#she doesn’t like a guy who told people to die of cancer so apparently she’s toxic according to twitter white knights for mr cancer

[the-real-list-of-ominous-threats]

I’ll make you get canceled and called part of a harassment campaign for not being friends with a guy who kind of sucks

[lexyvey]

𝐋𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐌𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬 (𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐝𝐝𝐢𝐞 𝐀𝐔)

I didn’t really have your typical upbringing. I mean, even before, when I had no mom and an alcoholic piece of shit father. All it did was make for a 12-year-old runaway burdening his Uncle Wayne’s doorstep. And sure, that’s normal-ish, but then the world ended. I don’t think anyone was really shocked – mean, yea it was shocking to the masses of mindlessly pathetic capital pigs twiddling their thumbs never asking questions of why or should I – but I digress. It wasn’t really much of a shock to those whose lives had been shaped by the Upside Down before the end of times. Robin kind of always thought it might after all the times it had screwed our little rag-tag group over, but then it finally happened. How it happened, now that’s where it gets interesting.

In 86’ we thought we’d finally defeated Vecna. I had only just joined in on the fight, but apparently, this guy was tired of waking, eating, and sleeping —or I think that’s how his evil cliche monologue went (truth be told I remembered every word because… well… he wasn’t exactly wrong on that front, but whatever) – and decided it was his purpose to turn earth into some monster fucked hellscape. The superhero girl gave him a hell of his own using magic powers though and the world was saved… except that didn’t quite end up happening. See, Max… she didn’t quite make it to the hospital before letting go. It wasn’t until two days later that everything changed.

And by “everything,” I mean cold-blooded creatures. 

And by “changed,” I mean supernatural cancer that caused temperatures to plummet and weather to shift, an overwhelming increase of fungi and sense of rot, and an unhealthy appetite for death. Flower-faced-face-sucking-fuckers, giant spider thingies, mutated bats: You name it. There’s a lot of them.

I knew this one kid, whose cat was eaten by his “pet lizard,” Dart, which turned out to be one of those juvenile flower-faced-face-sucking-fuckers. Man, Dustin loved Dart… and that cat.

So, for most of human history, if you wanted to kill a bat, all you needed was a glue trap. Well, suddenly you needed a shotgun – thank God for Nancy Wheeler. And sometimes even a tank. And sometimes… even that doesn’t work. Especially if you don’t stay in the tank.

Eventually, the really big ones and our military took each other out. We lost 95% of the human population in about a year. Mean, that’s one way to combat overpopulation issues, but… that’s a lot of Bobs… and a lot of Barbs that never deserved to die (Billy can suck my --).

Those of us who survived, we hid anywhere we could. Bunkers, caves, panic rooms, all around the world. So, for the last seven years, I’ve been living in an underground bunker. It’s not as bad as it sounds. Really. It’s a great group of people, and we all love each other. It’s kinda what I imagined college would have looked like (not like I’d ever be caught dead there even before all this shit).

“Are you sure he’s asleep?”

“Who?”

“Eddie. Who else?”

“Yeah, he’s asleep.”

“Hang on. Shh.”

“He’s not awake.”

“Are you sure?”

“It’s just you.”

“I just… I don’t…”

“Eddie. Eddie.”

“See? He’s not awake. It’s just you.”

Dear Stevie,

I am wide awake. I’ve just gotten really good at not really moving or breathing. Being stuck in a survival bunker with a bunch of people who have all found their soul mate is less than ideal. Karen and Ray got together a few months ago, so they’re still kinda in their honeymoon phase. It is super physical. Good for them. They’re both very attractive and apparently quite flexible.

Hey, life’s short. Especially down here.

After Tim’s parents were eaten by a swarm of demobats, he and Ava became inseparable. So, pretty much everyone’s coupled up down here. Our first baby was born last winter. It was super emotional.

Welcome to the apocalypse, kid.

The food sucks. At least you’ll never know what you’re missing.

Kala and Connor got together after Sharon died. Sharon was a cow that ate a box of laundry detergent – it was a pretty Ozzy move – and now we only have one cow. Her name’s Debbie. Debbie is great. Debbie’s not our only food source. We actually have a hunting party that brings back whatever they can from the surface. It was easier in the beginning, you know, before we ran out of bullets. Facing down one of those things with a janky handmade weapon is no walk in the stuck-up suburban neighborhood dog park. Or so they tell me.

I don’t go on the hunting parties. They need me in the kitchen. I’m kinda the, uh… the chef of the bunker. I know, I know. Ironic that the guy who lived off a diet of Yoohoos, weed, and Combos is the chef. Laugh it up Harrington, but everyone likes my Minestrone.

Being the only single person in the bunker has its perks too. I get to hang out with Tomy Omnibot 2000. Of course, he’s not much for conversation. The core battery’s shot, just like every other Tomy, I’d imagine. Actually, I’ve never seen a working one.

Sure wish you were here, Stevie. I’d love for you to meet everyone.

[ckneal]

So, there’s this one angel story in the back of my head that I know I wont write. I wont write it, because it’s utter nonsense, with very little regard for the canonical timeline of Supernatural, and a willfully blurry view on what is and is not “in character.” It’s fluff. It’s all fluff, in the form of a bunch of smaller stories that gradually weave together, following the Love, Actually style of storytelling, but instead of problematic love stories, it’s all about angels playing hooky from Heaven after the Fall.

(Seriously, there is no substance here, I swear.)

Stories include Abner, living out the first half of the movie Family Man, struggling to figure out how to be a good father and house husband after he steps into the life of the raging alcoholic who agreed to be his vessel. There’s also a very minor story about Esther (not to be confused with Hester, who is not in this story because she never deserted her post in Heaven) learning to play the part of a little girl and navigating schoolyard politics, but kids can be mean and Esther learns the hard way that Michael’s approach to asserting dominance in Heaven does not translate well. There’s also Daniel and Adina, who both settle into vessels in the same movie theater where a romantic comedy is playing, and fall into a very innocent, play-acting sort of love after they leave the theatre—like little kids pretending to be in love, recreating the scenes from the movie, but at the same time not really understanding it. Balthazar, Gabriel, and Anael each trying to roll with the luxurious high roller life style, and awkwardly running into each other at VIP poker games, exclusive spas and clubs, and the occasional orgy that they promptly leave IMMEDATELY after running into a sibling (don’t give me weird looks, Balthazar and Gabriel canonically include that sort of thing in their definition of luxury, and the whole thing of their story is their siblings keep cramping their style). Tyrus is in there bowling, somewhere. Benjamin’s playing arcade games with his wife. And then there’s Thaddeus, my pet favorite minor angel character, realizing what’s happening as he’s falling with all the other faithful angels during the Fall and seizing the opportunity to abandon his life as a guard and torturer, settling into a pop star for his vessel—initially for the sake of the cushy lifestyle, but then gradually looking back, before the garden and Lucifer, before everyone was assigned a job in Heaven, like it or not, and the options were to adapt or to be smote, and remembering that back then, he could sing.

And of course, Michael and Adam get a story too—in which Michael lowkey gets into a pissing contest with death, as he and Adam travel the world, hitting up hospital after hospital to heal people. Because the first thing Adam wanted to do after getting out of the cage (okay, second thing—burgers came first) was go to the nearest medical center and start healing people left and right. And at first, they’re having a great time. Adam steals a white jacket he finds in the breakroom somewhere, and anytime someone says he looks a little young to be a doctor (Adam still looking nineteen years old, because I say so), Michael wipes the poor sap’s mind. But eventually—sometime after they’ve cleared out the children’s ward, the cancer ward, the cardiac ward—Billie shows up, sniping at them that they can’t just go around healing people who are destined to die, because there is an order to life and death that cannot be shoved aside. And Billie tries to make a show of it, as Terra did with Dean, by having several people who Adam had healed over the course of the day inadvertently cause several massive accidents. The news suddenly comes pouring out of the television, channels flipping as newscasters talk about tragedies occurring in several different parts of the city they’re currently in. The sound of approaching ambulance sirens fills the air, as in the hospital hallway, doctors and nurses begin hurrying to receive a rush of ER patients.

Adam’s horrified.

Michael does not take kindly to this. He snaps his fingers and makes it so that the carnage has never happened. Because he is the archangel Michael, only two steps away from being a god, and if he says that all of these people are going to live, then they are going to live, and he WILL NOT be intimidated, especially by an amateur reaper whose only qualification for her position was dying at the right time.

Billie in turn lands Michael with a cold stare, and points out that the order to life and death is beyond even God’s authority, let alone daddy’s blunt, sniveling instrument.

As Michael’s eyes start to glow, Adam steps in and says, “So, to be clear, you want us to stop healing people on the verge of death? We can do that.”

After Billie leaves, Michael is outraged, but Adam says, “No, Michael, THINK about it.”

We then cut to other stories, where newscasts in the background reveal that ailments that are not IMMIEDATELY fatal (AIDs, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, etc.) are mysteriously disappearing overnight, worldwide.

Billie is not amused, and tells her reapers to be on the lookout for an archangel at every major hospital in the world.

Cut to Michael throwing open the door of the bunker, muttering aloud to Adam that he’s going to do it, he’s going to bind Death, just like Lucifer did—how hard can it be? Sam and Dean see him as he goes stomping off toward the cabinet where they keep all of their magical dry goods, but Michael snaps his fingers and the two of them are abruptly half drunk in Dean’s man cave, sitting in front of Dean’s flat screen TV, watching some campy monster movie, because that’s lowkey what Michael and Adam assume they do all day.

As they’re raiding Sam and Dean’s supplies though, Adam says, “Wait, I have an idea.”

Cut to Abner looking up while pushing his vessel’s daughter in a park swing, and literally seeing Michael and Adam chasing an ambulance, so they can technically heal the person inside before reaching the hospital.

Yes, I’m aware that Abner was dead by the time Michael and Adam got out of the cage. But see, this story? This story is like when someone gifts you a goldfish unexpectedly, and you put it in a bowl, checking in to feed it a couple times a day, lowkey expecting it to die. But it doesn’t die, it gets bigger. And you’re not a cruel person, so you put it in a bigger tank, but it just gets bigger again, and you don’t really know what’s going on, but you know, you just kind of keep checking in, meeting the minimum requirements but not really getting in there as a guiding force because it’s a goldfish and it’s surely going to die any minute now—but then you look over and there’s giant tank taking up your living room, and you’re thawing out bloodworms twice a day, and looking into tankmates to keep Charles company, and realize that “Oh wow, I guess this is a thing now.”

In short, the story says we’re ignoring the timeline, and it’s calling the shots. I’m just keeping the tank clean.

The angels all eventually wind up running into each other. Abner and Esther happen upon one another in a park, where Esther is morosely realizing that she is terrible at being a human child but she does not want to go home to Heaven, and it just happens to be the same park where Abner goes with his “little nibblet” once a day to let her toddle around the playground while he chats with nannies and other house parents. Anael, Adina, and Daniel meet up when the latter two’s game has reached the point where they’ve decided to get married, and they apparently need to buy something new—preferably blue—as per this very important rhyme someone told them about. Esther and Gabriel run into each other in an ice cream parlor. Thaddeus gets recognized while doing an interview on TV that everyone sees. And, while out joyriding in a Lamborghini, on their way to meet up with the growing community of angels who decided to opt out of their responsibility to Heaven and their father’s legacy, Balthazar, Gabriel, and Anael are all startled to see Michael land on an ambulance stopped next to them at a red light.

Balthazar and Anael are both terrified, as if they’ve just been busted by a parent, because Michael, of course, is the guy who enforces the rules, and isn’t he supposed to be in Hell? They both shoot Gabriel looks as if to say ‘what the hell are you doing’ when Gabriel, watching as Michael climbs down and matter-of-factly wrenches the ambulance doors open, calls out, “Hey, Mike! Is that you?”

Michael looks over, freezes for a second—not prepared to be suddenly thrust into a social situation in the middle of his self-imposed mission to spite death—then his eyes flash and Adam takes over. “Oh hey, you’re Michael’s family? What a small world! I’m Adam, I’ve heard so much about you. Wait, hang on—”

The light starts to turn green, but Adam snaps his fingers and it promptly reverts to red.

Three jaws drop in the luxury car, and they don’t even hear Adam politely explain that he and Michael are in the middle of something, as he ducks into the ambulance, because Michael’s evidently letting a tiny human use his powers like it’s nothing, and what does that mean?

“Sweet dad in the unknown, Michael’s shagging a human. . .”

“Nooo!”

“HOW?”

“Hey, kid, you like weddings?”

At some point in the story, all the MIA angels are together, and Benjamin or someone comes running in saying, “Quick, they’re coming! Everyone hide!”

And everyone scatters, except for Michael, who stands in place, saying, “Gabriel, we’re archangels, two of the most powerful beings in existence. Why would we—”

And then Gabriel picks Adam up like a sack of potatoes and sprints off, calling back, “Trust me, you do NOT want to get involved with them!”

Being a projection, Michael is obligated to follow.

Team Free Will then walks by, looking constipated from whatever Big Awful Thing is currently threatening to destroy the world.

The story, of course, culminates in the wedding of Adina and Daniel, who still don’t quite understand what marriage is beyond promising to love each forever, which of course they will, after all, they are the very best of friends—which is about the same concept that most of the other angels present have. Adam is the first one to actually approach the big awkward question, upon finding out who the bride and groom are.

“Wait, aren’t they brother and sister?”

To which Serafina’s Adam, (who is of course there since Serafina was the original angel to play hooky) whose sons married his daughters, and all the angels, who do not understand what that has to do with anything, all cock their heads in unison and respond with, “So?”

Adam struggles to find words, looking into so many innocent faces. Then Benjamin’s wife puts a hand on his shoulder, whispering, “Shhh, let them have their fun.”

Benjamin’s wife and the two Adams wind up sitting at the venue’s bar, where they order nachos from a very confused bar tender, and watch as the angels go about setting up a wedding. But given that most angels haven’t been on earth regularly in roughly two thousand years, none of them have a clear grasp of what a human wedding entails.

“I heard it’s traditional for the father to give away the bride.”

“I think they’re supposed to kiss over bread.”

“Do humans still slaughter cows at these things?”

“I’m pretty sure someone is supposed to break a glass—”

Several angels promptly throw glassware on the floor.

At no point do the angels ask the humans for advice.

Occasionally, Gabriel knowingly throws out obscure details to keep the confusion going.

“You know, the groom needs to stand with the right arm to the aisle in case a sword fight breaks out.”

“Right! . . .How do we know which one’s the groom?”

At the bar, Adam open’s his mouth to say something, but the original Adam shushes him.

“No no, son, let them get there.”

The angels agree that being the better fighter, Adina should be the groom.

They’re nearly ready to start when Michael suddenly doubles over with his hand over his mouth. It coincides with the sound of Adam pounding the bar top, having just eaten a Carolina Reaper pepper on dare. Michael’s eyes quickly flash silver-blue as he straightens, and both he and Adam are abruptly fine—even if their eyes are still watering somewhat. But a different sort of damage has already been done, as Anael, Balthazar, and Gabriel all abruptly turn toward the triad of humans, having been reminded that the Michael walking around with them is actually a projection. In actuality, Michael is anchored to the human ex-college student sitting at the bar.

All three of them rush toward Adam, but Serafina gets there first, asking Adam if he’s ever tried mushroom tea.

Balthazar gets there next. 

“Adam, was it? We didn’t get to talk in the car, let’s fix that. Are you over twenty-one? You know what, this is a family affair, don’t worry—CAN I GET TWO SHOTS OF DON JULIO OVER HERE?”

From that point on, any time Adam turns around, there’s one of Michael’s siblings, wanting to get to know him—by consuming some sort of beverage. Because Adam and Michael are sharing body—and that means they share a liver too. A bet ensues as to how much it will take to get God’s alleged favorite wasted.

Gabriel’s actually one of the first out, having been convinced that Michael would be a lightweight. Little does he suspect that Benjamin and his wife caught onto what was happening soon after Adam was fed his third long island iced tea and second jager bomb, and began quietly cleansing the alcohol from his system through casual shoulder pats and high fives.

Adam does not know what to make of any of this, but it’s Michael’s family and he wants to make a good impression, so he just goes with it.

Thaddeus, of course, is in charge of music, Gabriel and Esther consume the majority of the cake, and Michael catches the bouquet (he may have cheated after finding out what the bouquet toss is for).

[immaturityofthomasastruc]

#10: Felix, Part Two: The Episode Itself

Here’s Part 1

So, uh... here's the thing. I was going to divide this post into three parts, but I had to cancel the third part where I analyze the stuff involving Astruc defending the episode on Twitter, specifically a certain scene that really showed off some serious double standards in regards to the way Adrien is being written, because Astruc deleted most of his tweets regarding the episode. I wonder why he did that? I thought he wanted to expose himself publicly and interact in a peaceful way.

So yeah, instead of a big three-parter, this is going to be a two-parter, and I apologize for that. I might be able to do a third part if anyone has any screenshots of some of the tweets Astruc made after “Felix” aired. If you did, I would really appreciate it, but if not, it's fine.

Either way, let's just get this over with, because I have SO MUCH to talk about. My friend, can your heart stand the shocking facts about Season 3, Episode 23 of Miraculous Ladybug, “Felix”?

So we start off with what Gabriel does for half of his scenes when he isn't Hawkmoth, monologuing to his (possibly) dead wife, Emilie about how Ladybug and Cat Noir's Miraculous will soon be his and all that crap. Sure, he's sent God knows how many Akumas after Ladybug and Cat Noir, and they've all failed miserably, but I'm positive he's getting close to his goal.

After he finishes cleaning his and Emilie's silver wedding rings that sadly don't allow them to transform into Ultraman Ace, Gabriel goes to check on Adrien, singing to a statue of Emilie (glad to see the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree), intending to tell him that he is Hawkmoth.

Gabriel: There is something important I have to talk to you about. I think about telling you every day, but I don't know how to find the right words.

Adrien: I think I already know, father.

Gabriel: But, how?

Adrien: I've noticed how close you and Nathalie have become. If she can make you happy again, then... as far as I'm concerned, she's already part of our family.

Yeah, apparently it's obvious that Gabriel and Nathalie are close or something, with how casually Adrien assumes they're planning on starting a relationship. I mean, it's not like Nathalie is close to Gabriel because she's his secretary or something like that.

Gabriel's response isn't any better, as he immediately jumps down Adrien's throat for daring to assume he might try to move on from his wife.

Gabriel: How could you possibly think such a thing?! Nobody could ever replace your mother! As long as she is still in our hearts, she lives on!

Even Adrien's face shows he's a little taken back by his father's brief outburst.

Part of me likes to assume that Plagg is trying to not break out into laughter at how crazy Gabriel sounds, while Nooroo is mentally questioning the sanity of his master.

Plagg: Wow! Your father's like a piece of tomme cheese, where the rind's so thick it's almost impossible to get inside the center.

Adrien: Don't be so hard on him, Plagg. It's been a year today since Mom... went away forever.

Oh my God, just say she DIED already! Why are so many kids' shows afraid to say the D-word? How can I cite an episode of Caillou of all shows as something that that actually talked about death to it's audience in a nuanced way?

It turns out that Adrien's aunt is visiting for the day, as it's the one-year anniversary of Emilie's “going away forever”. We also learn that the gene pool in Adrien's family is so shallow, a toddler could swim in it, because Emilie's sister looks exactly like her.

Even better, her name is Amelie. I bet the parents thought naming their kids Emilie and Amelie was hilarious for like three minutes.

And of course, she also brought her son, the asshole of the hour.

Someone cue the Imperial March.

So Felix is finally here, and of course, he looks just like Adrien. It's almost like the animators didn't want to create any new character models for this episode, so they thought nobody would notice if they just reused a few. Seriously, towards the end of the episode, we see Felix wearing the Cat Miraculous on his hand, and none of the animators noticed it.

So while Adrien is happy to see his cousin, Felix isn't. I'll talk more about it in a minute.

Amelie mentions that the wedding rings are actually heirlooms in her side of the family, so she naturally wants them back. Of course, Gabriel, being Gabriel, responds accordingly.

Gabriel: These rings are obviously very special to me.

Amelie: And they're very dear to me too, Gabriel. Those jewels have always been in the Graham de Vanily family, not the Agreste's.

Gabriel: We'll discuss it later.

“Yeah, yeah, these rings are priceless family heirlooms or whatever, but why can't you think about how important they are to me?”

Meanwhile, Marinette and her friends are planning on recording some messages for Adrien to cheer him up on this day, but Marinette isn't sure what to say before she decides to confess her love to him. I'm sure Adrien will get the message and return Marinette's feelings this episode... and Cliff Hanger will finally escape that cliff he's been hanging from for years.

Speaking of, Adrien and Felix are hanging out in the former's room where we learn that Felix's father passed away recently. We don't know how long, but with the way they talk about, it's clear the funeral wasn't too long ago. Keep this in mind.

So while Adrien leaves the room to get a chess board for the two to play a game of, Felix, for no reason, decides to search through Adrien's things and crush a piece of cheese that Plagg had been aging for two weeks. And here is the interaction that helps this episode go from mediocre to aggravating, just because of what they imply here.

Adrien: Listen, Plagg. Felix lost his dad not so long ago, he's probably not himself.

Plagg: I'm sorry, but there's just no excuse! You never touch my cheese, and yet, you just lost your mother not so long ago, right?

Yes. The show is actually implying that Adrien is better than Felix because Adrien isn't acting out because his mom “went away forever”. Keep in mind, we know that Felix just lost his father, while Adrien has had a year to cope. I'm not saying he can't be sad anymore, as everyone processes grief differently, but you can't set up Felix as a foil to Adrien just because they both lost a parent, as their situations are entirely different.

Oh, and when Plagg's statement upsets Adrien, it isn't because he's angry at Plagg for making the comparison, it's because he mentions Emilie. And this argument is never brought up again.

I still can't believe this episode is basically saying that even if you lose a loved one, that's no excuse to get emotional. This isn't just a horrible lesson to teach children, but it pisses me off on a more personal level. Why?

My grandfather died last year after a long battle with lung cancer.

He had been in and out of the hospital for a few years at this point, and part of me was relieved that he was finally free of the pain. I tried not to let it bother me, as I had already mentally prepared myself for the day he would die whenever he was readmitted to the hospital. But it was still painful to go through because he was so important to me. Instead of simply telling someone how I was feeling, I threw myself into my schoolwork in an effort to distract myself from actually confronting my emotions. After seeing A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, a movie where the main character made peace with his father on his deathbed with some encouragement from Mr. Rogers, it made me think about how unhealthy it was to bottle up my emotions, so I started to open up more about how I was feeling. When I told my mom (who was his daughter) about why I was so conflicted regarding his death, she said it was completely understandable, as she had been an emotional wreck as well. I also talked with my therapist about how this was affecting me mentally.

What does this have to do with the episode? I don't think Felix had access to this kind of emotional support when his dad died, or that he tried coping the same way I did initially.

And the worst part is that this could have been used to teach people a lesson on how to cope with losing a loved one. Maybe Adrien could have helped Felix find a healthier coping mechanism, or simply help him open up emotionally, teaching him that it's okay to be upset when someone close to you dies, but that you just need to be honest about your feelings.

But no, rather than portray Felix's actions as a troubled youth lashing out because he's angry at the cards the world dealt him, Felix does several awful things this episode for no other reason than because he's evil, even though he has a good reason to hate Adrien and Gabriel.

So the very next scene, we see Felix has stolen Adrien's phone and is going through the messages that Adrien's friends sent him, but not before insulting his crush on Ladybug. I'm not sure if that's supposed to reflect the fandom's criticism of Adrien's crush on Ladybug, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was.

Nino's Message: Hey, my dude! I'm not quite sure what to tell you, except that, you're my man, dude! And bros are always there for their guys!

Felix: (Mockingly) “Bros are always there--” blah, blah, blah! Moron.

Rose's Message: Unicorns have a saying: even when there's nothing but gray skies and rain, all it takes is one little sunbeam for a rainbow to appear!

Felix: Loser.

Max's Message: It's one hundred percent proven, you should feel fifty-two percent happier with a healthy dose of laughter. So Markov has uploaded a few jokes for you! Starting with--

Felix: Freak.

Chloe's Message: When my mother left for New York, I felt so sad. It felt like she was... (sighs) She came back, and I know how lucky I am. So, you can count on me, my Adrikins.

Felix: Chloe. Just as annoying as usual.

And that line right there is the only time Astruc actually liked writing Felix, as it gave him the chance to satisfy his need to insult Chloe.

And then when he sees Marinette's message, he deletes it because... hell if I know

Again, this scene could have worked if it was interpreted as Felix saying stuff that he wasn't dependent on others for support and that he could easily power through life on his own, but nope! Instead, he hates Adrien's friends and only deletes Marinette's message instead of all of them simply because he's evil, heart blacker than Don Cheadle.

Felix continues to show how awful he is by dressing up in Adrien's clothes and—Oh, son of a bitch, SERIOUSLY? This is the SEVENTH evil doppelganger plotline we've had in THREE SEASONS! You're telling me this isn't doing the same thing over and over again, Astruc?

Yeah, so Felix records some messages to send to his friends that, once again, could have worked if this episode was actually teaching a lesson about dealing with grief.

“Adrien's” Message:  First of all, thanks so much for all your messages, guys, really. Sending me messages on today of all days... (angrily) to remind me how sad I'm supposed to be feeling? Why, that's great! Really, Thanks a lot!

But because nobody ever considers how Felix is feeling, it's never acknowledged, because that would actually involve writing him with complexity.

Gabriel gets a message from Lila, who recently became one of his confidants to spy on Adrien, tells him about the fake message, and decides to use the negative emotions felt as an excuse to get rid of his in-laws. No, seriously.

Gabriel: All this disappointment might just help us get rid of our unwanted guests.

To be fair, I'd probably do the same thing just so I wouldn't have to talk to some of the people I hate at my job.

And so, Hawkmoth akumatizes Alya, Juleka, and Rose into the Punisher's Trio, who are basically just their previously akumatized forms Lady Wifi, Reflekta, and Princess Fragrance. Because why would you expect anyone to use an original character model for this episode?

All joking aside, this development raises several questions. First, why wasn't Nino one of the Punisher's akumatized? He's Adrien's best friend, so shouldn't be just as upset as everyone else? Hell, the whole reason he was akumatized into the Bubbler in Season 1 was just so he could throw Adrien a birthday party after Gabriel said no. Then there's the fact that Chloe could have also been akumatized because she's just as close as Adrien, which is another wasted opportunity here.

Second, why bring back Reflekta and Princess Fragrance of all villains? It doesn't even make sense when you consider their motifs are based off of the circumstances that led to them getting akumatized in their respective episodes. Juleka became Reflekta because of her anxiety over easily blending in, so she got the power to turn everyone into an exact copy of herself so they could understand the feeling. Rose became Princess Fragrance when Chloe destroyed her letter and perfume bottle dedicated to the prince of a foreign nation, so the perfume bottle was the basis of her powers. At least Lady Wifi makes sense as the akumatized object this episode is a tablet used to record the messages to Adrien, but Reflekta and Princess Fragrance have nothing to do with the plot of this episode, and just feel tacked on. If it was just Lady Wifi or the Bubbler, I'd get it, but this just doesn't work.

Third, what exactly is this show's obsession with Reflekta? We saw in Reflekta's first episode that her powers had a huge drawback as if either of the heroes is zapped by her, she can't get their Miraculous, like what we saw happened to Cat Noir. Yet, this is the second time this season that Hawkmoth had the bright idea to bring back Reflekta (even giving her a giant robot to amplify her powers). At least Lady Wifi and Princess Fragrance's powers worked together well (Lady Wifi could freeze someone in place, while Princess Fragrance can brainwash them with her perfume), but Reflekta just feels like the odd one out here.

Fourth, and most importantly, why did we only get to hear the line “At your service, Princess Fragrance!” A single time this episode?

So the Punishers head to Adrien's house to take their revenge, but see Felix, still dressed in Adrien's clothes, and are naturally confused. Adrien pretends to be Felix by running away while laughing evilly (so not too far off from how Astruc sees Felix), while the real Felix and Nathalie put up a good fight against the Punishers.

And then... here is the moment that shows just how skewed Astruc's view of Adrien really is.

Felix pretends to confess his love to Ladybug as Adrien, trying to force a kiss on him, making Ladybug punch him in the face by claiming that the real Adrien “would never be so pushy”.

BULL. SHIT.

Yes, Ladybug doesn't know that Adrien is actually Cat Noir, but it's clear that this scene is meant to solidify just how Felix is far worse than Adrien because according to Astruc, he would never do that.

But maybe I'm being too hard on him.

It's not like Adrien has ever forced himself onto Ladybug, right?

I mean, imagine if the show just ignored something like that.

All while trying to teach kids the importance of saying no when someone harasses them.

Can you imagine if someone was that oblivious to their own hypocrisy?

I'm not saying that the lesson is a bad one, but you can't call someone out for doing something bad, and then ignore one of your main characters doing the exact same thing!

Even in the context of the episode, the comparison doesn't work. We know that Felix is only doing this to make Adrien look bad, and has no romantic feelings towards Ladybug like Adrien does. Felix knows what he is doing is wrong, while Adrien doesn't. Whenever Cat Noir tries to kiss Ladybug, he is never aware that what he is doing is wrong, and while he is almost always stopped from kissing Ladybug for one reason or another.

Like when the episode tried to compare two different characters reacting to losing loved ones when there are different circumstances regarding them, the comparison DOESN'T WORK.

And to add insult to injury, Cat Noir shows up just to insult Felix by implying he doesn't have a lot of friends because of the way he acts, because why would he? After all, he's a complete loser that nobody would want to be friends with, and if you like him, you're an idiot for thinking so! At least, that's probably what Astruc was going for.

Ladybug summons her Lucky Charm, leading to a brief Mexican standoff, until Felix steals the tablet containing the Akuma, making a deal with Hawkmoth that he'll help out the Punishers as long as he gets the wedding rings. Do you hate Felix yet? Come on, do you hate him? WHY WON'T YOU HATE HIM, GODDAMN IT!?

This whole bit is completely pointless as Ladybug immediately finds a way to stop all four of them and de-evilize the Akuma.

And when it looks like Felix is actually apologizing for his actions this episode, it's naturally a ruse he put on to steal one of the wedding rings from Gabriel to give to his mom. Because why would Astruc even think of portraying him sympathetically, or at least have him learn a lesson?

So Felix stares out the window with an evil look in his eye (possibly foreshadowing another appearance), as Gabriel takes Emilie's wedding ring to wear for himself, and the episode mercifully ends.

It also means that I never have to watch this episode ever again.

Do you understand why it took so long for me to fully analyze this episode? Hell, it would have taken longer if Astruc didn't delete his tweets defending the kiss scene and how Cat Noir is totally a gentlemen unlike Satan, I mean Felix.

What else do I have to say about this episode that hasn’t already been said? Well, I do have one thing.

I’m not that big a fan of Felix.

I think he’s an okay character in fanfics, but I’m more indifferent to him and fanfics that ship him and Marinette together. I don’t know, maybe that’s because there are so many Felinette fanfics that are heavily seasoned with salt, or it could just be because I’m complete Love Square and Lukanette trash.

But just think about the fact that the scathing criticism of this episode was delivered by someone who isn’t that into Felix. That is how bad this episode is.

In addition to being an obvious mouthpiece for Astruc to yell at fans why they’re idiots for actually liking Felix, it does so by touching on delicate subject and trying to act like it’s easy to tell how Felix is worse than Adrien when the circumstances are nothing alike.

But the fact that Astruc takes a popular character just to portray him as a complete menace just to antagonize his fans is ridiculous, utterly ridiculous.

[myhauntedsalem]

Real EMTs Share True Ghost Stories

Together Forever

“I’ve had a couple of weird calls. One was a major MVA-head on many, many years ago when we played M.E. as well. We had 2 DOA (husband and spouse) that were killed instantly in a head on collision. They had a 12-year-old daughter that was in between them and they actually took the impact, saving her life.

While en route, we noticed the husband’s arm had come loose so I went back to re-strap it. As I was doing that, the wife’s arm suddenly fell out as well, and her hand fell into her husband’s. My boss was watching in the rear view mirror and helped clear the way as I ran back into the front. It spooked both of us. Apparently the couple (mid 30’s), had just found out he was cancer free after his last treatment.”

Will I Go to Heaven?

“Had a young woman in full liver failure. She was orange in color and she was still conscious. She asked me what I thought it would be like to die. I told her I didn’t know but I hoped it wouldn’t be painful. She then asked me if I thought I would go to heaven. I told her that I believed I would. She asked me if I thought she would go to heaven, and I told her I wasn’t able to answer that question.

She then told me ‘I am going to heaven and I know it,’ and I asked her how she knew that and she told me something that I will never ever forget. She told me ‘I know I am because that man over there told me so.’ I asked what man and she said the man sitting on the end of the bench. I asked her what he looked like and she said ‘he looks just like the Jesus on the windows of my church.’

Well, to tell you I was pretty well affected by that statement. She then went on to say ‘And he says that you are going to go to heaven too.’

We then prayed and I will never forget that interaction between the two of us. About a week later she passed away. I hope she made it to heaven.”

Otherworldly Screams at the ER

“I have had fellow coworkers swear that strange things have occurred in the ER. Two people that I work with were charting at the nurses station when they both heard a scream followed by incoherent words come from one of our open bays. There were three patients in the room and they denied screaming or hearing anything. I have also had fellow coworkers talk about hearing strange voices especially after really bad codes and one person states she felt someone grabbing her shoulder after the doc pronounced a trauma code. These are all respectable people and I do not think they would lie.”

666

“We responded to a ‘sick call’ at about 4 a.m. Dispatch said he was a hospice patient with a history of cancer who had not eaten for a couple of days and had pulled out his medication port. We get there and it’s this poor guy in his early 40’s who is bald from chemo and sitting on his brother’s couch. His skin was blotchy, pale and purple, and he was hyperventilating and diaphoretic. His sis-in-law said he had been pacing from the bed to the couch all night, clearly agitated.

We went out to get the stretcher, and when we came back in he had crapped himself. He just kept saying, ‘Oh… ooooh. No. No. Oooh’ and looking around the room, flinching every now and then like he was waving away flies. We got him to sit on the stretcher, and he said, ‘No, not now!’ We assured him and rolled him out. The medic I was with asked me to get DNR papers, because, ‘He’s doing it right now.’

I walked up to his bro and sis-in law, got the papers, and returned just in time to see him cry a couple of big tears, sob a little, and then crumple. I had to tell his brother he had passed (not easy to see a man drop to his knees in a driveway and wail). Then I got in and prepared to drive to the ER. As I wondered if the man would go to Heaven, I got a bad feeling, like darkness was creeping all around us. I happened to look down at the volt-meter and I saw the number 666 flashing. This panel normally doesn’t flash at all, it just reads voltage. It went 666, then .1, then 666 then .1, then 666 then .1 and then it went back up to 1200 or so and stayed that way. The uneasy feeling went away, but I still prayed the whole way to the hospital. I felt sick as hell all that day, and had a violent vomiting spell later on.

The Haunted Ambulance Company

“This is a true story about an ongoing haunting that is occurring in Richmond, Virginia at a local ambulance company located just off Broad Street near the Willow Lawn Shopping Center. My 25-year-old son-in-law has been working at this company as an Emergency Medical Technician for approximately a year now and he comes home weekly with new haunting stories.

The small brick building was once a warehouse of some type, and during a fire many years ago several people were trapped inside and died. They were Hispanic migrant workers who apparently slept in the warehouse. It is now used as an ambulance company and during the 24 hour shifts, EMT people are required to spend the night in the building. There is also a dispatcher who is always on duty, even during the night hours.

When my son-in-law first went to work there, he wondered why the sleeping cots were set up in the smaller room rather than the larger bunk room. He was told that the larger room was haunted and if people tried to sleep there, they’d feel cold hands on them in the night. He didn’t know whether to believe this or not, but he did notice that whenever he worked a 24 hour shift and slept there, he had very bad nightmares and he’d wake up to a cold tingling feeling running up and down his spine.

They think there are at least two ghosts in the building. The first is an aggressive one who bangs the chain on the bay door, walks around the bay area, slams doors, and puts his cold hands on people. The other is a woman has also been seen in the office area. She was sighted recently when two ambulance workers walked by the office window and saw a short, dark-haired woman in the office. Not recognizing her, they went back to find out who she was but there was no one there.”

[with-my-murder-flute]

by the sword (Nile genfic, 2.6k)

Fic summary: Nile learned fencing and longsword and hand-to-hand fighting long before she ever met Andy's small army. But learning with them is a new form of difficult. Not because they've got thousands of years more experience (though they do), but because this time the practice doesn't stop when somebody gets hurt.

So she has to learn about war and how you balance it out with peace. Figure out how they do it and who she wants to be. And decide which weapons suit her best.

Content notes: Explicit depiction of the injuries Nile gets when training in knife fighting and quarterstaff combat with Nicky and Joe. There are also discussions of the physical damage done by different kinds of weapons, the butchering of animals, and people cutting off their own body parts in industrial accidents. (Oh, and a positive/sympathetic portrayal of Nile as a Christian)

They promised that in March they'd start teaching Nile how to fight with a sword, but when March came, Nicky gave her a knife.

A hauntingly familiar one, even though she'd never touched it before. For a second she thought it was her own, the Ka-Bar she planted in Andy's shoulder the day they met. Instead, as she turned it over, finding it familiar in every groove and contour, she found it an anonymous and identical match to her dad's instead. Not new, with the black paint worn down around the edges of the handle, but not a knife she knew. It could have been used by any Marine in the world except her. Except her father.

"You know too much," Joe explained from the side of the hangar, where he'd tumbled an umbrella stand of swords out onto a tarp and started removing their rust with fine-grit sandpaper. "We're not knights or cavaliers. For them, swordfighting was about honour. There were rules. We don't have any of that."

Nile knew going into this that nothing she knew so far was real swordsmanship. Like yes, she could fence; she'd competed in foil and saber for two years as a teenager. But that was closer to stagefighting than actual combat. It was all so staged and carefully managed. Even in her longsword league they said over and over again, it was a martial sport, not actual combat. They could imagine what it might have been like—could land heavy blows on armour, could mime falling down dead—but that wasn't the reality of it.

It seemed to her that the purpose of beginning with knife-fighting lessons was to go over territory she already knew, and do it for real this time. Nicky said he had something else in mind, some principle of combat he meant to teach. But that wasn't what Nile noticed.

What Nile noticed was that this time, she really died.

The old people argued it over, about how to teach Nile. Andy's example made them newly-cautious, but this was the way they'd always trained: You had to do it through blood and pain, you had to fight when you were still resurrecting. It was the way Andy and Quynh had trained Nicky and Joe.

Nile wondered, in the back of her mind, if being trained like that had something to do with the way Booker... well, Booker. After he'd already had such terrible experience of war that he'd wanted to desert. But that was the kind of thing she didn't air out loud, because they'd only just stopped having that kind of useless, circular, self-flagellating argument. She figured she'd keep her own peace on Booker.

She also opined, after hearing them wrangle over it for a day or two, that she'd rather practice with live weapons and get injured among friends than play it safe and incur a dangerous injury among enemies.

And when the knife fighting started, she was grateful they hadn't moved directly to longswords.

They taught knights how to do this, Nicky said, by having them slaughter and butcher animals. It taught you your way around muscles and tendons and joints. He offered to take her to a bullfight sometime, which she didn't say sounded so barbaric she had to wonder why PETA bothered with picketing rodeos.

He said that after her trachea healed over. She hadn't actually died that time; you had to aim further up or to the side to get the carotid artery. But the horror—not actually the pain, but the horror of feeling the air wheeze through the gash in her throat—had been so overwhelming that she'd barely resisted the pin he got her in. She'd just shuddered with her arms behind her back and his weight pressing her down until it healed, and tapped out of the rest of the afternoon. He'd been understanding when she didn't want to be around him for a bit, and let Joe gather her into a hug and let her cry.

That was when he told her about the bulls. She told him about Chicago's meatpacking district, about the old men she knew who'd butchered hogs every day of their lives for decades. About how they said they got numb to it, until one day one of them cut off his thumb with a machine and didn't feel it, until the guy next to him looked over and noticed all the new blood. About how after you see too much violence, your brain just stops processing it. About how a study on kids in the next neighbourhood over from hers had shown they had permanently elevated levels of cortisol, a sign that their bodies were under stress all the time and didn't know how to calm down.

Those were the kind of conversations Andy couldn't stay in the room for. She slunk off somewhere and got drunk, and you saw her the next morning, maybe. Nile used to judge her a lot more for it, but the day her throat got cut she let Joe and Nicky feed her a red wine as soft as velvet and fell asleep pressed against Joe on the sofa and understood, deeper than words, just how much keeping sane meant feeling anything other than your body shattering into pain.

Nicky braided her hair, the next day. Slow and careful, a little unpracticed, singing ballads in a language that wasn't exactly dead, but only had a few thousand speakers left in northern Italy. Their composer hadn't been good, exactly, but they'd been snowed into a castle with him one winter in the 1680s, so Nicky remembered his entire repertoire. Nile listened to the music and knew he'd refuse if she offered to record it, or write it down. One of the songs felt like the length of a novel (but was, when she checked her phone, more like one hour twenty) and by the end of it she was singing the chorus along with him, and it occurred to her that she could simply ask him to teach her.

"You can't rescue every one you see," she remembered her mom saying, when she found a half-stunned bird on the sidewalk. That was what it felt like with languages.

That afternoon Andy took her to the market. Ostensibly it was for groceries, but Andy didn't do simple errands, especially not when it involved food. She stopped to smell fruit Nile had never heard of; Google told Nile that medlar and quince were related to apples and also, apparently, roses. Nile had to try pine nuts, wild mustard, and three different kinds of yogurt drinks, one of which tasted of roses. Andy protested when she added a bag of potatoes to the load, saying they were bland, but Nile, who'd had enough of turnips, sweetly told her to pay the fuck up.

If you were lonely, and hurting, and didn't have someone to hold you, you could comfort yourself like this. Sunshine and sweetmeats and the steady hands of friends. Something, but probably still not enough. Nile understood it but it made her chest ache. She felt, sometimes, a little glad that Andy would die someday, the way families felt helping someone keep alive from cancer. Of course you wanted them to be alive, but you didn't want them to suffer.

Joe moved her on to staff fighting the next day. It was, he said, not the most useful of weapons in the current day and age, since it was most useful against long bladed weapons, "And who else but us uses those?" But there was some kind of theoretical basis behind the progression of her teaching, from weapon to weapon, and after knife came staff.

To tell the truth, Nile liked it. She'd learned about quarterstaff in her longsword weapons, as something that could defeat a swordsman, but nobody anybody she knew actually practiced it, because while you could wear percussion-resistant cloth and keep safe with blunted swords, there was simply no defending your bones against the percussive strike of a giant whirling stick.

There was something less offensive about getting your skull split or your collarbone broken, compared to getting stabbed. Partly it was because Joe was just a much nicer teacher, slower and more patient, while Nicky would keep stabbing you as you fought to reach your own knife. But also it felt more impersonal, more like an accident that had happened to you.

Okay, and it was also more fun. Knives created small imaginary hemispheres of pain, the angle of the arm as it swept out. Quarterstaves were huge, so long that if you wanted to get around them, sometimes it was literally easier to flip yourself into the air or dump your opponent to the ground instead of getting the staff to move. The first time she managed to run up a wall to get leverage on him, it felt so awesome she didn't actually mind that much that he popped her shoulder out taking her back down.

It was bloody and violent and really would have been impossible if dying had been a significant barrier for them. It made Nile laugh in a high-on-endorphins way, because it felt like she could finally push past the pain and find a place beyond her limits. It felt like being free. Like all her life she'd been wearing a heavy armor of caution, knowing she'd had to keep herself alive, and now she just felt the lightness of taking it off.

There were tears at the back of that laughter, about everything she'd lost because of it, but she pushed that away and went to shower. She and Joe spent the evening on Youtube, watching videos of capoeira and wushu, while the other two made a batch of some kind of pickled egg they thought they remembered from three hundred years ago.

Nile hugged Andy sometimes, because she looked like she needed to be hugged. Andy almost never turned her down.

A long time ago, she thought she remembered, holding a sword had seemed to transport her to some other time. Some other place. Like the sword had been a tangible connection to the past, to a time when things felt... clearer, or truer, or more real somehow. Like the feeling the word "honour" gave her, of something echoing and amplifying through a vaulted space. There was a time when people fought with swords for what they believed in. There was a time when you knew what was right and what was wrong and laid down your life accordingly.

She'd been twelve and believed in fairytales. So sue her.

The swords in their armory spelled out a long story of misery and war. When she held them now, Nile felt like she could feel the bodies that had come into contact with their blades. Curved single-bladed sabers and scimitars, ideally wielded from horseback, meant for a decisive downward chop. Nicky's giant longswords, meant to peel an armored knight like a tin can. (He'd used it, he said, to similar effect on a tank once or twice.) Andy's axes showed her age; before they had the metallurgy to make an entire blade, it was better to use a wood polearm with a blade on the end, and focus the sharp metal to a curved edge, to as small a surface area as possible.

Andy's axes showed her age, but not theirs; they were less than ten years old. Steel, especially steel that came into contact with blood, aged fast enough (and could only take so much of a beating) that the old people knew and had opinions on all the modern replica manufacturers. The oldest blades in the collection were used at Waterloo, only a little more than 200 years ago.

(Nile wondered, as she polished one and rubbed a state-of-the-art hydrophobic finish on it, if the quarterstaff lessons were actually preparing her to fight Booker, should she ever find herself opposing him. It was the kind of thing she couldn't help but think about the logistics of. Surely firearms would be more effective, she initially reasoned, except... guns jammed, guns broke, guns overheated, guns ran out of bullets. And then your gun became a very expensive bludgeon. And you're facing a swordsman who's had 200 years to train. So... why not try a very big stick?)

She knew that even this team could betray her. Even they could fight for the wrong cause. They'd supported revolutions that turned into dictatorships and fought alongside people who turned out to be monsters. There was no promise, no moral certainty, in violence.

So she felt really stupid about it, but the truth was that holding a sword... still brought back that old emotion. That feeling of being capable of doing things. Fighting for a better world. It made her feel taller. It made her feel like her life had a purpose that she'd been heading towards since she was young.

Like God had called her for a special purpose.

Which she'd never say to any of the rest of them, since Andy had been a god and Nicky had been a holy warrior and Joe had broken down completely once, when they let him get too close to a newspaper. They'd only ever hear it with the weight of all the horror they had seen.

So instead she had to carry it as a private conviction, a calling she would have to follow by herself, her own career to make holy instead of horrific. Like when she joined the Marines. Freer, in some ways, but even more out of her depth, not sure she totally understood the situations she was injecting herself into.

The fact that she wasn't sure she ever could walk the path of righteousness and keep herself always on the side of good... was absolutely no inducement not to try. It never had been.

"Picked one yet?" Andy asked, from the door.

"What, you guys weren't gonna pick one for me?" Nile asked, craning her neck around. Andy had her hands buried in the pockets of her jacket, smiling faintly.

"Some things, nobody can pick for you," she said. She picked up one of Nile's polished sabers and admired the sheen along its blade. "Your last-ditch weapon, least of all."

Nile already had a secret favourite of all the swords, but what she found herself saying was, "I want us to do some training in de-escalation."

Andy looked aside from the blade. "Sorry?"

Nile took a deep breath, her heart suddenly pounding like crazy. "That's what I was trained in, aside from combat. De-escalating conflicts. When I was a security guard, we... I got a course on mental health crisis from a guy who does hostage negotiation. I want... we should practice it."

She was ready to be seared by Andy's instant, caustic sarcasm. By a reminder that they were a specialist unit brought in when negotiation failed. Instead Andy looked back at the sword, twisting it to catch the light. "Was it useful?"

"Yeah," Nile said, trying not to let the breath shudder out of her in one long exhale. She didn't want Andy to know how nervous she'd been. "There's a... a lotta conflicts that don't have to turn violent, if you just approach it in..." She ran out of steam for an instant, and shrugged. "If you know how to respond."

"See if there's a webinar," Andy said, which flabbergasted Nile so much—coming from Andy!—that she didn't have anything to say while Andy set the saber down and sauntered back out of the building.

Nile sat for a good long while after that, surrounded by swords on a floor stained with her own blood, and got her breathing under control. Eventually she took her knife out of its sheath and looked it over.

It felt silly, to take a sacred oath on a Ka-Bar knife.

"I swear to almighty God," she said to it, anyway, "that I will use you as my last resort. Not my first."

[stop-breaking-my-heart-telltale]

Top 5 Characters in ANF Who Would’ve Made Better Love Interests Than Kate

There are a lot of mixed opinions on TWDG: A New Frontier. Some people like it, some don’t, and some people hate it so much that they refuse to accept as canon in the series. Extreme? Yeah, but hey, to each their own. 

One thing that always bothers me when I do my replay of the series and this game is how much Kate is forced on us and even kinda punishes us for not romancing her. Like, no offense, but I’m not really interested in dating my sister-in-law, especially when her husband is actually alive, and even if she wasn’t my brother’s wife, she’s still not a character I have chemistry with, y’know? 

And every time I play, I can’t help but think that almost anyone else in ANF would’ve been a better romantic interest for Javi over Kate, so I decided to make that the list for this week. 

I would’ve loved more choices and for the game to actually show Javi’s canon bisexuality outside of a flirty line with Jesus that most players didn’t even pick. Just sayin’.

I do want to note that if you enjoy the romance with Kate and the relationship between her and Javi, that’s totally cool. Just because I don’t like it doesn’t mean you can’t ship them, y’know? I’m not here to try to change your mind or tell you you’re bad for shipping something I don’t because I’m not a dingus. You do what makes you happy, friend. :)

Besides, going off the stats, a majority of players romanced her so if anything, I’m the weirdo. This list is just for fun! 

Before we start, just wanna say a big thank you to @pi-creates​ for helping out with this one! Really appreciate it! Now, here are my top 5 characters who, in my opinion, would’ve made better love interests for Javier than Kate.

5. Jane if the writers didn’t turn her into a dead potato

Oh man, you should see your face right now. 

Wait, wait, stop! Before you click outta here in a huff with your “Kenny good Jane bad” grunts and come yell at me, just hear me out-- this entry is mostly a joke and the other four on this list are serious, okay? 

I needed someone to put at #5 and after talking over some options and going back and forth.... Jane came up as a joke and then kind of made the list. Because really, I thought about it. I was like, “Would I really rather have dingdong “whatever happens stay out of it” potato face Jane as a love interest over Kate? Do I dislike Kate as an option that much?” and Pi and I talked about this for a while and yeah.... yeah I would actually. 

When I said anyone but Kate, I guess I really meant anyone. 

Trust me, I know, I’m just as surprised. I guess this really says a lot about my feelings for Kate. I didn’t know I disliked her this much either.

But for fun, let’s entertain this idea of the writers NOT pulling the ol’ character assassination on Jane and she made it to Richmond with Clementine and AJ because--

Jane: "One time I ate glass because I was drunk and thought it was sugar."

Javier: "I gambled on my own baseball matches and disgraced myself for money."

Jane: “Well, I dragged my little sister around with me after everything went to shit until I finally gave her what she wanted and left her to die.”

Javier: “I wasn’t there when my dad was fighting cancer and when I finally showed up, I was too late and he was already dead, then he turned and I bashed his skull in with a piece of wood.” 

Jane: “I shot a dude’s dick off once.”

Javier: “Oof. I insulted an old lady’s cake and then shot her eye out.”

Jane: “I screwed a guy when I was supposed to be securing a place for some lady to have her baby and it resulted in the death of a teenage girl.”

Javier: “I screwed my brother’s wife.” 

Jane: “...”

Javier: “In my defense, I thought he was dead.” 

Jane: “That’s fair.”

Clementine, exasperated and emo: “Oh my god.” 

....I mean... we might be onto something here, c’mon--

Okay, now onto the more legit entries. 

4. Conrad

Now listen... I know, okay? I know. I know this one can be seen as a bit problematic considering the fact that Conrad, in his grief and anger over Francine’s death, held a gun to Gabe’s head and threatened Javi and Clementine.... plus Javi can literally murder him.

...and if you don’t do anything, Conrad with murder both Gabe and Javi and you’ll get a “YOU ARE DEAD” screen...

But we don’t talk about that because it’s not canon.

I know, but listen... I’m allowed to have ships that are difficult, as are you, and this is my list so... there.

If Conrad was a love interest that’s the route I’d take because I love him and I think a relationship between him and Javi could’ve been so damn good if properly done.

I just find Conrad to be an interesting character with a great arc that you only get to see if you don’t shoot him... which is what most people did, so they missed out. And like, I get it, I get why y’all shot him but maybe next time you play, you could consider not doing that?

So here’s the thing, Javi and Conrad share something-- they both lost loved ones because of shithead Badger. Javi is heartbroken after Mariana’s death, Conrad is devastated after Francine’s death, and they both handle that in different ways. Conrad becomes so focused on revenge and getting into Richmond, that he’s willing to threaten two kids in order to get what he wants but the thing is... that’s not him.

He even says so himself when you keep him alive-- he genuinely apologizes for what happened and will end up coming back to save Javi’s life in ep4. The potential for this to work as a relationship? It’s there... the only problem is that my confidence in the writers handling something like this is low, but let’s pretend they used their time and brains wisely-- ya got yourself a classic slow-burn friends to enemies to friends again to lovers romance and I’m here for it. 

3. Paul “Jesus” Monroe

A lot of people really like the idea of Javi and Jesus and wanted him to be a romantic option, and I don’t blame them. They have chemistry in the scenes they share, and Javi can straight up flirt with him at the end of the season, and it’s super cute... of course, I wish we had more but Telltale was too scared to actually show Javi’s bisexuality outside of that one line, I guess.

But, anyway, this ship has a lot of sweet fanart that we love to see.

The only real reason he isn’t higher on the list is that Jesus is apparently already in a relationship at this point? I guess? From what I’ve been told? Listen, I don’t read the comics, I don’t watch the show, I just go off what y’all tell me. Plus, I believe Kent joked about Jesus having someone in each community during the commentaries so like... that’s a thing?

But let’s pretend that we throw that all out and Jesus is single and ready to be in a committed relationship with our boy Javier here. Like I mentioned above, these characters have a believable chemistry from the moment they meet and I think that has a lot to do with how charming they are by themselves. Those different charms work well together.

I also enjoy how much of a badass Jesus is when it comes to fighting off walkers. Javi has a lot of force that you feel with each hit, while Jesus almost has a lighter but just as impactful hit? I dunno if I’m explaining that well-- basically, Javi strong but Jesus can bounce off walls and do cool shit with weapons that feels effortless.

It’s a combo of fighting styles that I love, so these two fighting together? *chef kiss*

There’s also Jesus’ morality and how he wants to see Javier make “good” decisions, y’know? Sure, he gets pissy if you murder the shit outta Badger, which is mostly just Telltale showing you consequences, but I get it. He sees a lot of potential in Javi, more than Javi himself sees. And unlike certain characters, Jesus doesn’t completely hate you for doing something he doesn’t agree with to a frustrating degree.

If the game gave us the option to pursue Jesus as a love interest, he and Javier would’ve been such a badass couple with a sweet romance.

2. Eleanor

This one might come as a surprise to those of you who know my feelings about Eleanor... as in, I don’t like her. I never forgave her for the shit she pulled in ep4/ep5, and now every time I replay ANF and she shows up? Well, all I really hear is the hissing of a snake.

But, putting those feelings aside and looking at her from a different perspective, I do believe that she would’ve made for a better love interest than Kate assuming that if you romanced her, she wouldn’t rat everyone out to Joan, y’know?

Hell, most people believed that Eleanor was going to be the second option with Kate back when the episodes were coming out, and for good reason. The chemistry is there in the flirting, and their relationship could’ve been super cute.

Of course, Eleanor being a love interest also comes with things becoming awkward with Tripp, but c’mon-- as awkward as pursuing a relationship with your sister-in-law and never telling your brother after finding out he’s alive? Nah, I don’t think so.

Plus, for the first three episodes, Eleanor’s not a bad character. In fact, she’s pretty damn likable, she deeply cares for the group and wants to use her medical skills for good.

And you can tell through the dialogue that she and Javi are fond of one another... well, I guess until they shove the Kate thing in our faces and suddenly Eleanor’s like “oh, I thought you two were a thing??” like... Eleanor, we were flirting and I totally rejected all of Kate’s advances last episode I mean??

If she were a love interest, instead of turning on us, she would... y’know, not do that and instead help us out. We have a couple cute moments like back in ep1 where she’s patching Javi up but this time with a smooch? Super cute.

1. Tripp

Okay but seriously, why wasn’t Tripp a love interest? 

He’s the perfect option. I just-- uuuughhhhh. 

They already have a great believable bromance, so why not take it a step further and make it an official romance? Oh wait, that’s right, ya gotta kill off 95% of your determinant characters, I forgot. Sorry Tripp. 

Well, fuck that. Out of all the other adult characters, Javi has the most chemistry with this man. I believe them more than I believe him and Kate. Sure, they got off to a rocky start the progression of their relationship felt natural with every episode. 

That scene where Tripp is confiding in Javi about his feelings for Eleanor? And in turn, Javi can confide in him about Kate? One of my favorite scenes. I only wish there was an option to tell Tripp he can do much better and set the path for the romance. 

Seriously, I’d probably feel more okay about the romance with Kate if Tripp were the second option. That way, Kate wouldn’t be so forced onto the player, the writers confirming Javi’s bisexuality on Twitter or whatever wouldn’t feel like they were trying to earn points without actually showing representation, and we would’ve gotten the beauty that is Javier and Tripp. 

Also, then Tripp could make it to the end without dying that dumb death of his that no one likes. 

And if I haven’t convinced you yet, then look at these swaps Pi did--

--and tell me they aren’t fucking perfect?? You can’t, because look at them. 

Where’s my Tripp route, Telltale??

---

Honorable Mentions

-If I wasn’t sticking to just ANF characters, Luke probably would’ve made the list because that’s apparently a popular combo and I dig it.  -Pudding... because Javi fucking loves pudding.  -Honestly Max probably would’ve been a better love interest than Kate oof--

---

So, whattya think? Do you agree with this top 5 or nah? Do you have a favorite Javi ship? Let me know, I’d love to hear from you. :D

Next week’s T5F Top 5 Times Lee was the Absolute Best

[nosferatvpussy]

distorted lullabies [chapter X]

Word count: 9,034  (big chapter again... I’m sorry?)

Warnings: vulgar language

Pairing: Dracula x female reader

AO3 link

___________________________________________________________

Friday. The day before the big day. 

Evelyn would finally tie the knot and I would, hopefully, be still alive by the end of the night and be free of Count Dracula. If everything went according to plan, in a few years I would only remember him as that mysterious guy I once had a fling with and reminisce about him over wine on nights where I found myself lonely.

I should not remember Count Dracula as the guy I had a fling with nor should I ever think about him as I was lonely. It would be better if I didn’t think about him at all, for the rest of my life. The fact that my brain hadn’t immediately presented that as an option was worrisome enough to make me press the button for St Thomas Hospital’s ground floor again, like that would make the lift descend faster. 

The faster I met with Zoe, the faster I would be reminded of the dangers of thinking about Dracula as any sort of romantic interest. That wasn’t an alternative – not when I was cornered into choosing eternal life or dying. 

“This can’t go on, Zoe,” said a male voice. 

I’d been in the process of entering the hospital’s lobby when I heard it and stopped dead in my tracks, dodging behind a flower bouquet display for sale. I grabbed one of the ‘get well’ cards and pretended to read it, pricking my ears up. The attendant circled the counter, offering to help me with the appropriate bouquet and telling me how I could buy one and send it up to my loved one’s room, but I quickly waved her away. 

I wasn’t entirely sure why I decided to hide but my gut told me this wasn’t a conversation I was supposed to hear. Like the world’s worst spy, I peered up between leaves and colourful flowers to see Zoe, sitting down on one of the hospital’s ugly couches as a young man paced in front of her, hands on his waist like he was scolding her. Zoe was facing sideways but I wasn’t in her line of vision, leading me to shift closer so I could hear the man. 

“... strong enough. You’re near death, for God’s sake! And you want to take him down with you?”

“Keep your voice down, Jack,” Zoe said. 

She tried to grab his wrist but he stepped out of her reach, shaking his head to the sides. Jack, her student if memory served, was one of those people that could be anywhere between 16 and 30. His pale face didn’t bear a shadow of a beard, which made me wonder if he could grow one at all, but his huge eyes looked so frightened and troubled that he couldn’t be a teenager.

“Zoe, this is a stupid plan...” he said something else in a hushed voice, and I moved closer, straining my hearing. “...happened in Surrey wasn’t enough for you? The Foundation has to stop. Everything has to stop! This is wrong, and you know it.” Shock kept me from gasping but I couldn’t help when my mouth fell open. “Why do you care about this woman? I ask you for help with Lucy, my- my best friend, and you push me away but you run to help this woman you barely know! You’ve known me for years, Zoe. I trusted you every step of the way with the Foundation but you can’t do this for me?”

“You don’t understand. There is no way I can help you with Lucy because she does not want to be helped. Y/N does! She wants out and after reviewing her reputation in London’s courtrooms, she doesn’t mind if things get ugly, either. She’ll do anything to be free of Count Dracula, I’m sure of it, but I’m not sure you’re willing to go that far, Jack.”

“I am!” He protested, slamming his foot on the floor. “I… I love Lucy, Zoe. I’ll do anything for her!”

“Would you let other people risk their lives for her? I’ll have over fifty people risking their lives at this wedding, not to say about the other two hundred guests that will be in danger if we don’t manage to get Dracula. Y/N can handle it but do you want something like that on your conscience?”

“No! But it’s stupid, Zoe. Nobody needs to–” he whispered the word but ‘die’ was clear on his mouth. “Help me get Lucy out of London and let Dracula have Y/N! Lucy will be safe with me, I’ll take her to Ireland, yeah,” –he nodded, face brightening– “she’ll stay with me and my grandparents until she gets better and the Count will be too wrapped up with Y/N to take any notice. It’s a great plan.”

“It’s a naïve one, Jack. Lucy won’t go willingly, that’s called kidnapping by the way, and I need Count Dracula. Is that included in your plan?” Zoe paused and Jack simply stared at her in silence. “I know it’s not. Unlike yours, my plan has a high chance of working–”

“At what cost?”

“–and Lucy will be free by the end of it, same as yours,” Zoe continued like he hadn’t spoken. “It’s not up for discussion, Jack, I told you about this as a courtesy, now go wait for me in the car. I know you’re angry but do me a favour and don’t storm off, I’m really in no condition to drive.” She looked at the watch on her wrist. “Y/N will be here any minute, she usually finishes up with visiting Mr. Renfield about this hour. Go, Jack.”

Jack stood there in a staring contest with Zoe. Not a moment later, Jack lowered his eyes, granting her the win before making his way towards the exit. I raised the get well card, concealing my face behind it as he passed me. I had never seen him before but now that I knew he was driving Zoe around, I couldn't be sure that he didn’t know me.

If I could, I would find somewhere to sit and ruminate about their conversation but then Zoe would have enough time to grow suspicious about my delay. 

As soon as Jack disappeared from my sight, I threw the card on the counter and strode over to where Zoe was sitting. 

I hadn’t made up my mind about how I was going to deal with what I had just heard until I took one look at her face. She was paler than when I last saw her and now her skin had a greenish tint that solidified death’s hold over her body. Her eyes appeared sunken like she’d lost a lot of weight in the span of the past week, but that could be the dark circles around them playing a trick on my brain. Zoe gave me a shaky smile that made me sit down next to her as if I was made of stone.

“I know I look like shit,” she said, patting my knee. “Save the pity.”

“I don’t pity you but I am worried about you. Is the cancer getting worse?”

“A bit but you caught me on a bad day, that’s all. Are you ready?”

“Zoe–” I began but she threw me a cold look with a slight shake of her head. “Okay, you don’t want sympathy, fine, but is there anything I can do for you?”

“Yes, now that we have these” –she pulled an orange pill bottle from her pocket and shook it– “you can trap Count Dracula. That’s what you can do for me.”

I plucked the tiny bottle from her fingers, analysing the two pills inside of it – one of them red and the other one blue – and then started to laugh. Zoe furrowed her brows but her lips tugged up, waiting for a cue to start laughing, too.

“Matrix pills,” I explained between laughs but Zoe didn’t join in, apparently clueless. “Keanu Reeves is offered two pills in the film, the blue one keeps him living in willful ignorance from the evil in the world and the red one is, well, freedom, if we put it simply.”

“Nevermind their colour, both of these are your red pill.” Her mouth quirked up. “Follow the white rabbit.”

“Hey, you know it!” I grinned. 

“Yeah, I’m a cool kid.” Zoe chuckled but was interrupted by a cough that soon left her out of breath. She waved me off before I offered help, so I stood there, waiting for her to cough up a lung anytime. “I made two–” another series of coughs “–two pills–” she cleared her throat and took a deep breath “–just in case... but I can replicate them if this fails and we need more in the future. I ran out of blue cases which is why they’re different colours.”

Remembering the day I first met Zoe and how she mentioned that studying Count Dracula might help with finding a cure for her cancer, I was filled with a determination I didn’t feel often in my everyday life. This plan wasn’t all about me. I needed to do this for Zoe so she could have a chance, too, no matter what.

“I’ll take the red pill for good luck,” I told her. “Does it actually work?”

“Yes, it works. Before they ingested the medication, the subjects were asked to memorise sequences from a card deck and play a memory game with them while we monitored brain waves. We continued mapping their brain all throughout the test, including the moment of the pill’s ingestion–” Zoe stopped, taking several breaths and sounding like she’d just ran a marathon.

“Okay, no need to explain the science behind it. If it works, I’m fine with it. What about the side effects?”

“Still the same ones, unfortunately. Short term memory loss is still a possibility which is why the plan needs to move fast after you take the pill. Here, you’ll need this, too.” From another pocket, she pulled a mobile phone and gave it to me. There wasn’t a scratch on the screen so I assumed it was brand new. “There are a few numbers saved in the contact list, one of them is mine. In my condition, it’s best that I stay in London, and if I go anywhere near Berkeley I bet Dracula will be able to scent me. Anything feels weird to you, anything at all, you text me and we abort the plan. Remember, text this time. We’ll destroy the phone later anyway. If you call me from inside the Berkeley Castle, the Count might be able to overhear it. Raoul’s and Sylvia’s numbers are saved there, too. Who are them, again?”

“Zoe, we’ve been through this–”

“I know we have but I need to be sure you remember. Parrot it back to me.”

I took a deep breath.

“Raoul is the burly french guy you showed me a picture of last time we met. He’ll pose as a waiter at the reception; when I’m ready, I ask him for a Manhattan. Terrible drink, by the way, I’m absolutely not drinking that.” I made a face of disgust and Zoe snorted. “Raoul will leave to ‘get the drink’”–I made air quotes–“ but he’ll take too long, so I tell Dracula that I’ll go look for the waiter because I’m really thirsting for a Manhattan. Then I slip out to the ladies’ room and take one of the pills. I’ll return to Dracula, annoyed because I couldn’t find the waiter, and ask him to join me in the garden.” Now, for the scary part. “Away from everyone, I’ll let him bite me and pray that this bloody pill works and he doesn’t kill me.”

“It’ll work.” Zoe clasped my hand and squeezed it.

“Sylvia is the tiny girl with short red hair disguised as one of the wedding planners,” I continued. “She’ll be outside all night, controlling who can go in and come out of the castle and she’ll have a panoramic view of the gardens. When Dracula is, huh, distracted drinking my blood, Sylvia will turn on the UV lights in the garden. If I’m still alive, I’ll run as your team moves in on him.”

“Now, for the final blow,” announced Zoe as she rummaged through her purse. She showed me a pen, black and slim. It looked like one those fancy, expensive ones posh people usually had. “It’s not an actual pen,” she explained as if reading my thoughts. “Looks like one, yeah but it’s a modified insulin pen.” She opened it and my nose was attacked by a wave of lavender, rosemary, and cinnamon. Not a nice combination. I was still grimacing when I noticed the tiny needle at the tip. “Inside of it, there are essential oils to disguise the scent of our true weapon, my blood.”

My mouth dropped open. It was sick, and genius at the same time. 

“You didn’t tell me about this part of the plan.”

“I didn’t think of it until three days ago.” Zoe closed the pen and handed it to me. I took it like it was made of crystal. “When Dracula bit me, my blood crippled him enough for the Foundation to take him into custody without any casualties. It was surprisingly easy once he was poisoned by it, I expect it’ll work perfectly this time, too. The pen is pressure activated. Jab him with it when you think he’s sufficiently distracted drinking you and he’ll go down like a ton of bricks.”

“Brilliant,” I said, turning the pen between my fingers. “Can we still keep the UV lights, though? Safety and all.”

“We’ll keep them. You’re all set now. Are you leaving tonight?”

“Yeah. I’ll take a train to Gloucester at 9pm. It’s twenty minutes away from Berkeley by car, so it should be fine.”

“Are you staying in Gloucester or Berkeley?”

“Gloucester. There weren’t vacancies in Berkeley anymore. It’ll be a full wedding, I guess. Will you need samples today? It’s all healed up now.” I pointed at the side of my neck where Dracula had bit me.

Apprehension made me hold my breath. What if Zoe collected my blood and somehow found out it was different because I drank the Count’s blood? I hadn’t told her about that, and I frankly had no plans to, whether it impacted her research or not. As much as I would like to deny it, that moment at the park was terrifying and sensuous at the same time, and entirely mine to remember. Zoe would only ruin it with her scolding and I wanted to keep at least a few good memories. 

“No,” said Zoe, assuaging my worry. “Now that it’s healed there aren’t any antibodies and white blood cells being produced specifically to combat the wound. There’s no point in collecting samples.”

Zoe and I stared at each other as silence fell, our resolve making our gazes nearly clang in the air. 

I trusted Zoe to make this work; trusted her because I knew she not only wanted this but needed this to survive. How far that trust reached was an entirely different matter. She was hiding something from me, and now, after overhearing Jack spouting at her, I knew it involved the Foundation and what happened to those poor students in Surrey. The fact that she had lied to me that day meant that I wouldn’t like the truth if I heard it, which is why I needed to know.

“Do I have to worry about what happened in Surrey?”

Zoe shut her eyes and threw her head back as she blew out a breath.

“You heard all of that?” Her voice was calm. Not such a bad liar, after all.

“Most of it. So. Anything you want to tell me?”

“Not really. Two of Jack’s friends from the Foundation got conscience heavy about some things and committed suicide.”

“The news are saying it was murder,” I countered.

“The news are making a spectacle,” Zoe said with a touch of finality. “It was suicide.”

I watched her carefully, shooting her one of my most piercing stares but she simply stared back without crumbling. 

I wouldn’t be quick to trust Zoe’s word on that matter; she’d lied before about it. It confirmed my suspicion that the Jonathan Harker Foundation was shady but as long as it didn’t affect me under these extraneous circumstances, I didn’t care what had weighed enough on those boys’ minds to commit suicide, or murder each other if the news were right. I knew damn well I should care like any person would and I found myself wondering if my ability to be stone-cold was something that appealed to Count Dracula.

What did it matter what appealed to him? In the next 48 hours I would be free of him. I’d never hear his voice again or look upon his face. I’d never live in fear of him again. 

But why wasn’t I dancing with joy at the prospect of going back to my normal life?

“Who’s Lucy?” I blurted. 

From what Jack said, I had a pretty good idea of who she was to Count Dracula but I needed to hear Zoe say it. I needed to be reminded that I wasn’t special, and it was more than my life on the line.

“A friend of Jack’s,” Zoe breathed. “Dracula has been feeding from her ever since he got here. She’s a willing donor, it seems. Jack thinks she’s very fond of Count Dracula.” Zoe stared at me with raised eyebrows to let me know just what type of fondness she was talking about. “Protective of him, too. Jack said she threw a massive fit when he questioned her about the bites on her neck.”

Something tore inside me. I tried to push it aside but my nose started to burn like I was about to cry.

This was what I’d wanted when I asked Zoe about Lucy, wasn’t it? Another reason why my entire ‘relationship’, if one could call it that, with Count Dracula wasn’t real. He had been manipulating me from the very beginning, and I should’ve been smarter than to fall for it, yet here I was: feeling betrayed and rejected, wishing to be swallowed by the ground for ever having thought that I mattered to him when I was just a conquest to keep him entertained while he drained Lucy. I should feel glad that he wasn’t that infatuated by me because it would make things easier but I felt the furthest thing from victorious in that moment.

I blinked to clear the tears that had threatened to spill. 

“I’m being ridiculous,” I murmured, looking down at my hands because I was too ashamed to look at Zoe. “Anyway. Why don’t we review plans B, C, D and all the rest of the alphabet in case things go south and I can’t stab Dracula with this?” I shook the pen.

“Y/N–” Zoe’s voice was gentle, and I gritted my teeth.

“Oh, please don’t be nice. You don’t want sympathy and neither do I. Come on, plan B. I think I’m still a little off on the details, so help me out.”

“It’s the bond, Y/N. Whatever you’re feeling, it’s not real.” 

I nodded, meeting her eyes briefly before looking down at my hands again.

“Right. So, plan B…”

When we were done reviewing the other scenarios, I barely remembered what I’d been so sad about but my chest still felt constricted as I headed home.

_______________________________________________________________

I thought I had it all figured out as I closed my suitcase. The jealousy and rejection I’d felt earlier must have derived from the bond I shared with the Count; much like Renfield had gone into a fit upon finding out his ‘master’ had bitten me, I had felt a figment of that when Zoe told me about Lucy. 

Simple as that. 

But when my phone rang and I saw the name Count Dracula, I almost didn’t answer him out of spite. 

“Stupid fucking bond,” I cursed, staring at the screen. “It’s not real, Y/N. Just answer him. He probably just wants to ask how to get to Berkeley.” I noticed my reflection on my window and frowned. “Talking to myself, excellent. I’ll be like Renfield in no time.” I grabbed the phone. “Hi.”

“What are you wearing?” Dracula asked, making my eyebrows shoot up.

“Usually there’s more foreplay before phone sex,” I blurted, and smacked my forehead as soon as I said it. 

Silence. And then a hearty laugh.

“I meant the wedding. But, I’m delighted to know that’s been on your mind. Would you care to elaborate, darling?”

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

“It was a joke,” I managed to say, throwing myself on my bed and placing a pillow over my face as if that could keep my cheeks from blushing.

“Of course it was,” he said, still laughing. “So, what colour is your dress? People tend to match for occasions like this, right?”

“Purple,” I replied, hoping my smile didn’t come through in the word. Was he worried about us looking good together? And why was this so endearing to me?

“Ah, perfect.”

“Is your tie purple, too?”

“No, but it’ll match. You can come down, now.”

“Come down to where?”

“I’m outside of your house,” he said. My doorbell rang as evidence, making me fling the pillow I had on my face across the room. “I’d only thought of the tie when I got here and I feared we would be late in case I needed to return home to–”

“No, I will be late.” I sat up. “I’ve got a train to catch for Gloucester in an hour. I can’t go on a date with you tonight.”

“It’s not a date and you’re not taking the train. I bought this car and I mean to use it, so I’m driving us there tonight.”

I didn’t know where to start; the fact that he had probably planned this and not warned me in advance – better yet, asked me! – or that he expected me to simply comply and come down because he said so. 

Instead, what came out of my mouth was, “It’s a three hour drive!”

“We can make it in less than that. Are you all packed?”

“Yes but I’m not going with you. I already bought train tickets. I’m not wasting my money and I’d much rather go by train and arrive there earlier than travel with you.”

“I’ll pay you back, and I promise I’ll be fun company.”

I stood up from the bed and started stomping around my room.

“You can’t make demands and expect me to obey. I don’t know how women were during your time but I certainly won’t–”

“Yes, yes, you bow to no one. We’re very clear on that,” he said with plain impatience and mockery, which made me huff in affront. “Take this road trip” –he chuckled– “as part of your deal. Like I said before, you didn’t specify how I was to convince you to accept immortality, and this is one of my many ways. You’re bound by your contract conditions, Y/N. Unless you want to rescind your deal,” he drawled “in which case I’ll go up there and make you mine. Right now.”

I stopped walking in front of my bedroom’s door, staring down the flight of stairs to the front door like I could burn a hole through it with my gaze and strike Count Dracula. 

I’d once won an entire case in court because I gave an expert at the stand a death stare so powerful that they suddenly changed their opinion on the crime scene’s blood splatter pattern. Sadly, I’d tried that death stare with Dracula already and it hadn’t worked. Knowing him, he had probably taken it as flirting. He couldn’t see me right now but I still hoped he felt the burn of my stare.

“In short, you’re giving me no choice,” I muttered, marching around my room again because I was too wired to stay put.

“Quite the contrary, my darling. Denying our deal is still a fair choice if you have a sudden change of heart. As much as I would be disappointed if you gave up so easily–” he sighed dramatically “–I wouldn’t pass the opportunity to savour you as you so deserve.” The silent threat of desire in his tone made my pace falter and my hair to rise in its ends. “I’m not a total beast.”

My belly coiled in unwarranted need and I bit the insides of my cheeks in an attempt to ground myself. All it did was make my mind run wild with ideas of Dracula kissing me and piercing my lips with his fangs, tasting me, and slowly willing my blood into his mouth in excruciating passion as he–

“Mmm,” he made and another stab of desire attacked my body as I wondered if that’s how he would sound if I knelt before him. “I can smell your lust from here.” A chuckle. “Say the word and I’ll go up there.”

It would be easy to say yes, and easy shouldn’t be a word concerning the Count. Besides, I wasn’t a quitter.

“I’ll be down in a minute,” I bit out. 

Blowing out a breath, and with it some of my sanity, I ended the call. Next I grabbed my suitcase, backpack and threw the black garment bag containing my dress over my arm. Before I started descending the staircase, I took a moment to squash my sex drive. After much needed concentration, no intrusive thoughts remained but my body still felt like someone had set me ablaze. 

Count Dracula was waiting by his car when I opened my door. I took in his appearance before I started mouthing off at him. 

So far I’d only seen him in blazers and slacks but tonight he was sporting dark jeans and a leather jacket, and for a second I was so in shock that I forgot why I was mad at him. The jacket was one I was most used to seeing bikers wear – straight cut around his neck in a way that framed his chiseled jaw and simple details on the shoulders that faded before reaching his arms. And it fit him perfectly. 

The man was sophistication incarnate in his manners and way of dressing but somehow the leather didn’t look out of place on him. In fact, he looked… cool, which wasn’t a word I would ever thought of attributing to him. Chic with a touch of menace? Yes, but cool while slightly less threatening? Not at all.

“I’ll take your blank expression as admiration,” he said, rolling his shoulders and making the jacket accentuate muscles on his arms that I hadn’t had the opportunity of noticing before. 

“It is. Look at you… All modern-like.” I swept my gaze through him again, nodding. 

“I’m modern,” he protested as he walked towards me.

“Modern-er, if that exists. I’m not complaining but why the sudden change in style?” I gave him my suitcase when he extended a hand for it.

“A road trip calls for comfortable clothing. At least that hasn’t changed in the last century.”

Since I was exchanging an hour and a half train trip for the double of that in a car with him, I was more than thankful for choosing to wear a large sweater over leggings and trainers. As for Count Dracula, there was no denying he looked good in a leather jacket but I wasn’t sure if it could be considered comfortable. What would he have worn to his travels centuries ago? Fur and armour? That’s a sight I would be curious to see.

I followed Dracula to the BMW’s trunk when he opened it and frowned at the earthy scents that drifted to my nose. 

“Are you planning on gardening in Berkeley?”

He laughed as he pushed the wood box where the smell came from to the side and fit my suitcase next to his. 

“No. Just a little something I need to travel with, in order to rest properly when I’m away from my own home. My former home, that is.”

Former home; another way to say Wallachia, I supposed. I sniffed the air and prayed that by the end of the trip my clothes wouldn’t smell like Diana’s garden after she decided to plant new seeds.

“What’s inside the box, dirt?” I joked with a smirk. When Dracula nodded, my smirk vanished. “Are you serious?” Another nod as he shut the boot. “What? Why? Is it a vampire thing?”

“It’s very much a vampire thing. One you’ll have to learn to live with when I make you my bride.” 

Too stunned as I tried to mull that piece of information, the Count opened the door to the backseat and took my dress from me, carefully placing it on top of another garment bag. Next, he held the passenger’s door for me, gesturing for me to enter. Last time he opened a door for me, things got a little sidetracked, which reminded me of why I was mad at him. 

His mouth opened in a large grin as I strode over and anger flared up again.

“Keep in mind that I’m only accepting to travel with you because the other option, well, isn’t an option,” I told him.

“Oh, yes, of course. How preposterous,” he leaned closer, smile growing sardonic “you consenting to relentless nights of pleasure for the next hundreds of years at my side. We can’t have that, can we?”

How in the hell he managed to make his voice feel like a caress and a whip at the same time was beyond me, and I had no intention to find out. 

“No, we can’t have that,” I declared. “For the next hours, I expect you to keep your full attention on the road. Unlike you, I don’t have the luxury of surviving a car crash. So hands and legs to yourself at all times.” He chuckled at the emphasis, switching his weight on his feet so that his knee touched my thigh; I gritted my teeth and forced myself not to move. I’d rather die than let him know how much he got to me, then again, not dying was the entire point. “No funny business.”

“I don’t see it as business. It is incredibly fun watching you squirm, though.”

“Yeah, must be a riot.” I rolled my eyes. “Are we agreed? Oh, fangs, too.”

It was his turn to roll his eyes. 

“Sadly, yes.” He stepped aside, unblocking the way so I could enter.

Once inside, I looked up at him.

“You owe me 30 quid for the train ride.”

“Consider your dinner paid,” he said and shut the door.

I was still smiling, wondering what 30 pounds could buy in rural England – a feast, presumably – when Dracula entered the car, turned it on and started accelerating down the street, all in 5 seconds. Understanding dawned on me when he said we could make the trip in less than 3 hours. Vampire speed combined with a BMW obviously resulted in him developing a leadfoot.

“Oh, are you staying in Gloucester, too?” I asked as I hurriedly pulled on my seatbelt.

He glanced at the navigation system on the car’s dashboard that indicated our trajectory towards Gloucester and then at me. 

“Yes, in a hotel. I couldn’t find anything available in Berkeley.” He clicked the screen in the dashboard a few times and music started playing softly. Hungry Like The Wolf, of all things. “Whose wedding are we attending? I seem to recall from our last date that you don’t consider this person a friend.”

I blew out a breath.

“Evelyn Seymour. I work with her. She’s done some awful things to me when we were starting at the firm and I’ve said some pretty terrible things back at her. She would’ve found a way to get me fired if it wasn’t for Renfield intervening.”

“What did she do?”

“I thought you knew everything there was to know.”

“The important things, yes, they’re easy to make out from your blood. Her name rings a bell and I know that you hate her but that’s it.”

Even my blood didn’t consider Evelyn important? Sweet.

“Remember those girls you met the other day when you picked me up from my office?” I asked, and he nodded. “All of us interned together plus Evelyn. Oftentimes the interns were paired together to run errands for our bosses, such as running to the courts to file motions and request subpoenas, things like that. Renfield and Talbot, the partner who Evelyn responded to, felt that she and I had different enough profiles yet skilled in our own ways to learn from each other, so we did most of those things together. Quite the learning experience,” I scoffed. “Everything is a competition to Evelyn, so instead of helping each other, she saw this as an opportunity to get ahead and fuck me over in the process, especially because I was being regarded as one of the most promising attorneys in the firm’s future.”

“It didn’t work,” said Dracula. He looked at me. “Renfield told me that you’re in line for becoming a partner if he doesn’t get better, so whatever Evelyn did was worthless.”

Becoming a partner at a big firm was something that I’d dreamed of since I got my degree. Until not long ago it was something I thought about often and I expected to be happy if I ever received those news, however, to my surprise, I felt absolutely nothing when hearing those words come out of Count Dracula’s lips.

Maybe it wasn’t as important as I’d imagined. 

“Yes, she tried her damndest to hurt my career, though, and me. She even went so far once to accuse me of having an affair with a judge from a case I was working with Renfield. Claimed to have ‘photographic’ evidence and everything. The partners insisted I be investigated and Renfield managed to prove that it was all pure slander before the other partners took any decisive action towards me. I think the only reason Evelyn didn’t get fired for this was because the firm practically belongs to her family, but she still got suspended for a week. She’s stopped trying to get in my way since then but she never loses an opportunity to take a jab at me, be it an outfit she deems unfashionable or a case I lost.”

“Which is where I come in,” Dracula remarked.

“Yes, as much as I try to be the bigger person when she’s involved, I’m not above a tiny bit of retribution,” I chuckled and he smiled at me before turning his eyes back to the road. “What’s with the box of dirt? I’m curious.”

“Because I’m not in Wallachia anymore, I need to rest in soil from my own land,” he explained like it was perfectly logical.

“What happens if you don’t?”

He shrugged.

“I’d rather not find out.”

I frowned.

“Fairly inconvenient, isn’t it? Sleeping on the earth?”

“I don’t sleep in it. Not anymore. I just need it near me when I sleep.”

“But why?”

“It’s one of the rules of the beast,” he said, chuckling. 

I didn’t see how that was funny but he obviously knew something I didn’t. 

When he wasn’t looking at me, it was easy to watch him without feeling like I was doing something improper, so I decided to keep up the conversation.

“Did you travel a lot? Back in Wallachia?” 

I imitated how he said the word and he immediately opened a smile. I tried not to smile back at how delighted he seemed but he must’ve caught me trying to hide it because his smile grew into a full-fledged grin.

“Except when I was traveling to battle, I didn’t really travel as a ruler. It was dangerous to travel and leave my land unguarded. Afterwards, though, I traveled to most of Europe.”

“As a vampire?”

“Yes. But the world’s changed so much, now, I doubt I would recognise all the places I’ve been to.”

“Did you have a favourite?”

“Oh, yes. I spent an entire month in Moscow when I first went there in 1785, I think was the year. Unlike anything I’d ever seen... There was this cathedral there, just stunning. I had to force myself to go in there but I couldn’t leave without seeing what it looked like on the inside.”

“I think it’s pretty famous now. You’re talking about the one that’s all colourful and has crazy shapes, right?”

“That’s the one. We can go there once you're a vampire.”

“Stop saying it like that, it’s disconcerting.” I said, making him glance at me. “You still have to convince me and so far you’re not doing very well.”

He laughed and gooseflesh trailed my skin as if he had touched me.

“Somehow I doubt that but I’ll stop since you asked so nicely.”

I raised my eyebrows, unable to conceal my surprise.

“Well, if I had known it was that easy I would have asked you to leave me alone. But we both know that’s not happening.”

“Depends how nicely you ask me. I might be open to hear you pleading if you fall to your knees.” He gave me a grin that could only be described as naughty. 

I prayed that he couldn’t see me blush under the high-tech lights coming from the BMW’s dashboard but I was deluding myself by entertaining the idea. Not less than 20 minutes ago, I had thought about doing exactly what he had just proposed. I wasn’t telling him that, though.

“Ha-ha. You got jokes.” I said without any humour, fussing with my backpack as if it suddenly felt uncomfortable on my lap. Something popped into my head that made me put my questions about Moscow aside. “How did you come to be a vampire?”

“Ah, that’s not a story for travels.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s not a good one.”

“Not everything is made up of good stories.” I shrugged. “I think you’re avoiding the question and I’ll let you slip this time but I’ll ask again some other time. You never know, maybe it’s something that can convince me, Count.”

“Maybe.”

For a moment there I’d forgotten that tomorrow I would have to carry out my plan with Zoe. I’d spoken to him as if we would have all the time in the world. And I almost wished that we would have more time, at least time for him to tell me about Moscow or Romania. Share with me all his experiences that I was curious about. We would spend hours talking freely about what he’d seen and how people changed, how history passed before his eyes; and how could he learn things from a person’s blood, and didn’t he miss discovering secrets by himself? How was his life when he ruled as a prince? And how did it differ from now after centuries had passed? 

With a jolt, I realised I felt a great need to know him down to the bone. Even the worst things about him, and the best, too. Perhaps that would cast a light into what made him so compelling to me or perhaps I just craved listening to him talk. Either way, exploring that was as dangerous as staring down the barrel of a loaded gun. 

As silence fell, music hailing from the 70s, 80s and 90s filled the car with melodies I knew well enough to hum along. Dracula surprised me by tapping his fingers on the wheel to the rhythm of INXS’s Need You Tonight; he even had a little Queen thrown in there which made me nod in approval. If he was trying to catch up with all the classics he had missed, then he was doing a good job of it. For over an hour stuck in London traffic, we talked about music and he let me connect my phone to his car to show him songs that perhaps weren’t iconic but just as good.

We’d gone from Queen to Billy Idol to Heart to Garbage and finally Nirvana. When I started yawning, Count Dracula changed Heart-Shaped Box for a piano version of Smells Like Teen Spirit. Reminding myself to congratulate him later, I allowed myself to close my eyes for a nap. 

I knew I was dreaming when the piano chords were replaced by the repetitive tone of a music box. 

The miniature ballerina spun slowly inside the box, forever trapped in dancing to the same old song. A song I knew but couldn’t decipher it on account of sounding distant and off-tune. As I watched, I wondered if she was happy but then laughed at what a silly thought that was. Why would the ballerina be happy? She was just a pretty toy, made precisely for the purpose of dancing in circles whenever someone opened the box. 

I closed the box but the song kept playing, now mixed with the cries of anguish of the ballerina, imprisoned in the haunting darkness of such a small space. My fingers struggled to open the box again, now afraid that I’d suffocated the ballerina but it wouldn’t open. In my battle, it fell to the ground and shattered as if it was made of glass instead of wood. The ballerina was nowhere to be found among the debris but blood pooled around the shards. More blood rose up from the floor as if I’d been standing in it the entire time and coated my bare feet, making me slip as I retreated from it. In my panic, I fell on my back and was quickly engulfed by a sea of blood. 

I started gulping large quantities of blood, smiling at the pleasant taste as I tried to keep myself from drowning. Suddenly, the sea was gone but I wasn’t breathing anymore.

There was something hard in my mouth and I gnawed at it, trying to find out what it was. Movement beneath made me draw back and I realised, horrified, that I’d been biting Count Dracula’s neck. Mocking laughter drowned all my other senses and I spit his blood from my mouth, noticing that it tasted the same as the sea of blood. I tried to scramble away but he held onto me, his fingers digging hard into my flesh during the struggle. 

“Shhh, shhh. Take me. Do it,” he urged. 

“Take what?!” I swatted at his hands, still trying to get away.

“All of me,” he responded, snatching my wrists in his grip to stop by blows.

“That’s impossible.”

“Don’t you want me to be yours as you are mine?”

His taste was still in my tongue and I frowned, knowing that was the only part of him I would ever possess.

My lips moved in the dream but I didn’t hear my answer. 

Whether it was yes or no, Dracula’s face transformed into a distorted version of his features. I watched in complacency, too fascinated by staring death in the face to get away. He buried his head in my neck and, as he started to drain me, I looked up at the reddened sky above us with the same ingenuous revere cherubs held in their gazes. 

I’m not sure what woke me up; the lack of movement from the car, Tori Amos singing about being crucified or Count Dracula’s voice sounding distant as he talked to someone that wasn’t me. Whatever it was, it wasn’t the dream. If I hadn’t been disturbed, I was certain I would have remained in that dream forever. Nothing significant could have pulled me from the peace I felt when Dracula bit me in the dream, yet there I was, awake and trying to understand why I was sitting alone inside the car parked outside a gas station. 

I quit fiddling with the car’s GPS to find out where we were when the Count’s words reached my ears.

“Because you’re not invited.” He laughed. “No, darling, I’m not neglecting you...” A pause. “Do that and I’ll bite you in a way you won’t enjoy. Stop being childish, Lucy, you know I don’t like it when you act this way.”

Trying to be as quiet as possible so he wouldn’t know I was awake, I slowly turned in the direction of his voice. Dracula had his back to me, a few metres away from the car, standing in the glow of blue neon lights coming from a convenience store. I hoped it was my fertile imagination playing tricks on me but I could swear I heard affection in his tone for a moment there. 

“Who I’m with doesn’t concern you,” he said into the phone, and this time there was only irritation in his voice. “Lucy, Lucy,” he laughed grimly. “This isn’t a relationship, and it never will be.” Another pause. “Yes, I still want you. I’ve got to go now. Goodbye.”

As he turned around, I got out of the car and stretched as if I had just woken up. 

“Oh, good, you’re awake,” he said upon laying eyes on me. “I bought you dinner, as promised.” He showed me a brown paper bag in his hand that I hadn’t noticed. 

“How did you know I was hungry?” As if on cue, my stomach growled. “Oh.” I blushed as I took the bag from him, peeking inside. “Oh! Pizza! Thanks.”

“I wanted to stop on the way so you could eat properly inside a restaurant but you slept more than I expected. If I’d waited for you to wake up, there wouldn’t be anything open so I stopped for fuel and went to get you food. I recognise it’s not the best–”

“No, I love pizza,” I cut him off. “Can I sit on top of your car to eat or are you becoming one of those guys who has a crush on his car?”

He answered me by sitting on the hood and patting the spot next to him.  The car must have been off for a while because the metal was cold on my butt when I took a seat.

“Where are we?” 

“Oxford,” he said. “An hour away from Gloucester, I think.”

I looked at the block we were in, searching for traces of the medieval architecture Oxford was so famous for but there was nothing special about it; we could just as well have been in London.

“What time is it?” I asked after finishing the first slice of pizza.

“Almost ten.”

“We made it all the way to Oxford in 40 minutes?” I raised my eyebrows and Dracula grinned, looking proud about that. “You can expect speeding fines in your mail during the next few weeks.”

He shrugged, apparently unbothered.

“Aren’t you going to ask me about her?”

I stopped reaching into the bag for another slice of pizza upon fully registering the implications of his question. He knew I’d been listening. Like he’d told Lucy, this wasn’t a relationship and he didn’t owe me an explanation any more than he owed her, but him bringing it up made it seem like I deserved one.

My dream from earlier flashed in mind. Freud only knew what the ballerina in the music box meant but I didn’t need a psychoanalyst to explain what it meant to bite Dracula in my subconscious.

My throat tightened as I thought about what I’d told Dracula in the dream, that it was impossible to have him. But I wanted to, I knew I did. I wanted this part of him, the part that knew I was bothered by him paying attention to someone else and cared enough to check on me, even if he wasn’t subtle about it. I wanted to believe it was the same part of him that had thought about taking me to V&A and broke into the Painted Hall because he’d seen how enthusiastic I was about it. The part of him that carried me to bed and laughed at me when I mumbled nonsensical phrases. 

I wanted something that wasn’t real. Something that I would never have because at this time tomorrow I would be injecting him with Zoe’s blood. And because it wasn’t real, I could play along for a little while.

“What’s to ask? It’s pretty obvious that you’re feeding from her.”

“Don’t play coy, Y/N, just ask me.”

“Fine. Are you fucking her?”

“No.”

I’d braced for a confirmation but his reply made my courtroom face fall apart. I scrutinised his face but nothing came to the surface.

“Really? It sounded a hell lot like you are.”

“I have fucked her but I haven’t made a habit out of it. Lucy is awfully… needy.”

It occurred to me that this was the first time I’d heard him swear and I had to purse my lips not to laugh like a nervous teen. Maybe it was the f-bomb that made me want to burst into laughter, or the sudden joy I’d felt when he called Lucy needy with obvious exasperation.

“Will you make her a vampire?” I continued since he was granting me the freedom to ask.

“Yes.”

“Does she want to be one?”

“Yes.”

“Did you have to convince her like you’re trying to do with me?”

“No.”

“Then why–” I exhaled “–do you still want me if you can have her?”

“Lucy is fun and wild and she wants to die but she doesn’t understand. You do.”

I frowned.

“Understand what?”

“What it takes to live forever.” He grinned but there was no humour in his eyes; I found a sliver of heat in his gaze, though. “Your pizza is getting cold.”

Dracula slid off the hood, like that was the end of the subject and I stalked after him, ignoring my pizza. He started rounding the car towards the driver’s side and I grabbed the back of his jacket to make him stop.

“What does that mean?” I questioned as he turned to look at me. This time his smile was slow, deepening the wrinkles around his eyes.

“The fact that you don’t know what I’m talking about only solidifies my beliefs about you.”

“Being cryptic isn’t helpful,” I snapped. 

“I’m not trying to be helpful.”

“Well, try!”

He took a step towards me and held my face in his hands. The shape of his lips distracted me and it took me a second to register his next words.

“From the start you’ve asked me for a reason to live forever. Don’t you think that means you value more than simply existing as you do now?”

“No. It’s just logical,” I countered, although I was suddenly frowning. “People don’t usually make big choices like this on impulse, you know? Of course I needed a reason.”

“Of course,” he repeated sarcastically.

“I don’t know what it takes to live forever!” I protested, flailing my arms.

I waited to see if he would contradict me but he just stared at me, eyes filled with mockery and confidence that served to further aggravate my mood.

“I barely know what it takes to live this life I’m living, how could I possibly fathom eternal life?” I continued, speaking so fast I could barely understand myself. I carried on when he didn’t reply, “Have I considered it since my deal with you? Of course I have, kinda hard not to but, but– I don’t know! I don’t know what I want! Or or or– how! How can I just give up everything and live forever? I’ve built things, things that I’m proud of, things that matter! And you want me to give them up! For you!”

Rambling wasn’t something I was used to and I forced myself to stop. Every word that came out of my mouth was usually carefully calculated to persuade a jury but this was my life and there was nobody to persuade, so why did it sound like I was trying to do just that?

“What matters in this life that could make me want to live forever?” My voice was so tiny that I scarcely heard my words. 

Suddenly I was literally swept off my feet and before I knew it, Dracula’s lips were on mine and I forgot all the things I was so confused about.��

My eyes shut into the kiss and my breath left me like my lungs had stopped working. Heart beating so fast I could feel it fluttering inside my chest, I wrapped my arms around him in senseless thought as our tongues met, sending sizzles all throughout my nerve endings. As soon as it had started, it was over, and I was standing with my feet on the ground again, body screaming in abandonment because Dracula’s hands weren’t touching me.

“What was that for?” I asked, trembling like I was cold.

“You were being emotional and looked like you were about to cry,” he said, stepping back from me and looking indifferent to what he’d just done as he ran his hands through his hair. “A kiss seemed like a good idea to stop that from happening.”

“That was a terrible idea.” 

“But it cleared your head,” he assured.

It did but it didn’t solve anything.

Looking at him suddenly became a challenge because I knew that at any second I could throw myself headfirst at this, despite the danger, despite feeling like I shouldn’t… All I wanted in that second was to not think and to drown in his kiss again. 

Instead, I turned my back on him and grabbed the brown bag from the car’s hood on my way to the passenger’s side.

“Let’s just go,” I told him, stealing one last glance at him. He was watching me with the same fascination he had when gazing at the Painted Hall but when I blinked, his face went back to that sarcastic mask he always wore. “We’re halfway to Gloucester.”

.

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Taglist: @festering-queen​ @feralstare​ @apocalypsenowish​ @rheabalaur​ @thorin-smokin-shield​ @girlonfireice​ @deborahlazaroff​ @dreamer2381​ @a-dorky-book-keeper @mr-kisskiss-bangbang​ @saint-hardy​

[crazy-loca-blog]

Personal thoughts on Open Heart, Book 2

Note: As the title says, these are just personal opinions on Choices books and chapters. Of course, you may agree or disagree with them, I only use this platform to express my thoughts on what I read every week and what I’d like to see in the next chapters, because none of my friends play Choices so I have no one to comment the books with.

It’s been a while since I started writing this post, I actually remember saying I would post it months ago. But then things escalated in such a negative way between some people, that I said “well, maybe it’s not the best moment to post this”. So now that the book will be back, I thought it might be a good time to revisit it.

Of course, as this was written before the second hiatus, it’s been done with the original plot in mind, and I don’t read spoilers and the book is supposedly being rewritten, it may be full of mistakes… it just took me so long to write it, that I don’t want it to go to waste! hahaha

I’ve read a lot of people complaining about the plot of Open Heart 2 being all over the place, and some people are worried about the “too many subplots” this book has. Well, sure, there might be A LOT going on in this book, but when you analyze what almost every character is going through (emphasis in “almost”), you’ll realize that they all have one thing in common: they’re all dealing with their past. Also, with a third book confirmed, I don’t think everything is going to find its closure in Book 2. But let’s analyze our gang (they are in alphabetic order, as usual):

Aurora Emery: This girl is so damaged that it hurts. She certainly had trust issues during college and she’s reliving them all over again. Of course, being Harper Emery’s niece is not easy when you go to medical school and become a doctor. Not only people have high expectations on your performance, they also want to be friends with you and you just don’t know if it’s because of your aunt or because they genuinely care about you. Tobias is not making things easier for her either (I’m so ready to punch this guy if he hurts her!), and our MC has been an ass to her lately as well. She truly needs to know there is a light at the end of the tunnel and I’m so waiting for the MC to have a chance to apologize because what they did was the stupidest thing I’ve seen them do so far.

Bryce Lahela: Even though I’m in love with this guy (I always say he’d be my BFF in real life), we knew since day 1 that he was hiding something. Well, it took us over a book to discover that his family has a very, very shady past that ended up affecting not only Bryce, but also his little sister Keiki. Of course, discovering that your parents are criminals when you’re a teenager mustn’t be easy, and Keiki escaping because she’s basically living the same hell as Bryce went through in the past has only made him relive some old feelings that he wanted to be forgotten. Now that the cat is out of the bag, I can only think of some healing process for him that will probably not have its closure in Book 2, but in Book 3.

Elijah Green: Our boy Elijah has always declared himself a “nerd”. So, it doesn’t surprise me at all the fact that he had problems making friends while growing up. Also, due to his condition and what we know about his past, I bet his parents were super overprotective, making things harder for him. That’s why he is having a hard time when trying to keep boundaries with Sothy, his intern. It doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be friends, not at all (not only Ines and Zaid consider the MC “a friend”, but my MC is romancing Ethan, soo…). But he certainly tries too hard to be accepted (and not judged) by his intern, to the point that it becomes a risk for them as doctors.  

Esme Ortega: Our new intern looks like she’s a tough girl, but it only took us one diamond scene to discover what’s behind her attitude. Her life has been hard and she’s basically facing the world alone since she was 14. Even though this apparently was a topic that was addressed and solved in the same scene, it’s very clear that she sees herself in her teen patient with leukemia. It’s very possible that her parents never told her that they were illegal immigrants, so she can’t stand lying to that kid. She knows how it feels. She knows he’s not a kid anymore and that his parents lying to him will only cause pain in the future. Hopefully we’ll be able to go deeper in her background during the rest of Book 2 or in Book 3.

Ethan Ramsey: Ethan is facing not only one, but two conflicts. The first one is a personal one: his mom left him and Alan (his dad) 25 years ago. Now she is suddenly back in their lives for some reason that we still need to figure out. Ethan believes she’s back because she needs money, and he might be right. There is also this idea that she’s actually sick and she needs Ethan’s help. This could also be pretty accurate. I actually think it’s something in between (maybe some stepbrother or stepsister he doesn’t know about needs medical care but they can’t afford it). The other one is professional: with the money problems in Edenbrook, he’s feeling all the pressure of having to make a choice between attending rich people who can afford their full treatments and being loyal to Naveen’s original purpose when he created the team (that is, to care about people who can’t afford their treatments). My thought is that, in the end, both his family issues and his career in the diagnostics team will be crossed and that this will become a turning point in the book (because yes, we still don’t have that “huge case” as we did have with Naveen’s case in Book 1).

Jackie Varma: Jackie’s issue actually hits home. College debts are a huge issue in my country, and I can tell almost every single one of my classmates is facing them now, even though we graduated a long time ago. It’s pretty common to see families struggling to help their kids to attend university and you can’t imagine how grateful I am that my hard work paid off and got me a scholarship that relieved that burden at home. So I can totally see Jackie in this situation: coming from a low income family who didn’t only become a doctor because she loves it, but also because she saw it as a chance to give her family a better life… and this isn’t happening right now. But she is actually doing something about it already, so she’ll probably be the first one to have her “burden from the past issue” solved, she just seems to need that raise that all residents are supposed to get… at least for now.

Rafael Aveiro: Our Rafael (who’s not going to die and who still is a LI in my opinion) surprised us when he introduced us to his significant other, Sora. I mean… what happened in that two-month period between Book 1 and Book 2? This is one of those times when I desperately need a diamond scene for him to explain everything. Because it doesn’t matter if he is your LI or not, he doesn’t seem convinced about this “new” relationship and you can’t change my mind. Also, the fact that he’s been taking more risks than usual is giving me some weird vibes (maybe he’s depressed and he’s been hiding it?). I’m pretty sure there’s something we don’t know yet… and I’m pretty sure that his conflict at the end of the book (if he is your LI) will be to decide between “staying in the past” (with Sora) and “moving into the future” (with the MC).

Sienna Trinh: Our sweetheart has had little screen time in this book, but that time has been enough to realize she’s having some serious issues, to the point that some people think she’s the one who’ll be dying because of how depressed she shows herself. We all remember that Sienna used to have a boyfriend certain specimen in her life, and how she dumped him in Book 1. Well, toxic relationships are not limited to love life, and that’s the case with her. She’s been repeating all the same patterns with her new resident, Mitch. He manipulates her and he’s basically abusing of her good will… just like certain ***hole she used to date it in the past.

Kyra Santana: I did leave Kyra for the end on purpose. Since the end of Book 1 I’ve been saying that she has to die at some point of the series, basically because we must be realistic here guys and we can’t be in denial: no matter how much we love her, our girl only has 10% chances of surviving cancer and before the hiatus, things were getting worse for her. Based on this… have you noticed how Kyra is the only character in the series (besides our MC) who’s not carrying some burden from her past? Instead, she just lives the present and she barely mentions her future, except in two cases: when she’s talking to the MC about her job interview, and when she says that her treatment “soon will be over”. To me, THIS SPEAK VOLUMES, GUYS!

[iamtrebleclefstories]

I Was Made For Loving You - Part 3

Soulmate AU series of unrelated one-shots where Jo and Alex discover that they are made for each other.

where you have a clock counting down the minutes

Please enjoy this insanely long monstrosity of a fic :)

Part 3 - I Was Made for Loving You 

The day his clock showed up, he was excited. At the age of thirteen, he’d been a little older than most. For a while, he didn’t think he had a soulmate. Most other kids got their clocks at twelve years old. Yet on his twelfth birthday, when he woke up and saw his empty wrist he was disappointed to see that his hadn’t. No, instead his clock showed up on a random Tuesday morning, about four months after his thirteenth birthday. His excitement was short-lived though. Because according to his clock, he wouldn’t meet his soulmate for at least two decades.

                                                    20:05:17:6:49

 Twenty years, five months, seventeen days, six hours, and forty-nine minutes away to be exact. He’d be thirty-three by the time he met the woman he was supposed to spend the rest of his life with. This didn’t sit right with Alex. He’d thought for sure the universe would favor him considering he’d had the crappiest childhood. The least the universe could do was grant him a soulmate sooner than twenty years from now. 

 It was frustrating when he got to college and it felt like everyone he knew was meeting their soulmate. It was even more frustrating when he got to medical school and the majority of his friends were in nice, loving, soul-bonded relationships while he was out partying and sleeping around. He’d never admit it, but as fun as sleeping around was, all Alex had ever wanted was the sureness and clarity of a soulmate bond. His whole life, he wondered what it was like to be loved for exactly who he was. He wondered what it was like to have someone stay. He wondered what it was like to have someone sane. The partying and the girls just so happened to serve as a useful distraction for the fact that he was years away from meeting the one person who just might stick around. 

 When he started working at Seattle Grace, he didn’t do much to change who he was. If anything, he was worse than before. With only seven years, three months, five days, ten hours, and thirty-six minutes left to meet his soulmate, Alex was growing even more restless. He couldn’t handle the idea of walking around the hospital as all of his friends met their soulmates before he did. Meredith had already met her’s, Izzie’s clock said that she was three months away, Cristina’s clock said one year left, and George’s said two years. 

 There wasn’t much time left for them to wait. The sad and funny thing was that some of his friends found themselves in relationships with someone other than their soulmate. Meredith was trying to get over McDreamy, Cristina was doing it with Burke, George was in love with Meredith, and Izzie had tried going out with him despite the fact that she was supposed to meet her guy very soon. It kind of sucked too, because he could see himself liking her enough to actually try something more than a one night stand. 

 Knowing that Izzie would be meeting her soulmate very soon didn’t make it much easier when she finally did. The guy came in the form of a bedridden cardiac patient who was on the brink of death. If Alex thought the universe was screwed up for making him wait so long to meet his soulmate, it was even more screwed up for giving Izzie a soulmate that might not live past his next surgery. That was all kinds of messed up and shitty that he didn’t even want to go into. As horrible as it sounded though, he hoped that maybe Izzie’s soulmate would kick the bucket and die. Then maybe he’d have a chance at something more than just meaningless. 

 And they did get the chance at it. Denny died and Izzie was a wreck. She ended up making some questionable decisions, got George to cheat on his wife—but not his soulmate—with her, and nearly got herself fired multiple times over. Alex on the other hand, had lived through a hookup with Addison Montgomery, a strange—regrettable—relationship with a patient by the name of Rebecca Pope, and had even hooked up with Meredith’s sister Lexie a couple times. So when they finally got together, Alex thought that this could be it. Maybe it could be enough. Maybe Izzie could be enough for him, and he could be enough for her. 

 Things didn’t go as planned, though. Izzie got cancer and started hallucinating Denny. So they got married and tried to make the best out of a bad situation, then George died on the very day he was supposed to meet his soulmate—saving her life apparently. He doesn’t know if it was the cancer or the soul bond that attached her to Denny that caused it or even her friendship with O’Malley, but one morning he woke up and she didn’t. Alex woke up and turned around to shake Izzie awake, but she wouldn’t wake up. Her body was cold. She’d died sometime in the middle of the night and he never noticed.

 That stuck with him for a long time. He felt like he should’ve been able to save her. He was a doctor for crying out loud. A doctor whose wife died in her sleep as he laid right beside her. He was a widower now and it was hell. His heart ached and he became a bigger asshole than before. And hence started the string of endless women all over again. He tried to date Lexie Grey, and it worked for a little while. But then the shooting happened and Lexie went crazy and Alex was trying to understand how he survived and so many others didn’t. He added that to his laundry list of failed attempts at love. 

 Then there was Lucy—the one who stole his job. After that he gave up on trying to have a real relationship. He realized it was pointless to try making a connection with someone that wasn’t soulmate. All it brought was hurt and pain that he didn’t have the patience for. He slept around again, waiting for the moment when he’d finally meet his soulmate and maybe, just maybe, he search would be over.

 The week before he was supposed to meet his soulmate, he decided to take advantage of the little bit of time he had left and slept with a lot of the new interns. Sure, he felt a little bad every time he looked down at his wrist, but he was trying to brace himself for the worst case scenario. The worst case scenario being that his soulmate hated him or that she was a horrible person and they didn’t work out. If his worst fears came true he wanted to at least have something to soften the blow. It may sound depressing, but that’s how it worked. And Alex had been through enough in his life to know that life was rarely ever fair or full of hope. 

 *****

 She was sixteen when her clock finally showed up on her wrist. For the longest time, she thought that maybe there just wasn’t someone out there for her. Most kids got their clocks at twelve years old. They’d wake up the morning of their twelfth birthday to find a clock there counting down the years, months, days, hours, and minutes until one met their soulmate. She tried to tell herself not to be discouraged. After all, she’d been left at a fire station as an infant. Who knows when her real birthday was? So, for about two weeks she held onto the tiniest bit of hope that one day she’d wake up and it would be there. 

 When the clock didn’t come in, it only reinforced everything she’d ever believe about herself. That she was unlovable. She was broken. She was unwanted. She was a waste of space. Those feelings intensified when her peers realized that her clock was missing. They made up mean jokes and rumors about soulmate-less Brooke. It was so bad that the family she’d been staying with at the time sent her away. They didn’t want a “defective” child in their home. 

 For about four years, she wore long sleeves. She didn’t want anyone to see her wrist. She didn’t want to see her own wrist and be reminded of the fact that she had no one in this world. That’s why it was such a surprise when her clock showed up on her wrist. 

 She remembered the day vividly. It was four in the morning and she’d been attempting to get some sleep while she heard the junkies talking outside her car. She’d just burrowed a little further into her blankets in an effort to cover herself so that no one would realize she was living there when she felt it. There was a dull ache in her wrist and then the sound of a clock chiming. After the sounding stopped, she was scared to look down. She was scared to look and realize that it had all been a figment of her imagination. 

 It wasn’t though. It was definitely there. The clock displayed the numbers brightly on her wrist for all to see. The countdown to meeting her soulmate was there. It was real. She had someone. For the first time in her life she thought that maybe she’d have someone. But when she realized the number of years before she’d meet him, she grew discouraged. Ten years was a long time. A very long time.

                                                        10:02:30:8:57

 Of course she’d have to wait a decade to meet her soulmate. As if her life wasn’t already difficult, as if she didn’t need for someone to love her right now. Maybe that’s why she got caught up with Paul in the first place. She just wanted so badly for someone to love her that she ended up in an abusive marriage for about two years before she did something about it.

 Of all the decisions she’d made in her life, getting with Paul was the worst one. He was harsh and hateful and deceptively charming. He’d told her exactly what she wanted to hear and she believed him. She ate up every false promise and calculated compliment. Her friends had not been happy with her, but she didn’t care. They told her to wait, to hold out for her soulmate, but Brooke wasn’t sure she believed in them anymore. 

 Paul didn’t have a soulmate. He was one of the very few people in the world that didn’t have a clock at all. He’d convinced her that it was all a fantasy. A childish daydream that would soon fade away like everything else in the world. For the most part, she believed him. 

 A part of her tried to hold on to the hope that maybe there was someone better for her out there than Paul. It all changed when she became a mother, though. The only thing that was supposed to be stronger than a soul bond was the bond between parents and their children. She could not possibly understand how or why her mother had abandoned her like she did. She couldn’t comprehend how you’d let go because the moment she held her child in her arms, she knew that she’d never be able to give this up. 

 The road to motherhood wasn’t easy, though. It was full of pain and suffering and complications she’d never anticipated. Originally, she wasn’t going to keep the baby. She had decided that after being beaten so bad that she had landed in the hospital. There was no way she could raise a child in the environment she was living in. For weeks, she walked around fearful of the decision that was looming over her. One day, while she was in the car with Paul they got into a horrible accident. She’d made it out mostly okay. Paul on the other hand sustained a severe injuries and was declared dead on arrival. 

 The death of her husband was not sad for her. If anything, it was liberating. She was a pregnant senior in college and suddenly inherited all of his money and his property. Of course, she was alone again, but for the first time in her life loneliness didn’t seem as daunting. As soon as she graduated with her degree in biology, she sold the house, their rings, and all of Paul’s belongings and hauled ass out of New Jersey. 

 She was about seven months pregnant when she finally moved into her brand new apartment in Boston. For a while after moving, she grappled with her identity. She didn’t want anything tying her to the life she’d left behind. She didn’t want her child to bear the legacy of hurt and pain that she’d left. Brooke Stadler didn’t feel like her anymore. That name was attached to the despair that she vowed to leave behind for the sake of the life she was about to bring into the world. 

 It was during one quest for baby names when she stumbled upon one that resonated with her. Josephine, God will increase. Jo, for short. Yes, that was it. No more standing back and letting people take advantage of her. She would increase. She would grow so tall that she would make a fool out of anyone who ever said she would never be enough. 

 So, she became Josephine. A last name would be a little more difficult. Jo knew that she didn’t want to keep the last name Stadler. She briefly considered Schmidt—after her high school teacher whom she had kept in contact with, but decided against that. She settled on Wilson. It was the name of the chief of the fire station where she’d been left as a child. That was it. That was her name. Josephine Brooke Wilson. 

 Her name change was approved about a week before she gave birth to her son on July 16, 2007. Yes, she had a boy. A little boy with the sweetest dimples and the craziest head full of hair. He had her eyes and her nose and her ears. Jo fell in love with him instantly. At twenty-two years old she became a mother to the most beautiful baby boy she’d ever laid eyes on. 

 She named him Liam Michael Wilson. Liam was a good baby, and she was grateful for that. It was difficult raising a child on her own while simultaneously trying to do well in med school. Harvard Medical School, to be specific. In the mornings she’d drop Liam off at daycare and pick him up after her classes were over. Her life consisted of going to school, being a mom, and working part time at the daycare Liam attended. She didn’t go out or party. She didn’t sleep around or start anything serious. There was no time and she definitely did not have the motivation to try harder.  

 On the day of her medical school graduation, she walked across the stage hand in hand with her almost four year old son. She smiled wide and almost cried after her son told her how proud he was of her.  She’d done it. She was finally a doctor. 

 And so began the next chapter of their lives. Jo had matched with Seattle Grace Mercy West’s surgical residency program. She was excited and nervous at the thought of moving across the country with her son. Her whole life, she’d lived on the east coast. It was time to leave this place and move on to the next thing. 

 *****

 “Today’s the day,” Jackson walked into the attendings lounge and clapped Alex on the back. 

 “What’s today?” Webber asked as he poured himself some coffee. 

 “Today’s the day Evil Spawn gets to meet his soulmate,” Cristina supplied. 

 April gasped, “Oh my goodness! Finally.”

 “Yeah it only took him thirty-three years,” Meredith snickered as she put her stuff into her locker. 

 "Awe, Karev is becoming a man today," Mark teased and slapped Alex on the shoulder.

 “Maybe this means he’ll stop being an ass that sleeps with all the interns,” Callie called out from her spot on the couch. 

 “Oh shush. Might I remind you that you slept with me once. So, you're no better,” Alex sent Callie a pointed look.

 “And now I no longer sleep with men,” Callie lifted her hands in mock surprise.

 The room full of doctors laughed at Callie's comment. Alex on the other hand rolled his eyes, "Whatever. You guys are way too invested in this soulmate thing."

 "Because we all already found ours. We want you to be happy. You of all people deserves something happy," Meredith smiled warmly at Alex. "So, stop complaining and let us be happy and excited for you."

 Alex knew that his friends just wanted what was best for him. They'd been by his side through a lot of really crappy things. When his wife died, Meredith opened up her home again for him to stay. Cristina hugged him—which was a miracle in and of itself. Kepner and Avery, who he wasn't even close to made it very clear that they would be there for him if he needed it. So many more of his friends and colleagues did the same.

 “How much time do you have left on your clock?” Bailey asked, trying to get as many details from Alex as possible.

 Alex looked down at his clock and read the numbers. It was strange to see mostly zeros. For years, he’d seen the clock full of numbers counting down very slowly. Today though, it seems as if the time had flown by.

                                                   00:00:00:04:37

 “Four hours and thirty-seven minutes,” Alex replied. “Which means that you all will be too busy doing your jobs to pay attention to me when I meet her. If this is even real and I meet her.”

   Meanwhile, Jo was in the locker room with her fellow interns getting ready for the day. She had just taken off her shirt and was about to put her scrub top on when she heard Stephanie gasp and grab her arm, “Oh my God.

Today is the day. Guys, Jo meets her soulmate today!”

 “Really?” Leah jumped up and squealed. “No why didn’t you say anything? We would’ve made a big deal about it.”

 “That’s exactly why I didn’t,” Jo removed her hand from Stephanie’s grasp and continued to get dressed for the day. “It’s not that big of a deal. Calm down.”

 “Not that big of a deal?” Stephanie looked at her as if she had three heads. “Jo. This is a huge deal. This is it. This is the most important day of your life. Why aren’t you more excited about this?”

 “Look, I’ve been burned one to many times in my life. It’s all a scam. It doesn’t mean anything,” Jo shook her head. “And it’s not the most important day of my life. The most important day of my life was the day I gave birth to my son. That’s the most important bond. It’s more important and stronger than a soul bond. So, unless my soulmate magically bonds with my son, then it’s meaningless.”

 Shane looked at Jo sadly, “There’s nothing wrong with trying find your own version of happiness. You’re allowed to let yourself be loved.”

 “Yeah,” Heather agreed. “You of all people deserves to meet their person.”

 “How much time is left on your clock?” Leah asked.

 Sighing Jo looked down and read it out loud, “Four hours and thirty-seven minutes.”

                                                  00:00:00:04:37

 “I wonder who it is,” Heather tilted her head to the side. “You’d have to meet him here in the hospital. Maybe it’s another doctor or a nurse. Ooh! Maybe even a patient! I’ve heard a couple stories of a few doctors that used to work here before us that met their soulmates while they were patients in the hospital.”

 “Gosh, I hope not,” Jo’s eyes widened. “I have a kid. I don’t have time to take care of a sick soulmate.”

 “I highly doubt it’s going to be a patient,” Stephanie assured. “It’s probably one another doctor. Which doctors are still single?”

 “Well, there’s Franklin from derm, Harrison from anesthesiology, that one guy Myers from OB, Johnson and Archer from Radiology, some others I don’t remember, and Karev," Leah replied.

 "How do you even know that?" Jo made a face. "Actually, I don't want to know."

 "She probably slept with all of them," Stephanie smirked.

 Leah shrugged, "Hey, I don't meet my soulmate for two more years. I'm taking advantage of all the freedom I have left."

 "No offense, but I don't want your sloppy seconds," Jo closed her locker and put on her lab coat. "I haven't had sex in... I can't even remember. But, I would still prefer it if my soulmate didn't sleep with all of my friends first."

 "I don't know, I kind of hope my soulmate is a manwhore," Heather thought out loud. The others turned to look at her strangely. "What? I do. That means he'll be good in bed. That's important. I'm going to be stuck with him for the rest of my life. He's got to know what he's doing."

 The interns busted out in laughter and chatted for a few more minutes before their resident, Lexie Grey walked in, “Hey guys. Today you all start new rotations so listen out for your assignments. Edwards you’re with Grey, Ross with Avery, Brooks with Bailey, Murphy with Robbins, and Wilson you’re with Yang.”

 The interns nodded and all made their ways to find their attendings. Jo walked over to where Yang was standing in the Cardiac ICU and smiled warmly, “Dr. Yang, I’m on your service today.”

 “Oh yes, Wilson right? I’ve heard some good things about you from Hunt and Torres. Make sure you keep up and don’t screw anything up,” Cristina instructed. “I’ve got things to do and lots of patients to see so there’s no time for messing around. Come on, before we’re late for rounds.”

 The next few hours were okay. Jo mostly kept an eye on Yang’s pre and post ops while Yang worked on studying for a new procedure she was going to preform later that afternoon. The day was going by so smoothly that she forgot to take a look at her clock to see how much time was left. She was about to look down when she heard her pager go off, Pit 911. Jo jumped up from her seat at the nurse’s station and hurried down to the ER, Dr. Yang following close behind her.

 They pulled on their trauma gowns and hurried into the trauma room they’d been paged to. The room was a buzz with multiple doctors from various specialties looking at a kid who seemed to be somewhere around eleven or twelve. Derek Shepherd was there, Kepner was there, Torres was there, and Karev.

 “What do we got?” Yang asked as she walked into the room.

 “Brandon Miller, eleven years old. He jumped off a balcony while on a school field trip because his friends dared him to,” Karev sounded off, not looking up from the kid he was examining. “He’s got splenic rupture that I’m going to have go in and repair, wrist fracture, an injury to his spine that’s putting pressure on the cord, a few broken ribs and a pneumothorax. I need you to run an echo on his heart to see if he can even withstand the stress of surgery.”

 For some reason, Jo’s heart rate picked up a little when she heard his voice. She’s seen Karev from afar, but in the past few months that she’d been working at Seattle Grace Mercy West, she’d never been on his service before. He seemed like a great doctor. She’d heard wonderful things about the projects he’d established and his dedication and commitment to his patients. She snapped out of her thoughts when she heard Karev yell out instructions.

 “Can someone insert a damn chest tube?”

 Yang looked at Jo and motioned to get to work, “Wilson, you know how to insert a chest tube?”

 “Yes ma’am,” Jo nodded.

 “Okay, then do it. We don’t have time to waste,” Yang commanded.

 Jo looked around the room for the supplies and was handed a tray by one of the nurses. She made her way up towards the kid and proceeded to insert the tube. She was about to move out of the way when bumped into Karev.

 “Do you mind?” Karev sneered gave her a sideways glance. He didn’t have time for this. He wanted to get out of this trauma room as quickly as possible. He was supposed to meet his soulmate any minute now, and he couldn’t do that if he was stuck in here fixing a kid in a room full of all his friends. He couldn’t miss their encounter. He’d been waiting for this exact moment for decades and he’d be damned if he missed it because some intern was in his way.

 “Sorry,” Jo apologized.

 Alex felt a jolt of electricity run through him as he heard her voice. Looking up, he finally decided to spare more than a quick glance at the intern. Feeling that someone’s eyes were on her, Jo looked up and locked eyes with Karev. She felt her heart and breathing pick up, then skip a few beats, before returning to normal. Alex felt a stirring within his chest and stopped what he was doing to stare at her for just a moment.

 That’s when the dinging started. It was a low chime sort of sound. It grew progressively louder and was getting on Alex’s nerves. He broke eye contact with the intern and looked around for the source of the noise. With all the commotion, he was unsure if anyone else heard it. He looked around at the monitors the kid had strapped to him, trying to determine what was going off.

 “What the hell is that noise? Can someone please figure out what freaking monitor is making that weird noise and turn it off?” Alex growled in annoyance.

 His request made the room go quiet, allowing everyone to hear for themselves exactly what was going on. Alex watched as one by one, all of his friends’ eyes widened in surprise. They looked at each other strangely, not saying anything.

 “Will someone please turn that freaking monitor off?” Alex continued to work on stabilizing the kid’s injuries.

 “Dr. Karev, that’s not one of the monitors,” nurse Tyler spoke, motioning to Alex’s clock that was covered by his trauma gown.

 He stepped away from his patient and pulled up the sleeve of his trauma gown. His numbers were at zero. How the hell were his numbers at zero? When did he meet her? He’d been stuck in this room for the past half hour. He was in a room full of friends and veteran nurses he’d known for years.

 Jo took a deep breath when she realized what happened. She removed her own sleeve and looked at the clock on her wrist. Sure enough, all zeros. Jo froze in fear and confusion as a steady ding came from her clock. After a couple seconds, she looked up at Karev who was still lost in thought.

 There was a gasp somewhere in the background. It sounded like Kepner, “Oh. My. God.”

 “Holy shit,” Yang’s voice rang out.

 “Woah!” Torres exclaimed.

 “I’ll be damned,” Shepherd chuckled.

 A couple of the nurses mumbled their own surprise as Jo continued to stare at her supposed soulmate with wide eyes. Finally, after a few seconds, he looked up at her.

 Jo felt it immediately. She felt the bond attach itself instantly. The thing that she’d convinced herself wasn’t real, the thing that seemed too much like a fairy tale to actually exist in real life, was happening to her. It all made sense. The shivers and butterflies she felt when she heard his voice. The heart palpitations she experienced and the sensation of breathlessness, were all her body’s way of syncing up their heart beats.

 Alex couldn’t believe it. He did meet her. She was here. She was the intern he’d bumped into. He’d been so caught up and desperate to meet her that when he did, he missed it. But then it made sense. The jolt of electricity he felt when he heard her speak. The captivating call of her eyes. Her gorgeous, hazel eyes. He didn’t think he’d ever seen more beautiful eyes. The longer he looked into them, the more he felt the soul bond increase. It was strong, and unlike anything he’d ever really experienced before. It was instant and all consuming. It was real.

 Soon, the dinging ceased. It was no longer needed. They had acknowledged each other. They had met.

 *****

 They never had a chance to talk after that moment. Brandon—the kid—began de-sating and needed to be rushed to the OR immediately. The echo he’d called Cristina in to run would have to wait. There was no time to waste, or he wouldn’t make it. It killed Alex to leave without being able to say anything to her. He wanted to get to know her and hear her story. He barely knew her name—and it was only because he asked while on his way to the OR with Torres, Kepner, and Shepherd. They hadn’t stopped talking about his soulmate throughout the entire time he was in the operating room. Thankfully, he and April were able to resolve the kid’s internal bleeding, leaving Shepherd and Torres to do the real work and try to keep Brandon from being paralyzed.

 Alex wanted to find her. Jo Wilson. That was her name. He asked around before he was directed to the OR board. Sure enough, her name was listed as the resident in OR 4 with Cristina. In the hours he’d been in surgery, she’d been pulled into one of her own. Sighing, Alex decided that he could use this time to talk to someone. He needed to vent. He needed to find Meredith.

 He ran around the hospital for about half hour before realizing where she was. Alex made his way to the hospital daycare and smiled as he showed his ID and walked to where Meredith was playing with Zola. Meredith was sitting on a bean bag chair while Zola was on the floor working on a puzzle. He hurried over to the corner they were in and sat in the bean bag chair across from Meredith.

 “Dude, I’ve been looking for you everywhere.”

 “What is it Alex? I’m trying to spend what little free time I have with my daughter. Can it wait?”

 “No, it can’t,” Alex rolled up the sleeve of his lab coat and showed her his arm. “I met her.”

 “Oh my God!” Meredith gasped and dropped the barbie doll that was in her hand. “You met her? Who is she?”

 “She’s an intern. Jo Wilson,” Alex shared. “I don’t really know a lot about her. I didn’t even get a chance to talk to her because my patient needed to get up to the OR because he was de-sating on us.”

 “Wilson is your soulmate?” Meredith’s eyes widened. “She was the intern I picked for the intern appy. She did really well until she freaked out and froze, but I think she’ll make it. You can normally tell who’s going to make it and who isn’t. She hasn’t given me any reason to believe otherwise. What are you doing here talking to me? Go find her.”

 “I did try to find her. But then I found out she was in OR 4 with Cristina, who just so happened to be there when we met,” Alex grimaced.

 Meredith let out a peel of laughter, “Oh, Cristina is never going to let you live it down. She’s probably airing out all your dirty laundry as we speak. Who knows what she’s told Wilson about you?”

 Alex narrowed his eyes, “Oh shush. I sure hope not. I don’t need my soulmate thinking that I’m an ass before she even meets me.”

 “Hey! There are children present. Language!” Meredith warned motioning to the children playing around them.

 “You act as if I don’t work with children all day.”

 Meredith rolled her eyes. Being friends with Alex really was a pain sometimes, but she wouldn’t have it any other way. She was happy for him. He’d finally met his soulmate. He was finally going to get the happiness he deserved. She just hoped that the universe knew what it was doing when it chose Jo Wilson as his soulmate, “Hold on… you said your soulmate is one of the interns?”

 “Yeah? So what? You were an intern when you met Derek,” Alex shrugged. “It happens.”

 “No, I know that. That’s not what I’m talking about,” Meredith shook her head. “Didn’t you sleep with half the intern class?”

 “Oh crap… You don’t think she knows, right?”

 “Are you kidding? Don’t you remember what it was like to be an intern? Gossip around here spreads like wildfire,” Meredith leaned back in her bean bag chair. “I’m positive she knows exactly how many of her friends you’ve slept with.”

 “Which means she already knows how big of a douche I am,” Alex groaned. “You know, on some level, I always knew that being a man-whore was going to come back and bite me in the ass.”

 Meredith was going to open her mouth to respond when they heard a crash followed by a child crying in the background. Being the peds surgeon that he was, Alex jumped up from his bean bag chair and scanned the room for the source of the crying. There was a young woman holding a boy who looked to be about four. He had a nasty head lac that would probably need stitches.

 “Can someone get ahold of an intern to come take a look at this kid? And page his parents?” One of the daycare workers yelled out.

 Not wanting an intern working on this kid’s face, Alex decided to step in, “Hey. No need to call an intern. I’m a peds surgeon. I’ll take a look at him and get him stitched up. You don’t need an intern leaving a nasty scar on his face. Just page his parents while I check him out.”

 The daycare instructor, Bethany, nodded in appreciation and Alex walked them over to a nearby exam room. He asked a nurse to bring him a suture kit and had Bethany place the crying boy on the bed. The kid was cute. He had wild brown hair and big hazel eyes that looked up at him in awe and wonder, “Hey kiddo, my name is Dr. Alex. What’s yours?”

 “Liam,” the little boy responded, the tears that had once been running down his face now dried.

 For some reason, Alex felt a connection to this kid. He couldn’t explain it. Of course, he’d bonded with patients in the past, but this was different. He’d known this boy for all of two minutes and already felt his protective instincts kick in. Alex decided to try to make some conversation, “Well, hi Liam. I see that you hurt your head a bit there. Do you think you can follow some instructions that I give you?”

 Liam attempted a nod but winced in pain a bit, “Yes Dr. Awex.”

 Alex seriously did not know what was wrong with him. Every time this little boy opened his mouth, he felt the love and affection he had for him increase. What the hell is wrong you? He’s not even your kid. You find your soulmate and all of a sudden you are overwhelmed by the desire to procreate? Shaking the thoughts out of his head, Alex looked over to Bethany, “Can you go make sure one of his parents are on their way? I’m going to do a quick neuro exam and some stitches. They might want to be here for that.”

 The two boys watched as Bethany nodded and walked out the room. Liam looked back up at Alex, “Is she getting my mommy?”

 “Yeah buddy, she is. Now how about you say we make sure you didn’t hit your head too hard when you fell,” Alex proceeded to go about his exam while trying to divert Liam’s attention from the needles he was about to use to close up the head lac.

 Meanwhile in OR 4, Jo had been trying her best to ignore the looks and questions Dr. Yang was sending her way. The first two hours had been mostly quiet, with Yang only speaking in order to teach or give instructions. Now that they were entering their third hour in surgery, Yang seemed to have loosened up a little bit, “Oh come on, give me something. You are Alex Karev’s soulmate, who just so happens to be one of my best friends. I care about him and I love him—if you ever say that I will deny it. What’s your story?”

 This was getting tiring. All Jo wanted was to distract Yang long enough to stop asking questions. Jo was this close to giving in and answering Yang’s questions when a nurse rushed into the room, “Dr. Wilson, Ms. Bethany from daycare called to let you know that your son fell and sustained a head injury. He’s being checked out by a doctor in an exam room nearby the daycare. The doctor said that he’s okay, but he’s going to require some stitches.”

 Jo looked up at the nurse with a panicked expression, “Oh my God. What the hell happened?”

 “I’m not sure of all the details, but your son was requesting your presence.”

 “Well that explains part of the story,” Cristina mumbled to herself. She looked over at the intern standing in front of her. “Go, take care of your kid. We’ll be okay here. Take the rest of the day off while you’re at it.”

 “Thank you so much Dr. Yang,” Jo rushed out of the OR and scrubbed out quickly. She hurried out of the scrub room into the hallway and made her way to the elevators. She tapped her foot impatiently as she waited for the elevator to arrive.

 As soon as she made it to the daycare, Jo asked for her son’s whereabouts. She had finally reached the door of the exam room when she heard a familiar peel of laughter on the other side. She breathed a sigh of relief when she realized that her son was laughing and steadied herself as she opened the door.

 Alex had been having the time of his life stitching Liam’s head lac up. Sure, he was great with kids, his job required it. But spending time with this kid is different. Alex was sure that he’d never clicked with a kid as much as this one. And he was kind of hilarious. The four-year-old was very bright for his age and had a sense of humor better than most adults. In the fifteen minutes that had passed, Alex learned that he and Liam had the same favorite color (green), favorite ice cream flavor (s’mores), they even shared a middle name. On top of that they were both obsessed with babies—Alex was a peds surgeon and Liam said that he was constantly asking his mom when they would have a baby.

 Alex had just promised to sneak Liam up to the hospital nursery when the door opened. With his back was to the door, Alex spoke to the parent he’d assumed had walked in, “Oh, hey. I’m Dr. Karev. I just was in the daycare visiting my niece when your son fell. He got a few stitches, but other than that he’s just fine.”

 Finally turning around, Alex came face to face with his wide-eyed soulmate. Confused, he stared at her dumbly as she stood unmoving like a deer in headlights. The moment was broken when Liam look up and grinned, “Mommy!”

 Breaking out of her trance, Jo looked up at the little boy sitting on the exam table, “Hey baby! I heard you took a fall in daycare. Are you okay?”

 “Yup,” Liam nodded happily. “Dr. Awex fixed me up! He’s so funny, mommy. We wike wots of the same tings and he pwomised to take me to see the babies!”

 “Really? You love babies don’t you,” Jo smiled at her son and glanced quickly at Alex.

 “Uh huh! Dr. Awex fixes babies,” Liam grinned brightly. “I want to fix babies too!”

 “You do, huh? Well, I’m sure he’d love to teach you one day,” Jo wrapped her son in her arms and hugged him closed. She looked up at Alex, “Was he good?”

 “Oh yeah, he was great,” Alex gave her one of his crooked grins. “So, he’s yours?”

 “Yeah, I had him a couple months before I started med school. It’s just us,” Jo felt her heart pick up in speed the more she looked at him. If this whole soulmate thing was true, the Jo was sure that his heart was beating equally as quickly. “Thank you for taking care of him.”

 “Of course,” Alex took a deep breath. This was all too surreal. He was standing in an exam room with his soulmate and her son and he’d never felt more at home. He didn’t want this to end. “You know, I was telling Liam here that maybe I’d try to get him some ice cream. What if we all go together? I know this really great place a couple blocks away. I’ve taken my niece, Zola there a couple times and she loves it.”

 Jo felt like she was dreaming. There was no way this was real. There was no way that her soulmate wanted to take her and her son out for ice cream. This didn’t happen in real life. It only happened in all the rom coms she’d grown to despise over the years. Men were never this good, but somehow, she could tell that Alex was. Jo turned to her son who looked at her with pleading eyes. Deciding that it wouldn’t hurt to say no, she smiled, “I think the two of us would like that very much.”

 And they did enjoy it. The trio looked like the sweetest little family as they went out for ice cream that night. Both Jo and Alex had been commented to on separate occasions by multiple people regarding their adorable dynamics. It was almost strange how normal it felt to be out and about with each other. Maybe it was because Liam was there acting as a buffer, but neither Jo nor Alex could remember why they’d been skeptical in the first place.

 Alex offered to give Jo and Liam a ride home after leaving the ice cream parlor. They’d taken the bus to the hospital that morning and Jo had been planning on taking it back when Alex insisted on getting them home safely. When they finally arrived at Jo’s apartment, Liam refused to go inside and go to sleep unless Alex tucked him into bed. Jo had tried reasoning with Liam, but Alex assured her that it was fine, and he wouldn’t mind reading Liam a bedtime story or two.

 So, that’s how she found herself standing in the doorway of her son’s room, watching as her new soulmate laughed with her son as he read a book to Liam. Jo’s heart fluttered at the scene. Her soulmate and her son had bonded in a matter of hours. Her soulmate actually existed and he was here in her home, tucking her son into bed as if he’d done it a hundred times before.

 When Alex was done, he pulled the covers up over Liam’s small frame and ruffled his hair. He turned off the light and walked out the door, finding Jo standing in the living room. He stuffed his hands in his pockets, “Hey.”

 “Hey,” Jo breathed out a shaky breath. “Thanks for… everything today. You really didn’t have to do all that.”

 “It was nothing,” Alex shrugged bashfully. “I—uh, I had fun.”

 The stood in awkward silence for a few minutes, each person staring at the ground. It’s wasn’t that they didn’t have anything to say, it was that there were too many things to say and neither one of them know where to start.

 "You don't have to do this," Jo shook her head. "I come with a lot of baggage, more than you probably bargained for. I have a very complicated past and I don't trust people easily. On top of that, have a kid. He's the most important person in my life. So if you don't think you can handle all that, it's okay. I won't hold it against you. I'm giving you an out."

 Alex looked at her curiously, "Are you free tomorrow night?"

 "What?" Jo scrunched her eyebrows.

 "Are you free tomorrow night?” Alex repeated.

 “Uh—yeah,” Jo looked at him strangely. “Why?”

 “Go out with me tomorrow, just us. I can ask Meredith if she can babysit. Liam can play with Zola,” Alex offered.

 Jo could feel her heart beating wildly. The nerves in her stomach increasing, “Okay.”

  *****

 The date was a disaster. Everything that could’ve gone wrong went wrong. To be fair, Alex wasn’t really one to go on dates. Which is why he’d enlisted the help of Kepner and Robbins to set up the perfect first date. They had given him a list of suggestions of all the places he could take Jo and all the things they could do.

 Of course, nothing went as planned. The restaurant they were going to eat at, didn’t have a table available. The movie they were going to watch was sold out. They missed their ferry, lost their tickets to the Seattle Great Wheel, and got stuck in traffic for about an hour.

 Finally deciding to screw it, Alex ordered a pizza and fried chicken, bought a six pack of beer, and drove up to one of the cliffs just outside the city. He grabbed the blanket that was in the trunk of his car and set it outside in the grass. Jo hopped out and put the food and beers on the ground.

 They spent some time talking about their pasts. They talked about their upbringing, discovering that they had a lot more in common than they would’ve thought. Alex shared about his first marriage and Jo shared hers. She told him about her name and why she chose it. They’d been making self-deprecating jokes and laughing while stargazing when it started to pour out of nowhere. They laugh and squeal as they hurry back into the car. Alex turned the heater on to help them warm up. He looked back at Jo and grimaced, "I am so sorry. This night has been a disaster. I should’ve known I would’ve screwed it up.”

 “Are you kidding?” Jo looked at Alex in disbelief. “I don’t think I’ve laughed this much ever. I’ve had more fun tonight than I have in a long time.”

 “Really?” Alex raised his eyebrows. “You don’t care that we’re sitting in my car, soaked, eating pizza and fried chicken while drinking a couple of beers.”

 “I don’t mind at all, honestly. I prefer this to fancy restaurants and cheesy movies,” Jo smiled brightly. Looking at Alex, she felt butterflies. She felt seen, she felt heard, she felt happy. “You know, I didn’t believe in all this. I didn’t believe that there was someone out there specifically made for me. I thought it was all a made-up fairytale that people just tried so hard to hold on to because life sucks sometimes. But meeting you, talking to you… I know that I want to do this for the rest of my life.”

 “I do too,” Alex gave her a crooked grin. In the past few hours, he knew he’d fallen in love with this woman. “Can I kiss you?”

 Jo felt her cheeks heat up. She nodded shyly, “Yes.”

 Alex leaned in and pulled Jo into a passionate kiss, leaving her breathless. Nothing had ever felt more right in her life. She wanted to stay here in his arms and never leave and so did he. Alex would give anything to stay in that moment forever.

 When they finally broke apart, both were grinning like idiots. Alex tucked a piece of hair behind Jo’s ear, “That was definitely worth the twenty years I spent looking at my clock wishing I could just hurry up and meet you.” He looked at the time on the dashboard of his car. “It’s getting late. We should go pick up Liam at Mer’s and I’ll drop you guys off at your place.”

 “Or… we could see if she wouldn’t mind keeping him overnight. He’s probably asleep now anyway. It would be a shame to wake him up,” Jo looked up at him mischievously.  

 “It would be a shame,” Alex nodded in understanding. His face broke out into a smirk. “Guess I’ll just be taking you home instead.”

  ******

  One year later….

 “Okay, you remember the plan?”

 “Yes, Daddy!” Liam nodded his little head at Alex. He was jumping with excitement. Today, his Daddy was going to propose to his Mommy. His Daddy wasn’t always his Daddy, though. For a long time, it was just Liam and Mommy. Now, the nice doctor that stitched up his head was his new Daddy and Liam couldn’t be happier. “Will Mommy like the ring?”

 “I sure hope so, because I spent a lot of money on that thing,” Alex muttered under his breath. “You’re going to make sure that Mommy walks over here to the fountain when it’s time. Got it?”

 “Got it!”

 Minutes later, Alex was standing by the fountain in downtown waiting for his son to lead his soulmate to where he was waiting for them. He paced nervously as he watched them round the corner, Liam pulling on his mom’s coat sleeve to get her to hurry. As they approached, Alex took a deep breath and adjusted his tie. He smiled as the two people he loved most in the world came to a halt in front of him.

 “Hi,” Alex smiled cheekily.

��“Hi,” Jo beamed in return. “What are you doing here? And why are you wearing a suit?”

 “I’m here because, I have something to say. And I decided to do it in public with Liam present so that I couldn’t’ chicken out,” Alex chuckled and looked down at the ground before lifting his gaze to meet Jo’s once more. “Jo, from the moment I met you, everything in my life suddenly made sense. Right then, I met the person I knew I was going to love for the rest of my life. You have changed me. I am a better man because of you and Liam. I want to grow old with you. I want to be by your side until we’re old and gray and yelling at each other about who was a better surgeon.”

 Jo let out a laugh as tears filled her eyes. Alex leaned in for a brief kiss before finally getting down on one knee, “I love you. So, Jo Wilson, will you marry me?”

 Jo’s breath hitched, “Yes.”

 “Yes?”

 “Yes! Alex, I can’t wait to marry you.”

 “Mommy and Daddy are getting married!” Liam squealed from where he was standing.

 Alex and Jo laughed at Liam’s excitement, “Yeah, we are.”

[cultofbeatles]

beginners guide to the members of led zeppelin (kind of)

a disclaimer before anyone starts reading: we all know led zeppelin is shady as hell and we hardly ever get anything confirmed or denied around here. so some stuff is up for speculation. everything in this post are things i've read in books, heard in interviews, or got from some other source. when it comes to “facts about led zeppelin” sometimes you gotta take it with a grain of salt. but honestly it’s led zeppelin we’re talking about, anything is possible. also this is all in good fun and giggles. with that being said, let’s get started with introductions to the members themselves.

jimmy page 

james patrick page 

born on January 9, 1944 

he’s a capricorn sun, cancer moon, and scorpio rising so you just know he’s a crazy motherfucker 

was an amazing session guitarist and basically everyone wanted him 

went to art school bc he’s just talented at everything i guess 

if you didn't know already he played the guitar for Joe cocker’s ‘with a little help from my friends’

declined his first offer to join the yardbirds but later decided to join 

was the last member to leave the group

basically was the leader of led zeppelin 

was gifted a telecaster guitar by his friend jeff beck and he adored it 

and he painted a cool dragon design on it 

played on it for the first led zeppelin album 

when he was on tour one of his friends painted over his dragon design and ruined the guitar 

he produced all of led zeppelin’s albums and is responsible for the remastering of those same albums 

paid for led zeppelin’s first album to be produced with his own money

deadass would have whips and handcuffs around with him on tour for the groupies 

but was apparently an amazing lover and cared for the people he slept with

one time he got naked on a food cart thingy, put whip cream over his body, and had john bonham push him into a room with groupies in it 

has such a small and soft voice 

was fascinated in aleister crowley and his work

would collect crowely memorabilia 

even bought crowley’s boleskine house 

had a bookstore at one point so he could get books easier 

struggled with addiction to drugs for most of the seventies 

went on a liquid diet late seventies and refused to eat solid food 

he got really skinny bc of it :( 

miss pamela (one of his girlfriends/lovers) once said that jimmy cried on the phone to her over her playboy photoshoot lmaoo

once flied pamela’s pet raccoon in first class 

allegedly had a relationship with lori maddox who was about 15 years old 

laughed as two of his girlfriends were fighting each other 

was kind of constantly nervous about his and the band’s image

has amazing guitar solos and improvisation but damn sometimes they drag on foreverrrr

deadass scared the shit out of david bowie so much that he had his house exorcised and would avoid jimmy at parties 

we love demons 

zoso

he’ll never tell us what zoso means and I'm mad

had two people die in his home. one was a friend who died from a drug overdose, and the other was john bonham when he died from choking on his vomit.  

has been accused for the deaths of john bonham and robert plant’s son karac bc of that stupid “curse” rumor

deserves critiques for several things but doesn't deserve hate for that 

has been through a lot and come out pretty okay

produced his current girlfriend’s, scarlett sabet, spoken poetry vinyl 

check out scarlett’s work bc it’s amazing

would probably always be down for another led zeppelin reunion 

robert plant

robert anthony plant 

born on august 20, 1948

this is the most attractive man ever. do not argue with me. 

nicknamed percy 

wasnt jimmy’s first pick for a singer 

jerry reid suggested robert to jimmy. and when jimmy asked what he looked like jerry said, “like a greek god.”

jimmy thought something was wrong with robert when he first found him bc he was such a good singer and hadn't been signed yet 

after a practice together jimmy knew he had his singer 

he would call robert “the young guy with the powerful voice.”

he thought about leaving the band early on bc he was so nervous about being in it 

convinced john bonham to join the group bc they were the bestest of buddies 

he’s not credited on the first album bc he was still under another contract 

started song writing for the second album by jimmy’s memory 

it didn't take long for him to gain confidence and start owning the stage 

once when he was performing a dove flew in his hands 

there’s an audio of him singing john bonham happy birthday and it makes me so happy 

he would call himself a greek god 

would party with john bonham a lot 

kind of the hippy of the group 

moans moans moans and even louder moans into the microphone 

would wear women’s shirts and looked amazing in them 

nurses do it better 

not to mention his super tight jeans 

we all know his dick is huge and he’s just showing it off 

has the prettiest, fluffiest blonde hair 

and the sweetest smile 

can you tell that i find him attractive yet?

has a fear of earthquakes 

also supposedly had some sort of a relationship to an underage groupie named sable starr (14)

also has a fear of led zeppelin nowadays 

either fear or amnesia 

it’s likely that he’s the reason we’ll never get another led zeppelin reunion 

though a close friend thinks that if the show went to charity robert would probably do it 

robert loved john bonham too much to play in led zeppelin without him

and i respect that a lot 

no matter how much he’s offered for a show he turns it down every time

in 1975 he got in a severe car crash and ended up being in a wheelchair 

still went on to record zeppelin’s album 

once while recording on crutches and started to fall and jimmy apparently zoomed in to save him. robert never saw him move that fast before

his five year old son (karac) died from a sudden stomach illness while he was in america on tour

absolutely crushed him 

was deeply upset that neither jimmy page or john paul jones reached out to him during that time of his life 

john bonham was there for him though 

robert apparently never forgave them for that 

a car he was working on fell on top of him and crushed some of his ribs as well 

late seventies was not a good time for robert plant 

but he got through it all like a champ

hates stairway to heaven with a passion lmao  

one time he paid a radio station a shit ton of money just to make sure they'd never play stairway to heaven again 

almost didn't sing stairway for the 2007 reunion but ended up agreeing to it after all 

he said he breaks out in hives when he has to play that song 

he and jimmy made their own symbols. robert’s is the feather inside the circle 

in 2007 he won beard of the year 

john bonham

john bonham 

born on may 31, 1948

nickname is bonzo

oh boy, there’s a lot of stories about bonzo 

he was known as the nicest and sweetest guy ever 

unless he was drunk 

he drank a lot :/

denied jimmy’s offer to join the group and continued to deny it until robert convinced him 

once flew the starship (led zeppelin’s plane) even though he didn't have a license to 

hated touring so much 

he always missed his family 

so he drank 

he was so damn crazy when drunk that the other members would book rooms floors above where his was so he wouldn't disturb them

tore about his hotel rooms like no other 

he has a son named jason bonham who he loved a lot 

bought him a nice drum kit when he was younger 

jason is just about led zeppelin’s biggest fan next to jimmy page 

one time bonzo broke a girl’s vibrator when drunk

also punched a girl in the face when drunk once bc she waved at him 

partly responsible for the famous mud shark story where a girl was apparently fucked with a dead shark by him and zeppelin’s tour manager 

liked cars a lot 

really really loved his family. cannot stress it enough

was irked that john paul jones got out of playing shows during the christmas holiday and he didn't 

punched robert in the face once too 

him and john paul jones equals the best rhythm section ever 

jimmy would call it magic how well him and bonzo got along 

bonzo could handle anything jimmy threw at him 

he wasn't really a part of it, but he had to go to jail bc peter grant and two other dudes almost killing a man (long story omfg, but apparently the doctors had to put the dude’s eyeball back into his socket)

was there for robert when karac died 

they were really good friends 

there’s an interview with them together where bonzo is laughing at robert about his little farm 

gave good hugs apparently 

played drums like no other could and knew he was good 

but still sometimes got insecure and got upset when someone he looked up to said his drumming wasn't all that special 

his symbol is the three rings and he picked it out of a book like john paul jones did his 

he died in jimmy page’s house (not the crowley house btw)

he had to drink the equivalent of 40 shots of vodka and choked on his vomit in his sleep 

led zeppelin died on the same day 

nobody can replace john bonham 

his son filled in his role for the 2007 reunion show and did an amazing job of it. the whole show is on youtube, go check it out

john paul jones

 john richard baldwin 

born on january 3, 1946

nickname is jonesy 

was also a session guitarist like jimmy 

they had worked together before 

when he found out jimmy was forming a group he called jimmy and was basically given the spot immediately 

not only was the bassist but also the keyboardist 

and could play the recorder 

insanely talented. put some respect on his name 

he talks in italics i swear to god 

i don't have mainly crazy stories about jonesy bc he wasn't about that life 

deadass he would go on stage, perform, walk off stage and go to a whole separate hotel from the other

he would only tell one person where he was at and told them not to call unless for super urgent emergencies 

pissed peter grant off so much lmao 

wasn't really super close to anyone in the band tbh 

but bonzo was probably his greatest friend in the band 

jimmy and robert kind of leave him out in my opinion 

or they use to 

when he found out that jimmy and robert were making their own symbols instead of picking out of a book like he was he said “of course!”  and laughed 

was pretty much left out of the live aid show 

he had to squeeze himself on the stage and wasn't even able to play bass. he had to play the keyboard 

“and thank you to my friends for finally remembering my phone number” -savage as hell john paul jones 

he was one of the two people who found john bonham dead 

it’s sad to think about

is actually quite funny

he has this kind of dry humor?? idk but it’s amazing 10/10 content 

when john paul jones walks into the room interviewers break into a sweat

managed to look like a completely different person every year throughout the seventies or is it just my eyes?

has an Instagram account now go follow it for cute throwback photos lol

that’s all i really have for generic useless information about led zeppelin members for beginners. i hope it was somewhat entertaining. i'll make some more beginners stuff for led zeppelin. i will make y'all stan them lmao. i'm tagging @babygotblueeyes​ bc i know for a fact you want to get into them <3

[shannendoherty-fans]

People, September 9th 1991

High School Confidential

By Tom Gliatto and Michael Alexander.

Photos by Mark Sennett.

Beverly Hills, 90210 Gets Its Heat from a Dangerously Cute Cast of TV's Hottest New Stars CONFIDENTIAL MEMO: FROM: The Vice Principal TO: The Faculty, High School U.S.A. I'm sure I don't need to remind you what happened when we didn't prepare for Bart Simpson last fall. The school was flooded with rude, antieducational T-shirts. Some cows were had. Well, as a new school year gets under way, I believe we face another daunting challenge: Brace yourselves for Beverly Hills, 90210. That's the Fox drama about unworldly twin teens Brandon and Brenda Walsh (played by Jason Priestley and Shannen Doherty), recent transferees from Minneapolis to the Hills of Beverly. There they struggle to assimilate into the fast-lane lifestyle of West Beverly Hills High School, where the kids come equipped with BMWs, call waiting and designer surfboards. In the process, the teens examine their emerging identities and the problems that adolescents everywhere face.

The show languished in the Nielsen ratings against Thursday powerhouse Cheers last year. But Fox had no replacement, so it stayed. While we were on summer vacation, new 90210 episodes began airing, and the show landed in the Top 20, becoming the most popular show among teenagers. To some extent, I take responsibility for having ignored 90210. I made the mistake of reading newspaper critics instead of my daughter's diary, and so I believed, as Howard Rosenberg sniffed in the Los Angeles Times, that the show was merely a "ZIP code for stereotypes and stock characters." Little did I know that this show would mesmerize teens by doing emotionally realistic shows that involved adolescent rebellion, alcoholic; parents, a breast-cancer scare and plenty of worrisome teen sex. "Most shows for adolescents," says 90210 creator Darren Star, "seem like they are written by 50-year-olds who think teenagers behave like 7-year-olds."

It also doesn't hurt that the show's male stars, Priestley and Luke Perry (who plays brooding loner Dylan McKay), are "to die for," as my daughter puts it. These two have each been receiving about 1,500 fan letters a week. So be vigilant: Surely some of these will be written by our students...during class! And I'm afraid that 90210 is only going to get bigger with our kids, if producer Aaron Spelling is to be believed. "I thought The Mod Squad and Charlie's Angels got a lot of publicity in their heyday," says Spelling, whose company produced those shows, "but it doesn't compare to this. It's crazy. We have merchandising coming out of our ears"—a complete line of T-shirts, beach towels, notebooks, etc. "And now these actors can't walk down the street!"

Or even streak through malls. You probably saw those alarming news reports about a frenzied mob of 10,000 fans that stampeded Perry when he appeared at a south Florida mall last month. "It's a little scary," says Perry. Scarier is the amount of time students will waste this fall discussing Luke. And Jason. And who is sexier. I provide some information on the two. Jason Priestley, 22, plays Brandon Walsh, a model of thoughtful level-headedness. In real life, however, the brown-haired, blue-eyed star, who started acting in commercials at age 4 and played an orphan on that very nice NBC sitcom Sister Kate, is no Oliver Twist. He likes dirt bikes, bungee jumping and is a chain-smoker (just about the whole cast puffs it up—but not on-camera). Vancouver-born Priestley likes to hang out in Las Vegas. As for his real romantic life, he was reportedly dating actress Robin (Doogie Howser, M.D.) Lively last spring, but it seems likely that now he is too busy for such dalliance;. He must be on the set 14 hours a day, five days a week. To avoid ever-present fans, Priestley says, "I look different from my character when I'm just walking around. I don't shave, I don't dress like Brandon."

On the show, 26-year-old Luke Perry (Brenda Walsh's boyfriend, Dylan) sports a leather jacket, dagger sideburns and a squint that spells t-r-o-u-b-l-e. Although he grew up and graduated from high school in Fredericktown, Ohio, he seems to have attended James Dean wise-guy classes. Perry, who played country-boy Ned Bates on the ABC soap Loving, entertains the 90210 cast by strutting around bare-chested making jokes. Does he have a girlfriend? "No. You know how I can get in touch with Linda Hamilton?" What kind of music does he listen to? "Tom Jones is awesome." Are he and Priestley ever mistaken for each other? "He's mistaken for me on his good days." And 90210, he says, is "the best show on television, except for Jeopardy!" We should act quickly, faculty, when we see any signs that Beverly Hills, 90210 is disrupting normal student activity.

How abnormal might things get? Consider: "It's almost like there are cults," says Brian Austin Green, 18, the North Hollywood High grad who plays the cutely dweeby David Silver. "Girls go to school the day after the show, and they actually become these characters. They say, 'Okay, today I want to be Dylan, you can be Brenda, you can be Brandon.' " Needless to say, students caught pretending to be TV characters should be brought directly to my office for detention. But you know, it might not be a bad thing if our students could show some of the good sense that the 90210ers display in coping with the pressures of fame and fortune. Jennie Garth, 19, who plays the very sexy, very blond, very snotty Kelly Taylor, is particularly admirable. The youngest of seven children, she grew up on a farm near Champaign, Ill., until her schoolteacher parents moved to Phoenix when she was 13. "Living in a small town and coming from a very tight and close family instilled a lot of standards that I need to live up to," says Garth, who just bought a home in Sherman Oaks. She also recently supplied her parents with the down payment for their new home, setting a splendid example for today's youth.

According to a tabloid that someone left in the faculty lounge, Memphis-raised Shannen Doherty, 20, a veteran of such wonderful shows as Little House: A New Beginning, is the only cast member to be accused of behaving like "a spoiled brat" on the set. But she maintains she is no such thing. "I think everybody gets in a bad mood," Shannen says. "You do not work 16-hour days and not start feeling it. But I have never thrown a tantrum. I've gotten upset on the set, but it's never been just to be a bitch. You have to stand up for yourself in this business. That was something I was told when I was 12 years old and working with Michael Landon."

As with about half the cast members, Doherty is in a relationship—in her case, a real-estate developer with whom she's exchanged commitment rings. "You really have to date a while before you decide if this is the person you want to marry," she says with Brenda-like candor. Almost sounds like the relationship could be a future 90210 plot. "The problems of young people have accelerated," says Aaron Spelling, "and so have their feelings and thoughts." The show, he says, has kept pace: Even with their Clearasil-perfect complexions and plump allowances, the students at Beverly Hills have encountered their share of problems. "We had the guts to make Luke Perry be a member of AA," says Spelling. "We had Jason, our star, drinking and driving. That's reality."

And, apparently, the adulatory fan mail often includes a sad dose of that reality. "I got a letter the other day from a girl who mentioned the show we did on parental drug abuse," says Perry in a rare moment of seriousness. "She wrote about catching her father freebasing in the basement. I get letters like that all the time, from people all over the country." Gabrielle Carteris (at age 30, she's 90210's oldest cast-kid), who plays Andrea Zuckerman, the bright student who comes from the wrong side of Rodeo Drive, remembers an encouraging close encounter in a grocery store. "One girl came up to me after we'd done the breast-cancer show," says Carteris. "She said, 'I went home with all my friends and we checked our breasts for lumps.' "

In conclusion: Maybe I didn't need to write this memo. Maybe things won't be that bad, even if every locker in every corridor has a picture of Jason, Luke, Shannen or Jennie in it. Perhaps our dear little school is more like West Beverly Hills High—at least the TV version—than I thought. That's what Ian Ziering, 27, thinks too. "The reality on the show pretty much mirrors the way life is all over, in terms of teenagers," says New Jersey—bred Ziering, who once did Fruit of the Loom underwear ads and now plays 90210's curly-headed jock, Steve Sanders. "There's a mystique about Beverly Hills. But that's not what keeps people tuning in. The show could have been Montana E-I-E-I-O." By the way, should any student pronounce his name "eee-an," correct him or her, please. It's "eye-an."

-- WHEN BEVERLY HILLS, 90210 PREMIERED last October, Highlights, the student newspaper at Beverly Hills High, ran articles mocking the school's TV counterpart, West Beverly Hills High. "They said that the show was a joke," says Jenny Brandt, 14, a sophomore at the 1,900-student school. But as the story lines improved and Jason Priestley and Luke Perry became stars, the jokes stopped, and Brandt found herself, like many of her pals, glued to the set on Thursday nights from 9 to 10 P.M. "No phone calls allowed," says Brandt. "Except during commercials." Hope Levy, a 17-year-old senior, has taken fandom a step further with her friends. "We have little handmade cards," she says, speaking from her mom's car phone. "They say you're a member of Club 90210." While some kids think the show treats them as snobby stereotypes, most agree with sophomore Jordan Rynes when he says, "It's like a soap opera for teens. The shows dealing with drinking and drugs are the most real—adults don't realize how accurate it is."

[letusmeetagain]

I like your interpretation of snk. It's enjoyable to read.

Not really an ask but... I think for all the shit eren has been through he deserves a chance at survival and to be happy. But eren willingly and knowingly activated the rumbling so there's no turning back from that and I think it's a done deal that eren won't survive because of it. For that reason I'm low-key hoping that eren was manipulated or controlled to activate the rumbling. I really just want to see him have a life and to be happy.

Anyway do you think eren has a chance at survival?

Hi anon!

You got exactly to the point that I'm most uncomfortable with.

That's why I wrote about that bad taste that leaves me this whole idea of the rumbling being "a catastrofe that holds a meaning" and Eren is being controlled.

I think there's no way for Eren to escape the guilt. More or less, he contributed to the rumbling and he will be guilty. He also acknowledges his own guilt. You can argue that Eren might be innocent if he was being controlled or manipulated but the point of justice is that he was a grown-up man that reflected very well about the consequences of his actions. There is a real case in USA of a kid that was manipulated by his step mother into killing his dad because she told him he had cancer and wanted to die to leave them the money of the insurance. The 6 yo child was found innocent but because he had no way to weigh the consequences nor to know the difference between a lie and the truth.

For us, that are immersed in a world with these rules, watching Eren and saying he is innocent is disturbing. It's like with Breaking Bad. The authors want you to align with the protagonist and feel pity. In my case, I never could... I wanted Walt to win over others but because they were even worst than him... But it didn't really made him innocent to me. My father, who felt related to him for his own life, told me he was a good guy whose life got ruined by others (my father also tens to shove the guilt on others btw) where I rather saw that it was Walt's nature what led him downward. However this is a genocide and it also relates to something fragile to us... That is respect to the diversity.

To be honest... I'm very disappointed with the approach of the rumbling. But not because of the work itself but because of the light-headed way the fandom takes it.

Some specific decision Isayama made was probably the trigger. He aims to show how the story is developed through everyone's decisions and how these decisions are based on their undeniable true nature. That everything they do anchors on their true self. He partly says that this is something they must be proud of... And that everyone's mindset, regardless how wicked or dangerous it is, is part of them and history.

So if Eren is doing this, it's because he accepted this way. I do believe that he chose it being free and also restricted by the circumstances.. but everyone face the same view. Nobody is 100% free and not every memory he got was beautiful so the mastermind that sent the memories didn't really manipulated him that much. The fact that he got a memory about Ramzy's death means something... It's like a sort of warning: "the rumbling is not just roses but also thorns.". He was manipulated about Mikasa. The idea that he can't change the future is kinda tricky: if he saw the future, it's because it happened. And if it happened it's because he chose it. It's because he lost hope, yeah, but it was his nature too that he would be able to lose it.

Now Isayama will somehow undermine this concept that supports his whole story to tell us that Eren was being controlled? Will he?

That about saying he deserves to be happy... It's complicated. What does happiness mean? Did every character attained happiness? Is happiness or relief what he needs? Why would he deserve happiness while his friends are dying? Will he be able to mentally survive the guilt of knowing he wasn't able to save them?

[I don't mean just because they are dying he shouldn't be happy as a sort of immature saltiness. I mean that how will he be able to live knowing the people he wanted to protect are dead... I wonder if he could live after that]

And the most important part: will he be forgiven by the world he destroyed? Will he be able to live among the mountains of corpses he caused?

EDIT: Tumblr arghhhh!!! Anon! Sorry but something happened to my answer. Apparently I posted a draft... I don't know.

So I'm adding what's missing.

I think that there are chances for Eren to survive. The point is how Isayama displays this without undermining his whole mindset throughout the series and also providing a fair approach of the genocide.

My fear is also that we have just 3 chapters left and I don't know if Eren would have time to redeem himself corresponding the dimensions of his doing. Two panels wouldn't be enough to me.

But I don't know. If I have to weight what's more important: Eren's happiness with Mikasa and co. or a fair approach of the rumbling so the series doesn't remain as "how to run away with genocide", I would maybe choose the latter for the sake of Isayama as author and for the sake of everyone that is reading this work. But it could be both, let's see.

This isn't an easy question. Even I am trying to reach the balance between the pity I feel for him and the idea that he did or helped this.

Thank you for the question and I'm sorry that I posted just part of it the first time!!

[dr-skellington]

And The Winner Is...

So I was hella bummed to miss HIV/AIDS Awareness Day... So I wrote this for National HIV/AIDS Testing Day but I feel like it can emcompass both

anyways happy National HIV/AIDS Testing Day! If you’re sexually active y’all better go get tested! 😜

This is being posted to both my main and nsfs blogs because all of us nsfs content creators are guilty of (more often than not) creating content that doesn’t portray safe sex, which is the only way to prevent STDs and AIDS. For all my followers out there, please use condoms when engaging in sexual activity and if you don’t want to get pregnant, use some form of contraceptive as well. Stay safe. Love you guys <3

Please reblog the version with links

Fandom: Sanders’ Sides

Pairing: Loceit

Words: 2,899

Summary: Janus has been in the epicenter of the AIDS pandemic since it began. He’s seen more death, felt more loss, and heard more pain than any human should just within the last seven years. He’d all but given up on family, friends, forming bonds of any kind, because he knew they would just be taken away from him.

Until he met Logan Abbott.

Tags/Warnings: death, character death, HIV/AIDS, takes place in the 80s, specifically ‘87-’89, mentions of ballroom culture, descriptions of illness, descriptions of delirium/fever, descriptions of unintentional minor starvation, this is not a cheery fic guys just keep that in mind and be careful

December, 1987

“Number 37?”

Silence.

“Number 37.”

People glancing around. Logan nudges Janus. “Janus, that’s you.”

Janus startles slightly when Logan nudges him, blinking. He’d been completely zoned out, staring at the white wall opposite their chairs. “Ah, yes. Right. Thank you, I’ll be back in a moment.” He stands up, meeting the nurse’s kind smile with a blank look and following her back to the doctor’s office.

Janus shuts the door behind him, the click of the deadlatch nearly deafening in the silence. He takes a seat across from the doctor in a stiff polyester chair, shifting his weight nervously and crossing one leg over the other. Janus folds his hands in front of him and gives a slight nod.

The doctor smiles at him, opening up his file and looking over a page as she speaks. “So, are you ready to hear the results of your test?” She looks up, one of her eyebrows slightly raised.

All he can manage is a nod, his heart hammering in his chest. Please let it be negative, please let it be negative, it has to be negative.

“You tested positive, Janus. I’m sorry.”

Janus sits in numb silence for a moment, his mind screeching to a halt, the sound of his racing heart unheard past the ringing in his ears. Positive. He had HIV.

“Run the test again.”

He doesn’t even realize he spoke until the doctor is replying, a sympathetic frown pulling at her lips. “We’ve run the test twice. I’m sorry, but that’s the result.” He shakes his head, looking at her with wide, frantic eyes.

“I can’t have HIV, I can’t die! Not yet!”

The doctor raises her hands in an effort to placate him. “Janus, you aren’t going to die. This doesn’t have to be a death sentence. There are options; treatments, support groups. There’s AZT. You don’t need to fight this forever, you just need to fight until a cure is found-”

Janus jumps to his feet, pushing the chair back. “What cure?! No one is looking! The world wants us dead!” He’s bordering on hysterical; shouting, trembling with his racing heartbeat, tears streaming down his face. He wasn’t an idiot. Doctors may promise help and support and solutions but the facts were that no one cared enough to even look for a cure and the only worthwhile treatment killed as many people as it helped. He’d seen the effects of AZT, seen how it can make your body shut down. He was just as well off not doing anything, in his mind.

His doctor sighs, lowering her hands. “I understand that this is hard to accept. I’ll give you a moment to yourself, I’ll be right outside if you need me.” She walks past Janus and shuts the door quietly behind her, leaving him in silence.

It lasts for all of ten seconds before he’s falling back into his chair and hiding his face in his hands as sobs wracked his body. In the span of thirty seconds his entire life had been thrown up in the air, all plans for the future shrouded in a veil of futile hope that he’d even live long enough to see them happen.

The virus had swept through the gay community like the final plague of Egypt, claiming countless lives in the last seven years and looming over thousands more. It had become apparent very quickly that there would be no help. Not from the president, or any governors; no one. Hospital staff would do their best, but even they could only do so much and due to lack of knowledge many of them were afraid to get too close to those on the downslide, afraid of catching the virus themselves. It was the kind of plague that left even the most healthy man riddled with anxiety. It was the kind of plague that didn’t care about sex, race, gender, religion; it only cared about spreading death.

It was the one thing in this world Janus was afraid of.

Janus had been only nineteen when the pandemic began. He remembered hearing of it through rumor, how so-and-so’s brother/cousin/son had become mysteriously ill, only to die months later. He remembered when it was no longer a rumor and people in his own backyard began to drop like flies. He remembered friends locking themselves away, ending relationships, never leaving the house in fear of catching it. He remembered moments of silence in ballroom and the absence of it on the television. He remembered the first house he had joined and the exact number of days it took for him to be the only one left standing. He remembered burying friends, brothers, sisters, mothers.

And now Logan would have to bury him.

Oh god, Logan. How could he tell him? He knew the pain of watching the man you love withering to nothing before your eyes while no one offered help. Now that he was on the other side, though, nothing terrified him more than Logan not being there, being left alone to rot in a hospital bed while this virus stole his life from him. But Janus was not a cruel man.

He had to tell him. He had to give him a choice.

Janus took another moment to collect himself, wipe the tears from his face, and stood. He left the doctor’s office without a word and made his way back to the hall Logan was waiting in like countless others from their community. The way Logan straightened up and looked up at him with hopeful eyes when Janus finally turned the corner crushed his heart in his chest. This may be the last time that he gets to see that face, hold those hands, kiss those lips.

He walks up to Logan, who’s stood up to meet him with an expectant look. “Well? What’d she say, Janus?”

Janus takes Logan’s hand in his, squeezing it gently. Logan’s expression morphs into one of pain and sadness.

“I’m positive.”

“Janus…”

Janus takes a breath through his nose and lets go of Logan’s hand. “I’ve been on your side of this too many times to ask that you stay in good conscience. If you… If it’s easier for you to leave, to move on now before things get bad… I understand.”

“Ten, ten, ten, ten, ten! The winner is Janus from the House of Fidelity!”

Janus Jackson was twenty-three when he met Logan Abbott. By then he had buried half of his house and five boyfriends, and had decided life would be more tolerable if he stopped forming close bonds with other people. Despite this self-declaration, anyone you asked would claim that Janus was an open, kind, charismatic young man. He could make the terminal men laugh, gossip with the most effeminate queens, and trade beauty tips with all the trans women without making anyone feel awkward, out of place, or invalidated. No one knew his whole story, but everyone loved to fill in the blanks. This was just as well, in Janus’ mind, as it made it nearly impossible to tell which parts were fictional gossip and which were the sad tale of his life.

Logan was a twenty year-old nobody from out of state. He’d moved to the city for a change of scenery, or so he claimed to anyone who would ask. Janus could tell there was more to it though, and had he cared at all about making friends he might have pried. He assumed Logan came out and got shamed by his community, as was the story for many of the people in the ballroom scene. It was their home, their refuge where they could be themselves when the world told them they were a mistake, a disease, a cancer. Logan had taken quickly to the ballroom scene, finding like-minded people to watch the night’s categories with.

Logan blinks, his eyebrows furrowed and lips slightly parted. “I… Janus, I would never leave you just because you have the virus. You mean more to me than that. I love you.”

Janus sighs, relief and sadness washing over him; he was thankful he had met Logan, that he wouldn’t have to go through this alone, but the guilt of putting Logan through the same pain he’d gone through would weigh him down until his dying breath.

“I love you, too.”

At some point during the night, be it during a category Janus was participating in or just idle chit-chat, someone had pointed Logan his way. Janus swore he would find out who it was and make them suffer, but for the moment he had to uphold his reputation and make Logan feel welcome. Logan had come wandering over like a little lost lamb, taking the chair next to Janus tentatively and glancing at him.

“Are you… Janice?”

Oh, this bitch.

Janus rolls his eyes. “Janus.”

Logan blinks. “That is what I said.”

“You said Janice. My name is Janus. J-A-N-U-S. I can hear the difference.”

Logan looks at his lap. “I see. I apologize. Though admittedly I feel a little better not having had the chance to accidentally misgender you.” He casts a glance around the room; gay men, a few lesbians, trans women - some more obvious than others - and those you couldn’t label at first glance.

Janus snrks. “Oh honey. You better watch those comments before you offend the wrong people. This isn’t the suburbs, where you can gossip and slander behind closed doors.” He sighs through his nose, crossing one leg over the other as he gives Logan a once-over. “But I can’t fault you for not knowing. Yet. What is your name, pup?”

“Logan,” he says, just loud enough over the emcee to be heard. Janus leans in with a soft smirk.

“Well Logan, after the ball you’ll be coming to my house and talking to mother. We can’t have a cute thing like you living on the streets.”

Logan blushes and nods, and the two turn their attentions to the next category being walked.

(∩ ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)⊃━☆ﾟ

In the spring of ‘88, Janus got a bad flu. Janus and Logan had just buried their house mother the week before, leaving the two of them and Roman - their newest and youngest house member, a gay Latino boy who was barely older than eighteen - in their house. Roman had been debating leaving to join another house, but his loyalty to Janus as an older brother-now-house-father (oh, the irony) kept him in that dingy apartment. Roman and Logan did their best to look after Janus, checking his temperature every few hours, feeding him soup and helping him drink water, helping him bathe when he was too weak to stand on his own. The flu lasted nearly a week before his fever finally broke. Once it did, Logan was hopeful that Janus would recover quickly, but he never fully did.

As the months went by, Janus seemed to have less and less energy. By the beginning of fall his diagnosis had been moved from HIV to AIDS, and he had stopped walking the balls. If he was having a particularly good day, he would still show up and show support for friends in other houses. Roman had even walked a category on one of Janus’ good days to cheer him up, earning the House of Fidelity their first trophy in almost a year. Janus had cried when Logan wheeled him down the runway to accept the trophy at Roman’s insistence.

The days began to grow colder and Janus never left the apartment. If he even got a cold, he could die, so he and Logan decided it would be better, safer, to stay indoors with the heat on. It didn’t last too long; November rolled around and Janus was admitted to the hospital with an infection. He couldn’t sleep, had trouble breathing, and would only eat if Logan was there to make him. No one thought he would live to see Christmas. Even after his infection cleared, Janus stayed in the AIDS ward with the other men who were too sick to leave. The place smelled of chemicals, with a backdrop of hacking coughs, desperate prayers, and crying. He hated it there, but Roman and Logan made sure to visit as often as they could to keep him company.

(∩ ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)⊃━☆ﾟ

On Thanksgiving, Logan walked into Janus’ room to find him gripping the pole of his IV stand, walking the length of his room like it was a runway. His eyes were unfocused, swinging his arms around in a delirious attempt at vogueing. Logan carefully approached Janus, gently guiding him back to bed, his heart beating anxiously in his chest. Janus sat on the edge of the mattress and looked up at Logan with a soft smile.

“What are my scores, baby?” He asked airily. Logan swallowed, his eyes burning with tears.

“Tens across the board, my love.”

(∩ ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)⊃━☆ﾟ

“Everyone misses you in ballroom, dad. Every night I got people comin’ up to me and telling me they hope you’re doin’ okay.”

Janus gives Roman a small smile, patting the teen’s knee as he sits before him on the bed. “And what do you tell them, Roman?”

Roman grins. “I tell them my dad’s the strongest guy there is! Just watch, spring’s gonna come and you’re gonna get better, I just know it.”

“I’d love to see the looks on their faces when I walk into the room like nothing happened.”

Logan smiles, running his fingers through Janus’ matted hair. “I’m sure you will, love. You just need to rest up.”

“Rest up later, it’s Christmas!” Roman shouts, bouncing a little. Janus chuckles.

“Yes, yes it is. Logan, did you bring the packages I told you about?” Logan nods and hands Janus two sloppily-wrapped presents. Janus hands the blue one to Logan, and the red one to Roman. “Merry Christmas, you two.”

Roman grins and snatches the present out of Janus’ hand, ripping the paper off. “Oh, bitchin’! Thanks, dad!” Roman holds up the leather jacket to inspect it, showing it off to Logan. Logan nods in amusement, watching Roman put the jacket on before he carefully unwraps his own present. He gasps as he looks down at the picture of him and Janus laughing together as they sit next to each other, Janus’ hand on Logan’s knee.

“Just in case. Don’t want you forgetting how hot I am,” Janus jokes lightly. Logan looks at him with teary eyes and takes his hand, squeezing gently.

“Never.”

(∩ ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)⊃━☆ﾟ

“I’m sorry, I’m s-sorry, Logan,” Janus sobs, his body shaking as tears make their way down bony cheeks.

Logan shakes his head, taking Janus’ hands and looking him in the eye. “You have nothing to apologize for, my love.”

“I-I didn’t want to d-die alone, I’m sorry, I’m s-so selfish.”

“You couldn’t have gotten rid of me if you’d tried.”

The pair sit in silence for a moment, Logan rubbing Janus’ knuckles as Janus cries. It was one of those days where a fever made Janus overemotional. Sometimes he thought it was still 1987, and when he realized it was almost 1989 he would lay there and cry, apologizing for trapping Logan with him. It was the same conversation every time.

“I don’t w-want to die.”

“You won’t die, my heart, not for a long time.”

“I should h-have taken the AZT, I should have tried e-everything I could.”

“You said so yourself, there is a significant chance that taking AZT would have shortened your lifespan even more. I’m thankful that we’ve had this time together, I wouldn’t want to change a thing.”

“I-I’m so sorry.”

“... I know.”

(∩ ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)⊃━☆ﾟ

Janus Jackson passed away on January 2nd, 1989, just twenty minutes after his boyfriend Logan had left the hospital. He’d passed away in his sleep, having been well looked-after and held in the arms of the one he loved until he drifted off. The funeral was a week later, and something told Logan that he would need to find a big space to hold it in. True to thought, the day of the funeral the entire church was full of people coming to say goodbye to Janus and celebrate his life, drawing a crowd so big that it spilled out the front doors. No one had known that Janus was religious. No one except Logan.

Logan tested positive for HIV just two months later. He’d sat in the doctor’s office in contemplative silence, nodded, and thanked them before leaving the room. That day, he’d walked the streets of Brooklyn and thought about his time with Janus; all the laughter, the excitement, and the tears. The one thing that kept coming back to mind was all the nights he would sit by Janus’ side in that hospital bed, listening to him cry and apologize, listening to his regrets. Logan returned to the doctor the next day and got a prescription for AZT.

Logan Abbott lived to the age of fifty-four. He had a small number of boyfriends in his life, a few after Janus’ passing, and had buried almost all of them. Shortly after testing positive he had joined ACT UP, leaving behind the balls that Janus loved so dearly to instead fight for his community’s life. When he finally passed on a cool spring day in his own home, Janus’ gift in his hands, he found he had no regrets, looking forward to seeing Janus once again.

[ziracona]

Could you elaborate on that Gordon fan theory about him being an inside mole? I haven't heard of it before and it sounds intriguing. Plus ever since the small reference to him on the memorial in ILM, I've been wondering what your thoughts were on how he ended up

Oof, okay, buckle up. This will be the abridged version but that’s still gonna be long. (Don’t read if you want to avoid spoilers for the Saw franchise).

So, in Saw, Gordon is a fkn anomaly to most of the fanbase. Becuase he has a wildly solidified character. You watch Gordon & Adam both go through three different character arcs back to back, and trauma bond, and the second to last scene in Saw is this fkn devestating & beautiful one where—let me back up. So. Quick Saw summary. Two people wake up chained by the ankle to pipes in a small nasty abandoned bathroom with a corpse on the floor between them. They’re each left a tape recorder which tells them why they’ve been targeted (Gordon because he doesn’t value life enough which is evidenced by...? — real reason is he’s literally just the unfortunate Doctor who told John he had Cancer, and John Kramer is that petty of a stupid bitch. & Adam is grabbed becuase...Literally he didn’t even bump into John Kramer or something. The guy took him because he’s a starving early 20s kid who is a photographer, and John thinks his occupation & he are pathetic. I’m not joking. Or exaggerating. This is quite literally the given reason for torturing & killing Adam being fine to John). Anyway, Gordon’s wife and like 7 year old daughter have been kidnapped and are being held at gunpoint. Gordon is told that if he finds a way to murder Adam by six (poor Fkn Adam is 6 feet away & hears this whole tape) on the clock, they and he go free. Adam is told if he can stay alive until after six, he wins and can go free.

They spend then the remaineder of Saw trying, like you’d hope good, decent, or even medium or somewhat shitty people would, to help each other escape, rather than Gordon trying to kill Adam at all. They attempt to fake Adam’s death & fail bc they didn’t realize their shackles were wired & they could be zapped, which makes playing dead really hard. Initially they are frustrated by each other, especially Gordon, who is an adult & levelheaded, by Adam who is young and jouvenile and freaking out & being a pain at first, but they bond through attempting to escape & to figure out what’s happened to them, and also learn more truth about each other. Meanwhile you also get backstory on Jigsaw & the case, and follow Detective Tapp’s story through a few investigated murders, the loss of his partner, and to where he is following Gordon, whom he is convinced is Jigsaw, now. Back in the bathroom, Adam and Gordon reach 6 on the clock, and Gordon gets a phone call where the man holding his wife at gunpoint makes her tell him he failed his game & now she and their daughter have to die. His wife bites the man’s hand, and they fight, but all Gordon hears is screaming in his wife and child’s voices and gunshots, and he has a mental breakdown believing they’re being murdered on the other end of the phone. Then is electrocuted. Adam flips out and tries to throw small stones at Gordon’s body to wake him up, terrified he’s dead, and succeeds. Adam is overcome with relief, but Gordon has a full mental breakdown, almost having died and believing his family is dead, then swapping immediately to denial and convincing himself it’s not too late and he can still save them. Adam tries desperately to apologize and calm him down, then to in horror talk him into stopping while he watched Gordon begin to saw off his foot (Adam was given a saw for this purpose too, but his broke early on before they realized the saws were meant for their feet instead of the chains). Gordon does not stop, and Adam watches in horror as he cuts off his foot, crawls to the gun the dead body on the floor has been holding, and puts the one bullet he was given into it. He tells Adam while crying and breaking down that he’s sorry but he has to die he has to save his family. Adam begs him not to shoot, but he does.

Meanwhile, Bc he’s staking out Gordon’s home, Tapp hears shots, runs in, and is able to chase off the killer and save Gordon’s wife and daughter. He pursues the killer to the meat packing plan, where he is ambushed, struggles, and then is shot in the stomach and left for dead. The man, Zepp, makes it to the bathroom where Gordon tries to shoot him with the bow empty gun & screams at him for what he did to his family, who he still believes are dead, then breaks down crying again. Zepp takes out a gun and tells him he failed to kill Adam by 6, so he has to die. Gordon asks hopeless why, and he tells him those are the rules, then goes to shoot him while Gordon tries to shut his eyes and brace for death. Adam, who is not dead, grabs Zepp’s feet and drags him down in a surprise attack, rips the toilet bowl lid off the toilet, and beats him to death with it, saving Gordon, who watches in shock and then crawls over and puts a hand on his shoulder and gets him to stop beating the dead corpse. Adam is wounded & criying because gunshot wounds fkn hurt, & Gordon tries to comfort him. Tells him it’s just a flesh wound—it’s his shoulder—he’ll be okay. Just keep pressure on it. He has to go get help. Adam begs him not to leave him alone in the bathroom, but Gordon says he has to or he’s going to bleed to death (which is incredibly visually apparent). Adam tries to keep him, then watches him crawl and pleads for him to wait and asks if they’re going to be okay? Gordon tells him “I wouldn’t lie to you.” and gives him a reassuring smile while half dead and crawls out to look for help. Adam is left alone and searches Zepp’s corpse for keys to his shackle, then finds a tape exactly like his & Gordon’s. He plays it, and realizes to his horror this man Zepp was another victim, not Jigsaw. He was poisoned and told to kidnap Gordon’s family & shoot them both & Gordon if Gordon lost to earn an antidote, or just accept death and refuse to participate. While the tape plays, the corpse in the room with them stands up, and Adam realizes to overwhelming horror it has been alive the whole time, and it is Jigsaw, who wanted a front row seat to their torture, suffering, and death. He tries to grab Zepp’s gun & shooot him, but Jigsaw/John electrocutes him w a remote (the shackles are wired) and leaves, congratulating him on winning & telling him where his key is (it got flushed down a drain when Adam woke up, which John no doubt planned), then telling him “Game Over” and locking him alone in the bathroom because John’s a fake ass piece of shit who doesn’t even keep his promises & let the winners go.

The end scene between Adam and Gordon is phenomenal & heart wrenching (Saw is an amazing character piece of a film, & the first film is the reason it became a modern horror staple! Watch here if you’re curious! :’-]

While Gordon does eventually, under extreme duress, shoot Adam, he never wants to kill him, and they are definitely close by the end of the film (which is clear both from the way they treat each other, and their more decisive actions, like Adam risking his life to save Gordon after being shot by him & never seeking recompense for the gunshot, Gordon trying to help Adam & comfort him as well as get help for them both). This is the central relationship of Saw 1, and it’s really well done.

Then, in Saw 2, there’s just no mention of Gordon going back to save Adam. We wonder what happened, until Amanda & Danny stumble to the bathroom form Saw 1 & you are greeted by Adam’s decaying corpse still chained there. It’s later revealed that Gordon escaped the bathroom, cauterized his wound on a hot pipe because he knew he was going to die otherwise, then passed out from pain. John found him and took him to his workshop, where he nursed him back to health & gave him a prosthetic leg, before convincing him to join the team.

Understandably, this did not sit well with any of the Saw fandom. We fight about all kinds of stuff, but the one thing I’ve like, never seen disagreement on, is that it makes no fkn sense for Gordon to betray Adam like that after how close they were, and it makes even less sense he’d willingly join the man who super tried to murder his wife and kid. If it wasn’t for Tapp and Adam, Gordon, his wife, and his child would be dead now. John endangered all 3 intentionally, and did not save or spare any of them.

Still with me? So. Because of that, people started digging. Now, out of Jigsaw’s apprentices, Gordon is the only one who never takes a very active roll. He did not run games or kidnap people. Becuase he was a doctor, John called him in to do medical work for tests, such as sewing a key into the eye of the man from the cold open to Saw II. The only active work he takes is catching Hoffman at the end of Saw 3D & locking him in the basement, which John asked him to do if Hoffman killed Jill (which Hoffman does). This together with Gordon’s character led to a massive fan theory. Let me try to break it down.

After Saw 1, Gordon joins a support group for Jigsaw game survivors, and returns to his family. We get very little info about him period until Saw 3D though. However! Pre Saw 1, Jigsaw basically never lost, the cops never even got close. Suddenly after Saw 1, the entire gang falls apart, starting with Amanda and John, then finally Hoffman & Jill. In Saw 3, it’s revealed Amanda went back to the bathroom to kill Adam when he survived his test. She promises she’s there to help him when he wakes up scared and half dead in the dark, and then puts a plastic bag over his head and smothers him while he fights. This lead to a fan theory that Gordon went back to save Adam once he could (able to walk & not being shadowed by Jigsaw), but was too late, and decided to take revenge very carefully. However, Amanda has a shit track record of thinking she killed someone & not checking for a pulse (see Eric Matthews, who she thought she beat to death), so the even more popular theory is that Adam was not dead by the time Gordon got to him, and Gordon saved him and replaced his corpse with another. This theory is backed by the fact that Adam was shot in the shoulder, but when the body is seen in other films, it is both too decayed to be recognizable, and the gunshot wound is in the stomach (where Tapp was shot). Furthermore, when Amanda & Danny find Zepp and “Adam”’s bodies in Saw 2, Zepp, who was already partially bald, still has hair, yet Adam’s corpse is completely bald. The shackle is also on the wrong foot now, which would indicate it was removed and then replaced by someone in a hurry. Now, obviously it’s possible this was just a continuity error, but given that Saw usually has a good track record with continuity (and uses them a lot for big reveals), that gives more weight than usual to the theory.

So, this led to the idea that Gordon was able to either save Adam, or at least remove his body & bury it, replaced it with a fake (possibly Tapp? but considering the bodies wouldn’t be decayed enough for the skin to be missed if he did it when Adam was alive or in decent preserve even, and Tapp is considerably taller, I’d assume he, as a doctor, didn’t have too much trouble stealing a John Doe cadaver from the hospital) corpse in Adam’s clothes, then agreed to help Jigsaw becuase he was smart enough to know if he didn’t play along, John would kill him (he would, and has. He never lets people with dangerous information go). John also tends to have failsafes in place, like “if Gordon betrays me, kill his daughter” kind of stuff, so the theory is Gordon played along to keep his family safe, instead of going to the cops, since he knew at least Hoffman worked for Jigsaw already, and there might be more plants, and did his best to engineer the breakdown and eventual demises of the whole team from Saw 1 on. (Was the one who gave Hoffman the idea to threaten Amanda or the info to do it, intentionally failed to protect Jill from Hoffman to have an easy excuse to kill/see both dead, etc). Makes double sense if Adam was alive, becuase if Gordon revealed himself as mole, first thing Jigsaw & co would check is what else he messed with, and they knew he was close to Adam.

There’s a lot more details to it, but that’s the short version. Most people I know in the Saw fandom ascribe to it in a weird kind of “Look I know it’s probably just inconsistent character writing and in that case fuck Gordon he can go to hell, but since I truly don’t believe Saw 1 Lawrence Gordon would do this & there’s enough evidence for reasonable doubt, I choose to believe the convoluted theory that makes him make sense & also means Adam could maybe be alive” way. Including me. If Gordon really decides he has no issue with John after what he did to him, his baby girl, Adam, and his poor wife, joins him willingly & helps, then he’s as bad as Amanda & Hoffman & fuck that guy. But since the characterization doesn’t match /at all/ & there’s never an explanation given, & fan theory makes more sense, I tend to think of Gordon as if the fan theory is right? Although if you don’t & thus hate Gordon, 100% respect. I just cannot watch Saw 1 & believe Lawrence would join up for any reason but revenge & long con to keep family safe. I mean, he tried to kill a /friend/ to save his family. You’re really going to try to convince me the man who cut off his own foot by hand to try to save his wife and daughter would ever be cool with or forgive the man who tried to execute them for no reason? Uhhh, to quote Dr. Gordon himself,

I mean.

💁🏻‍♀️ You can’t convince me the man this hellbent on destroying the man who was threatening his family did not make him pay, and just decided to be pals. You can’t. It’s inconsistent writing. :’-] anyway, there’s other info too—one of the disguised figures who helps Lawrence take out Hoffman is the exact height Adam was, the plastic bag from Amanda is gone & the corpse in a different position, etc—been like 2 years so I don’t even remember it all, but it’s very fascinating. & that’s the short yet somehow still too long version of the Gordon theory I definitely did not proof read at all for which I apologize! It’s more convincing than I write it I swear I am just exhausted. :’-] But yeah, most saw fans ascribe to it, which is why we all seem to still like Gordon, and he’s so often shipped with Adam, both of which would probably otherwise seem massively confusing. Hope it helps!

(Oh! & in ILM, since i ascribe to that theory, I wrote him that way. Failed to save Adam, buried his body, then took slow, careful revenge on Jigsaw & co. to keep his family safe. Knows there are deaths he is not blameless for becuase of that, and is full of guilt over wondering if going to the police wouldn’t have saved people, even if he had understandable doubts & reasons for what he did. Is especially guilty for Adam’s death. Seeks to make reparations slowly his own way. [tho also soemtimes secretive characters lie to me until it becomes necessary for me to know, so it’s possible Gordon saved Adam & is hiding it, but given the whole gang is dead, I don’t know why he still would be, so I think ILM verse all he could do was bury the body]).

[louistomlinsoncouk]

It’s 3:00 p.m. on a Saturday, and Louis Tomlinson is casually trying to catch cigarettes in his mouth.

Tyler Joe He’s standing on a Brooklyn sidewalk, killing time between shots of his Cosmopolitan photoshoot, in front of a friend who's about six feet away.

On Louis’ cue, Not-Louis throws a cigarette in the general direction of Louis' open mouth, the way high school boys do with Swedish Fish during lunch. He misses. Not-Louis tries again. Another miss. Then, on the third attempt, Not-Louis finally catches the cig, and he proceeds to light it and then immediately put it out when he’s called back to set.

As the oldest member of the mega-successful group formerly known as One Direction, Louis is about to embark on the solo career his bandmates Zayn Malik and Harry Styles got a two-year head-start on. His debut solo album Walls is set to come out at the end of this month. The sound is more soulful—less teen heartthrob, more grown-up man who isn't trying to get every teenage girl in the world to have a crush on him. He even looks more mature, in part because he's not trying to do the fluffy boy band hair anymore. Yeah, and he’s never felt more aware of how old he is.

“I’ve never been more conscious of my age, at 27,” he tells me a few hours later while sitting in on a couch in a now-empty photo studio, with perfect afternoon selfie light coming through the windows, still obviously nursing a hangover from the night before. “When you’re in your late 20s, you’re in a funny stage of your life—you haven’t been around for ages, but you’re also not young, you’re in this weird transitional stage," he goes on. "That’s been very apparent in my life, and I’m always trying to be as immature as I possibly fucking can now, to balance it all out. There’s only so much you can get away with for so long.”  

No one would blame Louis for trying to reclaim a little bit of his youth while he still can. In the past four years, he’s faced enough change to turn him from a fresh-faced kid in a boy band to an adult with very real obstacles in his path. In 2016, he lost his mother to cancer. Three years later, his younger sister passed away from an accidental overdose.

In that same stretch of time, he saw the breakup of One Direction—excuse me, “hiatus,” not breakup. While his former bandmates were able to go on world tours and front fragrance campaigns for Gucci, he had serious reasons for delaying the release of his first album.

His new music reflects the grief of all the above. In the track “Two Of Us,” he vulnerably sings: “I know you'll be looking down, swear I'm gonna make you proud / I'll be living one life for the two of us.” But there’s still plenty of time spent on the idea of falling in love too.

These lyrics are more personal than the ones you find in the singles he released when he first left the band, before his solo career stalled due to all those personal reasons. Those early songs admittedly slapped, but didn’t really feel like him-him.

“I was making music to try to chase radio, and not really making the right decisions by me in terms of music,” he says.

“I respect the artists that I worked with and I respect the songs, absolutely, but in hindsight, it wasn't necessarily true to me.”  

That’s part of why he’s stayed away from collaborations on Walls. He feels like he needs to create an image for himself separate from other people—there are, ahem, four very specific names that come to mind. “I've got to stand on my own two feet and say, ‘This is my identity. This is who I am as an artist,’” he says. 

That said, the whole promoting-your-album-alone thing isn't exactly easy—especially when you're very used to doing this job as part of a unit. The interviews, the photoshoots, the studio sessions, the gigs, were all situations he could rely on his bandmates for in the past.

Like, say, if he showed up hungover to something (cough, cough), he could usually depend on Harry, Liam, Niall, or Zayn to be on their game. But now, it’s just him. The one thing that doesn’t feel different, though, are the fans, who have a reputation for being absolute die-hards.

“They’re still as manic and as crazy, in the best possible way,” he says. At a meet-and-greet recently, he met a girl who told him the first time she listened to a One Direction song, she was 11. Now, she’s 19 or 20, which means Louis has been a part of her life for roughly half of it. “That's a crazy concept," he continues. "I left that meet-and-greet thinking about the fact that she was still very young girl at 11, and there she was as an adult."

The fans have grown up, so has he, and so have the other guys he used to make music with. Now that they’re all older and doing their own things, Louis isn’t shy about the fact that they don’t talk all the time. Like any group of friends that come together as 16-year-olds, that relationship is going to look a lot different by the time you’re almost 30.

But it's not like he has anything bad to say about them. There’s no shade to throw accusing one member of the band of being Ringo Starr, the man who notoriously left The Beatles first. There's no wink-wink comments made about not knowing what to say to any of the other members if they were to run into each other, because their life is shrouded in “mystery” or something. (Although, to be fair, the topic of Zayn was generally avoided.)

“I think all the boys would agree with this. There's been moments in all of our lives where naturally some of us speak to others more than others,” he says. “I wouldn't say I’m closest to any of the boys. Recently, I’ve probably spoken to Liam 10 times as much as I spoke to the other lads. Six months ago, that was Niall.”

He’s also quick to say he’s not not down for a reunion. If he had to guess, he’d be the one to send the initial, “Alright boys, let’s do this,” kind of message. When they were in the band, he felt like he was the de facto team captain because he was the oldest.

But, if it were to happen, the music would have to be different. The songs were great, but they were definitely reflective of the fact that they were being performed by teenagers, and he’s careful to say that he’d want to pick up specifically where “Made In The A.M.” left off. Take that to mean whatever you want. Cue the conspiracy theories.  

As for the timeline of when this would all go down? He’s not sure. Anything past 35 feels too late, but it’s hard to look too far forward when you’re trying to sneak in those last moments of being immature.

“Anything over 30 sounds fucking old to me right now,” he says.