I can finally post this!! Here is my contribution to the @topgunzine for the Wingman collection! I got the lovely opportunity to complete a spread as a pinch hitter! Of course, I had to do the obligatory beach volleyball piece! I also contributed the Maverick Handwriting font that can be found here for anyone to use freely!
[Click for better quality, reblogs and tags appreciated]
And there they are, the three of them: Goose and Carole absolutely glowing, heads tipped together, and Maverick tucked in the corner, startled grin on his face.
“Here,” Carole says, startling him out of his reverie and pressing the photo into his hand, squeezing his arm again. “A reminder of the people you’ll always have in your corner. And don’t you go doubting it, now. This is proof.”
or: Three little moments spread out over the years. Each tie back to Maverick's photo collection.
read on ao3
finally time to share our pieces from @topgunzine !! this project was an absolute blast to work on and mod and I'm so incredibly happy I got to help put it all together!! thank you to all of our contributors and to all who supported this project; hope y'all enjoy! 💜
Headcanon Series #6 New because I wanted to update the original post but that shit wouldn’t let me, so I had to delete it.
Bradley Bradshaw grows up hearing story after story about his great father and when he starts speaking he asks questions about why his dad isn’t there and why they visit that stone all the time (it took Mav and Carole a whole minute to realise he meant Nick’s tombstone), so Mav sits him down one day and tells him with a surprisingly steady voice that his dad flew high enough to reach heaven and now he spends his time there, looking down them and whenever Bradley sees a jet in the sky, it’s his dad telling him how much he loves him. Bradley is barely four years old and that’s the only child-friendly version thing Pete can think of. He even draws a tiny F-14 on a sticky note and hands it to Bradley, telling him to look out for these. Bradley is delighted and starts drawing his own F-14s and with every year passing, he gets better and better. His first attempt finds its place on Nick’s grave, the second goes to Carole, then Pete gets one and by the end of the month the whole class of 86’ possesses Bradshaw-Artworks.
Bradley stops drawing after his fight with Pete and swears to never to touch a pencil again for that purpose but then Tom dies and Bradley deeply mourns his loss. He thinks back to the days when Pete had taken him in after his mother’s death and how Uncle Ice had been with them so often, he basically lived with them. His chest hurts with the thought of Pete having lost, what Bradley always had secretly been convinced was the love of his life and he thinks maybe he can make an exception for Tom. Because even if he despises Pete for pulling his papers, no one deserves to suffer this much alone.
So when Pete comes home from Tom’s funeral, he finds a folded piece of paper taped to his door and when he opens it, he is greeted with the sight of two quite good drawn F-14s, one coloured in silver and the other in red and blue. He frames the paper and hangs it on the wall across his bed, where it’s been hanging ever since.
I am no artist, as you may notice. This is just kinda how I imagined it to look like. Feel free to draw your own version; I’d love to see how your ideas turn out!
Mav: Look, as a reasonable, adult, and well-functioning member of society-
Ice: A what? I'm sorry, I don't think I heard you correctly. Run that one by me again. Reasonable? Adult? Functioning?
Mav: *Ignoring him* —I understand logically that the different Froot Loop colors are just dyes, but I'm telling you, in my heart and in my mouth, they're different flavors.
I love TGM, but Maverick needed to lose his shit at least once in that film. Be when he was arguing with Bradley, when Hangman was annoying Rooster and pulled out Gooses death, I just want Mav to fully fly off the handle and remind the aviators exactly why the navy stories warned of Mavericks legendary temper.