#so that being said… bobby feels like the most likely choice

[seddair]

.

[zainclaw]

One of the reasons why I've always thought that pairing up Eddie or Buck with a brand new character who's only brought in as a love interest will simply not work, is the fact that the rest of the mains are all paired up with other mains.

Bobby and Athena. Maddie and Chimney. Karen is the only wife who's not a real main herself, but her character and her and Hen's relationship are both so fleshed out and beautiful that she still feels like a main.

This is the main reason why, in my opinion, it's always going to feel so incredibly lacking to try and pair up Eddie and Buck with random new people. When we're so used to knowing and loving both parties in a romantic relationship on this show. It's one of the many reasons why I feel like endgame romantic Buddie is the only thing that's going to feel fair to their characters.

Which leads me to the genious choice of Tommy being brought back to be Buck's new love interest. Tommy, who's already an established character in this universe. Tommy, who's already got history with members of the 118 that aren't Buck. Who was insinuated to be a closeted gay long before he was gonna be Buck's bisexual awakening. Who said he thought Kirsten Stewart was too broody way before the show decided to pair him up with someone as sweet and bright as Buck.

And even now that he is a love interest, he still gets to keep a personality of his own. He still gets to be a little reserved when meeting up Buck for coffee at the end of the episode, hesitant to say yes to another date, because he's allowed to look after his own heart and not wanting to be hurt by someone who might still be in the closet, unlike himself. Like that is such a real and fair choice to make for yourself as a queer person, and I'm so happy they let him be all that.

I still think endgame Buddie is the thing that'll make the most sense for this show and its characters. But, my god, is it hard to be anything but fucking thrilled about having Tommy around right now.

[lover-of-mine]

I've been thinking while chilling in the they cast Ryan with a plan delusionland, but specifically what it would take to give Buck the most satisfying love story possible. Because Buck was written as the love interest. His purpose in season 1 is to give something to the main character. And ever since, he's been there to provide something to his love interests even though he's the main character now, he gave Ali a place to stay, he gave Taylor professional advancement (and this one is made worse by her book), he gave Natalia inside information on death, so he's constantly providing things without getting anything substantial in return, much like with Abby and the way that he was just a device to make her feel better about her life. And the main thing here is that Buck is being pursued in order to offer something. He's never the one to go after them, he's the one being chased in a sense, Abby calls him, Ali calls him, Taylor kisses him, Natalia asks him out, Tommy kisses him, so these people want something from him and they take it, most of the time without giving him something in return, Abby forces him to get closure by himself, Ali leaves him because she can't handle the job, where do I even begin with Taylor. So if you think about it, considering the initial way Buck was written, and the way they expanded this to the point that he was literally born to offer something to someone who provided him with nothing (in this case his parents), or the way Maddie shows up because she needs the safety he could provide (I'm not saying Maddie doesn't provide him with anything, I know she does so much for him, but she did show up because she needed a place to hide) his main love interest needs to be someone who's not asking him for stuff. And that's been Eddie since he was introduced. Under Pressure is about Buck choosing Eddie. Eddie tries, but when he realizes Buck is serious about not liking him, he validates Buck's feelings, granted in his sassy way of his, and backs off until he has a chance to give Buck the choice to let him in. You can have my back any day. The phrasing of this is great for the whole Eddie trusts Buck to take care of him, he's not saying he will take care of Buck, he's giving Buck the option of taking care of him. But the thing there is that he puts the choice in Buck's hands. Buck could've walked away. Even Buck's reactions to the way Eddie says it shows a moment where Buck is considering before offering the or you can have mine. The metaphor surrounding the rescue in this context is interesting because while Eddie is choosing Buck right there, he's not forcing Buck to step in. Much like the ambulance, Eddie is offering himself, but he's not forcing anyone to go into the ambulance and risk getting blown up with him. Buck needs to volunteer. And he does.

I know the fandom loves to say Eddie baby trapped Buck, but Buck was the one who took one look at Eddie and said I'm stepping in with you whether you like it or not. Eddie never demanded anything from Buck beyond for Buck to be himself. He never asked for help with Chris, Buck chose to talk to Bobby to clear him being at the station, Buck chose to trick Eddie to offer him help in the form of Carla. Sure, when it's convenient for the plot, Eddie will just decide on things, but like, even the lawsuit of it all, when Eddie is inserting himself into the conflict, Buck is ready to be forced to provide Eddie with something to be forgiven "so whatever it takes for you to forgive me" but Eddie is instantly "I forgive you" because he doesn't need for Buck to prove himself. Over and over again, the show puts Eddie in a position that shows that he just loves Buck. No matter what. He never asked Buck to provide him with something. I think even the will and the way Eddie hides it plays into this. He doesn't want to ask for Buck to do this. Eddie knows Buck will do it, he knows how much Buck loves Chris, but the will reveal is not really about Eddie asking Buck to do something for him, taking care of Chris if he can't because the episode already showed Buck doing that without knowing that was what Eddie wanted, but to give Buck that shock that he does have something to live for, that he matters, that someone loves him. Eddie exists as the person that allows Buck to make his own decisions. He does push back when he thinks Buck needs that push but he doesn't make the choice for him. Even if Buck ever decides to walk away from him, he'll let him if that's what Buck really wants, because ultimately it will be Buck's choice and he respects that. And ultimately, with the archetype they had in mind when they created Buck, that is what Buck needs for him to be in the most satisfying romantic relationship narratively. Buck needs someone who loved him before they were in love with him. And that is the work they have been putting towards buddie since Eddie was introduced. And that's also why Buck is the one who needs to start his endgame relationship. It's never gonna feel right until Buck chooses to do something about it because everything about him is about someone else making the choice.

[missmagooglie]

The promo for next week is what made it clear that Buck is regressing regressing. All that bullshit he's suggesting to Chim? All those proposals that Bobby (correctly) said were just a list of potential calls?

That's Season 1 Buck talking. That's Early Abby Days, pre She Needs You To Step Inside With Her Buck who wants love and romance but doesn't know what it's supposed to look like. That's a version of Buck who isn't ready for something quite so grown up.

Our Buck, Season 6 Buck, knows better than that. He knows Chimney and he knows Maddie and if he stopped and thought about it for half a second he would realize that a big showy proposal isn't right for them. He'd realize that the right approach is something more personal, more intimate. It's Chimney sitting Maddie down and saying, 'we both know there are plenty of reasons we "should" get married, but let me take a minute to make sure you understand the reasons I want to marry you', and giving Maddie space to express all the reasons she's hesitant rather than putting her on the spot with something public that pressures her into saying yes without a conversation.

Buck's been different since the lightning strike, sure. It was a big event, it had a profound psychological effect. But I think the bigger issue here is that Buck has been growing and changing and maturing for the past 6 seasons and he hasn't had a chance yet to properly acknowledge that to himself and update his self-concept. I think the reason we're seeing Buck regress so hard is because he's consciously trying to act like "the same old Buck", but his understanding of "what it means to be Buck" hasn't kept up with the growth he's been doing.

At the gravesite, Buck says he feels like Natalia "really sees him" - which, let's be real, is an insane thing to say about a person you've just met on a good day. And he's saying it to Eddie, who the writers have made abundantly clear is the one person who most sees Buck and understands him and has seen his growth and his insecurities even when others don't.

But the thing I think Buck is getting from Natalia is actually the opposite of what Buck thinks he's getting from her. When Buck says "she sees me", he means "She only sees this me. She doesn't know the man who died, just the man who woke up again."

And while there is some value in that, mostly in allowing himself to be his "now" self without worrying about how it might or might not align with his past self, I think Buck also needs someone who can help him understand that those two versions of himself are closer to each other than he thinks. And the version of himself he's trying to be for the sake of everyone else (ie "the same old Buck") is not the version of him that his loved ones lost at the top of that ladder.

The lightning strike changed Buck - after all, how could it not? And Buck, being someone who is so used to being left behind, is naturally worried that changing who he is will cause the people he loves to leave. But that isn't something Buck needs to be afraid of, because he's been changing for a long time now and he has people who love every version of him, and will continue to love every version that comes next.

And I keep thinking about that choice to have Christopher fall asleep on the couch just like Buck did, the way it puts Christopher and Buck in the same category for Eddie - that category of "family" and "home". Because Christopher is changing too. He's growing up. The man he is going to slowly become is not the same person as the boy he is now, and it is understood that while some of that growth might be painful it is normal and natural and to be expected. And there is not a single direction in which Christopher could grow that would make Eddie love him even a little bit less.

When Buck realizes that Eddie loves him the same way? That there is no version of Buck that Eddie will not love with his whole heart? And when he doesn't just realize it, but actually believes it?

That's the endgame, baby.

[matan4il]

Buddie 601 meta

The ep kicks off with the blimp call, and what I liked about it is that while Buck and Eddie weren’t initially paired up with each other, it quickly became clear that this was done so that at the peak of this emergency, after someone had to already go down with one of the pilots, the person who’ll be left up there with Eddie would be Buck. Battlefield boyfriends ride again!  ~~

I love how Eddie right away realized that Buck is feeling off about Lucy having been offered the role of interim captain, and how he and Chim try to ease the tension by joking around. It’s a part of Eddie’s love language when it comes to Buck, because we saw him using this strategy in other situations in the past as well, like in 405. Eddie’s also so in tune with Buck, he’s clearly the first to get what Buck is trying to do during the golf course call. They’re not married, but they’re married.

So it’s a beautiful and rightful extension of that when Buck turns naturally to Eddie with his displeasure over Bobby’s choice of interim captain, and Eddie of course right away guesses the part that Buck was having trouble vocalizing. Get yourself a partner like that. This is true love and intimacy at its finest. ~~

Holy shit, the absolute mad levels of domesticity in the Buddifer scene! I mean, I’ve said before that 911 somehow keeps making these guys impossibly closer, and this scene is no exception. We’ve seen them having dinners together before. But we’ve not yet seen Eddie and Chris being there while Buck cooks. And I have to say, I love it. Because it’s one thing to invite someone over for a meal you’ve cooked, it’s another to invite them or allow them to be there while you prepare it, that’s inviting them into your mess. Just like in 513, when Buck stepped into Eddie’s mess with him and 518 when Eddie had Buck over to help him clean his mess. And yeah, this time it’s not the emotional mess of a breakdown, it’s the beautiful, daily mess of living, but that in a sense makes it even better? After all, this isn’t Buck letting someone else in on his mess 'coz things are dire and he has to. It’s him choosing to share the behind the scenes of his life with Eddie and Chris, mess and all. This is the most domestic Buddifer scene, when we already had so many amazing domestic scenes with them, and I am this close to proposing to it, because I love it that much! ~~

If that’s not enough, this ep used meals as a theme for different relationships. We have Hen and Athena who are good friends, but nothing more. No underlying romantic tensions. So they were going to enjoy a meal together outside. When Hen didn’t show up, Athena grabbed some food prepared by others and brought it over. Because they ARE good friends and care about each other, and want to catch up, offering each other support. But they’re not life partners or a family unit. They’re not a part of the “behind the scenes” of each other’s life. At the same time, Madney are having a meal at home. So out of the two non-Buddie pairs, the platonic friends and the romantic couple, Buddie are shown to be more similar to the romantic couple (the one that needs to wake up, own their feelings and get together already. The one that will by the end of this ep). Who would have thunk it? ~~

Which brings me to the transitions used in this ep. We have the Buddifer scene transitioning into the Madney one, meaning 911 is choosing to show us these two family units one after the other (in fact, the Madney one is specifically about declaring that they’re still a family even when it might appear like they’re not). Then we have the montage at the end of the ep giving us closure for the characters who have been going through changes. TBH, nothing much happened with Eddie and Chris in this ep that would require them to be a part of this montage. And yet, they are there, and specifically, their short scene is a nod at the Buddifer one (it didn’t have to be. For example, since Eddie talked about Shannon in this ep, we could have had him looking at her old pics, yet that’s not the choice 911 made here), and that transitions to Buck in his apartment, making his choice of not getting a new couch (i.e girlfriend). There are CHOICES, my friends. ~~

Speaking of Madney and Buddie parallels in this ep, can we talk for a second about how Chim told Maddie she didn’t have to keep apologizing, and she agreed they were beyond apologies at this point? Anyone else had flashbacks right away to Buck and Eddie in the infamous kitchen scene in 309? These are both pairs of life partners, where each person is the most significant one in the other’s life emotionally, to the point where they’ll have this kind of exchange, because of how important they are to each other. Are we really supposed to believe only one is destined to be partnered up romantically? Not in this house, good sir. ~~

One more point regarding the Madney / Buddie parallels, this time from the Buckley siblings perspective. Maddie and Buck had a talk in s5 where they admitted that she’s always running and he’s always clinging. In this ep, Maddie got to say she’s done running. And we know that with 518’s break up, Buck was done clinging to Taylor specifically, but in this ep, he was also done clinging to the idea that he HAD to have a girlfriend to be somehow worthy. And, of course, he understood back then that the clinging was tied to settling. So now we know, with his hesitancy about getting a new couch, he’s done settling, too. Maddie got to declare her breakthrough to her romantic partner who she knows is the right person for her, enabling this progress. I can’t wait until Buck can do the same, when he gets to look his own partner in the eyes and, knowing this is the right person, say he’s done settling… ~~

Speaking of that couch, I love Chris roasting one of his dads yet again (like in 312 and 511 when he’s sassy with Eddie or 414 with Buck), but the second he brought the couch into it, well... Buck was actually right, it did come out of left field, so it was evident that the couch would be metaphorical even before Buddie’s discussion of how it’s tied to Buck’s ex girlfriends. When at the end of the ep, he chooses not to buy a new one, and instead he’s moving the armchair around, that’s the moment when he chooses not to cling or settle anymore. The couch is for two people. The armchair is for one. He’s choosing himself. He’s choosing to be happy in his own skin, even if he’s single. I love that for him. But I couldn’t help noticing that we didn’t simply get him choosing the armchair by sitting down in it, looking comfy and happy, nodding in satisfaction. Nope, he also had to move it around a bit. Something he already had could make him really happy, but it had to be moved to its rightful place first. I couldn’t help thinking that this might be a metaphor for how happy Eddie can make Buck, once he takes his rightful place in Buck’s life, both of them finally recognizing they’re truly each other’s life partners, and when considering the feelings behind that, why. ~~

Lastly, it’s just a small note, but I wanna mention, once more, what a good dad Eddie is. He doesn’t purposely lose his game against Chris. It can be so tempting for adults to do that, just like it was a very natural instinct for Eddie to first rush in and wanna help Chris with getting dressed in 204. But Eddie gets that in order to feel truly empowered by his accomplishments, Chris has to try and tackle challenges on his own, without being pampered. No wonder Buck is head over heels in love with this man. ~~

Thank you so much for reading and for any and all support! Thank you also for the great gifs to the beautiful @whosoldherout​, who’s a true gem. You can find more of my Buddie fics and meta, if you’re interested. Thank you again! xoxox

[stagefoureddiediaz]

Mini costume meta

Gonna throw in a very mini costume meta because now I’ve got a proper look at Bucks velvet jacket I am having a lot - and I mean a lot of feelings about it.

For starters this jacket is not maroon - it is burgundy and that is an important distinction. maroon is a more brown toned colour while burgundy is a more red and purple toned colour and they have very different meanings. 

I’m not sure how easily you can see it from these two pictures, but the tee Buck wears when he tells Christopher about Eddie getting shot - in 4x14 - is much more brown toned, while the velvet suit jacket has much more of a purplish tone to it (i’m hoping for better pictures of the suit jacket when the episode actually airs as the screenshots I grabbed are not the best!!)

So Like I’ve said in previous metas, maroon has been used in scenes where a character is taking on some form of parental role - this is something thats been going on since season 1 and its been used on pretty much all the characters. Buck telling Chris about the shooting is the most obvious example, but Eddie in the last episode when Buck went over to the Diaz house was making Christopher's lunch - a parental thing. We’ve also seen Bobby in maroon a fair amount when he’s needed to step into a parental role - think back to Bobby telling Harry he needed to clear the table - that he couldn’t be best buddy Bobby anymore, and needed to be step dad Bobby and so on. 

Maroon is thought to promote comfort and warmth, it is also a colour of strength and maturity - all things associated with parenthood. It is also a colour often associated with drying blood which connects it to the idea of blood ties - which equals family ties.

Then we have burgundy - a colour of sophistication. It’s a powerful colour commonly associated with refinement - stemming from the idea that a Burgundy wine is among the best and most expensive in the world. This association also means Burgundy is associated with wealth - the perfect colour for Buck to be wearing while he’s winning at poker!

The other thing about burgundy though is that it is also associated with lust, passion and desire - it is a colour very much connected with romance and deep love as it is a deep form of red!

Combined with the black of the rest of the outfit, including the black wide peaked satin lapels, which is a colour of elegance, sophistication, power and seduction, as well as the choice of velvet and satin for the blazer - two fabrics considered to be symbols of wealth luxury and sophistication I think it’s safe to say that this outfit is very much an outfit one would chose for a date. Peaked lapels are an interesting choice - they are the most difficult lapel to achieve and are considered the mark of an accomplished tailor - hinting at the idea that Buck has been on a difficult journey, but will achieve success with it. it can also hint at him being accomplished at cards!

Its also worth mentioning that velvet as a word is a slang term for money acquired through gambling 👀👀👀 

Last thing to note is that Eddie is not the only one wearing a new and more blingy watch - Buck is also wearing a new one - we only get a couple of very brief glimpses and I’m hoping we’ll see a bit more of it once the episode airs, but I am very literally screaming over it. (you can see a tiny glimpse in the still below)

Buck has had the same watch since season 1 - no deviations, just the same watch! and now - now we get a new one! Post dying, post coma dream, post Buck going to the Diaz house and sleeping on the couch and post Buck appearing all contemplative and figuring things out at the end of last episode we see Buck in a new watch!!!!

The fact that they both appear to be wearing metal watches means we have the possibility that their watches are going to potentially match up, because metal watches are more showy and confident - they’re less practical (especially if you’re a fire fighter) and are therefore much more about making a statement of some sort. Them both wearing them for the first time at the same time is a choice! Not to mention the fact that while Eddies watch is out and proud - on display for everyone to see, Bucks is mostly hidden - we only get to see a tiny part of it for a moment. The idea that Eddie is confident and essentially putting this new version of himself out there for people to see, while Buck is ‘on the same page’ but still mostly hiding his new self - he’s still uncertain about it etc is a choice - especially as we’ve seen watch theory around Buck expand much more this season than previously! I should also mention the fact that the show very loudly made a big thing about Michael buying David a watch as an engagement gift - rather than a ring - and we don’t see any other (male)  characters wearing metal watches, so for them to choose now to put Eddie in a metal watch as well as possibly Buck is making a very purposeful connection!!

I really can’t wait to see if we’re going to get more of these watches - if we do I’m expecting we’ll only see them connected to Buddie developments and that they’ll revert to their normal watches for other non work scenes (I’m expecting the brown leather strap watch for whatever date(s) Pepa has set Eddie up on!!)!

[everydayyoulovemeless]

Hello! I hope you're well, if you don't mind, could I get some brotherly headcanons for Arcade, Hancock, Fawkes and Gob with an 18 yr old female or gender neutral reader (your choice really for gender)? Perhaps they could help the reader through the early stages of adulthood?

Thank you so much, have a good day/night/evening!

Brother!Arcade, Hancock, Fawkes, and Gob With a Teen!Reader

➼ Word Count » 0.7k ➼ Warnings » None ➼ Genre » Platonic

Arcade gets more and more stressed with every passing day. You're getting older, and he's dreading the day you ask to travel on your own. He's got to let go at some point, sure, but he doesn't think he'll ever get over the fear that you'll be injured, or worse, sold into slavery. The first thing he's going to do is drill medical advice into your head, that way you'll be prepared for just about every occasion. God, it's hot out here. Is he sweating? He just can't seem to get over you becoming independent. As long as you're careful. He wants to go with you but doesn't want to come off as overbearing. You have to do your own thing at some point, autonomy is important and he needs to learn to let go. At the end of his mini freak out, he'll hug you, hand you a bag full of stimpaks, and make you promise to not get involved with anyone who could be considered even slightly dangerous or untrusting.

Hancock is the least responsible compared to the others. He's reckless, violent, and an addict, but that doesn't mean he's hopeless. He gives you tons of freedom for self-discovery. Wanna try jet? Sure, here you are. Wanna learn to shoot a gun? Let him grab Kleo. He'll never be one to prevent you from trying something out. That being said, he'd rather you leave anything more... 'hands-on' to him. You haven't seen the Commonwealth like he has, and he'd prefer to keep it that way. You don't need to see the darker parts of the world. Another benefit of being as close as you are with Hancock is that everyone in Goodneighbor treats you like the little sibling they've never had. Of course, some are resentful (Bobbi), but most will gladly break a few bones if they ever need to. When facing adulthood, Hancock just tells you to stay as free as you can. Pave your own paths and whatnot. Growing up is different for everyone, but you shouldn't let that deter you. Just live as you want, do a bit of community service here and there, and you should be fine.

Fawkes thinks it's admirable that someone so young is surviving out in the waste, however, he'll quickly put an end to you traveling on your own. You're far too young to be facing everything on your own and he is much too willing to fill in for the missing guardian role. He'd be so ready to die for you, shielding you from anything hostile that comes your way. It's rare for someone your age to still be alive and he'd never take that for granted. Anytime he can, he'll ensure you're safe and relatively unharmed. Adulthood's a weird transition, and he'll gladly be there to hold your hand every step of the way so you feel ready and prepared for when you have to face it on your own. You shouldn't be afraid of the unknowns in your life, although, he isn't all too worried you'll have any problems at all. You're strong and quick to adapt, just look at how well you handled leaving the Vault for the first time. If you still feel a bit uncertain, he's always glad to help you through everything.

The first thing Gob would try to teach you is to never get caught up in debt and never to go near Moritarity's. He's so scared that his boss will find a way to trap you into his business like he did to Gob and he'd rather you didn't lose so many years of your life doing something so mundane. Every time Nova tells him she spotted you enter Megaton, he'll quickly leave his post behind the bar and gently tell you to return to the Underworld where it's safe. Carol and Greta will care for you, so go back there, won't you? He feels bad. He wants to travel with you and try to help you navigate your life in the wasteland, but he can't afford to be beaten again, so he opts to try and finish his debt quickly. That way he can be out there with you and make sure you're doing alright. He might be a nervous wreck at the best of times, but he cares for you just as much as he does anyone in his makeshift family.

[lost-inthemeadow]

Somethin' stupid - Daisy Johnson/f!reader (AOS one shot)

Summary: In which Y/N and Daisy are best friends, but they secretly like each other, thinking their counterpart doesn't feel the same way. During Karaoke Night, the rest of the team starts to notice.

Features most of the team.

Word count: 1481.

Karaoke nights were a rare occurrence around the base. They happened only if the team wasn't on an "end of the world" kind of mission, so they all cherished them wholeheartedly.

Tonight was one of those infrequent nights. While Coulson set up his precious karaoke machine, everyone settled down in the common area. Daisy and Y/N were together, as they always were, sitting next to one another on the big couch. The two were inseparable, the best of friends, two pieces of one single being, like Fitz and Simmons.

Hunter arrived, bringing a cooler full of beer, followed by Bobbi, who carried the eight boxes of pizza as if they were filled with feathers. The group cheered when they saw them enter the room, and Fitz ran to Bobbi to take three of the boxes and then started passing the food around.

Y/N grabbed a slice of pizza just as Coulson finished. He rubbed his hands together in satisfaction. "Who's going first?" he asked as he fished a beer from the cooler.

"Y/N!" said everyone in the room with one voice. It wasn't a mystery that Y/N was the best singer of the bunch; after all, singing was what kept her from sleeping on the streets when she was younger, so she loved to do it anytime she had the chance.

She gave her pizza a quick bite and stood up. "Alright," she said, handing her slice to Daisy for safekeeping. Daisy bit into it playfully, and though Y/N protested, the fact that she was laughing just encouraged the brunette to take another bite.

"Do you have anything in mind?" asked Mack. "Because I'd love to suggest a song."

"I do, actually. I think Coulson's going to like this one." Y/N grinned as she took the microphone, looking at him.

Daisy frowned, curious about what her best friend had chosen. She picked at her brain to recall the music Coulson liked, but nothing of the sort was something Y/N would sing on a normal day, let alone Karaoke Night.

"I am?" asked the man.

"I think so. I've heard you play it a few times in your office. It's really different from my usual picks, but I like it," Y/N replied as she searched for the song on the list. "Ah! Got it. Ready?" she asked, clearing her throat before starting.

"Please!" exclaimed Simmons.

Y/N hit play, and the Frank Sinatra song started playing. Sounds of amusement came from around the room. Even Daisy, who knew Y/N so well, was surprised by the song choice.

Coulson's face lit up the moment he heard the first note playing. "You're right, I love it!" he said, smiling widely.

"Told you," Y/N replied.

"This is definitely not your style. Are you turning all old-timey on me?" asked Daisy teasingly.

The song's intro wasn't too long, so it was almost time for her to sing. "Shut up, flower," Y/N managed to reply with a laugh before starting.

Flower. That was the nickname Y/N had given Daisy when she changed her name. Y/N was the only one allowed to call her that, so she used it to her advantage anytime she could.

Y/N closed her eyes and started singing, not needing to read the lyrics on the screen: "I know I stand in line until you think you have the time to spend an evening with me." She let her melodic, beautiful voice fill the common area. It traveled through the air and extended to every corner of the room.

As the sound reached her, Daisy allowed herself to close her eyes as well, taking advantage of the fact that Y/N couldn't see her. She had always liked her friend's voice, but ever since she got her powers, Y/N's singing pierced through her heart like one of Cupid's arrows. Her ability to feel vibrations made it so she could sense it on every bone, every muscle, and every nerve, and she was addicted to how good it felt.

"And if we go someplace to dance, I know that there's a chance you won't be leaving with me." Her tone adjusted to the tune perfectly, making it sound as if it belonged to her. "And afterwards, we drop into a quiet little place and have a drink or two". She opened her eyes and looked at Daisy, knowing that the next part belonged to her and her only. "And then I go and spoil it all by saying something stupid like 'I love you'".

She had lied, of course, when she said that she picked the song because of Coulson. This song said precisely what she felt for Daisy, and if she couldn't say it, she was determined to sing it. It told the story of the dilemma she was going through—how she thought that by expressing her feelings, she would lose Daisy forever and ruin their friendship for good.

Bobbi, who was sitting on the armrest of the smaller couch, elbowed Hunter, having noticed what had just happened. "Did you see that?" she asked him in a loud whisper.

"See what?" he asked with his mouth full of pizza.

"How Y/N looked at Daisy. I think she likes her!"

"That's old news, love," he replied. Y/N had confessed her feelings for her best friend to Hunter not long ago, and despite how out of character it may seem, he had kept her secret until now.

"Wait, you knew about this?" Mack chimed in; he was sitting next to Bobbi on a simple chair. "I always suspected it, but I'm glad I was right. Do we know if the feeling's...you know...mutual?" he asked.

"No idea," Hunter replied.

"I practice every day to find some clever lines to say to make the meaning come through, but then I think I'll wait until the evening gets late and I'm alone with you." Y/N continued, unaware of the conversation going on around her. "The time is right; your perfume fills my head; the stars get red; and, oh, the night's so blue. And then I go and spoil it all by saying somethin' stupid like, 'I love you'"

Daisy couldn't help but look at Y/N as her friend sang the words she so desperately wanted to hear directed at her. They had said "I love you" to each other a million times, but never in the way Daisy so deeply wanted.

The short instrumental interlude interrupted Y/N's singing, which Hunter saw as an opportunity to sneak a little dance with her. He jumped from his seat and chivalrously offered his hand to her. She took it with a giggle, and they both started dancing in circles while the rest of the team cheered.

As her feet moved along with Hunter's, who was the closest she had ever had to a big brother, all she could imagine was what would happen if she had the courage to do this with Daisy.

When it was time for her to sing again, Y/N pushed the man aside to have the imaginary stage for herself. Hunter went back to his seat just in time to hear Simmons, who had caught up to their previous conversation, say to Mack:

"I don't know. I've never seen anything out of the ordinary. Though I do hope she does, they'd be perfect together!"

"I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you." Y/N sang the last stanza, her eyes closing again to focus. Daisy looked at her, lost in how beautiful she looked, and sang the words with her in a whisper, dumbly smiling.

"Look!" exclaimed Jemma.

"Oh, she definitely does," added Bobbi.

"We have to do something about this. We can't let them just silently like each other forever," said Mack.

Everyone in the room clapped after Y/N's performance ended. People asked for another song, but she declined, wanting to give her friends a chance. Coulson stood up from beside Daisy, which is where he was sitting, and took the microphone from Y/N's hands. As she went back to her seat, she found only the crust of her pizza was left—the only part Daisy didn't like.

"Pizza thief," she whispered to the brunette, taking another slice from the pizza box on the coffee table before them.

"Yes," Daisy said proudly, "and you love me for it."

"Oh, I so do," said Y/N sarcastically. But oh, how she actually did.

"Alright," Coulson interrupted their moment, speaking into the mic. "Now that we heard the only person in this whole base who can actually sing, who wants to go next?"

"Daisy!" Mack, Bobbi, Hunter, and Simmons yelled together.

"Me? Why me?" asked Daisy.

"Oh, you'll see," Mack replied. "And please, choose a love song.

[glorious-spoon]

Second-Guessing [9-1-1 | Buck/Eddie | 1/1]

Rating: Teen Wordcount: ~1000 Warnings: None Other Tags: Pre-relationship, Emotional hurt/comfort, Friendship, Episode tag - 6x13 Mixed Feelings

-

“Do you think I’m bad at sex?”

Eddie barks out a startled laugh at his ceiling, then straightens up. This is not, unfortunately, the weirdest way Buck has ever opened a phone call with him, but it’s definitely up there. “What?”

“That call the other day, you know, the lady with the vibrator—”

“Jesus Christ.”

“Eddie,” Buck whines. “This is important!”

“Is it, really?”

“Eighty percent. He said that the article said eighty percent of people report being unsatisfied. Do you know how many women I’ve slept with? Eighty percent of that is, like, a lot. Okay? And I was doing some research—on a first time hookup, did you know that only forty percent of women even have an orgasm at all? So if I do the math on that—”

“Buck.”

Buck lets out a deep sigh that crackles down the phone line. “I’m being an idiot about this, aren’t I?”

“Nah. Well, I mean, kinda. But it’s okay.”

“Is it, though? Like—” there’s a rustle on the other end of the line. It’s easy to imagine Buck right now, flopped out across his bed because the couch his parents bought him is a bona fide torture device. In his sweatpants, probably, his hair still damp from the shower. He lets out another sigh, then says, “You know, Bobby was saying—when I was with Taylor, Bobby said that the problem was that I never talk to my partners, that I don’t know how to communicate, and that’s why my relationships always turn into catastrophes.”

“I don’t think that’s quite what he was saying. And Taylor—”

“I know. You hate her guts.”

Eddie snorts. “I was gonna say that it’s different, in a long term relationship.”

“Right, but. I haven’t historically had a lot of success with those.”

“Relationships don’t work out sometimes. A lot of the time.”

There’s silence for a moment. It’s not just Taylor hanging over the conversation now; Ana is there too. And Shannon.

Sex with Ana was always stilted, awkward in a way that he told himself at the time was just the newness of it all. Just a new person, a new body to learn, just Eddie being rusty when it came to literally any form of physical intimacy. He and Shannon were each other's firsts, so of course neither of them knew what they were doing to start with, and what they learned they learned together. By the end of it, sex was the only part of their relationship that actually worked. Beyond that—

He doesn’t really have a lot of perspective to offer Buck, is the thing. Even setting aside the fact that he’s not sure he can give an objective analysis of the sexual history of the guy he’s in love with.

So there’s that.

“It’s just…” Buck sounds quieter now, almost miserable, and it tugs at Eddie's heartstrings despite the absurdity of this whole conversation. “That was like. The one thing I knew I was good at. You know? Everything else, sure, my life was a mess, I made a lot of dumb choices and messed up a lot of relationships and got myself fired, and—but at least I knew how to, you know, make somebody feel good. Except maybe I didn’t after all. And if I wasn’t even any good at that, then—”

“Buck,” Eddie interrupts again. Gently, this time. He firmly squashes the unhelpful little voice in the back of his head that wants to ask for a hands-on demonstration. Buck sounds freaked out enough that he might actually take Eddie up on it, and Eddie is… really not ready to cope with that possibility. “You’re spiraling.”

Another silence. Then: “I called them. Some of them.”

Good grief. “Your hookups?”

“Yeah—is that a disrespectful way to talk about them? I mean—anyway, yeah. The ones I still have phone numbers for, I called them. Most of them didn’t want to talk to me.”

“Shocking,” Eddie deadpans.

Buck laughs, which is what he was going for. “Shut up.”

“So? What was the verdict?”

He regrets asking the moment the words are out of his mouth, but he doesn't take it back.

“Uh,” Buck says, still laughing a little. “Of the ones I actually got a hold of? Yes, yes, probably, no, who the hell are you, I thought I blocked your number, yes, no, I don't remember, yes.”

“More yeses than nos,” Eddie offers.

“Unless they were lying to make me feel better,” Buck counters triumphantly.

“Buck. If someone called you up out of the blue after years of radio silence to ask if you had an orgasm when you slept together, would you lie about it to spare their feelings?”

Buck is quiet for a minute. “Yeah, okay, that was kind of an insane thing to do, huh.”

“A little. Yeah.”

He can hear the fondness in his own voice and is helpless to mute it. Though he's honestly not really trying that hard. Buck deserves to know that he's loved, even when he's being ridiculous. Maybe especially then.

“I just worry. You know, that all the shit I thought I knew about myself—that maybe it’s not really true after all. And if that’s the case then who the hell am I, anyway?”

“Feels like this maybe isn’t actually about whether or not you’re good in bed,” Eddie offers, and bites his teeth on anything else he could say about that. About finding out that maybe the person you thought you were was just a carefully painted mask over the messy, tender reality underneath. He could offer Buck some truth of his own, but he doesn’t. It doesn’t feel like the right time for it.

That, or he’s a coward. He’s working on it, though.

“Maybe not. I guess. Eddie, I…” Buck trails off.

“What?” Eddie asks, when a few moments of silence have passed.

“Nothing,” Buck says. He laughs quietly; Eddie can conjure up the shape of his smile and the crinkles at the corners of his eyes as easily as breathing. “Just. Thanks for taking my call.”

“Of course. Always.”

For a little while, they just breathe together across the miles between them as night falls gently over Los Angeles. Then Buck says softly, “Come over tomorrow?”

“Yeah,” Eddie says back, just as soft. There’s nothing new about the invitation, but it feels new, somehow, anyway. Either way, the answer is the same as it’s always been. “Yeah, okay.”

[blues-of-randomness]

How I would have done chapter 3

So when Chapter 3 was being teased I was convinced that the smiling critters were going to be split down the middle. 3 of the critters being on Catnap's side "the followers" and 3 on Dogday's side "the Heretics".

Who are the followers?

Catnap, Kickinchicken, Pickypiggy and Bobby bearhug are apart of the follower group. Catnap is the leader given that he was saved by the prototype and started worshipping him first. As for why I think Kickin, Bobby and Picky are part of the follower group olddly enough hearing their voicelines in chapter three only gave me more material to work with for this.

Kickin, Bobby and Picky all have something they are very desperate for in their voicelines, these being the ones that tipped me off the most: Kickin- "Can you come with me? I'm scared." Bobby- "I'm lost without you, I've been lost for a long time...will you take me with you this time?" and Picky - "I'm still hungry..." What is see from the lines in particular are fear, yearning for companionship and insaitable hunger. When Cultists look for people to recruit it's not uncommon for them to scope out people who are desperate and at a low point int here lives. Who better to recruit than a bunch experimented children right?

Kickin was afraid of what could be outside cause he's never been outside before and whose to say that the sceintists didn't scare him with stories of scary monsters that lurk around outside or even in the dark. Bobby is desperate for someone to stay alongside her and never leave, why this is could be a plethera of reasons, she's been hurt by the scientists no doubt about that, perhaps alot of that left her with abandoment issues. Finally, Pickypiggy is pretty straight forward, she wanted food. She was obviously being starved one way or another (wheither this was a punishment from the scientists or the ran out of food after everything went to heck an may have resorted eating pieces of her friends). Kickin wanted to feel safe and secure, Bobby wanted a companion and Picky was desperate for food all attributes Catnap could manipulate in order to get them onto the side of the prototype by promising them what they desired.

Who are the heretics?

Dogday, Craftycorn, Bubba and Hoppy are the heretics, Dogday led the group while other fought or hi in order to stay alive.

Dogday knew the dangers of the prototype and being leader it was hi duty to keep them safe. Further pointed out by Dogday's cardboard cutout saying things like "you can't stay here, you need to leave." while disguising it as a game of fetch which implies that we would run but he would stay behind, possibly baiting whatever monster is hunting them. Bubba's carboard cutout has him being friendly with whatever threat is Infront of you, seemingly trying to reason with them. Bubba has always bee the the for reason and logic, being smart doesn't keep you from being manipulated, yes, but he doesn't seem like the type for fall for any tricks that Catnap or the prototype would've tried to use on him. What Hoppy wants is simple, she wanted to escape and nothing more, she probably would have been turned over to to prototype but I like to think Dogday was able to keep her in place, espically after the hour joy, I canimagine her fighting with herself on weither or not she made the right choice of not following the prototype. Like if she was following us there could be a rare instance where we hear her mumble to herself, saying something like "He said the prototype would save us...but then....why are we still here..?". Crafty was kind of hard to figure out from her dialouge but then I realized that it seems like she's trying to have a sense of normalcy in this crumbling hellhole. For instance she asks us to pass the blue paint but then panics when she's informed that she's out of red paint, insisting that we must be hiding it before attacking us. Crafty stayed with Dogday cause the cult was to different and sary for her, even though it ended up putting her in danger, I imagine if crafty had been somewhere there would be little stickers over the scratch marks signaling her basically trying to put a bandaid on a bullet hole.

This took me so long to type, so have the barebones description, if ya'll really want to eleaborate I'll answer some questions if you have some..

[agathasangel]

in the middle (jen barkley x claire debella x fem!reader NSFW)

warnings: smut, angst, cheating, sexting/dirty picture sharing, mutual masturbation, semi-public sex acts, threesome, legal age gap (reader is 24-25, jen is late 30s and claire is around 40).

I literally thought of this whole plot last night and somehow wrote 2k words of it in one day. Yay brainrot. also this takes place pre-glass onion while claire is running for governor and fairly soon after jen was bobby newport’s campaign manager.

summary: jen is your girlfriend, and you are trying to repair your relationship after her struggle to stay loyal to you. but when jen’s away and her new candidate, claire debella, sees a photo of you and has to have you, they make a plan to share.

“I’ll be honest, (y/n), I’m not exactly a “committed relationship” kind of gal. But I really like you. I want to keep seeing you, just… don’t expect me to be the perfect girlfriend at first. I don’t know if that’s something I’m capable of.”

That was what Jen said to you at the end of your internship on the campaign she was working on at the time. While her political career required her to lie her ass off on a daily basis, she was brutally honest when it came to her personal life. That was something you appreciated about her.

But she was more right than either of you could have imagined. While you were living in the same city, things were fine. But her work often required her to leave, and Jen had a hard time resisting temptation. Your most recent fight happened after she got back from Indiana from a job and she admitted to you that she had cheated on you- yet again- this time with a man who worked for her opponent.

“But it meant nothing! I have no feelings for Chris, you’re the one I actually care about! He- he was just there.”

Of course, she managed to win you back, like she always did. Despite her flaws, you loved her, and you knew she loved you. She worked so hard, courting you, buying you flowers and gifts, helping you study for grad school, and just making you feel special.

But then, of course, she had to leave again.

“Babe, I got another job offer! Claire Debella is running for governor of Connecticut, and she’s being backed by some tech billionaire. I can’t refuse this, I’m gonna make a killing!”

“Does that mean you’ll have to go to Connecticut?”

“It does but- hey, I promise it won’t be like last time, alright? We’ll talk every day, you can visit-“

“Jen, I have school…”

“You can visit on weekends, or breaks. I can pay for your flights. We’ll make this work, okay?”

You agreed, although you didn’t have much of a choice in the matter. You dropped her off at the airport a week later, and she made you another promise.

“Keep your phone on, babe. When I get to the hotel, I’ll send you something extra special.”

And she did. That night you got a photo message captioned “wish you were here ;)”. You opened the photo and it was her, sprawled on her hotel bed, completely naked. God, she was perfect.

You texted her back “I’ll miss that so much”, to which she immediately replied, “send me something back to enjoy tonight! I’m missing u already”

This was not something you and Jen had ever thought to do before, but you complied. You stripped and found a lingerie set Jen had bought you a while back to change into, and started taking photos for her. This became a nightly ritual between the two of you that you kept sacred. You sent her photos of yourself in the various lingerie pieces she kept ordering for you.

“you look even better in that than I thought you would, baby. Let me see from the back”

You sent her another photo of you from the back, bending over and sticking your ass out slightly.

“that’s it, baby. god i wish i was there so i could take you in that position.”

Sometimes Jen would send you audio clips of her moaning as she touched herself to your photos, and you would replay those at night as you imagined you were together, and that she was fucking you.

Jen thought that this would be enough to keep her from giving into her temptations, and truth be told, it was. At least for a while. But that didn’t mean the temptation wasn’t present. This time it was the woman she was working for, Claire Debella herself. It was rare that Jen actually liked one of her candidates, but Claire was smart, had some great ideas, and was gorgeous to boot. The two women would meet daily for coffee in the morning, or drinks at night, and were starting to become actual friends.

The two of them would always start by talking business, campaign strategy, the usual. But they started to venture into talking about their personal lives.

“You dated an intern? And it actually worked out?”

“It did. She was- is- pretty great, and it wasn’t what you’re probably thinking. (Y/n) was the only one there who wasn’t some dumb legacy kid. I had a lot of respect for her, we bonded, one thing led to another and we were sneaking off to the supply closet every day for the rest of the campaign.”

Claire laughed, “I gotta say, Jen, I kinda wish I had a story like that.”

I could give you a story… Jen thought. But she knew better. You were all she wanted, all she needed. She just had to keep reminding herself.

That night you sent her a video of you riding your favorite strap, which Jen of course left at home for your use. For the first time, you weren’t wearing lingerie, you weren’t wearing anything. Jen reveled in the sight of your bare breasts moving up and down. She imagined she was wearing the strap like she usually did, that you were bouncing up and down on her cock, moaning.

“Yes, baby, just like that. You look so pretty riding me baby, just a little more, yes…fuck, good girl… cum for me baby, good girl…”

The next day at work, Jen was conflicted. She couldn’t stop thinking about your video, but she also couldn’t stop thinking about Claire. She wanted you both so much it hurt. She never felt this way before. Jen was used to hooking up no-strings-attached, mostly with men. But you and Claire were different. She walked to her office distracted and in a daze, not having gotten much sleep last night thanks to that video you sent her. Jen felt herself bump into someone, and felt hot coffee spill on her shirt.

Shit. It was Claire. Of course it was Claire.

“I’m so sorry!”

“Are you okay, Jen?”

“Yeah, I just- I didn’t get much sleep last night, that’s all. “

“Okay. Don’t worry about it, I have an extra shirt in my office, I’ll let you borrow it.” Claire led Jen up to her office and took off her coffee-stained blazer that covered her otherwise clean dress. The dress hugged all her curves beautifully and showed off her strong, lean arms.

“Here you go.” Claire, for whatever reason, helped Jen take her shirt off, her gaze lingering for a bit before their eyes met. Jen felt vulnerable, exposed. And what’s more, she was enjoying it. She put the shirt on and quickly made a beeline to her own office, shut the door and turned the lights off. She then unbuttoned her dress pants and put your video on, trying to get the image of Claire’s eyes and body out of her head. And it worked.

That is, until she realized she forgot to lock the door. She heard a voice behind her.

“Jen? Jen?”

“Claire! Um, how much did you see?”

“Just a couple seconds. I was going to ask about my speech, but first, I have to ask, that girl you were watching. Is she your girlfriend?”

“Yeah.”

“God, you’re lucky.” Her eyes darkened as she reached over Jen’s shoulder and pressed play. “Wow, look at her go…”

“You’re not mad?”

“Please. This is nothing. Besides, I can enjoy it myself. If you’ll let me, of course.” Jen breathed a sigh of relief, excited at the possibility that was just presented to her.

“Pull up a chair. Wait until you see all the pretty photos she’s taken for me.” Claire did so, making sure to lock the door behind her so no one could disturb the two of them as they enjoyed you.

“Stunning,” Said Claire, slipping a hand under her dress. “Imagining the two of you together, it’s getting me fucking soaked. You touching her, your girl riding your pretty face-“

“We can make her our girl, Claire. She’ll be into it.”

“Oh, I bet she will be. Such a little slut for us.”

Jen told Claire the plan she came up with to introduce them. Your spring break was coming up, and Jen would buy you a plane ticket to come and visit. The day came, but not as quickly as either of them would like.

Jen picked you up from the airport, just as you had planned. She looked beautiful and put together as always, and you ran into her arms.

“I missed you! I missed you so much Jen!”

“Oh baby, you have no idea. Let’s get back to the hotel and get you all cleaned up, and then I made a dinner reservation. You, me, and Claire Debella.”

“Claire’s coming? I know you two have gotten close during the campaign and I hate to be the jealous girlfriend but should I be worried?”

“Oh, honey, no. She just wants to meet you, that’s all. I think the two of you will really hit it off.”

So you showed up at the restaurant, by Jen’s side, wearing the impossibly short black dress she picked out for you. Claire was already sitting down, and the host led you right to her.

“She’s even prettier in person, Jen. Hi, you must be the famous (y/n). Jen talks about you all the time. I’m Claire Debella, it’s so nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too.”

The woman was definitely your type. Powerful, charming, older. And the three of you did hit it off. You talked about the campaign, your classes, and your worried about Claire and Jen were gone. Claire was incredibly friendly to you. A couple cocktails in and you started thinking about how pretty Claire was, about all the things you, her and Jen could do together…

So you cut yourself off. You couldn’t think about that, not when you’ve spent the past few months chastising your own girlfriend, terrified of her cheating on you. You nervously excused yourself to the bathroom, not noticing Jen motioning for Claire to follow you.

“I’ve been waiting to get you alone.” Said Claire as you left the bathroom stall.

“I’m sorry?”

Claire grabbed you and turned around, pinning you against the sink, slightly bent over so that your short little dress slid up.

“Look at you. I wish you could see yourself when you’re like this. Ever since Jen showed me you, I knew I had to have you.”

“Claire, what if someone comes in?”

“I bet you’d like that, wouldn’t you?” She teased, pulling your skirt up further.

“What cute panties you have on. And what an even cuter little wet spot right there. Just from me bending you over like this, where just anyone can walk in and see.” She ran her fingers between your clothed folds, and you stopped yourself from moaning. It felt so good, but you couldn’t betray your girlfriend.

“Claire, this isn’t right. Jen is my girlfriend, I can’t do that to her-“

You were interrupted by a stall door opening behind you.

“It’s so sweet how loyal you are to me baby,” you heard Jen’s voice say from behind, “but right now I want you to let Claire fuck you. She’s wanted to from the moment I showed you to her. I told you this trip would be different, and it sure was. Don’t you wanna let us make you feel good?” At that moment, Claire slipped her hand into your panties, brushing your clit and you let out a moan.

“Good girl,” Claire praised as she teased your pussy some more, slipping a finger inside you as Jen watched eagerly. But Claire quickly pulled out when she heard footsteps coming towards the door. As much as the idea of getting caught turned her on, she was running for office and couldn’t risk it. You whined a bit at the loss but stood up and pulled your skirt down, locking eyes with your girlfriend, smiling at you proudly.

“Why don’t we get the check and get out of here?”

[lover-of-mine]

Hi, hi, hello, I am here once again to sound absolutely insane while arguing something buddie, this time from Buck's side because I haven't done one on him in a while. I think this is a Buck needs to choose defense, but who knows really ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Okay, I've talked about this before, but Oliver is a really big guy, he's taller than the rest of the cast so we don't see Buck looking up a whole lot. In conversations where Buck would be in a more vulnerable position, they put all of the involved sitting down so they are on the same eye level, when he tells Abby about the catfish guy, when he talks to Maddie after the bombing, when he talks to Maddie after Red dies, when he finds out about Daniel, when he talks to Maddie after the thing with Jonah, when he talks to Bobby after the lightning.

Or they're both standing up, when he talks to Bobby before he quits before the tsunami, when he talks to Bobby after the lawsuit, when he tells Bobby he is one of the most important people in his life, when he tells Eddie about the fight with his parents, when he talks to Bobby after the crane, when he’s helping Eddie fix the walls (as I was typing this I noticed the trend of having him sitting down with Maddie and standing up with Bobby, which makes sense considering how much shorter than Oliver Jennifer is and how Oliver and Peter are just a few inches apart).

Or they have Buck being the only one standing up, or just at a higher level, so that he has the high ground in sense, when he tells the 118 about the thing with Daniel, when he yells at his parents, when he talks to Maddie after he messes up with Red, when he breaks up with Taylor, but it is a trend to not have him look up at people. (All of these have more examples, I just didn't feel like screenshotting every major Buck scene lol)

People he does look up to in vulnerable moments, moments actually end up leading to a fight? Ali and Taylor. He looks up at Ali when she's talking about not understanding what the job means and when he tells Taylor he kissed someone else. So he looks up at his love interests. Before a fight, but still looking up. Ali is the most intense example I could find in my quick skimming of the scenes I could think of, but since Taylor is standing up and he's sitting down, it counts.

This does nothing for my point but I do want to point it out. He looks up at Eddie before the confrontation at the gym lol. Sure that ends with Buck towering over Eddie, but it starts with him looking up at him and fits the trend (or actually starts it? Considering this happens before Ali or Taylor lol).

I could be wrong here, maybe there are other moments where he's looking up and I just can't think of them right now, but Eddie is pretty much the only person he consistently looks up to, when he clears with Bobby for Chris to stay at the station (not about him but he's looking up), the Hildy incident (this one is just funny but it happens), when he tells Eddie it would’ve been better if he had been shot, after Chim leaves to look for Maddie, after he dies. And it's interesting to have those last two scenes because he's going to Eddie for advice and they decided to literally have him look up at Eddie. 

Conversations with Eddie fit all types of categories when it comes to the two of them because they are best friends, just focus on these ones tho (you can read this for thoughts on framing in multiple scenes tho)

"But Anna you've said this before in at least 3 different posts already" I know, I know, and I have a point, I promise. 

I like taking season 6 knowledge and recontextualizing the previous seasons. What does Buck want in season 6? Answers. From the dude at the happiness convention to “I’m the guy with the answers, I kinda like that”. But it’s not crazy to say that Buck has been looking for whatever this answer is his whole life, but the main thing is that Buck keeps looking for answers outside of what he already has, the choice he makes is to look for something else to make things make sense and for someone else to tell him so he can pretend he's not responsible for the consequences. There’s a whole other discussion here and I was talking about this yesterday, but Buck doesn’t really make choices in his life (bisexual king 🫶), he fell into firefighting, he tripped into every relationship he had, he didn’t pick his apartment, he still hasn’t picked a couch. 

Okay, but why does that relate to the whole looking-up thing? I don’t know if this makes sense, but I think in a way he expects Eddie to have the answers in a way that’s a bit, not excessive, but like, bordering on too much? Like, for example, the way he takes what Eddie tells him before the tsunami and runs with it, the whole just move on thing that he is still doing (I’m kinda fascinated about the way that the end of the cemetery conversation gives the same message that Eddie tried to push onto him there and we all know how that ended for Eddie), the whole “somehow we manage to just suck it up, why can’t you?” and “a lot of I’s in there” and “you’re making it about you? again?” that does make Buck act as if having feelings about traumatic events means he’s making it about himself, makes him selfish, that makes him act as if he needs just to push through. He keeps following Eddie’s lead at all times. And I think that is something that needs to be addressed in some way before they can have a relationship. I do think post-lawsuit Eddie is trying, post-therapy Eddie is trying even harder to not lead them wrong or dismiss Buck’s feelings, and if Eddie asked Buck out, chances are he would say yes, but it would leave the question of whether he’s just following Eddie’s lead. Because Buck keeps tripping into relationships. We don't see him ask anyone out, we don't see Buck make the decision. The only way to fight this is to have Buck be the one to march to Eddie and go “I want this, do you want me?” and hope he’s doing the right thing while knowing he is the one who went for it. 

And like, I don’t really think Eddie would ask Buck, not for lack of wanting, but because he runs from fights he’s not sure he can win, dude retreats back to safety like no one else, and taking a leap with Buck is not safe. But, hey, we’re supposed to believe Buck is the one who keeps running into unsafe situations, so sure, have Buck do it. 

And I think the cemetery can be used as a start for that, because Buck keeps trying to get Eddie to tell him what to do, he keeps looking at Eddie and waiting for him to just give him the answers, but Eddie already retreated from the fight, he’s all “whatever you say, bud” so Buck thinks he’s doing something Eddie agrees on, but what Eddie wants is the opposite, the shift in the way Eddie is handling that conversation is really obvious and to have Buck go against it could be used in an interesting way. 

And the cemetery scene itself opposes the whole looking-up thing because Eddie refuses to keep looking at Buck while Buck keeps poking him to get him to look. Buck is all “*tugging on his sleeve* tell me I'm right tell me I'm right tell me I’m right” and Eddie is all “you’re right buddy *narrators voice* he doesn’t think he’s right at all”.

And Eddie is locked out of making changes in the relationship in a sense, because Buck basically told him “this woman is the one” so why would he risk the friendship when Buck has made it clear what he wants? In Eddie's head, it's a fight that's already lost, so why would he jeopardize the part of the relationship he does have for something he thinks is hopeless?

But Buck doesn’t have that, I think right now, the power is in Buck’s hands, Buck needs to realize he has it and Buck needs to make the choice to use it. 

Mr. Human Calculator I Have The Answers Now needs to accept that life has a level of unpredictability and go for it anyway. Start fighting the current he put himself in and getting the things he does wants not the things he thinks he should want.

Random rant about the cemetery if you feel like reading my thoughts on that.

Random post about Buck, water, and the way he just goes with it forever and ever.

Shorter post about why Buck needs to choose.

My tag for metas if you liked my brand of crazy. 🫶🫶🫶

[vicsnook]

Long Story Short | Bob Floyd x Reader

word count: 1018

warnings: arguing, profanity

song pairing: Long Story Short -  Taylor Swift

notes: Hey y’all!! This is pt 3 to Wildest Dreams and Exile but Bob’s version! There will be more parts to this which will be linked under Bob in my masterlist. If you’re Team Jake, in my masterlist you will find Cruel Summer which is pt 3 to this but Jake’s version (will be posted Sunday 😅). Hope y’all enjoy!!! Please if you don’t mind, don’t forget to like and reblog and thank you for the previous ones!!! 🫶🏼

Fatefully

I tried to pick my battles 'til the battle picked me

It was now Thursday. 3 days since the fight between Bob and Jake and since you told Nat everything. Everyone at work initially tried to find out what happened but when they realized none of you were going to say anything they quit asking. All of the bruises were now turning yellow but yours were hidden under what felt like a pound of concealer.

Maverick had pulled Bob and Jake aside to ask if there was anything he should know but neither men told him anything. You assumed the concealer was working since he never asked you. Everyone continued the exercises without a hitch. The only noticeable difference was that you always headed off home instantly after the squad was dismissed.

Misery

Like the war of words I shouted in my sleep

The past few nights you’d woken up screaming. In your nightmares, you couldn't stop the fight and one of the boys always got seriously hurt. It was the same nightmare each night but with a different guy being left in the hospital each time. Bob had called each day since the fight and asked how you were, never pressuring you to talk and apologizing endlessly. Jake on the other hand was radio silent.

And you passed right by

I was in the alley, surrounded on all sides

After you were done with your exercises that morning you headed for the vending machines in the conference room. Regretting it immediately as you shut the door and came face to face with Jake. 

“Hey” you whispered as he stood in front of you. His eyes were cold, sending a shiver down your spine. “Excuse me,  I have somewhere to be.” he replied and reached for the door handle behind you but the door handle didn’t turn.

And I fell from the pedestal

Right down the rabbit hole

Long story short, it was a bad time

“It’s fucking stuck, of course.” He sighed as he let go of the handle. You turned around to try it and confirmed it was indeed stuck. Most doors at the Academy tended to get stuck due to being so old. “Can we talk?” you asked as you sat on the table across from him. “Well, I don’t think I have much of a choice.” He replied sarcastically.

“Please don’t be like that,” you retorted and he chuckled sarcastically in response.  

“What do you want from me, Peach?” 

“I just want to fix things or try to.” 

 “Look, I’ll fix it for you. It was just sex. I don’t care what you do, we’re just teammates.” He said, the Hangman persona clearly at play which you knew he resorted to in difficult conversations.

“Teammates? I thought we were at least friends. Was it really just sex for you?” You asked, afraid you knew the answer because Hangman didn’t care about your feelings even if Jake did.

“Friends? No, I just wanted to fuck you, Peach.” He answered coldly. The tears starting to pool  in your eyes. 

“What?” You asked, trying to get past Hangman and to Jake.

“Oh Peach,  I bet Mickey that I could sleep with you before the summer was over.” 

“No, you didn’t.”

“Oh darlin’ I sure did. Ask him.” His smug look told you he knew you wouldn’t ask because then you’d have to tell Mickey why you wanted to know. 

“Why did you stick around so long? Why did you keep coming back until Bob showed up then? If it was just a bet?” you asked, beginning to stand up from the chair and heading for the door.

“Well honey, to put it simply, I was just bored. I was always going to leave but Bobby here gave me the perfect out. Why’d you think I haven’t answered your calls? 

You turned away from him and pushed on the door as you turned the handle. Still stuck. But as you pushed again it opened causing you to lose your balance and land on the floor.

“Peach?” asked Bob who’d been walking down the hall. He extended his hand and helped you up as Hangman walked past you both. You thanked him and turned to walk off but he grabbed your wrist.

“What’s wrong?” His blue eyes scanning your tear stained face. “Not here.” You murmured quietly, leading him outside to your car. 

—

Pushed from the precipice

Clung to the nearest lips

Long story short, it was the wrong guy

You had explained everything to Bob as you drove towards the beach. He listened quietly but you noticed his jaw tense when you told him about you and Jake. His fists balling up when you finished off with what Jake had just said in the conference room. 

As you both sat down in the sand he reached over and caressed your cheek but stopped quickly as you winced. “Sorry, I forgot about the bruise” he mumbled as you shook your head and gave him a small smile.

“I want to tell you something.” He said, breaking the silence and then he explained that Cobra kissed him the night after you and him broke up. It never went further than a few kisses but he felt you should know.

“Don’t beat yourself up about Hangman. I was out of line. You had all the right to do whatever you wanted.” He said as you looked ahead at the ocean.

“I shouldn’t have and I don’t want you to think I’m coming back to you just because of what he said either.” 

No more keepin' score now

I just keep you warm (keep you warm)

And my waves meet your shore

Ever and evermore

“I know. I want you to take your time. Let’s be friends first and we’ll see what happens later.”

“I’d like that,” you responded as you placed your head on his shoulder and closed your eyes. Listening to the waves as you did once before with him when he told you he was being deployed. 

Long story short, it was a bad time

Long story short, I survived

taglist: @harperdoodle , @weirdothatwritess

click here for the next part!

[angelsdean]

wanna preface this by saying if my tone comes across as biting, i did not mean that! especially not to you! i feel ok sending this in bc i agree with your takes on s8/9

anyway lol! maybe a spicy take but…

if we’re blaming dean for kevin’s death, then we’ve gotta blame sam for charlie’s and benny’s, cas for mary and jo and ellen and anna and bobby and sam (s5) and honestly i love you cas but i could probably go on :/

but seriously, i don’t actually *blame* them for these deaths bc while dean/sam/cas’s actions helped create the situations that got each character dead, their actual deaths were on other characters’ choices or even their own (sam, benny). the blame game is just too simple for how complicated spn is. like if you blamed them for every death that occurred after a sequence of events that included their actions, for every death that they were indirectly involved with, it’d just be impossible to count. and that’s just not productive or fair imo yk 🤷‍♀️

yea i definitely get what you're saying. there are a lot of factors playing into things, and chain reaction domino effects that lead from one character making a decision to another character way down the line killing someone. that doesn't necessarily mean the first character is responsible for the death or should be the one that is blamed for it. they couldn't have foreseen how events would transpire. however, i do think, like you said, these situations are more complicated and nuanced. and in some scenarios the "blamed" character did play more of a part in the death of another character. but i don't think in the case of kevin's death dean should be shouldering the blame or responsibility here at all.

like, the stuff with blaming dean for kevin's death feels unfair imo because well, when dean made the choice to let gadreel try to save sam (and sam still !! had to say yes himself!) dean didn't have all the facts. he thought gadreel was ezekiel. he thought this was a friend of cas's that he could trust. he didn't know he was opening the door to someone with ulterior motives, who might try to hurt people he cared about. and secondly, kevin's death was coming, one way or another, because as @aliveboydean says in this post, metatron wanted him dead and wasn't going to stop until he was. so if gadreel hadn't gotten him, metatron very likely would have killed him.

to address another seemingly similar situation where i come away feeling differently: sam and charlie. i have to say i kinda do "blame" sam for charlie's death, because he roped charlie back in. she really would not have been there or been in that situation or been a target for the Stynes had sam not specifically invited her to come help them. and while it seems like charlie and kevin's deaths are comparable, a key distinguishing factor is that one would have been safe had they not been in that specific situation that another character (sam) put them in, while the other always was in danger simply for being who they were. charlie's death is different from kevin's because kevin was always in the line of fire, always had a target on his back by simply being a prophet. so many people wanted to kill him, he wasn't uniquely in danger being around the winchesters. and he wasn't put IN danger solely because of dean's actions. he was always in danger, the whole time. no matter where in the world kevin was, people were going to be out to get him. and i'd argue he was safer in the bunker (and therefore around sam and dean) than anywhere else in the world. dean had no way of knowing gadreel would kill kevin! but charlie was just a regular person who no one cared about killing. if she hadn't been brought in at that time and made a target for the stynes she...most definitely would still be alive.

SO, i think at the very least dean is definitely allowed to blame sam in-world and be pissed at him. (tho sam is obvs still not the one that killed her. but i can understand if dean felt resentment toward him for her death). but. yea i kinda do see sam as more responsible for charlie's death in this case than dean with kevin's because the scenarios and key factors are different. that's what i feel a lot of people don't get when they want to issue blanket statements of who to blame for what and who did worse. there's nuance! and two seemingly similar situations are not always a 1:1 comparison. (this isn't directed at you, just a general sentiment abt fandom)

(and i think a similar situation for cas is mary's death. and i fall somewhere in the middle for him. he knew jack was dangerous at the time. he should've said something. he's still not the one who killed mary though and he couldn't have predicted that outcome)

[gowns]

I’m expecting a baby boy and tbh have never given any thought to what it would be like to be the mother of a boy (having spent a LOT of time thinking about raising a girl in contrast to how I was raised). As someone who has good observations of both little kid society and of gender, what have you observed about little boy kids today?

my general observation is that even in this liberal area where many parents do an attempt* at gender neutrality, the girls and the boys end up cliqueing up according to gender and behavior. by this i mean: the majority of the boys only want to play with other boys, and play rough, roughhouse, do games where they "hunt" each other, play bad guys vs good guys, etc. the girls only want to socialize with other girls, and they do pretend games (either domestic or "fantasy" inspired like fairies and unicorns and princesses, although already at the age of 6 they're moving more into girl power superheroes), or sometimes just straight up circling up and gabbing with each other.

*i do think that since most of these parents are like, liberal liberal, the attempts are quite half-hearted.

i remember it being kind of like that when i was a kid too, except i didn't like either way of playing, and i would usually be off by myself doing my own little thing. when i got older i was kind of a "social butterfly," in that i liked flitting around between groups and had a lot of guy friends and a lot of girl friends, none of them terribly close, but a lot i could reliably "hang out" with and pass the time. i got along best with people who i could joke with or make smart references with.

as an adult i basically do the same thing tbh. i'm always just vibing doing whatever. the difference is i have more choices in who i can contact and spend more time with, and my closest friends are just as weird / gay / leftist / bookish / funny as i am. i find myself alienated by a lot of people, but they're also very very interesting to me, as case studies.

so in other words -- i do feel that there will be inevitably cliques that form around parroting gendered behaviors, but it's not inevitable that your kid will be constrained by that!

--

ANYway. as to what it's like to have a son. i really wouldn't know, personally! i have friends who have boys and it seems like everything will be all right as long as you're kind and gentle and model that for them. let them wear whatever colors they want and teach them how to stick up for themselves and others. then you'll already be miles ahead of the standard boy-parent.

we always said that if we had a boy it would be a bobby hill kind of kid. you know? we are goofy people, so we were always destined to have goofy kids. my kids are very into pink and princesses and fairies (i am actually sitting in their all-pink bedroom writing this), but more than that, they are good at critical thinking, they love to read, they are compassionate and funny and friendly and like to say and do things that weird me out. like showing me chewed up food or turning their eyelids inside out or making monster sounds. that's all good.

it's more important that we allow them to be weird little humans than anything else. and all kids are naturally weird. every human is! just don't let them experience shame about it.

be kooky and your kid will be kooky, trust me on that. and teach them to question everything. they'll inevitably be shaped by social pressures one way or another, but you can help them keep the flame of their individuality alive.

[twc-thoughts-you-didnt-ask-for]

My thoughts on TWC Book 3… SPOILER WARNING

I’m going to do this in the order I played them… Please note I have not done a run through of if you did not enter a relationship with N or F in Book 2 yet and I have not done LT. This is also just not a comprehensive list because there’s lots of options and so little time.

M’s route is literally perfection in Book 3 I can’t think of any beef I have with it like at all and I’m beyond pleased with it. I will be inconsolable until Book 4.

F’s route was also pretty good but there were some things that really shocked me. Out of all the routes, I figured F would be the one that had the “L” word first but it was no where in sight. This route is the one that feels best and most natural for it to happen in and… nothing. I also don’t care for how… swept under the rug entering a physical relationship felt? In Book 2, being physical with M had the level of importance to it that felt okay but this was just not that way. For the most part though I’m happy here.

N’s route… I’m not sure what happened here. It feels wrong and like I don’t know this character anymore or that the answers I know of N have changed. I expected them to be the second love confession… certainly not the first. It also strikes me as odd that we can confess to N and it really just be… not disregarded but looked over shortly after rather than be reciprocated in the moment. It would have been more natural maybe at the end where it was a mutual thing? I don’t know I just didn’t care for that but you could also just not say it I suppose too. Like F’s route I also didn’t care for how it went about entering a physical relationship with N and how… casual it was which goes against like everything N stands for at least the first time. The level of importance there is like if N and the detective had been boinking since Book 1. And N disregarding the argument between them and the detective (if the detective got hurt and was upset by N’s behavior) was really out of character. Even when you choose the option to not be near them because you’re still upset the game acts the exact same as if you chose another answer. That being said, I was really happy to see N’s anger and stuff regarding the detective and them getting upset with the detective’s disregard for themselves. I also wish the game would decide if N is going to be fully honest about the past or not. I was expecting 100% or 0% it just felt wrong to only get some and move on. I was also shocked about N thinking about the detective turning like at all because the answers we’ve been given has been so adamant that’s not something they want to have happen or to think about. I don’t know, it’s not that I didn’t enjoy some of N’s route but it was definitely like “who is this character and what did they do with N” for me and I’m not sure if I’m alone in that.

A’s route was also pretty good and shocked me in good ways. I don’t have much to say on this one because it felt pretty natural and expected. I was shocked that the kiss can happen at the end and that A would allow themselves to have it just once. The breakdown immediately after and especially the tears had me like :o I also really loved the detective bestie dynamic here when it comes to A hurting themselves and the detective. And for them to take a shot to the colleague question in front of everyone? Some really tasty stuff.

Non-route related thoughts…. I’m not happy about the detective joining the agency. It feels wrong and like what’s the point of being in Wayhaven if you’re not the detective and just an agent and can go anywhere. I really don’t understand that choice especially so early on in the series. I also don’t know where the Bobby/Douglas storyline with go from here. There was just a lot of confusing decisions for the detectives personal life and career. Idk maybe with time I’ll understand more. EDIT: Also for M I suppose it makes sense… but less can be more with the sex scenes. It was really heavy-handed for F/N I feel and out of place. And the blood drive plot point was so unnecessary and took up too much for something that amounted to a non issue in the end. I would have loved less or none of that and more of the auction or literally anything else. Also the auction was weird because there was so much stressed on going alone and not having UB as backup… but UB was there anyways????? I don’t like Rebecca so I didn’t team up with her so I’m not sure what difference that makes.