#spray our dreams on any surface where the paint will stick

[dalygrace]

🔆 + [post] college au featuring @catherinedaly @evcravens @katarinadvpont

“Grace! Mamma wants a picture to make sure I got here okay and didn’t die en route!”

Catherine’s voice floats from the living room into the kitchen where Grace has her head in the fridge, looking for the bottles of wine Katarina had put in there to chill. She grabs the first one she sees (Kat can come back and get a different bottle herself if she wanted something specific, she thinks, swiping the corkscrew from the counter) before sweeping into the living room and depositing herself onto the couch beside her younger sister. Catia’s face is flushed from the two glasses of wine she’s already consumed, and Grace laughs as she fumbles with her phone for a moment before finally taking a selfie. Grace knows she’ll likely get a scolding voicemail from Simona before the night is out for the wine in her hands and Catia’s clearly buzzed state, but she’s happy, so she doesn’t care.

“Are you going to open that or just let it get warm in your hands?” Mikael asks, slouched in the armchair opposite her, and Grace laughs again, deftly uncorking the bottle and pouring him a glass. “For you, m’sieur,” she says in her snootiest sommelier voice, the one she’d perfected  those long nights in college when they used to mix something awful for each other and have a guess at what was in it, an exercise in masochism on both their parts that left them more often than not hating themselves the morning after. They’d grown since then, matured to real cocktails and wine that came in bottles instead of boxes (Thank god, Everett had exclaimed at the sight of real Italian wine, last year when they’d all gathered to christen Mikael’s new apartment in Jersey), and Grace’s liver thanked her for it.

“It’s Italian,” she says before Everett can ask, pouring three more glasses and pushing them across the table to their intended recipients. “Kat put aside her homeland snobbery just for you tonight, so we can indulge in your homeland snobbery to celebrate you finally deigning to grace us with your presence.” Mikael roars with laughter as Kat and Ev make twin faces of affront and Catia sneaks Grace’s glass off the table, taking a big sip before Grace can snatch it back. “That’s the last glass for you, drunky,” Grace says fondly, “You’ve gotta be with it when Papa comes to pick you up later or else Mamma will start thinking Kat and Everett are bad influences.”

The two in question pull faces again, and Grace settles back onto the couch with her new glass of wine, smile so wide it hurts her cheeks. 

She loves nights like this, family and friends gathered in the living room, when the house is full of laughter and conversation. The brownstone she shares with Katarina is warm and spacious, always kept tidy (Grace) and packed with art and photographs of their mutual friends (Katarina). They have a spare bedroom that they use to house the rotating cast of characters that come through New York, because despite only being in their mid-twenties, having a six figure salary (Grace) and coming from a long line of successful stock brokers (Katarina) means they can afford to live somewhere that isn’t a shoebox, exorbitant rent be damned. Its most common occupant is Mikael, despite the fact that he lives only a short train ride away, because he always whines about how annoying New Jersey Transit is and how cold it gets in the winter. Grace, who grew up in the City, thinks he’s full of shit; then again, he’d spent his whole life in Southern California before moving east after college, so she supposes he gets a free pass for the first few years of real winter.

Sometimes she wonders how they all ended up like this, living in each other’s pockets. Everett and Katarina had met first at an orientation for international students; then Mikael had crashed in, a fortuitous roommate pairing; Lillian came next, trailing in Katarina’s wake, and the four of them became MikandEvandKatandLil easily in the first months of freshman year. Grace, down the hall in Reiber and two rows back in econ classes, was an outsider to the fearsome four, too snarky to fit right in, raising hackles with her quick anger and the drinks she kept accidentally spilling on Everett. Ironic that that’s what brought them together in the end, she thinks, sleepy and warm, before excusing herself from the room.

It’s strange, she thinks, basking in the glow of their laughter as it follows her down the hall to the bathroom, that they all stayed together, relatively speaking. Lillian was off being beautiful somewhere in Europe (she’s in Paris, Grace knows, but she still instinctively pushes down the knowledge of the kind woman with whom she never quite clicked, a sequelae of having pushed down for years the frustration over whether she wants to kiss her or be her, a crisis she’s become more comfortable with since it first started in sophomore year) but she visits as often as she can; Everett was still in Boston, a godsend for Grace’s mother’s nerves as Catia settled into her first year at Tufts (Simona can’t quite handle being an empty nester - it doesn’t matter that Grace lives an easy ride away on the NQR, with Regina fucked off to Montreal for most of the year and Catia in Boston now, Simona is struggling to adjust to not having them all at family meals again like they had been once Grace came back from UCLA), but he too made the pilgrimage to New York with some regularity. Mikael was practically a third housemate. They’d muddled through important years together, through good ideas (vandalizing USC and using an unassuming Everett as the getaway driver) and bad (Grace’s brief affair with Rafaella, a beautiful but flighty exchange student; Mikael’s everything with Lucrezia, a Kappa a year younger than them all who’d moved back to Chicago after her graduation and summarily dumped Mikael over text when she was introduced to a player for the Cubs). Something expands in Grace’s chest as she looks at herself in the mirror, bright and warm and painful in the best way, and she has to sit for a moment on the tub to catch her breath. She leans against the wall, tired and overwhelmed by all the love she holds, and she doesn’t notice the minutes slipping away until the door opens with a quiet click.

To Everett’s credit, he doesn’t startle when he sees Grace, only makes an appraising noise and moves to the sink. Grace, head fuzzy with wine and sleep, does at the sight of him, and smacks her head hard against the tub. She groans, long and low, and Everett laughs at her, the bastard, before stripping off his shirt. “Not that I’m not enjoying the free show,” Grace says with a joking leer, “but why are you rinsing your shirt off?”

“Catia spilled her wine on me,” Everett says evenly, running the bottom of his shirt under the tap. “Must be genetic,” Grace mutters, and he laughs again. 

“I still don’t believe all those times were accidents,” he says, wringing out the shirt as best he can. “I’ve never seen you be clumsy around anyone else.”

“They really were,” she whines, clambering out of the tub to perch on the edge. “It’s not like I was purposefully trying to ruin the godawful number of polos you owned.”

“Really? All of them?” He turns from where he’s hanging his shirt on the towel rack to raise an eyebrow at her pointedly. “Even when an entire bucket of punch somehow went from your hands onto Castora and I all through the second story window senior year?”

“And she never forgave me,” Grace says solemly, and Everett only shakes his head with a bemused smile.

“We thought you all went to sleep without telling us.”

It takes her a moment to process the change in topic, but her mouth has always been quick on the draw, ready to spout nonsense until her brain catches up. “I only disappear mysteriously from parties that I am not hosting,” she says, “and this is, regrettably, my house.” She yawns, listing forward from the rim of the tub with enough force to alarm Everett, who easily catches her and pulls her to her feet.  “That begs another question,” he starts, bemused, “of why you’re in the bathtub and not, say, your room, where there’s a real bed?”

“Going to bed while you still have people ‘round is admitting defeat,” Grace says haughtily, though the effect is somewhat ruined when she almost trips going out the door on the hallway runner. She rights herself before Everett can steady her and flashes him a placating smile as she turns pointedly back towards the living room, where the rise and fall of Kat’s voice and Mikael’s laughter can be heard over the humming of whatever music Catherine’s put on the stereo. She’s only made it a few steps before Everett is in front of her, turning her around and shooing her back towards the stairs. “I just found you half-asleep in the bathtub,” he says pointedly, boxing her in as she tries halfheartedly to push past him. “And most of us are sleeping here anyway, so it’s not like you need to make sure we all leave without stealing your things.” She gives in with a frown, too tired to argue, overwhelmed by the nearness of him, the warmth he radiates, the sudden urge she has to latch on and not let go.

“Why do you do that?” He asks as he corrals her up the stairs, interrupting the low grumbling she’s kept up all the way down the hall. “What?” She replies brilliantly, caught up in her false irritation and the effort it takes to not trip up the stairs. “Sleep in the tub,” he continues, to which she stops on the top step and shrugs, full body. “Dunno,” she replies, truly uncertain of where that particular quirk came from but now painfully aware that this is not the first time that Everett has come across her asleep in a tub. Once is an anomaly, twice is a pattern.... She can’t quite figure the rest of the thought and instead flings herself onto her bed, loose-limbed and nearly asleep by the time she’s horizontal.

She looks up to see Everett leaning against the side of the doorframe, soft smile playing over his lips. She smiles in return, warm and open and real, and pats the bed beside her. “C’mere,” she says, rolling over to make space for him beside her. Grace closes her eyes as he closes the door, and she feels rather than sees him settle onto the edge of the bed, perched as if he wants to take up as little space as possible. She cracks her eyes open to level him with a withering look. “It’s okay, Mr. Chivalry. Let your hair down. Relax, take off your shoes and dive in, the water’s fine,” she quips stupidly, too tired and buzzed to filter herself. She’s suddenly aware as she rambles that this is the first time he’s seen her room since their freshman year at UCLA, all three thousand miles and seven years away from where they sit now. He’s been to her house before - to her apartment on Levering after their tentative friendship blossomed into something real; once, notably, to her parent’s Upper East Side apartment the summer after their graduation where he’d charmed her father with his talk of his Harvard MBA courseload and her mother and sisters with his insistence on making dinner to repay them for allowing him to crash on their fancy and entirely uncomfortable couch for a night - but never in those times did he come close to entering her room, a strange and sacred space. He never visited her in the shoebox of a studio she kept for the hell of it in Alphabet City that first year, too busy in Boston to do more than catch the Amtrak up for a weekend once or twice every few months. Grace, who had been pulling hellish hours in the office to prove to herself as much as her superiors that she was worthy of a promotion so soon into the job, saw him for an hour at most when he did make it up, safely tucked away in the dark corners of pubs that Katarina and Mikael kept locating in various parts of the city.

It is strangely intimate now, having him in her space, seeing the emptiness of the pale blue walls, the way each thing had its place and no mess was allowed to exist. This was where her fastidiousness for work was echoed in her personality; there was no room for her trademark wildness here.

“Just lie down,” she says finally, after they’ve sat a moment too long in a silence that’s toeing the line of discomfort. “Or walk down two flights of stairs to the guest bedroom, I don’t care.” With a shrug, she flops onto her back, closing her eyes again. She hears him type something (obvious by the quiet click of his iPhone keyboard because he has his ringer on, the maniac) and set his phone down on the bedside table, feels him settle beside her a moment later. She waits a beat before reaching out to tangle her fingers in his.

“Grazie per aver guidato Catia qui e prendersi cura di lei a Boston,” she mumbles sleepily, feeling him tense lightly at the language change. She likes that he forgets sometimes that she grew up speaking Italian around the house, likes that she can still surprise him by volleying his native tongue back at him. She saves it for moments like these, just the two of them, but tonight it feels different and the aching love in her chest feels different too. Tonight Italian feels like the hushed French she can hear from Katarina’s room every night when she talks to Lillian, devotion bridging the hours and miles that separate them. Tonight, sono contento che tu sia mio amico feels a little like I love you. Everett’s hand in hers is warm.

“È facile. Non c'è niente di cui ringraziarmi. So quanto eri eccitato di vederla.” The bright thing expands in her chest again.

“Sono felice di vederti anche io,” she mumbles.

“Lo so,” he says, smile evident in his voice, and he gives her hand a little squeeze. Grace grins stupidly at the ceiling, warm with pleasure and the gentle weight of Everett beside her, and falls asleep.

[laughingmango]

1234w, no archive warnings apply, Teens and up Cabanela/Jowd Final Fantasy X AU, Sending

Trick of Treat gift for @siverwrites in lieu of a truckload of heart emojis 💖 a bit streamlined from our vague talks of FFX AU...

It's a tale as old as sin: there is a summoner, whose sacrificial journey will end in death no matter whether in success or in defeat, and there is a guardian, who would just rather have him back. These are the roles set out for them. It is up to Jowd to dance for the dead and he leaves a little bit too much of himself behind; it is up to Cabanela to put his foot down and have absolutely none of that.

It's the second-to-last step to the shore when Jowd - Lord Jowd now, a title that fits well on his broad shoulders but still rolls uncomfortably off the tongue - falters and loses his summoner's grip on the surface of the water. The spell is broken, his feet slip and fall through the waves, pushing him off balance, and Jowd accepts that the sacred ceremony will end with the newly anointed Lord Summoner biting a faceful of sand. He is too tired to fight against this notion, to find his footing and face the townsfolk gathered by the shore with any semblance of dignity. With the single-mindedness that comes with exhaustion, in that moment all his focus, all that matters to him is that his audience, at least, should find it funny. It says in the job description that summoners are to bring smiles to the people of Spira; the rules are not too clear as to how not to do so, and so Jowd is ready to call the day a success.

He does not fall.

He cannot fall. Cabanela has been following his summoner's little improvised choreography on the water's surface, the part of the ritual that took place in the material world, swift footwork and tense muscles keeping a precarious balance above the waves as Jowd's spirit, unseen, communed with the dead and eased their regrets. Tapping his foot to the rhythm of the villagers' chanting and humming its foreign tune, loudly enough to garner a few sideward glances, hasn't taken Cabanela's attention off the main deal. By the time Jowd's absolute concentration breaks, his breath has already been getting short and irregular, and cold sweat has joined the water spray pooling in his brow. On cue, Cabanela hops on the beach, into the cold water, and in one fluid movement he is planting his feet on the sandbed and propping up Jowd with an arm under his shoulder.

They almost fall, alright. But they don't, and that's what matters. Jowd must have known deep down that his guardian was coming, he recognizes him and drops his staff into the sea to wrap his hand around Cabanela's shoulder. They are a team. Balancing their unstable footing, Cabanela manages to pivot them both out of the water's edge and onto the soft sand, where they drop like actors as curtain close. He raises one arm to wave at the small crowd to disperse, trusting the temple monks to handle the rabble and carry out the formalities. Can't they see that the lord summoner is inconvenienced? Lord Jowd shall meet with them all later, or better yet, tomorrow. His guardian is feeling just fine, thanks for askin', he's fine where he is. Just leave them alone.

"Eeexit stage left, we said in Zanarkand..."

"You said... a lot of things in that Zanarkand of yours," says Jowd, still struggling to catch his breath. He has been staring at the darkening sky as the sand grows colder under their backs. The beach has emptied and the waves have long since carried his staff back next to their side. "And I'm still not convinced that's not a royal we."

Cabanela is lying down next to him, stretched on his side like a cat. He finds his summoner more interesting than the first stars above. "Maybe it is, baby," he teases. "Maybe it iiis."

"What? Are you pulling my leg? I have to warn you, it's quite heavy."

"I pulled all of you out of the water earlier, you know."

"I know." A quick smile grows under his beard, fond, thankful, always guarded. "How'd I do?"

"A whole, total, unmitigated disaster. All across the board… Whateeever shall we do with you, baby?"

"You tell me. I'll play along."

As he speaks, Jowd decides that he is tired of staying still and makes an effort to sit up, leaving a trail of drenched robes behind him that give him the looks of a stranded jellyfish. If he leaves on his pilgrimage, and he can see within him that the day looms ever nearer, he swears to himself that he will do away with Yevon's ceremonial robes, fit only for priests and scriveners.

He turns to his side and offers his hand to Cabanela, helping him to sit up as well. Cabanela being Cabanela, he sees a hand and takes the entire arm, clinging to his biceps with candid enthusiasm and taking the liberty to use that momentum to roll into Jowd's lap altogether. An armful of his lanky guardian was not what Jowd had in mind, but he prides himself on being an adaptable fellow and scoops him up properly, keeping him close, breathing in how real and alive his companion is. They are both going along with an unwritten script, uncertain of where it should end, not really wanting it to. Jowd needs this warmth, he realizes, caressing Cabanela's back under the strange fabric of his clothes. He left so much of himself in the still, dark waters of the spirit where the dead could feel him. His guardian makes sure he can find his way back, for now. For example, now he is nuzzling in his beard in a way that keeps teasing the possibility of a neck kiss but doesn't give him the satisfaction. That's got a way of making a man feel alive.

"I'm still waiting for that verdict, Cabanela." Much as he loathes to distract the man.

"Oh, thaaat…" Cabanela lets out a breath he didn't realize he was holding and rests the back of his head against Jowd's shoulder, leaning against him with abandon. He waves his hand dismissively. "That was no dance, baby. That was an atrocity toward mankind."

"I'm supposed to help the dead let go," Jowd points out. If he had a whole feeling left it'd be offended. "If they danced with  you  they'd want to stick around."

"Who's to say they shooouldn't? Anyhoot, it'd be better than losin' you to them, like you almost did today. You really feel the pull of every cliff you could pooossibly throw yourself off of, don't you? What's so interesting in this Farplane of yours that you can't look away?"

They both know the answer. No need to ruin it by saying it out loud. Jowd shrugs.

"...Fine. Can you help with the dancing?"

"I can help with anything."

There is no arguing with that reply, it's set in stone, like so much of the hodgepodge of beliefs and unshakable will that make up this strange man (Jowd is reminded of a fayth, carved and painted but bubbling with so much more under the surface. Offer it your dream and soar). There is also no arguing with the way Cabanela slides back on the sand, hops up and reaches down to cup Jowd's face, pressing his forehead against his. Jowd can lean into this touch, feel alive, and hopeful, in the doomed way of summoners, at least. If he were to dance again now, the pull back toward the living would be stronger. For the first time, it feels like the road could continue past Guadosalam and toward Zanarkand, a Zanarkand, and at this point either city would suit him just as well.

"I don't wanna lose you, baby."

Cabanela throws him a dry blanket. The temple looms over them; dinner awaits, and a warm bed with it.

"I know."

For today, it's enough.

[alltheworldsinmyhead]

OUR FUTURE WILL BE A BRIGHT ONE: CHAPTER NINE                                                              (finale)

                       eremika soulmates through time modern au

                                     (previous chapters/ff.net/ao3)

IKIGAI

JAPANESE; "A REASON FOR BEING", ‘A THING THAT YOU LIVE FOR”  – THE THING THAT GETS YOU OUT OF BED EACH MORNING

 I think we deserve

 a soft epilogue, my love.

 We are good people

 and we’ve suffered enough.

 SEVENTY YEARS OF SLEEP # 4. NIKKA URSULA

 She’s a shy girl, but she’s also a  quick learner and it doesn’t take her very long to pick up the games that kids play on the narrow streets of Shinganshina. It’s a completely different world here,  such alien and strange for somebody who used to have daffodils and squirrels for friends before. The morning comes and all of the doors fly open as kids practically burst out of their homes to run around until their little legs get tired or the dinner is ready and their mothers usher them back to wash up dirt from their hands and faces.

Mikasa begins to participate in this ritual as well – Carla Jaeger never forgets to give her and Eren a piece of bread with honey and a kiss on the cheek before she waves to them as they disappear in the crowd. And while Eren and Armin usually prefer to do other things than play with neighbors’ kids, the three of them sometimes join one of the small bands scattered in the district and spend an afternoon with them - and that’s how Mikasa learns it all, this collection of games created when the lack of resources crashes with children’s boredom and creativity. There’s hide-and-seek and tag and  hoola hop that requires a narrow, wooden ring that girls spin around their hips. One child chases others and taps their shoulders to turn into the chased one. Kids sit in circle, clap hands in intricate patterns and recite dirty rhymes; they use chalk and sticks to draw on the stones and dig in the soil; they jump on one leg and pretend that the ground is lava.

Sometimes smaller girls gawk at her eyes and nag her about her hair long enough that she lets them sit behind her cross-leggedand braid her black strands into an elaborate construction that ends up un-tangling halfway home. She would never admit that to Eren, but she likes this – likes feeling little, quick fingers on her scalp and listening to their excited chatter. Those girls are sweet and innocent and just the way she used to be, while she was living with her parents. And their dreams and wishes reflect that; they want to grow their hair long and beautiful, to have handsome husbands in the Military Police and big houses behind Wall Rose or even Sina, with crimson flowers blooming on the balcony and chubby, pink-cheeked babies.

And Mikasa can understand that.

Those girls  (what are their names? Tina, Riza, Mirielle? Maritte? Marie? She can never remember) also teach her one more game, the one under “no boys allowed category” – the apple skin one.

Tina is sitting on an empty apple crate, a small knife looking wrong and weird in her plump hand. She keeps on cutting her fingers and cursing and when Mikasa asks her what she’s doing, the girl raises her round, brown eyes at her and blinks in surprise;

“You don’t know about the apple skin?”

She doesn’t and so they eagerly show her. They instruct her to peel the skin off an apple with a knife, but not to break the skin - as the peel has to be intact, long and spiral. Then they tell her to stand up and throw it behind her left shoulder, her left hand flat on her chest, above her heart.

“And why am I supposed to do that?” she asks them, skeptical about the whole thing. It really sounds silly and she doesn’t even wanna think about what Eren would say if he saw her standing on the street and throwing apple peels around.

And she does not want Eren to laugh at her. At all.

But the girls insist; they circle her like a swarm of little bees or chirping baby birds.

“You’ll see! The peel will make the shape of a letter-“ “And the letter that it shows is a name-“ “- It’s not a name stupid, it’s the first letter of a name-“

“- of your future husband!” they end in unison, the three of them looking up at her with such a brightness and honesty written on their round faces that she just can’t refuse them.

Not that it matters anyway – she doesn’t need to throw any peels to know what will be the first letter of her future husband’s name.

After all, she is also just a little  girl, who also dreams of a husband, of a house, of flowers and of a green-eyed baby of her own.

  “Yes.” Historia nods her head solemnly after Mikasa stops talking. “I remember that. We were there too. Paradise Island, before the Second Eldian Uprising. Around mid-800s, I think?” the blonde rests her chin on the hand and stares off the distance.

They are both sitting on the plastic chairs in Historia’s backyard, in the middle of the first “Summer Party” of the season, as Eren cryptically called those meetings when Mikasa asked him about them. The sprinklers have just turned on, making some guests shriek and scatter, trying to run away from the water – not an easy task, considering the place is packed with people. The smell of barbecue makes Mikasa salivate, Toto’s Africa is blasting through the portable speakers that somebody brought and some brave individuals decided to dip in the pool, even though it’s just May and not a particularly hot evening. She can hear Eren somewhere on her left side, playing a kind of rules-free version of soccer on the grass with his friends which seemingly involves a lot of screaming and, more often than not, multiple players ending up in a pile on the ground.

Historia sits on  folded legs, with daisy chain on her head and loose strands of hair dancing around her face on the breeze like spider webs. So lost in her thoughts, she seems as dainty and fragile as possible. Mikasa tries hard to put together the fawn-like line of her neck and delicate collarbone with the nightmarish visions that would make her wake up covered in cold sweat more often than not lately; winged crests, flakes of gore spiraling in the air like gruesome cherry petals, cobblestones streets stinking of too much people. The world bathed in blood. Cruel. Unforgiving. Devoid of any beauty. And yet familiar, as odd as it is to find familiarity in something straight out of their high school history books.

Mikasa wonders how Historia made it through there. Was she as graceful and full of sweetness as she is now?

“This is where we first met.” The girl adds quietly after a minute or two of silence,  her eyes locked on Ymir’s back as she is getting up from the grass. “ But I don’t like to think about it too much. To be honest, it was horrible. I never want to live so much longer than her again.”

That Mikasa understands. There is not a worse thing than existing when the other one is gone. It is a torment that she would not wish on anyone, ever, no matter the time or place.

“So weird, isn’t it? Us, talking about those times like it was last week. Feeling so ancient when we are so young.” The corners of Historia’s mouth go up slightly and she shakes her head. “Look at them, my god.”

Connie slipped on the wet grass and all the players lay toppled again, one big tangle of limbs and curses and laughter. Eren catches her eyes and sends her a blazing smile, trying fruitlessly to wiggle from underneath Berthold.

800s. So old. And yet Mikasa doesn’t think she has ever been younger than now, with her lips chapped and happiness bubbling inside her.

I’m hungry, I’m hungry for whatever comes next. – sings some guy through the speaker.

Historia giggles as Ymir keeps on tripping over Reiner’s legs.

Sprinklers spray Mikasa’s bare feet with cold water.

The sun colors the horizon pink and yellow and red and all of the brilliant shades in between.

Eren managed to stand up and lowers his hand down to help Sasha; there are sweat stains on his shirt and grass in his messy hair. If he was nearer, she could smell it all on him. The sweat and the grass and the happiness.

As far as she is, she doesn’t hear his exact thoughts -  just feels contentment, stretching between them like a golden cord or a silk ribbon.

“Yeah.” She answers softly. “ It is really strange.”

 ***

  What comes next? Mikasa remembers it used to plague her mind for some time, before she even met Eren. Supposed I have a soulmate, how life even looks like, with a bond like that?

She jumps higher, runs faster and spins tighter than ever, that’s what happens. Once she would curse her muscles and limbs for weighting her down and working against her will, but now she feels so light that she’s surprised she makes any sound walking at all. It suddenly feels so easy; the sequences of movements, soft and smooth, crisp with no hesitation in them. She diligently pins her now-short hair in place, chalks her hands and faces each obstacle with no fear whatsoever. The steady flow of medals that follow her improvement make it look like as if she turned into Midas, painting everything gold with her touch alone. And while it all brings her a lot of joy and while praises that she hears from her coach and teammates and fans are not unwelcomed either, she knows well what makes her soar so high.

She knows now how it feels to be up, so that the surface of the Earth looks like a glorious oriental rug painted with sunlight and spread down her feet.

It shows in her movements, this joy. Even when she’s walking, she goes through the motions as if she was dancing. She supposes that it’s even more evident, while she’s doing gymnastics. She used to think she was good, before, and there was a truth in that – she was born with a natural talent which was then honed with years and years of steel discipline and hard work. Before, she was flexible and strong and well-trained, but now, with her eyes wide opened and memories back, she is not just simply good – she is superb. She has this spark that shines so brightly in her, fueling each and every step. And the centuries past don’t lie, it’s evident now, clear as a day. She could never reach stars without Eren by her side. She was always at her best, when she was with him.

So she jumps higher, runs faster and spins tighter.

And it feels exactly like running on the roofs and jumping up and down, suspended in the air with steel lines of her 3DMG used to feel like.

 *

 “How many times did we lay just like that?” he asks her one night, his hot breath caressing the shell of her ear, his fingers idly tracing figures in between her shoulder blades, while she’s still shivering, oversensitive and satisfied.

Countless she thinks. Countless and more

But something painful blooms in her chest, like a thorny bush tearing her heart into shreds.

“ I don’t think we had many occasions to do that.”  She answers honestly and he hums in agreement.

Not in the softly-lit room, not in a  warm bed, not smelling like her peach-scented shower gel and each other. Not without scars spoiling their skins and with no mountains on their backs.

Never so calm. Never so sure, so careless.

 *

He supposes that the funniest part is that he doesn’t feel like anything changed at all, for the most part. Armin is still his best friend just as he used to be for as long as he can remember and his mother still smiles when his visits her every Saturday and brings her flowers. He still trains in his favorite gym, listens to his favorite bands and fails in saying “no” to his dog.

He’s still the same person, basically.

Only suddenly everything is different. Only suddenly everything is easier and simpler and more bearable; only suddenly he’s calmer and faster and more focused than ever before. This mess in his head quiet now. The twitching of his leg gone. It’s like somebody took a sheet of sandpaper and dulled the sharp edges of the world so that they don’t hurt him anymore.

Mikasa came into his life, fitting neatly in as if she has never been a stranger, as if there has always existed an empty place ready for her.  She brought a series of small changes with her, that’s true. But those changes feel more like a fresh, cool breeze from the fan during a humid afternoon than anything else. Like tiny snowflakes that just keep on falling until they cover everything in white and all he sees is her, her, her.

The Thursday game nights, Annie ruthless in Monopoly, Armin miles ahead all of them in Scrabble, Mikasa surprising everyone by her mad poker skills.

Sunday mornings, lazy and sweet; Mikasa in his arms from the dawn till dusk, making love until they both collapse curled around each other, sleepy and sated and so, so fucking happy.

Saturday afternoons, Mikasa and his mother working in the garden and laughing quietly, drinking lemonade and watching old movies with Audrey Hepburn on this ancient VHS player.

She came and reorganized pretty much everything and yet he cannot even imagine how his life looked like without her.

 *

 July comes strangely unexpected, like a cat creeping on soft, soundless paws.

He closes the doors of the apartment behind him, with a bag of groceries in his hands and a blissful perspective of three full days without work in his mind. Tomorrow they’re going to Levi and Petra’s daughter christening and then … well, he has keys to Mikasa’s parent’s summer house on the countryside in his pocket and a lot of great ideas how to spent all this time alone with her.

He doesn’t bother to say hello; Miki is not home, he knew it before he opened the door. She should be here, but she’s not – on the emotional level it feels like a very cold blow of AC right into his face and he tries to swallow this feeling before it overcomes him. She’s probably out jogging or something anyway.

Instead of dwelling on that, he focuses on the small things; packs fruits and vegetables into the fridge and hides Mikasa’s favorite, absolutely sinfully unhealthy chocolate cereal in the upper shelf, where she needs a stool to reach. She begged him to do that; she kept on insisting that sometimes, before she can climb on the chair she changes her mind about eating them.

He, personally, never witnessed it, but whatever makes her sleep better at night.

The flat is not as white as it used to be before he moved in; there are splashes of color here and there, scattered on the furniture in form of his flannel shirts and Bumblebee’s chewing toys. And the Bumblebee itself brings the element of destruction into this sea of serenity; right now, she may be snoring soundly on her pillow in the living room, but years and years of constant spoiling made Eren’s pug a very hard roommate indeed and he never realized it until moving to Mikasa. More often than not she would run around the flat with this stripped yellow-and-black bandana around her neck and wreak havoc in her wake… to the constant displeasure of Madeline.

“Well, these two are definitely not soulmates, that’s for sure” crosses Eren’s mind, as he flops down on the sofa. He decides to kill some time by watching this video from two weeks ago, of Bumblebee cashing Madeline around Mikasa’s ankles; his girl was holding a salad bowl in her hands and looked half-irritated and half-amused, as if she was torn between yelling and laughing.

He loves this video; everyone at work has already seen it at least three times and Petra even more. Besides Levi of course, who seemed hell-bent on pretending that Eren is not as prominent in his niece’s life as he is.

But as he is about to press play, the bell chimes loudly, waking Bee from her slumber. Narrowly avoiding stepping on his angry dog, Eren makes his way to the door, wondering silently who could be coming over at such weird hour without letting them know earlier. The only people he can think of are either his mom, which he highly doubts, or Armin and Annie, who are currently enjoying the cloudy English weather and the company of old books, and kindred nerdy, pale scholars during their trip to Oxford.

“Hello- Oh, hi Tori.” He can feel the frown on his face smooth out as he sees a familiar blond figure standing behind the door.

“Hi, Eren.” Chirps Historia Reiss, smiling like a little sunflower and raising up a foil clothing cover in her hands. “ Is Mikasa home? I finished her christening dress.”

“Nah. But come in, she should show up soon.” He takes the hanger from her hands and waves his hand in a welcoming manner.

Historia and Mikasa’s friendship is something nobody could predict or foresee, but when it clicked, it continued to work smoothly and without any glitches.

They found the connection in their respective relationships, Historia patiently guiding Mikasa by the hand through the uncharted territory, them sharing stories of their past lives and current connections, a tangle web of centuries of trauma that they had to work through and could never fully resolve with their respective partners.

Sometimes Eren wishes he remembered more – that he remembered as much as Miki at least, so that they could share this burden together. But for all her eagerness to give him all of her, this is the one part that Mikasa doesn’t let go of easily. Surely, she happily drags him along if she has something nice for him to see, but besides that, she keeps all that she sees and knows and suspects to herself. And he doesn’t want to pressure her to open up.

But sometimes Mikasa would go awfully quiet and so awfully sad. Tears pooling in her eyes she would bite on her lip hard enough to draw blood and shiver in his arms for hours, sweating with cold sweat and making him so, so scared.  And still, she refuses to talk about, clams up when she asks.

“What’s in the past, stays in the pasts.” She simply says, not looking at him and biting on her nails absent-mindedly.

It’s not if it still haunts you. – he wants to scream, but the words got stuck somewhere in his throat. Maybe it’s the same with her; or maybe she just wants to protect her, in the only way she can.

Either way, he us beyond glad she has but somebody that can help her somehow compartmentalize it all.

 Historia quietly pads into the apartment, bursting into laughter at the sight of agitated pug spinning nervous circles on the floor.

“Damn, your dog has some issues, Eren.”

“ You can only imagine.” He sighs heavily, picking Bee up to rub behind her ears. “ Hi girl, won’t you just-“

 Just like that, everything goes quiet.

There is no sound.

No light, no movement, nothing.

Just coldness spreading through his body, chilling each and every cell of his body.

Just pain, so strong that it doesn’t even seem like a pain at all; it is incomparable to anything he has ever felt. Broken leg? Nothing. A concussion? A walk in the park. That time when he fell down the stairs and injured his spine? A nap on the feathery bed.

Pain exploding within him, taking his breath away, making his heart stop.

Mikasa,

Mikasa,

Mikasa.

“Eren? Eren!” Historia on her knees next to him on the floor, Bee barking again, the coolness of the wood underneath his palms-

Red car speeding on red light, red pooling on the concrete, Mikasa’s red iPod Mini shattered into tiny, little pieces.

“Eren.” She whispers, eyes desperately opened, sun so bright above her. “Eren.”

  *

 He doesn’t believe in god. Never has, as far as he remembers.

“Take the sun away.” he whispers, lips brushing cool wood of his mother’s worn-out rosary. – “Take the sun and- and the moon and all of the stars, just- “

His voice breaks in half; ugly sob escaping from his mouth before he can stop it. It’s so, so cold.

“ Just bring her back to me.”

There is a lifeline that stretches between them, red and infinite and beyond a crowded waiting room on the Intensive Care; a lifeline that nobody else sitting on those ugly orange chairs can see. But he can. And he will hold onto it, as tightly as possible.

And pull her back.

 *

There is a memory that keeps on coming back to her over and over again. Eren ahead of her on the mountainside; his right hand holding onto a metal chain and left one outstretched towards her. He doesn’t even have to turn away to see her slipping on the ice-covered stones. He somehow knows, even though the wind is too loud for him to hear her quiet gasp or the sound that the soles of her boots make.

His hand shots and catches her wrist before she can even begin to fall, before the line that ties their waists together even begins to tighten; he pulls her upright strongly, steading her on a slippery slope.

Wordless support, wordless trust.

Thank you. She thinks. Thank you.

 The image of his hand outstretched. He has always looked ahead and trusted her to watch his back. But he has never abandoned her either, never forgot she was there behind him, even when she thought he did.

 She has a lot of time to think, is this sea of whiteness where she floats. Without any weight to carry, her thoughts flow lazily, one image after another. Some of them would normally make her heart ache, or even cry. But now she is glad they’re there; even the bad, the ugly. She doesn’t know that she would still be there if it wasn’t for the anchor they form. Maybe she would wander off to far to even make it back.

But with this goddamn, piercing I have always hated you, Mikasa echoing in her ears on repeat, it is impossible to let go.

It doesn’t matter that he didn’t mean it. It doesn’t matter that it was thousands of years away. Some wounds remain open for forever and that is one of them, still open and bleeding all over everything.  She would laugh if it could even when you’re hurting me, you’re saving me.

So, against all she latches onto all that pain and heartbreak and reaches out her hand; searches through the nothingness for hours and hours until her fingers find it – the string, taunt and so, so warm.

Mikasa grabs onto it and holds on for what simultaneously feels like a fragment of a second and forever. Blinded and deaf, she holds on until her senses come back, one by one; until she can feel warmth of the sun of her skin and biting stench of antiseptics. Until she opens her eyes and sees him again, silent and grief-stricken and sitting next to her hospital bed, holding her hand.

She blinks, once, twice; watches as big, fat tears fall down his cheeks as he presses his forehead to her hand, his whole body shaking with relief that washes over both of them. She is too weak to do anything else but look at him, to keep her eyes opened and blink. But maybe that’s enough.

  *

 “There you are, honey.” Coos Carla, leaning down and putting a cup of green tea in Mikasa’s shaky hands.

It might be hot outside, but surrounded by hospital walls Mikasa feels very cold and quite small, really, so she will take every comfort she can have. She wills the corners of her mouth to raise a little and takes a sip, hot liquid burning the roof of her mouth.

“Thank you.”

“No problem, darling.”

All those pet names, thrown on her like a blanket covering her useless legs. She wishes she could ask everyone to stop – Carla, her mom, her dad, her friends – to stop hovering over her, but it simply won’t do. They would listen and genuinely try to stop, but she still would see it in their eyes. All the worry.  

For now, her only solace is Annie with her own brand of harsh love that involved passive-aggressive remarks like “Will you stand up finally?” which makes other people present gasp. But Mikasa indeed, wants to stand up very much.

After Carla leaves, Eren appears; his steps echoing in her ears long before the doors open and he enters her room.

With a sight, he plops down on her bed, but she refuses to look at him. Still sitting on a wheelchair, she stares out of the window; what a beautiful day, sunny, not a cloud of the sky. Her whole body itches; in irritation, she forcefully sets down the teacup on the table and spills some tea in process.

“Miki.”

From her position, she can almost see green grass of the lawn next to the parking. She would jog there sometimes, passing the hospital, the parking and the lawn, not stopping to rest for she hardly ever needed to. How weird it is, to miss the stretch of her muscles and sweat dripping down her back.

Warm hand closes over hers.

“Miki.”

Eren’s kneeling on the floor next to her, his eyes big and pleading.

“Why are you so angry?”

We should be out there, she thinks, desperately and against herself, on Historia’s summer party, in my parents’ country house. Not here.

So much was stolen from  them already. All those times where they met only to be torn apart, all this tragedy following them wherever they went. She is just so done with it.

Damn, Mikasa. His voice in her head is so infinitely sweet, almost dripping in honey. He gently brushes hair away from her face and leans his forehead on hers. This? This is nothing compared to what we’ve been through. There will be other summers.

There will be other summers.

She closes her eyes, trying to forget about the sun spilling through the window and focus on his voice on the promise ringing in them.

Really?

He chuckles quietly.

Yeah, really.

Her memories are subjective, but they don’t lie. Presented with the choice wheatear or not to trust Eren, all the Mikasas would always choose the former, without fail.

***

 Their days become very long now, with the seasons passing behind the windows of their apartment like in kaleidoscope; summer in full bloom and then autumn, radiant in golds and scarlets. And winter again, the two of them cozy in their little microcosm lit with sweet-smelling candles.

Mikasa learns how to sit again and then how to walk again. It’s an excruciating process, more often than not involving a meeting with the plush carpets that now cover the entirety of the floors in the flat. And although Eren would keep her from falling if she let him, she prefers to do it a hard way. By that, she can at least feel like in those old good times, as if she was covered in sweat and exhausted after a hard training and not after taking a few shaky steps.

But it all passes like seasons; soon enough she walks again and then jogs, faster and faster, Eren always glued to her side, his silent prescience so comforting that it somehow makes it up for all the lost dreams that she had to abandon. She thinks a lot about it, how it felt to fly; but at least she can still curl up in his arms and he can kiss her neck and it’s different but it’s good. So good.

Snow falls and then melts; spring comes again, brilliant and fresh. By that time, she is already working out with a jumping rope again, drops by the neighboring dance studio whenever she can.  There is a white dress hidden somewhere at the back of her closet; one beautiful mess of silk and lace crafted with Historia’s meticulous hands. The dress is waiting for the right occasions, but Mikasa has stopped waiting a long time ago.

Life is good when doesn’t need crunches or Eren’s arms to stand up. Life is good when she can actually sneak up on him and put her cold hands underneath his shirt when he’s cooking, making him jump and scream jesus Mikasa, go wear a sweater or something. Life is good when he doesn’t have to pick her up from the wheelchair and carry her to bed. Life is good with her new job and old friends and Annie and Armin standing underneath flowery arch and smiling like dorks.

Even after she met Eren, she was still waiting for the other shoe to drop. But know she knows for sure, that even when it drops – it is not gonna be the hardest thing she has ever been through, not even close. And that life will always be good, as long as he will hold onto her, as long as he will keep her centered.

 ***

 “Soulmates… why didn’t you like the idea?”

“I don’t really know. It always seemed so limited to me, like, why am I supposed to just be with this one person because we used to be together a couple of times before in a span of centuries? I didn’t enjoy somebody dictating me how to live my life, I guess.”

“You’re are such a rebel, Miki.”

“Oh, shut up. Tell me about you. What made you okay with that?”

“ Well. You know, when people find their partners, they tend to look at certain things. Like money and race, and gender, and interests and all of that. We don’t really tend to pair up with people who are very different from us. But the notion of soulmates… it just shows that it’s all bullshit. It doesn’t matter at all. When you really love somebody, all of those things are just so insignificant. That always sounded kinda beautiful for me, that it’s your heart that chooses this person time and time again, not your head. “

Maybe he is right. She doesn’t know; she doesn’t care. All she knows is that everything before him seems now like a soft, slow build-up and being with him is a beautiful crescendo; a moment when the music drags you under, overwhelms you.

Give me all your love now, cause for all we know, we might be dead by tomorrow.

One headphone in his ear, one in hers; hands linked and eyes closed, they sit in an empty train, talking without barely opening their mouths.

Even if we’re dead tomorrow, I’ll find you again, Miki.

I’ll find you again and I’ll love you again, Eren.

Ugly and beautiful, all together. She doesn’t think that this crescendo will ever really end.

  *

 As if the heavy slope of my shoulders

doesn’t write a hundred paragraphs.

As if the way I look at you

doesn’t write the singular ending.

 You are my epilogue,

my prologue,

and every chapter that exists in between.

 Everybody, sit down.

  I have a story to tell."

-          Stories. Seventy Years of Sleep, nikka ursula (n.t)

[dalygrace]

@stlapin said: 🔆 + lear crew + atla (maybe with a sibling agni kai :D)! featuring @catherinedaly and @evcravens

The day of Sozin's comet dawns clear and crisp, a clean slate to usher in a new era of Fire Nation dominance. She follows the armies to the ports, kneels before her father as he prepares to battle. She can feel the energy of victory all around, crackling from the soldiers, and her heart feels as if it has lodged itself in her throat. She burns, all fierce pride, as her father names her successor in the early morning light. Fire Lord. The title is sweet on her tongue, but there is too the taste of ash - her rise tempered by her father's further ascension. Some small part of her stings with this once and final insult, but she shoves it down, revels in the glory of her day, the day of her coronation.

By noon she has dismissed all her personal servants, banished both the Dai Lee and her lifelong advisors, and thoroughly frustrated herself with the ritual hairstyles she needs for the ceremony. In other words, she was doing fabulously. The black rot of her heart was on full display, and she found she quite enjoyed the rush of giving orders as much as she thought she would. She grins at herself in her bedroom mirror, smoothing down the edges of her newly shorn bangs. "What a shame," a voice says from behind her, and Grace's blood runs cold.

Her mother stands just behind her, a sad frown on her face as she takes in Grace's crisp uniform and unruly hair. "You always had such beautiful hair." Grace does not dignify this with a response, only pulls her hair roughly back into a bun, murderous feeling in her chest growing. "How could I miss my own daughter's coronation?" Her mother continues, as if Grace had played into her little dialogue, as if she'd entertained the idea that she was worth her time. "Don't patronize me," she snaps back, eyes blazing. "I know you'd rather it be Catherine, some little soft thing for you to puppet. I am not yours to control."

"You have always been about control," her mother replies, neatly dodging the splinters of Grace's anger that underly her words. "You cling to it, draw it to you with other people's fear. Why?"

Grace's anger boils under her skin. "Being feared is easy," she replies cooly. "I am seen as I should be seen - superior." She clutches her hairbrush like a vice, focusing on the feeling of the wood in her grasp as her mother's eyes turn sad. "Fear may be easy for others, but it is not for you. You use it to push people out, even your friends and sisters." Her mother tilts her head, gaze appraising, driving deep holes into Grace's already crumbling facade. "You are only hurting yourself. Why not try trust?"

"Trust is for fools," Grace retorts. "Fools like Catia and the Avatar." Her lip curls in disgust as her mother shakes her head sadly, and she turns sharply away. "Fear is the only way to bring power," she continues on, bullheaded to the last. "Even you fear me."

"No," the reflection says simply. "I love you, Grace. I do."

Something in her crumples. Her rage expands to fill the space, bright and hot, and Grace hurls the hairbrush at her mother's face. She is out the door before the last shards of mirror hit the ground.

She seethes all the way to the empty palace courtyard, until she kneels before the fire sages and prepares to receive her crown and title. They begin to speak and a sense of calm washes over Grace. Finally, she will be what she has been born for - Fire Lord, ruler, all-powerful. She is moments away from stepping into her birthright.

Which is, of course, why fate sees fit to send her sister back home.

Daly! Catherine shouts, their shared name sharp and echoing around the grand palace architecture. Grace's rage overpowers her and she stands, sneering down at her sister as she slides off the giant flying thing that brought her here, the waterbending boy just behind. "Kitty Cat," she spits, "so good of you to join us."

"You won't be Fire Lord today," Catia continues, and Grace laughs, a cruel sound. "Oh?" She questions, all mock solemnity. "Then who is? Certainly not you," she jeers, and revels in the angry twist of Catherine's mouth, the way Everett straightens up beside her. "If you're so keen for the title, sister," she continues, voice sharp, the plan of attack suddenly clear in her mind. "Then we fight for it. Agni kai."

"You're on," Catherine agrees, ever the go-getter, ever the optimist. Beside her, Everett looks concerned - Good, Grace thinks. He should be. They both should be.

When they fight, it is a battle of light and heat, blue flame tangling with orange. The stands are barren, devoid of the usual jeering and energetic crowd that would come to witness such an event. Their flames lick the edges of the seats, catch the rooftops ablaze. It does not matter to Grace - all she cares about is her sister before her, the scar on her face a reminder of how far she'd fallen, how worthless she'd turned out to be. Grace deflects a blast of orange flame and bares her teeth at Catherine, a sickly sharp grin. This was no agni kai for precious little Kitty Cat's honor, a lesson for her to learn - no. Only one of them was leaving here alive, and Grace knows it will be her.

Catherine's next blow takes her by surprise, a whip of flame that knocks her off her feet. She's gotten stronger since she's been away, become a force with fire that almost matches Grace. "No lightning today?" Her sister taunts as Grace drags herself up from the ground, and something cracks within her. The static charge builds as she rises, sparks playing along the length of her arms. This is where Grace stands supreme, leagues above her sister in ways she could not even imagine. The force of the lightning rips through her, sending her already manic pulse skyrocketing, as she takes in Catia's form, her stance as she readies herself against Grace's renewed onslaught. "Afraid I'll redirect it?" Catherine taunts again, unwavering, and Grace can see she no longer fears her, no longer sees the dominion she holds over her. She thinks she knows what Grace will do, knows her tricks and her vices after a lifetime of battling them - but she has underestimated her once again, here, when it counts the most.

The world stills as Grace breathes. Her vision, dominated by her sister, widens just a fraction, taking in Everett's nervous form behind Catia. He stands like a sentinel, the only witness to this battle of titans, the last puzzle piece in this ramshackle life her sister has cobbled together from the scraps given to her by their father. She sees the fear on his face and knows, in an instant, that it is not of her but rather for Catia's safety. Another smile stretches over her face, angry and cruel.

Grace has seen how Everett cares for people - for the Avatar, for the rest of his traveling band of misfits - but especially for her sister. It strikes something within her, his blind faith that Catia has been redeemed, wiped clean of her sins against him. He is weak for believing it, for believing in goodness even when there is none, just as her sister is. They have not known the path of righteousness that she treads, the unwavering faith in her actions that she holds. They act as though it is Grace who has transgressed, but have they not both acted against their nature, blinded by their so-called morality? It is Grace who has never wavered from her path, who has come, at last, to the apex of her destiny.

Grace channels all the rage she has left and sends it hurtling forward, pure deadly energy, aimed right at Everett's heart.

She sees the instant he realizes, sees the fear in his eyes change, and satisfaction pools low in her gut. They may have underestimated her, but she has read them perfectly - Catia leaps, taking the bolt straight to her chest, and the satisfaction grows, washing over Grace in a sickly wave. "Oh Catia," she sighs, voice laden with sarcasm, "You always were so predictable." She sends a bolt of lightning in Everett's direction as he tries to rush to Catherine's side, blocking his approach. The energy crackles around her as she looks down at her sister, manic smile carved across her face, all teeth and sharp edges.

"Kitty Cat, you don't look so good," she mocks, taking in the crumpled heap of Catherine's body, the small shocks that send her muscles twitching against her will. Before her, Everett looks murderous, and it is all too easy to dodge the wall of water he sends her way. She comes down behind him, lashing out with flames that chase him as he skates away from her. He does not have far to run, boxed in by the faintly burning stadium, pillars to hide behind no deterrent to Grace's determined flames. She stalks him like a cat toying with a mouse, dizzy with power, with the knowledge that she has just killed her sister, with victory sharp like iron on her tongue.

It is easy to corner him, to drive him back against the far edge of the field. "Everett," she coos, sending another blast of fire his way. "Tired already?" The torches flickering around cast ghastly shadows across her face, highlight the wild tangle of her hair as it cascades down her back. It had slipped from its loose bun at some point during the fight and Grace pushes it roughly over her shoulder as she strides forward. Everett says nothing, mouth set in a hard line, and Grace smiles further, feels the muscles in her cheeks pull tight as it splits her face. He whips several strands of water at her, a last ditch effort as he's cornered that Grace ducks into an easy roll to avoid. She comes up, power surging, drawing the crackling energy once more from her heart. She lunges, arm outstretched, fingers pointed at his head - and freezes.

The weight and chill of the ice hit her at once and she panics, unable to move. The lightning fizzles on her fingertips, a shockwave of energy radiating back down her arm to her core. The suddenness of it makes her gasp, an aborted motion as it is then that she realizes she cannot breathe. Everett's slow exhale before her, the way he moves fluidly through the ice turned liquid, only heightens the rapid thumping of her heart, the desperate realization that he has manufactured a space where she is utterly and completely powerless.

No, she tries to scream, as Everett takes hold of her arms, as she feels chains bite into her wrists. She tries to struggle, to pull away, but the ice has her pinned. Panic rises in her like bile as her lungs scream for air, burning as Everett forces her to her knees and pulls the chains tight. She feels as though she is about to burst, flames tearing through her as the ice falls away and Everett lands hard on his knees beside her, breath coming heavy. She breathes flame in a ragged arc, pulling hard against her restraints, undignified tears leaking from her eyes. She pulls hard as Everett rushes to Catia's side, feels her shoulder pop from its socket. The plain blinds her more than her tears and she screams - in pain, in grief, in anger at the mercy she has been shown that she does not deserve.

She screams until her throat is raw, burning from her bright blue flame. She screams until they are forced to subdue her like a rabid animal, muzzled and bound. She screams even then, as her vision blacks out - screams for all that she should have been and never will be. She screams for herself, lost now, irrevocably.

[dalygrace]

@lavolumnia said: 🔆 + AU where they've got each other's backs

“Do you ever think,” Grace says one night, exhausted, sprawled across a cheap motel bed, craning her neck over the edge of the mattress to better see Vivianne as she steps out of the adjoining bathroom, “that this was a bad idea?”

This being a word far too simple to encompass the magnitude of words Grace means to say but cannot find. This, meaning their life on the run, four years of evading police and hiding out between targets, all cheap motels and late night diners. This, meaning what they do, taking down men who hurt others, exposing them, getting rid of them when necessary. This, meaning countless times they’ve jumped into danger, knowing the other is there, knowing they’ll make it out alright.

This, most of all meaning saving Grace’s life in the first place, those long years ago, when she’d been trapped, alone and unarmed, in a parking lot, outnumbered and running out of steam; the shots in self defense; the murders that started them on this road.

“No,” Vivianne says simply, toweling off her hair, and Grace nods, fierce, before turning back to her laptop.

They don’t talk about it for a few weeks. Vivianne brings it up one morning as they’re making their way down the coast in a battered gold Prius, bought quickly for far more than it’s worth from an older woman who needed it taken off her hands. It’s a bit flashier than they’d go for usually, despite the mundanity of it being a Prius, mostly because of the paint. The gold is the exact shade of strange brown-yellow where if it didn’t have a bit of sparkle in it it would look like utter shit. Not many cars are made with a gold as a paint option, mostly because it looks objectively horrendous. Grace, for no discernible reason, loves it. Vivianne, who has taste, hates it on principle.

Grace is driving. All the windows are open to let in the breeze coming off the ocean, and stray bits of hair that have come loose from her ponytail keep whipping her in the face. They’ve been driving in near silence for an hour, radio humming quietly, before Vivianne says “You’re not getting cold feet, are you?”

Grace snorts. “Bit late for that, no?” She peers at Vivianne, sees the serious look on her face, and cuts her sarcastic schtick off at the start.

“I just mean - you had people, Vivianne, that you left because of me. Sometimes I just - I don’t get why. They were your people. And now we’re here.” She waves a hand broadly at the car, their status as fugitives, the blood proverbially on their hands. “I just worry sometimes, you know? That we’ve taken on more than we can handle. That it wasn’t worth it, to leave everything behind.”

“Bit late for second thoughts on that, no?” Vivianne parrots, and Grace frowns lightly at her, turning back to the road. “I thought about it,” she continues after a moment. “Thought about it real hard, those first few months. If we were in the right. If I’d be better off at home. You scared me sometimes, how deep you’d go to get what we needed. I’d think about it, but then I’d think about you in that parking lot.”

Grace must make a face, involuntarily, at the memory, the feeling of hands on her, the loud noise of the gun. The speedometer ticks up minutely, and Vivianne pushes on. “You can hold your own, Grace, I know you can. But you don’t have to. That’s what this means to me.” Grace can feel Vivianne’s gaze on her as she stares resolutely out the windshield, heavy. “If I could go back, I’d do the same thing every time. No matter the consequences, no matter what can still happen to us now. I’d still save you every time.”

A stupid jingle for a local car salesman plays through their silence. The wind whips hair into Grace’s face, long strands that Vivianne pulls away from her eyes and tucks behind her ear.

“’Sides,” Vivianne says after a long moment, “You had people too.” 

Grace thinks of her family: her parents and their suffocating love for her; her sisters, too young for her to connect with. Those relationships were dead in the water long before any of this, stalled out when Grace herself did, fresh out of college and stuck not knowing what to do with herself. She shrugs, feels Vivianne’s eyes track the movement, the ghost of a smile that rises on her lips. “Sure, I had people,” she says. “But they weren’t my people.”

She cuts her eyes across to Vivianne. “You’re mine.”

She catches the start of a grin before Vivianne turns to look out her window, wind sending her hair streaming behind her. “Good,” she says, and the subtle warmth in her voice suffuses through Grace’s bones. She grins wildly at the road, switches lanes to pass another car. Thinks yeah. Good.

[dalygrace]

🔆 + the self-indulgent no mafia au nobody asked for featuring @evcravens​ and @catherinedaly​

When Grace had stormed out of the joint Craven-Daly dinner a mere twenty minutes earlier, she could not have imagined ending up like this, pinned to the wall, stretching on her tiptoes to capture Everett's mouth with her own, her hands buried deep into the loose waves of his hair.

She remembers having only a few moments to breathe before she heard his footsteps following her quickly down the hallway, remembers the brief flare of irritation before resigning herself to confrontation. He always followed her, no matter how bad their fight, no matter how obvious she made it to the rest of their families that she needed time alone - it should not still be a surprise, especially not when he was usually able to calm her, to bring her slinking back to the conversation she'd abandoned. Tonight, she cannot remember what she had been arguing about, not when Everett bites gently at the joint of her jaw and neck, as she is overwhelmed by the warmth and weight of his body against hers. She pulls his mouth back up to hers, biting his lower lip, relishing briefly in the low gasp that wrenches its way out of his mouth before suddenly there is space between them, his hands no longer at her waist.

Grace's eyes snap open to see him gaping at her from a few feet back, hair mussed and mouth smudged with her lipstick. Her head spins. She faintly remembers yelling at him, though about what she cannot recall. She remembers him yelling in response, him getting into her personal space - she really must have hit a nerve - and then nothing other than the warm press of his mouth and the feeling of right that came with it. It had been so natural to fall into it, like his body was an extension of hers, something that she didn't realize she'd been missing for years. It was harder now, reconciling that feeling with the look on Everett's face, the wrecked rasp of his voice as he says her name. She shatters back into reality then, a harsh "What was that?" tearing from her throat before she could filter herself.

"What was- You kissed me, Grace, so don't look to me for answers," Everett snaps, and then they're really back, irritation flaring to fill the space between them with antagonism again. "And you clearly enjoyed it, so apologies for offending your prudish sensibilities," Grace snaps, smoothing down her hair and her dress, pushing past him back into the hallway. "My pru- Grace!" She hears from behind her as she strides resolutely back towards the dining room, certain that throwing herself to the lions that are her mother and Margherita Craven at this moment would be infinitely better than this.

Long strides have Everett catching up to her handily, and he steps into her path, grabbing her arm before she can dodge around him. "Grace," he repeats, and she glares up at him. "Grace, you can't just walk away from me right now."

"I can, and I will," she retorts, icy, wrenching her arm out of his grasp. He steps back into her path, crowding her against the hallway again in a move reminiscent of their position a mere few moments ago. Everett seems to realize as he does, and he takes a hasty step away from her. "Fine," he says, haughty composure slipping back over his features as she crosses her arms to stop her itching fingers from dragging him back down to her level. "Fine, okay. You want to ignore this? Fine. But at least come back to dinner."

Grace gives him a simpering smile before slipping past him again. "That's where I was headed, or did your sense of direction get messed up just like your hair?" She catches him frantically patting down his ruffled hair and scrubbing a hand over his mouth before she power walks down the hallway as fast as she can without seeming to be running away. She slips into a bathroom, takes stock of her flushed cheeks and wonders how she'll salvage the mess of her lipstick. As she wipes at the corners of her mouth she hopes that Everett has returned to dinner on his own, letting her slink in on her own, like a chastised cat allowed back into the room after being shut out for swiping at the furniture. She hopes he'll let them settle back into their pattern, not get something into his head about them coming back together, some misguided mockery of making up to appease their parents. Unable to delay her return any longer, she throws the red-streaked tissue into the trash and opens the door to a blessedly empty hallway.

Coming back into the dining room a moment later, Grace resolutely does not make eye contact with her father, who is watching her with a look that is far too scrutinizing for her to take right now. She maintains a frosty silence for the rest of dinner, spitting short terse answers when directly addressed. Everett, in his customary seat across from her, cuts his lamb with far too much force and engages his father in some conversation about his studies that Grace does not try to follow. Her mind is a riot of emotions, too many things that she typically locks away tightly and refuses to acknowledge. Every clink of silverware, every tap of a glass returned to the table has her on edge, and she aches to be excused like her younger sisters, given the go ahead to ignore the stranglehold of propriety that keeps her at the table, unable to leave a second time. 

After dinner, her father breaks out the 1982 Vietti "Rocche" Barolo that he always claimed was being held for special occasions, and Grace stays only to hear Everett's surprised "Ah, breaking out the good wine tonight, Zio Louis?" before she flees to the safety of what her room. Every inch of it suddenly drips with Everett - as it should, being the Craven’s property - swirls of memories of summer vacations every year for the whole twenty years of her life threatening to drown her in the confusion she’s been avoiding since Everett pulled away from her in the first place.

"Are you and Everett fighting?"

Grace whirls around, startled curse falling from her lips before she recognizes the small figure of Catherine before her. "Don't repeat that," she says hastily. "And no, Catia we're not - we're not fighting, exactly. No more than usual, I guess." The memory of Everett crowding her against the wall, of her harsh words replaced with the warmth of his mouth rises unbidden, and she smothers it before the riot in her mind can strike up again. Catia is still standing in the doorway, eyes wide with unasked questions, too observant for a child of eight. Was Grace this nosy when she was that young? She can't remember. She forces a smile onto her face, one that is either too harsh or too fake if the furrow that appears in her sister's brow is any indication, and she shoos her back across the hall to the room she shares with Regina. "Everything's fine, don't worry about it and don't mention it to Mamma, okay?"

"But why?" Catherine asks, too brightly, and Grace could kick herself. She’d hold onto that now, that Grace doesn’t want her mother involved, which almost certainly means that Simona will know something is up by the end of the evening when she comes to tuck Catherine and Regina in. "She's already worried about me finishing up my classes, she doesn't need something else to get herself worked up about," Grace says, crouching down to meet her sister's eyes. She smoothes a stray lock of Catherine's blonde hair back behind her ear, a rare gesture of comfort. "Just promise me, Catia. Please?"

Catherine's face scrunches for a moment before she says simply "Okay." Slipping away from Grace's grasp, she flings herself up onto her bed, once again full of childhood energy. Regina, reading calmly on her bed, doesn't look up as Grace lingers in the doorway, soft smile playing on her lips. She turns, crisis averted, and returns to her room to continue her breakdown in peace.

She's so wrapped up in unravelling the tangle of thoughts that have been plaguing her since dinner that she doesn't realize there's another person in her space until she shuts the door and hears, suddenly, from behind her "Grace-"

For the second time that night, she whirls around, startled, accidentally slamming her outstretched arm into something solid. She scrambles away until her back hits the door, until she recognizes the voice and body as Everett. "Jesus fuck, Ev," she breathes, advancing back towards him to smack him in the arm again, this time with more force. She drowns his pained yelp with a simple "What the fuck was that for?"

"I thought you saw me when you came in, I was standing right in front of the door -" he cuts himself off, shaking his head as Grace moves past him to sit on her bed. "I came up here to talk to you."

Grace snorts before she can smother it, failing at her valiant effort to school her face into a neutral expression. "Talk," she repeats, skepticism clear in her tone. "Okay." She leans back, rakes her eyes over Everett's face, the tense set to his shoulders, the way he lingers still by the door instead of settling in her desk chair like he would on a typical night when they ended up tucked away here while their parents chatted downstairs in the dining room. She takes a deep breath, forces down the warmth that blooms in her chest as he fidgets minutely with his cuffs. Smothers the part of her that wants to take his face in her hands, to soothe the slightly pained expression that he wears. "Okay," she repeats. "Take a seat. Let's talk."

[dalygrace]

@evcravens said: 🔆 + the one where ev goes feral or the one where grace is chill  featuring heavy mentions of @catherinedaly 

Everett exits his bathroom, scrubbing a towel through his still-wet hair. Grace, from her position sprawled across his bed, has a perfect view of the exact moment he realizes there is another person in the room, startling so hard at the sight of her that he drops the towel.  Instinct has him grasping for a weapon she knows he does not have on him, stopping a split second later when he recognizes her. “Grace? When - what?” He stammers. “When did you get here? I didn’t hear the door open.”

“That’s because I didn’t come in through the door,” Grace retorts, and Everett frowns. 

“I don’t want to know, do I?” He sighs, the weariness in his tone as much due to her antics as it is the comedown from the adrenaline spike the scare gave him. “I gave you a key for a reason, Grace. So you would use it.”

Grace just shrugs and flops back onto the bed, tracing a spiderweb crack in the ceiling as she tries to ignore the way that Everett’s frown deepens when she doesn’t argue back. She can hear him puttering around, picking up the discarded towel and getting something from the dresser. He leaves a pause for her, as if she’ll pick up their usual mode after a beat or two, before continuing a bit hesitantly when she remains silent. “Not that it’s not good to see you, but why are you here? If you needed something you could have called.”

“Mm,” Grace intones flatly, rolling over onto her stomach and propping herself up on her elbows. Why had she come? It seemed so flippant now, to have been so unsettled over a simple conversation that she sought out comfort in another person instead of simply taking it in stride. “Papa’s been talking about Catia -” she starts, then stops, suddenly unable to say it. This, she realizes, was why she’d come - the knowledge that he would understand even when she couldn’t get her words out. Louis Daly had been hinting at this for months now, subtle nudges to her youngest sister that the Capulet-Daly legacy Grace had begun would extend to her as well. It wasn’t a surprise to Grace, but something had hit differently the last time he’d brought it up, something shifting inside Grace until she felt like she would tear herself apart seeking the center of her discomfort before she could understand it. So she’d broken into Everett’s apartment, seeking out the thrill of the act and the comfort she knew he alone could bring. Maybe it was unbefitting of a woman her age - twenty eight and still clinging to their childhood friendship like a lifeline, often feeling like a child herself when she turned to him - but he was the only person she knew who would understand.

The soft sounds of Everett moving through the room have ceased, but she cannot bring herself to look up at him. “Papa’s been talking to Catia about the Capulets,” she starts again, breath leaving her in a rush, “and she seems - amenable.” Grace frowns, picking at a loose thread in Everett’s bedspread. She can feel his eyes on her, a soft, steadying weight. “I worry about her,” she says simply, the breadth of the discomfort warring in her chest impossible to put into words. “She’s still so young, and I - I worry.”

“I know Regina’s young too but she’s always been...” She trails off, waving a hand. Everett makes a small sound of agreement and Grace finally looks up, meeting his eyes. She wonders what he can see on her face, if he can tell how hard it is for her to wrench these words from their place in her heart. “Catia - she’s not like Gina - she’s not like me.” The unspoken words hang heavy in between them, the weight of countless arguments borne from the moment Grace first held a gun, from the way she took to this life and the blood on her hands without faltering. It was easier for her than most to take another’s life, but she tried - for Everett’s sake, if not for the sake of her own soul - to not get dragged under by the sickly sweet thrill of it. 

Before her now, Everett frowns, undoubtably following her down this distracted path of thought. It was uncanny sometimes, how easy it was for him to read her, for her to do the same. Codependent, Raf had called them once, her words not without a trace of irony, before swallowing Grace’s laugh with a kiss. It was moments like these where she saw the weight in such statements, knew that she had been lucky to be born as she had been, with inquisitive four-year-old Everett waiting, twin soul ready to be bound hers the moment Simona deposited her into his arms. “I know,” he says simply, and the ball of emotions expands in her chest, painful and good in equal measure. She looks back down at her hands before rolling back to lie slumped across his bed once more. 

“You’ll protect her, right?” She says quietly to the ceiling, the words ripping a hole through the last tentative barrier she held between her and the mess inside. She presses the heels of her hands into her eyes, ignores the heat prickling behind them. She feels rather than sees Everett settle beside her, the mattress dipping under his weight as he finds space against the awkward angle of her body. Grace stays where she is, limp, ignoring the hitching of her breath, desperate to stop the sobs that threaten to shake their way out of her. She’d known since Regina pledged herself to the Capulets last year, following the path Grace had laid so many years before, that Catherine would one day walk into this darkness as well. It was all she could do to believe that Catia’s light would stay bright, would hold the grasping shadow hands from twisting her beyond recognition like they had done to Grace. She did not want her sister to look in the mirror and find herself unable to recognize the person that looked back at her, the one whose hands were stained bloody and who didn’t mind it as much as she probably should. 

It isn’t until she feels Everett’s hand in her hair, calmly brushing the tangled strands away from her face that she realizes she’s been vocalizing these concerns. She pushes the air from her lungs in a harsh huff, snaps her mouth shut too hard, jarring her jaw. “Of course I will,” Everett says calmly, like he hasn’t just witnessed her losing her mind for a brief moment, like she hasn’t cracked open up her ribs and bared her heart to him. She is suddenly intensely grateful for him, for the level of tact that comes with his aristocratic breeding, something that never quite stuck with her. The ball of emotions flares again and she flings herself into him, burying her face in his chest. She can feel him tense beneath her, though she can’t tell if that’s in response to their sudden closeness or the tears that are now soaking his shirt, and then he’s moving, shifting to his side to pull her close and tuck her up against his chest.

Later, when Grace has cried herself dry, they lie there quietly, Everett still rubbing comforting circles into her back as her breathing slowly returns to normal. Grace feels like she’s been hollowed out, left empty by the pressing sense of dread that had compelled her here. She focuses on their points of contact, on the warmth of Everett’s body where it’s bracketing her, and counts her breaths until he breaks the silence. “You’ll be able to protect her too, you know,” he says, and she can feel the rumbling of his voice through her where she’s pressed up against his chest. “She’s lucky to have you looking out for her.”

His words are simple but something catches in the hollow of her chest, a small fire radiating warmth and light. “Thank you,” she whispers, and he laughs. “You don’t have to thank me for the truth,” he replies, smile evident in his voice, and Grace smiles too, softly, into his chest. 

[dalygrace]

@odessasvernon said: 🔆+ hunger games au

If there is one thing Grace wants most in the world, it is control.

She knows, logically, that there was no such thing - not so long as the Games still kept the Districts subservient, offering up sacrifices year in and year out. But thinking on that was treason. (She still thinks it.)

In the Arena, she feels a modicum of control. Well trained and ravenous for victory, she decimates nearly half the other Tributes herself with little regard for the lives she was ending. She is a living weapon, that much everyone had known.

They just hadn’t expected her to also be human.

                                                ━━━━━━━━

It starts accidentally, when she finds Odessa buried in the mud, half-dead and starving. Truth be told, it had started well before then, in training rooms where Dess had sought her out for help with a weapon, over dinners where Grace mocked the genteel accent of their Capitol escort and Odessa smothered her laughter into her napkin. It started in the fierce bubble of pride that rose, unbidden, when Odessa blossomed on the interview stage and charmed the Capitol to her side. It started as Grace was struck, time and time and time again, by how fiercely the younger girl clung to life, even when hope had abandoned her.

It started for the people watching - where it really counted - well before Grace ever knew there was something to think twice about.

                                                 ━━━━━━━━

Grace had volunteered. It was expected in the Career districts, but this had been a special case. Little Catia, freshly twelve years old mere weeks before the reaping, had had the misfortune of having her name drawn, of all the hundreds available. Grace had not even breathed before shoving her way through he crowd, voice rising in the words that would seal her fate: “I volunteer! I volunteer as Tribute!”

Odessa, picked second, was dragged unceremoniously to the stage - no one to volunteer in her stead with her father dead and brother working in the Capitol. No one dared step out of the crowd to replace her with Grace already on the stage - her bloodlust was well known in the District and there was no need to launch another true contender into the Arena. District One already had its winner.

                                                ━━━━━━━━

When the announcement comes, several days into the Games, that both Tributes from a District could win, if they both survive, Grace doesn't pay much attention. She hasn't caught sight of Dess in days, doesn't care much if she's alive or dead.

It isn't until she stumbles across her, inches from death's door, that Grace begins to think maybe.

                                                ━━━━━━━━

They weren’t friends, not really. Odessa was too soft for her own good, fragile in ways Grace could not remember herself ever being. She confesses to Grace in her delirum, fever burning high, the guilt she felt at taking another Tribute's life some days before - Grace's hands, stained with the blood of countless others, shake as they brush Odessa's hair away from her forehead. A vicious and sudden rage flares at the thought that Odessa might die here, lonely and afraid, when she could have been so much more.

Grace fights furiously for the medicine that saves Dess' life. She thinks of one thing as she takes down those around her: she is going to get this girl home, even if she has to die trying.

                                                ━━━━━━━━

The moment Grace realizes that the direction of her life is utterly out of her control is the moment when the Gamemakers' voice rings throughout the empty arena: Only one tribute can win.

Grace's rage, incandescent and all-consuming, rips out of her. "Fuck you!" She yells towards the sky, wrenching away from where Odessa tries to calm her. "What the fuck is wrong with you people? To let us get this far, only to have our hope snatched out from under our noses? You're sick!" She would go one, but a sharp Grace has her turning back to where Dess stands, knife out, just behind her.

Grace has her own knife out in seconds, but Dess only drops hers into the lake. "Grace," she repeats. "You have to kill me."

"What?" Startled momentarily from her anger, Grace lowers her knife and stares uncomprehendingly at Odessa. "You have so many people waiting for you - your sisters, your parents. You fought to get here, so take your victory. Kill me."

Staring into the determined face of Odessa Vernon, Grace realizes what the Gamemakers probably knew all along, for them to manipulate them so pefectly into this position - that she would never forgive herself if this bright light, this fragile girl did not make it out of the arena, and especially if her death was by Grace's own hand.

"Fuck that. Winning this fucked up game means nothing if you aren't with me. I don't - I won't be able to live if you die here. I mean it, Odessa. You deserve to make it out of here, to have a life and to move on and to see your brother again. I didn't spend weeks nursing you back to health only for you to give up on me here. No fucking way." Grace looks at the girl before her - old before her time, ragged and raw in ways that may never heal. Grace could not assure that she would get over this, but she would make damn sure that Odessa had the chance to try. Reaching into her bag, Grace takes out the nightlock berries they had collected the day before. "I don't want my death on your hands. I won't make you live with that."

Dess is on her before she can bring her hand to her mouth, tackling her to the ground with more force than Grace thought she could muster. Surprised, Grace is easily pinned, berries falling out of her hand as she lands unceremoniously in the dirt. Odessa rolls off of her, scooping the berries up where they fell - and presses some back into Grace's hand as she sits up, dazed. "Together," she says, simply, and Grace smiles, a fierce and private thing. She stands, hauling Odessa up and keeping hold of her free hand once they're standing. This is how you die nobly, she thinks, before she raises the berries to the sky and says, eyes locked on Dess, "On three."