#people walk dogs late at night in the suburbs | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

theraggedygirl11 · 2 months

Text

Tant que notre amour est fou, il défiera toutes les lois

SUMMARY: Jan is a sorcerer. Nace is a human. An "accident" makes them meet and since then they are in each other's mind.

PAIRING: Nace Jordan/Jan Peteh

WARNINGS: swearing, and nothing else in particular, maybe some tears lmao

WORDS COUNT: 2.844

LINK: AO3

NOTES: First of all, I'd like to thank @mrsebastianmoran that created this amazing moodboard and @paperphilia who wrote this short fic inspired by that same moodboard. You two made me write my own version of dark sorcerer!Jan. Please, check both works, they are amazing!

I also thank @anxious-witch, my partner in crime (and in fangirling too) and beta reader.

I might come back to this au, maybe with a sequel. Who knows.

* * *

Oh, mon amour (oh, my love) Tu es ma chance (you are my chance) Si je renonce (if I give up) Plus rien n'a de sens (nothing makes sense anymore) Oh, mon amour (oh, my love) La robe blanche (this white dress) Est la réponse à leurs offenses (is the reply to their offenses)

On se moque - Molière l’Opéra Urbain

It all happened so fast that Nace wasn't able to realise what was really occurring. It still felt like a vivid dream.

He was walking home in the city centre of Ljubljana. It was late at night, he had just finished playing with his band at an event in a local cafe when he noticed a shadow moving fast in the corner of his eye.

He stopped and looked back. He saw nothing, he was alone in that street. He gulped, then decided to walk faster, marching towards his house, that wasn't even that far away.

But as soon as he turned, in front of him there was a huge shadow figure, with red flaming eyes and an enormous, open mouth in which he could clearly see fangs as sharp as knives and as white as the Moon itself.

He was petrified. His first thought was "this must be a nightmare". He needed to wake up, yet he couldn't do it. No, that was reality. A monster made of pure darkness was about to kill him and he couldn't do anything about it.

He closed his eyes, praying to whatever deity he had in mind in that moment, not ready to die. He waited and waited but nothing happened.

He heard a noise made by metal links, banging against one another.

"How many times have I told you that you are not allowed to go around and scare people?"

Who was talking? Nace opened his eyes and that shadow creature now looked more like a dog that was getting scolded by his owner. Around his neck there was a metal collar connected to a metal chain. A man was near the creature, holding its chain, and he was talking to it like it was his own-he was the owner of that monster?!

"You are grounded. No more freedom to roam around the city until you learn to behave, ok?"

The creature whimpered while looking at its owner.

"No. Shut up. I won't change my mind. You could have killed innocent people! You must learn to behave, or I will send you back to Hell."

The strange man sighed, then turned to Nace. "Sorry. My hellhound is learning to behave in the hum-"

Nace was pale and still petrified. The weird man dressed in black kept looking at him.

"You are human." He murmured.

Nace saw him trying to get closer. At the same moment he felt his own body go numb, his vision blurred and then black surrounded him.

"Oh, fuck-" were the last words he heard before fainting.

* * *

Jan obviously didn't mention what happened the night before with that (handsome) human to Kris.

He didn't want to be scolded like a child. He was one of the strongest dark sorcerers of the Balkan covenant, but he struggled to control his hellhound. It was a bit shameful for him, to be honest.

That day Kris and he were at the local market in the suburbs of Ljubljana because they needed to buy stuff for their group of sorcerers.

"Go to Marija, I need these herbs and ingredients for my potions and magic cures." Kris handed him a piece of paper with a list of stuff in it. He was a healer, his dominant element was water.

Jan took the list and nodded. He needed stuff from Marija too for some of his spells.

"I'll go to Primož, Bojan needs his animal blood for his damn blood magic."

"He's always so lazy, he never goes to buy it himself." Jan shook his head.

Kris sighed. "I know and I hate him for that."

They then split to do their chores. It was at Marija's stall that Jan felt observed by familiar eyes. He turned and right behind him there was the human he had met the night before.

"It's you," he said, his eyes widening in shock.

"I think you mistook me for someone else." Jan immediately replied. He turned again to the stall to get his bags full of herbs and other stuff, then paid Marija and tried to go away quickly.

The human had other plans however, he followed him and grabbed his arm.

"I knew that it was all true, it couldn’t be a dream."

Jan turned again to look at him. Their faces were so close.

"I don't know what you are talking about."

"You know. That...that shadow monster. You called it a hellhound. And you controlled him."

"It was probably a dream, as you mentioned before."

"I'm not crazy, I know what I saw!" His voice got louder. Some people around them turned to look at them.

Jan's heart sank in his chest. The look in that human’s eyes was begging for answers, begging him to confirm what he saw that night.

“What did you do to me then? I woke up in my room, in my house!”

"It's better if you forget everything, man. Trust me.” He whispered.

"Jan, is everything ok?" That was Kris. Jan felt his presence behind him.

"Yeah, don't worry. This man thought I was someone else he knew." And he cast a quick spell in his voice to force that stranger to free his arm.

He went away with Kris, leaving that human in the middle of the market. He turned to look at him with a guilty glance. He could almost touch his confusion with his hands. “I’m sorry”, he thought.

* * *

In the next few days Jan kept thinking about that human, about his eyes and his hand around his arm. He still felt his touch against his skin like a fire mark. In the end he decided to look for him, he deserved answers, even if it was against every law that ruled sorcerers around the world: humans mustn’t know about magic. He didn’t care, he felt so guilty.

After a quick location spell, he found the stranger in a park in the suburb of the city. It was getting dark outside, so it was easier for him to use shadows to travel to his destination. He appeared in front of him. The human was holding his head between his hands and he was staring at the ground while sitting on a bench.

“I think I owe you some explanations.”

The stranger lifted his head and looked at Jan. His eyes opened wide, but the initial shock became anger. “Did you come here to make me look like a fool again? Wasn’t enough what you did today at the market?”

His rage hit him like a dagger in the heart. “N-no.” He replied. “I want to talk to you.” He raised his hands, a gesture of surrender. “May I?” He asked then, pointing to the empty space near him on that bench.

The stranger nodded, but his look was still angry.

Jan took a couple of deep breaths before starting to talk. “What you saw yesterday was real. It was a hellhound.” He stopped for a second. “My hellhound. And I have problems with controlling it.” He sighed. “I’m a sorcerer. My specialty is dark magic.” He turned to look at the human. He felt judged by his eyes.

“A sorcerer that practises magic.” The human repeated. “Like...Harry Potter?”

“Hm...kind of, yeah. We are completely different from that...hm, representation. That it’s just completely wrong, to be honest. We don’t need a piece of wood to cast spells.” And to make him understand better, he raised his hand and called a small dark flame on his palm.

The man startled and jumped a bit backwards. Jan made the flame disappear. “I shouldn’t tell you all this, but I felt guilty for how I treated you,” he explained. “Usually, when one of us ends up revealing magic to humans, we cancel their memories. I hate playing with people’s minds.”

“A dark sorcerer who’s worried about a stranger? Shouldn’t dark sorcerers be evil?”

“That’s kinda biased. Just because we bond with darkness and shadows, it doesn’t mean that we are evil.” Jan crossed his arms. “I fought against evil water and air sorcerers.” He even raised an eyebrow.

The stranger giggled. Jan smiled, seeing the anger disappearing from his face and his eyes. The human kept asking Jan questions and he tried to answer, without giving away too much information about his world. He explained that sorcerers were born with a dominant element that guided their magic, that they all studied how to control and use their magic according to this element and also specialised in different roles based on the nature of their magic.

Jan was a dark sorcerer, so his magic was mainly offensive, focused on curses and powerful destructive spells. He was also able to control people, summon creatures from Hell, like demons or hellhounds, control shadows and travel through them, bond with animals that lived at night and cast protection spells that could harm if activated.

It was too late to continue talking, so they decided to meet again. Both enjoyed the time they spent together that evening. It wasn’t against the covenant rules to have friends among humans, in the end.

“Oh, what’s your name, by the way?” The sorcerer asked.

“Nace.” The human smiled. “Yours?”

“Jan.” He replied with a shy smile.

“Nice to meet you, sorcerer Jan, then.” Nace giggled. “Till the next time.”

“Till the next time, human Nace.” And he vanished in the shadow, just like he appeared there a few hours before.

* * *

Weeks passed. Jan and Nace kept hanging out together. They talked about everything outside of magic and sorcery. They met in various places, sometimes the sorcerer used his magic to travel with his human friend.

Jan started feeling something weird inside of him while he was with Nace. His heart beat faster, he took every excuse to initiate physical touch between them. When they weren’t together, he missed him so much and he felt like there was an emptiness in his chest.

“Kris, may I ask you something?” He entered his friend’s lair.

He raised his head from the table where he was working on some potions. “Yeah, sure. Tell me.”

“How did you realise you fell in love with Bojan?”

“Well, we spent a lot of time together. I missed him when I wasn’t with him. The world gained colours when the feelings started blooming. And the deep and wild waters inside of me calmed the moment I felt his presence, a stormy ocean becoming a placid sea. And this happens also today, nothing changed.” Kris answered, then looked at his friend. “Why did you ask this?”

“I...think I’m in love with a person.” He admitted.

“Really?” Kris smiled. “Who is this person?”

“It’s a human.”

That smile on Kris’s face disappeared instantly. “You know that’s forbidden by our laws.”

“I know, but I don’t care. This person soothes the shadows in me.” He looked Kris in the eyes. “There's been a light in me since I started hanging out with them.”

“The Council won’t allow you to date this person, Jan.” He stood up and went closer to his friend. “It’s a human.”

“I hate these rules! Just because they want to keep our damn power from mixing with humans, we are not allowed to date who we love!” He shouted.

“These rules exist to protect us and our community. What if the wrong people discover that we exist? We already have sorcerers that turn evil, we don’t need humans to meddle with us too.”

Kris was right. As much as Jan wanted to reply, his friend was right. They already had their problems to deal with.

Jan felt tears invading his eyes. “...I love him, Kris.” He whispered, voice trembling. “I’ve never felt this way for anyone else. I-I can’t leave him.”

Kris hugged his friend and gently caressed his back. Jan hid his face against his neck. He felt the shadows agitating in him, reeling like whirlpools. He grabbed his friend’s shirts while starting to cry silently, his shaking shoulders were the only sign that he was crying.

“I’m sorry, Janči.” Kris whispered.

But Jan wasn’t surrendering so easily. He was taught how to fight, how to resist, and how to persevere to reach his goal. And he didn’t want to lose Nace. If he wasn’t allowed to stay with a human without going against those laws, the only solution was to defy them.

Some days after his decision, Jan met with Nace in the park where he revealed he was a sorcerer. His human was on the same bench too. He smiled when he saw his dear friend.

“Hi, Janči.”

“Hi, Nace.” He sat next to him, smiling. For a couple of seconds his eyes stopped on Nace’s lips.

“Is everything ok? It’s early for you.”

“I needed to meet you because I wanted to say something to you.” He explained while looking him in the eyes. He grabbed one of his hands and intertwined their fingers.

“Yeah, sure, tell me.” He nodded.

“Remember when I told you about our covenants?”

“Yes, I remember that covenants are exclusives for sorcerers and humans are not allowed in.”

Jan sighed and lowered his eyes on their hands. “There’s more about it. We are allowed to have human friends, but not relationships with humans. The elders say that it’s a matter of mixed blood not strong enough to carry magic and other stuff.”

“Ok, but why are you tell-oh.”

Their eyes met again. There was only silence between them. Nace freed Jan’s hand, then cupped his face and kissed him, slowly. Their foreheads touched when their lips parted.

“I was afraid you didn’t love me back.” Confessed Nace with a delicate voice, almost inaudible. “Just because I’m a mere human and you are an amazing sorcerer.”

“Don’t ever think about it, my love. You are as important as I am.” Jan cupped Nace’s face and caressed his cheeks.

They stayed in that position for seconds, maybe minutes. The first to interrupt that intimate moment was Jan.

“We need to go far away from here.” Said Jan.

“It’s because of what you told me before?” Nace asked while caressing his cheek.

“Yes, unfortunately.” He nodded. “I don’t want to give you up. No one can force me to do it. I don’t care if I need to become a fugitive or a traitor of my own kind. I just know that you calm the chaos created by the shadows in me.”

“I calm the shadows in you?”

“Yes, Nace.” Jan nodded. He grabbed his hand and put it on his heart. “Magic is this raw power inside of us. We learn to harness it, but there’s always a possibility that we lose control. Love can help us find a balance. You are the lighthouse that shines my way through this stormy darkness.”

“I help you this much?”

Jan nodded, then kissed him again. “Run away with me, my love. We can start over somewhere else where people don’t know us. And I can protect us with my magic. I won’t allow anyone to touch you. I’m strong, they fear me.”

* * *

Nace hesitated at the beginning, but the next day he accepted the offer. In those past months he learned to love Jan and his true nature. He wasn’t scared of him, he was a lovely and kind person, maybe his only flaw was his ability to get lost so deep into his mind and in his thoughts. But Nace loved him so much even when he dove into his mind and he stared at him with heart eyes for hours.

They ran away in northern Europe a few days later. They found a small house in a village not so far from the capital of the country they chose, so they could live in a quiet place but were also close to a bigger city in case they needed anything.

It was hard to get used to the new habits, but they managed to in the end. Jan kept practising his magic, learning new stuff and new spells while Nace began working in the capital as a professional musician and then even as a bass guitar teacher in music schools.

That night when they met neither of them could imagine what would have happened. Maybe Jan’s hellhound knew something they didn’t and escaped from his owner so he could meet the love of his life. Or perhaps it was just a coincidence of events that led them to living together as runaways.

They only knew one thing, that they were luckier than Romeo and Juliet, because they got the chance to live their prohibited love, even if they had to abandon their previous life behind. Neither of them regretted that decision.

#my first jance i hope it's a good one #tant que notre amour est fou il défiera toutes les loi #joker out fanfic #joker out #my writing #annies writes #jance #jan peteh #nace jordan

21 notes · View notes

trivialbob · 5 months

Text

Last night Sheila and I drove to a far suburb for a party at the house of some people we know. Because it was going to be late night and a bit of a drive, we got a hotel room. We hired a young woman in the neighborhood to stay overnight with our dogs.

The party was nice, but it's breakfast the next day that I want to write about.

The hotel provided the typical free breakfast. The little dining area was clean, the food was fresh, and the coffee hot and plentiful. But it's the same hotel breakfast we've had plenty of time. Lucky for us, across the parking lot was a family owned restaurant known for bakery and breakfast dishes.

We were seated promptly. Our timing was excellent, because a small line soon formed at the waiting area by the front door.

This is one of those places where the servers, like the hash browns, are well seasoned. These competent women were really good, even the youngest one. How do they hire someone new who seemingly has five years of experience already working in that very same restaurant?

Even though a single server was assigned to our table, every other time a different one walked by she'd check on us. It's quite possible I could have had a refill of hot coffee after every three sips. I didn't need that much coffee, so I declined. Had I dropped a fork it likely wouldn't have hit the floor, as one of those servers would have caught it and had a new one in my hand before I knew it.

If the tables were nucleui in atoms, the bus boy was an electron, constantly moving around them. When his hands were full the servers grabbed what they could to help out.

We could see plates coming out of the kitchen. I ordered corned beef hash, but with each plate for other people I observed I second guessed my choice. Until I got my corned beef hash.

There was a lot of food. It was another instance where Sheila and I should have split a meal. I devoured my hash and eggs. A piece of toast the size of a license plate covered half my plate. When I moved it I found another helping of hash!

Sheila ordered her favorite breakfast, eggs Benedict. Most of it came home for lunch or dinner.

Nothing made us feel rushed. The employees simply do their best to not waste a nanosecond of anyone's time. Turnover is swift. It's not unlike fast forwarding through TV commercials. No need for that fluff, just get to the meat and potatoes of the program.

Payment is at the front counter. There's none of that song and dance about here's the check, come back, grab a card, bring it back with a receipt, sign the check, put card away.

When we returned after being away 21 hours the dogs acted like they'd been in solitary confinement for a year. I am absolutely certain the woman who watched them did a good job. The dogs are just drama queens.

#Maybe Quantum Mechanics would be a good name for this style of restaurant service #The cinnamon rolls were as big as footballs

45 notes · View notes

scoops404 · 8 months

Text

Droncert report!!

Okay this got long so, it's under the cut <3

Hi, it's me! Okay well, here's a little anecdote from me. I'll walk you guys through the whole shebang. I worked all day Wednesday and then packed up, grabbed my dog, and drove an hour to my parents house in the suburbs so I could leave Padme there (my dog, Padme Amidala). Got there pretty late (wanted to miss traffic), went to bed trying to sleep early, knowing I needed to be up early enough to make it Orlando with plenty of time. The plan was to have enough time to take a quick nap when I got to my hotel.

Padme woke me up like 3 times throughout the night to go potty (I think a bit of leftover anxiety, she always knows when something's happening, when I pack a suitcase lol). Anyway, didn't sleep very well because of that. BUT!!! I found an awesome audiobook to listen to by Naomi Novik called "Uprooted" and it's so good but so long and I'm still listening to it. Fun fact, Naomi Novik is astolat on ao3 and started ao3 and I adore her.

I only stopped once for like 20 minutes to get gas and to text my discord that I made it to Florida, and I just kinda cruised getting more and more excited (but also anxious) -- got to the hotel. The check in girls were like oh you're just here for a night, what are you doing? and i was like okay well, don't judge me, BUTTT... and they were really sweet that I drove in for one night for a concert. ANYWAY, got to my room, took a much needed shower, texted KB to figure out where she is (KB, for those of you who don't know is one of the kindest people in the fandom, an older fan, but SOOO lovely with comments and spreading positivity, etc and I'm lucky enough to be in a discord with her and we realized we were both going so we figured we'd meet up. If she wasn't going, I probably wouldn't have gone, so I really owe her)

KB walked me through getting there, parking, picking up my ticket, etc. So i ended up getting there around 4ish. Got a corndog and took two bites before it broke (sad) and then went and found KB. She was in line with the other fans who got there at noon, and I could already see the VIP line and catbeanies everywhere lol. It was so cute!

Then, I knew Leah thievesluck had made a cat beanie for me so I wanted to meet up with her. She's sooo nice and has always been really kind online and that definitely transferred into real life. She was standing in the VIP line with puppybird and kyrankat (kkmbrly as I think of her) who were also both incredibly kind and we got to talk fics and writing and reading lol.

Back with KB, the girl in line behind me (she had to be like 18 but i am so bad with ages on people now) was really sweet and getting excited when new fans would walk by to join the end of the line. She had gathered the little group around us and everyone was talking about their favorite things and passing around chargers and bracelets. It was really sweet! She mentioned Ira snowdrmr who is one of my friends in the writing sphere and I DM'd Ira really quick to be like omg someone said something so sweet about you (because my favorite thing to do is spread when someone says something nice about one of my friends or one of their fics, lol)

Once the VIPs got in, they moved our line up to in front of the house of blues and put a water thing at the front, so we got a few shots of water, which was really thoughtful. Everyone was checking twitter and looking at the pictures of Dream and George arriving, and later when Sapnap arrived. The girl in front of me was a bit older (maybe 22ish? once, again, bad with names) but she had really lovely purple highlights in her hair and she was on a twitter space. Someone behind us passed glowsticks up so I put one around my neck like a necklace. I can't stress enough how sweet everyone was being and like safe and secure in a group of people who all love dream. No one made me feel weird for being older, which was appreciated haha.

Anyway, so then it starts raining... yikes. People shared umbrellas with strangers and I turned my back to the rain and just let it hit my back and so I was fine. I think they let us in a little early because of the rain (if so, thank you!) so we went in and got very good spots, dead center, and like halfway back. For two hours fans kept each other entertained by writing things on their phones and holding them up and then everyone would cheer. It was really quite (thought tbr it got a little annoying after a while but i am OLD and my patience was wearing thin after driving all day on no sleep and very little food, so I knew i was just being cranky so i let it go)

KB was the first person to spot manager Ken and then like ten minutes later everyone else did, and then we entertained ourselves watching people play rock paper scissors with him from the balcony. From our spot halfway up, we couldn't see much of the balcony but we could see him on our left (stage left?) and later, I spotted hannah on the other side. Very proud of the fact that I was the first person to see Hannah and then everyone else kinda picked up on it and made her a bit uncomfortable with the attention (oops - but also, that was during the droncert, and this was before still).

The DJ comes on and it turns out he's a friend of Yung Gravy which is kinda cute, then, that Dream had him come on. He made a power point for us and it was called "Drorlando" where he wrote some things about the city and then we jammed for thirty minutes and got all hyped.

I heard rumblings of maybe drantis being there? I thought it was weird. A girl around me tried to call the venue, I saw online later that might have worked? Seems weird to pay money to go see a guy you like, but okay? Also, yall, i am SO nosy like i was in my element eavesdropping on everyone, it's one of my favorite things to do and when you're packed that tightly, there's no room for secrets.

AND THEN...

Dream came on and it was magical. My first impression, I'm so sorry to say and it's with all the love in my entire heart, but his head is massive. Like it's so big. I didn't think much of it in pictures but standing twenty feet from him, it's a big head. And I love him so much. The cat beanies being too small makes so much sense now. It's a big head and a lot of curls and he looked amazing and sounded amazing and I love him. This was my main takeaway because it shocked me so much, but he looked great. He's a big dude. (I also had this thought when I met Dan and Phil years ago, like they're bigger IRL than on screens - something about when you can see them in relation to your own size, it makes sense somehow?)

Anyway, the concert went about like I thought! You could tell he was definitely live singing at points because 1) the mic but also 2) he would stop in the middle of the stage and close his eyes like he was really focusing on it. ((Once again saying this with all the love in my heart and I have no problem with it because it's a live show and I'd rather have a good show than 100% real authentic vocals the entire time, but it was clear there was parts with the track playing. But also, I noticed this at the Taylor Swift concert so once again, I don't care, but I did want to point it out that the times he was clearly live singing were VERY good. He sang parts of Panic Attack for us with no music or backing or anything and then we sang it back, and that sounded really really good, so, grain of sand and all that))

We played games in between some songs, which I liked because the EP is only like 19 minutes and even with the added songs, none of them are like long rambling songs, so it was fine with me to add some fun elements. [this is where he went to change his clothes and for a few seconds in between with nothing to keep our attention, I spotted Hannah]. Quickly, though, Sapnap came out and we had to pick the correct Dream and I'm very happy to announce that I knew right away which Dream was *our* Dream. It did make me wonder who the guys were under the other masks but whatever

There was another bit later with balls in the audience and we were supposed to put them in the basket for the song we wanted, slowed down version of Slow Down versues sped up version of Everest (which he had just played so we were all kinda eager for the song we hadn't heard yet) he said "balls" really funny and we laughed at him, and then he told us we sucked at the game later, which was funny and definitely something only our Dream would say to us. Like it's hard to imagine JLo playing a concert and telling her fans they suck at something and them liking it, lol, it was funny.

There were a couple times he sat down which was bad for me because I couldn't see him, but the pictures I've seen since then looked awesome.

Anyway, I spent my time singing along and recording the songs my friends definitely wanted to see all the while my phone battery dropped down below 10%. I also was trying to make eye contact and let him know he was doing great (like a fun auntie lmao) and I think it worked once or twice -- i was like dead center and halfway back and I'm kinda tall so he might have seen me.

And then he announced he was done (a lie, we all know concerts go like that) and we chanted for him to come back, and THEN we chanted for GeorgeNotFound lmao and then he came back out and announced he had 3 more songs and then announced "gogy" and I recorded that song and omgggg it was so funny. Later I put that one on twitter because i focused EXCLUSIVELY on George like the simp I am. Panic Attack and Trust Issues were both also really cool and I think I'll have to listen back later and let the lyrics take me tf out but when he got to the part of trust issues he hadn't finished and literally sang "i didn't finish these lyrics here" it was very funny and painfully Dream, like so endearing.

Anyway, that's all I can report back on the actual event itself. Very fun! I met up with Pondsofkoi right after the droncert and then I was about dead tired from driving all day, no food, very little water, a ball of anxiety in my chest all day, and standing for hours, so I went back to my hotel and passed tf out. Woke up the next morning and drove home and then made my parents feed me while I picked up Padme.

And here I am! Oh, and I did watch the twitch part of sapnap's stream last night which was fun

I do want to say, I love Dream so much. I admire him because he doesn't do anything halfway. He puts his entire Dreamussy into everything and anything he does and he doesn't stop until it's as excellent as he can make it. He's innovative and charismatic, and I just think he has the biggest heart (and head lol) in the world. He could have easily become bitter after the way he's been treated, could have become acerbic and rude and closed off, but instead, he's open and loving, and kind, and overflowing with creativity.

#droncert #scoops live from the scene #except later

13 notes · View notes

harrison-abbott · 10 months

Text

NOCTURNAL WOODS (1992)

When I was a boy I was never able to sleep well. I hated school and when I usually slept for a couple of hours when I got in, meaning I’d be up in the evening doing what I liked to do, which was read and watch films etc. This meant that I wasn’t tired in the late evening like neurotypical people, and I’d stay up into the a.m. hours.

My mother disliked this and I went into this routine naively, because I still needed to go to the toilet and move around the house. And when I woke her up with bangs I’d get a beating. She was quite the monster when deducted sleep. So I learned how to sneak quietly. I learned how to place my feet on the right floorboards, avoiding the others which would wince. It was intense and like a game and I enjoyed it.

I loved the dark and its sense of creation. Daylight made a new world and in the dark there were other possibilities. People are not designed to function in the night and that’s what I liked about it.

To this day I’m usually up at night. I’m not as quick with reading as a man but I still have insomnia or am only to rest in four-hour bouts. It doesn’t bother me much.

But, anyway, Davies gave me a new case. Two people had been murdered in a park in a south side suburb of the city. Shot. I looked over the files and information. They were shot in the early morning; one was a middle-aged man walking his dog, the other an elderly woman taking a stroll … Their bodies were found cold around nine or ten a.m. by other dogwalkers, who called the police.

Thus the victims must have been shot when it was still dark. Or during very low light. And thus I knew that the killer must the same admiration for the night as I did. I told Davies that I’d get right on it. I was intrigued.

I drove down to this suburban area. I met up with the teams who had sealed off the most recent murder scene with the old lady. There was no possibility of her being killed for a reason. It was obvious we were dealing with somebody of a serial psychopathic nature who would be looking to attack again soon. The spot where she was shot was wide open and near a handsome little bridge above the river.

“Morning, sir,” I shook hands with the cop who was in charge.

“Morning, Walter.”

“So have your team searched around the area yet?”

“We cut the woods off to the public yesterday. We did a routine scout around the area yesterday afternoon. It was raining like crazy and we didn’t find anything.”

I looked around. The valley rose up in a steep ascent where the trees were muffled by dense ivy.

“Did you check up the valley, sir?” I asked.

“We went over the woods in a general way, so yes, but we were waiting for today to do a proper search.”

I took this as a no.

“Okay,” I said, “I’m going to head up the valley now and have a mosey.”

The men stayed behind and I teetered up the hill alone. Indeed the strands were slippery with the recent rainfall; my breath puffed out in clumsy clouds. I got maybe fifty metres up and looked down at the bridge with the policemen by it. What I was looking for was some kind of vantage point where I expected the killer to have shot from.

I scanned the ground and went through the branches of the trees. There were many places where he could get an easy shot from this range. But I simply didn’t find any evidence of him being there. So I went back down the valley.

“Find anything, detective?” the cop said to me.

“I didn’t, no. But could you take me to the spot where the other person was shot? The man?”

As we went along the trail I scanned the landscape. These were fairly heavy woods and any whiff of urbanity was a half-mile off. We ducked away from the river where the path led down under another hillside. Rocky and craggy with birches clung to its canvass. The policeman showed me where the man had been shot.

“What happened to his dog?” I said. “The dead man’s dog.”

“His dog? Oh, I actually didn’t think about that. I think somebody found it.”

The rockface arose wildly above me. I noticed it came to an abrupt end at the top – a distance high enough to kill you if you jumped from there. I told the policeman I was going to go searching again and he could come if he wanted but he refrained and said he would stay behind.

I obviously couldn’t climb the rock bit directly so I went into the woods the far side of it and picked my way through the ferns and thickets, using the tree roots to lever myself up. Was quite fun. I reached the top and came up to the area at the top of the cliff.

There were footprints in the mud. Boots, a man’s size, a big man. I avoided them and edged my way towards the clifftop. I could see the policeman at the bottom. Another perfect shooting position. Then I saw something in the grass, and I went closer. It was a flask. As in, a coffee flask, lying there. He’d left it behind. By it the grass was leaden down as if somebody had been sitting there reading.

Good stuff. I knew I would have to wait for this man. He would be returning here again to kill or perhaps he was still here already, spying on me. Maybe I could lure him out and tempt him into a duel. Either way it would have to be done at night. The quickest way to catch him would be through some form of espionage. He would not strike in the day. Only in the nocturnal escapism of the woods.

I told my plan to Davies on the phone. He was uneasy about it. I told him I wanted to do it alone.

“So you reckon there’s a good chance he’s still in the woods?” Davies said.

“I just have a hunch, boss.”

“As in, he’s camping out there? How big is the forest anyway?”

“He very well might be and it’s large enough to hide in.”

“You sure you don’t want to have a team with you?”

“It would work better with one man.”

“Well, if that’s how you want to proceed then so be it.”

I ordered the policemen in the woods to keep the area off-limits to the public. Then they could leave. I drove to the nearest supermarket and got some whisky in. I sat in my car near the woodland and read the newspaper, waiting for it to get dark. There was a pretty sunset and then the night cloaked the area and all fell silent, and I set out into the woods.

The only tactic was to explore; I didn’t quite have a plan save to find further clues he might have left. So I took off the public trail and went into the rough parts. The ivy covered everything like an evergreen plague. And a thick frost multiplied on the leaves in a magical haze. The whiteness of the frost gave off small light which helped me in an arena which was otherwise pitch black.

I saw something ahead of me in the gloom. It slid across the frosty ivy every so faintly. Then there was a rustle in the trees ahead of it. I followed and came to said trees and looked down the other side, onto a hillside where this shape was angling down it. He moved fast and skilful down the slope. That was him, that was the killer. I didn’t expect to find him so fast.

A tingle came over my body. I brought my bottle out and drank as his body reached the bottom of the hill. It was like being in a film, or watching something cryptic in a play. When he vanished into a new group of trees I pursued.

I was bemused at how easy he descended the slope because it was gnarly and lubricious. I fumbled down it slow and awkward, all the whiles losing time on the man below me. And I reached the bottom and looked into an abyss of trees and couldn’t see him. I’d also lost the point where I’d seen him last – was confused. I chose a location and ventured. Then I caught a smell of something.

Woodsmoke.

That pearly homely smell. It came from behind me, which proved I’d gone the wrong way. So I followed the woodsmoke instead and came to a cluster of holly bushes. Through the leaves I saw the miraculous glow of firelight. I peeled closer and peered through the branches.

I saw him perched by a bonfire. He was working at something in front of him: I was too far away to see what it was but it looked like he was knitting. As I watched I drank, feeling smug that he didn’t know I was there. Then he stopped whatever he was doing and he put something into a bag. Then he left the bag there and moved off into the woods again and vanished from view. I came out of the hollies and went up to the bonfire.

The rucksack was small and I looked inside it. There was a bottle of water, some apples, a pencil and a notebook. I looked inside it and there were all kinds of slinky handwriting inside it. The letters were so small I couldn’t read it.

Suddenly I heard a noise ahead of me in the trees and I flinched and tucked the book back in the bag and then ran off. I dove into the bushes as the killer came back to his fire. He came up to the flames and I saw his frame for the first proper time. He was huge. And he’d stopped and was looking at his bag. Because it had changed position. I’d moved it.

Then he brought his rife out and started looking around the trees. I swallowed and then crouched up. The killer took a torch out and clicked it on and the battery beam of it was wondrous in the night. He held the rifle in one hand and torch in another and came towards where I was hiding. Closer and closer and suddenly the dark was undone. The torch overpowered the weeds and bushes.

I stood up and ran and simultaneously the light hit me. He swore. Then he took aim and fired. And a gush of timber spat out of the tree trunk in front of me and I ran on. I dove through more tree trunks. He shot a second time and the bullet whistled into time but didn’t hit me. I pulled my own gun out and ran. There was no way of telling where he was and the other immediate danger was running into one of these trees.

Something snagged my foot and I fell over, cartoonish, landing on my face. Then I saw him lurking between the trees. Hunting. Thirty yards from me and then twenty and I was on the floor watching him. His torch whipped about and then it found me.

His face disappeared behind the torchlight. He brought his rifle up and shot. My body jarred and jolted aside. I felt a tremendous weakness. The torchlight beamed closer and closer. I brought my pistol out and shot at it. I shot at the torch, not the human, and that made it easier. And the torch twirled away.

I heard the man gasp and grunt. The torch was lying in the weeds and I could dimly see the killer squirming on the floor. I’d shot him somewhere in the torso.

My left knee was shot. First time I’d ever been whacked by a bullet. I had a clear aim at him again and it would’ve been easy to shoot a second time. I hesitated.

He grumbled up and got a stance and lumbered away from me. I could have capped him then but I didn’t, I didn’t want to.

The reverb of the gun battle still hung in the woods in failed echoes.

I turned my lighter on and looked at my gunshot wound. It had blown away a chunk of the lower calf. Not good but not lethal if I could get to a hospital in time. Okay, so I needed to get out of the woods. First thing I needed to do was stand up. I scrawled over to a tree trunk and lifted myself up using my right leg for support. And the blood flumed down my left knee in hot currents.

There was a branch above me which might serve as a crutch for the time being. I broke it off. It was tall and sturdy enough and a lucky find. Then I drank. I downed as much as I could for the next journey.

And as I went I got thinking about my mother in the old house again, when I used to sneak around to try and play with her. My mother always seemed old and irritable. She never spoke much and never particularly liked me … Did I sneak around the house because I wanted to prove one of her tantrums? Maybe I enjoyed those explosive bells when I woke her up by mistake … And maybe I got so good at evasion that I had no relationship with her at all.

And now I was here in the woods with a firm possibility of bleeding to death. I wasn’t going to go out without being drunk. Fuck that. So I drank as much as I could and then I came to the river.

I didn’t even know I was that close to the river but suddenly there I was and there was no other option save to jump it. So I jumped. And I landed about a yard off the bank the other side. And I tried to jump with my walking stick but it fell away and the current took it downstream. I came out of the water laughing, and headed out of the dead shrubbery. And I came upon the main trail.

The public trail – I was here! I recognised where I was suddenly, a little bit. If I followed it west I should come upon the scene where the woman was murdered. And I walked along it, an idiot, a failed detective, a failed spy. I reached the taped-off scene of the woman.

I wondered why a good woman like that deserved to die compared to a vagabond like me. Maybe she wasn’t a good woman; maybe she had an insidious past filled with selfish vengeance and greed and was like that until she was shot in the head by some random lunatic in the forest. Who knows. That’s what crime is there for.

The trail continued and I came upon the streetlamps beyond the trees in the far distance and knew I was going to survive. There was further tape on the main entrance to the park and I ducked under it and went along the road and found my car and I got inside and tried not to think about my leg.

I didn’t really feel much in the way of panic. Perhaps I’d been trying to kill myself for such a long time there wasn’t much difference in the current situation …

The bottle was nearly dry. I knew that there was a big hospital on the south side of the city. It was only a ten minute drive away in fact. Handy.

It felt good to be back in urbanity. And the car warmed me up. I stuck the radio on and a national audio brought me back to society – a place where I never belonged. And I finished my bottle on the way to the hospital and met not a single other car in the indigo icy morning.

THE END

#writeblr #creative writing #Detective L Walter #speculative fiction #cops and robbers #noir fiction #crime fiction #prose #short story

16 notes · View notes

waterspoutskies · 3 months

Text

NBC made a pair of podcast series' about my childhood hometown area.

Ok, I've been formatting this post for a hot minute but given the timing. The primaries start in two weeks. It is three weeks to Super Tuesday. And I am beginning to be sorely worried.

I'm not so steady on how to phrase this, how to explain the sheer magnitude of how and why this election matters So Very Much. (And maybe that's why I'm writing this so late at night with the fog of medication settling in.) But I will try.

I am originally from Texas- North Texas, specifically, and Northeast Tarrant County to really zoom in the lens. I grew up on the cutting edge of both gifted student and disability accessible programs, surrounded by teachers who taught us we could and would go anywhere, supported by parents who loved and fought for our futures. We lived in an idyll. An American dreamscape.

There was a battleground brewing underneath it all.

For you see, this is conservative, (majority) white, christian, suburban North Texas. And the same school where our valedictorian is gay and our prom queen is lesbian harbored the quiet laboratory for pushing intolerance to the masses- One upset megachurch attendee at a time.

First it was Southlake.

In the Southlake podcast, the topics and recordings include blatant, overt racism. They include explicit and vulgar language. There are points recounting anti-LGBTQ+ commentary, racial slurs, deriding mental illnesses, the whole nine yards. Every episode comes with a necessary warning preceding the vicious parts.

And then, god help me, it was my quiet, tolerant, always insulated hometown. Grapevine.

In the Grapevine podcast, the topics and recordings include anti-LGBTQ+ commentary of all levels. They cover conversion therapy, deadnaming, homophobia. They cover how parents ruined lives and careers for their own interest. Anything that you have seen spouted online is fair game. As with Southlake, every episode comes with a necessary warning preceding the vicious parts.

I cannot and will not make anyone listen to/read (transcripts are available for each episode) these, but I hope people will.

In short, the sum is that we do not win. In Southlake, white supremacy wins. In Grapevine, evangelical nonsense wins.

And I need people to understand that this is the kind of thing at stake in the elections this year. This is my hometown. This is where my classmates took our educational opportunities and made them political weapons. This is where the same people who shook my hand and smiled so brightly as I campaigned against them are those who want my friends in conversion therapy, run out of town, or dead.

Some of the students highlighted within these podcasts are friends and acquaintances of mine. My best friend and I walk one student's dogs when their family is on vacation. Another plays the 7 foot something war-axe wielding barbarian in our D&D campaign.

Mercifully, we have or are able to get out. But there are so many who are not as close or free to escape as we were.

So please, please, do not skip this election. Do not stay at home. Do not think your vote does not matter, because it does. Every inch we can claw back, from the municipal to the legislative to making our anger known in the primaries, it matters. This starts in your town, and yes, it does goes all the way up. But there are so. many. steps, and offices, and intervening laws, and political entities in between here and the White House. And if there is anywhere you can throw in a wrench or shock the system, you should.

A lot of queer kids in my hometown high school will thank you.

(I think, following this, I'm going to go back and try to explain a little more of the situation and the buildup to how we've gotten here, how this has been bubbling up to the surface for years longer than the last four. But not now, and not in this post. I just needed to get this out there.)

#Oh look it's 2024 #2024 elections #us elections #US politics #politics #Please vote #Please dear god go vote #This isn't me trying to be alarmist. This happened and is still happening.#Please learn from us.

2 notes · View notes

just-a-pole-sir · 5 months

Text

#matthew daddario #people walk dogs late at night in the suburbs #matthewdaddarioedit #mine

353 notes · View notes

criscura · 2 years

Text

People have been asking about the hitman!AU in Risky Business, and it makes me so happy 😭❤️❤️ I figured I'd mention that I have a shit ton of other AUs I'm low-key thinking about all the time too, if anyone is interested:

Prodigal prince pirate AU: Saitama and Genos were betrothed princes as children, but while Genos is away at a finishing school, the rest of the royal family is assassinated. The powers that be let the rumor spread that Genos died too so that he's not hunted out. Not long after he stops contacting anyone from home and the kingdom falls into the hands of whatever nobles are left. Over the years Saitama misses him more and more, resigned to having lost him, until he hears whispers that the prince has come home to port. He goes to he dock asking for a skinny dandelion of a boy...only to be greeted by a massive, sun-kissed man with one glass eye and half his limbs made from metal. It's his smile, though, that gives him away. The "mysterious sailor" is folded into the royal guard that Saitama captains while they figure out how to get Genos back to his rightful place as king...and try to make up for the time stolen from them. Church AU: Genos, having survived the car crash that killed her parents, is taken in by her sweet Uncle Kuseno in a small suburb. She's furious with everything and everyone--including herself--and doesn't know how to move on. He's tried everything he can think of to help her, and in a last ditch effort, suggests that she comes to church with him. He promises the pastor is a great (having been an ex-convict makes him far more accepting than most), but if she doesn't like it, she never needs to come back. Said pastor stops her from nearly punching out one of the other churchgoers who bothers her about her prosthetics. Instead of kicking her out, though, he shows her better form so she doesn't hurt herself. She asks to learn more from him, and he says she can help at the church, if she likes. She does. Along the way she discovers he's just as haunted by his past as she is, and wonders if maybe, possibly, just a little, she can't help him too.

Summer Lovin' (Peeping tom): It's so easy to make money online nowadays, if that's all you do. So Saitama does. He streams, he makes Tiktoks, he's got an OnlyFans... You say it's got a payout and Saitama's there. It's enough to cover his share of the rent for the house he's got with King and Mumen along with getting him some good food every now and again, and that's all he can ask for. The neighborhood's pretty nice too--especially when that gorgeous college kid across the street comes home for the summer. He doesn't expect, though, for said gorgeous kid to start talking to him one day, or want to hang out with him, or help make videos, or spend all day goofing off at the beach with him... He's so smart--he's some biology major, right?--and so bashful Saitama doesn't even know how to make a move on him. Would he even get it if he tried? It would be easier if Genos wasn't so damned innocent. Oh well. He's gotta get home to make that request video for that mystery man who's been throwing cash at his OF lately. Oh, and he should tell Genos about that weird hole in his blinds one day...

Dog Days, Summer Nights: In the mountain in the woods in a thunderstruck temple live a blasphemous priest and a cunning fox, devoted more to each other than any god they may say they pray to. But they are powerful, and many a man, woman, and child owe their life to the blessings from the pair. Visitors who've braved the walk to their doorstep wonder that there are pups there, small and sharp-toothed, who look like any other creature of the forest--but as they slip from the corner of your vision, do so on two legs and two arms, giggling with the voice of a child. Those same visitors say they felt always watched there...and it is safer to assume that they were. Where kits go, their parents are close to follow, and only a fool would get between a beast and their babe.

Yes these were almost all started for porn. No they aren't fully developed. Y E S I daydream intensely about them as bedtime stories. No I do not feel guilty that I have no idea about key features in some of them because they are cute and make my heart go dokidoki. Also I'm sure you can pick out each AU's particular kink XD

#one punch man #one punch #opm #genos #saitama #genosai #saigenos #precious robot baby #egg on legs #egg on all fours #Risky Business #hitman!au #prince!au #church!au #summer lovin!au #that's clunky but it's really what it is.....#it's just so fucking soft and fluffy T0T #oh geeze i forgot extracurricular #i'll add it later ;;;;

15 notes · View notes

ignisaurumprobat9 · 4 months

Text

this man has me.

#matthew daddario #matt daddario #people walk dogs late at night in the suburbs #people walk dogs film

45 notes · View notes

gothams-white-knight · 2 years

Text

Drabble: Life with the Hartmanns

I’m counting this toward the drabble meme!

Harvey remembered John and Irene- his grandparent’s- house very well. How could he forget it? He remembered being dropped off there as a small, sleepy boy about three or four years old. It was one of his earliest memories. It had been a dark, rainy, night. In one hand, Harvey held his mother’s hand as they walked up to the house. In the other hand, he held his little suitcase. It had a few changes of clothes, The Velveteen Rabbit, and his favorite stuffed dog.

As they stood outside the door, Dolores knelt down to his level and talked to him. He couldn’t remember what she said. Something along the lines of “Grandma and Grandpa will take care of you for a few days, okay?”

Harvey just nodded and obediently said: “Okay, Mommy.”

The next thing he remembered, he was sitting in Irene’s yellow tile kitchen, eating one of her soft chocolate chip cookies. Then it was off to bed. That was all Harvey could remember about that visit. Lissie hadn’t even been born yet.

Harvey- and later his sister- were occasionally dropped off at their grandparents’ house, on days Dolores was working late, couldn’t get a babysitter, or their afterschool program had been cancelled. John and Irene lived in the suburbs, not Gotham proper. It was a nice neighborhood where nice, respectable, people lived. Neat little ranch houses on every street. Perfectly-manicured lawns. Kids riding around on bikes.

There was no crime here. No real crime, at least. The worst that ever happened was bored housewives cheating on their husbands. Or teenagers caught smoking pot. It seemed more like a town on an old postcard than anything real. Harvey remembered the long, peach-colored sunsets. When night fell, you could see every star in the sky. No smog. No pollution.

John and Irene’s house almost felt like a museum. Or a church. You had to be very quiet at all times. And there were some things you could never, ever, touch. Like Irene’s antique porcelain vase in the hallway. Or John’s hunting rifle mounted on the living room wall. In his younger years, Harvey’s grandfather had loved to hunt. As a college student, he traveled to Wyoming, and bagged a white-tailed buck. Its head was mounted above the living room fireplace.

Lissie insisted on sleeping in Dolores’ bedroom. It was untouched since her childhood. Perfectly preserved, like an insect in amber. Pale pink walls, white lace curtains, stuffed animals arranged on the canopy bed…But Lissie loved Dolores’ dollhouse best of all. It was an ornate, Victorian-style house Irene had commissioned for one of Dolores’ birthdays. It was beautifully detailed, it looked just like a real house shrunk down to miniature. Lissie could spend hours in her mother’s old room, acting out ridiculous stories with the dollhouse family. Harvey was happy to leave her there.

Reminders of Dolores were everywhere. Her photos were scattered all over the house, showing her at every age from a chubby baby to a lovely young woman. There were pictures of Dolores playing with her beloved dog, Anya. Dolores’ first day of school. Her prom photos. Her eighteenth birthday portrait.

Her favorite books were Nancy Drew mysteries and Charlotte’s Web. All her books had THIS BOOK BELONGS TO DOLORES HARTMANN proudly written on the inside. Dolores Hartmann. A lost girl. A prodigal daughter.

As he got older, Harvey began to understand why his mother hated living here. She felt trapped. Restrained, suffocated. John and Irene’s perfect world- their perfect life- was fake. An illusion. Dolores had seen it too. No wonder, then, she ran into the arms of a man who was everything her parents warned her about.

#drabble #drabble meme

6 notes · View notes