#overworked and underpaid - autumn

[groundedinthecloudsss]

[h-ruchiyo]

Your dainty hands began to type down the last page of revision for your boss, carefully looking at the corner of the monitor as a small '20:38' was trying its best to remind you of the due; hoping you can submit your work last minute before the deadline in less than half an hour.

As if your body received another injection of adrenaline and caffeine from a sip of this god-awful coffee, cursing at anyone who gave you this before submitting your finished paper and clocking out right away; cursing at your boss inside your head before realised how free you were now since tomorrow would be your last week as their (underpaid and overworked) intern.

"Lola, Lola, hmm,"

You hummed along the way back to the apartment, holding your bag tightly in your hand as you could see how crowded it was; numerous people flocking around to hold each other close while you had decided that spending another night of reading Bloomic's latest chapter might be a best go-to.

After a refreshing shower and a can of cold drink in your hand, no one could stop you from reading your only coping mechanism to postpone the upcoming dread of existential crisis you shall face one day; well, 'or so' you thought.

As you decided to take a break and looked around for cute ships on Twitter, a post caught you surprised since it was your first time reading it ever.

"Huh? A discord server for Bloomic?"

As if you were in trance, your finger began to hover around to click the link and there you were, inside the server as Bloombot barged you around with a few questions then let you go to the wild '#general' with some unread messages related and directed to you.

"Oh, wow, what is this,"

You muttered under your breath, standing up from your position to turn your PC on and drinking down the rest of your drink; fingers hovering over the keyboard as your eyes were trained to reach each message carefully by greeting each one of them personally, thinking it'd be the best instead of being vague and whisk around nowhere.

Your eyes lit up at a comment this one account made, claiming you could call him Xyx as each one of them began to introduce themselves including the mod aka Quest; a sweetman who reminded you of warm cinnamon roll and spiced latte in the late autumn.

"'wanna call?' man, this mod is friendly for sure."

You agreed to his invitation since some members were busy with their own stuff on other channels or going idle for a moment to sort life out in real life.

Clicking on the voice channel, you tried to find your headphones for a bit before going back to connect it with your PC; not realising that your camera was on this whole time and Quest's cheeks were in fire when he got a good look of your appearance.

Sitting inside a modern chic room with few decorations, he could see a young woman wearing a flimsy sleeping dress as her hair was draped over her shoulders; looking around for something nearby her desk before going back to the call and made contact with his eyes.

"Oh, hi!"

He smiled, reaching his ears while his arm was seen resting on top of the table; giving you a view of a tattoo covering his limb before you returned the smile, giving him a slight wave before disconnecting your headphones and taking it off from your head, feeling pissed as the lack of sound it provided.

Quest began to introduce himself, looking away once in a while as he explained how the server worked and expected how everyone would act from now on, stating the Bloombot could get confusing for him sometimes to control around.

"Thank you for looking after all of us, Quest. I feel so happy that you're here with me."

A small and appreciative sentence that rolled over your tongue smoothly, almost giving Quest a small heart attack if it wasn't for his hand gripping on his desk; trying his best to calm his heart beat and dizzy head, almost getting drunk from all those praise you threw at.

"God, angel. If it's for you, I'd for sure throw everything away and run straight to you."

You listened to him carefully as your cheeks were heated up, almost gaping at his words; hoping that he'd stop striking you away with these comments before you could actually start to combust due to him.

As he looked at your face through the screen, he made a hope for once after a while. A hope to see you in real life, gazing into his eyes and threading his fingers between yours — away from his boss, coworkers and Bloombot, that always goes hard with its censorship.

"Well then, angel. I suppose I should call it a night now, you look tired. Can't have you sleeping on me, yes?"

A deep chuckle escaped from his lips, making you break the eye contact and look away to suppress your embarrassment; wondering if the call was supposed to be like this or you were overthinking over such a small nickname.

The night finally had its grasp around you and lulled you to a state Quest finding you look cutest for tonight.

Your head was resting against your arm on the desk, looking up to see him with your half-lidded eyes and pursed lips; trying to fight the spell moon had cast over you.

"Sleep well, angel. Have a good one for me, yes?"

"Hey, intern, we need you here! Come fast!"

Your black pumps stumped against the concrete floor almost hurriedly, giving you a cramp since today had been quite hectic and a worker had asked you to cover her shift for today since she had an emergency issues at home.

You went forward and back, running around the office with fresh prints every minute and placing it on everyone's cubicle; double take each of them to make sure none was left out and let out a sigh as it was finally lunch hour, a time for you to take a deep breath and give your poor calves a massage.

Sitting at the cafeteria, you watched a long line of workers and decided to take some time to sip on iced milk tea with boba and cream on the top; understanding how good it was and perfect for Lola's exhausting life, running around and facing life-changing moments on almost every chapter.

"Angel?"

You looked up and met a pair of brilliant blue eyes staring back at your eyes, not expecting to find him out of everyone to meet you at the cafeteria here. As if he was asking for permission to sit down with you with those eyes, you gave him a nod before holding out your hands to take the tray from his hand, placing it on the table as he sat down in front of you.

"Um, hi."

You flashed him a small smile, eyes' corners slightly crinkled with some sweat beads went past over it. He looked down for a minute, not returning your smile right away like last night and instead taking out a handkerchief, dabbing it over your forehead.

"Sorry, you look tired and I— I can't, y'know,"

He stuttered over his words, eliciting a warm laugh from you as you wrapped your hands around his wrist and putting it down gently before sending him another shockwave in his lane with a small 'thank you'.

Apparently, Quest had been working here for a while (preferably almost five to six years) at the marketing section as a salesman and almost rarely leaving his cubicle, enjoying most of his time inside including during lunch time due to endless works.

You could see he tried to muster it up and play it off as a small joke, but the darkening circles under his eyes and fine lines around them couldn't fool you. Quest was for sure tired and never got enough rest after he started to work here, barely hanging on the thread.

"Can you work on them home, Quest?"

"Yeah, but, I'd rather not, you know?"

"How about going to my place tonight? I'll help you out."

Quest might have started to call you 'angel' because your eyes always glowed in his eyes and whenever he listened to your voice, it felt as if, everything was worth it and he's willing to stay up late at night and finish all his works before eight so he could have you all for himself until time for him to clock out.

But, this?

It took him aback and he was basically a stranger, one that you could always walk past and forget in a week; but, why would you offer him such a suggestion? Working here was already tired enough and he would feel bad for taking up so much of your free time at home.

Alas, here both of you were, spending time with you after finishing his total workload until next week in less than eight hours; pushing each other's capabilities until it reached its limit before Quest slumped down in his seat while you were half-asleep against the bed, letting out a small giggle when you got caught red-handed staring at him.

"You look tired, angel. C'mere,"

He spread his legs open and put a hand on his right thigh before realising what he was doing, straightening his back with panic written all over his face. As you walked in his direction, you put your hand over his chest, trying to calm him down before sitting on his lap — resting your cheek against his left chest as your legs were over his right leg, smiling slightly when his hands began to massage them gently.

While it wasn't supposed to be a shock for you, having Quest to be in your real life was still a surprise. He was tall and bulky with broad shoulders, yet the way he talked and brought himself reminded you of a small raccoon after getting a food.

"Ah, yes, Quest, right there"

You moaned close to his ear, noticing your feet were feeling better than before since you took off those pumps; cursing at the company's requirements to have you wear black pumps with heels above five centimetre and below fifteen.

Quest started to feel embarrassed again just like before at the cafeteria, touching his warmed up cheek with the back of his hand before looking down to see you in the eyes; lips hovering and lightly brush each other when you could feel his breath started to get heavier.

"May I?"

He cupped your cheek, cradling you closer to his side before he pressed his lips against yours; humming at the combination of sweet taste of your drink and chapstick, placing his other hand around your waist to pull you closer and sit down on top of him, knees hitting again the seat in the process.

You wrapped your arms around his neck and then went down to his chest, using it as a leverage to deepen the kiss; humming slightly as you could feel him starting to get hard under you.

You broke the kiss and looked into his eyes, asking for silent permission before taking off his tie and shirt; after giving you a small nod, you took off your shorts and his belt, slightly fumbling before he blew out his signature laugh, giving you a small comfort and reassurance before shifting your eyes back to his face.

"Fuck, angel,"

His hands were both on your waist, tightly gripping on the soft skin as you began to grind your hips against his; sucking on a sharp breath when he began to lower you down, making a direct contact with his clad one.

"Take your panties off, sweetie. Let daddy do the rest for you, hmm?"

He brushed his thumb against your cheek, sensing a slight nervousness as you put your panties away and Quest began to do something similar; hand not leaving your side when you went back to align yourself with him, giving you some time adjusting to his size as the tip had slipped inside.

Your hands were still on his chest, depending on it as a leverage while his other hand was right behind your back; keeping you steady and close to him, making the older man feel in cloud nine when you looked at him with those eyes — begging for him to take control and let you watch how everything unfolded.

It didn't take long for him to lose control of himself, slamming your hips down even though his thick, fat head was already hitting the deepest part inside you minutes ago; not giving you any space to breathe and making your hips bouncing on his, covering his whole length with your slick before slamming it down again.

"Never knew you'd be so tight, angel. Scared?"

You whimpered, digging your nails into his shoulders while he treated you like a fleshlight; ignoring your pleas to go easy, as if he knew that if he stopped right now, you'd probably beg to go like this — all messy, sticky and drunk on his cock; boosting his confidence on rewarding you for tonight.

You might have hoped he would ignore your clit for tonight, but, it was Quest; he would never forgive himself for not paying any attention to every inch of your body, leaving one of them ignored. And thus, he began to draw a small circle around your clit, eliciting a ripped scream from your throat as you made a mess over his lower stomach and length; a white ring forming on the base as he kept thrusting his hips against yours, overstimulating you in the process.

"Angel, do you want me to cum inside?"

"Yes, don't worry about it."

He watched your eyes rolling to the back, sweaty skin slapping against each other and then spreading your ass with his hands, giving him a chance to angle himself better before a thick rope of his cum filled you up to the brim; forming a small bump on your stomach as Quest rested his hand and put some pressure on it, letting his cum oozing out your folds.

"This is one way to end the day after our first meeting this morning, eh?"

[tipsycad147]

Diving Deep: Tarot and Tea for Scorpio Season

Welcome to Scorpio Season and my latest post on tarot practices and herbal allies for the twelve seasons of the zodiac (you can learn more here).

Scorpio is a sign of depth which is reflected in the fact that its season arrives during the depth of autumn (for the northern hemisphere) or spring (for the southern hemisphere). Past the balance of Libra, which always seeks to balance multiple needs at once, Scorpio draws us beneath the surface and into what interests us most, to know ourselves and our worlds intimately. If Libra is an exhale, and the harmonizing of sound and breath in the wider community, Scorpio is the inhale, drawing in the relationships and patterns of relating that are most present and powerful in our lives.

Scorpio is a fixed water sign which means that it carries the energy of steadfastness, intensity, and strength (Taurus, Leo, and Aquarius are also fixed sign). While cardinal signs like Libra may introduce us to a new season, a new perspective, a change of pace, and mutable signs like Gemini may entice us away to a season or place over there, fixed signs like Scorpio help us to settle and get to know a season through and through. If Libra season helps us to recognize that there is so much beauty to know in the world, it is in the season of Scorpio that we form a long(er) term relationship with whatever beauty we are drawn most intensely to (and the beauty that draws itself most intensely to us). The season of Scorpio helps us to discover what it is that we are most curious about and what we want to learn about in-depth. Sometimes this is part of our life calling, sometimes it is a passing but important lesson, but the energy of Scorpio is always felt most acutely when we allow ourselves to be as focused and invested in something as we are called to be.

Learning and living our intensity is not always easy or comfortable. Allowing ourselves to be drawn into that which most interests us (including our own understanding of ourselves and our identities) can create schisms between the life that we were once living and the life we are beginning to live anew. But that's the nature of the season. For fixed sign seasons, where we are in the depth of a particular earthly season, there is no denying that what once was has passed and our new reality is here (i.e. the heat of summer has long given way to the cool damp of autumn and we need to change our habits accordingly). Sometimes our intensity drives us instead of us using it like a compass. Other times fear or shame is stirred up as we realize that the space we need for our curiosity and life calling isn't available in our current life. Too much intensity can cause rigidity, hubris, and an overdeveloped need to control our surroundings - things to guard against on any Scorpio adventure. But with care, the season of Scorpio can help us open up to the wonders of the world that can only be discovered when we spend time in the depths of wondering.

Diving Deep Scorpio Season Tarot Spread

The quickest way to block Scorpio energy is to deny the time and space it needs to percolate, explore, and engage with an interest. Stagnated and frustrated Scorpio energy is something that shows up a lot in healing work. Many of us live within cultural systems that keep us overworked and underpaid, starved of time to just pursue that which we're interested in. Other times we've been skimming the surface of interests for so long that we don't know where to look to go deeper. We sense that a door to the mysteries we seek is out there somewhere, just beyond our peripheral vision, but it remains hidden. Scorpio energy helps us to understand that one of the ways to find your hidden door is to know what must change in order to unlock it.

Scorpio asks, "What needs to be transformed in your life for you to live more deeply?"

Understanding the need for transformation in our lives helps us to find the key which opens up the door of our curiosity to worlds we've yet to know. Intuition is required, compassion always, and more than a bit of bravery. The following spread helps us to find the hidden door to the places and spaces that we are being called to explore in more depth in our lives.

Card 1. The Hidden Door

This card helps you to glimpse at the hidden door which is calling to you. Listen to your intuition with this card, as its true message may be buried beneath the noisiness of your analytical mind.

Card 2. That Which Hides the Door

A card to help you understand what hinders your ability to live more deeply as you are called to, including pursuing the transformation that is necessary in your life.

Card 3. That Which Needs Transforming

This card illuminates the part of your life - a habit, a pattern of thought, a relationship, and so on - that is in most need of transforming.

Card 4. That Which Opens the Door

A card which gives a glimpse of what you need in order to open the hidden door and move through it. Sometimes this card will make startling sense, other times it may seem opaque in its meaning - take note of it either way and allow its meaning to come to you in other avenues of your life. Think of this card like a bit of a spell, something to start the process of unlocking your hidden door.

Card 5. A Message for Scorpio Season

A general message, signs to pay attention to, and perhaps next steps to take as we move into Scorpio season. This card can highlight energy which you might bring more into your life during Scorpio season so that you are better able to connect with the energetic flow of the next month.

Bonus Card: That Which Guards the Reproductive System

If you feel connected with the philosophy of astroherbology you can pull an additional card to help you understand the current energies of your reproductive system, including sex organs, including physical experiences and energetic energies and what tension or wisdom you might be keeping there. I encourage you to take a somatic approach with this card - when you pull it and see the energy, follow the feelings and sensations that it evokes from your body to understand its meaning. 

A Tea for Scorpio Season

How do we nourish the energy of Scorpio? Traditionally, Scorpio guards reproductive function as well as our sex organs (click here for a full list of traditional correspondences for Scorpio). Much of Scorpio energy feels intense because it is about the propagation of life and the desire to live. For all their beautiful intensity, Scorpio is able to locate the tenderness of the world (and our individual lives) with great precision. When supported, the energy of Scorpio can be one of great repair as our curiosity leads us to finding out what needs most healing in our life and how to go about doing it. Thorn magick plants like Hawthorn (Crataegus monogyna) and Rose (Rosa spp.) which simultaneously protect and open the heart are wonderful Scorpio plant allies. Sacred Basil (Ocimum sanctum) brings in much needed flexibility of spirit through its adaptogenic qualities as well as helping us to guide the intensity of Scorpio energy instead of being overwhelmed by it. All herbs support our ability to open up to that which we desire most - a very Scorpio trait indeed.

4 parts Sacred Basil (Ocimum sanctum)

2 parts Hawthorn Berry (Crataegus monogyna)

½ part Rose (Rosa spp.)

These proportions are only suggested guidelines, so feel free to play around with them to your liking. As you make your tea, slow down, breathe deep, and infuse the blend with your intentions for the season (or whenever you’re drinking this tea to connect with the energy of Scorpio). If you’re looking for more breathwork practices to help you connect with the energy of the season, come this way.

Seasonal Reflections

What does the land feel like, look like, smell like this season?

What is coming to the surface from within me?

What is receding within me?

What am I feeling grateful for?

What am I grieving for or feeling challenged by?

What am I feeling inspired and where is it calling me to this season?

What am I calling to me?

What am I called to give?

♏️

Want to learn more about the magick and astroherbalism of Scorpio? I’ve written a full profile on the sign for you to enjoy. You can also check out the rest of my seasons of astrology series. Looking for some more visual inspiration? Come have a look at my mood board for Scorpio season.

Another Scorpio herb that I think is a useful one for many folks is Nettles (Urtica dioica). If you're going to be plumbing the mysteries, it's good to have the herbal equivalent of a multivitamin on your side, and Nettles is just that and more. For those who struggle with the

inflexibility that Scorpio energy can bring or an intensity that feels run amuck, consider connecting with Vervain (Verbena spp.).

May your Scorpio season be full of revelation and many interesting things to learn more about.

[flammedoudoune]

Every other day now, I see some Shein discourse on twitter. With some people always saying you shouldn’t criticize them for shopping there unless you offer some real alternatives. And no, secondhand shopping isn’t an alternative because you don’t have as many style and size options as on Shein. Shopping new from other brands isn’t an option either because it’s more expensive than on Shein. So essentially when they ask for more ethical alternatives, they mean something with as many options and for as cheap as on Shein.

But that’s just never going to happen. You can’t have this much mass produced clothes for that cheap and it being ethical in any way.

Now I know some people buy from Shein cause it’s literally all they can afford if they want to wear something they like and that fit their size. And I also know that Shein isn’t the only unethical brand out there, and that even if you try to avoid this one as well as the other “bad” ones, like H&M, Zara, etc, chances are at least some, if not most of your clothes are mass produced by underpaid and overworked people. I’m not here to shame anyone because cause we all buy what we can afford (except for influencers who make 500$ fast fashion hauls, fuck them).

But I’m also pretty sure that a lot of the people complaining that they can’t find any ethical alternative to Shein, aren’t necessarily the ones who don’t have any other option, but more like people who shop there because it’s convenient. Like some people just don’t consider that maybe they could buy less clothes? Sure they won’t find as many clothes that fit their size and their style on vinted, and if they shop new from more ethical brands they won’t be able to afford as many clothes as often. But do they need all the clothes they’re buying from Shein? Are they gonna wear all of them? And for how long? It just baffles me when people act like they can’t shop anywhere else because Shein is the only website where they can afford to buy new clothes every month. Like yeah, it sure is, but also, only in recent years has it become a normal way to consume fashion. It’s not one of these situations where it’s always been like that so people can’t imagine doing it differently. And when I say it’s not always been like that, I don’t even mean pre 20th century where people only had a couple of outfits that they’d keep for most of their life or something. I’m talking even in my lifetime I remember things being different, and I’m only 28. I remember 10-15 years ago, clothing brands had one spring-summer collection, and one autumn-winter one and that was it. And it still was a large choice of clothes for relatively cheap (not saying this was super ethically made even at the time, but it definitely wasn’t as bad as it is now). I remember being shocked when I was in high school when I learned that Zara was renewing their collections every two weeks, I thought that was insane. Now it’s the norm for so many brands, and I don’t understand why people act like it’s just the natural way of things and that we have no choice but to buy new clothes all the time, when it’s such a recent trend.

[daring-elm]

!!! Ooo, 53 and 20? - logan 💫

Mutual Pining + Teacher AU 

heck yes so

let's have us some uuuuh analogical!! virgil's an overworked and underpaid art teacher, whereas logan teaches science

logan taught at the local college for a while (it's dr. sanders, please), but he applied at the high school virgil teaches at because after hearing his niece speak of her school he knows that some changes must be made, and who better than him to do it

virgil had only been teaching for 20 years, but his experience is enough to know that the system will break you in half no matter how much you try and fight it—so even though he's stressed, burned out and exhausted beyond his bullshit capacity, he'll fight tooth and nail to make his classroom a space where his students can relax

and then logan walks in on his first day, tie knotted, hair slicked back, full of ideas about what this job will look like, and virgil sees him through his messy bangs and the steam rising from his third cup of coffee and immediately falls in love

logan very quickly noticed it's way worse than he thought, and he has no one to receive any guidance from, so he turns to that one art teacher his students seem to love (logan can't tell why, to be honest—he's messy, always looks like he rolled out of bed minutes ago, and his classroom is all over the place; he may be (very very) handsome but that can't be an excuse), and virgil, however begrudgingly, takes another poor lost soul under his wing

in the next few months, virgil's roommate gets to hear a lot of nervous rambling about this hot clueless guy and his pretty eyes and how fucking smart he is and i can't just ask him out ro what if he's straight what if he wants to stay friends are we even friends what are we?

as does logan's brother, who gives him the same advice every time—to just talk to him like a normal person, then invite him to grab lunch or dinner or whatever it is you people do, to which logan responds with equivalent concerns (he's just better at masking his anxiety)

so these two absolute dumbasses spend the rest of the semester pining and not daring to flirt until nearly the whole staff has caught on (there are bets going)

then at the winter break party—the last day before the vacation both the students and teachers have been yearning for since early autumn—logan brings up the courage to ask virgil out, and believe it or not, virgil agrees

(one thing leads to another; they date, get married, adopt two dogs and a cat, spend the rest of their days living happily ever after the end)

[phanfictioncatalogue]

Student!Dan Masterlist

A Picture Is Worth - yiffandquiff

Summary: Dan is a student photographer who finds comfort in taking photos. Phil is the older man who is finally confronting Dan on why he’s trespassing on his dock.

Blue - washedoutgay

Summary: Dan is an artist who sees people as colours and Phil needs money.

Figure My Heart Out - definitelythor

Summary: Dan’s a student with a massive crush on the university’s librarian, and it’s Valentines day.

If These Shelves Could Speak (ao3) - phandomestic

Summary: a slice-of-life-esque library au where dan has plans to study for an exam but a certain distraction by the name of hot librarian #1 gets in the way.

If You Like To Do The Things You Know That We Shouldn't Do (ao3) - resurrectdead

Summary: When first year law student Dan meets Mr. Lester.

Professionally, Yours (ao3) - deletable_bird

Summary: Dan is an overworked, underpaid, very homosexual uni student in need of an easy job. Phil is a successful, rather lonely businessman in need of a housekeeper. This is their story.

Psyche You Out - xinyanhowell

Summary: Usually, Dan’s nine a.m. psychology class on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays is the highlight of his week. Despite all of the weird looks he receives whenever he tells someone, Dan Howell actually is morning person, functioning at a much higher level between the hours of seven a.m. and one p.m. than at any other time of day.

Purple Lavender Clouds - minniti

Summary: The one where Dan and Phil aren’t bitch ass liars and actually met while Dan was still a student at Manchester uni. if you can cue student stress, shitty studio apartments, and copious weed use–  you’ve got the right picture.

Safe and Sound (ao3) - pasteldanhowells

Summary: Dan gets bullied in school for being gay and gets beat up constantly by Chris Kendall’s ‘gang’. It wasn’t until one day when Dan escapes from the boys and finds himself in the English classroom, and he’s surprised when he finds help from Mr. Lester, the English teacher.

Sleepy Drawings - jilliancares

Summary; Dan is drowning is textbooks, and he can’t help it that he falls asleep in the library. Phil, an art major, can’t help it that he draws the sleeping boy, and neither of them can help the relationship that blooms.

Soulmating - lionsheart

Summary: Meet Dan, a university student majoring in soulmating. meet Phil, the black haired boy who has nothing going for him except his talents with technology. Add a feud that has lasted since middle school and an epic love story with mismatching dates, and you’ve got yourself a classic.

Spilt Coffee (ao3) - dip_the_pip

Summary: Uni student Dan, being the nightowl he is, has a habit of studying at a cafe in the middle of the night to escape his busy house on campus. The cafe is cute and quiet, and all the barista’s are sweet to him, including the one with the free cookies.

Sucking Too Hard On A Lollipop - gorgeousdan

Summary: Phil Lester was the head of a multi-billion dollar pharmaceutical company. Dan Howell was a broke college student. Both are in need of a little love.

The Punk And The Pianist - pasteldanhowells

Summary: Dan is a struggling college student whose dream is to be a pianist, but he doesn’t think it’s a “practical” job. Phil is a punk works as a bartender at a small bar. Dan decides to try playing the piano for open mic night at the bar, Phil sees him blah blah blah they fall for each other blah blah happy end.

The Rhythm of the Rain (ao3) - BecauseWords

Summary: In which Phil is an art major working as a spray paint artist on the streets of London where he meets lots of new people. Includes: Excessive consumption of marshmallows, a cactus named Edward, and two dorks getting to know each other during the cold months of autumn.

Third Period - heartthrobphilly

Summary: At first, when Dan arrived in Phil’s third period sociology class, the two bickered, but spite eventually turned to love, and the two ended up spending lunch together occasionally. But when another student found the two of them together, they were forced to defend themselves not only for the sake of their relationship, but for the sake of both their futures.

Treat Me Gently (ao3) - Leswell

Summary: An university student who's mastering as a pianist, Dan Howell, is out of the money to pay his next semester's tuition and there is Phil Lester, a CEO of famous company, who offers Dan 'special job'.

What Defines A Good Person (ao3) - crazed_peanut

Summary: Dan and Phil are university students and meet at a party. Dan has a boyfriend, but him and Phil still let things happen between them.

[liminal-storage]

► Name ➔ ”Okuni. Those closest to me call me Kuni. Only my brothers are permitted to use my other nickname, Oki. And that is mostly because there honestly isn’t anything I can do to stop them.” ► Are you single ➔ “Ah...Yes, I am.”  ► Are you happy ➔ “For the most part I suppose I could say so. I mean, I’m perfectly content at the moment.”  ► Are you angry? ➔ “I often am, yes.”  ► Are your parents still married ➔ “Indeed they are. Forty years and going strong, and with six children to show for it.” 

NINE FACTS ► Birth Place ➔ “Harami Village, in the Ruby Sea. It is a small fishing village on an island. Contrary to popular belief, not all Raen from the area hail from Sui-no-Sato.” ► Hair Color ➔ “Black, with greenish undertones like a raven’s wing.” ► Eye Color ➔ “They are actually black. My limbal rings are the red you see.” ► Birthday ➔ “I have forgotten the exact date, but I celebrate in early winter.” ► Mood ➔ “Overworked and underpaid. All work and no play makes...you get the idea.” ► Gender ➔ “Female.” ► Summer or winter ➔ “I prefer the more transient seasons, the spring and autumn between, but if I had to choose I would take the warmth of summer.” ► Morning or afternoon ➔ “I’m quite active from the afternoon on due to my working hours.” 

EIGHT THINGS ABOUT YOUR LOVE LIFE ► Are you in love ➔ “...love does not simply snuff itself out when a relationship ends, but the scope of it changes. I am not ‘in’ love, but I have love.”  ► Do you believe in love at first sight ➔ “No. How in the world are you to know your compatibility if you base relationships on physical aspects alone?” ► Who ended your last relationship ➔ “It was a mutual decision. We’re still friends but...it is not remotely the same as it was.” ► Have you ever broken someone’s heart ➔ “I should hope not, but I have no way of knowing.” ► Have you hugged someone within the last week? ➔ “ My dearest friend Idanwyn, yes. Oh, you mean romantically? There is no one, so...no.”   ► Have you ever had a secret admirer ➔ “If it was properly kept secret I wouldn’t know, now would I?” ► Have you ever broken your own heart? ➔ “Find me a person who hasn’t.”

SIX CHOICES ► Love or lust ➔ “I would prefer a balance of the two, and should hope that they come in a pair. To be the maddening song of a siren that drives another to love and potent desire both...Ah, it is a faery tale dream, is it not?” ► Lemonade or iced tea ➔ “I do not prefer iced drinks unless there is alcohol in them.” ► Cats or Dogs ➔ “Dogs unnerve me. Cats too, but less so. There is something truly bizarre about domesticating the wild and sacred wolf into the form that we treat as companions. It simply isn’t right. They are a mockery of real wolves.” ► A few best friends or many regular friends ➔ “I have a few close friends who know my heart and mind well. I do not choose them lightly.” ► Wild night out or romantic night in ➔ “Can’t I have both? Can I not go out with an intended to see ancient and possibly haunted ruins, flee for our lives, and return home late in the evening to spend quality time with one another? ...what? That isn’t the wild night you have in mind? Too bad. This is my ideal, not yours.” ► Day or night ➔ “Night, I should say.” 

FIVE HAVE YOU EVERS ► Been caught sneaking out ➔ “Often as a child, yes. Because of that, my mother told me if I got up to so much as stretch in the middle of the night, I’d be eaten by Gashadokuro. I never snuck out again.”  ► Fallen down/up the stairs ➔ “I can’t recall ever doing so, no.” ► Wanted something/someone so badly it hurt? ➔ “Indeed I have...such is the ravenous nature of lonely desire.” ► Wanted to disappear ➔ “Again, hasn’t everyone wanted this in some form or another?”

FOUR PREFERENCES ► Smile or eyes ➔ “You’re quite caught up in these relationship-centric questions, aren’t you? The eyes. A smile can be faked, but the look in a person’s eyes is seldom a lie. That is what makes eye contact intimidating to some. Looking someone in the eye, you can more easily see their truths. Why else do you think some people hide theirs?” ► Shorter or Taller ➔ “...ahem. Ah, taller. Not...to say that it is particularly difficult to be taller than I am.” ► Intelligence or Attraction ➔ “A person with both would be a dangerous, potent combination, deadly to my heart and a plague to my mind.” ► Hook-up or Relationship ➔ “As long as honesty is involved, and there’s some connection, I can’t say that I would mind the former. Not to say I have much experience with the fast and fleeting sort of relationships... I am not a person who does things in halves, so I certainly have a preference for devotion.”

FAMILY ► Do you and your family get along ➔ “We had a dark cloud over our lives for quite some time, but I feel that things are improving bit by bit. It can be hard to feel like you’re particularly loved or important in a large family.”  ► Would you say you have a “messed up life” ➔ “Not any more or less than anyone else. Messed up things have happened before, the underpainting to my current life, but is my life messy as a whole? Not particularly.” ► Have you ever ran away from home ➔ “Mm...sort of yes. It’s a bit complicated. Part of it was my decision, and part was the urging of my family.” ► Have you ever gotten kicked out ➔ “I do not wish to speak on it any further.”

FRIENDS ► Do you secretly hate one of your friends ➔ “Why would I waste time and energy pretending to be friends with someone I hate?” ► Do you consider all of your friends good friends ➔ “ALL of them? Not strictly. We’re friends, and I’m fairly close with a few of them, but there are others I do not know as well. There’s one person in particular I’ve recently met who I am still getting to know. He makes the task a challenging one.” ► Who is your best friend? ➔ “Ah, Idanwyn. My ‘swys’ from another miss, the other half of my soul...the very best friend I could have ever asked for. If you believe in soulmates, I would say she’s mine or at least one of them, a fragment and reflection of both who I am and who I could be. I’m truly grateful for her. I know we make an odd pair, but honestly I...don’t really give a care what others think? What, I’m too scaly to be friends with a Roegadyn woman?” ► Who knows everything about you? ➔ “That’s between myself and the woman in the mirror. The only one who can really, truly know everything about you...is you. She knows my weaknesses, my truths, my lies, my desires, my everything. Best of all, I know she will keep my secrets.”

(Saw this floating around a while back and decided to give it a try. No tags, but if it looks interesting give it a shot!)

[robinmarlowe]

The Manor

Chapter 1 — Arrival

When the carriage pulled up to the estate, the wind was whipping around us in a fury. It smelled salty, from the sea, and sweet with the beginning of autumn's rot. Dry leaves scraped across the cobblestone in swirling dervishes. It was the sort of weather that reminded you how nature could disregard the very existence of humanity. The wide and open fields of the estate gave the wind free reign to roll and build and push the world about.

I liked this sort of weather. It seemed consequential. I lived in a dull world that was carefully built up and maintained, held together by manners and tradition and devoted to comfort and boredom. Weather like this pulled trees out by the roots and reminded each and every person that their life is fragile, and their society even more so.

My father once called me a destructive little brat, and so maybe my affinity for the wind has to do with our shared ability to destroy and annoy.

My aunt, Edith, was chattering along next to me, the wind whipping away every other word as if hoping to spare me somewhat from the cruelty of idle gossip, but now she looked as if she was expecting responses. I leaned forward to listen.

"You know your father is the only one who ever met her mother. An actress from the americas. He told me once that she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen -- though I was sworn to secrecy because he was courting your mother at the time. She left two months after poor Elizabeth was born. Absolutely devastating. Jack told Elizabeth that her mother died in childbirth. He thought it would spare her from more complicated emotions. I think it did no such thing. It kept her from the real world. Why, if her mother had been around, I am certain Elizabeth would have married. It's such a tragedy."

"Tragedy seems to be an exaggeration," I said, leaning back into my seat. "She doesn't need to marry. She has money."

"And I would wager that she is unequipped to handle it," Edith said. "I suppose you will be learning that this winter."

The carriage turned down the winding road and the manor rose from the ground and into view.

It was grey, threaded together with brilliant green as vines crept up the walls, their sturdy brick holding even as roots pressed into them. We slowed as the road ended, stopping in front of the large entrance way.

I stepped out of the carriage, thanking the driver, my legs stiff from the journey and pleased to be put back to work. I hadn't seen the manor in years. When we were young my sisters were convinced it was haunted. We would run through the halls, hiding in closets and under couches, and I would search every nook and cranny for the hint of a ghost with whom I could become acquainted.

It didn't look any less haunted now, and Ms. Lancaster must not be particularly worried about the impression that it might be. The lawn was overgrown with yellow-green weeds that blew in the wind, and vines creeped up the stone walls.

Edith tutted her disapproval. "See? She doesn't even have the means to clean up her yard. Her father would be ashamed."

I had always loved the manor. I used to think it was a castle, with its round tower and high ceilings, pinnacles stretching into the sky. It was old, but felt even older than it was. It was large, but the more time you spent in it, the more it grew. Its floorboards creaked and shifted with the weather, bones elderly but far from brittle.

It felt abandoned, even as we inhabited it. It felt as if it was waiting for a long lost lord to return. It felt as if maybe the lord had returned, and the house had entombed him there, in its walls.

Now I know that this is part of the appeal. When Jack Lancaster purchased this estate fifty years ago, he must have felt such satisfaction -- this castle, this palace, was finally his. He no longer had to exist as a common man. He was like a king, even if he never had the power that a king wields.

I could imagine how intoxicating that would feel.

The driver carried my luggage towards the entrance. I hurried after him. I had meant to do it myself. We were no longer in civilized society. I was allowed to be seen lifting something heavier than a tea cup.

I burst through the doors and into the hallway.

The furniture and decor was contemporary. The bench in the foyer was a deep turquoise, and the rug Persian, with elaborate designs woven in jewel tones.

The house smelled like leaves and flowers. It wasn't musty, exactly. Instead, it smelled as if it had just been cleared of must a few minutes ago, but, like a child who has just bathed, was itching to undo the cleanliness.

Everything about the manor reached upwards, the ceilings, the double staircase, the white marble statues that adorned the hall.

"Emma! I'm delighted to see you!"

Ms. Elizabeth Lancaster descended the staircase, looking less delighted than anyone I had ever seen.

"And Edith, of course," Elizabeth said. "You look younger than the last time I saw you. Is that possible?"

Edit, in spite of herself, smiled at the compliment.

I gathered my skirts in my hands and curtsied.

"Ms. Lancaster. Thank you for your hospitality."

"No need for formalities. We're to be friends this winter, are we not?"

I looked up at her.

She was a woman who held her own beauty at arms length, the way one would hold a particularly aggressive animal. She was just north of fashionable. Her black dress didn't quite match her deep brown, wide-rimmed hat. Her spectacles had brilliant gold frames, but were smudged with fingerprints. Each of her hairs seemed to be striving for independence.

She had high cheekbones and brown eyes so dark it looked almost as if she had no irises at all. She looked older than she was, crows feet gracing the creases of her eyes, but the age didn't diminish her. Instead, it gave her the option of severity. Should she choose to give you a withering look, you may indeed wither.

Now, though, she was friendly, if apprehensive.

"We are to be friends... Beth..."

"Oh!" Elizabeth said, delighted. "I haven't been called Beth since I was a child."

"Apologies--"

"No!" Elizabeth said. "I said we are to be friends, and you confirmed it. Beth will be fine."

I disliked her analytical gaze. She dissected me, piece by piece, in a way I recognized. So many people in my life seemed certain they could perform a kind of psychic surgery on me. If they could just take me apart, then they could put me back together, new and improved.

Elizabeth wouldn't be any more successful than her predecessors, no matter what my parents might have thought. They sent me here to force me to confront the realities of my life without a husband. They refuse to understand that anything short of hell would be preferable.

"Shall I give you a tour?" Elizabeth asked.

"That would be lovely," Edith said, no doubt eager to search for more gossip in the nooks and crannies of this house.

"Let me see -- JOSEPH!"

Her yell made Edith and I both jump. An older man of about sixty walked calmly and swiftly down the stairs.

"Would you mind grabbing their coats?" Elizabeth asked.

"Of course, ma'am," Joseph said, giving her a shallow bow.

He was handsome for his age.He had a strong jawline and thick black hair. He was nearly as short as I was, and I was not tall.

He took the thick wool coat from my shoulders, and then assisted my aunt with hers.

Houses, I had noticed, are engineered not only as shelter but as a respite from the very concept of the natural world. The more removed from the mud and dirt of nature, the more successful the house.While the natural world has its dangers, I find that as humans we have veered away from logic in our understanding of it. Hygienic has become a moral concept instead of a medical one. Hogs, for instance, use mud to clean themselves, and we are as prone to disease, passing sickness back and forth with farm animals as if we are no more civilized than they.

The manor was,technically, a wonderful example of human achievement. The gothic nature of the architecture suggested that not only have men distinguished themselves from other animals, but that they did this with the understanding that it was,ultimately, futile. The towers reached into the heavens, knowing they would never get there, a tower of Babel that God felt no need to topple.

I don't know why I felt at home here. I always had.

"I don't keep a large staff, since it is only me," Elizabeth said as they walked past the entryway into the hall. "Just Joseph, my cook, Elena, and two maids. If there is reason for me to host anyone, I call in hands from the local tavern."

"Surely there are better servants to be had," Edith said

Elizabeth continued as if she heard nothing. "I hope that will be acceptable for you, Emma."

She said my name with caution, as if forcing herself into familiarity.

"It will be fine, thank you, Ms. Lancaster."

At home we had one servant, Dana, who was underpaid and overworked. The women of our family took turns cooking, and though it was not a task I enjoyed, I was capable enough. I had never had a lady in waiting, and I can't imagine why I'd want one.

We entered the parlor room, and I let out an involuntary gasp.

The room itself was beautiful. Emerald green furniture was placed around a coffee table with gilded edges. The bookshelves that lined the walls strained upwards towards the high ceilings.Spines of deep reds and navy blues advertised the books' contents in gold and silver print. A ladder was required to reach the highest books, and even that was carved out of a red cedar.

However, what drew my attention was the painting over the fireplace.

It must have been ten feet tall, at minimum. It portrayed a woman in velvet clothing, towering over a small village. Her facial expression was obscured by the clouds. The villagers at her feet looked up at her, some with awe, and others with anger.

"What an... interesting piece of art," Edith said.

I could feel Elizabeth's eyes on me as I examined the painting. The woman's posture was over-corrected, her shoulders back and her chin high. But there was something about her that seemed delicate, as if she was holding herself together through will alone.

One of the men was running back to his hut. Another had already retrieved a pitchfork.

Elizabeth once again ignored Edith. "Do you like it?" She asked me.

I didn't know what to say. I didn't know that "like" was the correct word to use. My response to it was visceral. I felt uncomfortably drawn to it. But it was as close as language would allow.

"Yes," I said, breathless.

"Hmmmm."

Elizabeth turned to Edith.

"If you'd like, I could get Joseph to make some tea. The journey was long, and I'm sure you'd like to rest. I can show Miss Cooper around."

"Oh, yes, that would be lovely," Edith said. "I didn't want to complain but it is a large house and I really don't think I need a tour at the moment."

"JOSEPH!"

The yell was no less surprising than before. Joseph appeared in the room suddenly, as if an apparition.

"Do you mind making the lady some tea?" Elizabeth asked.

"Of course not. Follow me, madam," Joseph said.

And then I was alone with Elizabeth.

"It's funny," I said, "When I was a child we explored every inch of this lace. We were looking for ghosts."

Elizabeth looked at me, her expression unreadable. Her gaze, like the painting, was unsettling.

"Did you ever find any?" Elizabeth asked.

"Of course not," I replied.

Elizabeth nodded, her expression serious. "I would suggest refraining from any such adventure in the future. Shall we see your room?"

And then she was sweeping out of the room.

I hurried after her, curiosity sufficiently piqued.

[fallforcs]

Hayrides, Fate, and Fortune Cookies

Art by @imagnifika 

Author: @searchingwardrobes

Hayrides, Fate, and Fortune Cookies

Summary: “Wow, you’re hot, but I’m pretty sure that’s your wife.” + “You are incredibly hot, and I keep falling in your lap on this hayride. I swear I’m not doing it on purpose. Wow, this is awkward!”

Rating: G for fall fluff. Like the fanfic equivalent of hot chocolate with whipped cream and cinnamon.

Trigger warnings: None unless you count the possibility of getting a toothache from the fluff :)         

A huge thank you to my beta, @looselipswontsinkships . She was swamped with school, yet still managed to look this story over and catch my silly mistakes. Also a shout out to my artist. I had this idea in my head of a beautiful fall aesthetic for my story (which I could never make myself), and look what I got! It’s not only gorgeous but exactly what I was hoping for.

I absolutely adore fall, so I hope you all enjoy this little Captain Swan autumn one shot …

When she woke up that morning, Emma Swan would have never believed that the day would start with a hayride and end with fortune cookies. Of course, she had promised three year old Henry that she would take him to the pumpkin patch in the little coastal town of Storybrooke, Main. The one that all the mom blogs in Portland rated the best pumpkin patch in the area. Peter’s Pumpkins and Pies. In Storybrooke . Ah, she got it. Cute and clever. Or something.

There was so little that she, as an overworked, underpaid single mother, could give to her tiny son. She could at least give him this. She could take pictures of Henry in his cute fall jacket amidst the bright orange pumpkins and post them on Instagram, just like all the other moms.

But then she had awakened to a cold drizzle outside the window and a leaden gray sky. She gently told Henry the weather was just too nasty for the pumpkin patch. Then Henry had dissolved into a puddle of tears on the kitchen floor. Now, Emma wasn’t one of those moms who was ruled by some kind of toddler tyrant. But the thing was, Henry wasn’t that kind of kid. Sure, he had colic the first four months of his life, but it was as if he’d spent all his tears in that brief space of time (though it hadn’t felt brief when she was in the middle of it.) But now Henry was a complacent, easy to please child. His tears that morning were more of the “my little heart is breaking” variety rather than the “I’m going to scream until I get my way” variety.

Emma’s heart broke a little bit too. She was supposed to feel like she didn’t suck at this mom thing for once. So she bundled Henry up in his waterproof jacket with the flannel lining and put his Spiderman boots on his little feet, and prayed the rain would taper off during the 45 minute drive.

For once, Emma’s prayers to anyone up there who would listen were actually answered because by the time she parked in the open field next to Peter’s Pumpkins and Pies, the rain had stopped. However, their feet still made loud squelching sounds as they walked across the soaked grass, and Emma was glad for the rain boots they both wore. The sky was still gray, and the wind that lashed their faces still held a hint of dampness. It also brought the smell of wet, dirty fur downwind from the petting zoo. Not the most pleasant aroma. Emma would have to make sure Henry didn’t notice the barnyard where they kept the animals. The last things she wanted to do was wade through the mud to pet wet, smelly sheep and goats.

“Two please,” Emma said when she reached the ticket booth.

“That’ll be twenty-four dollars,” the plump, cheery woman behind the counter told her.

Emma’s eyebrows rose to her hairline. “Tw-twenty f-four dollars?” she stuttered incredulously.

“That’s right, tickets are twelve dollars a person,” the woman explained, her smile not wavering in the least at Emma’s reaction.

“But, he’s only three,” Emma said, gesturing down to Henry, “does he get in free?”

The woman peered at Henry over the edge of the booth and shrugged apologetically at Emma. “Only guests two and under are free.”

Emma let out a long breath. “A child’s ticket?” she asked hopefully.

“That is the child’s price,” the woman clarified, pointing to a bright sign decorated in fall leaves that announced: Adult Admission at Child’s Price! This weekend only! “Adult tickets are normally sixteen dollars.”

Emma bit her lip as she fished the money out of her pocket. She had promised Henry, but there went pizza for tonight. She guessed it was bologna sandwiches again.

The good thing about the rain was that the crowd was thin. Emma figured that the weather was a blessing in disguise since the weekend’s special deal usually made it a crowded one. Emma was also relieved to see that the petting zoo was down the hill and out of sight of her enthusiastic three year old. Henry was bouncing up and down and swinging their joined hands back and forth.

“What do you want to do first, Henry?” Emma asked, the sight of her son’s joy causing everything else - the weather, the mud, the smells, and the expensive cost of admission - to be pushed far from her mind. “There’s a corn maze, a story barn, a hay ride … oooh, look you can paint your own little pumpkin!”

Emma was relieved to see that everything, including the mini pumpkins to paint, were included in the price of admission. The only thing they would have to pay for was a large pumpkin to take home and carve and maybe a pie. (Okay, she was definitely getting a pie. If pizza was out, she was at least getting a dessert out of all this.)

The next hay ride wasn’t for another fifteen minutes, so they decided to go the story barn where an enthusiastic teenager in overalls and braids was getting ready to read a picture book to the children gathering around on huge logs. Emma grimaced when they took a seat; the logs had apparently soaked up all the rain. Henry scrambled up to stand on top of the log so he could see better over the gathering crowd.

“Henry care-“ the words had barely left Emma’s mouth when Henry’s left Spiderman boot slid out from under him. He pitched backwards, arms pinwheeling in empty air. Emma reached out to grab him, but another set of hands caught him first. “Oh my God, thank you! I –“

Emma’s words failed her then as she looked up into an unfairly attractive face. The man had lustrous dark hair, a finely chiseled jaw covered in delicious looking scruff, and the brightest blue eyes she had ever seen. The eyes were what left her speechless. Then he smiled. A charming, somewhat rakish smile, and then Emma felt herself go hot. She blinked, trying to rouse herself from this stupor. She never let men affect her this way. Ever.

“Be careful there, lad,” he chuckled as he swung Henry up.

He had a British accent, too. Great. If he wasn’t a solid ten before, he sure was now. And he was fit too she could now see as he deposited Henry gently back onto the log (in a seated position this time). His tight jeans, black leather jacket, and gray t-shirt beneath put his toned physique on clear display. The v-neck of the shirt also showed off dark chest hair that made Emma’s throat go dry. He winked at her as he took his seat again on the log behind them.

“Swing me up too!” the little girl next to him squealed. She was an adorable thing with big blonde curls and huge blue eyes that were the same shade as Henry’s rescuer. The man caved immediately to the little girl’s request, and she giggled in delight as he scooped her up and swooped her around in an arc.

“Put her down, Killian!” a woman admonished, though her words had little heat. “The show’s about to start, and you’re blocking everyone’s view!”

The man – Killian, apparently – obeyed the woman’s request immediately, settling the little girl on his knee. It was then that Emma noticed the wedding band glinting in the sun on his left hand. Emma’s heart immediately sank. Sure enough, the woman beside him also had a wedding band with a sparkling diamond solitaire nestled above it. Emma wondered how those rings could sparkle so much on a cloudy day. They must be mocking her.

Emma turned away, putting her arm around Henry to pull him closer as story time began. It was about a misfit pumpkin who was square instead of round, though Emma had a hard time following the plot. She was far too aware of the handsome stranger behind her, and she had to force herself not to glance behind her. He’s with his wife she kept admonishing herself.

The enthusiastic storyteller had Henry giggling in all the right places. She finished up the story with a bow, informing everyone that another hayride was about to leave from the wooden gate directly behind them. It was insane how fast the mob headed in that direction, and Emma held tight to Henry’s hand. They were jostled by overeager children and parents who acted as if this were a ride at Disneyland instead of a flatbed piled with hay. A large man with an ample midsection shoved Emma from behind, propelling her right into … married hottie.

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry!” she exclaimed, her face burning with embarrassment. To make matters worse, her next step sent her sliding through a slick patch of mud, and the stranger had to grasp her by both arms to keep her from falling.

“No harm, love,” he assured as he helped her find her footing again.

“Mommy, hu-wee!” Henry piped up, yanking on her hand.

She shook her head to clear it and saw that the hayride was almost full. She mumbled a thank you to the blue-eyed Brit and hurried after her son. The man’s wife and daughter were already climbing the steps into the hay bed, and he hurried past Emma to assist them. Emma took the opportunity to really look at the woman. She moved with elegance, even when taking her husband’s hand to climb aboard the flatbed. Her light blonde hair was in a fishtail braid that rested over her shoulder. She smiled at the little girl as her husband swung the child up, tickling her as she settled into her mother’s lap. It was a picture of domestic bliss framed with the wooden fence and the trees above covered in red and orange leaves like the covers of those parenting magazines that littered the waiting room at the health department. But she could at least scoff at those, knowing they were fake families made of perfect models. This scene was like salt rubbed right where it would hurt most.

Emma brushed off the melancholy thoughts as she helped Henry up into the hay. She had never been so keenly aware of how scuffed his boots were, how faded his little thrift store jacket. Did everyone on this hayride look at the two of them and feel pity? Or worse, judgment? Emma bit her lip, wondering why the handsome man and his picture perfect family were bothering her so much. She grasped the sides of the flatbed and pulled herself up. She and Henry were the last two on, and the hay was packed with people. Emma hesitated, glancing around for an open spot. Impatient, Henry began to whine and cling to her leg. His weight, combined with the uneven bed of hay and the slight tilt of the vehicle on the rutted trail, sent Emma pitching sideways. She fell into another person, both of them grunting with the impact. Emma braced herself against a strong pair of shoulders and looked up into the shocked blue eyes of the same handsome – unavailable – man as before. What did his wife call him again? Oh right …Killian.

To Emma’s shock, his wife actually laughed as Emma stammered an apology. She had literally fallen into the man’s lap, and her legs were tangled up with his. A blush colored his own cheeks as he grinned at her.

“We’ve got to quit meeting this way,” he teased.

“Stop flirting and let the poor woman go,” his wife admonished with a light slap to his shoulder.

She was either really secure in their relationship, or she was really used to women falling all over her husband. Probably the latter, though most women probably didn’t do it as literally as Emma just had. Emma scooted quickly out of his lap, but still didn’t see a spot for her and Henry. It felt like everyone on the hayride was staring at her.

“Here love,” Killian said, scooting over closer to his wife and slinging his arm over her shoulder, “you and your boy can squeeze in here.”

Emma mumbled a thank you yet again – when had her tongue swollen to twice its size? – and wedged herself between Killian and the back gate of the flatbed. She got Henry situated on her lap just as the tractor lurched forward. She grabbed onto the metal grate next to her to steady herself.

“Killian Jones,” the man at her side officially introduced himself, offering his hand.

“Emma Swan,” she replied, shaking it.

“Elsa Jones,” the other woman said, leaning over Killian to offer her hand to shake as well. The last name snuffed out the tiny flicker of hope that had remained in Emma’s heart. So they were married. “And this,” Elsa Jones added, tickling the little girl in her own lap, “is Bethany.”

“Nice to meet you, Bethany,” Emma told the little girl, “how old are you?”

“Thwee,” the child answered, struggling to hold up the requisite number of fingers.

“What do you know?” Emma said to Henry enthusiastically. “You’re three too, Henry. Say hello to Bethany.”

“Hello,” Henry muttered as if it pained him to do so, then turned his face to bury it in his mother’s chest.

Emma frowned. “What’s up with you, kid? You’re never shy.”

Killian leaned towards her conspiratorially. “Maybe he just has a thing for blondes.”

He waggled his eyes, and Emma wondered what his angle was. Maybe he was referring to his wife? Then again, he had also winked at Emma earlier. The guy’s handsome looks suddenly weren’t affecting her quite the same way. What kind of jerk flirted with another woman right in front of his wife?

Emma pressed her lips together as she purposefully looked away from him. Come on, Emma, a part of her argued, maybe he’s just friendly and doesn’t realize how it comes across. But another part of her argued back that the male gender hadn’t exactly proven itself trustworthy throughout her life. Most were scumbags, weren’t they?

The hay ride took them past a field of cows and another of beautiful horses. Emma and Elsa both chatted with the children about the animals, asking what sounds they made. Elsa laughed and chatted with Emma about the things mothers usually do; the struggles of potty training, the annoying kid shows with songs that get stuck in your head, the infernal stubbornness of three year olds. Emma found it odd that she didn’t include her husband in the parenting equation, and even more strange that he didn’t put in his own antidotes. The cracks were showing in this supposedly perfect little family, but it strangely didn’t bring Emma any satisfaction.

The hayride was incredibly bumpy because of all the rain, much to Emma’s chagrin because she kept falling against the rock-hard chest of the man sitting next to her. The more it happened, the more irritated Emma became and the more apologetic Killian became.

Next they passed a field of pumpkins where families ambled amongst the orange gourds, searching for the perfect one. The children both exclaimed with delight, asking when they would get to choose their own pumpkin. Bethany tugged on her father’s arm, pointing excitedly.

“I see, starfish, pumpkins!” he chuckled, brushing a kiss against her curls.

Emma blinked, her heart playing ping pong with her brain. Who was this guy? Flirtatious jerk? Inattentive husband? Doting father? Emma couldn’t tell.

As they rounded the pumpkin patch, the tractor hit a deep rut and then slid in the mud. For one terrifying moment, the entire thing pitched sideways and everyone on board screamed. The driver corrected, guiding them back onto steady ground with a huge bump. The bump sent Emma careening sideways, and she ended up draped across the chest of Killian Jones, her arms encircling his neck.

She reacted more quickly this time, her “I’m so, so, SO sorry!” now directed at Elsa. The woman, amazingly, still didn’t seem fazed. As a matter of fact, the smile on her face and the light in her eyes almost seemed … delighted?

Emma didn’t want to waste one more minute trying to figure out this little family. As soon as the driver opened the gate, Emma scrambled down from the hayride, balancing Henry on her hip. Her son, however, wasn’t cooperating with her attempt at a quick getaway. At some point during the hay ride, Bethany had apparently become his new best friend. She squealed and grabbed his hand as soon as her family climbed down.

“We wanna do the maze!” Bethany shouted.

“The maze! The maze!” Henry echoed her, jumping up and down.

Then the two of them were off like a shot towards the nearby field of tall corn.

“Don’t get too far ahead!” Elsa shouted after them.

“You’ll get lost in there, Henry!” Emma called out as she and her new friend jogged down the hill after them.

“I’ve got them!” Killian assured, passing them with his longer strides. He grabbed up both kids easily, one in each arm, and they both giggled with delight. He turned towards Emma and Elsa with a wink then set the kids down at the entrance to the maze marked “easy.”

Elsa and Emma slowed their pace, following Killian and the children into the maze. Elsa gave her an almost mischievous smile before leaning over to speak to her in a low voice.

“I think he likes you.”

Emma’s eyes grew wide as saucers and her mouth hung open at the other woman’s words. She glanced over at Killian, then back to Elsa, then blinked rapidly. “He, you mean Killian? As in your … your … husband?” She practically whispered the last word.

Elsa’s eyebrows flew to her hairline before she tilted her head back and let out a long, hearty laugh. Emma narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest, failing to see why being invited into some weird open marriage scenario was so hilarious to this woman.

“Oh my God, no!” Elsa laughed, tears forming at the corners of her eyes. “I guess I can see how you thought that. We should have been clearer when we introduced ourselves. Killian’s my brother-in-law .”

“Ohhh …” Emma said, trailing off, feeling like she’d just gotten mental whiplash, “but he is married. I saw the ring.”

The smile fell from Elsa’s face as she shook her head, “I’ve told him so many times to take that ring off. He says he can’t bear to, but I think it’s sort of a way to protect his heart, you know? Women assume, like you did, so they stay away.”

Emma tilted her head as her gaze landed on Killian again. He grabbed Bethany before she could dash off in the opposite direction from Henry, tickling her as he tossed her over his shoulder.

“What happened to his wife?”

Elsa sighed. “It was a brain tumor. By the time they found it, the cancer was too advanced. He only had Milah for about four months after the diagnosis. That was four years ago.”

Emma groaned and covered her face with her hands, “God, I feel horrible now.”

Elsa chuckled. “I understand now why you got a little prickly back there. You thought my husband was hitting on you.” She laughed again as if being married to Killian was the funniest, most preposterous scenario. “I mean, he’s a great guy, but he and Liam – my husband – couldn’t be more different. I guess steady and serious is more my type.”

They walked in silence for a moment. They could no longer see Killian or the kids, but they could hear the children’s giggles around the corner and followed the sound.

“Liam is in the navy,” Elsa explained, “and when he was deployed eight months ago, Killian moved here to help with Bethany.”

“Wow,” Emma said, feeling even worse about the assumptions she had made, “that’s a rare guy.”

“Yeah,” Elsa agreed, “that’s why I want to see him move on from his grief.” She stopped and turned to Emma with an earnest expression. “That’s why I was so happy the second he winked at you back at the story barn. I haven’t seen him flirt with a woman that way in so long. And he blushed ten shades of red when you landed in his lap.”

Emma groaned. “Twice. I landed in his lap twice.”

Elsa nudged her shoulder. “Maybe it was fate giving you a little push.”

The “easy” corn maze took far longer than Emma would have expected, and they were all hot, sweaty, and hungry by the time they found their way out. The clouds had rolled away, revealing a bright blue sky, and the temperature had risen with it. Henry had shed his jacket long ago, leaving Emma to lug it around along with her own.

“Why do people think these things are fun?” Emma quipped as they exited the corn field, and Elsa and Killian both laughed in agreement.

“And that was the easy one!” Elsa said with a shake of her head.

“Let’s get some food into these little ones, shall we?” Killian asked, gesturing to a food truck that had been parked along the tree line with wooden picnic benches set up in front of it.

“The little ones?” Emma laughed. “ I’m starving.”

“Uh, why don’t I take the kids and get us a table?” Elsa suggested. “And you two go get the food?”

Emma had only just met the woman, but she was no fool. She noticed the slight tilt of Elsa’s head in Killian’s direction as she locked eyes with Emma. Then she was corralling the kids towards the tables, assuming the other two adults would follow her orders.

“How she and my brother don’t fight twenty four seven is beyond me,” Killian commented with a shake of his head. “They both like bossing people around.”

Emma laughed as they made their way to the food truck. When they joined the long line of people waiting to order, she cleared her throat nervously and shuffled her feet.

“I owe you an apology,” she finally blurted out.

Killian’s brow furrowed. “Miss Swan, you really need to stop apologizing. It was crowded and bumpy –“

She waved her hand to stop him. “I’m not talking about that. I’m talking about … .” she searched for the right words and finally settled on the one Elsa had used earlier, “being prickly.”

He cocked his head at her. “Prickly?”

She let out a long breath. “I was sort of rude. I … I thought you and Elsa were married.”

He gave a small chuckle but didn’t dissolve into laughter as Elsa hand. Instead he lifted his left hand and fiddled with the ring resting there. “I can’t fault you for being confused, love. And if you were right, I would definitely be worthy of your cold shoulder.”

“Are you always so eloquent?” Emma asked, stuffing her hands in her pockets.

He laughed and scratched behind his ear. “So I’ve been told.”

“So I’m forgiven?”

His smile broadened. “Of course.”

They shuffled forward in the slow moving line, and Emma gazed across the field where Elsa sat at a picnic table. Henry was chasing Bethany in circles nearby.

“Elsa explained it all to me,” she told him quietly.

“About why I’m tagging along with their little family or why I’m still wearing a wedding ring?” he asked bluntly.

Emma shrugged. “Both.”

He nodded, staring down at the ring and twirling it around his finger. “It was hard for me to be around them at first. I know it hurt Liam; he was so excited when Bethany was born. But all it did was remind me of what I had lost.” He looked up and met Emma’s gaze. “Milah was pregnant when they found the tumor. Our child and Bethany would have been about the same age.”

Emma frowned as her heart sank. “That’s awful. I’m so sorry.”

He released a sigh as he rubbed his chin. “But it was wrong of me to stay away. I see that now. When Liam shipped out, I was going nowhere, doing nothing with my life. The least I could do was be here for my family when they needed me. Being around Bethany has been the best medicine for my soul, you know? I love that little starfish with all I have.”

Emma smiled. “Kids can do that. Henry is the only good thing to come from a very painful time in my life.”

Killian frowned. “I’m sorry, Emma. Is his father in his life at all?”

Emma shook her head. “No. He doesn’t deserve to be. Let’s just say he took advantage of me, then left me.” She pressed her lips together, hoping Killian didn’t ask for more of the story. She was shocked she had told him that much.

He reached down and gently took her hand. “He must be the world’s biggest idiot, then,” he told her softly, giving her fingers a tiny squeeze.

Emma felt a blush stain her cheeks even as she rolled her eyes. “Smooth.”

Killian wiggled his eyebrows. “It was rather, wasn’t it?” he quipped, making her laugh.

By that point, they had reached the truck. Emma looked over the menu, which was filled with typical country fair type refreshments: funnel cakes, corn dogs, French fries, and candy apples. Emma’s heart sank as she looked at the inflated prices, imagining the tiny wad of cash remaining in the front pocket of her jeans.

“It’s on me, Swan,” Killian said as he stepped up to the window, pulling his wallet from the inside pocket of his jacket. “Anything you and your boy would like.”

“Oh, you don’t have to do that,” Emma protested.

He smiled gently at her. “I know I don’t have to. I want to.”

Emma hated charity, but the way Killian spoke so sincerely, the way his gaze rested warmly on her, it didn’t feel like charity at all. She gave a simple nod, then gave the employee in the window her order. They made their way back to Elsa and the kids laden down with five corn dogs, four orders of fries, an order of onion rings, and five cans of soda. Killian helped her hand everything out, and they all sat down. Elsa and Emma went to work immediately cutting the kids’ corn dogs into bite size pieces.

“Onion rings, not fries,” Killian pointed out before taking a sip of his drink, “I’ll file that information away, love.”

Emma shook her head, hating the way he could so easily make her blush as she concentrated on Henry’s corn dog. She cleared her throat. “Who says you’ll need it?”

He arched one brow and smirked. “A man can hope.”

Elsa smiled delightedly at the pair of them, no doubt praising herself for her matchmaking skills.

          *********************************************************

After eating, the kids wanted to go to the pumpkin painting booth. Each child got a complimentary tiny pumpkin to paint. Being typical three year olds, both children were too stubborn to let Elsa or Emma assist them. Little Bethany poked her tongue out of the corner of her mouth as she carefully dabbed blue and yellow polka dots all over her pumpkin. Her circles were blotchy and misshapen, but for three, it was extremely impressive. Henry, on the other hand, insisted on covering his pumpkin sloppily in every color available.

“She’s really good at this,” Emma commented, gesturing to Bethany’s handiwork.

Elsa grinned and elbowed Killian in the ribs. “It’s in her genes, isn’t it?”

“You’re an artist?” Emma asked as Killian scratched behind his ear. She was beginning to wonder if it was a nervous tic of his.

“I dabble,” he admitted with a shrug.

“Dabble?” Elsa snorted with a roll of her eyes. Then she looked at Emma and explained, “he’s a graphic artist.”

“Well,” Killian explained, gesturing to the table before them, “I was referring to the paint. I dabble with painting. The computer stuff is my job. But drawing and painting? That’s my hobby.”

Emma smiled with appreciation at him, then frowned down at Henry’s pumpkin. The colors had all mixed together into a nasty brown. “Well, I can’t say there are any artistic genes in my family.”

Henry turned with a broad grin to show off his pumpkin, and Killian hid a laugh behind his hand. Emma shrugged as she praised Henry’s effort. Oh well, maybe her kid would have other talents, right?

The employees manning the booth lined up all the pumpkins to dry on a shelf behind them, jotting the kids’ names on paper towels. They were informed that they could pick up the dried projects on their way out in about half an hour, so the five of them headed for the pumpkin patch.

“We’re avoiding the petting zoo,” Elsa whispered in Emma’s ear conspiratorially.

“Oh, I’m with you on that one,” Emma whispered back.

“I mean, it rained this morning,” Elsa continued, wrinkling her nose, “do you know how bad those animals are going to smell?”

Emma laughed, “I know, right?”

She remembered reading Anne of Green Gables as a kid. Tried to read it, anyway. The librarian at her middle school thought it would be perfect for Emma; the story of an unwanted orphan finding an unlikely family. The librarian was wrong. Emma Swan had never met a Marilla and Matthew Cuthbert, had never been as optimistic as Anne Shirley, and she had certainly never had any friends who were “kindred spirits.” But now, here with Elsa? She was re-thinking the possibility of such things.

The kids raced through the rows of pumpkins, thumping them with their hands like giant drums. Elsa chose a medium sized pumpkin to make a pie, tucking it under her arm. Emma just stood there, looking up and down the rows with a frown on her face.

“Something wrong, love?” Killian asked.

Emma shrugged with a wry laugh. “Never been to a pumpkin patch before. I’ve always just gotten them at the grocery store.”

Killian nodded, shoving his hands in his pockets. “The first time I ever went was with Milah after we’d been married about a year.” He pushed a pumpkin idly with his toe before meeting her gaze. “Not many foster parents take the time you know. Never even carved a pumpkin until Liam and I were on our own.”

Emma blinked, shocked to recognize the shame in his eyes. “Foster parents?”

Killian nodded. “Mum died when I was so young, I don’t remember her. Papa just up and left. So …”

Emma bit her lip. “Similar story,” she admitted, “I guess. Thing is, I don’t even know who my parents were or why they abandoned me.”

They were quiet for a long moment, and Emma was relieved to see only understanding, not pity in Killian’s eyes. Then he gave her a soft smile and reached out to twirl a lock of her hair around his finger.

“Well Swan, you never forget your first,” he told her with a smirk.

Emma gaped. “Excuse me?”

He laughed. “First pumpkin that is.”

Emma rolled her eyes and smacked him in the shoulder. “You’re awful.”

“You think I’m cute, admit it,” he teased, sauntering into her personal space.

Emma swallowed hard as she tilted her head to look up at him. The sun overhead sparkled in his blue eyes and his smile crinkled the corners of his eyes.

“Are you two ever going to pick a pumpkin, or are you just going to keep flirting?”

Elsa’s voice snapped them both out of it, and Killian rushed over to hoist the large carving pumpkin that his sister-in-law was attempting to juggle with the pie pumpkin. Killian turned back to Emma, his expression looking a bit bashful as his tongue swiped across his lower lip nervously.

“We’re having a get together tonight,” Killian began, “for Elsa’s sister’s birthday. It’s real casual; just ordering some Chinese and then having a bonfire. We … we would love to have you. And Henry, of course.”

“That’s a great idea!” Elsa exulted, smiling broadly. “Bethany and Henry have obviously hit it off, and we always order way too much food.”

“Um …” Emma hedged, her gaze darting from Killian to Elsa and back again.

A part of her wanted to say yes. She had only just met these two, and they already felt like such great friends. But the other part of her, the cautious part, latched onto the fact that she had just met these people . Wasn’t this the part in movies where the naïve young mother gets taken in by the seemingly friendly couple who are actually serial killers? Or she accepts a friendly offer only to find herself escorted to the compound of some weird cult?

Emma shook her head before the words were even out of her mouth. “It’s such a long drive to the city. We really shouldn’t.”

Killian glanced at his wristwatch. “It’s three already, and we’re eating at six. You can just come on over and visit until everyone arrives.”

“You’ll love Anna and her husband,” Elsa insisted.

Emma looked into both their faces, so friendly, so open. In Killian’s eyes, and in their conversations, she also felt a deep connection that she couldn’t explain. But instead of those things comforting her, they only freaked her out more.

“I really can’t,” she said firmly.

Neither of them could hide their disappointment. Killian’s shoulders sagged and he dropped his head to stare at the pumpkin in his arms. When he lifted his gaze to Emma’s, his expression was almost pleading.

“It was wonderful meeting you, Swan. Perhaps … I could get your number?”

Emma felt her heart thudding in her chest, the air suddenly tight in her lungs. They had too much in common, too much shared tragedy. He would expect things to get serious, and that terrified her.

“I … don’t think that’s a good idea.” She averted her gaze when she saw the clear hurt in his eyes.

“Well,” he said with a resigned sigh, “let me help Elsa get these to the car, and I’ll come back and carry yours for you.”

“No, don’t do that,” Emma told him quickly. She feared if she was in this man’s presence for one more minute, her resolve might crumble. “We may be awhile yet. First pumpkin, remember? Gotta make it a good one.”

The smile he gave her was forced, and Elsa laid a hand on his arm as they walked away. Emma remembered her words earlier, I haven’t seen him flirt with a woman that way in so long. He had finally put himself out there, and Emma had crushed him. After they disappeared over the hill, Emma collapsed onto an enormous pumpkin behind her.

“Mo-mmy!” Henry exclaimed, pulling on her hand. “Why you sittin?”

Emma looked at her son wearily. “Because Mommy feels like dirt, that’s why.”

She let Henry pull her to her feet, and she wandered aimlessly among the pumpkins. Henry didn’t seem to mind her stupor, content to run around, climbing on pumpkins and using them like bongo drums. She finally snapped out of it and helped Henry pick a pumpkin for them to carve. One that wasn’t too big or too small and was nice and round. When she hoisted it into her arms, she regretted turning down Killian’s offer to come back and carry it for her. Thankfully, an employee came over to assist her, pushing a wheelbarrow.

It wasn’t until Emma had paid for the pumpkin with the last of the cash in her pocket and had the employee lift it into her backseat that she remembered the tiny pumpkin Henry had painted. She contemplated leaving it, considering that it looked like it had been rolled in doggy poo, but then she thought about what would happen if Henry remembered it. She might have a meltdown on her hands, especially since he hadn’t had a nap today. She sighed wearily, took Henry’s hand, and headed back to the painting booth.

Emma smiled at the workers and thanked them as they handed her Henry’s brown-smudged pumpkin. As she turned to go, Henry’s exclamation stopped her.

“Mommy, look!”

Her son was holding up a pink polka dot Minnie Mouse backpack. On the table next to him was the adorable polka dotted pumpkin Bethany had painted earlier. Emma gasped and took the backpack from her son’s hand. She remembered Elsa carrying it around all day, even complaining how she couldn’t get Bethany to wear it. She examined the pack, looking for a tag with an address, but she could find nothing. She zipped it open, and there, written in black sharpie on the inside cover was, “Property of Bethany Jones, 1245 Sweet Haven Lane, Storybrooke, ME.”

“Henry,” Emma said to her little boy with a smile on her face, “I think fate just gave me another push.”

                    ***********************************************************

Emma’s GPS told her to take another right turn, then announced that her destination was on the left. Emma parked along the curb, leaning to look out of the window of her yellow bug at the adorable blue Victorian house at 1245 Sweet Haven Lane.

“I hung-wee, Mommy,” Henry told her from the backseat.

“I know, kid,” Emma told him as she unbuckled her seat belt, “we might be eating in just a minute.” If they still want us, that is.

Emma helped Henry out of his car seat and onto the curb. She grabbed Bethany’s things from the front passenger seat, then took Henry’s hand as they walked up the front steps of the beautiful house. It was a little after six, and dusk was falling. The porch lights were already glowing beside the quaint front door. Emma took a deep breath and knocked.

The door swung open a few moments later, and Emma’s breath left her lungs when she saw Killian Jones standing there. Thankfully, he smiled when he saw her.

“Swan! You changed your mind?”

Emma returned his smile and lifted the backpack up for him to see. “I found this after you left. Your address was inside.”

“Oh,” Killian said, his face falling as he accepted the bag, “thank you.”

“The pumpkin she painted is inside.”

“Uncle Ki-wee!” a small voice called, and then Bethany Jones was colliding with her uncle’s leg. “My bag!” she squealed, grabbing it and hugging it to her chest. “Hen-we!” she exclaimed next, launching herself at her new friend.

“Beffy!” Henry shouted in return.

Before Emma could say anything, Bethany was pulling Henry inside and tugging him down the hall. She shouted as she ran, “They came, Mommy! It worked!”

Killian’s jaw dropped and his face turned red. He pointed at his niece’s retreating form. “I did not plan this, I swear. This was all Elsa’s doing.”

Emma smiled shyly up at him. “I don’t mind. I’m kind of glad, actually.”

He grinned so wide, Emma noticed for the first time that he had dimples. “So you’ll stay?”

She shrugged, trying to play it cool. “I do like Chinese food.”

Killian ushered her inside, where she was promptly enveloped in a hug from Elsa.

“Don’t be mad,” she whispered in Emma’s ear.

Emma smiled at her as she pulled away from her embrace. “Mad? I might just thank you.”

Elsa gave a relieved laugh as she pulled her gently into a formal dining room. A red head walked through an archway that led into the kitchen, carrying two cartons of take out. She actually waddled more than walked because she was very hugely pregnant.

“Emma,” Elsa said eagerly, pulling her across the room, “this is my sister Anna.”

The woman set the cartons of fried rice onto the table and then hugged Emma eagerly. “It is so nice to meet you! Elsa told me all about everything,” she finished with a wink.

Emma could only stammer and blush as Anna stepped away. A man with dirty blonde hair came through the archway next, carrying plastic containers of sweet and sour chicken.

“So who was at the door?” he asked as he came into the room, not really paying attention. “Was it that blonde Killian has a crush on?”

Killian walked in the room at the same moment from the hallway, and he stood there, the top of his ears turning red. Bethany was wrapped around his left leg, and Henry around his right. Both were giggling delightedly. Overall, it made an adorable picture.

“Kristoff!” Anna admonished over her shoulder, then quickly turned back to Emma. “Forgive my husband, he has no filter.”

“Says the girl who asked me why I smelled like wet fur the day she met me,” Kristoff grumbled.

Anna rolled her eyes. “Just go get the soy sauce, honey.”

Chastised, Kristoff shuffled back to the kitchen. Elsa shook her head. “Don’t mind them, their cutting banter is their idea of foreplay.”

Anna laughed as she eased herself awkwardly into a dining room chair. “As you can clearly see,” she said, rubbing her large abdomen.

“When are you due?” Emma asked politely.

“Not for another month,” Anna said on a long sigh, “and I know, I’m huge.”

“You look perfect,” Kristoff assured her as he returned with the condiments.

He leaned over and planted a kiss to her forehead. Anna tilted her head and smiled up at him, squeezing the hand that rested on her shoulder. Emma had to admit they were an adorable couple.

Elsa encouraged everyone to take a seat, adamant about who sat where. Therefore, Emma wasn’t surprised to end up on Killian’s right with Henry on the other side of her. Food was passed around amidst easy chatter, and Emma just soaked it in. The only time she ever had this as a kid was with that one family when she was fourteen. Then they had chosen their “real kids” over her, and she had run away.

“So Elsa said you live in Portland,” Kristoff said, making small talk to include her. “What do you do?”

“Oh, um … “ Emma hedged, squirming in her seat, “right now I’m just a temp, filling in here and there.”

She stared at her fried rice, hoping her answer didn’t make her sound irresponsible. Giving birth in jail at 18 wasn’t exactly conducive to higher education, and even though she had worked her butt off once she got out to be able to keep Henry, employers weren’t exactly jumping to give her a chance.

“That’s so funny,” Elsa laughed, “I was working at a temp agency when I met Kristoff. I would never have offered him a home cooked meal if I had known he would steal away my sister.”

Emma laughed along with them as they reminisced, relieved that no one was pressing her about her career plans. Until Elsa turned to her again.

“Have you thought of online college?” she asked. “That’s what I did while working as a temp. Anna and I lost our parents when I was a freshman in college, and it drastically changed both our plans.”

“I’m sorry,” Emma said softly.

Killian leaned over, “Welcome to the orphan’s club.”

Emma glanced around the table at all of the welcoming faces around her, and for the first time since she pulled up to the curb in front of the house, she relaxed. The conversation shifted to lighter topics, and Emma found herself smiling and laughing.

“Killian!” Anna gasped, reaching across the table to grasp his left hand which was reaching for another helping of rice, “You took off your wedding ring!”

“Um, aye,” he said awkwardly, pulling his hand from her grip and scratching behind his ear. He glanced at Emma and held her gaze as he explained. “It felt like it was finally time to move on.”

“Oh, I’m so happy!” Anna gasped, both hands flying to her face and tears filling her eyes. She grabbed her napkin and dabbed at her cheeks as they spilled over. “Sorry, pregnancy hormones you know.”

“Mommy,” Bethany piped up, tugging on Elsa’s sleeve, “when we get mashmell-os?”

Elsa rubbed her daughter’s back. “In just a little bit, sweetie.”

“I think we’re all done, right?” Kristoff asked. “All we have to do is toss the paper plates and put away the leftovers.”

“Yay!” Bethany cheered.

“Wait!” Anna said. She reached for a small bowl full of cellophane wrapped fortune cookies. “It’s a birthday tradition, you know. Choose a cookie.”

“We all have to go around and read our fortunes out loud,” Killian explained.

“Oh,” Emma said with a nod as she reached into the bowl as it was passed to her.

“Birthday girl first!” Anna squealed, then broke open her cookie. She read it silently, then burst out laughing. “A great change is coming your way.”

Everyone laughed along with her, and Elsa quipped, “Believe me, you have lots of changes in your future, most of them smelly ones. Right, Emma?”

“Okay,” Anna said, rubbing her hands together gleefully, “I choose Killian to go next.” She exchanged a delighted glance with her sister then added in a sing-song voice, “I hope it’s a good one!”

Killian just shook his head at the teasing as he cracked open his fortune cookie. As he read the tiny slip of paper, however, the blood seemed to drain from his face, and his eyes widened considerably. He just sat there for a long moment, staring at it.

“Well,” Anna pressed, leaning across the table and craning her neck to try to see his fortune, “what does it say?”

“Nothing,” Killian said with a shake of his head, “just your generic good luck sentiment, you know.”

“Killian,” Elsa admonished with a narrowing of her eyes, “that’s not how the tradition works and you know it. Read the fortune, Jones.”

Killian swallowed as red crept up his neck. Then he cleared his throat and read, “Kiss the person to your right.”

Every pair of eyes at the table swiveled towards Emma. Except Killian, who stared down at his plate.

“No way!” Kristoff argued. “It doesn’t say that. Let me see!”

He reached across the table and snatched the fortune. Upon reading it, he handed it to his wife. Her jaw dropped.

“That’s really what it says!”

The fortune was passed around until it got to Emma. Sure enough, Killian wasn’t making it up. Emma’s face burned as she slid the paper over to Killian, their fingertips brushing. She ever so slowly lifted her gaze to his. He gave her a sheepish smile and an apologetic shrug.

“Well, kiss her!” Anna insisted. Her sister and her husband added their encouragement as well.

Emma could see that Killian was conflicted. So she arched a brow and gave him a flirty smile as she said, “Well, how about it? You gonna kiss me or just sit there?”

There was a combination of cheering and clapping from the others, even Bethany and Henry, though they probably had no idea what was going on. Killian chuckled and ducked his head, rubbing a hand across the back of his neck. Then his eyes met hers again, and he leaned towards her. But just before his lips could connect with hers, he changed his angle and brushed them across her cheek instead. Emma was simultaneously disappointed and amazed at how that simple brush of his lips sent a thrill all the way to the core of her. A groan resounded from the others but Emma gave him a tender smile. Though part of her wanted him to kiss her properly, she knew it would have been awkward with everyone, including her three year old watching. He reached out with his thumb and brushed it across the dimple in her chin. It was only a quick, light touch, but it made her heart flip anyway.

          *************************************************

After the fortune cookies, Kristoff and Killian got a bonfire going in the backyard, and everyone gathered around to roast marshmallows. There was also a chocolate cake for Anna’s birthday. Both Kristoff and Killian could play the guitar, and Elsa was an amazing singer. Emma had never heard a better rendition of the birthday song. Then the guys took requests, readily singing and playing whatever was thrown their way, even the PJ Masks theme song (as requested by Henry and Bethany, of course). It showed what good uncles they both were to Bethany that the men already knew all the words.

Now Henry was asleep in Killian’s arms as he walked them to her yellow bug. He gently placed the child in his car seat, and Emma’s heart ached in her chest as Killian smoothed her son’s hair across his forehead. Emma put her hand in her pocket and fingered the fortune she had gotten: When fate gives you a sign, leap.

“Can I ask you something?” she asked as Killian stood and gently shut the car door.

“Sure.”

“Was that kiss really the best that you could do?” her mouth turned up flirtatiously as she said it.

A slow smile filled Killian’s face as well. He sauntered into her personal space as he answered. “Perhaps I was worried that you couldn’t handle it.”

Emma tilted her head as she bit her lower lip. She saw Killian’s eyes drift to stare at that spot, his pupils dilating. “Maybe you’re the one who couldn’t handle it.”

He pounced on her so suddenly, that Emma let out a yelp. It was quickly swallowed up, however, by his mouth on hers. The kiss was deep and aggressive, and it caused Emma to lose her balance. Killian cupped her cheek with one hand and steadied her at the waist with the other. He turned her slightly to pin her between the bug and his body. Emma snaked her arms up his chest and then grasped the back of his head with both hands. It was his turn now as she kissed him back with ferocity, a groan escaping from his throat.

When they finally parted, panting, they were both wobbling slightly and disoriented. They pressed their foreheads together to steady themselves.

“Now that,” Emma gasped, “was a kiss.”

He chuckled, brushing both of her cheeks with his thumbs as he cupped her face. He bent down to kiss her again, this one slow and languid. His fingers drifted to her hair, tangling there and tugging slightly. It took every ounce of willpower Emma had to push him away, and even then she chased his lips, brushing them chastely before reaching behind her and grasping the door handle.

“Good night,” she told him as she opened the car door.

“Wait …” he said, looking completely wrecked by their kisses.

Emma put two fingers to his lips to stop his words, then with her other hand, she pressed a tiny slip of paper into his palm. Then she quickly entered the bug, started the car, and drove away. She glanced in her rearview mirror only once to see him standing in the street, staring down at that tiny bit of paper. She tore her gaze away as she turned at the next stop sign.

Suddenly, her cell phone started ringing. Emma picked it up and grinned broadly to see an unknown number flashing on the screen. She cleared her throat and took a deep breath so that when she answered, she sounded calm.

“Hello.”

“You know, a lesser man might think you were teasing, Swan. Writing your number on such an itty bitty piece of paper.”

“Well,” Emma teased back, “I wanted you to work for it.”

“When can I see you again?”

The timbre of Killian’s voice when he asked the question sent a shiver down Emma’s spine.

“When are you available?”

“Well, we’ve already been on a hayride, solved a corn maze, been to a pumpkin patch, and had a bonfire. How about we continue the fall clichés and carve said pumpkins together? Could you and Henry be here tomorrow afternoon? Or do you work Sundays?”

Emma didn’t know what touched her more; that he wanted to see her again so soon, that he was including Henry, or that he had chosen a casual activity. It took her so long to get herself together, that Killian got nervous waiting on the other end.

“Swan, you still there?”

Emma cleared her throat. “Um, yeah, sorry. I was just … thinking that tomorrow is perfect.”

Over the next few weeks, Killian insisted that they check off every fall tradition together. In addition to carving pumpkins, they watched a Storybrooke High football game cuddled underneath a fuzzy blanket, jumped into a pile of leaves, bobbed for apples at the Storybrooke Fall Festival, and took Henry and Bethany trick or treating. By the time Emma found herself gathered around the dining room table once again for Thanksgiving with Killian’s family, she had decided one thing beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Fall was definitely her favorite season.

[panatmansam]

Imagine being some poor underpaid, overworked English sailor in the landing party for the first time on New Zealand. The first thing you see on the beach are these Maori warriors doing the “haka”, their ceremonial dance, which I can vouch for personally as a very scary experience in person when there are forty of these guys.

They are very big compared to an 18th-century British sailor. Many over six feet and some weighing over three hundred pounds (136 kg). Their upper bodies are like tree trunks from rowing every day. Our English sailor averages about half of that weight and nearly a foot shorter. Those Maori guys are big. They are angry and they don’t like us.

“Ummm, Captain, pardon me for speaking Sir, but I hear Austrailia is lovely this time of year. The gum trees will be taking on their Autumn colors, you know, a slightly different shade of dull green and the vast kangaroo herds should begin their yearly migration to the South Pole. Not a sight to miss Cap’n.“

[20qs20somethings]

Julia, 26

1. Can you use three to five words to describe our generation? Underpaid, overworked, hopeful, ambitious

2. Talk about a person or an experience that has helped shape you into the person you are today? Without a doubt, it was losing my dad when I was 15. People say life is short, but that phrase really put it into reality for me very quickly and I had to grow up very fast. I think to this day, I live in this constant fear that I’ll lose another family member and what that will be like for me because that was so traumatic as a 15 year old and I pushed a lot back at that time to just move forward. But I think it has been the one event in my life that has truly shaped me into the person I am today and I think it taught me how to live authentically.

3. Who or what is your biggest motivator in life? The first thing that comes to mind which is so frustrating is money because I think we’re all lacking it. But really, it’s relationships, friendships, family, any kind of genuine, authentic relationships. I feel like in college you have these superficial relationships and you try to make a lot of friends, and now I have a small number and try to maintain those.

4. Do you believe in love? Yes. I do! I believe in different kinds of love. I say that with pause, because I believe the expression of love is more important than the idea of love.

5. What’s something you think people assume of you based on your internet persona? I think people probably assume that I live this grand life of adventure and that I like to try new things. 

6. What’s one thing you want people to know about you? That everything I do is intentional. It used to not be that way, I used to do things because I thought it was something I was supposed to do or because other people did them.

7. Do you volunteer? Why? I do volunteer. I think it’s sort of inherent in what I’ve done in and after college. I volunteer a lot with my students, we go to rallies and lobby day at the state house. So a lot of the volunteering I do is lobbying and volunteering for higher ed and decreasing tuition costs and making college more accessible. I do it because my students need it and I do it because without students, I don’t have a job. It’s more out of having these very personal relationships with these students and you realize that they don’t have the resources they need. So how can we get these resources for them so they can stay in school, so they can work to support their families. I think access and equity in education is my #1 priority right now and it will be for a while, especially for women. If we can do more to support women in higher ed, it would be great. So that’s why I do it.

8. Fill in the blank: “Home is _______” Autumn with my mom, sitting by the fire, drinking a glass of red wine. Home is with my mom.

9. What are your thoughts on race? That white people need to recognize their place of privilege in this world and white people need to do more work around race relations around this country. Just because you live in a place like New York, Boston, or San Francisco even if you live in what you consider to be a liberal place, you have work to do. I think when I think of race I think of growing tensions. We have a lot of work to do. 

10. What’s the title of the current chapter of your life? Finally

11. What do you want out of this life? Companionship, lots of laughter, really good pizza.

12. What’s something that makes you angry? Intolerance. I have no patience for intolerant, ignorant people, and an unwillingness to learn about others.

13. How do you measure success? In how many times a day I can laugh whether with friends, at my job, with my students. Did I laugh today? That to me means I’ve had a successful day.

14. How do you want to be remembered? As someone who stood up for what she believed in, for someone who maintained really authentic relationships, as someone who brought joy to other people and I wanna be remembered as a fucking feminist. 

15. What are qualities that you value? Honesty, interest in current events, a sense of humor, kindness.

16. What do you hope 30 will look like? I hope it will look like fun, stability, love, and just being content.

17. How would you describe what it’s like to navigate your 20s? Oh it’s a fucking dumpster fire, it’s a hell hole. I’m still trying to figure it out. But I will say, it is at least up until this point of my life, the biggest period of growth I’ve ever experienced personally. I feel like I’ve made a lot of progress in who I am as a person, even in the past 3 or 4 years. I know who I am and I feel really confident about that.

18. What’s the most important lesson you’ve learned so far? To give without the expectation that you will receive.

19. What’s the hardest lesson you’ve had to learn? That you will lose people whether that’s physically, emotionally, romantically. You will lose people, it’s inevitable.

20. What is the best piece of advice you want to leave the world with? Don’t hold grudges, be forgiving, and exist to love one another.

[networkingdefinition]

Football Quotes

Official Website: Football Quotes

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• A football team is a like a beautiful woman, when you do not tell her, she forgets she is beautiful – Arsene Wenger • A football team is like a piano. You need eight men to carry it and three who can play the damn thing. – Bill Shankly • A lot of football success is in the mind. You must believe you are the best and then make sure that you are. – Bill Shankly • A professional football team warms up grimly and disparately, like an army on maneuvers: the ground troops here, the tanks there, the artillery and air force over there. – Ted Solotaroff • A school without football is in danger of deteriorating into a medieval study hall. – Vince Lombardi • After all, is football a game or a religion? – Howard Cosell • All that I know most surely about morality and obligations I owe to football. – Albert Camus • And I coached against Mike when he was an assistant with the Bears and they won that football game. – Don Shula • And of course in America you’ve got American football and baseball and all those other ball games, soccer has become a little niche that the women have kind of filled. – Parminder Nagra • At a football club, there’s a holy trinity – the players, the manager and the supporters. Directors don’t come into it. They are only there to sign the checks. – Bill Shankly • At the base of it was the urge, if you wanted to play football, to knock someone down, that was what the sport was all about, the will to win closely linked with contact. – George Plimpton

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'Football', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '68', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_football').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_football img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); ); • Baseball is fathers and sons. Football is brothers beating each other up in the backyard. – Donald Hall • Baseball is what we were, football is what we have become. – Mary McGrory • Baseball players are smarter than football players. How often do you see a baseball team penalized for too many men on the field? – Jim Bouton • Because I was small, I was getting the hell kicked out of me playing football. – Burt Bacharach • Being a woman is of special interest only to aspiring male transsexuals. To actual women, it is simply a good excuse not to play football. – Fran Lebowitz • But I just want to be known for my football. – Jamie Redknapp • But when you lose a family member or something tragic happens, that stays with you forever. You never get over it. Knowing that you have to deal with that for the rest of your life… Football is important, but not as important as you once thought it was. – Brett Favre

[clickbank-storefront-bestselling]

• College football is a game which would be much more interesting if the faculty played instead of the students, and even more interesting if the trustees played. There would be a great increase in broken arms, legs, and necks, and simultaneously an appreciable diminution in the loss to humanity. – H. L. Mencken • Fifa cannot sit by and see greed rule the football world. Nor shall we. – Sepp Blatter • Football brings out the sociologist that lurks in some otherwise respectable citizens. They say football is a metaphor for America’s sinfulness. – George Will • Football combines the two worst things about America: it is violence punctuated by committee meetings. – George Will • Football doesn’t build character, it reveals character. – Marv Levy • Football doesn’t build character. It eliminates the weak ones. – Darrell Royal • Football is a fertility festival. Eleven sperm trying to get into the egg. I feel sorry for the goalkeeper.- Bjork • Football is a game about feelings and intelligence. – Jose Mourinho • Football is a game played with arms, legs and shoulders but mostly from the neck up. – Knute Rockne • Football is a simple game made complicated by people who should know better. – Bill Shankly • Football is a team game. So is life. – Joe Namath • Football is an honest game. It’s true to life. It’s a game about sharing. Football is a team game. So is life. – Joe Namath • Football is an incredible game. Sometimes it’s so incredible, it’s unbelievable. – Tom Landry • Football is like a religion to me. I worship the ball, and I treat it like a god. Too many players think of a football as something to kick. They should be taught to caress it and to treat it like a precious gem. – Pele • Football is like life – it requires perseverance, self-denial, hard work, sacrifice, dedication and respect for authority. – Vince Lombardi • Football is like life and I know life. – Rush Limbaugh • Football is mesmerizing, because it’s a figurative war. You go in one direction till you get there, but you get there as a team, not as an individual. Players bond whether they’re black or white, much as soldiers do. – Oliver Stone • Football is, after all, a wonderful way to get rid of your aggressions without going to jail for it. – Woody Hayes • Football isn’t a contact sport, it’s a collision sport. – Duffy Daugherty • Football isn’t a contact sport; it’s a collision sport. Dancing is a contact sport. – Vince Lombardi • Football linemen are motivated by a more complicated, self-determining series of factors than the simple fear of humiliation in the public gaze, which is the emotion that galvanizes the backs and receivers. – Merlin Olsen • Football, wherein is nothing but beastly fury and extreme violence, whereoth proceedeth hurt, and consequently rancour and malice do remain with them that be wounded. – Philip Stubbs • Football: A sport that bears the same relation to education that bullfighting does to agriculture. – Elbert Hubbard • Football’s a difficult business and aren’t they prima donnas. But it’s a wonderful game. – Queen Elizabeth II • From that moment the pendulum went into reverse – Gerald Sinstadt • Gentlemen, it is better to have died a small boy than to fumble this football. – John Heisman • He’s a nice guy, but he played too much football with his helmet off. – Lyndon B. Johnson • I also played two years of high school football but I wasn’t very, how shall I say it, talented. – Kyle Chandler • I am delighted to have you play football. I believe in rough, manly sports. But I do not believe in them if they degenerate into the sole end of any one’s existence. I don’t want you to sacrifice standing well in your studies to any over-athleticism; and I need not tell you that character counts for a great deal more than either intellect or body in winning success in life. Athletic proficiency is a mighty good servant, and like so many other good servants, a mighty bad master. – Theodore Roosevelt • I don’t like to lose, and that isn’t so much because it is just a football game, but because defeat means the failure to reach your objective. – Knute Rockne • I eat football, I sleep football. I am not mad I am just passionate – Thierry Henry • I feel an autumnal Saturday, no matter how beautiful, is wasted if it doesn’t find me sitting in on a football game. – Howard Roberts • I feel like football players are overworked and underpaid compared to any other sports. – Terrell Owens • I have been a fan all my life, but now I have been out of football for over 10 years, and out of baseball for a little over six years and I don’t go to games. – Bo Jackson • I love football and it’s the sport I would really like to play. I’ve said on national television here that I would really love to play for one of our football clubs when I finished my tennis career. – Novak Djokovic • I love football, football is my life. – Wayne Rooney • I played English football – soccer – instead of American football, because we couldn’t afford the equipment. – Wally Schirra • I really do love football. – Ricky Williams • I stopped playing football because I’d done as much as I could. I needed something which was going to excite me as much as football had excited me. – Eric Cantona • I was always the last one chosen for football games in Central Park. – Merlin Olsen • I was surprised, but I always say nothing surprises me in football. – Les Ferdinand • I was very poor. As a child my dream was to have a leather football. – Stephen Chow • If a man watches three football games in a row, he should be declared legally dead. – Erma Bombeck • If anything goes bad, I did it. If anything goes semi-good, we did it. If anything goes real good, then you did it. That’s all it takes to get people to win football games for you. – Bear Bryant • If football players were armed with guns, there wouldn’t be stadiums large enough to hold the crowds. – Irwin Shaw • If God had wanted us to play football in the sky, He’d have put grass up there. – Brian Clough • If you don’t play well, you have a bad game or a nightmare you know that the amount of coverage is worldwide. – Steven Gerrard • If you have only one passion in life – football – and you pursue it to the exclusion of everything else, it becomes very dangerous. When you stop doing this activity it is as though you are dying. The death of that activity is a death in itself. – Eric Cantona • In football as in watchmaking, talent and elegance mean nothing without rigour and precision. – Lionel Messi • In football everything is complicated by the presence of the opposite team. – Jean-Paul Sartre • In football, the worst blindness is only seeing the ball. – Nelson Rodrigues • In life, as in football, the principle to follow is to hit the line hard. – Theodore Roosevelt • In real football, I wouldn’t want Terrell Owens anywhere near my team. But you’re nuts if you don’t take him in fantasy. – Randy Cross • International football is the continuation of war by other means. – George Orwell • It is veneer, rouge, aestheticism, art museums, new theaters, etc. that make America impotent. The good things are football, kindness, and jazz bands. – George Santayana • It was an ideal day for football – too cold for the spectators and too cold for the players. – Red Smith • It’s so easy for a kid to join a gang, to do drugs. We should make it that easy to be involved in football and academics. – Snoop Dogg • Kicking is very important in football. In fact, some of the more enthusiastic players even kick the ball, occasionally. – Alfred Hitchcock • Maybe Louis does have a golden willy. – Arjen Robben • Most football players are temperamental. That’s 90 percent temper and 10 percent mental. – Doug Plank • Music was important. Football was the easy part. – Zinedine Zidane • Nine in the box… that’s a football term. – Ricky Williams • No talking. Talking doesn’t play football, talking isn’t going to make you practice harder or play harder. – Ken Simonton • Nobody in football should be called a genius. A genius is a guy like Norman Einstein. – Joe Theismann • Nobody who ever gave his best regretted it. – George Halas • Of course I didn’t take my wife to see Rochdale as an anniversary present. It was her birthday and would I have got married during the football season? Anyway, it was Rochdale reserves. – Bill Shankly • Often there are players who have only football as a way of expressing themselves and never develop other interests. And when they no longer play football, they no longer do anything; they no longer exist, or rather they have the sensation of no longer existing. – Eric Cantona • Other countries have their history. Uruguay has its football. – Ondino Viera • People who work together will win, whether it be against complex football defenses, or the problems of modern society. – Vince Lombardi • Pro football is like nuclear warfare. There are no winners, only survivors. – Frank Gifford • Rugby is a game for barbarians played by gentlemen. Football is a game for gentlemen played by barbarians. – Oscar Wilde • Sharks are as tough as those football fans who take their shirts off during games in Chicago in January, only more intelligent. – Dave Barry • Some people try to find things in this game that don’t exist but football is only two things – blocking and tackling. – Vince Lombardi • Sometimes in football you have to score goals. – Thierry Henry • Sure, luck means a lot in football. Not having a good quarterback is bad luck. – Don Shula • That’s football, Mike, Northern Ireland have had several chances and haven’t scored but England have had no chances and scored twice. – Trevor Brooking • That’s kind of how I approach life and football; why dwell on something that’s hasn’t happened. – Brett Favre • The best thing I ever learned in life was that things have to be worked for. A lot of people seem to think there is some sort of magic in making a winning football team. There isn’t, but there’s plenty of work. – Knute Rockne • The crowd think that Todd handled the ball…they must have seen something that nobody else did. – Barry Davies • The function of football, soccer, basketball and other passion-sports in modern industrial society is the transference of boredom, frustration, anger and rage into socially acceptable forms of combat. A temporary substitute for war; for nationalism; identification with something bigger than the self. – Edward Abbey • The game of life is a lot like football. You have to tackle your problems, block your fears, and score your points when you get the opportunity. – Lewis Grizzard • The negative side of football. The negative side of our society. People sometimes go to football and bring to it the negative aspects of our society. – Jose Mourinho • The pride and presence of a professional football team is far more important than 30 libraries. – Art Modell • The reason women don’t play football is because 11 of them would never wear the same outfit in public. – Phyllis Diller • The supreme quality for leadership is unquestionably integrity. Without it, no real success is possible, no matter whether it is on a section gang, a football field, in an army, or in an office. – Dwight D. Eisenhower • The tactical difference between Association Football and Rugby with its varieties seems to be that in the former the ball is the missile, in the latter men are the missiles. – Ernest Crawley • The town, the team, it’s a family. That has helped. For some people who have had to deal with some of the problems I have had to deal with don’t have football as an out. – Brett Favre • There are so many things about playing football that seem to me uniquely American. Anybody can succeed, anybody can play, but youve got to work hard to do it. – Dean Cain • There are two things every man in America thinks he can do: work a grill and coach football. – Greg Schiano • There is a progression of understanding vis-a-vis pro football that varies drastically with the factor of distance — physical, emotional, intellectual and every other way. Which is exactly the way it should be, in the eyes of the amazingly small number of people who own and control the game, because it is this finely managed distance factor that accounts for the high-profit mystique that blew the sacred institution of baseball off its ”national pastime” pedestal in less than fifteen years. – Hunter S. Thompson • This is a dirty business, that is why I go out and play with my heart. I feel like football players are overworked and underpaid compared to any other sports. This is like a nine to five. No guaranteed contracts, and that is the worst thing about it. – Terrell Owens • Tottenham are trying tonight to become the first London team to win this cup. The last team to do so was the 1973 Spurs team. – Mike Ingham • Violent ground-acquisition games such as football are in fact a crypto-fascist metaphor for nuclear war. – Robert Downey, Jr. • We can’t run. We can’t pass. We can’t stop the run. We can’t stop the pass. We can’t kick. Other than that, we’re just not a very good football team right now. – Bruce Coslet • Well family is obviously the most important. There was a time when I thought football was the most important. – Brett Favre • What are you doing here? Tell me why you are here. If you are not here to win a national championship, you’re in the wrong place. You boys are special. I don’t want my players to be like other students. I want special people. You can learn a lot on the football field that isn’t taught in the home, the church, or the classroom. There are going to be days when you think you’ve got no more to give and then you’re going to give plenty more. You are going to have pride and class. You are going to be very special. You are going to win the national championship for Alabama. – Bear Bryant • When I played pro football, I never set out to hurt anyone deliberately – unless it was, you know, important, like a league game or something. – Dick Butkus • Whenever I wasn’t watching the planes, I was playing community baseball, football, or something like that. – Bo Jackson • Why is it good for football to take the excitement away from fans by overcharging them for tickets to see their team? – Sepp Blatter • Women will not talk about football unless one of them is in love with a football player, and then suddenly you discover that they know everything that is to be known about it. – Jeanne Moreau • You can spend the money on new housing for poor people and the homeless, or you can spend it on a football stadium or a golf course. – Jello Biafra • You can’t be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline. It helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer. – Frank Zappa [clickbank-storefront-bestselling]

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[equitiesstocks]

Football Quotes

Official Website: Football Quotes

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• A football team is a like a beautiful woman, when you do not tell her, she forgets she is beautiful – Arsene Wenger • A football team is like a piano. You need eight men to carry it and three who can play the damn thing. – Bill Shankly • A lot of football success is in the mind. You must believe you are the best and then make sure that you are. – Bill Shankly • A professional football team warms up grimly and disparately, like an army on maneuvers: the ground troops here, the tanks there, the artillery and air force over there. – Ted Solotaroff • A school without football is in danger of deteriorating into a medieval study hall. – Vince Lombardi • After all, is football a game or a religion? – Howard Cosell • All that I know most surely about morality and obligations I owe to football. – Albert Camus • And I coached against Mike when he was an assistant with the Bears and they won that football game. – Don Shula • And of course in America you’ve got American football and baseball and all those other ball games, soccer has become a little niche that the women have kind of filled. – Parminder Nagra • At a football club, there’s a holy trinity – the players, the manager and the supporters. Directors don’t come into it. They are only there to sign the checks. – Bill Shankly • At the base of it was the urge, if you wanted to play football, to knock someone down, that was what the sport was all about, the will to win closely linked with contact. – George Plimpton

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'Football', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '68', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_football').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_football img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); ); • Baseball is fathers and sons. Football is brothers beating each other up in the backyard. – Donald Hall • Baseball is what we were, football is what we have become. – Mary McGrory • Baseball players are smarter than football players. How often do you see a baseball team penalized for too many men on the field? – Jim Bouton • Because I was small, I was getting the hell kicked out of me playing football. – Burt Bacharach • Being a woman is of special interest only to aspiring male transsexuals. To actual women, it is simply a good excuse not to play football. – Fran Lebowitz • But I just want to be known for my football. – Jamie Redknapp • But when you lose a family member or something tragic happens, that stays with you forever. You never get over it. Knowing that you have to deal with that for the rest of your life… Football is important, but not as important as you once thought it was. – Brett Favre

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• College football is a game which would be much more interesting if the faculty played instead of the students, and even more interesting if the trustees played. There would be a great increase in broken arms, legs, and necks, and simultaneously an appreciable diminution in the loss to humanity. – H. L. Mencken • Fifa cannot sit by and see greed rule the football world. Nor shall we. – Sepp Blatter • Football brings out the sociologist that lurks in some otherwise respectable citizens. They say football is a metaphor for America’s sinfulness. – George Will • Football combines the two worst things about America: it is violence punctuated by committee meetings. – George Will • Football doesn’t build character, it reveals character. – Marv Levy • Football doesn’t build character. It eliminates the weak ones. – Darrell Royal • Football is a fertility festival. Eleven sperm trying to get into the egg. I feel sorry for the goalkeeper.- Bjork • Football is a game about feelings and intelligence. – Jose Mourinho • Football is a game played with arms, legs and shoulders but mostly from the neck up. – Knute Rockne • Football is a simple game made complicated by people who should know better. – Bill Shankly • Football is a team game. So is life. – Joe Namath • Football is an honest game. It’s true to life. It’s a game about sharing. Football is a team game. So is life. – Joe Namath • Football is an incredible game. Sometimes it’s so incredible, it’s unbelievable. – Tom Landry • Football is like a religion to me. I worship the ball, and I treat it like a god. Too many players think of a football as something to kick. They should be taught to caress it and to treat it like a precious gem. – Pele • Football is like life – it requires perseverance, self-denial, hard work, sacrifice, dedication and respect for authority. – Vince Lombardi • Football is like life and I know life. – Rush Limbaugh • Football is mesmerizing, because it’s a figurative war. You go in one direction till you get there, but you get there as a team, not as an individual. Players bond whether they’re black or white, much as soldiers do. – Oliver Stone • Football is, after all, a wonderful way to get rid of your aggressions without going to jail for it. – Woody Hayes • Football isn’t a contact sport, it’s a collision sport. – Duffy Daugherty • Football isn’t a contact sport; it’s a collision sport. Dancing is a contact sport. – Vince Lombardi • Football linemen are motivated by a more complicated, self-determining series of factors than the simple fear of humiliation in the public gaze, which is the emotion that galvanizes the backs and receivers. – Merlin Olsen • Football, wherein is nothing but beastly fury and extreme violence, whereoth proceedeth hurt, and consequently rancour and malice do remain with them that be wounded. – Philip Stubbs • Football: A sport that bears the same relation to education that bullfighting does to agriculture. – Elbert Hubbard • Football’s a difficult business and aren’t they prima donnas. But it’s a wonderful game. – Queen Elizabeth II • From that moment the pendulum went into reverse – Gerald Sinstadt • Gentlemen, it is better to have died a small boy than to fumble this football. – John Heisman • He’s a nice guy, but he played too much football with his helmet off. – Lyndon B. Johnson • I also played two years of high school football but I wasn’t very, how shall I say it, talented. – Kyle Chandler • I am delighted to have you play football. I believe in rough, manly sports. But I do not believe in them if they degenerate into the sole end of any one’s existence. I don’t want you to sacrifice standing well in your studies to any over-athleticism; and I need not tell you that character counts for a great deal more than either intellect or body in winning success in life. Athletic proficiency is a mighty good servant, and like so many other good servants, a mighty bad master. – Theodore Roosevelt • I don’t like to lose, and that isn’t so much because it is just a football game, but because defeat means the failure to reach your objective. – Knute Rockne • I eat football, I sleep football. I am not mad I am just passionate – Thierry Henry • I feel an autumnal Saturday, no matter how beautiful, is wasted if it doesn’t find me sitting in on a football game. – Howard Roberts • I feel like football players are overworked and underpaid compared to any other sports. – Terrell Owens • I have been a fan all my life, but now I have been out of football for over 10 years, and out of baseball for a little over six years and I don’t go to games. – Bo Jackson • I love football and it’s the sport I would really like to play. I’ve said on national television here that I would really love to play for one of our football clubs when I finished my tennis career. – Novak Djokovic • I love football, football is my life. – Wayne Rooney • I played English football – soccer – instead of American football, because we couldn’t afford the equipment. – Wally Schirra • I really do love football. – Ricky Williams • I stopped playing football because I’d done as much as I could. I needed something which was going to excite me as much as football had excited me. – Eric Cantona • I was always the last one chosen for football games in Central Park. – Merlin Olsen • I was surprised, but I always say nothing surprises me in football. – Les Ferdinand • I was very poor. As a child my dream was to have a leather football. – Stephen Chow • If a man watches three football games in a row, he should be declared legally dead. – Erma Bombeck • If anything goes bad, I did it. If anything goes semi-good, we did it. If anything goes real good, then you did it. That’s all it takes to get people to win football games for you. – Bear Bryant • If football players were armed with guns, there wouldn’t be stadiums large enough to hold the crowds. – Irwin Shaw • If God had wanted us to play football in the sky, He’d have put grass up there. – Brian Clough • If you don’t play well, you have a bad game or a nightmare you know that the amount of coverage is worldwide. – Steven Gerrard • If you have only one passion in life – football – and you pursue it to the exclusion of everything else, it becomes very dangerous. When you stop doing this activity it is as though you are dying. The death of that activity is a death in itself. – Eric Cantona • In football as in watchmaking, talent and elegance mean nothing without rigour and precision. – Lionel Messi • In football everything is complicated by the presence of the opposite team. – Jean-Paul Sartre • In football, the worst blindness is only seeing the ball. – Nelson Rodrigues • In life, as in football, the principle to follow is to hit the line hard. – Theodore Roosevelt • In real football, I wouldn’t want Terrell Owens anywhere near my team. But you’re nuts if you don’t take him in fantasy. – Randy Cross • International football is the continuation of war by other means. – George Orwell • It is veneer, rouge, aestheticism, art museums, new theaters, etc. that make America impotent. The good things are football, kindness, and jazz bands. – George Santayana • It was an ideal day for football – too cold for the spectators and too cold for the players. – Red Smith • It’s so easy for a kid to join a gang, to do drugs. We should make it that easy to be involved in football and academics. – Snoop Dogg • Kicking is very important in football. In fact, some of the more enthusiastic players even kick the ball, occasionally. – Alfred Hitchcock • Maybe Louis does have a golden willy. – Arjen Robben • Most football players are temperamental. That’s 90 percent temper and 10 percent mental. – Doug Plank • Music was important. Football was the easy part. – Zinedine Zidane • Nine in the box… that’s a football term. – Ricky Williams • No talking. Talking doesn’t play football, talking isn’t going to make you practice harder or play harder. – Ken Simonton • Nobody in football should be called a genius. A genius is a guy like Norman Einstein. – Joe Theismann • Nobody who ever gave his best regretted it. – George Halas • Of course I didn’t take my wife to see Rochdale as an anniversary present. It was her birthday and would I have got married during the football season? Anyway, it was Rochdale reserves. – Bill Shankly • Often there are players who have only football as a way of expressing themselves and never develop other interests. And when they no longer play football, they no longer do anything; they no longer exist, or rather they have the sensation of no longer existing. – Eric Cantona • Other countries have their history. Uruguay has its football. – Ondino Viera • People who work together will win, whether it be against complex football defenses, or the problems of modern society. – Vince Lombardi • Pro football is like nuclear warfare. There are no winners, only survivors. – Frank Gifford • Rugby is a game for barbarians played by gentlemen. Football is a game for gentlemen played by barbarians. – Oscar Wilde • Sharks are as tough as those football fans who take their shirts off during games in Chicago in January, only more intelligent. – Dave Barry • Some people try to find things in this game that don’t exist but football is only two things – blocking and tackling. – Vince Lombardi • Sometimes in football you have to score goals. – Thierry Henry • Sure, luck means a lot in football. Not having a good quarterback is bad luck. – Don Shula • That’s football, Mike, Northern Ireland have had several chances and haven’t scored but England have had no chances and scored twice. – Trevor Brooking • That’s kind of how I approach life and football; why dwell on something that’s hasn’t happened. – Brett Favre • The best thing I ever learned in life was that things have to be worked for. A lot of people seem to think there is some sort of magic in making a winning football team. There isn’t, but there’s plenty of work. – Knute Rockne • The crowd think that Todd handled the ball…they must have seen something that nobody else did. – Barry Davies • The function of football, soccer, basketball and other passion-sports in modern industrial society is the transference of boredom, frustration, anger and rage into socially acceptable forms of combat. A temporary substitute for war; for nationalism; identification with something bigger than the self. – Edward Abbey • The game of life is a lot like football. You have to tackle your problems, block your fears, and score your points when you get the opportunity. – Lewis Grizzard • The negative side of football. The negative side of our society. People sometimes go to football and bring to it the negative aspects of our society. – Jose Mourinho • The pride and presence of a professional football team is far more important than 30 libraries. – Art Modell • The reason women don’t play football is because 11 of them would never wear the same outfit in public. – Phyllis Diller • The supreme quality for leadership is unquestionably integrity. Without it, no real success is possible, no matter whether it is on a section gang, a football field, in an army, or in an office. – Dwight D. Eisenhower • The tactical difference between Association Football and Rugby with its varieties seems to be that in the former the ball is the missile, in the latter men are the missiles. – Ernest Crawley • The town, the team, it’s a family. That has helped. For some people who have had to deal with some of the problems I have had to deal with don’t have football as an out. – Brett Favre • There are so many things about playing football that seem to me uniquely American. Anybody can succeed, anybody can play, but youve got to work hard to do it. – Dean Cain • There are two things every man in America thinks he can do: work a grill and coach football. – Greg Schiano • There is a progression of understanding vis-a-vis pro football that varies drastically with the factor of distance — physical, emotional, intellectual and every other way. Which is exactly the way it should be, in the eyes of the amazingly small number of people who own and control the game, because it is this finely managed distance factor that accounts for the high-profit mystique that blew the sacred institution of baseball off its ”national pastime” pedestal in less than fifteen years. – Hunter S. Thompson • This is a dirty business, that is why I go out and play with my heart. I feel like football players are overworked and underpaid compared to any other sports. This is like a nine to five. No guaranteed contracts, and that is the worst thing about it. – Terrell Owens • Tottenham are trying tonight to become the first London team to win this cup. The last team to do so was the 1973 Spurs team. – Mike Ingham • Violent ground-acquisition games such as football are in fact a crypto-fascist metaphor for nuclear war. – Robert Downey, Jr. • We can’t run. We can’t pass. We can’t stop the run. We can’t stop the pass. We can’t kick. Other than that, we’re just not a very good football team right now. – Bruce Coslet • Well family is obviously the most important. There was a time when I thought football was the most important. – Brett Favre • What are you doing here? Tell me why you are here. If you are not here to win a national championship, you’re in the wrong place. You boys are special. I don’t want my players to be like other students. I want special people. You can learn a lot on the football field that isn’t taught in the home, the church, or the classroom. There are going to be days when you think you’ve got no more to give and then you’re going to give plenty more. You are going to have pride and class. You are going to be very special. You are going to win the national championship for Alabama. – Bear Bryant • When I played pro football, I never set out to hurt anyone deliberately – unless it was, you know, important, like a league game or something. – Dick Butkus • Whenever I wasn’t watching the planes, I was playing community baseball, football, or something like that. – Bo Jackson • Why is it good for football to take the excitement away from fans by overcharging them for tickets to see their team? – Sepp Blatter • Women will not talk about football unless one of them is in love with a football player, and then suddenly you discover that they know everything that is to be known about it. – Jeanne Moreau • You can spend the money on new housing for poor people and the homeless, or you can spend it on a football stadium or a golf course. – Jello Biafra • You can’t be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline. It helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer. – Frank Zappa [clickbank-storefront-bestselling]

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