#take the money you keep throwing at the cops and put it into your communities

[ligbi]

is anyone else in a field that feels like climbing up a falling ladder?

went to school for MIS (computer science but less programming more business) graduated 14. First job 15-18, another 19-20, and then 21-23. every time I job hunt I see positions that I had seen before but the amount they offer seems so much lower than they had offered? sysadmin seems like a position I could have sword was averaging 120k/year in 18, and now I'm seeing a listing for not even 60k.

I know every job is working their employees to the bone for as little as they can get away with while the world burns down but god you do everything right- go to school, go local to keep loans low, get a degree in something that can pay you instead of something you like- and you still get screwed

we need universal healthcare, ubi, and a fix to the housing crisis, as well as making all jobs 30hours 1.5x for any hours post that, and capping maximum pay (15x the lowest paid employee's salary is extremely generous. 30k for employees? You still get almost half a mil a year you greedy fucks)

[writing-with-olive]

The Stonewall Riots of 1969

1) Current State of Being (it was not good, fam, not good)

To set the scene, we’re in the late sixties. We’ve won the second World War, and suddenly everyone’s dealing with the fact that the patriotic frenzy America has been whipped into isn’t really having the same purpose it used to. Thing is, everyone’s still really heated along the basic lines of DEATH TO COMMUNISM AND ALSO COMMUNISTS. During the war, this was helpful. It created a sense of unity. But once the war was over, attention turned inward.

At this time, there was also research that queer people were "sex perverts" and a government report even came out saying

"The lack of emotional stability which is found in most sex perverts and the weakness of their moral fiber, makes them susceptible to the blandishments of the foreign espionage agent [...] the pervert is easy prey to the blackmailer.

This same report also cited a case of a gay man "who's homosexuality was used by the Russians [who were communist] to recruit him as a double agent before world war 1." Basically, the overall gist was that gay people were believed to either be communists now, or they would become communists because their brains were weaker.

Alrighty, but why were they easy prey? First, when it came to communism, they were just as susceptible as anyone else, but after steep laws against queer people were passed, blackmail became pretty real.

So... yeah, let's talk about a couple laws that were in place in the late sixties, shall we?

For the crime of sleeping with a consenting partner in the privacy of your own home you could face anything from:

A light fine

Five, ten or twenty years in prison

A life sentence

Electrical shock therapy

Castration

In addition, to target trans people, police had also dug out a law from the nineteenth century that was originally passed to supress angry tenant farmers who would don disguises and demonstrate against their landlords (law found in subsection 4 of section 240.35 of the New York Penal Code). The law stated that individuals could not wear more than three items of clothing that did not match their assigned gender at birth.If an officer thought you were breaking this law, they could arrest you and take you to a bathroom or similarly private location and have an officer who matched your presented gender either do a strip search or pat you down there to see if things matched.

Things got especially bad when New York realized they’d have to “clean up the place” in preperation for hosting the World Fair. In part, this meant a heavy crackdown on the gay community, and by extention, gay bars.

2) The Genovese Crime Family and Stonewall

At around this time, the Mob was starting to notice that gay bars were an excelent source of profit - since the prohibition era (1920-1933), limited access bars and speakeasies had popped up everywhere and since the gay community already couldn’t be themselves on the streets, they retreated to these more sheltered locations.

Three mafia members decided to open a gay bar because ohhh boy could you rake in some serious profit. Combined, the three of them put up $3500 to “renovate” the Stonewall Inn (which had gone through itterations of being a straight nightclub, straight bar, and gay restaurant in a sort of irregular cycle). 

Renovations included building a stage to dance on, painting the walls black, and getting a jukebox. No running water, no fire exit, just the bare minimum. It certainly wasn’t legal.

When they opened (as a bottle club to get around pesky liquor laws), the bouncer would look through a little slat in the door and if you had a codeword or looked sufficiently gay, he’d let you in. You then had to sign up to be a part of the club (about a dollar) and write your name down on a sheet of paper. Of course, no one wrote down their real names. 

The liquor in question was stolen, to begin with, and then heavily watered down with... questionably clean water, and then sold at about three times the original price in half-cleaned glasses (glasses were dunked in a bucket and then reused). Since none of the patrons really had high expectations anyway, they went with it. Needless to say, however, Stonewall was not a particularly nice place to be.

With all the money the trio raked in, a cut had to go to the Mafia man who controlled the district, and another cut went to paying of the notoriously corrupt 6th Precinct, to avoid getting the whole place shut down. 

Because they were payed off, the police would only conduct their mandated raids early in the night before things got going, and on weekdays - this was when there weren’t a ton of people there, and it was easy to make it look like nothing was amiss.

3) The Raid (this is where shit gets real)

First of all, the thing is - no one knows why it happened. It just.... did.

On June 28th, 1969, at about 2am, the night was in full swing. The bar was crammed full of people dancing and drinking. The air was stuffy as usual and quite dark. 

Then the bright flourescent lights come on - the signal that there was a raid and to seperate and to look less gay. The police came through, and called that they were making arrests. Everyone needed to line up against the wall and have their ID’s ready. Of course this was an issue, because just about everyone was legally not supposed to be at stonewall. 

As the police began taking people outside, a crowd was going - raids at this time were... unusual to say the least. Some of the queens went into the back of the police cars without much of a fight - obviously they were terrified, but it didn’t look like there was much they could do.

One of them, however, and no one knows who for sure, was having none of this. Though Marsha Johnson and Sylvia Rivera have both been suggested as the starter of the riot, both have denied it, saying it was someone else. Storme DeLarverie, however, has both accepted and denied it was her. In an interview where she confirmed herself as the starter, she described her reaction, saying:

“The cop said ‘Move f****t’, thinking that I was a gay guy. I said, ‘I will not! And, don’t you dare touch me.’ With that, the cop shoved me and I instinctively punched him right in the face. He bled! He was then dropping to the ground - not me!”

She then turned to the crowd and yelled “why don’t you all do something?”

This was when things transformed. Objects started to fly. It was like someone had just punched a hole through the dam holding back the collective anger of the queer community.

A lot of the queer street kids, homeless, desperate, and with nothing to lose, were at the forefront of the fight, throwing anything from stones to pennies to bottles. Here’s the thing: no one really liked Stonewall - it wasn’t particularly nice or inviting or anything like that, but it was THEIRS and they were going to fight like hell for it.

Those being pulled out of the Inn started fighting back too - throwing what they could, kicking, punching, pushing back against the police. Marsha Johnson, a woman some have referred to as “basically a lesbian superhero” even climbed a telephone pole and threw an unidentified heavy object at a police car, shattering the window. 

It was chaos and the crowd was still building. The flying objects didn’t stop, and it wasn’t like anyone had great aim - they were just as likely to hit a fellow protester - but there was a sense of comraderie and it made the police nervous. They were calling for reinforcements, but none were coming.

Finally, one of the police chiefs decided they had to retreat into Stonewall. They grabbed a few people as hostages and dissapeared inside, and barricaded the door. The inside of the Stonewall Inn was a wreck. The jukebox had been smashed. Same with the stage, the bathroom mirrors, and the cash register. Broken furniture was strewn on the floor.

Outside, the rioters had yanked a parking meter out of the ground and were trying to bash their way through the door, using it like a battering ram. Each thud made the officers even more nervous, and the captain, realizing things could turn from bad to horrific and deadly commanded his officers not to shoot unless he shot first. He went up to each one, commanding them individually by name, saying that if they shot without his direct sayso, they would be spend the rest of their police careers with only the worst possible jobs. To their credit, no one shot.

Outside, reinforcements finally arrived, armed in full riot gear - helmets, plastic shields, those club/baton things. They came forward in a full on phalanx. Then it started getting really ugly. People ended up lying on the sidewalk with blood coming from their heads or injured in other ways. The crowd started falling back, step by step. Finally, many of them ran.

But not to flee. Instead, they went all the way around the block and came up behind the reinforcement officers. Surprised that there was a new attack coming from behind, it was the police that began to loose the ground, and were forced to retreat back, back, back.

It was into the late, late hours of the night when the riots finally died down to nothing, the last of the crowd finally dispersed, exhausted.

4) The Next Day (aka a giant middle finger to the cops)

The shattered glass sparkled in the morning light the next day - a tribute to what had gone down the night before. 

That night, the crowds around stonewall were huge. And it wasn’t just the queer community - the anti-war protesters and Black Panthers had joined in, standing against the even larger ranks of officers. The night before was a tipping point, but if momentum was to keep going, there needed to be sustained effort.

Inside, the Inn was back to normal. The Mafia had repaired the stage, gotten a new cash register, and even replaced the jukebox. It was if the efforts of the police had never even happened. Throughout the night, the queer community went in and out as though everything were totally normal - as if the police didn’t matter.

The riots were even worse than the night before, but the police couldn’t gain any ground.

Despite what was happening and the triumphs of the queer community, the press was a little less enthusiastic, aiming to diminish what had happened, taking the viewpoint of the police, or claiming the riots happened because of a celebrity’s death, and not the decades upon decades of oppression.

5) The Impact (how we got to today)

A year later, a lot of the Stonewall participants gathered to commemorate the movement. There were now several activism groups that had grown since the riots, but there needed a way to keep it growing - keep the flame from dying out.

One woman proposed that they have a march like the Civil Rights movement and Anti-war protesters were having. As soon as the question filled the space, there was unanimous consensus. Yes - they were to march.

It was terrifying. One member remembered fearing that only ten or so people would show up - that it was only going to make them into a laughingstock and nothing more. Indeed, many people had shown up with popcorn to “watch the f*gs” - it was seen almost as a show or performance. 

But the moment was anything but. When the member looked back, in apprehension, what he saw wasn’t ten or the anticipated couple hundred people. No more than two thousand people had joined the parade. And not just the queer community - straight New Yorkers were there too. It was a moment of solidarity, and a demand for justice.

Every year since, there have been pride marches around the country, memorium to the community, and to the fight we’ve been fighting for a very long time, and to the patrons of Stonewall Inn who finally decided enough was enough.

6) Sources (because apparently trusting an unsourced tumblr posts is seen as an academic no-no)

(all in MLA because I just copy/pasted them from my research notes and also MLA feels official and all that)

Yardley, William. "Stormy DeLarverie, Early Leader in the Gay Rights Movement, Dies at 93." The New York Times, 29 May 2014, www.nytimes.com/2014/05/30/nyregion/storme-delarverie-early-leader-in-the-gay-rights-movement-dies-at-93.html?_r=0. Accessed 12 Apr. 2021.

Brown, Dalvin. "Marsha P. Johnson: Transgender Hero of Stonewall Riots Finally Gets Her Due." USA Today, 27 Mar. 2019, www.usatoday.com/story/news/investigations/2019/03/27/black-history-marsha-johnson-and-stonewall-riots/2353538002/. Accessed 12 Apr. 2021.

Burey, Jodi-Ann. "'It Wasn't No Damn Riot': Celebrating Stonewall Uprising Activist Storme DeLarverie." The Riveter, Feb. 2017, theriveter.co/voice/it-wasnt-no-damn-riot-celebrating-stonewall-uprising-activist-storme-delarverie/. Accessed 12 Apr. 2021.

Carter, David. Stonewall: The Riots That Sparked the Gay Revolution. 2nd ed., New York, St. Martin's Griffin, 2010.

Duberman, Martin B. Stonewall. New York, Plume, 1993.

Edsall, Nicholas C. Toward Stonewall: Homosexuality and Society in the Modern Western World. Charlottesville [Va.], U of Virginia P, 2003.

Kristi K. "Something like a Super Lesbian: Storme DeLarverie (In Memoriam)." The K Word, edited by Kristi K, 28 May 2014, thekword.com/2014/05/28/something-like-a-super-lesbian-storme-delarverie-in-memoriam/. Accessed 12 Apr. 2021.

---. "Something like a Super Lesbian: Storme DeLarverie (In Memoriam)." The K Word, edited by Kristi K, 28 May 2014, thekword.com/2014/05/28/something-like-a-super-lesbian-storme-delarverie-in-memoriam/. Accessed 12 Apr. 2021.

"The Stonewall You Know Is a Myth. And That's O.K. | NYT Celebrating Pride." YouTube, uploaded by The New York Times, 31 May 2019, www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7jnzOMxb14. Accessed 12 Apr. 2021.

(not in mla sorry) - PBS’s Stonewall Uprising (documentary)

++++

tagging: @veryunoriginal and @doggo038 because yall seemed pretty interested. Also my usual taglist: @candlemouse @bookdragonfanish @book-limerence​

If you want to be added/removed from any of my taglists, let me know! taglists found pinned to the top of my blog :D

[marjansmarwani]

I'm standing guard, I'm falling apart

5.1k || ao3

When Carlos and his partner encounter the bank robber with the bomb, Carlos knows in his gut that the man is telling the truth. But it's not that simple because nothing ever is so when the man offers a compromise Carlos jumps at it and he tries to help him by removing the bomb. It does not end well, and it's left to TK and his crew to pick up the pieces.

TK wants nothing more than for Carlos to be okay, than for this nightmare to be over, but when Gabriel Reyes arrives it's clear that the universe is not done throwing curveballs at them yet. ----- Day 3 of Angst Week: Coda/Fix-it for 2x08

-----------------

“Trust your instincts, Carlitos,” his dad had told him, “they are the only thing in life that won’t steer you wrong.”

He had been 15 at the time and he and his dad had spent hours together, working side by side on the ranch, Gabriel dropping words of wisdom as they came to him and interspacing it all with anecdotes and thrilling stories from his job. It was normal, such a typical part of his life that he didn’t think about it until it had happened less and less shortly after he had turned 17, shortly after he had a certain conversation with his parents.

Logically he knew there were a number of reasons for this: he had graduated high school shortly after and was around the ranch less and less. His dad had gotten a promotion and was working longer hours. There were any number of reasons that all made perfect sense, but Carlos could never shake the feeling that maybe that one conversation had been one of them. It didn’t change the fact that those hours and those stories and chats had been so formative to Carlos. They were a large part of the reason he had become a cop, and they were a large part of what shaped his conscious and his decision-making process.

And now, standing in an alley with his gun leveled at a man with a bomb strapped to his neck and a bag of stolen money in his hands, it came back to him again: trust your instincts.

His instincts told him this man was telling the truth, that he was being forced and that his life was in danger. He believed him when he told him that he wanted nothing more than to get home to his son, to little Enrique. But he couldn’t just let him walk away with a bag full of several thousand dollars — not if he wanted to keep his job.

Mitchell and the suspect were both watching him, both waiting for him to come to a decision, to break the tie. He knew what his partner wanted to do. He knew that she wanted to follow the book, but his instincts were screaming at him that it wasn’t right, that they would be condemning an innocent man to death and a child to a life without his father.

Perhaps the man sensed his hesitation; maybe he somehow knew that Carlos was on the fence because when he spoke next it was directed to him, and it was a compromise: “If you can get this thing off of me,” he began, voice steady but eyes still pleading, “I will give you the money and go with you. I’ll tell you everything I know about the people who did this. Please, I—” he broke off and when he continued his voice had lost its steadiness. It was full of desperation, “I don’t want to die.”

Carlos looked at Mitchell, but he was already lowering his gun. They communicated silently for a moment before his partner relented, lowering her own weapon, “Fine, but we are not touching it. We are calling for the bomb squad.”

“There’s not enough time for that,” the man protested. “If I’m in one place for too long they’ll know something is wrong. And if they think something is wrong…” he trailed off, but Carlos could fill in the blanks pretty well.

“Go ahead and radio for the bomb squad,” Carlos told Mitchell as he holstered his weapon, “but I’m going to take a look. I think he’s right and that means we don’t have that kind of time on our side.”

“Reyes—”

“We don’t have a lot of options here, Mitchell,” he reminded her tersely. “Either we run the risk of driving what is possibly an active explosive device into a police station or we let him go. I think this is the best shot we have, for everyone involved.”

She bit her lip, but nodded, “Do what you can, but please try not to get yourself blown up Reyes. That’s an awful lot of paperwork.”

“I’ll do my best,” he agreed as he stepped forward, gesturing for the man to turn so he could see the mechanism clasped around his neck. It looked fairly simple, at first glance, but there were some wires that were concerning, to say the least.

“Anything you could tell me that might help?” he asked the man wryly, but he shook his head frantically.

“No, they just held me down and put it on. I couldn’t stop them. I…” he broke off with a sob and Carlos could feel his heart clench.

“Hey,” he told him evenly, “we’re going to do everything we can to get you out of this and home safe to Enrique, I promise. I just need you to stay calm and still. Can you do that?”

He waited until the man started to nod before thinking better of it and instead giving him a small, quiet, “Yes.”

“That’s good,” Carlos told him bracingly, “now just hang tight and I’m sure we’ll have this off in no time.”

He felt around the band holding it to his neck. While the device itself looked complex, closer inspection showed him that it was secured to the terrified man by simple straps. He made quick work of them with his utility knife, and even though some were too close to wires for his comfort he is still able to cut enough of them that between him and his partner, they are able to ease it off the man.

When it is finally off he nearly sags in relief, almost collapsing on the ground before them and only held aloof by Mitchell’s bracing hold.

“Thank you,” he told him appreciatively, “thank you! I thought...thank you.”

“Of course,” Carlos said evenly, studied the device now in his hands, “I’m just glad we were able to get it off without incident.”

“Maybe they were lying to me,” the man admitted, “I was too scared to ask too many questions. Maybe it’s just a fake after all.”

Carlos wanted to believe him, but while he was no expert in explosives the contraption in his hands did not look fake. His opinion was reinforced when the lights started blinking more rapidly, and the man paled.

“The tracker,” he whispered. “They must have realized that I’m not coming, they must have triggered it. I’m so…”

But Carlos didn’t wait to hear the rest of his apology. “Get down!” he instructed Mitchell, who pulled the man down with her even as his desperate eyes followed the device and his mouth still moved in soundless apologies. Carlos pulled his arm back and launched the device as far away from them as he could, further into the alley before them. Maybe he could throw it far enough, maybe it wouldn’t be a large explosion. Maybe whoever had made it wasn’t good with explosives, maybe it wouldn’t even…

But all of his conjecture was cut short by a resounding boom as the device exploded in the air. The force of the blast pushed him off his feet and the searing heat caught him on the way down. It was disorienting; loud and fast and hot. He could feel his body being pelted by debris, he could feel the sharp pain as it sliced through him on its way by. He hit the ground with a resounding crash that echoed in his head as it bounced off the ground as pain bloomed from everywhere all at once. His last view was of bits of destruction raining down like snow, gently drifting as it obeyed gravity. It could have been beautiful if it hadn’t been for the pain.

He blinked again, feeling his eyes grow heavy. He wanted to look around, to check on his partner and the man who had formerly had a bomb stuck to his chest. He couldn’t summon the energy to move an inch. He supposed he could take the small comfort of having been right, he supposed as his eyes drifted closed. His instincts had been right, on all of this.

His last fleeting thought before everything went black was that sometimes he wouldn’t mind if his instincts were wrong.

-----------

The 126 paramedic crew pulled up to the scene in tense silence. The intel had been spotty but what they knew was enough to have TK gripping the steering wheel so tight that his knuckles were white: there had been reports of an explosion, there had been police on the scene before the explosion, and those police could not be reached now.

That was all they knew because it was all dispatch had been able to piece together. There was no saying what kind of explosion or what kind of destruction it had left behind. There was no knowing what had gone down or who the officers ever were. All TK knew was that his gut was filled with a dread that grew incrementally as he sped towards the scene. He knew that his team had picked up on his tension, that they understood how his fear was different from theirs. He couldn’t put into words how much he appreciated them letting him be.

There was an eerie silence over the scene as they stepped out of the ambulance when they arrived. They weren’t far from the main street; it was as if a hush had fallen over the alley in reverence to the fallen. Because there were fallen — they could see that now as they drew closer. Three figures sprawled on the ground; unmoving and surrounded by destruction. They gathered their gear and rushed forward, Tommy alerting dispatch that they would require additional RA units to respond.

It was another step and another heartbeat before TK realized just how well he knew one of the fallen figures and in that instant, he couldn’t breathe. His feet moved forward of their own accord and his mind frantically tried to process every detail of the horrible sight before him as he crashed to his knees besides Carlos’s still form. There was blood, but he couldn’t tell from where. Burns were likely too, given the singe marks and lingering heat. But TK’s chief concern was that Carlos wasn’t moving, that there had been no acknowledgment of his arrival. Even in sleep, Carlos seemed to know when TK was nearby but now, there was nothing.

He reached out a shaking hand to his neck, holding his breath as he waited, as he prayed to feel the familiar thrum of a pulse under his hand. For a long moment, there was nothing and TK was sure he would shatter. But he shifted his hand because Carlos couldn’t die today and tried again. He waited, every ounce of his being focused on the hand on Carlos’s pulse point until a slow but steady rhythm began to beat under his fingers and TK finally allowed himself to breathe.

“Pulse is weak but present,” he announced to Tommy who had kneeled beside him, his voice sounding strange even to his own ears. His captain nodded and reached into her bag, pulling out her gear as she appraised TK.

“Are you good Strand?” she asked. “Usually I would tell you to stand down, but given the situation, we don’t really have a choice. I need all hands on deck.”

TK took a deep breath and nodded, reaching into the case beside him to pull out what they would need. No, he was not good but he knew Tommy was right: there was no other option. Either he did this or risked losing Carlos for good, and he would always do anything in his power to stop that from happening. That was not an option he could live with. “I’ve got this Cap, what do you need me to do?”

“Start the exam while I finish up his vitals. We need to know what we’re dealing with here.”

“What about the other two?” he asked even as he started following her instructions. “Don’t you need to…”

But Tommy shook her head, “They’re both relatively fine, Nancy can handle them until more help arrives. Reyes here seems to have taken the brunt of the blast.”

TK nodded without hesitation. It sounded like Carlos, after all: always trying to be everyone’s shield.

He began his exam, starting with his head. It seemed like every moment revealed a new injury: blood on the back of his head, likely from a fall. Cuts and abrasions of various sizes littered across his body, fragments of what looked like a car taking up residence where they didn’t belong. Each new discovery struck TK like a physical blow, but he pushed on.

The head injury was the most concerning, for a while. But as TK moved forward, as he examined more he learned that was not the case. There was a large piece of sharp metal sticking out of the left side of his abdomen and though TK had no way of knowing how long it was, it looked as if the majority of it was buried inside Carlos’s body, far far too close to vital organs for TK to breathe easily. He sucked in a breath and alerted Tommy, who grimaced when she saw it.  

“Pack it tightly,” she instructed him, handing him the gauze and tape necessary for the job, “make sure there is no room for it to move during transport. We want it held still until they are able to remove it at the hospital.”

TK nodded and took the gauze, tightly winding it around the intrusive object so that it held firm. He watched with dread as the gauze steadily turned red as blood sluggishly leaked out from around it. There were so many ways an injury like this could go wrong, too many ways that it could turn fatal. The thought alone was almost enough to send TK reeling but he pushed it down. This wasn’t the time; Carlos needed him here. He needed him focused. He couldn’t risk falling apart when the very existence of the one person who just might mean more to him than anyone else in this world depended on it.

TK and Tommy had finished examining Carlos and packing what wounds they could to prep him for transport when the requested additional units arrived. Tommy gave them a run down as TK and Nancy loaded Carlos onto the gurney and transferred him to the back of the ambulance. Not a word was said when TK climbed into the back instead of the driver’s seat, Nancy stepping around to take that spot instead without a word.

As they drove he and Tommy continued working; monitoring and treating Carlos the best they could. In all that time and all the movement, Carlos had not stirred once and TK tried hard not to think about that, to dwell on what it might mean. He managed to hold it together, to stay professional and focused until they arrived at the hospital and unloaded the gurney, Tommy relaying the necessary info to the medical team that met them at the doors.

He held it together until the moment Carlos’s still and bloody form disappeared through the doors of the trauma bay. Then, with nothing left to focus on, he finally let the tears come.

He felt arms around him and felt himself being guided to a chair that he sank into gratefully, aware now that his entire body was trembling. Now that they were here and now that Carlos was in the care of the doctors, the situation was out of his control. Whatever happened now, he had no say in. He had done all he could and he had to hope that it was enough. Carlos’s injuries returned to him in flashes and TK knew with a sinking dread this was not going to be a short wait. It would be a while before any news came; good or bad.

So he sat here in the waiting room, tears running down his face and his team at his side, waiting for the answer he knew would come eventually, hoping and praying that it would be one he could live with. That somehow, despite all the odds, Carlos would be okay.

TK couldn’t lose him, it was as simple as that.

---------

After a while, there are no more tears left.

It was a surprisingly short time before he cried himself dry, until he pulled himself together and settled into quiet fear. Tommy and Nancy settled in to wait with him, offering their quiet reassurances and comforting presence until their radios sounded. He found words enough to assure then that it would be fine, that he understood. That he would be fine on his own. They didn’t look like they believed him, but what other choice did they have? So, with a promise that he would keep them updated and that they and the rest of the crew would be by as soon as they could, they were gone and TK was alone.

He sat in silence, alone in the waiting room, trying to keep his mind from spiraling. But no amount of bouncing his leg could keep him from picturing the scene, from thinking of what Carlos must have gone through, from imagining the worst. He twisted his hands in his lap, noticing a spot of blood that had slipped past the protection of his gloves on the inside of his wrist. He swallowed and turned his arm so he couldn’t see it. He didn’t need a physical reminder; the scene was still all too fresh in his head.

Every single detail of it was seared into his mind and TK knew with a sinking dread that this was one of those times where being a paramedic put him at a disadvantage. He had seen more than his fair share of injuries and over time, you got a sense from the ones that people walked away from. The injuries he had treated Carlos for — the ones that had littered the body he loved so well — were not those. He knew that losing Carlos was a real possibility.

He also knew that it wasn’t that simple. He knew that losing Carlos meant losing his world, and he couldn’t face that.

Nearly an hour of silent, solitary waiting passed before he heard footsteps approaching his seat in the waiting room. His mind was still too fractured to process their proximity so when they halted and someone sank into the chair beside him, he hardly gave it a thought (he hardly had a thought left to give). The tears may be gone but the bone-deep fear was ever-present and all-consuming; his constant companion as he sat and waited, rubbing his still shaking hands on his legs.

And so he doesn’t process anything until the figure beside him started speaking: “You know, Carlitos didn’t always want to be a cop. He wanted to be an astronaut first, for the longest time.”

The voice was shaky but startlingly familiar. It took TK a moment to place it but when he did the shock was visceral; running through his whole body as he looked up to see Gabriel Reyes sitting next to him, eyes staring off in the direction of the treatment rooms that currently held his son.

“Maybe if I had encouraged that desire a bit more, we wouldn’t be here,” the man said quietly, sadly. “Maybe he would be a world away, but safe.”

TK didn’t know what to say to that. Somewhere between the shock of his boyfriend’s father appearing and the fact that he was speaking to him as if he knew him TK had lost the ability to speak. He could simply stare.

“I suppose that’s neither here nor there though,” Gabriel continued, “I suppose we are past what-ifs.”

He turned then, taking his first look at TK. He looked him up and down, registering the blood staining his uniform and the anxiety and fear radiating from him with a grim expression. “You treated him,” he observed, voice growing quieter and softer. “First of all, thank you. No matter what happens, thank you.”

His gaze held TK’s, his eyes (so much like Carlos’s it almost broke TK to look at them) sad and heavy with worry. TK swallowed down the tears that threatened to return and nodded.

“I can’t imagine having to do that,” Gabriel continued in the same tone, “I can’t imagine having to keep your head about you when you see someone you care about hurt like that. That shows real strength, in my opinion. I’m not so sure I would be as strong.”

TK heard the words being said, but he simply stared in response. Someone you care about he had said. And the look in his eyes…

“You knew?” TK said, finally finding the words that had eluded him for so long, “About Carlos and I?”

Gabriel nodded, “Since we ran into y’all at the market,” he confirmed.

TK was left staring again, but for a different reason. Carlos’s parents had known. They had known for weeks now. They had known as Carlos tore himself apart, they had known as the secret almost ripped TK and Carlos apart. They had known and they hadn’t said anything.

“Why didn’t you say anything?” he finally managed.

“We wanted Carlitos to come to us on his own, in his own time,” Gabriel told him softly. “We didn’t want to push.”

TK watched the older man look sadly back towards the doors separating them from Carlos and for the first time since it happened, he found an emotion besides fear rising up in him.

“It has been eating him alive,” he told Gabriel, voice far stronger and far sharper than before. “It almost cost us our relationship. He is afraid of how you will react, he is so afraid that…” he trailed off, feeling that he was veering into territory he should never enter without Carlos’s consent or presence. He allowed himself a breath before he continued: “He was afraid to tell you and this whole time you’ve known?”

It’s not until his hot anger begins to fade from his mind that he can fully process the reaction from his boyfriend’s father. Gabriel’s eyes are wide in shock and horror, and TK came to his senses with a resounding crash.

“I’m sorry,” he says more softly, calmly. “That was out of line. It’s not my place to—”

“No, I think it is,” Gabriel disagreed, cutting off TK’s apology. “It’s your concern as much as his, after all.”

“Still,” TK tied again, “I shouldn’t have said it like that.”

“Perhaps not,” Gabriel agreed with a dry laugh that felt so foreign amongst the fear still so heavy in TK’s heart, “but it certainly got the point across.”

They studied each other for a moment before Gabriel spoke again, “I know I haven’t been a perfect father,” he admitted, “but I do love my son.”

“I don’t doubt that,” TK assured him. “Carlos loves you too, I know that for sure.”

“And you?” Gabriel asked, fixing him with a piercing gaze. “Do you love my son?”

“I do,” TK said firmly. “More than I have ever loved anyone.”

“Does he love you?”

“Yes,” TK said, without hesitation. “He has never let me doubt that, even when I’ve wanted to.”

There was silence again as the two men regarded each other and after a long moment, Gabriel nodded, expression sad.

“We’ve missed so much,” he said quietly. “We should have done better. We will do better,” he promised, voice stronger as he met TK’s eyes, “when he wakes up.”

His voice was strong and his eyes certain, and TK nodded, taking comfort in the older man’s certainty that there would be a future, that they would get to see Carlos again.

Gabriel smiled at him before continuing, “I’d like to get to know you, TK. You and my son and what you are together; if you’ll let me.”

The expression on the older man’s face was sincere and despite everything, TK managed to find the smallest of smiles.

“I’d like that,” he agreed. “I’d like that very much.”

-----------

If Carlos had to describe everything that came after the pain in a word it would be confusion.

There was pain and then darkness, that he knew for sure. But everything after was a haze. There were moments of awareness (he thinks) here the darkness lifted and he could hear voices. He couldn’t make out the words and the voices didn’t make sense. It sounded like TK and his father, but he didn’t know how that was possible. Awareness didn’t last for long though, so his final thought before he slipped back into the darkness was that his mind was playing tricks on him.

When he woke up again, his head felt clearer. He was more sure that he was actually awake and alive, this time. There were still voices and he could almost make out the words. He could even place them with absolute certainty: they were TK and his father. But that still didn’t make any sense, even to his less hazy mind.

He blinked his eyes open, having to repeat the process several times in order to adjust his eyes enough to see. There was a hand holding his own and he squeezed it, hearing a familiar intake of breath in response.

“Carlos?” TK asked voice choked with emotion, “Can you hear me, babe?”

“Ty,” he said in response, pulling his eyes open fully and tilting his head to drink in the sight of his beautiful boyfriend, grinning through tears. He tried to reach up a hand to wipe them away but his limbs felt heavy.

“Try not to move too much,” TK said softly, “you’re still pretty hurt.”

“What happened?” he asked, and TK looked across his bed before another familiar voice cut through the room.

“What do you remember, Carlitos?”

Carlos whipped his head around to the other side of the bed - or at least, whatever the slow and painful equivalent of whipping his head was - to see his dad sitting in the seat to his right.

“Dad? What’re you...” he trailed off turning to TK again with a baffled expression but his dad pressed on.

“Try to answer the question, mijo. What do you remember?” His dad’s voice was soft but the instruction was clear. Carlos looked into his dad’s eyes as he tried to pull the bits of memory together into a cohesive memory.

“There was a man,” he said slowly, “he robbed a bank, but he didn’t want to.” He paused and his dad nodded and smiled at him, urging him to continue. “There was a bomb around his neck, he said two guys forced it onto him. He said they had a tracker on him so he couldn’t go with us because they would set it off. He said that if we could get it off of him he would come with us though and tell us everything he knew, so I did. I guess it didn’t like that much though, because the last thing I remember is it exploding, I think.”

There was silence as he finished his account and Carlos pieced the rest together in his mind. Mitchell hadn’t wanted him to try, she wanted to wait for the bomb squad…

“Mitchell!” he exclaimed, looking frantically back to TK, “and the man. Are they…?”

“Easy Carlos,” TK said calmly, squeezing his hand again and leaning closer, “don’t worry, they’re fine. A little banged up, but you got the worst of it. It looked like you were closest to the blast,” he added quietly, voice turning more serious. “You were certainly the worst off of the three of you.”

Something in the way TK said it filled him with dread. “Did you…” he began, and TK nodded. “Ty,” he said softly, squeezing his hand this time as best he could, “I...I am so sorry. I wish you never had to see that, I can’t even imagine.”

“Don’t you even start with me, Carlos Reyes,” TK told him firmly. “This was not your fault. You have absolutely nothing to apologize for.”

“Besides,” his dad added from the other side, “I think we should all count our blessings that it was your boy and his team. I have no doubt they are the best and that they would have moved heaven and earth to save you.”

Carlos couldn’t agree more, as much as he would rather TK never have to experience that level of pain on his behalf ever. He was about to say as much when something else his dad said struck him. Your boy. He knew. He knew that TK was his boyfriend. He looked to his dad again, searching his face for any clue before finally asking the question.

“You know?” His dad’s expression didn’t change and Carlos shifted his gaze to TK, who looked down.

“I’m sorry Carlos, I know you wanted to tell them in your own time but…”

“But your boy did nothing wrong, Carlitos,” his dad interrupted, shooting TK a firm look. “We already knew. I approached him. All he did was make me see how we had been hurting you by not acknowledging it and for that, I am so sorry son.”

Carlos blinked at his dad, processing his words before turning to TK with a raised eyebrow, “Do I want to know what happened while I was unconscious?”

TK grimaced and his dad laughed, “I will say you’ve found yourself a tough one. He has spine for sure, mijo.”

“Yeah,” Carlos agreed, studying TK as he winced at his dad’s statement, “he’s pretty special.”

TK relaxed at his words and gave him a warm smile, squeezing his hand gently. Distantly he could see his father watching them fondly and Carlos was struck by the surrealness of this moment. He had pictured this so many times: his boyfriend and his dad co-existing, him casually showing his affection for someone he loved in the presence of his family. He had ached for it for so long and a part of him had always been convinced that it would never be any more than a dream.

Yet here they were. The proof was right before him in the hand holding his own, in the soft kisses pressed to his forehead by the man he loved, in the soft smile of his father as he watched from his chair on the other side of his bed. Never had he expected to find such happiness in the wake of such pain and fear, but he knew he would be eternally grateful for this ending to this disaster because it had brought about a wonderful beginning.

[bloodbenderz]

Can I ask what your season 1 Lok reboot looks like?

this is about 3k words i checked lmfao dont say i didnt warn u

a key part of the whole thing is that korra gets way more perspectives and more experiences representative of like, normal people in republic city bc i think something that really defined what a good avatar aang was was how many people he met and got to know and how he didnt exclusively or even mostly associate w cops and bureaucrats and leaders. so mako and bolin. well first of all their backstories are a little more fleshed out and we get a less black and white view of the “triads” (lol) and mako and bolin’s experiences w them. cuz the show very much does the whole thing of like Criminals Bad but dont worry even tho mako and bolin did commit crimes theyre not Criminals!! so just a little more nuance on the alleged gang problem and the poverty in the city

korra does start out very naive w very black and white ideas (ex. “you guys are CRIMINALS?”) i think a really good way of developing her away from her sheltered naive worldview is putting her in whats clearly an incredibly complicated city w an absolute cesspool of political conflicts, ethnic tensions, the lasting effects of colonization, etc and having her try and understand the needs of “the people” in a more complicated way than “i have to save the good guys from the bad guys” ykwim? and i think the absolute WORST way to do that is what they did. bc we get mako and bolin who could contribute genuinely compelling thematic elements to the story: one parent who was indigenous and one who was from a colonizer background in the decades directly following the end of the war, kids who grew up in poverty apparently without any familial support, and who now are trying to be “respectable” members of society (especially mako). and then most of that is pretty much tossed aside bc asami swoops in w her capitalist dad and her piles of money and the class issue is just never talked about again.

so the way i’d fix all that is like. introducing more, like, normal people. some nonbenders, more workers, more immigrants, etc, to show what daily life is actually like for people. because. we dont know! we dont have any context about whether the nonbender oppression thing is actually an issue bc we dont KNOW any nonbenders with normal lives! and spoiler: the nonbender oppression thing is not an issue. bc it doesnt make historical sense. lok is set 7 decades after the end of the war. that is not by ANY stretch of the imagination long enough to heal from the scars of imperialism, ESPECIALLY not when lok is also set in a settler colonial state. like that fact should have featured PROMINENTLY in the political and social setting! realistically, nonbenders arent an oppressed class, earth and water nation people are, regardless of bending status! as in all settler colonial states, the colonizers and their descendants (in this case fire nation people) retain most of the financial and political capital, leaving the colonized and racialized immigrants (in this case earth kingdom and water tribe people respectively) generally impoverished and politically suppressed. like aside from the fact that theres no way toph would have become a cop, it’s so ridiculous to think that an established privileged class of fire nation colonizers would EVER accept being policed by earthbenders!

imagine how much more nuanced and interesting it would be to set republic city as a remnant of a colonial past still fraught w the violence and tension that colonialism and the associated ideology imposed?? instead of some vague ideas of criminal who wear 1920s outfits and harass shopkeepers think about why extralegal and violent groups like that might form! earth kingdom people trying to push for the reclamation of their land? ethnic groups protecting themselves against corrupt cops? ESPECIALLY w the history that the fire nation has of SPECIFICALLY jailing and killing earthbenders and waterbenders BECAUSE of the potential they have to resist against fire nation imperialism like it just makes no sense at all that earthbenders would be privileged on land that, 70 years ago, they would have been imprisoned on! like these various paramilitary groups falling along these different ideological or ethnic lines, fire nation or earth kingdom or water tribe, pro colonization or anti colonization, pro cop or anti cop, pro immigrant or anti immigrant, and then you juxtapose that w depictions of a govt thats failing to keep this all under control w tenzin trying desperately to keep it together despite the fact that it’s becoming increasingly obvious that the state has no interest in taking the conflicts seriously and would rather just point vague fingers at criminals and gangs? and THEN you bring in korra, who has no idea about any of this and thinks that all its gonna take is kicking some ass every couple days, meeting normal people who offer all kinds of different opinions abt the efficacy of the state and the different violent or nonviolent groups and ideologies clashing in the city and the way all this shit is affecting people’s lives and livelihoods and relationships w other citizens??

theres so much good shit there so many incredible things u could do w that like Where do we go after colonial atrocities? is it possible for a settler colonial state to take revolutionary or indigenous ideas seriously? is liberal reform enough in a state like this? and then all the growth that korra could do going from a simple black and white life about mastering the elements to this messy complicated sociopolitical knot of a city? and all the different kinds of characters u could introduce in this city? like why would u EVER think that the most interesting characters that this story has to offer is a police chief a congressman and a billionaire????

but anyways. that’s what the Setting of my idealized version of lok is. as for the actual plot, it is as follows

it starts out similarly as the show. republic city is MUCH more fraught w political tension and violence and korra knows this but assumes that it’s just a matter of throwing a few gang leaders and corrupt officials in jail. tenzin manages to come see them in the south pole and intends give korra real lessons while he’s there but they receive news of a terrorist attack in republic city only a few days after he gets there so his family has to pack up and leave again.

korra stows away to republic city (katara catches her leaving and gives her blessing im a SUCKER for that moment). she does have a hard time adjusting but she doesn’t do what she did in the show lol the first person she meets in the city is this older woman who works on the docks, directs her to a place where she can eat and gives her a roof to sleep under for the first night. so korra’s first exposure to republic city is just about forming connections w ordinary people like ship workers and a family owned restaurant and people practicing their bending in the park. and by the time she reaches air temple island a day or so later her head is spinning w all this new information and the way that nothing is really what she expected it to be. tenzin gives her his own perspective on everything and pema gives her her own perspective on everything and even those two seem wildly different from all the people she’s already met. and so korra starts to get a kind of outline of the conflicts plaguing the city as extremely complex and a lot more influenced by older ideas of fire nation imperialism and earth kingdom land reclamation than she had any idea about.

mako and bolin are still pro benders but not like. super famous like they are in the show. korra’s picked up a couple friends by now and one of them takes her to a gym where a lot of amateur pro bending (is that an oxymoron? lol) matches happen and thats how she meets mako and bolin and joins their pro bending team. Unfortunately for korra, this gym is run by lin beifong, and also has the distinction of being one of the most notoriously anti settler state organizations in the country. lin beifong is NOT a cop but she runs this gym (and the pro bending league) as a way to offer support to local earth kingdom/water tribe youth, teach self defense skills, a center of community organizing, and sometimes to act as a front to hide revolutionary/combat organizing against the pro fire nation paramilitaries/police force. tenzin is DISTRAUGHT that korra does this and this is where the friction btwn them comes from bc (from tenzin’s perspective) she does things like this without thinking or even fully understanding the context behind them and tenzin will have to deal w the political fallout of the avatar openly aligning herself w a very divisive figure in the community and (from korra’s perspective) tenzin is too unwilling to take sides in a conflict that’s claiming lives and when the state is clearly not taking sufficient steps to protect people well then why the hell shouldnt she align herself w lin beifong, who IS taking steps to protect and support people?

as korra more fully integrates herself into the city and learns more abt how different people think abt everything going on this is where the real exposition abt the equalists begins. they’re a paramilitary group w an ideology thats gaining increasing support among middle/upper class fire nation people, esp nonbenders. on the face theyre abt putting checks on “bender oppression” but really it’s an excuse to persecute and surveil earthbenders waterbenders and airbenders, bc fire nation people have all this leftover fear about benders who arent fire nation Rising Up Against them and these people who r using their Savage Excuse for Bending to terrorize good innocent (fire nation) people. theres all too frequent terrorist attacks that the equalists claim credit for mostly against monuments to earth/water/air nation people and earth/water nation community centers (one like it was the event that forced tenzin back to republic city) but also like the govt doesnt take a lot of these seriously or if they do only a couple people are charged without doing damage to the entire organization

this is also around the time that they meet asami and she becomes part of their friend group. asami likes pro bending but her dad HATES it so she sneaks out to watch matches at lin beifong’s gym (korra says ironically like don’t u know how ~divisive~ that is and asami answers that the only reason its Not divisive is that gyms like beifongs are the only place where nobody recognizes her). and asami alongside korra is also kind of developing a more nuanced perspective on the city that she lives in cuz obviously the only worldview she’s ever been exposed to is her father’s right? and she keeps pushing it off making excuses not to bring mako and bolin and korra around to her house or even not to be seen w them in certain neighborhoods until they call her on it and she’s like Well honestly my dad might do something awful to u! and i dont wanna risk it!

and as time goes on we see more abt asami’s home life like her father’s hyper conservative politics and asami keeps these secrets abt her hobbies and her friends from him but she’s still clearly under his influence and mako bolin and korra r getting increasingly worried abt it cuz like...asami seems to tend to make excuses for him so that she wont have to be drawn into conflict and originally they think its just her being privileged and thats def part of it but the more they find out abt it the more they realize what a tight fucking grip he has on her and the way that like. asami sneaking out once or twice a week is the Only thing she does for herself. and it really starts freaking them out how influential this billionaire is and all the information theyre getting from asami abt what a piece of shit he clearly is. and so that whole plot thing comes about and shows us how deeply embedded these “equalist” ideas are in conservative republic city politics and how much influence theyre actually having in policy making and law enforcement.

asami suffers in the aftermath of this like being forced to truly confront the harm her father is doing both to the city and to herself. and she ends up leaving home when this discovery really breaks. but bc of the deep corruption in govt and police sato isn’t really....dealt with? like this big story breaks and everyones like Oh, My God! Hiroshi Sato Is Funding An Illegal Paramilitary Group! and theres all kinds of inane political discourse about it and he’s arrested but he bails himself out immediately and his finances are examined but he maintains control over them and after a few weeks the gang (bc they Have become close among all this w much less interpersonal drama lol) has to admit that this news story hasnt done what they thought it was going to it hasn’t dealt the equalists a real hit its just given them a very high profile ally

and this is when things really start to ramp up in terms of action like up until now korra’s daily activities are mostly like hanging around in the city w her friends  (which in part entails doing little avatar stuff that people dont feel comfortable going to police with, like Can you help me my ex husband wont pay child support or Please help i got robbed and i really needed that money for rent next month or Help my son keeps skipping school can you talk to him cuz im worried abt him being safe and doing well in school) and pro bending and airbending lessons (which i know ive neglected this part of the story in terms of her whole spiritual/physical conflict but it’s more of a subtle thing like it’s one of tenzin and korra’s more frequent arguments like tenzin says she needs to focus on spirituality and korra asks why she even needs to bc republic city is a sociopolitical problem not a spiritual one) but now the equalist threat seems to really be looming on every level of society like the storyline of equalists preventing pro bending matches happens here and everyones just at a total loss of what to do next. plus increasing and scary rhetoric about tenzin and his family that destroying the last airbenders is necessary to preserving the integrity of the united republic

and so theres the equalist takeover of the city. the people who are mostly resisting this are lin and ragtag group of people who have been resisting colonial rule for a long time (including suyin, who is part of a communist anti colonial community outside the city, because i said so and i think it would be fun), people who have been visiting her gym for years, members of her amateur pro bending league, plus asami and korra and tenzin. korra and tenzin have a sweet moment (bc they do genuinely care abt each other a lot even if their relationship has been marked w a lot of tension and arguing) where tenzin says like you know i think that ive lost focus on the kind of spirituality that might actually help you. korra says what do you mean? and tenzin kind of gestures to where theyre sitting with people buzzing around organizing to take care of innocents and civilians and to fight the equalists and he says this is a kind of spiritual too, isnt it?

and something something plot plot blah blah i havent decided on the details of the plot climax yet but that’s the climax of korra’s character development and what helps her connect w her spiritual side in order to protect the city: the realization that community is its own kind of spirituality. and it kind of represents the real development that i want her to have going from somebody who thinks that the world is divided into criminals and victims and she has to save the victims Into the kind of avatar who understands the people that she’s bound to serve. she becomes an avatar of the people!

and then happy ending lol korra and asami get together lin and tenzin reconcile after years of being at odds the show ends on a hopeful note that the inhabitants of republic city and the united republic as a whole Can move on from the scars of colonialism by reckoning w the remnants of fire nation colonial ideology and reparations to the earth kingdom people whose land this is and destruction of colonial systems that have maintained and enforced colonial violence all these years

[costellos]

author’s note: this wasn’t a request, just something super self-indulgent that I wanted to do! ❤⃛(*ૂ❛ัᴗ❛ั*ૂ) also this ended up taking 2.5 hours to write aldkf;j so much for unwinding at the end of the day. overall, I’m super proud of how this came out — please enjoy!

❥ ┋ ❝ bucci gang realizing that they’re in love!

bruno bucciarati.

Bucciarati realizes he’s in love when he sees you defending civilians.

he is a man made of love. for his people, for his community, for his goals — he firmly believes that everyone and everything can be built on yes, but more importantly, taken care of.

he sees you protecting an elderly couple during a stand battle. in a split second do you throw your stand at the couple, taking a hefty amount of damage in their place. you’re bloody and your arm is definitely broken, but you still turn to them. "you need to leave. now,” you say. although your words are harsh and hoarse, your smile reminds them that yes, everything will be fine, I just need you to trust me.

you didn’t have to protect them. any other gangster would have left them to die. they’re old, no one would miss them.

but you did. you put these two strangers, two no ones at the wrong place at the wrong time, before yourself. even if it meant you’d die.

Bucciarati would visit you shortly after the battle. Giorno had already tended to your wounds, evident by your lack of bandages. his hair is normally neatly placed, but it looks like he had been rustling it, with his clips out of place and the braid atop his head uneven. his concern is apparent; he’s wracked his brain waiting for your recovery. you knew that Bucciarati cared about his team, but when did he care this much? ↳ “I admit, your actions were certainly reckless,” he would say to you, taking a seat beside your bed. “you’re lucky that fight didn’t end worse than it did. nonetheless...” his voice is tired yet soft, comforting. “I’m glad you’re okay. I’m... I’m incredibly glad.”

leone abbacchio.

Abbacchio realizes he’s in love when he sees you upholding true justice.

although he would never admit it, he is haunted by his inability to save his partner during his time as an officer. as such, Abbacchio envies those who back justice in spite of the system Italy lives under.

you’re patrolling one of La Passione’s turfs with him when you see it: two officers harassing a young girl. even though Abbacchio tells you not to get involved, you quickly storm over to the scene. their voices are loud and clear, despite them being several meters away. the girl looks scared.

it turns out she had stolen a handful of painkillers from the corner store. the cops noticed her scurrying out as they were buying a pack of smokes. and now, they were threatening to take her into the station. “I need them for my family!” she explains, but the cops don’t buy it. they huff something about her bringing them to school and selling them to her friends.

“here. I’ll pay for her. just leave her alone.” Abbacchio watches as you flash 30 euros to the cops, more than enough to pay for the medicine. playing them at their own game, he sees. thankfully, they relent, pocketing the money and leaving the scene. and after you talk to the girl, explaining that if she needs more help to come find you, you both leave the scene too.

it’s a brief affair. truthfully, he wouldn’t have gotten himself involved. he wishes you hadn’t either. it would’ve been less of a headache, and now that girl is going to pester you again in the future. but he can’t stop replaying the scene in this head. how you willingly stood up for her, reassured her that everything would be okay. how you smiled and looked so content after the fact. ↳ “ I envy you,” he would say as you walked away from the scene. “doing the right thing is...” he pauses. stupid? naive? “...it’s not easy. you didn’t have to do anything but I admire your valor. just don’t be surprised if that girl comes up at your doorstep begging for more money.” nonetheless, he wants to learn more from you. to be good again, he thinks. maybe then he can be someone that he himself is proud of. and maybe, eventually, he’ll make you proud too.

giorno giovanna.

Giorno realizes he’s in love when he sees your ambition.

he prides himself on his resolve. to him, resolve is committing to something regardless of the difficulties that a person faces. seeing you be so goal-oriented would make him believe that he’s found his match.

it doesn’t have to be a huge goal, like dedicating yourself to a field of practice or learning a new language. it can be as simple as trying to keep your houseplants alive. in fact, those little things come off as more charming to him. it shows that you’re passionate about everything you do, no matter what it is.

seeing you continuously try despite numerous failures would make Giorno’s heart pound. you refuse to give up. even with everything against you, you still roll up your sleeves, take a deep breath, and pick yourself up again. he adores this about you.

he realizes it when you’re rambling about your next move in your goals. your face is so excited, your eyes so wide and bright. your mouth is voicing your steps a million words a minute but all he can focus on is how beautiful you look. the smile on his lips is unmistakable. ↳ “tell me more. I want to know everything. tell me about every detail, every step, what you’ll do when you’re finished... all of it.” he won’t say it — after all, he doesn’t want to come off as too desperate — but he wants to be there every step of the way with you. and when you’ve completed your goal, he wants to be the one next to you, the one to say, “I am so, so proud of you.”

guido mista.

Mista realizes he’s in love when you laugh at one of his jokes.

life should be simple. that’s the mantra he lives by. despite being a gangster, he just wants to have a simple life filled with simple pleasures. one of those ways is through telling stories.

it happens when the group is eating dinner at a local restaurant. Mista is telling some long-winded anecdote, something about how he heroically beat up a landlord for harassing his tenants over money. at the end, it turned out to be the set up for a really brief and really stupid punchline.

everyone is looking at him. “ah? ahhhh?” he muses, but no one responds. the silence in the air is unbearable. hm. wow. is it hot in here or what? finally, Narancia breaks the silence, muttering that he doesn’t get it. Fugo tells him that Mista could have made the joke so much shorter. Bucciarti exhales quickly from his nostrils, a half-assed attempt at laughing. Giorno and Abbacchio don’t say anything.

but then you. oh, you. it takes you a moment to get it, but when you do, your giggling disrupts the awkwardness. it sounds like bells, Mista thinks. sweet bells, ringing like how they used to at the church every Sunday morning in his hometown. it makes him feel warm, welcome, and he can’t help but feel his face flush when he hears your laughing.

Mista stays in place afterwards, pushing his white beans to and fro on his plate. he’s not hungry anymore. he keeps looking up at you, and while he had acknowledged you were attractive before, something about you was now beautiful. you were happy here, with your eyes bright and your smile wide. eventually, he would say: ↳ “hey, thanks for covering me back there. those guys never laugh at anything I say.” he rolls his eyes playfully, adding a slight shrug of his shoulders. “lemme make it up to you. what can I do for you?” he’s trying to be smooth, but he’s so giddy at the prospect at spending more time with you!

narancia ghirga.

Narancia realizes he’s in love when you don’t lose your patience with him.

he doesn’t have much of a formal education. hence, critical thinking skills don’t come easy to him. he tries his best, he really does, but it’s difficult when he’s hardly flexed his brain.

he’s writing a song. nothing fancy, but music has always been a part of Narancia’s life that he wants to give it a go himself. maybe one day he’ll be a famous hip hop artist, touring across Europe and maybe even the U.S. one day! the thought makes him excited. but for now, he needs to establish the lyrics.

rap is easier said than done, though. Fugo is teasing him about his inability to write poetry — what makes Narancia think that he could write a whole song? he grits his teeth and turns back to his paper. 

that’s when you approach him. you sit down with him, asking him what he would like to write about. “oh, uh... growing up in the streets, I guess,” he mumbles. he’s taken aback by your help. plus, talking about it now makes him embarrassed. but you don’t judge him, no; you sit down with him and try to help him nail down the theme. and once you have that, you assist him in finding snappy lyrics and catchy rhymes. 

you don’t criticize him for his ideas. you don’t yell at him for his suggestions. you just listen and add on. the encounter is foreign, to say the least... but not unwelcome. Narancia finds your help incredibly productive (much better than Fugo could ever offer him). and the time goes by so fast! within a few hours, his song is done. yet he’s not happy... no, he starts to feel lonely the moment you stand up, off to assist Bucciarati with whatever he needs. ↳ “wait, hold on, [Name]!” shit. his voice is way too desperate. he softens it as best he can muster: “can... can we write another song sometime? I have a lot more ideas and I can’t do it without you.” fuck. he did it again. but when smile at him and nod, promising that you’ll help him hit the Top 40, Narancia can’t help but smile back.  

panacotta fugo.

Fugo realizes that he’s in love when you put him before yourself.

genius. prodigy. failure. Fugo is defined by how others see him. after his parents abandoned him for leaving an abusive establishment, he finds himself lost in the world. who is he? what is he worth?

he’s escorting you to your mission when his car is attacked by a rival gang. the assault is a blur. he can remember the car flipping over, tumbling off the road and into the Mediterranean Sea. it happens so fast. the salty water surrounding you both. the windshield cracking. the airbag goes off, suffocating him. he can’t see. he can’t breathe. and suddenly, it’s dark.

when he wakes up, he realizes that you’re both on the beach. “where are we?” he musters out. it hurts to talk. you hush him to take it easy, that he had most certainly broken a few ribs. and that’s when he sees it: when he looks down, his wounds are tended to. gashes have been tenderly wrapped in gauze and minor cuts treated with balm. a pain relief patch has been placed on his chest, no doubt where the air bag hit him. but when he looks at you, you’re bleeding through your bandages.

that’s right. there was a first aid kit in the car. based on his injuries, you spent the majority of supplies on him, even though you definitely had it just as bad. “why?” is all he can say.

why? you shake your head. “because you’re my friend,” you answer, adjusting the gauze on his wrist. “I’m taking care of you because you’re worth it.”

your words catch him by surprise. he doesn’t believe it, but... your face is honest enough. his thoughts are jumbled, as mixed as the sand and water at the shore just a few meters away. and when your hand touches his wrist... he shakes his own head.

↳ “you should’ve tended to yourself first.” his tongue tastes of nothing but blood and salt and his words show it. a beat, and gentler this time: “I appreciate your thinking of me. thank you.” that’s all he can say, at least for now. it hurts to much to talk, moreover think. so he places his hand over yours as a gesture of thanks. friends, huh? the idea before sounded laughable, but now... there was something warm about it. the answer to his question — who is he? — had come as quickly as the waves beneath him: a friend.

[missmentelle]

Just some small ways that the system keeps people down

When we think about social justice, we often think about it in terms of huge, sweeping reforms that happen on a national level: the nation-wide legalization of gay marriage. The end of segregation. Loving v Virginia. Roe v Wade. Many people only vote in federal elections and only keep up with federal politics, thinking that the federal government is what “really matters” when it comes to progress and human rights. 

Federal-level politics and landmark court rulings are important, but oppression often happens in much smaller, less obvious ways. It’s in the fine print of the eligibility criteria for disability benefits. It’s in municipal zoning laws. It’s in bank mortgage eligibility policies. It’s in the enforcement of public park bylaws. The things that make life difficult for marginalized communities often come from local bureaucracy, and look something like this: Disabled people effectively do not have the right to marry. 

In the United States, when a disabled person marries a non-disabled person, they gain a spouse, but they risk losing something immensely important - namely, all of their benefits. Currently, the government assumes that a non-disabled spouse takes full responsibility for all of their disabled spouse’s needs; it becomes their job to provide the disabled spouse with healthcare, housing, basic needs and assistive devices that they require, regardless of their ability to actually afford any of these things. Obviously, this is completely out of the question for most couples. Medical costs for a person with complex needs can be exorbitant, and the average person just cannot provide things like private home health services and out-of-pocket medical expenses for their spouse. 

Unless a disabled person is marrying someone who is independently wealthy, marriage is often out of the question. 

As a result, many disabled people simply have no meaningful access to marriage or the legal benefits and protections it provides. Without a wedding certificate, your partner cannot stay with you in the hospital, access your medical information or make decisions for you while you are incapacitated - something that people with complex medical issues may desperately need their partner to be able to do. International couples may have no means of being able to live in the same country. It may not even be possible for couples to live together at all, as the state may decide that that’s a “common-law” situation and strip away disability benefits even without a formal certificate. The people who are most in need of companionship and legal protection are denied access to it because of cruel and outdated laws that were designed with the false assumption that disabled people cannot desirable partners for non-disabled spouses. 

Domestic violence victims can be evicted for being abused. 

Some cities across America have implemented “nuisance laws” - these are laws originally designed to punish “slum landlords” who don’t try to stop criminal activity or loud parties in their buildings. In cities with nuisance laws, the city tracks how many 911 calls are made to (or about) each address in the city; if an address goes over their yearly limit of 911 calls, the city goes after the property’s landlord, fining them or even threatening them with criminal charges if they don’t make the calls stop. The point of the law is to encourage landlords to keep an eye on their tenants and evict “problem” tenants that disrupt the neighbourhood, and these policies have definitely resulted in a lot of 911-related evictions. And that’s a problem. Because you know who calls 911 a lot? Domestic violence victims. 

These laws have made it so that many people experiencing domestic violence have to choose between “help” and “housing”. If your partner is violently attacking you but your landlord has told you “one more 911 call and you’re out on the streets”, what do you do? How do you navigate such an impossible situation? Many victims simply hold off calling for help unless they’re reasonably certain that their partner is going to kill them, which is incredibly and almost indescribably dangerous, and still results in threats of eviction. Even victims who never call for help themselves can still find themselves out in the cold because of these policies - nuisance laws count any 911 calls made about an address, which means that a well-meaning neighbour calling the cops because they hear screams can cost you your housing. The end result is that an already-vulnerable population are either losing their housing or losing access to lifesaving emergency services, and everyone is worse for it. 

It’s worth noting that these policies also disproportionately affect disabled, elderly and chronically ill people. When you are medically fragile, you tend to have increased medical emergencies and a decreased ability to safely transport yourself to the hospital without an ambulance. So if 80-year-old diabetic woman uses her LifeAlert bracelet to call 911 three times in a year because she’s fallen down or having a hypoglycemic episode, she could face eviction for going over her 911 limit and being a “nuisance” to the city. 

Redlining has shut black people out of wealth-building for decades. How do you build wealth in America? You need credit. If you want to achieve real financial security, you need to convince someone to loan you large amounts of money at a low interest rate so you can use that money to purchase something that will build wealth for you. Let’s say you only have a little bit of money - you go to the bank and convince them to give you a mortgage (which is effectively just a large low-interest loan) so you can purchase a house for yourself. Once you’ve paid off the mortgage and showed the bank how reliable you are, you can go back and ask them for another loan against your house, and use that loan to buy a business, or a second house to rent out for income, or just save your money while your paid-off first house continues to increase in value. When you eventually die, your kids get all the property you amassed with those loans, and they start life in an even better financial position than you did - they can use that property to get even more credit and invest in even more businesses and property. This is how most American families clawed their way into the middle class after the Great Depression - your great-grandfather buying a house in the 1940s is the reason your parents could afford to pay for your college today. 

But there is one group that have been systemically left out of that process for decades, thanks to a practice called “redlining”. 

Banks decide whether or not they are going to loan you money by deciding how much of a “risk” you are. In the 1930s, bankers determined risk by looking at maps of their cities and drawing lines around particular neighbourhoods to determine how much of a risk they were. Bankers would draw red lines around predominantly-black neighbourhoods to signal that people who lived in those neighbourhoods were not eligible for credit - this was done regardless of their income. Poor white neighbourhoods could get loans, but middle-class black neighbourhoods could not. This meant that black people could not improve their situations - they could not afford to move out of cramped black neighbourhoods, they could not get the money to start a business, and they could not afford to renovate their houses to sell them at a profit. They were effectively shut out of opportunities that their white peers were granted. 

Redlining has been illegal for decades, but the cumulative impact of generations of redlining persist to this day. Experts estimate that an average black homeowner today has missed out on $212,023 in personal wealth because of the impacts of redlining.   “Zero-tolerance” policies have harmed marginalized and neurodivergent children without making schools safer. 

If you’ve attended or worked in a grade school in the last 20 years, you’re probably familiar with so-called “zero tolerance” policies. These policies emerged as a result of the 1999 Columbine school shooting, and are pretty much exactly what they sound like - in the wake of Columbine, schools began taking an extremely hardline stance against violence and bullying, assuring worried parents that they would not tolerate even the smallest hint of violence. In schools with zero-tolerance policies in place, punishments are extremely harsh - just about everything will get you suspended at a minimum. Get in a fistfight at school? Doesn’t even matter who started it, everyone involved is suspended. Throwing food? Suspended. Shouting at someone? Suspended. It doesn’t tend to matter if you were joking around or if you'd been pushed to the brink by a student who has bullied you for months - “zero tolerance” means absolutely zero tolerance, and you are suspended. 

But if you ever actually attended a zero-tolerance school, you probably won’t be surprised to learn that these policies don’t actually have any impact on school safety. What they do accomplish is higher rates of school failure and worse overall student outcomes, especially for marginalized students. 

And it makes sense. Which students are the most likely to be acting out in school? Students with ADHD, autism and learning disorders. Students with turbulent home lives. Students in foster care. Students dealing with abuse or trauma. These are the students who need to be in school the most, and need extra support from staff and teachers - instead of getting that support, though, zero-tolerance policies send them away from school for several days at a time, where they are unable to access support and fall further behind their peers. School quickly turns into a vicious cycle; students act out because they’re frustrated, they get suspended, they fall behind in class, which leads to more frustration, which leads to more acting out, which means more suspensions, which puts them further behind, etc, etc. Eventually they become so disillusioned that many of them leave school altogether, putting them at a permanent increased risk of unemployment, poverty, and incarceration.

Parking requirements are making cities unaffordable and unlivable for the poor.

Many cities - like Toronto and Vancouver - have mandatory minimum parking requirements written into their city zoning laws. These policies usually require that all residential buildings have at least one parking space available for every unit of residential housing - if you build a 60-unit apartment building, you need to make sure that you also buy enough land for a 60-stall parking lot or build a 60-space underground parking structure. 

When you think about the reasons that housing is unaffordable, “parking” might not be one of the first things you think of, but these laws have huge impacts on the cost of housing, and they negatively impact both the city itself and the working-class people who live there. Parking spaces are not free, especially in major cities like Toronto where land is at a premium - an above-ground parking space in a city costs an average of $24,000, while a below-ground space costs $34,000. Every unit of residential housing has $24-34k in parking costs tacked onto it - whether the tenant needs a parking space or not - and you can bet that landlords and developers are passing every penny of that cost onto their tenants. 

Parking requirements also decrease the number of units available, which is a problem, because the best way to keep housing affordable is to make sure that you have a lot of it available. A developer who might want to build a 300-unit apartment complex has to factor in the cost of creating at least 300 parking spaces.... so they might scale back to a 100-unit complex instead. Downtown areas that have huge demand for housing and low demand for residential parking are being underutilized because of zoning laws that were created decades ago and no longer reflect today’s reality. Young people, elderly people and urban poor people are increasingly unlikely to own a car, but they are being priced out of walkable neighbourhoods with good public transit for the sake of unwanted parking spaces.

Food safety laws and public property usage laws are making it illegal to feed the homeless. 

“Feeding the homeless” should be one of the most uncontroversial things you can do. Giving food to a person who is hungry is one of the most basic ways that humans care for one another. Everything from cheesy Hallmark movies to the Bible reinforces the importance of giving to others in need. But in dozens of cities across America, you can be fined, arrested or even jailed for giving out food to the homeless. 

Cities use different justifications to shut down or even arrest community service workers for trying to feed the homeless. Some pass increasingly restrictive “food safety laws”, stating that charities are only allowed to give away hot food, or that they are only allowed to give away sealed and individually-packed meals, or that they are only allowed to feed homeless people indoors (something that community organizations like mine do not always have the resources to do). Restrictions continue to get tighter every year in some places, despite the fact that there are virtually zero recorded cases of a homeless person being harmed by food they received from a registered charity. Food safety laws can also force restaurants and stores to destroy their unsold food instead of passing it out; some have to go as far as pouring bleach over the food they throw out in their dumpsters. 

Other cities have used public property bylaws to ban food-sharing on public property, forcing charities to apply for permits to hand out food (which are rarely granted). Justifications for these bylaws vary - some cities give vague excuses about “safety” while others admit that they’re trying to drive homeless people out of their cities - but the end result is the same. Cities are so desperate to be rid of their homeless populations that they’ll criminalize trying to help the homeless, rather than offering stable, affordable housing solutions. 

[pi-cat000]

BNHA: something sad (Implosion)

Summary: The last time Katsuki sees Izuku alive the other boy is rushing to save him.  A ‘the Sludge Villain incident gone wrong’ aka Izuku dies.

Characters:  Katsuki Bakugo

Fandom: My Hero Academia

WARNINGS! Major Character death, swearing, heavy angst, graphic descriptions of violence

Other parts in this AU: (Something Sad),  (Anger), (Grief)

...

(Katsuki gets a taste of vigilantism)

.

“GET OFF!” Katsuki struggles against the hands pulling him down. Down. Down into never-ending darkness. Ahead of him is Deku, trapped in a swirling cocoon of shifting green sludge. The idiot is smiling, so bloody pleased with himself like he isn’t seconds away from death. He yells and struggles but the shadowy figures holding him are unaffected. All they do is watch with empty eyes.

.

Katsuki flings himself upright, taking several hash breaths. The air is still, the silence oppressive. Around him, the walls of his bedroom loom, the single remaining All Might poster he still has up glaring down at him. He is shaking drenched in sweat, hands twitching, itching, eager to blow something up. Anything to loosen the knot of empty, pointless frustration stuck in his chest. In between breaths, Katsuki rolls out of bed, yanking a jacket from where it is slung over his lopsided desk in the same move. He is not wearing a shirt and he doesn’t want to go out completely exposed.

The front door is deadlocked and needs a key. A change brought about by his continued unsanctioned trips outside.  Luckily, it is not his only exit option. Katsuki yanks open his bedroom window, sticking his head out, scanning the narrow walkway that runs between his building and the next. Nothing moves, the dark space is empty save for the apartment’s collection of communal garbage bins. Quickly, he shimmies out through the narrow opening, twisting so he can drop feet first.

It is four stories down and he lets himself fall, forming twin blasts in both hands to slow his descent.

 He had long theorised that he would be able to increase and decrease his momentum with controlled explosive bursts. Pain shoots through his ankles as he lands in a crouch next to the bins but it’s not bond-breaking, so he guesses his theory is correct.

Katsuki straightens, listening to the muffled sounds of a TV playing somewhere in the building next to him. It doesn’t seem like the sound of his blasts had caught anybody’s attention. The air outside is muggy, still warm from the day's heat. Another beat passes and he is strolling off down the street, hands shoved deep in his jacket pockets, bare feet silent on the sun-warmed pavement. Slowly, his breathing returns to normal. Now, if he could only find something to distract his dumb brain from re-playing the scene of Deku’s final moments that would be great. He needs something to fuel his anger and rage so he can distract himself from the new empty bitterness, burrowing into his chest.  

The few people he passes are salarymen returning from an evening drinking and they all give him a wide berth. He glares, daring one of them to comment on his appearance or take issue with the fact that he is a middle-schooler roaming the streets at midnight. None of them do. The cowards.

Katsuki is cutting through backstreets, making his way towards one of the busier sections of the city, when a faint groaning sound catches his attention. He freezes, listening, eyes darting over the plain brick walls, scanning the taller office buildings and apartment complexes for the source. There…around the corner… two streets down…there is someone groaning. He stalks forward, following the murmur of angry voices. In between angry muttering is the yelp of a person in pain.

Katsuki breaks into a jog, turning in the direction of the noise, following till he can make out conversation. 

“I told you to pay up old man. You stupid or something.”

“Please. I don’t have any money…”

There is the thunk of something solid hitting flesh. 

Katsuki comes to a stop near the entrance to a shadowed alleyway just big enough to fit a small car. There is a group of three adults in loose clothing, looming over a downed fourth person. A tall lanky man with a metal bat, a shorter guy with bulging arm muscles, and a greasy-haired man holding a knife are focused on an older man who is holding a briefcase over his head like a shield. Thoughts of Deku fade to be replaced with single-minded determination.

“Hey losers,” he strolls out into full view, “How about you fight someone who’s not missing his geriatrics appointment.”

All three would-be muggers, he’ll call them Tiny, Lanky and Grease-Hair, freeze, turning as one to stare at him. In his chest his blood seems to come alive as his heart rate ramps up.

“What the hell?” Tiny looks to his fellow muggers for confirmation, “it’s a kid?”

There are few seconds of disbelieving silence before Grease-Hair shakes off their collective aneurism. “Hey kid! Why don’t you fuck off? This is none of your business.”

“You weak, wannabe-thugs got a problem with the truth?” He smirks, fingers twitching. His response has three, four if you include the Brief-Case man, incredulous looks directed his way.

“You got hearing problems kid? He said to fuck off,” Lanky steps forward, resting his bat across his shoulder in a display of aggression.

Katsuki cracks his knuckles as loudly as possible and settles into a semi-crouch, ready to use his blasts to propel himself forward. It was time to put his newly confirmed quirk ability to the test.

“Guess the standard for criminals around here just really sucks.”

“You got a death wish brat?” Grease-Hair brandishes his knife, coming to stand beside Tall-and-Lanky, “I’ll make you cry so fucking much you shit stain.”

“HA! as if you could!” All at once his anger, excitement and frustration spike into a wave of adrenalin. 

Before Grease-Hair can take another step toward him, Katsuki launches himself forward, propelling himself with as big a blast as he can manage without breaking his arms. As Katsuki is naturally hardier than the average person-a secondly quirk characteristic- the blast ends up being pretty damn big. WHOOOM! It rattles the glass in the adjacent windows. His last coherent thought before he lets his mind succumb to the rush of exhilaration is that he needs to take out one of these guys as quickly as possible to even the odds.

Crunch, is the sound Grease-Hair’s face and nose make when he slams his knee into it. The snap of bones breaking is unnervingly satisfying. Grease-Hair topples over, eyes blank, expression of shock frozen on his face as he takes an express trip into dreamland. The knife clatters on the concrete.

“Holy crap!” The two remaining men offer shouts of alarm. The bat comes hurtling towards his head and Katsuki hurls himself to the side, ignoring the stab of pain that runs up his shoulder when he lands at an awkward angle. He flexes his hands, throwing both arms up in direction of his attacker who is now trying to bring the bat down on his legs.

BOOM!

Fire and smoke erupt between them, throwing them in opposite directions. The bright flash of light and heat provides enough cover for him to roll on his feet. Tiny and Lanky stumble backward and Brief-Case man makes a run for it while they are distracted. In the main street, several car alarms go off. Katsuki, being unaffected by the explosion, recovers first and leaps through the smoke, fists clenched. Moving his arm around in an arching swing, it smacks into Lanky’s head. He barely feels this sting in his wrist and knuckles as the skin on his knuckles break against his teeth. Blood sprays into the air.

It is at this point that Tiny recovers enough to retreat a few paces and make a slashing motion with his hand. Some invisible force slams into Katsuki’s side and he is flung sideward away from Lanky. Pain blossoms in his ribs and he lets off a clumsily blast to slow his momentum. He still hits the wall of the ally hard enough to leave cracks in the brick. Blood fills his mouth from where he has accidentally bitten into the side of his tongue.

A quirk effect? Something invisible that hit hard and had some range to it. Not great for him. He pushes off the wall, crouching, ready to dodge. Tiny drags Lanky to his feet. They are both glaring at him, eyes dark.

He coughs, and, even as the distant realisation that this might not have been a good idea tugs at his thoughts, he grins, “You pieces of trash are weak shit.”

“You’re fucking dead,” Lanky fumes.

Unfortunately- or maybe fortunately- Katsuki never finds out what the two thugs would have done next in retaliation because there is a loud, amplified shout from the ally entrance.  

“FREEZE COMBATANTS.”

A blinding white light flickers on and illuminates the entire alleyway, making him wince and bring an arm up to shield his eyes.

“Shit. Cops.” Both Tiny and Lanky turn, obviously intending to make a run for it, only to realise that the ally ends in a tall stone wall.

“WOULD ALL COMBATANTS TAKE FIVE STEPS AWAY FROM EACH OTHER AND FACE THE WALL!” 

Katsuki glowers in the direction of the megaphone-enhanced voice but can only make out the silhouettes of almost a dozen figures against the spotlight. Well, he’s definitely in shit now.

“ANYONE WHO DOES NOT COMPLY WILL BE SUBDUED BY FORCE!”

“Shit. Damn it.” Both men throw their hands in the air in a display of surrender not willing to try and take on what looked like half of the Musutafu police depo.  Katsuki begrudgingly follows suit, his breath beginning to even out as the rush adrenalin dips now that the fighting was over.

“Turn around and face the wall,” Is shouted once more, “Keep your hands in the air.” The silhouettes begin their approach. And they all awkwardly stand in a line and stare at the grey brick. Around them, blasted fragments of asphalt and ripped up concrete stand as damning evidence of his involvement. Guess he’ll be taking that ‘trip to the station’ after all. No way the bastards were going to let him off with a stern lecture after this.

“I hope you’re happy you psycho shit,” Lanky snaps, drawing his attention and he notes that the man is now missing one of his front teeth,  “Got us all fuckin in arrested.”

Katsuki spits out the blood that has been collecting in his mouth since he hit the wall. It spats on the ground near the man’s feet, “You got beaten up by a middle schooler. I did the criminal underworld a favour getting your weak asses off the street.”

That hits a nerve going by how the man’s face twists into a snarl of rage “Why you little…” Lanky lunges towards him and is immediately blocked by a swarm of police officers who have since surround them and tackle the man to the ground. “HEY, DON’T MOVE!” “GET ON THE GROUND” There is a lot of yelling, swearing, and spitting but the thug is quickly overwhelmed.

“All right, you, the one standing on the left…”

 Katsuki shifts his attention from watching Lanky get wrestled into cuffs to the tired-sounding cop standing a few feet behind him. Is it just him or does the guy sound annoyingly familiar?

“Put your arms down and cross them behind your back…” the sentence trails off.

“Bakugō?”

Katsuki squints over his shoulder at the familiar face of Senior Officer Watanabe. So…not just him. Fucking fantastic. Said familiar face is frozen, surprised, hands half way to opening a set of bulky cuffs.

There is a long exhale, “What have you done now.”

“Done?” Katsuki sneers, “I saw these assholes beating the shit out of some old man so I beat the shit of them instead.” Now the fight is over, that feeling of irritable restlessness is creeping back.

The Senior Officer shakes his head in disbelief, “Geeze kid, this isn’t like setting off explosives in the park, vigilantism is a serious offence.”

“What? I was supposed to do nothing then?” He grits his teeth. There, he can feel it, the anger flaring up again.

“You’re supposed to call for help. You’re lucky we got reports of the altercation and responded as quick as we did. You’re a mess kid.” 

“Tch. I was handling it.”

The man looks at him funny before letting out a long exhausted breath, “Are you going to come quietly so I can get an EMT to look you over or do I have to put you in these suppressant cuffs?”  A pause, “ And where is your shirt … and shoes?”

“Do whatever old man.” Katsuki ignores the second question. 

A firm hand lands on his shoulder, which he tries and fails to shrug off, pulling him off towards the entrance of the ally. The cuffs are handed off to another officer. They pass Tiny and Lanky who are both now sitting cross-legged on the ground, hands secured behind their backs, facing the wall. Grease-Hair, still unconscious, is being fussed over by two men in white and red paramedic uniforms. There is a small crater where Katsuki had let off his larger blast.

“Your handy work I presume?” Watanabe asks.

 “Hell yeah it is.”

That gets another sigh, “This is all going on your record. You do understand that, right?”

It must be the remaining adrenalin that has him laughing, “Like I give a shit.”

[toflyandfall]

I just saw a photo of "What persona. Dick Grayson isn't a mask. Not like Bruce Wayne is" from Detective Comics #725 and I find it interesting that Dick and the rest of the bats, with the exception of Bruce, don't wear "masks" per se. They are who they are with or without the domino mask/helmet. The only time I can really think of Dick faking things is when he pretended to be an incompetent BPD cop. How was he able to avoid creating and living, half the time, through a "persona" like "Brucie"?

Oooh, this is a lovely, meaty question.  There’s a lot more analysis of Bruce than I planned because let’s be real, it’s kinda weirder for a guy to run around with half a dozen personas than for someone else to run around as himself.  I hope you still find it interesting, but if you want to skip straight to the more Dick-centric stuff, head under the readmore.

A simple but significant factor is that Dick thrives on the company of people in a way that Bruce does not.  I suspect if you talk honestly to many introverts, you will find they too have an extroverted ‘mask’ they put on to the larger world, though probably not quite so extreme.

Another factor is that the civilian social circles Dick and Bruce travel in are vastly different.  Though they each have a reason for being in those circles, that difference itself enables Dick to escape much of the scrutiny that Bruce’s public identity undergoes, because he doesn’t frequently associate with the much more media-hounded elite.

An interesting thing here is that the large difference in social circles between their civilian lives is actually caused by their own personal similarities: they are 100% committed work-a-holics.  It’s just that they have differing civilian approaches to their goals.

I want to start with Bruce because as you point out, his use of persona is distinct among the bats and his reasons for using them in part explain why Dick and the other bats do not.

Bruce is a child of privilege, he has always lived a lifestyle of privilege, regardless of the tragedies that have occurred during it, and his default view of the world, through no fault of his own, is natively that of the extreme upper class.  This drastically influences his perspective and approach to change, and changing the world is his perpetual goal, the reason he put on the suit in the first place.

Bruce works a top-down society approach toward systemic change, and he works it all the time.  This is actually my favorite but woefully under-emphasized part of him: he is not just someone who punches people on the street ‘for justice’, he uses his company, his money, and his social position toward substantial systemic change. This post does a wonderful job covering the ways he does this through his corporations and personal wealth, as does this one.  I cannot recommend either enough because I constantly want to push even the most casual Batman fans to understand: Bruce Wayne is not just a violent punchy puncher man.  He is a traumatized person genuinely trying to use all his resources including himself to make the world safer.

Detective Comics #725

Bruce has many personas he maintains, and he uses all of them according to what suits his need--Batman for places the law can’t go, Bruce Wayne the CEO pushing for systemic changes, Matches Malone for street information, and Brucie the society high roller for society information and social influencing.  He is rarely ever not in a persona and simply ‘Bruce’.

His top-down perspective of enacting change are what dictated the usage and necessity of these personas. He has the means and capacity to basically disappear from society if he so chose--he in fact does so to train during his younger years so successfully they don’t even know how long he was actually gone. 

The Batman Files

So he doesn’t need the personas.  Not Bruce Wayne, CEO, or Brucie, or any of them really, to protect his identity.  That tells us that Brucie is a deliberate choice he made at some point.  He could have been a recluse billionaire Batman indefinitely.  Even though he fully has the status and means to not maintain a job or a persona or, let’s be frank, a life outside the mask at all, it’s his own work-a-holicness that led to the creation of his public personas.  He’s an obsessive strategist, so if Brucie is a choice, that leads us to why?

Bruce does many philanthropic things with his money, but he isn’t the only rich person around, especially not in a city as old and corrupt as Gotham.   But he’s one of the very few ones doing good with it.

The comic you mentioned has a very beautiful moment where Bruce touches on that, and in full context you can feel how consumed he is by this goal of creating the Gotham his parents would have wanted.  Batman mentions he never sees himself in that place, and the morbid interpretation is that the city kills him before he reaches it, but the hopeful interpretation is that in that shining city, Bruce Wayne and Batman and Brucie and all his masks will no longer be needed.

Detective Comics #725

Back in the old days they’d call it noblesse oblige: the inferred responsibility of privileged people to act with generosity and nobility toward those less privileged. Thomas and Martha Wayne ingrained this feeling of responsibility into Bruce by example, and as all things related to them, he obsesses over it.  It urges him to fulfill expectations within segments of society he finds onorous for the betterment of society as a whole in order to carry out their unfinished works.

Enter Brucie.

Brucie serves a two-fold purpose.  Since Bruce has chosen to maintain personas among society, it becomes a false face to justify any oddities Batman might bring into the life of Bruce Wayne by setting himself up as a eccentric, popular social scion.  But that persona itself also allows him to manipulate the upper crust of society.

I have some insider perspective on the kind of society events Brucie attends.  They’re all about the who’s who of making connections, name-dropping and networking, and unspoken class-based elitism.  Charity events among the upper class have these things at the forefront and the cause is the background.  You don’t get your hands dirty, you don’t go out and make change yourself, you pay money to be socially seen and sometimes it happens to go towards a philanthropic cause.  If you want to raise money from the rich and keep people with deep pockets coming in the door, you have to have social currency yourself. This is where, and why, Brucie comes in.  I believe Brucie ws crafted to maintain Batman’s cover but still attempt to carry on his parents’ legacy to grease the wheels of the rich in the directions he chooses: one of generosity towards those less privileged. 

Superman/Batman #51

The inevitable flaw of Bruce’s approach to his personas and their philanthropy is that in a city rife with corruption, money distributed from the top has many opportunities to disappear well before it reaches the bottom.  As in many of ways they are complements to each other, Dick’s approach balances that out, because his approach to helping his fellow man starts out at the street level...literally.

Nightwing #153 (Nightwing: The Great Leap)

Dick, we know, does not come from privilege.  His mother was from a middle class family before she joined the circus, and despite being world famous athletes, most circus workers are lower to middle class.  The people he grew up with, was comfortable with, were all working folk who expected everyone to pull their weight right alongside each other.  He enacts this everyone-together approach in almost all aspects and phases of his life. 

Batman #615

Even once he had settled into being Robin and adapted to living at the manor, he didn’t feel belonging to a culture of privilege, materialism, or high society. He preferred shotgun in the limo to chat with the driver to riding fancy in the back.  Once he was able to start making his own decisions about where and how he lived, despite having both Bruce’s money and then later inheriting a substantial amount of his own, he chose mostly lower-class communal places.

Batman Black and White #6

Dick also doesn’t see the value of throwing money at a problem when there is an option to fix it with his own hands.  We see this frequently, from building his own car instead of buying a finished one or outsourcing the work, to deciding the best way to clean out the BPD was to start at the bottom and work his way up (literally), to quitting college because his classes never got prioritized over crimesolving.  Most of his day jobs ended for similar reasons. 

Nightwing #153 (Nightwing: The Great Leap)

Despite the showmanship training, he gravitates away from spotlight on the rich and wealthy, who are notoriously the kind of people who do not get their hands dirty or go out and take care of things themselves, and prefers to find or build communities around the kind of people who do.

Finally, Dick is an extrovert.  He doesn’t need to act extroverted as Brucie does because he is extroverted.  He likes people and likes being around people.  Whether by conscious choice or not, he tends to put himself in situations where he is surrounded by people in nearly all aspects of his life.  He chooses apartment buildings whose occupants frequently pass each other on the stairs; jobs that involve interacting with many co-workers, patrons, or students; and collects superhero teammates like Boy Scout badges.  And all of these behaviors come very naturally to him.  

He doesn’t need a mask or a role or a persona for those kind of interactions; his mask is pre-supplied as “neighbor” or “co-worker” or “teacher” by the situations he puts himself in.  It helps make him an exemplary leader, because just by acting authentically to himself, he automatically builds up little communities around him any time he arrives somewhere.

Bruce, on the other hand, is an introvert.  For him, interacting with people isn’t easy, automatic, or comfortable unless it has a purpose, but as a strategist, he knows the necessity of human interaction as a catalyst to achieving dynamic change. So he adapts personas to suit people’s expectations.  Extroverts have more social currency; the life of the party can generate more resources than a brooding wallflower.  

So, it boils down to just a few elements: Dick believes in living and interacting at the street level to accomplish the things that he wants to, and he is extroverted enough that the level of social interaction that entails is not a burden to him.  He surrounds himself with the types of people he is more familiar or perhaps more comfortable with, which happens to keep him further out from the media’s eye than associating with the upper crust does. The lower profile is more incidental than intentional, but it lessens his need to have a cover story for every single bruise and lets him get away with even less of a ‘persona’.

Bruce, on the other hand, is introverted and follows a more classist view that systemic change needs to be effected from the top down.   His personas are more of a self-assumed duty than a necessity, as a way of trying to carry out his parents’ legacy.  Any of his children could have chosen to follow his path in business or the high society limelight, but the sense of obligation toward it is something personal to him that most of them don’t share.

[rubix-writings]

Punisher Pt. 3

Third part of Punisher. I apologize it’s taking me so long to post these, but want to make sure they’re good for you all. Thank you for the support so far!! This is a Chicago PD/Fire imagine with an original character. I don’t own any of the plot points or characters from the show. Also, it doesn’t follow any particular season or sequence in the shows.

Series Summary: Josephine (Jo) never expected to find support and pure love when she left Los Angeles. She ran away to Chicago and was content with living an insignificant, hidden life. But everything changes when she walks into Molly’s to get a job.

Josephine (OC) x Jay Halstead

The italicized lines are internal thoughts of the character.

Warnings: language, mentions of drinking, long (!)

Things are going really well at Molly’s. It’s like falling into step during a choreographed dance. It feels odd to say that I’m comfortable and confident when it’s only my second shift. I’m working with Stella tonight, who to say the least had a lot of fun the night before. When she first walked into the bar she looked as if Casper made a stop in Chicago. At the start of opening she kept her jacket on and slammed down cups of black coffee. Her body seemed to stay in a permanent state hunched over the bar top while she only communicated through slow movements with her fingers. I couldn’t watch her pain any longer, so I used my break to grab a cheeseburger and fries so greasy the oil soaked the paper bag. 

“You need to put something solid into your body,” I announce as I plop the white, greased bag on the bar top in front of Stella’s practically limp body. She slowly lifts her head with a deep groan and analyzes the bag.

“I’m a firefighter Jo, my body is a temple. I can’t eat this,” I can’t stop the laugh that escapes my lips.

“Are tequila shots a part of your ‘temple’s’ regimen?” she sniffs the bag and sighs.

“You see, the tequila actually kills all the bacteria in the stomach,” Stella examines the golden fry before taking a bite. 

“Be sure to tell your theory to the doctors that come in later, I’m sure they’d love to hear that.”

“I will,” she says with a mouthful of cheeseburger. 

Just like magic, Stella is back to her bouncy self. It amazes me how much like Hermann she is, she practically floats around Molly’s. She talks to everyone and makes sure they’re having a good time. Stella sets the tone of the entire bar, bringing life to every inch of the place. It’s nice to watch her interact with others, a part of me is envious of how natural it comes to her. A part of me is, also, envious of her relationship with Kelly. His eyes when he looks at her are filled with unconditional love and the way Stella looks at him when he’s not looking confirms that she feels the same. I’ve never had that… or will have it. The bar top serves its purpose as a closed door to the patrons on the other side, I open it as much as I want and they see what I want them to see. I’m in control.

It’s a busy Friday night, the bar filled quickly. The firemen I met last night stroll in with the same vigor as the night before, obviously hurting a lot less than Stella was a few hours ago. Stella plays it off as if she didn’t have a raging hangover, but Kelly quickly throws her under the bus. Cruz yells as he claims he’s known the truth all along, but Mouch steps in to deny it, leading to Cruz listing out facts about how he knew. I place a few beer bottles in front of the guys, trying not to get involved.

“I’m sorry about them,” Matt says.

“There’s nothing to be sorry for. They’re funny,” I smile.

“You don’t have to hear it all day long,” Matt grumbles as he takes a long sip from his beer.

“This is true. I get them in concentrated doses,” I excuse myself to collect empties at the tables scattered around the room. With my hands full I turn to head back to the bar top, but crash into a hard body. I stumble back from the blow and the mystery man swiftly grabs my arms to keep me from falling. Once I get my footing back, he releases my arms.

“Sorry about that. Are you okay?” His voice is like velvet that draws my eyes up to look at his face. Wow. My mind fell into a haze barely registering his question. 

“Um, yeah. Thanks,” he smirks at how long it took me to answer his question. Really smooth Jo. “I should get back to work, sorry about running into you,” I walk backwards a few steps, he immediately steps forward keeping the same amount of space between us as before.

“Let me at least help you with those, I’m heading to the bar anyway,” before I could object, his large hand cradles the numerous beer bottles that were once in my hand. Before my brain can spiral about his large hands, I spin and head back to the bar. I silently weave through the customer’s of Molly’s, I needed to get back to my safe zone to hopefully make his charm less effective. He gently places the bottles on the bar top for me to discard, I smile and thank him. Before I can ask for his order, the firemen and Stella welcome him to the bar.

“Hey Jay, haven’t seen you around here in awhile,” Stella mentions. 

“Yeah I know. Um have you seen my brother anywhere?” Stella shakes her head no. Brother? I try to seem like I’m not listening while cleaning up behind the bar and get any excuse not to look at him again. One embarrassing moment for tonight is enough. Out of nowhere, Will pops up and slaps Jay on the back. They go in for a quick hug before Will says hi to everyone. 

“Hey don’t kill me, but I invited Nat. I know it’s supposed to just be us, but she had a really rough day,” Will whispers, Jay shakes his head to let him know he’s totally fine with it. “Great, thanks man.”

I put two glasses of red wine on the bar top for two women that definitely want to take a firefighter home tonight. After how many women these men turned down the night before I highly doubt they’ll have any luck, but I’m kinda rooting for them.

“Hey Jo,” Will smiles.

“Hi Will,” I say in monotone to mess with him.

“Have you met my brother Jay?” Will slaps Jay’s chest which startles Jay a little, making me smile. Geez, these guys must have gorgeous parents. Will is handsome of course, but Jay... 

“We kinda ran into each other actually.” I smirk.

“Oh that’s great, he’s a really good guy. He’s a cop, detective, sorry,” Will corrects himself, Jay is glaring at him.

“I’m not making you a manhattan,” he slaps his hand against the bar top.

“Worth a shot. Can I get a glass of chardonnay and a beer, oh and whatever Jay’s having,” I nod and grab Will his drinks. He slides me his credit card to open a tab then walks off to see Natalie at the table.

“I’m definitely missing something, why does my brother want a manhattan?” Jay finally asks. 

“Oh Jay it was great!” Stella jumps in to tell a very colorful version of the events that happened between Will and I. As she finishes up she is swept to the end of the bar to take an order. 

“She was drunk last night” I mumble under my breath. Jay smirks, knowing Stella’s retelling was probably fabricated. “What can I get you?” I try to change the subject.

“A beer please,” I nod. “You’re new here Jo?” He phrases it as a question, but it's definitely more of a statement. 

“Yeah, started yesterday,” I hand him his beer. 

“Thanks. Are you from Chicago?”

“No, LA actually, lived there my whole life,” I lean my forearms on the bar top in front of him.

“Wow, big change.” “Yeah, I don’t know if I thought it all the way through to be honest,” he smiles.

“Well let me tell you if you haven’t figured it out already, snow and winter are incredibly overrated.” “Ah yes, that’s exactly what I needed to hear. I can go back to LA now.” “Glad to be of service,” he shrugs. Jay stayed on the same stoll at the bar for the rest of the night. It was strange how easy it was to talk with him, he offered stories about his job and funny stories about him and Will growing up. It’s so beautiful to have those stories, that he’s gone through life with someone that deeply and come out the other side. I tell him that I don’t have siblings and mostly spent time with my mom when I was young. Jay was quick to offer up Will to fill the void.

“I’ll keep you updated on that,” I laugh.

“Are you and your mom still close?”

“Um no, she… she died about ten years ago,” even though her death happened so long ago it still felt so weird saying it out loud. 

“I’m sorry Jo. I lost my mom to cancer a few years back.”

“So you get it,” he nods and offers a somber smile. 

It wasn’t till Will and Natalie announced their departure, that Jay made any moves to leave Molly’s. The bar was slowly emptying out as last call was already declared. 

“I should head out, it was really nice talking with you Jo,” Jay stands.

“It was really nice talking with you too Jay,” I say sincerely. He smiles wide before making a beeline for the front door. I can’t help but stare until he’s fully out of sight, my cheeks start to hurt from fighting the smile on my face. I tuck my loose hair behind my ear and start grabbing the empty glasses from the bar top. 

“Have fun?” Stella questions, I jump slightly not realizing she was standing there.

“Another good night for tips, yeah,” she looks at Kelly who’s the last of the firefighters at the bar. 

“Sure, doesn’t hurt that Officer Handsome was here all night either.” “I… I’m going to wash the glasses,” I pick up the large plastic crate with dirty drinking glasses and head to the back where Hermann showed me where the sink was. Stella didn’t mention Jay again, but it didn’t matter. The damage was done, Jay’s blue eyes and the way he got so passionate during a story were ingrained in my mind for the rest of the night. 

***

Hermann asked if I could open Molly’s for him the next day as he was running late with paperwork at the firehouse. I had a short shift that night anyway and could use the extra money no matter how little. Hermann told me to meet him at the firehouse to give me the keys since they haven’t been able to cut me my own yet. The firehouse isn’t far from Molly’s, a couple blocks on foot. I prepared myself with my warmest coat for the trek since the wind chill makes Chicago brutally cold. I focus on the sound of my shoes against the wet pavement to take my mind off of how cold I really am. 

The firehouse is a ball of color on this cold, dark Chicago day. The plain brick buildings surrounding it emphasize the reds and yellows. It somehow feels untouched by the rest of the city, a true sign of purity. As soon as I walk through the doors of the firehouse I’m met with the sweet smell of food cooking. It’s as if my feet have a mind of their own and take my body towards the magnificent smell’s source. The kitchen was buzzing with people cooking, talking, and playing card games. 

“Jo!” Stella yells, “what are you doing here?” she walks over to me, leaving her conversation with Matt and Kelly, who both wave at me.

“I’m here to get the keys from Hermann, do you know where he is?” 

“Yeah, he’s in the garage let me take you to him,” I try to argue that it could wait, but Stella insists. “Hermman!” she yells once we get into the garage. 

“What?!” he snaps back. She giggles as we both walk towards the outburst. As we turn around the big fire engine, I see why Stella was so insistent about not waiting. “Oh hey, Jo,” he says calmer.

Jay is standing tall with a notepad in front of Hermann. Stella silently excuses herself from the conversation and makes her way back inside. Hermann pays no attention to his surroundings as he’s searching for the three keys I need to open Molly’s. 

“Hey,” Jay smiles.

“Hi.”

“Here you go, I labeled them for you so you know what lock they go into. Once you get inside, lock the front door, just in case,” I nod and take the keys from him. The silver keys have thin pieces of masking tape on them with dark blue sharpie stating what they open. 

“Thanks, I’ll see you there,” I back away from the men to head back to the bar. Hermann nods and waves.

“Hermann we’re done here right?” Jay asks.

“Yeah, let me know if you find anything,” Hermann states somewhat hopeless. Jay puts away the notepad in his back pocket of his jeans and jogs to catch up to me. The sound of Jay’s thick boots hitting the cement fills the sound of the garage. When he finally catches up to me, he moves ahead to open the door to outside for me. 

“So you’re stalking me now?” He jokes.

“Um how did you get to that? Hermann asked me to come here,” Jay quickly fell into step with me, not that it was difficult as he’s much taller than me.

“I was here first,” he says plainly.

“Oh well, with that bulletproof logic…” he laughs.

“You headed to Molly’s?” we stop walking once we get to the sidewalk.

“Yeah, I’m opening today,” Jay slips the keys to his car from his jacket pocket. 

“Let me drive you.” “Oh no, you don’t have to do that. It’s only a couple of blocks and you’re working,” I spew out trying to find an excuse that’ll stick.

“Don’t worry about me. I’m parked right here,” he brushes off quickly. I roll my eyes at his back and get into the car. Jay puts the car into gear and sets off towards Molly’s. 

“So, is Hermann okay?” I ask since I couldn’t get his hopeless tone out of my head.

“His house was broken into, they didn’t get a lot, just some jewelry and a few Alexa’s. His wife came home which freaked them out and they bolted before they did any real damage.” “Jesus. Poor Hermann. Do you think you’ll find his stuff?” “Probably not, that sort of stuff is so small that they may keep it for themselves instead of pawning it, but we’ll try,” the car is silent for a little while till Jay pulls in front of Molly’s.

“Thanks for the ride.” “Course,” I get out of the car and make my way onto the sidewalk. “Hey Jo,” Jay says out of his rolled down window. 

“Hey Jay,” I say while playing with the keys Hermann gave me.

“Are you working late tonight?”

“Not too late, I have a short shift.”

“How about I meet you here later and we get a drink?” Jay says casually. I bite my lip and look down the street in hopes to take my mind off of what he just asked.

“Maybe,” I say as I make eye contact with him again. “See yah Jay.”

“See yah Jo.”

I’m losing control.

[tabloidtoc]

National Enquirer, May 10

You can buy a brand new copy of this issue without the mailing label for your very own at my eBay store: https://www.ebay.com/str/bradentonbooks

Cover: Prince Charles orders Prince Harry to divorce Meghan Markle

Page 2: In a sniveling fit of pique, scorned Alex Rodriguez has trashed former fiancee Jennifer Lopez as a dud in the sack and A-Rod is moaning J. Lo drove him to chase excitement elsewhere because she couldn't keep up with his sex demands and Alex is defending his piggish behavior by saying Jennifer pushed him into it and their spark died long ago, and they were barely intimate for the best part of a year before calling it quits -- Jennifer would pack on the PDA for the cameras, but the moment they were in private she pushed Alex away and even made him sleep in a separate bedroom and he says it was like dating an ice queen and pities the next guy she ropes in -- Jennifer thought she and Alex had a pretty good connection during their happier times, even though she'd likely admit things really petered out toward the end when the lack of trust set in so it will sting her that he's trashing her skills in the bedroom

Page 4: Robert De Niro is getting pummeled by estranged wife Grace Hightower's free-spending ways and his bitter spouse is intent on taking the aging legend for every penny as their nasty divorce drags on -- Robert's lawyers argued in court that greedy Grace's extravagant lifestyle has forced him to take every job he can snag, causing the 77-year-old to toil 12-hour days, six days a week and what's more, Robert's Nobu restaurant business has hit hard times and his tax bills to Uncle Sam are piling up but he is reportedly worth a whopping $500 million, and Grace's lawyers have countered he's pleading poverty but regularly charters a helicopter to Sunday brunch, a charge denied by his lawyer and her attorneys also claimed Robert frequently flies to Florida on a private plane and spends millions and millions on himself -- meanwhile, Robert's relationship with 66-year-old Grace has taken such a nosedive, she's spending frivolously just to punish him and she's walked into a shop a spent $80,000 in 15 minutes and she will go on vacations to the Bahamas, stop at the duty-free store and pay four times the price of what things usually cost and she has more wigs than Imelda Marcos had shoes -- Robert met Grace in 1987 when she was working as a waitress in London, and they married a decade later but they split in 1999 then reconciled and renewed their vows in 2004 before finally calling it quits in 2018 -- De Niro has forked over as much as $375,000 a month to his spouse since their split and the financially squeezed star may resort to doing product endorsements just to pay the bills -- under the terms of the couple's prenuptial agreement, once Grace and Robert are finally divorced, she's allowed a $6 million home, $500,000 cash and $1 million in annual alimony, but her lawyers have argued she should be entitled to half his fortune

* Nearly two years after Hayden Panettiere accused ex-boyfriend Brian Hickerson of brutally attacking her, the bully was sentenced to serve time in Los Angeles after he pleaded no contest to two felony counts of injuring a spouse or girlfriend, and the remaining charges of battery, assault with a deadly weapon and dissuading a witness were dismissed and he was hit with 45 days behind bars and four years' probation but he'll get credit for 12 days served -- he's done his own damage and will pay a permanent price for it -- meanwhile, Hayden is now in a great place in her life

Page 5: Danny Masterson has dragged Leah Remini into his rape case, claiming her docuseries Scientology and Its Aftermath influenced his alleged victims to file police reports against him -- former Scientologist Leah offered the women inducements and benefits to report Masterson to cops, his lawyer Tom Mesereau told a L.A. criminal court -- Danny, a 45-year-old Scientologist and That '70s Show alum, has pleaded not guilty to charges he raped three women in separate incidents between 2001 and 2003 -- Mesereau also called an LAPD detective who worked a second job as security for Leah a double agent and questioned how a 2000 police report made by one alleged victim went missing, but Deputy District Attorney Reinhold Mueller dismissed Mesereau's double agent claims as hyperbole and said the defense got a copy of the missing report and Mesereau's request to push back Masterson's preliminary hearing, a Scientology delay tactic, was also rejected

Page 6: Kelly Osbourne's shocking relapse after nearly four years of sobriety occurred amid intense family drama for the former reality show clan -- Kelly's mom Sharon Osbourne's exit from The Talk amid racism claims by co-hosts and dad Ozzy Osbourne's struggles with crippling Parkinson's disease and excruciating nerve damage frazzled her and she confessed she relapsed and she's not proud of it, but she's back on track and she's truly learned that it is just one day at a time -- her parents' problems weighed heavily on 36-year-old Kelly, who first struggled with substance abuse in her teens, and there's no doubt her mother's scandalous exit from The Talk played a big role as Kelly was crushed over the beating Sharon took in the press and retired rocker Ozzy's relentless suffering also pains Kelly and throw in brother Jack Osbourne's progressive MS and she's dealing with a lot

Page 7: Distressed Dolly Parton is ready to stage an all-star country intervention for her party-hearty goddaughter Miley Cyrus after recent photos of the troubled wild child swilling booze triggered alarm bells for Miley's family members and inner circle, including Dolly who has acted as a mentor to Miley and Dolly has always fussed over Miley like a mother hen and she's worried Miley is going to throw away her career and her life -- 75-year-old Dolly is so concerned about 28-year-old Miley that she's talked about reaching out to other country icons to arrange a meeting with the former Disney child star and help her consider her options and Dolly wants to enlist women she knows Miley truly admires, like Reba McEntire and Loretta Lynn, and organize a sit-down and Dolly knows if Miley hears from legends who achieved so much in the music industry, she's likely to understand any mistakes she makes now can affect her life forever -- every time Dolly thinks Miley's got her demons beat, she hears of another slip-up, so she feels like it's time to take action and Miley's parents Billy Ray Cyrus and Tish Cyrus, who are good pals of Dolly, are thankful for Dolly's concern because Billy Ray and Tish have tried talking to Miley, but she tunes her parents out and they agree their daughter is more likely to respond to Dolly and her legendary friends

* Angelina Jolie blamed her ugly divorce with Brad Pitt for dashing her dreams to direct movies -- she and Brad split in 2016 and the two have been locked in a mudslinging legal slugfest ever since -- Angie says she love directing, but she had a change in her family situation that's not made it possible for her to direct for a few years and Angie, who last directed 2017's First They Killed My Father, said she needed to just do shorter jobs and be home more, so she kind of went back to doing a few acting jobs

Page 8: Shamed sleaze Matt Lauer has been snubbed by his old Hamptons crowd, and it's got the scandal-scarred scumbag down in the dumps and the super-rich who live and socialize in the fashionable high-society playground won't forget how Lauer was axed from his longtime Today gig over bombshell allegations of sexual misconduct and Matt's done everything he can to regain his place in the community, from hanging out in the village to splashing money around and tipping too well and he's convinced he can make a comeback, but snooty residents turn their noses up and it must be difficult for him because it's tough for anyone who wants to get in with this crowd but for Matt it's become almost impossible -- with scandal raging, Lauer's marriage to Annette Roque collapsed and they divorced in 2019 after a two-year separation and they share three children, daughter Romy, 17, and sons Jack, 19, and Thijs, 14, and Lauer has denied any wrongdoing and insisted his reputation was wrongly smeared in a media feeding frenzy intent on destroying him -- after his divorce, Matt hooked up with public relations guru Shamin Abas and the two have reportedly been pals for years and were first linked when Matt took her to his New Zealand home in December 2019 and Matt's friends are saying he's talking about a big Hamptons wedding when he and Shamin make things official, but it would be a failure if no one attends but Shamin has a lot of connections, so maybe that will help in time -- Matt's obviously an embarrassment in the area and he's not getting much joy at the swanky country clubs he likes to frequent either and it's clear to see that doors from many A-listers, like Martha Stewart, Gwyneth Paltrow and Scarlett Johansson, who have had ample time to put out the welcome mat and Matt won't be getting invites to their homes anytime soon

Page 9: Kourtney Kardashian is packing on the PDA with new boyfriend Travis Barker and insiders said her desperate bid to compete with her sisters has gone way over the top and ever since Kourtney and Travis first went public, the oldest Kardashian sibling has made it a point to post the couple's passionate romps in racy pics and videos on social media and people in her circle feel it's beneath her to advertise her personal moments like this and even her family thinks it's unflattering, but she's getting a kick out of showing off her wild side and Kourtney has been desperate to raise her profile to keep up with internet-savvy sisters Kim Kardashian and Khloe Kardashian, who promote themselves by posting incessantly and Kourtney was always more low-key, but now she thinks she needs to be outrageous to keep up but her friends and family say it's not who she is, and she should put a lid on the steam

Page 10: Hot Shots -- Alison Brie helped tend to newly planted trees in Malibu, Chris Rock tuned out the world with a set of headphones while walking in Miami, Dylan McDermott plays a bad guy on Law & Order: Organized Crime, Dancing with the Stars pro Sasha Farber buzzed around L.A. on an electric bike, Margot Robbie skating in Malibu

Page 11: Paula Abdul is filling in for Luke Bryan on American Idol, but she's gone crazy with fillers and Botox to the point where she can barely move her face -- 58-year-old Paula, one of the show's original three judges who left before the ninth season, jumped at the chance after Luke tested positive for COVID-19, but when she showed up for work, she was far from the familiar face everyone was expecting and she must have given her co-hosts quite a fright because her face is blown up like a balloon and her forehead has no lines and her eyes have no crinkling at the corners that you would normally expect on someone who's pushing 60 and people are saying she never did know when to quit and this time she's really gone overboard and it was a shame, since it's no secret she'd love to make a comeback on the show and she's still in fantastic shape, but it's kind of sad to see her fall victim to these Hollywood trends as she's a lovely lady and should leave well enough alone -- her heart-shaped face may predispose her to a slower aging process than longer facial shapes

* Jessica Simpson has plumped up her kisser, but one expert thinks her new inflated piehole would look better on a fish because she's gone overboard with filler in her lips and the end result is an unnatural and very unattractive look because the M-shape of the middle upper lip is distorted, creating a fishy appearance she surely wasn't going for

Page 12: Straight Shuter gossip column -- James Bond will be gunning for Top Gun: Maverick on movie screens in November, and Tom Cruise isn't happy -- moving the Top Gun sequel from July to November has left Tom shaken and stirred and no one is more competitive than Tom and going up against the new 007 film starring Daniel Craig has put the fear of God into him because Tom likes to win and coming in second is not an option so get ready for an all-out box office war between Tom and James Bond and this is going to get ugly

* Just out-of-the-closet Colton Underwood has been invited back to his old stomping grounds on The Bachelor but he won't be the new Gay Bachelor, but there's been talk about him returning to help contestants through the process -- he'll literally play the gay best friend who helps the straight contestants find love

* Bridgerton stud Rege-Jean Page won't be back for season 2, but crossing the show's powerful producer Shonda Rhimes was not smart because Shonda is not used to being told no, especially by an actor no one had heard of before she cast him -- Rege-Jean was naive about the business of Hollywood, but he's learning fast but saying no to Shonda is a move he's now thinking twice about

* Irina Shayk had her hands full during a photo shoot in NYC (picture)

Page 13: Racy reality series The Bachelorette has so disgusted some American viewers, they've flooded the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) with complaints and calls to yank the sexy show from TV -- according to documents, a season 16 dodgeball game that turned into a stripping competition among Clare Crawley's suitors in 2020 especially fueled viewers' rage, even though the aired footage was blacked out to protect the men's privates but the game was not over until one team was fully naked

* Matchmaker Olivia Newton-John is itching to play Cupid for longtime pal John Travolta as her Grease co-star approaches the one-year anniversary of the death of his beloved wife Kelly Preston and Oliva would like nothing more than to bring some joy and happiness back into John's life and she has lots of beautiful, fun-filled lady friends from the U.S. and Australia she could set John up with but he may not be ready for a new romance, and John himself has admitted mourning is individual and experiencing your own journey is what can lead to healing and John still hasn't gotten over Kelly's death yet and it feels like yesterday to him

Page 15: Tiger Woods' former mistress Jamie Jungers is dishing about her doomed 18-month affair with the then-married golf great and the fallout that triggered her harrowing spiral into drug addiction in a juicy new tell-all -- Jamie, 38, said she met the skirt-chasing links legend, now recovering from a shattered right leg after a February car crash, during her stint as a party host in Sin City and she claimed they kicked off a fling behind the back of his wife Elin Nordegren and Tiger would often fly his new squeeze to his L.A. home for their secret trysts and Jamie said she even once signed for a package at the newlyweds' pad that turned out to be wedding photos of Tiger and his bride, who divorced the sex addict in 2010 -- but it was not too hard for Jamie to convince herself the couple's marriage was on the skids because Elin spent so much time in her native Sweden and Jamie confessed she loved Tiger in a way but knew they'd never have a real relationship -- things came to a screeching halt when the tightwad millionaire refused to help her find new digs and Jamie kept her lips zipped about the hush-hush affair for three years, but she claimed her ensuing media appearances, in which she was dubbed Mistress No. 4, left her feeling humiliated, triggering a $500 a day pill habit that led to her getting hooked on heroin and meth and homeless Jamie endured failed stints in rehab, went through detox while behind bars and hit rock bottom before getting clean in 2018 and now sober, she said of her former flame she's not in love with him anymore

Page 16: Picky parents Alec Baldwin and Hilaria Baldwin have found one thing that's even tougher than raising six kids: finding the right nanny -- Alec and Hilaria have high expectations for prospective carers and exacting demands when it comes to their duties and Hilaria is so involved with the kids, so she's especially vigilant and has the final say when it comes to hiring and firing though Alec definitely has his checklist on what makes a good nanny and try as they might, they realize they can't do everything themselves and need help, lots of it, but it's been a logistical nightmare getting a team of nannies organized as Alec and Hilaria are tough on them and firm and long hours and multitasking are a must and of course they must be quick on their toes and know what to do with a cranky set of children without losing their cool and a good disposition, a clean and tidy appearance and the ability to step in last minute when needed are all prerequisites to be a Baldwin nanny -- Hilaria and Alec feel guilty about using more help than they initially thought they'd need and typically have at least two nannies on duty and they're doing their best to keep their home from becoming a nuthouse and stay sane and even when Hilaria and Alec are both home at the same time, they still need help changing diapers and doing endless loads of laundry, preparing meals and snacks and assisting homeschooling for the older ones and making sure they all get plenty of exercise and playtime -- it's been a challenge and they won't settle for anything but the most skilled nannies, and their friends can see the efforts are paying off

Page 17: Britney Spears has taken to social media to insist she's OK, but there are increasing concerns over the singer's state of mind -- Britney, 39, has shared bizarre Instagram posts showing her maniacally dancing and also bellyached that she's trying to learn how to use technology in this technology-driven generation, but to be totally honest she can't stand it -- the wacky videos followed the documentary Framing Britney Spears, which cast an unflattering spotlight on her troubled history amid her fight to have her conservator dad Jamie Spears removed from overseeing her personal and financial affairs and Britney, who has not had control over her own cash or major life decisions since her notorious 2008 breakdown, said the documentary's portrayal embarrassed her and brought her to tears and she cried for two weeks -- still, Britney reassured fans she's totally fine and she's extremely happy, she has a beautiful home, beautiful children, referring to her sons Sean, 15, and Jayden, 14, and although Britney, who's been coupled up with 27-year-old personal trainer Sam Asghari since 2016, insisted she's enjoying herself, she was caught on camera in Malibu appearing out of sorts and she looked a total mess and she looked like she hadn't brushed her hair in days and the truth is she's wracked with anxiety and she doesn't trust anyone in her orbit except her boyfriend

Page 18: American Life -- Like many dads, J.B. Handley couldn't understand his teenage son, but in this case, 18-year-old Jamison Handley is autistic and has not spoken a word since he was born -- using a breakthrough strategy called Spelling to Communicate (STC), J.B. discovered his son was hyper-intelligent and now Jamison is graduating from high school and will go to college to study neuroscience in 2022

Page 19: Newly single Kanye West is in the market for someone to cuddle with now that Kim Kardashian is out of the picture and the National Enquirer has decided to help him in his quest: Amanda Gorman, Bjork, Quay Dash, Marina Abramovic, Maria Cristerna

* While Kanye West is looking for a new lady to be his creative muse, his estranged wife Kim Kardashian sees the dating pool as the source of her next career move -- Kim has not been romantically linked to anyone since she filed for divorce in February and she's not dating anyone because, if she were, it would be a career move and Kim can't date quietly; she doesn't even understand what that would be like

Page 22: Katie Holmes and her boytoy beau Emilio Vitolo Jr. haven't been photographed together in more than a month, leaving people to wonder if the once snap-happy couple's romance is cooling off -- after being constantly caught on camera packing on the PDAs, the coosome twosome's vanishing act has sources suspecting work stress is taking a toll -- they're still together but things aren't anything like they were, and Katie seems pretty down and Emilio has been working long hours at his dad's restaurant, which was hit hard during the pandemic and that's meant less time for him and Katie to hang out and their romance may have gone from full boil to simmer

* Hollywood Hookups -- Danica Patrick and Carter Comstock dating, Zac Efron and Vanessa Valladares split, Madison LeCroy is dating a mystery man

Page 23: Lizzo stripped nude on social media for an unedited selfie to promote body positivity in all its glory and the 32-year-old defied the haters by bravely going makeup-free and wearing only her birthday suit -- she said she's letting it all hang out to encourage girls struggling with their self-image and self-confidence to embrace their natural beauty

* Bethenny Frankel plans to spend a whopping $10 million on her upcoming wedding -- she is set to wed Paul Bernon after she was spotted flashing a ginormous sparkler reportedly worth over $400,000 and movie producer Paul, 43, has given Bethenny, 50, carte blanche to spend whatever she wants so she's thinking 50,000 roses, champagne, gilt-edged glasses, a garden setting with fountains, dancers and a choir and Bethenny wants it to be perfect and she expects the best of everything

* Julianna Margulies has admitted things were hot on the set of ER, and it was because she and co-star George Clooney had a crush on each other and the chemistry on the beloved TV series between Julianna, now 54, and George, 60, was organic, she gushed in her upcoming memoir -- she also said when you create an environment that people feel safe in, then you do your best work and George taught her that and she felt so safe with him

Page 25: Troubled Tori Spelling is convinced having a sixth baby is the only way to bring her rocky 15-year marriage to Dean McDermott back from the brink -- Tori, 47, and Dean, 54, have been living separate lives for months and she has frequently been seen in public without her wedding ring and lately they've been more like brother and sister than husband and wife, but Tori is under the impression that another baby will give them a fresh start -- Dean has tried to repair their romance by taking on more dad duties and he even pushed for a recent family getaway to Palm Springs, where Tori socked her husband with the ultimatum to give her another baby or hit the highway and it's true they got along a lot happier when she was pregnant, but a lot of people think she's being delusional since they still have a lot of issues to work through and having another kid isn't going to be a magic fix and in fact, it may even add to their problems

Page 26: Cover Story -- Prince Harry's desperate bid to make peace with his estranged royal family exploded spectacularly when his father Prince Charles gave him an ultimatum to divorce Meghan Markle or you're out forever -- the secret showdown came after the funeral for his grandfather Prince Philip that forced family members to reunite for the first time following a year of bitterness and shocking allegations and any hope Harry had of mending fences and being welcomed back went out the window when he broke Queen Elizabeth's heart by snubbing her 95th birthday right after the funeral because he flew back to California the day before her birthday and it was the last straw for Charles, who was furious and he was stunned his son couldn't wait just 24 hours more to show respect for his grandmother and felt compelled to rush back to his pregnant wife Meghan and it would have meant so much for Her Majesty, who was still mourning her husband and needs all the comfort she can get but instead Harry headed back to his ritzy $14 mansion and Hollywood lifestyle, callously leaving his grieving grandmother on what should have been her big day -- the word is Meghan ordered him back as he'd been gone 10 days, their longest separation since they wed, and she didn't want his family playing mind tricks on him, trying to convince him he should return to the U.K. -- Charles confronted his younger son about snubbing Her Majesty during a phone call from his country getaway in Wales, where Charles was grieving his father Prince Philip and considering the future of the monarchy and Charles didn't mince words and he called Harry selfish and blamed Meghan for ripping the family apart and he bluntly admitted he and other royals, including the queen herself, were deeply disappointed and very angry by what the couple said in an explosive tell-all TV special and he couldn't believe Harry would agree to such a devastating interview without pressure from his publicity-obsessed wife or her advisors and Charles told Harry he was ashamed of him for turning his back on his family and breaking his grandmother's heart and Charles said he didn't believe Harry's marriage can survive long-term and suggested that Meghan was so ambitious, she'd dump Harry when something, or someone, better came along then he shockingly told his son he would only be welcomed back if he divorced that American actress and Charles insisted divorce was the only way to save the royal family and Harry himself -- Harry faced a great deal of frostiness from other members of the family after he arrived for Philip's funeral: Princess Anne, Prince Edward, his wife Sophie and other relatives didn't even look at Harry, they are so angry with him and Meghan, and Prince William and his wife Duchess Kate tried to put on a united front, speaking to Harry as they walked away from the service, but it was all for show as the queen had ordered a truce in the feud to avoid another public scandal, but family feelings are running very deep against Harry and Meghan for quitting royal duties and trashing the royals in their interview and the truth is if Harry doesn't divorce Meghan, this rift will never be mended

Page 36: Ellen DeGeneres confessed she'd swilled three cannabis-laced drinks and popped two snooze-inducing pills before driving wife Portia de Rossi to the hospital for an emergency appendectomy -- during an interview with Jimmy Kimmel, Ellen said she'd downed a commercial beverage containing the weed compounds THC and CBD and admitted she didn't feel anything and then she drank three, and she also took two melatonin sleep pills and she's lying in bed and realizes Portia is not in bed -- after finding Portia on all fours and in pain, Ellen claimed her adrenaline kicked in and she rushed Portia to the hospital

Page 38: Gwyneth Paltrow knows at least one person who is not a fan of her catalog of sex toys: her mom Blythe Danner -- while Gwynnie loves to bang the drum for frisky female fun by hawking vibrators, whips, handcuffs, genital-themed jewelry and even a candle called This Smells Like My Orgasm, her 78-year-old mother is always shocked by her raunchy online inventory and is very proper, but Gwyneth said even proper ladies have sexuality too -- although her mom is not lining up to purchase the BDSM starter kit or the $15,000 gold-plated dildo, Gwyneth remains committed to tackling taboos related to female pleasure, saying she thinks that our sexuality is such an important part of who we are and one of the things they really believe in at Goop is eliminating shame from these topics

* The Entourage crew might get back together, with Charlie Sheen joining the gang -- the creator of the bro show and 2015 spinoff movie said he may bring the boys back with his buddy Charlie in the reboot and Doug Elin says whether he would ever be in Entourage as Charlie Sheen or whether he would create a character for him, he would be all for it -- Charlie hasn't been seen on the big screen since a 2018 guest spot on Saturday Night Live

Page 42: Red Carpet -- Sofia Vergara

[angst-fairygodmother]

Light Fingers (The Umbrella Academy)

Diego’s vigilantism brings him repeatedly across the path of a young cat burglar. But as he finds himself developing feelings for the thief, he begins to wonder if there’s more to her than meets the eye, and whether they’re really on opposite sides. And as their relationship deepens, it brings with it a plot involving his estranged adopted father, and threatens to destroy all of them.

CHAPTER 6: LAID BARE

Word Count: 4970 Pairing: Diego Hargreeves x Reader Rating: M Content Warnings: childhood poverty, discussion of theft/thievery, discussion of death, discussion of childhood illness Cross-posted to AO3: here

Previous Chapter: Revelations || Masterlist

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Your eyes traced the flicker of headlights through the narrow half-window as you tried to gather your thoughts into some sort of sense. You wanted to tell him everything. But what did that even mean anymore?

“So what is it you want to talk about?” Diego asked finally, cutting through the waiting silence. 

“Actually,” you looked down at your fingers where they rested on the tabletop, tracing anxious shapes against the laminate. “I know a lot more about you, by virtue of your very public childhood, than you know about me. Which I think, is part of the problem here. So the better question is, where do you want to start?”

“Alright,” he was silent for a moment, jaw twitching as if he was working the words over in his mouth before he said them. “Why do you get so defensive when I say you could do more with your powers, and your skills?”

“Because it’s judgmental, it relies on untrue assumptions, and I don’t like having other people’s will imposed on me,” you explained, face twisting wryly.

“Tell me the truth then.”

“What?”

“If my assumptions aren’t true, set the record straight.”

“You aren’t going to like what I have to say.”

“Now who’s the one making assumptions?”

You sighed. “It’s a long story, especially if I start at the beginning. So you might want to make yourself comfortable.”

He shifted in the hard plastic chair across from you, leaning back with his arms folded across his chest, waiting expectantly.

“Your ‘father’ tried to buy me too, when we were babies,” you couldn’t help throwing air quotes around the word and he smiled at the gesture. “But my parents were stable. They both had jobs; they already had one child and were thinking about trying for another anyway. So they said no. And then my dad died, in a workplace accident, because his boss cut corners to save time and money, and things got hard. And the bastard never got punished for it, or even had the decency to pay for the funeral.”

He looked like he was going to say something, some comment of pity or sympathy and you held up a hand to stop him, knowing that if he did, you would fall apart and never finish telling him what he needed to know, what you needed him to know.

“Your dad showed up again, offered her literal millions to let him have me. At least twice that I know of, but there could have been more. But she was as stubborn as they come. I was her daughter and he wasn’t getting me over her dead body. But a florist’s salary really isn’t enough to raise two kids on. Eventually, I realized that my abilities were things no one else could do, and figured out that I could use them to get things. So when money was skint, Daniel and I could still eat properly; rice and beans can only get a kid so far you know. Or we could have clothes that fit and didn’t have holes without bothering her.”

You shrugged, looking away from the growing ache on his face to stare at some spot on the wall. It had just been the facts of your reality. 

“And then I found that bigger risks meant bigger rewards. I could give her money or things, nice things like she deserved. She would cry and get so mad at me, but she always took them and life seemed to get better.”

“Y/N….” he reached out across the table to take one of your hands, which you hadn’t noticed was getting more and more fidgety as you spoke. 

“I grew up. I realized it wasn’t just us. I figured out how to take care of myself, got a job that let me keep a roof over my head and food in the cupboard. Daniel had his own shit figured out, so I didn’t have to worry about anyone else. But all those other people needed someone to look out for them. And if the people I happen to take things from are the kind that exploit their workers or cheat their taxes instead of paying their fair share, who…cut corners and skimp on safety, who’s it hurting?”

You finally turned your eyes back to him, a challenge sparking in them to tell you that you were wrong.

“So it’s what? Karma with you as it’s righteous deliverer?” He asked.

You pursed your lips. He still wasn’t getting it. 

“Even with what I take, those people have more than they need. And now, kids get proper care; families don’t have to decide between going hungry and getting the lights turned off.” You shook your head. “I don’t know how to put it any simpler than that.”

He frowned. “I don’t...get it. I’m sorry, I’m trying to understand but…”

“Okay, how about an example then. When I stole from that museum, you know the one…”

He smirked at the memory.

“There was this kid. Rare terminal something, something. I don’t remember the details of it. Just that I was able to anonymously pay for the experimental treatment that he needed and he got to live to see twelve. His foster parents and the social worker didn’t have to worry about going bankrupt or applying to the state and praying they’d get funds. And all it cost was one less shiny rock, that some exploited worker probably died to fish out of the ground, wasting space on display.”

“You know,” he said off-handedly as if it wasn’t an obvious attempt to deflect, “the kinds of people that can afford to buy those things aren’t any better than the people you’re stealing from. In fact, they’re probably worse if they’re willing to buy from a fence.”

You rolled your eyes. “So? I’ll just rob them blind to fund a school or whatever later.”

“There’s got to be a better way,” he sighed. “One that isn’t criminal.”

“You find it for me then, Diego,” you snapped. “I’m doing the best I can to help as many people as possible with what I’ve got. And sure maybe there’s a little bit of a revenge angle but who cares? Every one of those assholes deserves it.” 

You felt tears welling up in your eyes, certain that you were losing him, that even after you had ripped your chest open and exposed your bleeding heart for the taking, he was going to ask for you to choose between him and your morals, your passions, things that made up the very fiber of your being.

He stood up, circling the table to kneel in front of you again. His hands came up to cup your face and he brushed away the moisture that leaked down your cheeks with the pads of his thumbs.

“Okay,” he said softly, eyes boring into yours. 

 “Okay? What does that mean, ‘okay’?”

“I still don’t like it,” he started and you growled in frustration before he stared you down. “But...I understand. And I’ll try to stop fighting you on it, judging you for it.”

“Do you actually?” you asked.

“What is that supposed to mean?” he pulled back, not moving away completely, but enough that his hands were no longer on you and you felt cold in a way that had nothing to do with the temperature of the room.

“I don’t know. It’s just this feeling I have. Like I can say whatever I want and tell you my life story in every explicit detail, but…I’m scared that you’re just saying those things to placate me. And that doubt is going to eat me alive.”

“What do you want me to do then, Y/N?”

“Work with me?” you suggested.

“I’m trying,” he countered, frustration leaching into his tone now. 

“No. I mean….Work one job with me, start to finish. Let me show you.”

“You want me to help you steal something?”

“Steal it. Sell it. Put it to good use. Together, as a team, the whole way through.”

“I…” he swallowed before nodding. “Alright.”

Plowing onward, not even registering his answer, you rambled, explaining that you weren’t expecting him to give up being a vigilante or go rogue and that if at any point he wanted out you’d let him, that you would even let him turn you over to the cops, as long as it wasn’t Eudora, if that was what he wanted, you just couldn’t take the doubt anymore. And then your mind caught up to reality and came to a screeching halt.

“Wait, really?” you asked incredulously. 

You had been expecting him not only to say no, but to get angry at the suggestion, bracing yourself for the inevitable complete rejection of it, maybe even of you, and trying to counter it preemptively.

“Yeah,” he nodded. “If you come with me for a night in return. Try things my way too. I…I want there to be an us, and if this is what it takes for there to even be a chance of that, I’m willing to do it.”

You stared, stunned.

“Sounds like a fair trade,” you murmured eventually. “I had no idea you felt so strongly about…this…” you gestured between the two of you, indicating what you meant.

“Of course I do, I l—“ he cut himself off, looking away with a clenched jaw, nervous tension practically vibrating his whole body.

“One other thing?” you said, biting your lip.

“What?”

“We’re both terrible at communication, and trust,” you observed. “I don’t want it to be like that anymore.”

He caressed your cheek once more, smiling softly. “I’ll try to be better if you will.”

You leaned in. “Deal.”

He closed the last gap of centimeters between you, pressing his lips to yours. You slowly sat back up, guiding him into a position hovering over you in the chair as his mouth chased where yours led, refusing to be parted from you. His tongue trailed hesitantly over your bottom lip, and you parted eagerly for him, losing yourself for a blissful moment in the kiss. 

“What time is it?” you mumbled reluctantly between kisses. 

“Why does it matter?” he countered, trying to shift you into a position more comfortable for you both.

“I have work. And you have streets to patrol. Although I know that’s far less exciting without your ravishing nemesis about,” you teased, breaking the kiss completely now.

“Mm...ravishing…” he muttered, eyes closed and face dazed. “I’d like that.”

You laughed. “You weren’t listening at all were you?”

He shook himself, blushing slightly as he opened his eyes to look at you.

“I appreciate your careful nursing, and this talk was...good, necessary, important. I don’t know. But I really do have to go.”

He sighed, sulking. “I know. Fine. I...I’ll see you later?”

“Sure, I’d like that,” you smirked. “Maybe we can revisit the whole, ravishing idea.”

~

Several days later, Diego came over to your apartment. You had suggested it under the guise of, at least partially true, a need to start planning for your heist together. But really, you just wanted to see him again, to spend some time with him now that there was, properly, something between you. 

Your stomach twisted nervously in anticipation, realizing that this was another big step, one quickly after the other, letting him into your home. It had always been your safe place to hide, your sanctum, and you were disrupting that with a new presence. 

But, you reminded yourself, he wasn’t the first (though the total number was incredibly small), and he had already let you into his, even so far as to let you stay there. And you trusted him. More than anyone, save maybe your brother. So it wouldn’t be so bad. 

You were just putting the finishing touches on the pot of cheesy mashed potatoes you had made when the intercom buzzed, indicating someone was at the building’s outer door and wanted to be let in. You hastily crossed the room to press the unlock button and the talk button at the same time.

“It’s open,” you called through the speaker.

There was no response but you heard the odd echo of the door opening and shutting and clicked off the box. A few moments later, someone knocked on your door. Despite knowing there was only one person it could be, you stood on your toes to look through the little peephole before sliding the chain aside and letting Diego in.

“Do you always just unlock your door for strangers?” he asked.

“Hmmm, no. Only the tall, dark and handsome ones.” 

You threaded your arms around his neck to greet him with a quick kiss, shaking your head and laughing when he responded with a hand on your backside.

“Something smells amazing,” he said as you pulled away and returned to the stove to finish the rest of dinner.

“Well, I figured since you were coming over, and our little...project was probably going to take a while, I should make food.” You shrugged, placing two steaming plates on your coffee table and gesturing for him to come sit beside you on the couch. “It’s not Michelin star or anything…”

He shoveled up a bite of the garlic-roasted vegetables and groaned in satisfaction.

“It’s perfect,” he countered around the mouthful.

“You eat raw eggs, so I think the bar’s pretty low,” you countered jokingly, "but thank you.”

~

After you had eaten and cleaned up from dinner, you decided it was time to get down to business. You led him over to one corner of the broad, open space that served as your ‘office’ of sorts, drawing the thick curtains shut as you passed, just in case any of the neighbors were out smoking on the fire escape tonight. 

“So, you said, planting your hands on the work table dramatically and looking across to him. “Any initial thoughts?”

His eyes grew wide, like a panicked deer. He opened his mouth and then closed it again several times, but no words came out.

“Relax,” you said, smiling reassuringly, eyes sparkling. “It’s not like I expected you to do any homework. It was just a question. I have a few ideas, but we’re supposed to be partners, so I didn’t want to launch into them without giving you a shot first.”

‘Partners.’ He thought he liked the sound of that, but he still found himself wishing it was doing what he was used to, instead of this. It felt wrong, like he was going against everything he’d been taught. But then, he supposed he had been taught by a man so rigid and set in his ways that he would never have even considered that there might be other options. And the last thing he wanted to do was be like Reginald Hargreeves. Besides, it was a one for one deal, and there was still a chance to change your mind.

He smiled at you. “You lead, I’ll follow. For this one.”

“I like the sound of that,” you muttered, smiling back, before settling back into a more serious mode.

“Some oil tycoon’s private collection is being temporarily hosted and displayed at the art museum. It’s a pretty soft target at night, easy to get in and out. Shockingly minimal security in general, and paintings are easy to move,” you offered. 

Diego nodded vaguely, wanting to hear everything you set out before agreeing to anything.

“Or, there’s another place I’ve been staking out for a while. A warehouse. Owned by D.S. Umbrella Manufacturing Co. Nothing to do with actual umbrellas, or manufacturing from what I can tell.”

Diego flinched, but you didn’t notice, having turned around to pull out a file of information you had been gathering. 

“It’s all shipping and receiving. Mostly receiving. Some stuff I think is probably stolen antiques; I think I saw a couple guys opening crates of straight cash at one point, and there’s definitely stuff labeled with shit like ‘caution: explosive’ which usually means weapons or some kind of chemicals and either way is bad news. Those don’t stay in the warehouse long, and I don’t tend to mess with that shit anyway…” you trailed off, noticing Diego’s strange expression. “What? Why are you staring?”

“That…that’s my father’s company.”

“Wait what? Really?” you couldn’t help the shock on your face. 

You knew that Hargreeves was a very rich man but somehow it had never occurred to you that he might actually own anything, other than the massive Academy. And you supposed in theory the seven babies he had bought. You bit the inside of your cheek to distract yourself, cutting off that train of thought before it went to dark places.

“Do you know what specifically he’s got there?” you asked hopefully.

“No. I...sorry I don’t.”

“Nah, that’s alright. And you’re sure it’s his? Not just a similar name or coincidence?”

He shook his head. “No, that’s definitely Dad’s company.”

“All the better then,” you smiled wolfishly, all teeth. “Vengeance and helping people. If you want? I mean, I’m not going to make you do anything you’re not comfortable with. We could always hit the museum. Or start listing some other options...”

He hesitated a moment. Then he nodded resolutely. “Let’s do it.”

You grinned. Maybe this would turn out even better than you’d hoped. 

~

The two of you spent the next several hours working out the details of your plan, pouring over warehouse blueprints (that he didn’t ask where you’d gotten them from) and road maps, talking entry and exit strategies, rendezvous points, likely potential pitfalls, including the possibility that Hargreeves would send in his brother, Number One to try and stop you if he got wind of the break-in. Diego assured you that he was prepared to fight Luther if it came to it, and you frowned, heart clenching at his cold acquiescence to the idea. 

Exhausted, heads drooping and necks and shoulders aching, you finally decided to call it quits for the night. There was still more to go over, but you had time, and tonight you weren’t going to get anywhere useful with the fog that was settling into your minds. 

“I guess I should go,” he murmured as you both turned toward the door.

“Do you want to?” your face felt hot with a blush and you looked away from him as you asked. 

“What else would I do?” he stepped in front of you, turning your head to look at him again. 

You knew that he knew what you were offering, but he wanted to hear you say it anyway, to make sure the invitation was explicitly there. God, just when you thought he couldn’t get more perfect, he went and did a thing like that. 

You bit your lip, the words feeling heavy in your throat, every nerve suddenly hyper-aware.

“You could stay?” you offered, tilting your head slightly to one side. 

He cocked an eyebrow.

“I mean, I spent a week freeloading off you at your place. The least I can do is offer tonight, especially with how late it’s gotten. It’s dangerous out in the city alone at night you know.” You chuckled, trying to break the tension that crackled between you.

“Y/N…”

“It’s a really nice couch to sleep on,” you continued nervously. “I’ve fallen asleep on it before, pretty often actually when I come home and I’m just too tired. Or if I’m watching a movie or something.”

“Is that what you want?” his voice was soft and he was so close that his breath ghosted over your face.

“Is what?”

“For me to stay, and sleep on your couch?” He made sure you were making complete eye-contact with him, voice serious. “Be honest, and don’t just say something out of feeling like you’re obligated.”

“It’s not an obligation, Diego,” you assured him, hand cupping his face in counterpoint to the one he still had resting on your face. “I want you to stay.”

“On the couch?”

You shook your head. “Not unless you want to sleep on the couch.”

He opened his mouth to ask again if you were sure, to try and get you to say instead of dance around the invitation you were making. You rolled your eyes, kissing him fiercely. 

“Christ Diego,” you groaned against his lips. “I am trying to say I want you, as much of you as you’re willing to let me have.”

That seemed to finally be good enough for him, as he kissed you back with just as much ferocity as you had used. Your lips parted eagerly before he'd even had the chance to act, and your tongues danced together. The hand you had on his cheek slid back to grasp his short-cropped hair, raking your nails across his scalp in a way that made him shiver. Your other gripped tightly to his shoulder to hold yourself steady. He continued to cup your face, his thumb running slowly back and forth over your cheekbone in tender circles, his other arm wrapping around you to hold you close to him. 

Carefully, without breaking contact between you, you led him in a sort of dance, crossing the apartment, circling the edge of the dividing screens that formed your bed“room”, stepping over laundry piles, and finally tumbling backward onto the already rumpled sheets. 

Pulling back to give you both a moment to breathe, Diego shifted, taking off his boots and socks. He bit his lip, staring down at you, your hair splayed around you like a halo, lips reddened from his kisses, skin practically glowing in the dim light (or was that just you?). 

“What?” you asked teasingly. “Have I got something on my face?”

“You’re just…” he found himself at a loss for words, every one he could come up with seeming insufficient.

“Beautiful,” he finally breathed, brushing a finger reverently across your cheek once more, continuing on to trace up your temple before threading back, into your hair. 

“Diego,” you sighed, reaching again to draw him close, needy and wanting. 

He leaned down, tugging lightly on your hair, to expose your neck, placing teasing kisses along the column of your throat. You pressed your lips together to stifle a moan as his teeth grazed over the sensitive skin of your pulse point. You felt him smirk against your skin and had only a few seconds before he redoubled his efforts, biting down harder on the same spot and causing you to cry out. He glided his tongue over the mark he made and his free hand trailed over your stomach, fingers slipping beneath your shirt, shockingly cold against your heated skin. You gasped at the contact, melting into his touch and moving like a marionette for him as he released your hair and lifted your arms above your head to pull the offending garment off, tossing it aside. You thought you heard the clatter of something being knocked over by it, but you couldn’t be bothered to care as his lips reconnected with your own. 

The next kiss was languid and tender, his arms pulling you close, yours curling around his shoulders, fingers dancing mindless patterns over his bicep. You tugged unceremoniously at his own shirt which he was quick to shuck off. A shiver ran through you at the feel of his skin on yours.

His lips continued their journey downward and you arched into him as they found the swell of your breast. You couldn’t help the whine that slipped out of you, hand dropping from where you clung to him to clutch the sheets beside you as he sucked an obvious mark there, just above the line of your bra. 

Your chest heaved as you struggled to regain your breath or senses when he suddenly withdrew. Your face flushed hotly as you caught his eye and he flashed you a wink, swiftly kicking off his pants. He crawled back up the mattress to you and you pulled him into another kiss, your tongues tangling together almost immediately, as if you were made for it. 

As his hand slipped down to your waistband, deftly undoing the button there, you couldn’t help trembling under his touch, gasping when he slipped inside to run teasing fingers over the soft cotton of your panties. 

Suddenly, the reality of what was happening crashed over you like an icy wave and you felt like you were suffocating. It was too much. Everything was too much.

Planting your hands firmly, you pushed his shoulders to put some space between you.

“Diego, wait,” you said softly.

Immediately he froze. Seconds ticked by, somehow agonizingly slowly and impossibly fast all at once, before he moved again, drawing his hand away and shifting his weight off of you completely. He locked eyes with yours, fear and misery staining his face as you both sat up. You reached for him, and he flinched away. You let your hand drop.

“I-I’mmmm,” his breath hitched painfully and he closed his eyes. “I’mm s-sorry.”

“Diego,” you sighed. “There’s nothing to apologize for. Why would you think…”

Your brow creased in confusion and distress that he was so upset.

“I...w-ww-went too far o-or hurt you or…”

You couldn’t help the incredulous laugh that slipped out. 

“No you didn’t. You have been nothing but good to me, and you’ve done nothing that I didn’t absolutely want you to do. I’m just...not sure I’m ready to take things any further. Not tonight at least. Let’s just take it slow, okay?”

He nodded, finally opening his eyes, looking down at you again and letting you brush a light caress against his face. There was still some hesitation, like he didn’t quite believe that you weren’t hurt or upset, so you curled your fingers against the corner of his jaw, pulling him to meet you. Your lips moved slowly against his, watching carefully for any sign that he wanted to withdraw.

“I’m the one who should be sorry, if anything,” you said reluctantly.

“What?” his eyebrows knitted in confusion. “What for?”

“Leading you on?” you said, stating what you thought was obvious. 

He pressed his forehead to yours tenderly. “Sure, if you had done that.”

“I did. I mean what else would you call inviting you to stay the night like this and then...not following through…” you bit your lip, trying to look away from his earnest gaze.

“Y/N,” he said seriously. “Setting a boundary, or changing your mind, is not the same thing as leading me on.”

“But--”

He sighed heavily, the sound cutting you short.

“I’d be lying if I said there’s not a little disappointment. But you’re more important to me than sex. And I don’t want to do anything that you’re not comfortable with, that you don’t want just as much.”

You felt tears welling up in your eyes, relief and love mingling with embarrassment and guilt, no matter what he said. 

“I’d have even been fine if you really had, or do, ask me to sleep on the couch, Y/N.” He brushed away a stray tear that rolled down toward your chin. “As long as I still have you, in my life.”

“You only have to move to the couch if you want to,” you said, trying to fight down the small smile that threatened to break out on your face. “I’d like it if you stayed. We could maybe keep kissing? Or just, sleep together? Actual sleep…”

He chuckled. “Sleep sounds pretty nice. It is late. And I can’t remember the last time I got a full night.”

“Well in that case, make yourself comfortable,” you laughed, awkwardly extracting an arm to gesture at the rest of the bed. 

Diego returned the laugh and flopped over to the side, stretching out on his back as he settled in for sleep. Briefly he marveled at the softness of the way the mattress sank around him. It was like sleeping on a cloud compared to his lumpy old thing.

His eyes followed you as you moved around the space, shimmying out of your jeans and trading your bra for an overstretched and faded t-shirt, stamped with some university logo. He watched one hand reach behind you to quickly undo the clasp, the two sides practically springing away from each other when you did. You slid the garment off and for a brief moment you were naked, or nearly so - the soft smooth expanse of your skin even from behind making his pulse race with desire again - before you pulled the soft fabric down over your head, the hem trailing across the tops of your thighs, and hid yourself from view again.

You quickly flicked off the lights throughout the little studio apartment.

Any lingering thought, any regret that all he'd gotten was that brief peek, was immediately wiped from his mind as you padded back over to the bed and crawled into it with him. Curling up in almost a ball, you tucked yourself into the hollow of his side, head brushing against his arm as you nestled further down into the bedding, trying to get as comfortable as possible. You breathed in deeply, the scent of him - sharp and spicy and mingled with leather and the cleaning oil he used on his knives, so oft exposed that they had become a natural part of his smell - filling your lungs and spirit with comfort. 

“Goodnight Diego,” you whispered, breath tickling his skin.

He brought his arm down, drawing you closer against him.

“Goodnight.”

You brushed your lips across his cheek in a fleeting kiss that he thought he might have imagined before settling back in your original position. He smiled, the feeling of your warmth lulling him into the best sleep he’d had in ages.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

@mysterydisposition I think you said that you wanted to be tagged in new chapters?

[arcticdementor]

Part III of my series about the changing face of L.A. Click for Parts I and II.

I ended Part II with a look at how L.A. County’s Hispanics are habitual nonvoters. Let’s pick up seamlessly from there, in Compton. Compton used to be so black (over 85%) that at my high school we had a litany of “Compton so black” jokes.

…

Today, the birthplace of “gangsta rap” be not black at all. At last count (prior to the 2020 census), it was 68% Hispanic and 27% black, and I’d bet my house that the new figures will show that the Hispanic number has risen beyond 70% and the black has dropped below 25%.

Compton so Mexican its city hall’s a Home Depot parking lot.

Now dig this: In a city that’s roughly one-quarter black and almost three-quarters Mexican, of the eight elected officials (mayor, city attorney, city clerk, treasurer, and four councilpeople), only one is Hispanic. All the rest are black. And it gets better. That one Hispanic councilman won his election by just one vote, and our Soros-backed DA is prosecuting the guy for fabricating the one vote that put him over the top. Turns out the bean only ran because a black guy who’d lost his primary made a deal with him to run in his stead in exchange for giving the failed black candidate a lucrative city commissioner position if he won, and together they faked the winning vote.

Can you wrap your brain around that? The city is 70% Hispanic, and the only Hispanic council member, who only ran because a black dude made him, won by just one vote, and that vote had to be faked.

Get my point now about Hispanics not voting?

I mean, imagine a city that’s 70% black, but only one out of eight city officials is black. And then the county DA tries to nullify the vote that got that one black elected. There’d be riots! Neighborhoods would be burned to ash. Don Lemon would be screaming about “equity,” and the Biden Justice Department would be investigating the DA.

But Mexicans don’t care. They’re fine with letting the black minority pretend to be da Emperor Jones. That’s how little participatory democracy matters to them. And Dems have no desire to “enfranchise” Compton Mexicans because blacks are their most reliable and manipulatable minions. Never trade a slave for an independent contractor. Plus, as I discussed last week, when Mexicans do vote, it’s all over the map. As Newsweek contributor Richard Hanania pointed out regarding polls that show California Hispanics divided 50/50 on the Newsom recall (blacks are 65/35 against it), “I feel like it’s fun living in a state with many Mexicans because you get a wildcard aspect to politics. Keeps things exciting.”

…

So what we know is that Mexi voting ambivalence is resilient. Would it be equally resilient to rightist coercion? Who knows; no rightists out here are testing the waters. The Hispanic rejection of affirmative action was due in large part to a general dislike of blacks. And in February when the black- and Jew-run L.A. school board defunded all campus police and redirected the $25 million LAUSD security budget to a program to fund the education of only black students, the discontent among L.A. Hispanics was palpable. Blacks make up barely 8% of LAUSD students (Hispanics comprise over 70%). Hispanic Twitter exploded with fury over the “black-only” payday coming at the expense of campus security, and the L.A. Times was forced to admit that Hispanic support for campus cops was massive, especially compared with support from non-Hispanic whites (a whopping 67% to 54%).

So did our local “Republicans” try to make hay out of that? Of course not, because to do so would risk offending blacks, and the GOP establishment has sworn a blood oath that it shall never allow itself any forward motion that might jeopardize its (zero) chance of “winning the black vote.”

There could literally be one black man left in L.A., and the GOP would sacrifice everything for his favor.

…

So, our Mexicans are untested, and our rapidly decreasing blacks, our gradually increasing Asians, and our moneyed and influential secular Jews are a lost cause. What about our non-Jewish non-Hispanic whites?

Ay yi yi, they’re the woist of all. The leftist ones represent the bottom of the barrel of self-hating “please genocide me before I enslave again,” “I hope my son goes tranny so that my foul DNA might dead-end with my progeny’s amputated penis” wastes of space. The mostly non-Jewish white upscale deep-blue city of Manhattan Beach, for example, is filled with self-flagellating WASPs who spend their time trying to make their safe city less safe by “giving land back” to blacks who were supposedly racisted out of town in the 1920s.

And now Manhattan Beach is regularly visited by black criminals, from serial rapists to boardwalk thieves to a home-invasion attempted murder just a week ago. I’m sure the guilt-ridden Robin DiAngelos of Manhattan Beach excuse these crimes as justified reparations owed to noble negroes.

…

Worse still, our “rightist” whites—those who choose to be activists—are just plain batshit crazy. Our MAGAs are violent, self-destructive, foolish, and dim-witted (I’ve covered this before, and I’ll be revisiting it next week in a column that’ll post on the eve of the gubernatorial recall).

…

In largely red Beverly Hills (and surrounding Westside areas), the Persian, Israeli, and Orthodox Jews, who are not suicidal, are holding the line against the violent crime and property crime that still disproportionately come from blacks (ironically, as the county’s black community shrinks, the thugs are forced to venture beyond their comfort zone in search of victims, rather like how bears become more bold as their natural habitat shrinks). But what of the areas that are largely Hispanic? Well, our Hispanics (as the Times pointed out) have a more positive view of police than our whites. That’s something often overlooked by those who claim to study criminality in racial or ethnic groups. It’s never just about criminality; it’s also about acceptance of policing. Whites who dismantle the criminal justice apparatus are as much to blame for rampant criminality as low-IQ thugs. Portland is an example of how poisonous such whites can be; violent crime in that city isn’t the result of a huge population of blacks but a huge population of self-hating anti-cop whites.

…

Our Hispanics occupy a middle ground: between black and white on the criminality scale (not as high as the former, not as low as the latter), but better than both groups on acceptance of policing. Half of L.A.’s cops and sheriff’s deputies are Hispanic, and our sheriff, Alex Villanueva—an unapologetic kick-ass crime fighter—survived the George Floyd purge last summer because his fellow Hispanics backed him against the blacks and whites who sought his ouster.

A county can weather criminality if it allows rigorous enforcement. L.A. had a lower murder rate than it does today back when there were more blacks but also more enforcement. Now that blacks, leftist whites, and secular Jews have decided that enforcement equals genocide, the last hope for the county lies with the Westside Persian/Israeli/Orthodox Jews and the Eastside beans.

There’s a logic to this, as those groups mingle more than you might think. Be it as nannies, gardeners, construction workers, warehouse personnel, or restaurant staff, the Westside is where many Mexicans go to work every day.

As one of those Westside Jews (though an outlier, as I’m “red” without being Persian, Israeli, or Orthodox), I would absolutely throw in with the beans as opposed to the leftist whites or the MAGA whites. Both groups, like blacks, have become suicidal. And suicidal people are dangerous.

Yes, Mexis have gangs, and you don’t want to walk down certain Eastside streets at night. Big shit; no one has reason to except those who live there. In the 1970s those areas were worse when they were black.

But Mexicans do the scut work around here, they don’t riot when one of their own is arrested (indeed they arrest their own), and they aren’t dangerously self-destructive.

I’ll take it.

Not that I have a choice; it’s the way it’s gonna be, demographically, whether I like it or not.

But it’s not the worst-case scenario, or even the second-to-worst. And these days that’s good enough.

[aroacepositivityplace]

I can’t even fathom how unproductive these conversations around kink at pride are. Due to the pandemic, most of us around the world aren’t going to get any public pride celebrations. The only thing this discourse seems to accomplish is pushing a conservative agenda inside our own communities, particularly targeted at queer men. And as tired as the statement is, yes, it’s very clear many people in the discussion have never been anywhere near an actual pride event.

Pride started as a protest. The sanitization of pride is what has led to corporations and uniformed cops moving in to shamelessly make money and spread propaganda through the very people they harm. It was never a disney/////land parade and given the multitude of issues still plaguing the community, eroding this tradition seems insidious to me. The fight for LGBTQIAP+ rights didn’t end at marriage equality and when too many people don’t even want us to exist, being loud and open sends a clear message that we aren’t going away or erasing our identities for their comfort.

And no, asking people to tone it down to show that “we’re just like straight/cis people” is not the answer. The hard truth is we will NEVER be accepted by people who think like that. Bigots have shown time and time again that they’ll happily tokenize conservative LGBTQIAP+ people and then throw them to the curb the moment they’ve lived out their usefulness to them. It isn’t just the kinky queers that demand more rights that they hate, it’s anyone who isn’t cis and straight. 

Beyond that, a lot of pride events have the nudity and other nsfw stuff roped off so that if you go past a certain point, you have nobody to blame but yourself if you see something that isn’t rated PG. Pride isn’t a public orgy, it has it’s rules and making it out to be is recycling the same garbage rhetoric bigots use to try and make ANY public displays of queerness to be pornographic deviance. 

While I agree that the issue with public kink is that others aren’t consenting to be a part of/witness to it, part of pride IS celebrating kink. Kink has been part of the community from its very beginnings and even outside of pride, you’re going to see kink pride flags alongside the others. If you don’t want to see kink and bare skin at pride, don’t go. You can’t throw a tantrum about seeing this kind of stuff when you know it’s part of pride and knowing that, you put yourself into that space.

If your kid is old enough to understand that people define their own genders and can love any gender they want to, you can add that said people can also have consenting sex if they want to and sometimes that sex involves more than just textbook intercourse. The human body isn’t something to be ashamed of and there isn’t anything positive to be had by protesting situations that may necessitate age-appropriate explanations. If you honestly think seeing a pup hood or leather daddy just hanging out at pride is going to ruin somebody’s childhood, I have a hard time believing you’re coming from a place of genuine concern. We’re exposed to so much straight sexuality on a daily basis, yet it’s only when queer people do the same that some of y’all clutch your rainbow pearls. 

I know it can be hard to have discussions like this when you aren’t in a place where you can be in real life queer spaces. For many of us, the internet is the only place we can talk with others like us and learn about our history. With that, though, it’s vital we all remember how inundated these online spaces are with bad information that’s meant to keep us at each other’s throats. If you don’t want to be arguing in bad faith, stop and ask yourself if what you’re about to say is something you’d hear some anti-gay, anti-trans politician say. Are you enforcing harmful stereotypes against queer people? Is this a community wide issue or something that makes you personally uncomfortable? Is what I’m saying meant to shame or hurt others? Life is hard enough without people who are supposed to be our siblings adding to the dog-pile 

TL/DR Taking the sex entirely out of sexuality is not progress, it’s the same repression that makes coming out and staying out a hell for too in the LGBTQIAP+ community. Keep pride weird. 

[lloydbanksnetworth]

Lloyd Banks Net Worth [MUST READ] Updates 2021 !

Lloyd Banks Net Worth [MUST READ] Updates 2021 !

Launch

Lloyd Banks Net Worth is roughly $10 million, as of 2021.

Lloyd Banks Net Worth better known by his stage name Lloyd Banking companies is an Us citizen rapper from Maryland. Finance institutions started off his career as a member of East Coast hiphop group of people G-Model, beside youth good friends 50 Cent and Tony Yayo.

After the party unveiled their first appearance recording, Plead with for Mercy in 2003, Banks produced his initial solo album The Hunger for More in 2004, which showcased the top twenty hit one “On Fire”.

Ahead of time Living

Christopher Charles Lloyd came to be for the 30th of Apr, in New Carrollton, Maryland. He came to be into a Puerto Rican mom, Rosa Lloyd, with an African Us father. His father was mainly in prison while youthful Lloyd matured and this man was mostly elevated by his mother.

He matured within the very same neighborhood as did 50 Cent and Tony Yayo, plus the about three boys grew to become close friends.

Job

Lloyd began producing tunes for a early age. His community manufacturers appreciated his skills and then he planned to begin with his own team. His good friends 50 Cent and Tony Yayo had been also appealing rappers along with the trio commenced their unique hiphop group G-Unit.

The group decreased numerous mixtapes range and also their initially formal mixtape was ’50 Cent Is the Future’ which was out in 2002. This was as well as the mixtapes ‘God’s Plan’, ‘No Mercy’, and ‘Automatic Gunfire’.

The group’s first appearance album ‘Beg for Mercy’ was introduced in December 2003. The recording had been a big hit which showcased the songs ‘Wanna Familiarize yourself with You’, and ‘My Buddy’.

Lloyd’s secondly album, ‘Rotten Apple’ was introduced in 2006. The album’s title is actually a participate in on New York City’s nickname. The recording acquired varying evaluations even though it was liked by his listeners. It experienced the keeps track of ‘Hands Up’, ‘The Cake’ and ‘Survival’ and debuted at No.3 around the U.S. Billboard 200.

In 2010, Lloyd appeared as himself within the humorous video, ‘Morning Glory’. One other members of G-System like 50 Yayo and Cent also created a short visual appeal inside the video.

Lloyd Banks’ net worth is $10 million, as of 2021.

Features

Right here are one of the very best illustrates of Lloyd Banks’ career:

I am so Take flight (Music, 2004)

Rotten The apple company (Album, 2006)

Any Young lady (Melody, 2010)

Great shock the World (Track, 2012)

Favourite Quotations from Lloyd Banking institutions

“Everybody goes to the funeral, but everybody laughs when it’s funny. Although leisure is happening, that is just what exactly it is, fun - until finally it crosses around to a complete ‘another circumstance. And today, me maturing, I reminisce at many things, driving forward, some things won’t get my consideration. A few things don’t deserve my electricity. I won’t place forth a great deal on points, you have to focus on what is the challenge on hand. That’s to put out ageless audio, and fantastic albums.” - Lloyd Finance institutions

“I roll with Females quite as tropic when the continual around my wallet Cop it, Smash it, Roll it, Ignite it, and mixture it in with the chocolate bars.” - Lloyd Finance institutions

“Hip-hop is vibrant. The youngsters confirms which course it is about to go. I think your thinking and your visions commence to transform, and you simply start off to concentrate on items, as much as the planet proceeds, somewhat afterwards in your life.” - Lloyd Finance institutions

“When you will get the money you’re generally a goal because there is always somebody who requirements dollars around.” - Lloyd Banks

“I have family in Ponce. It’s a shame that my grandpa handed down so i was not able to be there with him.” - Lloyd Banking institutions

3 Lessons from Lloyd Finance institutions

Let’s check out some of the best instruction we can easily study from him:

1. Don’t Shed Bridges

I get it, we all deal with jerks at some point in our jobs. Who cares? Do not allow it to arrive at you. There’s no need to say something awful on them. If anything, try to find humor in it, learn from it and move on. You have acquired greater things to target. Like becoming probably the most epic model of by yourself that you could be.

2. View Issues as Options

Before, have you ever spent a long time waiting at the post office to ship something? I understand I actually have. What happens if as opposed to stressing of that particular procedure, you produced an mobile app that may let you request a driver to reach your property and to get and give your shipping for you personally?

If you viewed that challenge as an opportunity, you would have created Shyp, an amazing app that does exactly that.

3. Reduce Your Travel

Perform near your geographical area. Make it within walking distance if you can. Time is valuable. Do not throw away it in the freeway.

Bottom line

Lloyd Banks is really a rapper who is best known for his first appearance single recording ‘The Cravings for food for More’. In reference to his music accomplishments, the rapper made a great progress way from the tough younger years encounters he experienced.

As of 2021, Lloyd Banks’ net worth is roughly $10 million.

More Info-

https://www.buzrush.com/lloyd-banks-net-worth/ 

https://sites.google.com/view/lloydbanksnetworth/home 

[eirian-houpe]

Disparate Pathway - Chapter 19

Read previous chapters on AO3

Chapter 19 - Grace

Jefferson had the cab drop him a block and a half away from his sister-in-law’s house. He didn’t think he’d been followed, but he’d learned the hard way that you could never be too careful where that kind of thing was concerned. No matter how pissed he was, the last thing he wanted to do was to bring danger to Rebecca’s door.

He took an indirect route, ducking through alley ways and across the community garden, before coming back out onto the street a few houses down. Once he reached the sidewalk he knelt down under the pretext of tying a shoelace, and took the time to have a good look around himself. Only when he was satisfied that the street was empty did he get up and finally make his way to the house and rang the bell.

It was late, and he knew it would take someone a while to get to the door, so he tried to resist the urge to push the bell again, or worse, to lean on the doorbell until someone pulled open the door to spit a whole load of invectives into his face. He was trembling, just a little, as the lights in the hallway snapped on and the silhouette of a figure approached the thick, frosted glass.

He heard the jingle of keys and locks, and the rattle of a chain before the door began to open just a crack.

“Rebecca, it’s me,” he said to forestall the necessity of too much opening and closing of the door, which might bring too much attention to what was going on. Attention, apparently, was not something from which Rebecca intended to shy away.

The door slammed shut, and then opened again with the velocity of a forced entry, until the doorway was blocked by a back-lit figure that involuntarily made his heart lurch, even though he knew it was not Priscilla, but her sister. She had her hands on her hips, and it didn’t take an investigative genius to know that she was unhappy with him.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” she spat.

In better circumstances he might have made a joke, nice to see you too, Rebecca. How the hell are you? It’s been a while, but these were not better circumstances and he didn’t have time to put up with her being a dick.

“I need my car,” he said, trying - and failing - not to match her tone at least a little and took a step toward her. “I went to storage and it’s not there. Where is it?”

“Whoa, back up buster,” her tone, if possible, was even more frosty than it had been when she opened the door, “We agreed that you wouldn’t come around here without at least a call—”

“You decided.” He talked over her.

“—twenty-four hours in advance.”

“There wasn’t time,” he protested, hackles rising despite not having the energy for the fight that it seemed she was intent on having anyway, “and if you’d left the car where it was supposed to be we wouldn’t even be having this conversation.”

“Conversation?!” she snapped. “This is what you call a conversation? You show up here, yelling at me on my own doorstep and—”

“Fuck you, Rebecca, you’ve never even heard me yelling,” he growled, and paced away from the door barely a step, running his hand through his hair before he turned back and repeated, “I don’t have time for this - Where’s my fucking car?”

“You’re not hearing me, Jefferson,” she said. “You don’t get to come around here demanding, aggressive, unreasonable and not to mention delinquent, and expect me to—”

“Excuse me?!” the shudder of incredulity burst out of him in the form of words. “Delinquent?” He moved to take a step forward, but she barred his way by closing the door on him just a little, but he pushed it open. “In what universe have I ever been delinquent?”

“The storage company—”

“Comes right out of my account. What’s going on, Rebecca?” Flared temper mingled with the worry of a million possibilities, and it made him even more demanding of answers. “Is there something I should know about!”

“Hey, hey, guys,” another calmer voice - Andy, his sister-in-law’s husband - interrupted their mutually rising tirade. “How would it be if you continue this inside, hmm, before the neighbors start calling the cops?”

The words made Jefferson look around, and he saw that several porch lights had been turned on, and there were the outlines of people in doorways and in windows.

“Fine,” Rebecca said, proving to him by her tone that it was anything other than fine, as she opened the door wider, and let him step inside.

It was Andy that closed the door behind him to Jefferson’s quiet, “Thanks, man.”

Andy shrugged, and then nodded toward Rebecca, before he said, “I’ll make tea.”

Jefferson tried to stay as calm as Andy’s intervention had afforded him the chance to achieve, and took a breath before he asked softly, “Now, what about the storage company?”

“They called a few months ago, and every month since. They said it was a personal matter and then would only speak with you,” she said, his affected calm quieting her. “Which is accounts-speak for you owing them money.”

“What did you tell them?” he asked, switching instantly back from being an ‘on the offensive brother-in-law,’ to being an undercover FBI agent. Either paranoid, or overcautious, or God-forbid, right, there was something suspect about all of this.

“Exactly what you told me to say,” she answered.

“And you called Rab?” he asked, frowning as she nodded.

“He said he’d take care of it,” she said in confirmation, “but the calls keep happening.”

“Someone’s fishing,” he said half to himself and half to Rebecca. “If they call again, write down the number and hang up, then give the number to Rab, tell him I think someone is trying to find out if I’ve been in contact with you.”

She nodded, and swallowed, then said, “Besides that,” she paused for a second before continuing, “Paige had to—”

“Grace,” he corrected, his temper rising again. “Her name is Grace.”

“She had to have dental work, Jefferson, and we—”

“I’ll see to it you get the money, Rebecca. When have I ever let you down with anything like that?”

She shook her head, “You haven’t just…” she sighed, and didn’t finish the sentence.

He reached out slowly, reaching past the fading red mist, to put a hand onto her shoulder. “I get it, it’s unsettling, but I promise you, everything will be fine.” He hated himself for the possibility he was lying.  He took his own breath and asked softly, “Can I… can I see her?”

She made a face and he knew she was about to refuse. He tried to think rationally, not to let the fact that she was about to deny him a moment with his daughter, derail him again. It wasn’t right. He was here and he had this moment, and maybe it would be his only moment. He shivered… thinking like that…

“It’s late, Jeff,” Rebecca said at last, “and it’s a school night, so—”

“Papa!”

The cry came from the top of the stairs, and throwing Rebecca a helpless expression, Jefferson took the stairs two at a time, barely making it to the landing to catch Grace as she launched herself against him, and with her in his arms, sank down to the floor, holding her tightly.

The press of every missed moment warred with the very real feeling of having her in his arms. He breathed in her scent. Squeezed her tighter, and felt that she had lost weight and felt waif-like against him, and he squeezed his eyes closed to keep his tears at bay. He eased his hold on her after a moment ready to draw back and take in the sight of her, but she tightened her arms around his neck.

“I miss you,” she whispered against his shoulder.

“Oh, Grace,” he forced the words past the knot in his throat, “I miss you too, sweetie.” He turned his head to plant a gentle kiss on the side of her head, finally managing to ease her away; to look at her, then reached out to wipe at the wetness on her cheeks with the pad of his thumb. His voice was hoarse when he spoke again. “You look good. You had a hair cut.”

“Just the ends,” she said, and then she released him enough that he could take her in properly, and he felt her little hand tugging his hair, before she told him, “You need one”

He let his head hang down playfully for a moment as he confessed, “I do. I really do.” Then he looked up at her and offered her a smile. “How about you show me your room. A little bird told me you’ve decorated in there.”

Grace giggled a little bit. “You won’t like it,” she said.

“Oh, I won’t?”

She shook her head, but took his hand and tugged until he climbed to his feet. His legs, inexplicably, felt like jello underneath him and his head felt light, and he wasn’t sure whether it was the lack of sleep, the physical beating he’d taken, or the overwhelming emotion he felt at holding his baby girl in his arms, even for such a short time.

She led him to her room. He’d been in there before, but it had been a while ago, and then it was decorated with faux wood panels in the lower half of the room, with almost a chintz paper above. He had hated it, but it gave him a kind of comfort, because it matched the rest of the house and that made it seem somehow impermanent - like the arrangement of Grace living with Rebecca and Andy was just a temporary thing.

When he walked in behind her this time, every sense screamed at him to get her out, to bring her with him; that he shouldn’t leave her there. Something was coming, and she was right - he wouldn’t like it, but it wasn’t the room. The room, he quite liked; reflected everything Grace loved.

The bed was new, and the wood panels had been replaced with a mural showing the inside of a country cottage, complete with a painted fireplace, with cooking utensils that ‘hung’ to the side of it on a mock hearth, built from what looked like corrugated cardboard painted to look like red bricks. On the ceiling the suggestion of wooden beams had been created in paint and cardboard, with yellow construction straws in the corners representing thatch.

He cleared his throat before he spoke. It felt like far too much work had gone into the room for it to be anything other than a lasting arrangement.

“You always did want to live in the country,” he said.

“Forest, Papa,” Grace corrected him. “Look.”

She drew back the heavy curtains that were pulled across the windows, and even in the darkness he could see that the glass had been painted across with trees, and bluebells, and even a little well.

“Nice,” he said softly, and kissed her hand as he took it from the drapes and covered up the windows and the light that came through the ‘forest’ from the city beyond. “I remember now, you always said you wanted to live in the forest.”

She looked up at him and then threw her arms around his waist, and he held her close, without moving from where they were. “I always want to live with you, Papa. I don’t care where.”

He leaned down to pick her up, resting her head against his shoulder, as he carried her across to her bed, so that she wouldn’t see the expression of pain that flashed across his eyes. “I know, sweetie, I know.” He wanted that too - desperately.

He sat them both down on the edge of the bed, and she squeezed him tightly, her arm catching the graze on the top of his shoulder, and he couldn’t help but wince. She pulled away at once, staring at him as though he had slapped her.

“Papa, you’re hurt,” she gasped. She started to wriggle in his lap to get down, “I have a band aid.”

He caught her wrist gently as she started toward the dresser. “It’s just a scratch,” he told her. “I’m good, I promise.”

She turned and looked at him then, as if taking him in properly for the first time, and he had to force himself to be still; not to hide himself from her. He’d promised himself he would never do that.

“But Papa, your scarf!” she said at last, “It’s torn.”

She pulled on his grasp until he let go so that she could cross the distance to the dresser, and reach inside. He watched as she took out a paisley patterned, silk scarf, and brought it back with her when she came to kneel on the bed beside him.

He swallowed as she reached out to unfasten the hurried knot he’d tied in his ruined scarf to fix it - it seemed a lifetime ago now - when it had torn in his struggle with Belle as she tried to run away.

“You can have this one of mine,” she told him as she finally freed the knot, and he closed his eyes and swallowed hard as she slipped it free, and then tenderly arranged the long, silk scarf around his neck, careful to cover his scars, before tying it at the back of his neck. “There.”

He ran his fingertips over its softness before he wrapped his arms around Grace, and held her again. “Thank you, baby,” he whispered, wiping away a tear that escaped onto his cheek in spite of his effort to keep them inside.

“I love you.”

“And I love you, Grace - so much.” He held her tightly, and then reached past her to pull back the covers of her bed. “Scooch down now. It’s late, and your aunt is worried about you being up on a school night.”

Reluctant, but obedient, Grace settled into bed, and Jefferson pulled the covers up to her chin, kneeling beside the bed as he did. He smoothed his fingers over her hair, committing her features to memory, and the feel of her hair beneath his fingertips, everything.

She sighed softly, calmed by his touch, he could feel her relax with each pass of his fingers through her hair.

“Promise me something,” he said quietly, and he smiled sadly as she turned her sleepy eyes his way. “Promise me that no matter what happens, no matter what you hear, or what people tell you, you’ll always remember that.

“I promise, Papa,” she whispered, her eyes closing as sleep reached up to claim her.

For a long time, Jefferson didn’t move; couldn’t, as he forced back the emotion that was threatening to spill over like a boiling kettle. He couldn’t - wouldn’t - let Rebecca see him breaking and vulnerable.

When he was sure Grace wouldn’t wake he pulled himself to his feet, leaned down and softly kissed her brow, whispering an almost inaudible, “Goodbye, my sweet Grace,” before turning and leaving the room.

To Jefferson the quiet click of the door catching closed sounded as loud as gunfire in the dim lit hallway, and the white hot pain, just as surely felt like the kiss of a bullet.

He took his time descending the stairs, using the repetitive motion to wrap the steel bands around himself, shoring himself up; confining himself to the present moment only. Andy met him at the foot of the stairs.

“N-ice,” Jefferson forced the words past the catch as he reached the last stair, “decorations you’ve done there.”

“Rebecca,” Andy said, confirming what Jefferson already suspected.

“She always did have a flair for art,” he answered.

Andy nodded, and then said, “Come with me.”

Jefferson followed Andy through to the garage, noticing as Andy picked up a travel mug on their way through the kitchen. His brother-in-law flicked on the light as they descended the few steps to the concrete floor, and then turned and handed the cup to Jefferson.

“I made your tea to go,” Andy said. “I’ll be honest with you, Jefferson, Becca really doesn’t want to talk to you any more.”

“…the fuck, Andy!”

Andy held up his hand in a gesture obviously meant to placate him. “I know, I know,” he said, “Just… give her time.”

“Time?” Jefferson ran his fingers through his hair, “How much more time! It’s been nine fucking years, almost ten.”

Again, Andy held up his hand. “She was her sister, Jeff.”

“And she was me wife!” he growled, “Grace’s mother. Do you think I don’t feel her loss every goddamn day? Feel like I failed her, and I’m still failing.”

He felt himself trembling beneath the hand that Andy placed on his shoulder; squeezed supportively. “It wasn’t you, and it’s not your fault,” Andy said, then added, “But Becca’s my wife, and I have to do what’s best for her, and for our family. So… I’m going to tell you something, and then you’re going to get in your car,” he nodded to the vehicle beside them as he reached out and pulled the tarp from covering it, “drive away, and finish this thing - whatever it is you’re involved in.” He held out the keys for Jefferson to take.

“Rebecca’s not going to put up with this arrangement much longer, and I’m not sure she’s thinking things through rationally.” Jefferson took the keys into his hand, but Andy didn’t let go and stepped in closer to catch the crook of Jefferson's other arm. “She means well, and I hope you can remember that, because when the shit hits the fan, it’s not going to be pretty.”

Jefferson was about to ask what the fuck he meant, when Rebecca appeared at the top of the steps to the kitchen, and he didn’t miss the warning Andy held in his eyes. He gave the barest of nods, and murmured his thanks as Andy let go of the car keys, and his arm.

“Don’t come around here any more, Jefferson,” Rebecca said, almost calmly, from the top of the stairs. “I really don’t want to see you again.”

Jefferson didn’t answer, just unlocked the car and opened the door. Andy caught him by the arm again before he could climb in, then he pulled an envelope from his pocket. He held it out to Jefferson.

“So you can stay off the radar for a little while longer,” he said.

Jefferson first clasped his hand, and allowed Andy to pull him in for a brief hug, truly appreciating the supportive slap on the back his brother-in-law offered. Then he took the envelope with a grateful nod, and slipped it into the pocket of his jacket.

Andy opened up the garage door as Jefferson started up the engine, feeling even more indebted to the man for taking such good care of his car that it started right away, then he backed out onto the driveway, and then onto the street.

He drove away as calmly as he could; one block… two, before turning on to the back country road that would take him out of town and toward the highway. Farmland soon rolled in on his left and right, and then a short stretch of wooded road, like the tiny forest he had seen on Grace’s window.

Suddenly, he couldn’t hold it in any more, and barely managed to pull in to the side of the road and put the car in park. He slapped the palm of his hand onto the padded steering wheel. It wasn’t enough. It needed both hands… again and again he hit the steering wheel with both hands, feeling, then hearing the whine gather in his throat before he opened his mouth and let it out, no longer hitting the wheel, but now gripping it tightly with both hands, as though it were a life preserver and he was drowning. Drowning he might have been, because he couldn’t breathe and his body shook, as his eyes flooded, and spilled over with hot and bitter tears.

[somedayonbroadway]

hii! i hope i don’t sound annoying by asking this, but i love your writing so much! i know you did a deaf race angst story a while back, i loved it so much and deaf race is probably my new favourite hc so, if you don’t mind, could you do some more deaf race hcs please? thank you!

Okay, first of all, I get a lot of you guys apologizing for sending asks and I just need to send out a PSA real quick:

Ya’ll are never annoying. I love the questions. Every time I see a new ask I literally can’t help but smile. As long as you aren’t spreading hate, I’m here for all the questions and prompts and everything because I LOVE THEM!

ALSO! I know this took me a long time to answer, so I’m sorry for the wait! (I currently have about 45 asks, so patience is much appreciated!)

Okay, Anon, so yes, deaf!Race is one of my favorite modern HCs. I haven’t written anything with it in a long time and I miss it.

So here we go…

In modern era where Jack and Race are brothers…

Race was born deaf.

Their parents love him so much but are a little upset by this fact, though they learn sign language.

Jack learned sign language too. He’s very excited about it, but he’s more excited to have a baby brother.

Jack and Race are seven years apart in age.

Growing up, they’re happy

Race is homeschooled by his parents. He has no idea that people outside of their house don’t use their hands to communicate.

But when Race is six, his whole family gets into a crash. Mother dies on impact, father dies upon arriving at the hospital and Jack is in critical condition and is kept in the hospital for a month before he’s released to social services.

During this time, Race realizes that people expect him to be able to communicate and talk to them. He tries but no one knows his language.

It takes three days for Race to get an interpreter. Since he’s not seriously hurt, no one sees it as a priority and even though it’s bad to not get an interpreter immediately, Race can’t argue with them. He’s only six. And no one else knows him or is willing to fight for him.

Once Mr. Kloppman gets there, he tears the staff a new one for not getting this kid an interpreter immediately and then sits with Race in Jack’s room, realizing that this little boy was all alone and didn’t even really know that both of his parents were dead.

Growing up in the system is hard. Jack’s right arm broke in the crash. He has to learn to sign with his left for a couple months so that he can talk to Race.

The first few homes are group homes. No one knows Sign. So Jack and Race are often outcast. The other kids don’t want to bother trying to talk with Jack because Jack refuses to talk without signing so Race can understand.

Their foster parents are already overwhelmed so they don’t cater to the boys at all, thinking they’d just figure out how things worked.

The longest they stay in one home in the first year is a month.

When Race has to start going to school, he realizes that sign language isn’t something that most people just know. Jack and him have to go to different schools and no one understands him. So he often sits alone and doesn’t bother trying to make friends. It’s easy because a small kid like him gets ignored often.

Outside of school Jack sticks to Race like glue, knowing that at some point, someone’s going to try and separate them and Jack can’t handle that. He knows that it’ll just make it worse for Race too.

Eventually, a year after the accident, they end up at the home of a William Snyder.

Race knows immediately that he doesn’t like this home. The man hit Jack on the first day.

Snyder doesn’t like it when Race signs. He says it’s not normal.

He’s the reason Race can read lips.

It starts with just a small slap anytime he’d sign but quickly escalated to getting his hands tied down

Jack and him are forced to sleep in different rooms for the first time in their lives.

Snyder goes hard on Jack because he knows that Race won’t hear Jack screaming. And when he beats on Race, he makes sure so gag him somehow.

Jack teaches Race English anyway he can, trying to help his brother escape the beatings and getting his hands tied down. Snyder hates it when he can’t understand.

Snyder has them for the money.

Race isolates even further into himself because Jack isn’t allowed to sign with him.

At this point, Jack is only fourteen. He can’t do much to stop it other than things that aggravate Snyder even more, like fight back.

On an unrelated note, there’s locks on all the cupboards and the fridge so Jack and Race can only have food if Snyder unlocks them.

Also, if Race can’t sign with Jack he likes to put a hand on Jack’s chest or neck to feel him talk to him

Anyways

Jack and Race are with Snyder for almost a full year before someone notices the bruises on Race realizing for the first time that he’s deaf and mute.

After that, Race and Jack are fully separated.

This just about breaks Race. He’s only almost eight and the one constant he’d had in his life was ripped away from him.

He falls into a depression. Even though his foster parents are kind and know sign, he doesn’t talk to them. He usually just lays around in his room on his bed, not wanting to move.

Meanwhile Jack is in a home with Miss Medda and a boy already adopted by the woman named Charlie.

Race grows up thinking he’s broken after his parents die. He believes that no one can really love him because he can’t hear and no one else that he meets is deaf

He stops signing for a long time because he and Jack can’t see each other for a few months. And when they get a meeting time and a promise to be able to see each other once a week, Race just goes to Jack and cries.

Medda tries to take Race in but their social worker sees no reason to move Race, especially when his foster parents know sign and Medda doesn’t.

His foster parents start to get irritated with him when he won’t sign or even try to communicate with them. They’re nice people, but even nice people have their limits.

His foster mother would push him into a wall one night.

Race would run away.

They’d call the cops and Medda who would tell Jack. Jack would immediately go out to find him.

He’d find him sitting alone in a park with a single newspaper for warmth.

Jack wouldn’t try to talk to him. He’d just sit there with him and Race would lean into him, not understanding why the world had chosen him to be so different.

Eventually, he just starts hanging out at Medda’s a lot anyway, because his foster parents realize that after he spends time with Jack, he’s happier and more relaxed.

Medda would teach Race how to play the piano and the guitar.

While Race never could hear what he was playing, feeling the vibrations and reading music would calm his nerves.

By this time Race is about nine. Jack is sixteen. And Jack’s foster brother, Charlie, is eleven.

It takes a long while, but eventually, about three months after Race runs away, Crutchie sits down next to him. Race doesn’t think anything of it at first, but Crutchie eventually turns to him starts signing to him.

It’s the first kid close to Race’s age that even makes an effort to try and communicate with him.

Him and Charlie are fast friends after that.

For two years, Charlie is Race’s only real friend.

When Jack turns eighteen, he adopts Race immediately.

They move down the street from Medda so Race can go to the same school. One that Race hates. The teachers never go slow enough for him to understand, his classmates call him stupid and constantly bully and belittle him. He’s often roughed up by other kids who take his backpack and dump out its belongings and then throw them everywhere while they make sure Race is on the ground.

It isn’t until Race is almost twelve that another boy comes to the school. Albert.

Albert isn’t deaf. One of his brothers is and his father is. So he knows sign language

Much like Race, Albert didn’t know that the rest of the world communicated verbally until he was forced into public school

While he does know English, he’s not very good at it, but he realizes that Race struggles to keep up with the teachers so he does his best to help him understand.

Albert and Race are inseparable from that point on.

And as we all know, Albert and Race love to cause trouble wherever they go.

As they get older they grow closer together and they love to tease bullies.

This eventually leads to a very bad fight between them and Oscar Delancey, a boy they can’t stand, where Race ends up with a broken wrist

Needless to say, it’s a bit too close to being back with Snyder and being tied down.

This happens when Race is fourteen.

He falls back into a short depression, not wanting to go to school which prompts Albert to break in through his window to talk to him.

That makes Race happy because at least he has a friend this time.

A certain football player in high school has a crush on Race.

Yes it’s Spot.

Yes he begs Albert to teach him sign so that he can talk to Race.

And that’s what I’ve got.

Let me know if y’all wanna see more deaf!Race or a deaf!Race scene or whump scene or anything!

Thank you so much, Anon!