are the most important? Kinda just.. I dunno everything looks important to me so it's hard for me to focus on the more important things, yanno?”

LOTTIE

“Sugar, I said you don’t have to drink it if you don’t want to, not chug it down to the point that you start chokin;.” Lottie laughed out as she placed a han on Tito’s shoulder to try and steady him. Because, yes, in order to help someone who is choking you needed to steady them by holding onto their shoulder. (Lottie’s brain worked in mysterious ways). “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be laughing, are you okay Tito? I can’t have you dyin ‘on me this early.” Or you know, at all that would certainly be tragic and definitely would make Lottie probably the worst tutor in the history of tutors ever.

It was weird. Because from the get go Tito had seemed so cool, calm, and collected. Or at least try to play like he was. The way that he had leaned back in his chair when Lottie had first walked back, the fact that he called her chica with that grin of his (which yes, it was much different than Lottie calling everyone sugar because she did not flash people smirks like that), and pretty much just his entire demeanor. Whatever it was though, he had already seemed...well…not like that at all. The way that he had sort of choked on his coffee because he was trying to appease her (which was sweet that he still was going to drink it) and how that wall that she assumed he put up came down when it came to the actual work she was there to help him with. Whatever it was, Lottie felt like maybe not a lot of people saw that side of Tito so she was at least happy she got a hint of it now.

He seemed like a nice guy!

Lottie clapped her hands quietly though as Tito agreed to help her with her Spanish before the French had rolled off of his lips. Her expression had changed into one of surprise, even bucking her head back just a bit, “Ahhh tres bien!” Lottie mused, already a bit impressed since he had managed to put together the sentence that quickly. She knew the two languages were a little similar, but she was still impressed nonetheless.

She let out another small laugh as he began to highlight the entire prompt. Definitely not what she had been going for, but mistakes were alright! That’s how you learned. “Here,” She replied, taking the notepad he had brought as well as the prompt so she could quickly write it down once more. “My go-to rule with highlighting is,” Lottie began as she jotted it down, “To try to stay to only highlighting like, five words, eight max.” She added, shooting Tito a playful glare before glancing back down to the pad as she finished up. Lottie pushed it back towards him so that he could see. “See look, this bit at the top is really only giving you some background information.” She spoke, using the pen to point out the sentence. “This really isn’t telling you what you need to write about, it’s just getting you to start thinking. Usually what you’re looking for is in the middle or right at the end. Try again, I think you got it this time.” Lottie offered with a smile. Positive affirmations. “Remember, try and look for those ‘buzz’ words. The ones your professor wants you to see. Not all that junk at the beginning.” 

[sserpicko]

Oscar: How Each 2018 Best Picture Nominee Got Here

There can only be one winner, but each of the Best Picture nominees overcame creative, financial and logistical hurdles to get this close to the finish line. Here are their war stories.

Black Panther

Fifty years ago, the phrase ‘Black Panther’ carried more political baggage than it does today, immediately summoning up images of a militant African-American revolutionary, named after by the controversial civil rights party founded by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale in Oakland, California, in 1966. Created by Stan Lee in a bid to deliver the world’s first non-stereotype black superhero, the comic book of the same name materialized around the same time. Unusually, The Black Panther wasn’t an alter ego—it was the formal title for T’Challa, King of Wakanda—but Lee described the overlapping of names as “a strange coincidence”, adding that “maybe if I had it to do over again, I’d have given him another name”. The sensitive politics of the next two decades might explain why the character lay dormant as a movie property until 1992, when Wesley Snipes began work on the concept, eventually securing support from Columbia in 1994.

Directors John Singleton and Mario Van Peebles showed interest, but the project stalled, only to be resurrected by Marvel Studios in 2005, when then-CEO Avi Arad announced it as one of ten new films on the company’s slate. This time development moved forward at a faster pace: a script was commissioned in 2011, and by 2013, elements of the story began to appear in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with the character, played by Chadwick Boseman, debuting in 2016’s Captain America: Civil War. Ava DuVernay was briefly attached, then F. Gary Gray, and finally Creed director Ryan Coogler agreed to take the helm. Marvel President Kevin Feige acknowledges that it was a slow but sure process, and defends the timescale. “The only way we ever wanted to do this project was the right way,” he says, “and that meant finding a filmmaker who had something personal to say, who had a vision and could take this character into another arena, and showcase the power of representation on a canvas of this size.” —Damon Wise

BlacKkKlansman

When Jordan Peele pitched Spike Lee on the story that would become BlacKkKlansman, and lead to the iconic filmmaker’s first Oscar nomination for directing, Lee was sure he was making it up. “It was one of the greatest pitches ever,” Lee recalls. “Black man infiltrates Ku Klux Klan. That’s high concept. I said, ‘I’ve seen this a million times, it’s the Dave Chappelle skit.’ He went, ‘Nah, nah, this is real.’”

And real it is, even though Lee’s film bends the truth here and there to offer an engine to a story that seizes on the rhetorical parallels with the violence in Charlottesville last year, takes a sideways glance at the legacy of DW Griffith and Gone with the Wind, and revels in its 1970s setting to play on the tropes of Blaxploitation movies. Ron Stallworth, a black police officer in Colorado Springs, really did infiltrate the local chapter of the Ku Klux Klan. And really did interact with one-time Grand Wizard David Duke.

Lee turned to an old collaborator to play Stallworth. John David Washington was six years old when he was given a line in Lee’s Malcolm X. Reunited for BlacKkKlansman, Lee kept Washington away from the real Stallworth until the table read, determined that he find his own version of the character in prep. “It was my thinking that he would meet Ron and want to walk like him, talk like him,” Lee says. “It wasn’t like Malcolm X. No one knew who Ron Stallworth was, and that gives you freedom.”

Lee casts aside criticism of the film’s forthright allusions to current politics. “These are dangerous times. The film had to end the way it did,” he says, with footage of the Charlottesville rally and a tribute to Heather Hayer, who was murdered there.

And it took the commitment of all of his collaborators, including nominee Adam Driver and the iconic Harry Belafonte—a key player in the Civil Rights Movement—to fully realize it. “This film, the teamwork was amazing. We were like the Golden State Warriors, or the New York Knicks. We didn’t have to sit around saying, ‘Oh this is such an important film and we have to…’ It wasn’t even discussed. Everybody knew what we had to do.” —Joe Utichi

Bohemian Rhapsody

Bohemian Rhapsody is the miracle Oscar nominee this year. Typically when a production is mired with on-set problems, its doom is inevitable, but in the year-plus wake of director Bryan Singer’s firing, Bohemian Rhapsody has had immense luck, with the producers determined to buck sour Singer headlines, after he clashed with Oscar nominated star Rami Malek. Graham King shepherded Bohemian Rhapsody for eight years, and nothing was going to stop it now.

Sacha Baron Cohen expressed interest in the project early on, but dismissed it when King opted against a warts-and-all biopic.

Then King’s partner had a sense that Emmy-winning Mr. Robot star Rami Malek could do the trick, and indeed he did, with a dedication that went to masochistic measures.

“I told Graham King if he gave me this role, I’d bleed for it, and he showed me a picture of blood on the piano keys after the final day of our Live Aid shoot,” Malek says.

Editor John Ottman gets proper credit here with his first Oscar nomination, working with the producers to hammer an impressive first cut, before Dexter Fletcher stepped in for Singer to finish a handful of scenes. While a director always gets credit for a final cut, Bohemian Rhapsody is an example this season that there’s no ‘I’ in team.

The press has repeatedly asked the production team for their thoughts on Singer in the wake of the film’s success, especially on Golden Globes night when it won for Best Motion Picture, Drama and Best Actor.

King waved off the question, but Malek answered, “There was only one thing we needed to do: celebrate Freddie Mercury. He is a marvel. Nothing was going to compromise us. We’re giving him the love, celebration and adulation he deserves.” —Anthony D’Alessandro

The Favourite

It took two decades for Deborah Davis’s script for The Favourite to make it to screen. A searing three-hander based on the true history of the British Queen Anne and the two women who fought for her affections, Sarah Churchill and Abigail Masham, it was a tough sell even for a market in Britain that specializes in costume drama. A film in which three women rule the roost over their male counterparts, fall in love—and graphic lust—with one another and scheme their way to dominance? Whatever to make of that?

But Davis knew she had something groundbreaking, and producers Ceci Dempsey, Lee Magiday and Ed Guiney weren’t prepared to let the project go without a fight. In an inspired move, they showed the script to Yorgos Lanthimos, whose twisted and unique earlier features, including Dogtooth, The Lobster and The Killing of a Sacred Deer seemed like an odd fit for a story based in true history. And yet, working on the script with Australian writer Tony McNamara, Lanthimos found a lens on the story through his own fascination with the more awkward aspects of human interaction.

“I was intrigued in trying to create these three very complicated and complex characters for women, and work with three great actresses,” Lanthimos says. “It was in my mind thinking you never see that: three female strong leads.”

For Olivia Colman, Rachel Weisz and Emma Stone, the three actresses cast in these roles, all of whom picked up Oscar nominations, it was just as enticing a prospect. Lanthimos started them off with an unconventional rehearsal period, challenging them to play trust exercises, tie themselves up in knots and say one another’s lines.

“It’s strange and not strange,” Stone notes. “By the end, I think one of the most effective aspects of it was that we all felt very, very close to each other. We all touched each other, embarrassed ourselves in front of one another, and became more reliant on one another.” —Joe Utichi

Green Book

Nick Vallelonga had been carrying the story for Green Book in his head ever since he was five years old, and yet it was not until his 50s that he was able to see his dream become a reality. The plot came directly from a period of his father’s life, when, in the early ’60s, Tony “Lip” Vallelonga was hired by an African-American classical pianist named Don Shirley to be his driver and bodyguard during a potentially dangerous concert tour of the racially segregated southern states. “Even as a child, it struck me as something you’d see in a movie,” says Vallelonga. There was only only one problem: even though both subjects gave him their blessing, they also made Vallelonga give his word that the film would not be made in their lifetimes. After Tony and Don passed in 2013, within just three months of the other, Vallelonga began to map out this extraordinary road trip.

To help shape the script, Vallelonga turned to writer/actor Brian Currie. Then, two years later, during a chance encounter, Currie outlined the project to Peter Farrelly, and the idea stuck. “Home run!” exclaimed Farrelly. Together, all three began shaping the production, which passed through Focus Features and Participant Media before landing at Universal, with Viggo Mortensen and Mahershala Ali as the leads. The result was Farrelly’s first non-comedy outside of the long-running partnership with his brother Bobby. “People had asked me over the years, ‘Do you think you’ll ever do a drama?’” Farrelly says. “And my answer was, ‘Sure, when it happens,’ because I never really planned. I probably should have, by the way, because I look at Rob Reiner’s career, and he was so smart. He did Spinal Tap, and then he did The Sure Thing, and then he goes off to do Stand by Me and A Few Good Men. He showed he could do everything. But we were just doing what came into our universe next, and we never really planned it. I didn’t plan this, but finally this dropped into my lap—I heard the story, and I thought, I gotta make this.” —Damon Wise

Roma

Alfonso Cuarón’s ode to his childhood in Mexico City, and in particular the domestic worker who helped made him, Roma was non-negotiable. “I had to do the film,” he says. “I told Carlos, my brother, ‘I don’t know if anybody is going to care about or like this movie. I have to do it because it’s something I need to do.’”

The notion started to form more than a decade ago, as Cuarón finished up 2006’s Children of Men. But there had been threads drawn from his youth in other projects—in his heralded Y Tu Mamá También, a voiceover for Diego Luna’s character tells a backstory that isn’t far off from Cuarón’s own—and he felt driven by a desire to tap more directly into that past.

Cuarón teamed up with Participant Media, who greenlit the $15 million the filmmaker needed; a tall order for a film that he knew he had to shoot primarily in Spanish, and in black-and-white. But so slavish was his desire to draw all this from his own very specific memories that Participant CEO David Linde would become one of the first and last people to ever see a script during production. He had intended to tap Emmanuel Lubezki to shoot the film, but ‘Chivo’ was unavailable when the dates finally set, and so Cuarón served as his own DP. He instructed his heads of department directly to get the details exactly as he saw them, rather than have them riff on the script. He gave his actors only what they needed for the scenes they shot, and then, only moments before they shot them. In the film’s lead, Cuarón found Yalitza Aparicio after an exhaustive search of Mexico. She was training to be a teacher when she heard about the audition. She is now an Oscar nominee.

Still, it was only after the process was completed that Cuarón understood the real challenge of Roma. With no stars, his black-and-white, Spanish-language opus was not built for the current realities of global theatrical distribution. Netflix came on board in April, when the film was looking set to debut at Cannes, and the controversy surrounding the streamer’s stance on theatrical put paid to a slot at the festival. It later debuted at Venice. But Cuarón is determined Netflix was the right home. “Our viewing habits are changing,” he says. “The challenge is now, how we can adapt ourselves, but present something that you believe is amazing and great cinema? It’s not so much about, ‘Let’s impose this kind of cinema on audiences.’ It’s also the conversation with them about how they want to watch.” —Joe Utichi

A Star Is Born

It’s hard to overstate the difficulty of shooting on stage in the middle of a music festival. Yet the cast and crew of A Star Is Born pulled off exactly that, with only a four-minute window for director and star Bradley Cooper to perform.

Serendipitously, it worked out thanks to the star of the film’s 1976 version. Kris Kristofferson happened to be playing Glastonbury on the planned shoot day, and offered a window of time in his own set.

“Bradley jumps on stage,” producer Lynette Howell Taylor recalls, “and says, ‘Hi, I’m Bradley Cooper. I’m here to perform a song from A Star Is Born, but you won’t be able to hear it. Please just look like you’re excited.’” With his vocal feed cut, only the front few rows could hear some of what Cooper sang. “We didn’t want the music to leak out.”

“There were many minutes along the way where we were running and gunning,” adds producer Bill Gerber, “But that one in particular wasn’t just a logistical threat, it was also incredible for Bradley to go from playing in controlled situations to all of a sudden literally singing live in front of 80,000 people.”

Gerber had been on the project since its early days, when, before timing got in the way, Clint Eastwood had been set to direct, with Beyoncé in the Lady Gaga role. Casting Gaga was initially a stretch for Warner Bros., Gerber says. “Even though Bradley and I were really blown away by the chemistry, the studio still wasn’t 100% sure. But to their credit, they said, ‘Do a test, spend what you have to spend, and let’s see.’”

During that test, Gerber saw the magic happen. “Bradley picked her up, and they walked out the doors of her house onto her lawn, which overlooks the Pacific Ocean. They looked at each other and it was undeniably brilliant. I thought, well, there’s our Gone with the Wind moment.” And the rest, of course, is history. —Antonia Blyth

Vice

Adam McKay probably wouldn’t have made Vice, his irreverent biopic of former Vice President Dick Cheney, if he hadn’t fallen ill for a couple of weeks at the end of 2015. The director had recently finished up The Big Short, an arch look at the financial crisis of 2008, and followed it immediately with a worldwide publicity tour, then a punishing awards season schedule. The net result was that McKay got sick, and while he was shivering with a particularly evil flu, he looked up at his bookshelves. “People give you books through the years,” McKay told the ACLU, “and you just shove them up there and don’t really think about them. And there was one about Dick Cheney, and it kind of struck me, like, ‘Wow, the book of history is about to close on that guy.’ I mean, you don’t really hear his name mentioned that much anymore, and you don’t hear [George] W. Bush’s name really mentioned, but, holy cow, those were a rough eight years.”

McKay started reading the book and found he couldn’t put it down. “I was amazed by what a large, epic American tale Cheney’s life story is—how far back it reaches, how many monumental moments in history he was around for. He had this Zelig-like presence in the ’70s through the ’80s. And then of course, I was amazed by how brilliant he was at manipulating the system.” The final impetus to tell Cheney’s story came in 2016. “Somewhere along that line,” recalled McKay, “Donald Trump got elected, and all of a sudden we started hearing people say, ‘Hey, I kinda miss George W. Bush. He wasn’t that bad, him and Cheney.’ And I really felt like I had to make the movie. I was like, ‘This is crazy that people are saying this.’ And that was it. We were off to the races.” —Damon Wise

Source: deadline

by Joe Utichi and Damon Wise and Anthony D’Alessandro and Antonia Blyth