#the phrase 'it's like when...' plus a source of light

[walks-the-ages]

OP deactivated, and some of the links were broken/marked unsafe by Firefox, so here's a new compilation post of Leslie Feinburg's (She/her, ze/hir) novels and essays on being transgender:

Stone Butch Blues official free source directly from Author's website:

Stone Butch Blues, backup on the webarchive:

Transgender Liberation: A movement whose time has come, on the web archive:

Transgender Warriors: Making History from Joan of Arc to Dennis Rodman, on the web archive:

Lavender and Red, PDF essay collection:

Drag King Dreams, on the web archive:

(Also, if anyone ever tells you that the protagonist of Stone Butch Blues ""ends up with a man""........ they're transmisogynistic jackass TERFs who are straight up lying)

Please also check out your local public libraries for these books and see if they carry them, to help support public libraries! If you have a library card already you can checkout Libby and Overdrive to see if your public library carries it as an ebook that you can checkout :)

EDIT: another not included on the orignal masterpost-- Trans Liberation: Beyond Pink or blue !

annnnnd in light of the web archive losing it's court case, here's a backup of both PDFs and generated epubs a friend made:

5/26/2023: hello! I am adding on yet another book of queer history, this time the autobiography of Karl Baer, a Jewish, intersex trans man who was born in 1884! Please signal boost this version, and remember to check the notes whenever this crosses your dash for any new updates :)

6/24/2023:

Two links to share!

Someone made an Epub version of Memoirs of a Man's Maiden Years, which you can find Here , as a more accessible version than a pdf of a scanned book if you're like me and need larger text size for reading--

And from another post I reblogged earlier today, I discovered the existence of "TransSisters: the Journal of Transsexual Feminism", which has 10 issues from 1993-1995, and includes multiple interviews with Leslie Feinburg and other queer feminists / activists of the 90s!

Here's a link to all 10 issues of TransSisters, plus a 1996 "look back at" by one of the writers after the journal ended, you can find all 10 issues on the Internet Archive Here !

------

8/28/2023:

"Bi Any Other Name: Bisexual People Speak Out", can be found on the web archive Here, for the 25th Anniversary Edition from 2015,

and also Here, for the original 1991 version.

Each of the above can be borrowed for one hour at a time as long as a copy is available :D

This is a living post that receives sporadic updates on the original, if you are seeing this on your dash, click Here to see the latest version of the post to make sure you're reblogging the most up to date one :)

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

October, 25th 2023:

"I began to dawdle over breakfast during shift changes, asking both waitresses questions. After weeks of inquiries, they invited me to a demonstration, outside Kleinhan's Music Hall, protesting the Israeli war against Egypt and Syria. I was particularly interested in that protest. The state of Israel had been declared shortly before my birth. In Hebrew school I was taught "Palestine was a land without peo-ple, for a people without a land." That phrase haunted me as a child. I pictured ears with no one in them, and movies projected on screens in empty theaters. When I checked a map of that region of the Middle East in my school geography textbook, it was labeled Palestine, not Israel. Yet when I asked my grandmother who the Palestinians were, she told me there were no such people. The puzzle had been solved for me in my adolescence. I developed a strong friendship with a Lebanese teenager, who explained to me that the Palestinian people had been driven off their land by Zionist settlers, like the Native peoples in the United States. I studied and thought a great deal about all she told me. From that point on I staunchly opposed Zionist ideology and the occupation of Palestine. So I wanted to go to the protest. However, I feared the demonstration, no matter how justified, would be tainted by anti-Semitism. But I was so angered by the actions of the Israeli government and military, that I went to the event to check it out for myself. That evening, I arrived at Kleinhan's before the protest began. Cops in uniforms and plainclothes surrounded the music hall. I waited impatiently for the protesters to arrive. Suddenly, all the media swarmed down the street. I ran after them. Coming over the hill was a long column of people moving toward Kleinhan's. The woman who led the march and spoke to reporters proudly told them she was Jewish! Others held signs and banners aloft that read: "Arab Land for Arab People!" and "Smash Anti-Semitism!" Now those were two slogans I could get behind! I wanted to know who these people were and where they had been all my life! Hours later I followed the group back to their headquarters. Orange banners tacked up on the walls expressed solidarity with the Attica prisoners and the Vietnamese. One banner particularly haunted me. It read: Stop the War Against Black America, which made me realize that it wasn't just distant wars that needed opposing. Yet although I worked with two members of this organization, I felt nervous that night. These people were communists, Marxists! Yet I found it easy to get into discussions with them. I met waitresses, factory workers, secretaries, and truck drivers. And I decided they were some of the most principled people I had ever met..." Transgender Warriors (1996) Leslie Feinberg

[hedgehog-moss]

One theory I have to explain some odd choices made by translators (and my source for it is “it makes sense to me” so take it with a grain of salt) is basically that as human beings we share a common limit of linguistic complexity, so that languages that are simple on one level (like an alphabet with just a couple dozen letters) can afford to be more complex on some other level and conversely, a language with a more complex feature like thousands of ideograms or lots of grammatical cases will make things easier for itself in some other way.

A language like English which is quite simple in substance (easy conjugations, few verb tenses and moods, no need to remember the gender of every noun and modify adjectives and verbs accordingly, etc) can afford to be more complex in practise, for instance having a higher tolerance for implied meaning, ambiguity, syntactical flexibility, single-use neologisms, and so on. A language which is more complex on the sentence-making level (or word level, with non-intuitive spellings) will shun extra complications on the meaning-making level and demand more precise and codified phrasings, few neologisms, visible logical connectors, etc.

The example in my last post was really typical (though extreme enough to be funny)—where the English text said “the Haves vs. Have Nots vs. Have Mosts” the French translated the latter as “those who have more than all the others.” English went for 'as concise as possible’ and French for ‘as clear as possible’. You could have said in French ‘ceux qui ont le plus’ (those who have the most) or even ‘les ayant-le-plus’ (the having-mosts) but the phrase with all the meaning out in the open was preferred. And although for specific examples you can argue that something else could have worked better, it still makes sense why each language made the choice it did when you consider the text in a holistic way.

A text translated from English to French gains complexity in some ways that are inevitable (e.g. verbs that are in preterit and indicative mood in English might have to alternate in French between imparfait and plus-que-parfait and indicative and subjunctive moods, with verbal structures that are longer or less straightforward) so the translator ends up lowering complexity on other levels, like choosing to spell out ideas more fully. It may seem like a small mental effort to deduce that “have-mosts” mean “those who have more than all others” but it quickly adds up when every sentence has vague or layered or innovative meanings. At the end of the day both the original text and the translation hit the same threshold of linguistic complexity, but the complexity is located in different aspects of language.

There are times when reading French -> English translations when you can see logical connectors being deleted for reasons that feel baffling to a French person (“it makes the structure of thinking less obvious? why would you do that”) but make sense if the complexity of the text has been lowered in some way that English speakers prefer (eg short, direct sentences instead of long meandering ones). Now that parsing the sentence and keeping track of clauses requires less effort, you can ask more effort of the reader by making meaning more implicit—and if the translator doesn’t readjust things in this way they’d be operating their language below capacity, and the English-speaking reader might feel like they’re getting bogged down in overexplained phrasings instead of walking at normal speed.

So in this light the wordiness of French makes sense for French and the pithiness of English makes sense for English—of course there are many factors at play but there’s one common motivation behind these opposite choices, and it’s balancing the different layers of complexity of each language (some of which are a matter of preference eg sentence length, while others are more hardwired) to try and situate your text at the level of complexity that is both hard enough to be interesting and easy enough to be comfortable for the human brain.

[sevensoulmates]

Thank you so much for the explanation, because yes I wasn't seeing the bigger picture (about the titles for the episodes) but yes, it's logical that the meaning behind the title will be to set an overall atmosphere for the whole thing. And I didn't knew about that many references to movies/series? mainly becausey I haven't seen most of them 🤦‍♀️ and other references about phrases (I just didn't know the "why" behind the titles).

And of course sometimes the characters don't even know what's going on their minds yet but luckily I'm on the "Eddie/Buck taking their sweet time realizing how they actually feel" side, getting there is half the fun right?

Thanks for the sharing the post by useramor, I didn't knew about it!

Can I ask another thing? I was really curious about some fans panicking over the possibility of Eddie calling Buck "brother" in incoming episodes, where is this coming from and why is this bad? I just don't get it and I feel like I missing some info.

Thank you for your prompt response, I really appreciate you taking the time to do it.

Titles do have some importance but most of the time the original source material doesn't have THAT much to do with it. Such as the movies, etc. Titles can help set the tone, and general themes, but I wouldn't take them wholly literally, as I've seen people be disappointed in the past because a title like "What's Your Fantasy?" didn't immediately equate to Buck and Eddie doing the nasty in that episode.

It's funny you should mention the "brother" thing, cuz that's actually what I was thinking about when I answered your last ask, hence the "CHARACTERS LIE!!" moment LOLOL I was actually debating making a whole post in regards to that but I was on the fence. Your ask gives me the perfect excuse.

For context: the "eddie calls buck his brother" rumors came about from some accounts on twitter and tumblr who claim (without proof) that they have a "source" that works for 911 that is feeding them info and pictures. Even if the source part is true, all of it is still out of context, and therefore anything that is leaked should ALWAYS be taken with the SMALLEST possible grain of salt. Nothing is true until we see it with our own eyeballs on our tv screens.

I feel like I'm one of the few people who didn't immediately be like one of them calling the other brother means it's the end of Buddie!! We already know that this arc is going to revolve around Buck (and possibly Eddie too) being confused and uncertain of where their relationship stands. I think that the purposeful confusion and uncertainty are because neither Buck nor Eddie really understands why their feelings are getting hurt or why the other is acting in certain ways. That, plus all of the last few seasons, have shown that Buck and Eddie don't really talk a lot about who they are to each other. They kind of just....live in that nebulousness and hope no one comes along and points out how odd it is.

Something else I want to point out is that if the rumor is true, we don't know AT WHAT POINT in the episode he says this. What new information might have come to light before this? Additionally, we don't know what acting choices might come along with it. Does Eddie look weird as he says "brother"? Does Buck make an odd face? Is the camera focus on the scene being uncomfortable? Is the "brother" comment accepted easily or hesitantly? Is there romantic/soft or discordant music in the background? What is being said without being said in the moment? There are simply too many unknown variables in the equation including story context, editing, sound, and acting choices for me to immediately be like "damn, guess I'll give up now".

We also don't know if this happens in episode 4 or 5 which also vastly changes the context.

I'll also tell you what my first thought was when I heard the "Eddie calls buck his brother!" rumors. I thought "Oh of course he did, he's still deep in compulsory heterosexuality".

Let's think about this in two ways:

If Buck comes out as Bi, and Eddie calls him his brother for the first time since they met? That's so strange. Why now all of a sudden is Eddie purposefully trying to immediately shut down the possibility of them being romantic? Why does the idea of Buck having a romantic interest in men suddenly make Eddie feel the need to draw boundaries? One could say it's a homophobic response, or (more likely) an internalized homophobic response. One could also say it's so Buck does not get the idea of a romantic relationship being possible between them, which again, why does he feel the need to draw that distinction if they're both oh so confident they're the best of friends and will never be anything but friends. "Brother" is also distancing language as well. It could be a way for Eddie to distance himself from Buck, and in turn, Buck's queerness. Again, why? No one in his immediate circle is homophobic so why does he feel the need to distance himself in every way possible from even the tiniest idea of queerness being associated with him? All of it screams internalized homophobia and compulsory heterosexuality to me.

Now let's go the non-queer route. Say Buck is still straight as a ruler. They resolve their issue, Eddie reassures Buck that they're best still friends, etc. I am again wondering why Eddie feels the need to use "brother" for the first time in years. It should imply being closer than friends. But Eddie has already proven that he views Buck as closer than his blood family, hence why Buck is in the will, and Eddie's family is not. So why again, "brother" if not to purposely draw attention to the odd (and out of character) word choice. This could once again be Eddie using distancing language, which once again implies all of the stuff I said before. And in this case, it's even odder, because Buck is (as far as Eddie knows) a straight man. So why the need to draw a boundary? That lends more to Eddie having a potential fear of being perceived as queer by Buck. That also lends to internalized homophobia.

And all of that aside, at the end of the day, Buck and Eddie are not blood-related, and they didn't grow up with each other, so even if they call each other brothers...it's always going to be in a metaphorical sense. And there's the fact that FEELINGS. CAN. CHANGE. Eddie might believe he sees Buck as a brother at the moment, but that could change in a single instant. If Eddie's really not had that many other close male friends in his life, he might truly believe that what he feels for Buck is just friendship and not realize that actually...this is something vastly different. Or, like I said, he might be LYING. The writers could also be LYING to us on purpose.

It's possible that it could be used as a red herring, to make the audience believe one thing, and then they plan to subvert it as a "plot twist" at the end. It could be used as a plot device and a stepping stool to so many other things. And additionally, why now? Why in this big episode where it seems like sexuality might come into play? Why not in episode 1 when Eddie could've been like "You're like an uncle to Chris". And of course, again, the biggest point of them all: we already KNOW that Buck and Eddie are the closest of friends. We've seen it, new audiences have seen it. So why suddenly redefine it as "brothers" during an episode where it seems like Buck is getting his own feelings regarding their relationship confused.

The last thing to think about is this: how does doubling down on Buck and Eddie being "brothers" push the story forward? Story needs conflict, and 911 thrives off of creating long-term conflict. How does being "brothers" set up a long-term conflict for them? Or, if being "brothers" is the resolution for their conflict, then what is changing as a result of being "brothers"? How are they getting closer than they already are by being "brothers"? Truthfully, them redefining their relationship to "brothers" changes absolutely nothing about their relationship.

I don't agree with people who say "This shuts down all hope of buddie" because season 6 already pulled them as far apart as they could be. It gave them female love interests to do something with if they wanted to this season but fact of the matter is that the writers didn't want to pursue those stories. They threw Buddie back together so fiercely and chopped their love interests down to less importance than randos on calls.

So what is left that actually can cause Buck and Eddie's relationship to evolve into something we've never seen from them before? The only answer is romance. So, no, I'm not worried about some random "brothers" comment.

[dannyphantomarchive]

Early production deep-dive - Part 6: The first trailer  

💚 Congrats to everyone who celebrated this 20th Dannyversary! 💚

Whether you participated in the Dannypocalypse or paid homage to the show in your own way, you’ve all made this year’s celebration truly special, which is why we’re also coming again with new content this weekend.

In our last post, we covered in great detail all the promotional content of the show's first episode, and during our hunt for the premiere’s footage, we stumbled upon another great find: the show’s very first trailer!

For this post let's rewind back to six months before the premiere, back to November 29th of 2003, the day when the first trailer of the show aired on the channel, during an All Grown Up marathon. 

“Title - danny phantom teaser’s airing! If you watched AGU then you already know this but, Nickelodeon is now airing teasers (commercials) for "Danny Phantom"! It's advertising a April 2004 release.” (Source: https://animesuperhero.com/forums/threads/danny-phantom-teasers-airing.3501651/)

The video was a 30-second trailer that contained animated boards of the original unused theme opening, which got written and even recorded, but was later scrapped, as discussed in Part 5 of our previous posts.

The trailer also featured shots of the first episode, plus the show’s catch phrase used at the time: ‘Not seeing is believing’. It was a very dynamic video, with multiple action shots and close-ups shown in sequence, inside panels that slid in and out of the screen.

(Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VPYjguE8A4 ;  Trailer can be found at 48:43-49:13)

[Image Description: Set of 8 snapshots from the first Danny Phantom trailer. The words ‘Courtesy of CDCB2’ are written in white at the bottom left of the screen in all of them.

Image 1 - A white splash with the words ‘April 2004’ in black inside. The splash is on top of a black and white background, with some partial shots of the show displayed. There is a green ghost underneath the splash. 

Image 2 - Danny in his Phantom form, seen from the torso up. He is glancing at the left with an upturned eyebrow and serious face. There is a green glow around him and the whole image has green hues. There are two other shots in black and white at the bottom right corner, only partially showing hands. 

Image 3 - Danny is standing with his knees bent and hands closed in fists. He is in his human form, wearing his usual white t-shirt with red accents and red circle on his chest, blue jeans and a red pair of shoes. He has a determined look and there are white transformation rings around his torso. This scene is shown inside a screen. Behind it, to the right, is a black and white shot of Danny holding a door open with one hand and carrying a lantern on the other. The lantern points directly forward.

Image 4 -  Danny is crouching down, one knee to the ground and arms up, body ready to jump forward. He is in his ghost form, face serious as he looks to a wall at his left. This scene is shown on a floating screen with two diagonal rips, dividing it in three.

Image 5 - Inside a floating screen, Danny is in his Phantom form holding the Fenton thermos in front of him, which is shooting out a beam. He is facing the left and is completely coated in a light blue glow.

Image 6 - Danny in his ghost form fighting a green liquidy ghost to his left. Danny is mid-action of throwing a punch and the ghost has its mouth open and hands up, in a threatening pose. The background is blue and the scene is inside a screen that floats in front of a black and white background.  

Image 7 - Danny stands in front of an orange background, seen from the torso up and looking at the camera with a smug smile. He is in his Phantom form. There is a white shape that looks like splashed liquid next to his head, with the text ‘Danny Phantom’ and in smaller text below it ‘A Brand New Nicktoon Series’ inside. There is an orange ghost flying past the ‘y’ in Danny.

Image 8 - Danny Phantom stands in front of a dark background, seen from the torso up and looking at the camera with a smug smile. There is a shape that looks like splashed liquid next to his head, with the text  ‘Not seeing is Believing’’ inside. All the lines are white and the inside of the shapes are the same color as the background, there is a soft blue glow around the splash and Danny, which is meant to give the impression that everything is transparent and ghostly. Danny’s eyes are green. /end ID]

And here it is:

(Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VPYjguE8A4 ;  Trailer can be found at 48:43-49:13)

-Transcription:

“Narrator: Coming April 2004, Nickelodeon’s new action hero. He’s going- going ghost. Danny: I’m going ghost! I think I figured out what these powers are for. I hope I’m right! Narrator: Danny Phantom. A brand new Nicktoon series coming this April to Nickelodeon. Not seeing is believing.”

This trailer marked the start of the marketing for the show, with more promotional content being released for the public, in both video and print format, as the show’s premiere date got closer. But to keep this short, we’ll cover those in the next posts instead! 

First - Previous - Next

[coinandcandle]

Coin's Blogging Tips II

Here's another post of blogging tips. Check out my other post here!

Tone

How do you want your blog to be perceived? Fun, friendly, intellectual, or serious? Choose a writing style that fits your brand and stick with it.

I tend to use a fun, light-hearted approach on most of my posts while keeping them educational, so I choose to write in a manner that sounds like I’m talking to a friend.

That’s also why I try to steer clear of too many difficult or academic words and phrases since the whole point of my blog is to be educational and accessible for all sorts of folks!

Grammar

It should go without saying that grammar is important when writing a blog post. If you don’t have time to proofread a post and you don’t have others to help, consider putting your post through google docs or downloading Grammarly for help!

However, it’s more than ok to sacrifice good grammar if it’s to create a specific tone. As stated, I prefer a light, friendly tone so I’ll often go with a less grammatically correct approach to achieve that.

Here’s an example: 

I was going to write a blog post about the Golden Dawn and its history but there is far too much information to write about in a singular post.

to:

I was gunna make a post about the Golden Dawn and its history but there’s way too much info for just one post!

The first sentence comes across as proper or more professional, but that’s not the tone we’re looking for! So we forgo good grammar to achieve a lighter and friendlier tone.

Navigation

Making your blog easy to navigate is a great way to retain someone's attention. By creating masterposts or linking your posts to each other in-text, you can help others flow through your related content with ease!

Interest

First and foremost, is your post interesting? Your topic doesn’t need to be particularly relevant to be interesting, but it certainly helps! Find out what’s popular in your niche or community right now and see if it’s something you’d enjoy writing about.

Pro Tip: If you’re bored while writing it, your readers will probably be bored while reading it. Take a break and step away from a post if you feel like it’s dragging on, you can come back to it later.

Alternatively, ask a friend to read your post and get their feedback on it. It helps if you can get multiple people to review it before posting!

Sources and Citations

You don’t need to go full MLA or APA with your sources and citation, just mentioning where you get your info or adding a hyperlink in-text can help give your post credibility.

This doesn’t mean you should just through around links, though, make sure your sources are actually credible otherwise you risk the chance of losing the trust of your readers. Plus it’s just good practice to be honest about where you get your information!

Enjoying my content? Consider supporting or tipping me on my ko-fi!

[sluttyhenley]

twenty questions for fic writers

tagged by: @redbelles 💖

1. how many works do you have on ao3?

54

2. what's your total ao3 word count?

303,100

3. what fandoms do you write for?

recently? 911, top gun and uhhhh masters of the air... (but if you ever check out my ao3 you will see several fandoms)

4. top five fics by kudos

my heart is working over time

is forever enough

lover be good to me

a twister to blow everything down

when one plus one equals three

5. do you respond to comments?

sometimes it takes me a while but yes, i love getting comments and so i like to make sure i actually reply when someone takes the time to talk to me about my fic

6. what is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

until the shadows fall, which is uhh, one of the earlier fics i wrote and my writing has definitely . . . . evolved since writing it, but. yeah, it is the angstiest ending i've written. actually, though, i'm going to mention the sound of glass, because yeah, that one is a close runner up

7. what's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

probably put a hold on my heart. if it's not the happiest ending it's definitely the sappiest ending

8. do you get hate on fics?

i have gotten hate on two separate fics

9. do you write smut?

ha. hahahahaha. stares for a long time at like..... 3 of my top 5 fics by kudos. and two of my most recently posted fics. and my mota fic that's upcoming. yeah... . .

10. craziest crossover:

i've only written one crossover, leverage and the old guard in the immortals job (the craziest one i ever conceptualized though was prob an idea to cross over star trek and doctor who)

11. have you ever had a fic stolen?

not that i know of

12. have you ever had a fic translated?

nope!

13. have you ever co-written a fic before?

no, but i have tossed story ideas back and forth with people

14. all time favorite ship?

i refuse to (read: can't) answer this

15. what's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

i have . . . . . a few. and they're fics that i started for a source that i don't want anything to do with anymore

16. what are your writing strengths?

@redbelles has a first row seat to this but because of what i'm trying to do right now, all of my writing feels weak. but i'm trying to remind myself that as your writing evolves you feel less confident in your abilities regardless of the accuracy of that feeling. but i think i'd say ummm characterization and humor

17. what are your writing weaknesses?

me @ me: for $1 pick literally any other word/phrase/imagery device. for god's sake

18. thoughts on dialogue in another language?

i won't do it except under very specific circumstances, such as actually having a reasonable proficiency in the language. i did pepper some french phrases in a book of nile fic a while back

19. first fandom you wrote in?

the librarians is the first fandom i actually posted fic i wrote for. but i did write some doctor who fic before that i a) never finished and b) don't actually want to see the light of day

20. favorite fic you've written?

probably put a hold on my heart. i put a lot of work into that one, and handwrote the whole thing. it was my baby for the better part of a year and i'm really proud of some of the things i did there.

tagging: @reachingforaspark, @ladywaffles, @shoesplease, @sindirimba, and @natashatrace (if you want!)

[feralkwe]

Wol thinkthonkers 8 and/or 9?

hi! yay! welcome! i can't be concise apparently so, a cut for you!

8. what is one of their biggest regrets? has it had an effect on how they act moving forward, for better or worse?

i think kit's biggest regrets are that she was quick to take things at face value because people told her that's how things just were. here and there along the way of her journey she fought in the name of something that seemed straightforward. usually it was in the name of what had to happen for the greater good (a burden she wears like a lead cape). ascians are evil and trying to destroy the world (yes, but...), hydaelyn is good and loves the world and wants what is best for everyone (yes, but...), the crystal exarch is trying to save his world and yours (yes, but...), the warriors of darkness are trying to kill you (yes, but...), zodiark is the source of all evil and corrupt and power hungry (uh... akshully...). none of these, save one big one, are lies per se, but they are all things she looks back on and wonders if she could have changed the fallout she carries if she'd just given it a little more thought. which is an unfair thing to place on her own shoulders. there is nuance that was unavailable to a lot of people, the scions included, for so long, and she did the best she could with the knowledge they all had to work with.

she very much tries to take that caution going forward.

9. The Warrior of Light has been through quite a lot, but what is a moment, big or small, that bolstered and renewed their spirit? Was it a cup of hot cocoa or a lovingly crafted sandwich? Did someone give them a few words or a gesture at just the right time that meant the world to them? (Of course, this can be a canon event or headcanon!)

oh, so many. so many little moments along the way. there were so many times kit just wanted to lie down and give up, and while she never would, the strength to move forward came in sometimes surprising places. there are the obvious larger moments, ardbert on the first and in the final gasp, hythlodaeus time and again throughout the story, emet-selch showing up when she called during seat of sacrifice. certainly, but this wants the small ones, so i'll try to rein myself in here.

minfilia telling kit just how much she means to her. i forget the exact phrasing, but i recall it striking a chord. early days with the scions made kit feel like a tool more than a person, but minfilia calling her a friend was restorative.

alisaie, time and again, is just a fount of this. even if it isn't her direct words, her very existence in kit's orbit pushes her on all the time. alisaie looks up to her so much that kit can't help but take her words and march on. kit probably has one of those 'do it for her' simpsons posters in her room that is just alisaie's face all over it.

ryne. ryne and gaia. ryne and gaia and their coffee biscuits and the idea that they deserve all the time the world has to offer them. their whole everything is something that pushes her on. i absolutely know that there were moments during the final days that she just had to remember their laughs to renew her determination when all felt lost.

i couldn't find an exact moment without doing ng+ for heavensward, but estinien, again and again, whether he realized it or not, spurred her on. likely nothing he did consciously, as he was certainly going through his own journey at the same time. a word here or there would have been all it took. maybe just a casual comment as they watched alphinaud sleep, or a quiet moment after losing ysayle. those really stuck with her. if he could keep going, so could she. i'm always threatening to write some jock bro story for them, but his voice intimidates me so i've yet to take this leap. lol.

weird ones, like emet-selch's weird 'wink wink, nudge nudge' speech before mt. gulg. the one-two of that plus ardbert's echoing her own feelings on it out loud immediately after. that probably doesn't count as little though.

every. kind. word. elidibus. ever said to her. he had no way of knowing this, but it came at a time she needed it.

thanks so much for the ask! here's the list if anyone wants to participate, either by sending or receiving.

[moondust-bard]

First off nice to meet you! Hi new mutual 👋 Your wips sound awesome and I'll definitely be tagging you in some games because I'd love to learn more about them :D

I see you're open to beta and sensitivity reads! I'm not quite ready for that yet but the second book in my paranormal fantasy duology has a recurring role that's actually a vampire who's visually impaired with albinism! (and queer but that's not explicitly stated or relevant)

I did some research and tried to avoid harmful stereotypes as much as possible, but I was wondering if you had any quick pointers of what I should absolutely avoid? Or vice versa, something you'd really like to see.

Hello, hi! I really enjoyed what I saw on your blog when I first rejoined the tumblr writing community. I’m excited to see more of your work.

First of all, thank you for asking! And thank you also for researching albinism and the harmful stereotypes we unfortunately encounter in media. If I can help bring about more positive, realistic representation of albinism and the spectrum of visual impairment in fiction by acting as a source of advice— well, honestly, I’ve been waiting for someone to ask me this since I started writing. Maybe even before that, really. My childhood was marred by not-great fictional examples of my disability, and those few that exist were used by others as faulty measurements of comparison. Baby Luna would've loved to see someone like herself in books and films who wasn’t a villain or a sympathy-inducer in one of those “disability inspiration” movies.

Speaking of, this brings me to my list of what I’d like to see— and not ever see again— in media. This list’s advice may or may not be relevant, depending on the vampire lore you’re using and the specifics of your— for lack of a better phrase—mythical humanoid world-building. If you'd prefer to share specific bits of relevant info privately— just in case my notes here aren't helpful or specific enough— please feel welcome to pop by in my private messages.

1. Demon comparisons are not well received by the albinism community. I’d love less “omg, red eyes? must be a demon!” energy aimed at us. If that’s a vampire trait in your story’s world, or otherwise plot-necessary, I'd probably support it if the character with albinism bites back with some sass or a teasing threat. The amount of times I’ve had religious weirdos and children freak out on me in public is in the double digits. I'm known to be pretty feisty in response to negative comments, and most of the people with albinism I've met either react with tolerant “in good faith” education or dry humor.

2. Albinism comes with some co-morbid conditions. For example, nystagmus— a condition many people with albinism possess— is rarely represented in media, and therefore not understood by the general population. I’d love to see it casually touched upon in a book or film. Some other related conditions and experiences include extreme photophobia, skin cancer, strabismus, poor vision, astigmatism, squinting, eye fatigue and migraines, and more I'm probably forgetting to mention.

3. Please, please, if you can help it, don't give the world another villain or evil henchman with albinism. I'm begging writers and filmmakers to stop. I can go into detail as to why this is detrimental to the albinism community if requested, but I'm trying to keep this post brief.

4. Not all blind people wear sunglasses, and those who do don't wear them 24/7. I personally only wear mine outside and if I've been under fluorescent lights for more than a few hours. Bright lights physically hurt after awhile. The whole “blind people always wear sunglasses” trope was popularized so that blind characters could be easily recognized as blind in tv and film.

5. We’re clumsy and confused a good portion of the time. Visual impairments plus possible depth perception issues and questionable ability to perceive light do not make for the most graceful of humans. We bump into stationary objects, stumble over uneven or unpredictable surfaces, fail to notice people right in front of us, and fumble with items we can't perceive. If I had a dollar for every time I've taken a doorknob into the hip, knocked over clear glasses, fallen into the street from the pavement, walked by my own mother in a store whilst searching for her, and almost gotten into the wrong car… I'd be able to actually afford to exist under capitalism, wow

I'm sure I'm forgetting some points, but alas my brain is mush and I've made you wait for my response to this question for much too long. Again, thank you for this considerate message and for taking the time to inquire about this topic. I really do appreciate the effort you've put into it. I'm always here to discuss disability, writing, and the intersection thereof.

[wander-wren]

there’s always comment tips floating around tumblr but today it’s MY TURN BABEY i’m not covering Every Possible Comment, just my personal tips and tricks

pick a few default phrases. write them down even if you want!! my go-tos are “i love this so much” and “thank you for writing/sharing!!” and “omg this is perfect.” sometimes all of them together! i’m an overachiever so i usually go more in-depth, but just these sorts of things is great too

straight up just describe what you’re doing. “it’s 2am and im going to be so tired tomorrow but it was worth it i love this so much” (look theres a default phrase!!) “i’m sitting here crying into my chicken nuggets oh my god” “i laughed so hard reading this i woke up my dog”

if its a multi-chapter, try to predict whats coming! in a nice way, not demanding or “if xyz does/n’t happen i’ll riot” (unless its something guaranteed to happen, like “if [tagged pairing] dont get over themselves and kiss soon i’ll scream.”). esp if the fic is ongoing!! i’ve changed directions of longfics slightly bc of what readers predicted!! fanfic is a communal activity!!

speaking of ongoing fics: feel free to express excitement for future chapters but dont demand them, and DEFINITELY don’t let that be the only thing you say. “update soon!” is different from “oh wow i loved this bc xyz, cant wait to see what happens next!” the former makes it feel like a thankless chore, they latter feels like encouragement.

if a fic is not usually up your alley but you liked it, say so! just be polite. “i dont usually read [ship] but i was curious and i liked this bc xyz” is cool!! “i usually hate [ship] bc its gross/weird/toxic/etc and Other People always write [insert common trope] but this one was good” is less cool. you dont need to trash on the thing the author clearly likes, but it IS nice to know i could open you up to a new idea or something!

pick a line, any line, that made you laugh or “aww” or cry or get angry or ANYTHING. paste it in the comment box. write “this made me [insert emotion/reaction]” or “YESS/NOOO [character name]” or “oh my god i love this” or whatever floats your boat

if you want to go above and beyond, if i’m reading a longer work that i can already tell is gonna be a favorite, i just open the notes on my phone and copy paste all my favorite lines with my reactions as i go, then bam, ready-made comment

can guarantee (source: me) it will make a writer’s WEEK bc its like, barely any extra effort but it shows what made the most impact, and sometimes it makes someone see their stuff in a new light bc maybe they didn’t expect the line to hit that way! but woah! its so cool how different people experience art!!

also, comment when you reread. comment on older fics. if authors ask for suggestions or take requests, ASK. you get a thing you want, authors get interaction and cool fun ideas, it’s a win-win! everyone else is just as awkward and anxious and starved for human communication as you i SWEAR

also leave nice things in bookmarks bc that EXTRA makes my day when i remember to check once every six months. plus it helps future me remember why i bookmarked it

[echoesofstardust]

FIRST! For the current project ask

FIRST — the first two sentences of my current project

(this is still wedding planners AU, but I kinda leant into my love of imagery for the opening sentences)

It’s like when you wake up and you’re just in time to see the sunrise, and as pinks and violets and golds and oranges unfurl and streak across the sky, something settles in your chest, something that you don’t yet have a name for. That, that’s what it feels like.

no excuses writing meme, askbox version

[byebyelingual]

HELLO BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE. Today's post is about:

🇼🇸🌴Samoa🌴🇼🇸

If you didn't know, Samoa is a State made of a group of 💫paradisiac💫 islands in Polynesia, near New Zealand and Australia, riiiiight here:

The best place for a vacation, right?

Samoan people are bilingual (speaking English and Samoan), so if you happen to be in Apia (Samoa's Capital) and want to make friends, you can say:

Hello = Malō (informal) / Tālofa

How are you? = Ua mai oe?

Thank you = Fa'afetai

Please = Fa'amolemole

Yes = Ioe

No = Leai

Sorry = Fa'amalie atu

I don't know = Ou te leiloa

Have a nice day! = Ia manuia le aso!

I understand = Ua ou mālamalama

I don't understand = 'Ou te lē mālamalama

Help! = Fia ola!

Excuse me = Tulou lava

I miss you = Ou te misia ia te oe

I love you = Ou te alofa ia te oe

One language is never enough = O le gagana e tasi e le lava

Source:

👉 You wanna learn the Samoan writing System? No problem.

The Samoan Language uses the latin alphabet plus 'Okina, the symbol (') used in writing to represent a glottal stop, similar to the sound between the syllables of "oh-oh", and kahakō, which when written over a vowel indicates that the vowel is long.

Samoa's Capital, Apia

🌴But let's look more into Samoan Culture

Samoan culture is based on Faʻa Sāmoa, the 'Samoan Way'.

It includes the behavior and the responsibilities that spell out all Samoans' relationships to one another and to persons holding positions of authority.

Faʻa Sāmoa includes the way one stands, walks and speaks, for example by saying "tulou" when one walks in front of someone who is seated. Likewise, it is extremely disrespectful to eat or drink when walking through a village.

"Family" in samoan is ʻAiga.

'Aiga consists of a wider family group of blood and marriage or even adopted connections who all acknowledge the matai (head of the family) who can be either male or female.

All members of the 'Aiga don't have to live under the same roof or even in the same village but it will assemble when the occasion requires it, generally at the residence of the matai, to discuss family affairs, deaths or weddings.

Samoan matai protestors outside Aotearoa New Zealand's Parliament. On 28 March 2003, this group of 3000 Samoans, among them hundreds of transnational matai, protested against the Citizenship [Western Samoa] Act 1982 outside Parliament. Image: Mark Mitchell

🔥Dancing is a huge part of Samoan culture.

There's many traditional samoan dances:

The Fa'ataupati, or "Samoan Slap Dance". Only performed by males, it's the only dance withouth music but with the clapping of the hands and stomping of the feet.

The Maulu'ulu. Literally it means "light rain" - due to the refreshing movements and style, as a "light rain" would cool the stifling tropical heat of a summer day.

The Sasa can be performed by both males and females.

The Siva Afi, a ceremonial dance using the fire knife.

The Manu Siva Tau is a Samoan War Dance, performed by the Samoan sporting teams before each match.

The Taualuga, considered the apex of Samoan performance art forms.

🌈Lgbtq+ in Samoa

Even though same sex relationships are illegal, Samoa has a large transgender or "third gender" community called fa'afafine.

Faʻafafine are people who identify themselves as having a third gender or non-binary role in Samoa.

They are assigned male at birth, and embody both masculine and feminine gender traits. Their behaviour typically ranges from extravagantly feminine to conventionally masculine.

A curious fact about Samoa is that male relationships are forbidden, while female ones are not.

A book about this general topic was written by the Samoan artists Dan Taulapapa McMullin and Yuki Kihara.

🌴☀️🌴☀️🌴☀️🌴☀️🌴☀️🌴☀️🌴☀️🌴☀️

If you read until now and learned something new, I'm proud of you!

And so are some Samoan characters you didn't know were Samoan, like:

And last but not least,

If you want to learn Samoan or just want to look more into its culture, check this:

Nafanuatele Lafitaga Mafaufau, the creator and writer of O Le Aiga Samoa comic, is the passionate founder and teacher of the Nafanua Communication and Culture Samoan language classes.

This comic helps to make the Samoan language accessible to people of all ages and backgrounds, and its goal is to make especially young people engage in Samoa's beautiful culture.

https://www.boosted.org.nz/projects/o-le-aiga-samoa

[devilishychubbyqueer]

Self Hypnosis 101

Hi there! You can call me Devil or Robin. I'm a 24 y/o queer, plus size hypno enthusiast, and I practice self hypnosis! This is just a little list of things I think are important to do during sessions and a general primer on the subject! This isn't a strict guide, so please take this with a grain of salt, and add/subtract as you see fit!

(I'll also be documenting a typical self brainwashing session of mine in writing soon~ so stay tuned for that ♡♡♡)

Let's get started!

Self Hypnosis is simply that- hypnosis done by yourself. No hypnotist needed. While couple or group hypnosis may be preferable for some, lots of us don't have that option for various reasons. So self hypnosis is honestly a good way to go, even if others don't talk too much about it. Here's some important things to know.

1. Be safe.

Above all, you need to keep yourself safe before, during, and after the sessions. This may sound like a no brainer, since you're the only one performing any hypnosis, but be mindful of a few things.

Are you in a safe place to do a session? Are you feeling well enough to do a session? Do you have time constraints? Health needs? That kind of list is important! It may seem like obvious answers, but it's good to know what they are, and if need be, write them down.

Another thing to be mindful of is safeguarding. Not everyone needs one, but some of us(like myself) get swept up in the headspace of hypnosis, and if pushed enough, can be coerced into letting others use our triggers. If this is not agreed upon, if it's pushed until you say yes, that's a BIG danger.

Self Hypnosis is something I started to be safe, and the first thing I did was install a Red Light trigger. That's essentially a very simple trigger to trip, allowing someone in trance to be able to think clearly when something feels wrong, and wake up safely but quickly. For me, it was easy to link it to the idea of being unsafe and therefore waking up to establish safety, but some people might need a phrase or physical trigger. That's fine.

The way I did it, I installed this trigger with a few trances just to reinforce, with a script I wrote out. I've since gotten rid of the script, so as to avoid avoid twisting it against me.

Aftercare is also super important, to be fair Just be safe, make safeguards, and take care of yourself during play, as you would during other kink activities ♡

2. Your wants are important!

Since you're the only one performing the hypnosis, it means you get to indulge in any fantasy you like! So long as it doesn't hurt you or anyone else, go for it!

It may feel strange to indulge in what you want at first, since oftentimes those who are kinky will be criticized and made to minimize, but this is time you set aside for yourself!

If you need to, write down what you'd like to do. Whether that's create triggers, explore a fantasy, or create long lasting effects. Have fun with it! You can always take it back if you don't enjoy it, and no one is there to stop you. As long as it's safe and you aren't hurting anyone else or yourself, try it out!

3. On the topic of self brainwashing.

Now, I know that's proooobably why most are here. Self brainwashing is something I've been doing for a while now, like any dom might do for a consenting, enthusiastic sub. Some say it can't be done, but I think it can!

Brainwashing, in essence, is training the mind to naturally gear towards something. Mostly, it's a fictional concept. However, doing it for fun can result in some lovely results~

If you want to self brainwash, it might be smart to find an outside source such as a visual or audio that gets you into that state. Reinforcing the triggers you want could be as simple as writing out what you want and reading it while under trance, posting while deep under, or finding audio files that emphasize the thing you've been looking to train yourself into.

My example is that I wanted to become aroused and addicted to hypnosis(loosely, not actually, this IS just a fantasy), and I know from experience that masturbation has a funny way of blanking the mind. So at first I found myself some files, some spirals, and set some time aside to rub my mind away.

After a while, I started snapping during these sessions, finding mantras to repeat, and slowly backing away from external sources. I kind of Pavlov'd my brain into associating the snaps with trance, the mantras with obedience, and stroking or edging myself with going deeper.

Now, if I snap in a safe place, my mind can drop like a stone and cause instant arousal, crossed eyes, etc. It took a long time to train to this state, and not everyone has that time. That's okay! Everyone has their own pace.

But I do think it's possible because I myself am doing it~ I've got a few next steps for myself but as for you, keep trying new things out. Find what works and stick with it! Find a goal and see what you can do to ramp up to it safely.

4. Listen to your body.

Some kinks are unrealistic in how far one can push a body. And while it's fun to engage in fantasy, just be careful not to overdo it. Give your body a break or switch things up if you're starting to experience pain or something unexpected. Retrace your steps and see if there's something you can change to make things better!

Nothing should well and truly HURT during play unless it's intentional. Be careful with your body and listen to it. If you need to stop or slow down, there's no shame in that.

I hope this helps somewhat. I know it's a long piece, but I hope it gives some insight! If anyone has questions, feel free to hit up my asks ♡♡♡

I am not the authority on self brainwashing, btw! These are all things I think are important, but they may change for you! I'm just a dork trying to branch out his experiences and indulge himself. You should do the same!

Be safe, have fun, and happy brainwashing♡♡♡

[grassbreads]

Ok but as much as I love the corruption arc jokes, I do think one of the best things about Greg’s character is that he was never actually a particularly great person. He’s always been incredibly entitled and weasely; his wealth/exposure to the Roys has simply made it much more obvious.

In the literal second episode of the show, Greg drops his little “I thought you all might be talking about me” line. Despite his great uncle, the father of the people he’s been hanging out with, being on his deathbed, he genuinely believes that they’ve been talking about him and his possible job offer this whole time. The kid’s got an ego the size of a blimp under all the awkward, out of place bumbling and funny turns of phrase, and though I understand that he was quite literally out of money and desperate, that doesn’t change the fact that the only thing he cared about through the whole stroke crisis was his own financial situation. He thought he was owed his nepotism job, and that was all that mattered.

Plus for all that he tried to play the “I have principles” card in season 2, it’s clear even as he says it that he’s quite willing to bend those principles when he doesn’t have to look directly at the results, or when bending them benefits him. He doesn’t want to work at ATN because he knows the network is toxic and harmful, but he’s just fine with working at other branches within the same company. And not only that, but he seems to have completely blocked out the fact that Logan, whom he seems to genuinely like at that point in the series, owns, runs, and watches fucking ATN. Logan is the source of all that toxicity he tries to decry, but it’s easier to ignore from him, so he does. Plus, when he asks to change departments because he doesn’t want to work for ATN anymore, he’s very easily satisfied by the offer of a promotion within the network instead. He doesn’t want to work for Fox News, unless working for them means a big raise and a fancy new title.

Greg is much nicer on a surface level than the other Roys, but he’s never been a particularly good person. Money and power haven’t changed him so much as they’ve just brought his pre-existing flaws to the surface in a much brighter light. He’s been managing to weasel his way out of pretty much everything so far without facing any real consequences or making many real decisions, plus he’s been gaining a bunch of money and privilege, so of course he’s getting worse. He gets a thrill out of being rich and powerful and treated like he matters. (Remember how excited he was when Tom called him family in the death pit scene? He loves the idea of being a Roy, toxicity or not, because of all the meaning that the family name carries).

So like, he really hasn’t developed any new negative traits. He’s escalated from “I’m entitled to this nepotism job, even if my uncle is sick” to “I’m entitled to my inheritance, even if I have to sue greenpeace to get it,” but the entitlement was always there. He’s escalated from “I’ll keep my job at the bad network because I got promoted” to “I’ll hang out with the alt right for a while because they’re cheering for me,” but he’s always been a hypocrite. And honestly, I think this is one of the best things about his character. Him and Shiv are both really great examples of a certain kind of liberal-adjacent performative morality that you don’t see in media very often, but which is everywhere IRL. I don’t think either of them (and especially not Greg) realize how false and hollow their claims of goodness really are, and it’s fascinating.

[welllpthisishappening]

Emma Swan, Olympian is not a phrase Emma Swan, totally normal person, ever expected to hear.

But she never expected one night at a party hosted by her college's baseball team to change her entire life, either. So, it should really come as no surprise that Emma Swan, Olympian, is now something of international sensation. Or that her husband has become a bit of a social media star.

——— Rating: Teen with sports feelings Word Count: 7.5K AN: As promised and because of who I am as a person, I wrote Olympic fic. I can neither confirm nor deny that there is an actual plot here, but there is a surplus of fluff and sports-based feelings. So, that’s something. Thanks to the Detroit Lions, specifically, for posting this Tweet and to my husband who is very much aware of what content I want the internet to provide me. Operation: Make Killian a New York Yankee as often as possible continues.

|| Read on Ao3 if that’s your jam ||

———

No one told her the questions would start to blur together.

That would require media training, Emma imagines. And no one is giving a first-time Olympian in a sport that only a handful of people marginally believe warrants notice from the IOC any sort of media training. She got, like, an orientation packet. With a lopsided staple in the top left corner. On her commercial flight. That she booked herself.

Twenty-plus hours crammed into a seat that she’s only a little concerned did permanent damage to her right knee, with a meal that was so chewy Emma was about four seconds and one exasperated, entirely exhausted exhale from asking if it was, in fact, made of plastic.

Mostly, the staple is what’s still managing to frustrate her. As frustrated as she can be at the Olympics. No one is supposed to be frustrated at the Olympics. Not really. Not while experiencing the pinnacle of athletic achievement, the calluses on Emma’s fingertips some sort of badge of honor that she’s wearing with at least a modicum of national pride, and everything is fine.

Her qualifying time was absurd. Where absurd is a compliment and very close to a record she’s suddenly determined to shatter.

So, she’s alone.

Big deal. So is everyone else. This Olympics, at least. Plus, Killian wouldn’t have been able to come no matter what the state of the world was. Even so, the quiet stands are admittedly weird. All these empty arenas with empty seats, the distinct lack of a roaring crowd no more obvious than when the world’s best athletes step to the line. Staring at the climbing wall in front of her four hours earlier, Emma swore she could hear every single beat of her heart echo between her ears.

And that’s—well, solitude is par for the course with an adolescence like hers, half-filled suitcases and brand-new faces in brand-new towns, but she’d gotten used to one town, and the town is actually a city, and the city has long since felt like home, and her fingers reach for the rings dangling above her Team USA t-shirt. They did give her an absolute shit ton of t-shirts, so that was nice.

Except—

Something keeps tugging. Nagging at the back of Emma’s consciousness, almost like she’s forgotten her keys on that flea market table they found in Park Slope two weeks after they moved into the apartment. Because for as well-versed Emma may be in that singular sort of existence, she’s also well-removed from wanting it, and at least three of her knuckles crack. Curling around her rings.

Muscles in her cheeks stretch, another nod and quick blink to avoid the threat of blinding via camera flashes. Someone really should have told her about this. She probably should have assumed. Human interest is the driving force of at least three-quarters of the stories in sports, and Emma’s not used to being the story, per se, but even she has to admit most of hers makes for a good one and they are still asking her questions.

Emma blinks again. Hopes she doesn’t look like a serial killer or the weird blonde, slightly sweaty cousin of the Joker, her smile starting to feel as if it’s painted on her face. She nods. Hums. Listens to questions that are startling in their tonal similarity to Charlie Brown’s teacher, and Emma wonders if Charlie Brown ever got a different teacher or what the school structure of the Peanuts’ universe is and, God, how old was Charlie Brown, even? To withstand that sort of consistent bullying. Was Linus the same age as him? No, right? How long did he carry the blanket around? Was Linus the same age as Sally? Why didn’t the red-headed girl with curly hair get a name?

She nearly falls out of her chair.

That might make the front page of several blogs. Possibly even the back page of a New York tab.

Careful to keep her feet on the ground, Emma lifts her head, directing her eyes toward the source of a question that must have been asked several times if the note of amusement mixing with deadline-based exasperation is anything to go by. Her smile definitely makes her look like a serial killer.

“Sorry, sorry,” Emma mumbles, and none of the oxygen she does her best to inhales makes it even close to her lungs. “I, uh—what was the question?”

The reporter grimaces.

“I wanted to know if you’d seen the video of your husband yet.”

Ice runs down her spine. Every single drop of wholly disgusting sweat falling in rivulets down either one of her cheeks freezes. Oxygen disappears from the room. Or so Emma assumes, what with the crushing feeling pushing down on her lungs and whatnot.

Her mind whirs. Races through possibilities and pitfalls with a speed that would be impressive if Emma weren’t already so close to that record, and she is going to break that record. Somehow she manages not to fall, though. From her chair or the metaphorical climbing wall in her brain, ignoring the sudden dryness of her mouth and the increasing size of her tongue.

Her nails are going to leave little half-moon creases in her palm.

“I don’t—” she starts, and eventually she will wish she was more articulate. For what turns out to be a very nice story.

Standing up, the reporter’s seat creaks as she moves toward the desk they deposited Emma behind after even. Several Olympic officials move to block her, but Emma shakes her head again, and she’s not exactly high-priority on the list of defensible athletes, anyway. So, none of them flinch when the reporter slides a phone closer to Emma, her crazed thoughts briefly lingering on how many phones a reporter could possibly need, but then her eyes drop, and she’s not sure if her ears can actually perk, but Emma certainly tries because she hears him yelling before she sees him.

Her smile shifts.

And the cameras flash again.

It starts, as with most things in Emma’s collegiate life, because Anna demands it.

She’s only half-listening, so Emma can never be entirely sure what it was, exactly, she was agreeing to, but in her experience, the agreement doesn’t matter so much as the action, and her roommate’s younger sister is unstoppable when it comes to action. So, Emma is dimly aware of a plan. Something about the baseball house and that one left fielder is in a handful of her classes.

David—something.

He’s got a girlfriend, too. A nice one. Who always smells like sugar when she slides into the seat next to David whatever his last name is, sitting in the row in front of Emma during their Tuesday-Thursday statistics class.

Emma hates statistics.

She doesn’t hate Anna, though. Or her roommate, one of the better college-based surprises, and either Anna has magic or Elsa is an enormous pushover because somehow all three of them are ready at the same time, and the walk to the baseball house isn’t far.

First-year players guard the door — passing out color-coded wristbands that absolutely do not do their job because it takes about six seconds of well-meaning flirting and batted eyelashes between Anna and a mountain of muscle masquerading as the team’s starting catcher to get them inside. With purple wristbands and two tickets for jungle juice instead of the keg.

“Victory,” Anna cries, twisting through the crowd. Half of it is already teetering on the edge of drunk, the rest free-falling into the pit of imminent hangovers, and Emma isn’t sure she’d classify their drinks as a victory, but it’s definitely better than watered-down beer.

And it doesn’t take long, really. By Emma’s shaky count, it’s not even a half-hour before the muscle — who introduces himself as Kristoff, and really is pretty cute, actually — returns, standing unnaturally close to Anna’s left shoulder, furtive glances shared out of the corners of their eyes. Emma rolls hers. Elsa’s appear perpetually stuck to the ceiling. It looks oddly sticky up there.

“Go,” Elsa says, and it’s not an instruction. Barely counts as more than a whisper, really. Anna lights up all the same. Like an alcohol-fueled Christmas tree.

Who does not need telling more than once.

Hands reach and smiles widen, Kristoff mumbling something that sounds like it was nice to meet you before he’s following Anna back to the beer pong table, leaving Elsa and Emma standing in the middle of a sea of raging hormones. All of which want to be there way more than either one of them does.

“Well,” Elsa mutters, “that was polite.”

Emma snickers into her glass. A mostly empty glass. That’s surprising. “Got that going for him.” “Plus, his on-base is nuts this year.”

“Say that again.” “On-base percentage,” Elsa repeats, making sure to do it slowly for maximum sarcastic emphasis. Emma’s eyes are going to fall out. That won’t end well. There are too many shuffling feet in this room.

“What does that mean?” “How often he gets on base.” Opening her mouth does nothing. Closing it does even less. Elsa looks overjoyed. “I know things,” she shrugs, “and I’m pretty positive Anna and Kristoff have been not-so-secretly dating since the start of the semester, so—” “You stalked your sister’s secret boyfriend?” “Stalk’s a very dirty word, don’t you think? No, no, there was no stalking. There was light research. One Google search and a single click to the team’s roster, and now I know he’s from Minnesota, too.” “Awfully convenient for the romance of the century.” Humming, Elsa takes a larger-than-usual sip before scrunching her nose in displeasure. At her empty cup. Emma has no idea how they ended up with empty cups so quickly. Suddenly the baseball house feels a bit like a time warp. Enter and drink and find the love of your life. Or something like that.

“I got next,” Emma says, ignoring Elsa’s laugh because she is not the sort of person who says things like that. It’s this house. This place. With its music and its happiness, and she’s not really a sports person. Can only marginally understand the joy of watching other people accomplish something. She has no idea what on-base percentage is.

Still.

Her feet move. Fingers curl over the rim of red solo cups, like the most cliché version of her college self. Her drinks get refilled. And it’s just as Emma’s about to let herself wonder if, maybe, sports aren’t all that bad and might even possess a bit of inherent romanticism, she slams into something.

Someone, more like.

Taller than her, he has to peer down his nose to glare at Emma. That’s fair. They’re both far more damp than they were ten seconds before. Some of that moisture ensures that the hem of his shirt sticks to his stomach. A very flat stomach. That draws Emma’s eyes because she’s human and slightly intoxicated, and it takes quite a lot more than she’s willing to admit to lift her chin, but then she’s glad she does. Even with the understandable glare.

“Shit,” she breathes, “your eyes are stupid blue.”

He narrows them. She hates that. Which is about all it takes for her to get royally pissed off, too.

“Can you pay attention to where you’re walking?”

The stupidly blue eyes blink. Darken a shade, like all his frustration is centered directly around his pupils, and the shirt he’s wearing is team-branded. Another baseball player, then.

“You ran into me!” Oh, Oh. Well, that sucks. He’s got a good voice, too. Eyes and voice and the few strands of hair that fall toward those eyes when he continues to glare at Emma likely aren’t supposed to make her stomach flip.

It’s the alcohol’s fault.

Or sports. Like, in general.

“Because you take up so much space,” Emma snarls He leans forward. Looms, really. Over her and around her, smelling like punch and body wash. It’s gross and absolutely wonderful. “Gotta pick a lane, love. Either I ran into you, or I was in the way.”

“It can definitely be both and there is nothing resembling love here.”

“So I can see. You have a name, wrecking ball?” “My shoes are never going to unstick from this floor.” To his credit, he does waver. His lips twist — which makes it all too obvious how much Emma is staring at his lips, but, seriously, the alcohol. Plus, it’s so hot in this house she can barely think straight. She wonders where he buys his body wash. He smells better than he should in this house. So, it's clear he considers. Ponders, even. Until his hands dart out and those hands are somehow warmer than every person in this house combined, heat scorching through Emma’s t-shirt as he lifts her off the ground.

Only to deposit her approximately fourteen inches to her left.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” “Look,” he grins, “you’re unstuck.” “Bastard!” “Eh, not technically.” “What?” “Not technically a bastard. Orphan, I suppose. But that’s kind of a mood ruiner, don’t you think?”

Emma’s fish impression is really going great. The grin becomes a smirk. Her stomach refuses to stay still. “Is there a mood to ruin?” “Might be if you tell me your name.”

Emma wavers, that time. Considers and ponders. Weighs the pros and cons while laughter drifts past her ears, consummate collegiate experiences that she’s only ever let herself be passably jealous of. A dark-haired girl’s talking to Elsa in the opposite corner.

And the hand hanging in front of her wiggles its fingers.

It’s still ridiculously warm when she grabs it. “Emma Swan.” “Killian Jones.”

Anna’s secret relationship becomes a real relationship no less than sixteen hours following what Elsa begins to call the Drink Incident.

And they become—

Baseball people.

Becoming baseball people is not bad. Not really. Emma likes the baseball team. She understands what WHIP is, now. Kristoff adores Anna, so that’s good. David, who does, in fact, have a last name, continues to be as nice as assumed, and his girlfriend sort of quasi adopts Emma. Mary Margaret Blanchard brims with positivity and an innate sort of joy that would usually annoy Emma, but most of that joy also serves as a direct counter to the snark that Killian Jones appears flush with. So, it’s something of a wash, really.

Plus, he’s a very sore Monopoly loser.

And Emma finds it endlessly entertaining.

“Stop that,” he grunts, glaring at the board with the sort of force Emma’s become accustomed to in the last few months, while she taps on the space in front of her, “I know how many spots it is.” Emma smiles. “So move, then.” “I’ll be bankrupt.” “Capitalism does that.” “Tell me more about capitalism, Swan.”

She doesn’t startle, so there’s that. Not much else, though. Not when a noticeable bit of equally familiar heat skitters down her spine. Her head tilts. His head remains frustratingly still, staring at the board like the spaces will change or Mary Margaret will tear down some of her hotels on Marvin Gardens.

Neither thing happens.

The heat pools. At the small of her back, inching dangerously close to that space between her hips, like it’s trying to tether her to this spot and this moment and its people. Baseball people. People who so clearly care about everything so much that even the cynic in Emma can appreciate it. Plus, they’re all ridiculously competitive.

David had to take a walk when Mary Margaret bankrupt him earlier.

“That’s about the extent of my capitalism knowledge,” Emma admits with a shrug, “I sucked at economics.” Pulling his gaze away from the board, Emma’s less prepared for the force behind Killian’s eyes than she was for the appearance of a nickname that might not warrant the title. It’s just her name, after all. But it sounds like more than that. Sinks under her skin with alarming ease, the precise tone of it wrapping its way around a variety of internal organs until they’re all beating at the same tempo and— “Move my piece for me.”

Kristoff groans. Mary Margaret chuckles. Elsa looks far too sure of herself. Knows everything, indeed.

And it’s not really a command, but there’s that same sense of something that found its way into the sound of Emma’s name and Killian’s voice, and he catches her by surprise. On a variety of levels. His fingers jump the moment hers reach out, all heat and an alarming size difference, his brows lifting when she turns her head.

“You’re taking this game way too seriously, you know,” Emma says. What she doesn’t say is more important, though. Because they’re not friends, really. They’re—acquaintances. Some kind of appropriate metaphor regarding a planet’s many moons and the tendency of those moons to orbit something far bigger than them. But they like each other, too. As much as they dance and twist, do their best to avoid getting hit in the batter’s box, Emma’s more comfortable bantering with him than just about anyone she’s ever met, a challenge in every conversation, and she’s rather loath to realize she’s memorized the different ways the blue in his eyes flash.

Now it feels a bit like a spotlight.

“Matter of pride, Swan.” “Is it just?” If there are other people laying on their stomachs in that living room, half-empty glasses by their hands and equipment stacked in various corners, Emma forgets about them. Quickly. Immediately. Killian doesn’t move his fingers.

He nods.

And Mary Marget only kind of gloats when she bankrupts him.

She dances when she wins, though.

It’s embarrassing. It’s absolutely, goddamn wonderful.

Realizing that baseball is a game of statistics ruins kind of Emma’s day. It makes Killian laugh. Her favorite sort of laugh. Where he throws his head back, an arm around his middle, and his shoulders shaking. Those same strands of hair she noticed that first night fall back toward lidded eyes, the corners of his mouth lifting in an angle Emma is sure she could determine if she just didn’t hate math so much, and it takes about four seconds, her head tilting back and forth twice and one swipe of her tongue to lean forward on the couch they're sharing, tilt her head up and press her lips to his.

Press is a vast understatement.

Crash, more like.

A bases-clearing double into the left-field gap.

She knows so many baseball terms now, it’s ridiculous.

It’s because she keeps going to games. With Anna. Without Anna. With Elsa. Without Elsa. With Mary Margaret every single time. And it creeps on so slowly, she’s practically a Jane Austen heroine, but then Emma finds she cares as much as everyone else. Screams herself hoarse at every crack of the bat. Jumps and fist bumps with startling regularity. Experiences the flutter of butterflies in her flip-prone stomach before ninth-inning rallies.

She memorizes statistics. Killian’s statistics, especially.

Because the Draft is a week away, and the nerves rolling off him are even more potent than his body wash. Bought in bulk from a locally-owned company, she learns.

Killian hates capitalism, too.

Which is only part of the reason she likes him, but right now all of the reason is centered around how it feels as if the world is shifting on its axis and what, precisely, he is capable of with his tongue. Quite a lot if this first time at bat is anything to believe.

Emma laughs.

Joy bubbles from the very center of her, pushing at the seam of her lips, and it’s not much of a seam when her mouth is open to accommodate tongue, but it’s enough of a sound that Killian pulls back. No glare. Definitely eyebrow movement, though.

“That’s not the best confidence boost, you know.” “I’m straddling you,” Emma counters, nodding toward the knees on either side of his, and she has no idea when her fingers found his hair. It’s very soft.

“How did that happen?” “What was that about confidence?”

Dropping his head, she gets a different sort of laugh, one that’s just as potent in its ability to settle into her bloodstream and the empty spaces around her heart, and sports have turned her into a sap. “I like you a lot,” Killian murmurs. Emma’s heart explodes. Metaphorically speaking.

“Good.” “Expand on that, for me.” She pinches his side, almost prepared for the way it leaves him bucking beneath her. Less prepared for the mutual groan it causes. Killian’s eyes widen. “I like you a lot,” Emma repeats, and his arms tighten, and her heart knits itself back together, and the second time through the kissing order is even better.

It starts, as with most things in Emma’s nearly-adult life, because Anna demands it.

“I just think it’ll be fun,” Anna says, not for the first time. And, not for the first time, she ignores the pointed look Emma and Elsa exchange. Elsa’s lips have all but disappeared behind her teeth “Think about it,” Anna continues, “we need something to do before the game, anyway. This way we’re—you know, staying active.” Emma’s eyebrows jump. Fly. Soar into her hairline where the level of her disbelief sits, all too aware of the ring hanging around her neck.

A Draft Day gift. As much as a family heirloom can be a gift. But Killian claimed it was good luck, his brother’s ring, because turns out that snark is at least a partial product of a wholly depressing childhood, and Emma supposes there’s something to be said for common ground. Understanding, too. Stories shared over weeks that turned to months that turned to years and seasons in the minors, and it absolutely figures Killian’s Major League debut is happening in Cincinnati. Where Kristoff plays.

It’s ridiculous how in love with him she is.

Killian. Not Kristoff.

Anna is still talking. “There’s nothing else to do in Cincinnati,” she reasons, which seems unfair to the city itself but not entirely untrue, and even the concept of chili on spaghetti grosses Emma out. “Also,” Anna adds, sounding as if she’s reached the final bullet point on her list of possible arguments, “I’ve got a Groupon deal for this place.”

Elsa blinks. “I didn’t realize Groupon was even still a thing.” “Surprise!”

Emma’s laugh isn’t entirely honest, but her sigh of acceptance is and—

Turns out she’s pretty good at it.

Goddamn fantastic, actually.

At rock climbing. Indoor rock climbing. Her feet push her up the wall with ease, the steady ache in her arms welcome and wonderful and a slew of other alliterative adjectives. That leave Killian grinning like a maniac, but it’s been a weird and equally wonderful day, without a hit, but two walks, so that ups the on-base, and Emma’s really, seriously in love with him.

“I don’t know what it was,” she says, preening just a bit under Killian’s stare. Hotel lighting casts shadows on his cheeks, slumped as he is against every pillow they could find. Even the ones in the closet. He’s not supposed to be in here for much longer, both of them aware of the team-ordained curfew hanging over them, but the pre-game nerves are long gone. Replaced instead with exhilaration and endorphins, the kind that could win Elle Woods a headline-making case. “But,” Emma continues, “I just kept moving, and the guy said it was, like, a course record. Is course the right word, you think?” Killian lifts a shoulder. Even as it’s covered in ice and tape. The play he made at third is going to show on loop. On TV. In Emma’s memory. She’s never yelled that loud before.

People took pictures.

And then she cried. Like a giant sap.

“This is your show, Swan,” Killian chuckles, pride infusing the words. As if she’s the one who deserves the pride today. It’s entirely possible she cried for multiple minutes after that play. They definitely showed that on the YES Network. Mary Margaret texted her no less than forty-seven times.

“I was really fast.” Killian hums, fingers fluttering enough to make it clear he wants her closer. Emma doesn’t argue. They’re a mess of limbs and mouths and that tongue thing they’ve collectively gotten better at giving and receiving over the years, hands that warm with the sort of confidence borne of repetition. Some joke about BP and finding your swing.

“Plus,” he says, a soft laugh at Emma’s noise of displeasure when talking means far less kissing, “becoming a rock climbing savant means more upper-body work, and you know how I love your arms.” Guffawing the way Emma does is not particularly romantic. Doesn’t matter. The sound comes, and the joy remains, a steady stream pumping through all her extremities and clouding her thoughts. In the best way possible. Before Killian, Emma didn’t know this could be that. Fun and easy, not quite simple, but something she’s willing to work for. Athletes are notoriously determined, after all.

Part of her wonders if a proclivity to rock climbing makes her an athlete, too.

“Please,” she says, laughter clinging to the letters even as she finds herself moved directly over Killian’s outstretched legs, “provide, in detail, everything you enjoy about my arms.” “I didn’t say enjoy.” “Were you misquoted, Jones?” His eyes flash. Glow, honestly. At her and because of her and athletes also know how to work their opponents. Goad them into making mistakes. Something about a pitcher’s duel and a battle in the box. Where the box is this bed. And Emma’s winning.

“I love your arms,” Killian says. Dragging his mouth against the column of her throat leaves goosebumps on Emma’s skin. Her back arches. His hand flattens. The compliments continue. Turn into promises. Guarantees. Of a future that’s spread out at their feet now, if only they reach for it.

Turns out Emma’s pretty good at reaching for things. When she wants them.

“This isn’t, like, free-scale, though, is it?”

Her heart cannot be expected to handle much more of this.

“Don’t worry,” Emma says, “all proper safety precautions were taken. Plus, I wouldn’t fall off the wall.”

Killian’s expression shutters. Not in any of that frustration Emma so clearly understood when his shirt was damp, and her shoes were unsalvagable despite his best efforts to get the school’s equipment manager to dry-clean them. No, it’s—it’s something big and important and unspoken, and Emma pulls his hand up. To rest directly over the rink that’s still tucked beneath her t-shirt.

His t-shirt.

It’s got his last number on it, at least.

“Would you catch me if I fell off the wall?” He doesn’t answer at first. Doesn’t mention the absurdity of a question that does not make sense, but those literal and metaphorical clock hands are ticking, and if they don’t replace his ice soon, they’re going to destroy these sheets. “Every single time, Swan.” “Right back at you.”

Killian doesn’t miss curfew, but it’s pretty close.

And Emma wakes up to twelve texts with links for indoor rock climbing gyms in the greater New York City area.

“Holy shit, this is hard.”

Grunting more than laughing, Emma’s fingers curl around the rock in front of her. Chalk cakes itself on the pads of those fingers, stuck beneath her nails and, somehow, the bend of her elbow. “Are you not an All-Star?” she asks, glancing at Killian.

“I do not see how that factors into this at all.”

“Huh, weird.” “Suspiciously sounds like an accusation.” “Weird,” Emma repeats. They’re halfway up a wall only one of them is really supposed to be on, but the other person several feet below them is faring far worse than the pair of them combined, so, that takes precedence in her mind. “He knows a lot more curse words than I realized.” “He’s showing off,” Killian grumbles, forehead resting against the wall.

Will Scarlet hasn’t moved in five minutes. Possibly six. Maybe a round ten. He's much better at second base.

“I cannot feel my arms,” he calls, and Emma’s laugh is better that time. Purer, somehow. As if happiness can actually have a sound. Even happiness that comes with sweat on her temple and a noticeable ache in her triceps and she sort of loves this.

Sort of is a vast understatement.

“Showing off, huh?” Emma asks. She finds her next footfall with ease, happiness blooming into confidence that’s become nearly consistent these days and weeks and years. It does not take her long to feel the stare that’s lingering on her. On her ass, specifically.

She glances over her shoulder. To find her fiancé smiling at her. And staring at her ass.

“Can I help you, love?” “Whatcha doing?” “Ogling you, obviously.” “Forearms feeling good?” He nods. Sort of. There’s a distinct slope to the back of his neck and more sweat on his brown than Emma’s. Not as much as Scarlet’s, probably. “Fantastic,” Killian drawls, “keep going, Swan, someone’s got to show us how to do it.” “Try not to fall off the wall, huh? Last thing we need is the might of the Yankees front office coming after us.” “I don’t think I can move my hands,” Will shouts. Killian doesn’t move. It’s impressive forearm strength. Blushing on the wall is not usually how Emma’s days go.

“I’ll see what I can do,” Killian promises, and Emma moves. He follows her. Up the wall and to the top, a quick brush of his lips against her shoulder that leaves Scarlet cursing even more, despite his presence on the floor, but then there’s lemon-flavored water and exceptionally soft towels and Emma’s caught a bit off guard by the question.

“Are there leagues for this?” Will asks. “Because you should probably be winning things for this.” Emma blinks. Considers. Wonders. Turns to Killian.

He’s still smiling. Broadly, in fact.

“We could look.” They do. They fill out paperwork. Buy fancy climbing shoes that Emma claims cost too much, but Killian’s a pushover and even more stubborn and she wins the first race she signs up for.

Plus, ten more after that.

Emma climbs indoor rock walls. Killian hits home runs. Occasionally they do these things simultaneously, and it usually leads to her nearly falling off the wall because everyone in her Tribeca gym knows what it means when WFAN is playing on the speakers.

Sometimes they shout out John Sterling’s home run call with him.

She gets better. He gets better.

They do end up destroying sheets in various hotels across the country. For various reasons. Not all of them post-game or ice related. There are games and events. Wins and losses. Back page spreads that Emma frames and hangs on their apartment walls, right next to other, smaller frames, with the same smiling faces who, once upon a time, called a sticky-floored baseball house home, and Killian’s fingers are warm in hers when the tears prick her eyes at Anna and Kristoff’s wedding.

There are stories. Think pieces and hot takes on a variety of drive-time radio shows. Those are all about Killian, though. He’s the athlete. The true one, some stories say. It’s impressive what Emma does, they admit, but it’s a hobby, and she’s got a grown-up career, anyway. So, she’s got more climbing records than she knew ever existed, but she’s not doing it for press, and both Mary Margaret and Anna weep at her and Killian’s wedding.

She wears her ring on a chain next to her other one when she climbs.

Every time Killian notices them hanging there, Emma swears, his eyes brighten. It’s her favorite thing in the whole, goddamn world.

“What is this?” He doesn’t answer. Just holds the sheet of paper he must have printed out in the clubhouse because they certainly don’t have a printer at home, and one of the edges is bent. Like he had to fit it in his back pocket.

“Going the stoic route, huh?” Emma quips, but there’s a noticeable hitch in her pulse. One that’s been there for weeks. Since the rumblings started, and the rumors began, whispers of possibility, and first-ever has a very nice ring to it. One side of Killian’s mouth tugs up. “Oh, that’s not fair.” “I’d like the record to show, that the only reason I didn’t know immediately was because I was in the trainer’s room, so—” “What were you in the trainer’s room for?” Killian ignores her. Well, sort of. His eyes shift, and his gaze holds, and Emma knows. Right down in the marrow of her. What the paper is and how Scarlet is the one who printed it out, but she’s even more confident Killian carried it home, and that does something funny to her entire worldview. Widens it and minimizes it at the same time, focusing on this and them and the possibility that creates.

In an athletic sort of way.

“My shoulder’s kind of sore.” Emma scoffs. “Oh, that’s pointed.” “I’m sure your shoulders are fine. Golden, even.’ “This is not your best work, you know that?” “Look at the paper.” “Did you fold it yourself?” “And then took a car back home. You really didn’t see yet?” Emma shakes her head. He knows the answer, too. He’s the one with the Google alert, after all. Because she’s still a bit of a pessimist at heart and an adult with a real job, and this is too much and abjectly terrifying, and the last thing she expects is for Killian to crouch in front of her.

One of his knees cracks.

“Don’t,” he warns, even as Emma does her best to swallow her laugh. Warm hands land on her thighs, a quiet steadiness that helps the state of her pulse and makes the possibility of the unknown a little less overwhelming. The lines crossing the center of the paper are absurdly straight. “You’re going to go.” “Oh, that sounded like a decree.” “A suggestion.” “A strong one.” “Mmhm, with the utmost confidence.” Emma makes an impressive sound. “Who’s doing your media training? What an impressive vocabulary you’ve got on you.” “Ready and willing to use it in a persuasive manner.” “Keep talking like that, and you won’t have to.” The smirk disappears. Evolves into a grin that is only Emma’s and only appears in moments like this, support clinging to air molecules and the ends of hair that constantly seems determined to fall into Killian’s eyes. “Passed, huh? All cool with the IOC.” “Decidedly cool. Officially an Olympic sport, now. Although the name could use some work. Sport climbing lacks a little oomph, don’t you think?”

“What would you call it?” “Emma Swan wins Olympic gold.” “Kinda wordy.” “Prophetic,” Killian corrects, hands shifting and pulling, and Emma has to widen her legs. His head’s at a very good kissing angle. “You’ve already got the qualifying numbers.” “You looked at the qualifying numbers?” “Don’t insult me like that. What do you think I did in the backseat?” “Planned the entire 2020 Olympics, apparently.” “Not the entire Olympics,” Killian counters, "just the part involving you. And maybe my individual expectations regarding the United States baseball team, but that’s another conversation altogether.”

“Naturally.”

“You’re using that voice.”

Widening her eyes does nothing. Emma didn’t expect it to. Not after years and games and events because rock climbing has events, and one time Mary Margaret made her a sign. Killian held it. He’s taller, that’s why.

“Don’t,” Killian repeats, “this is happening.” “Yuh-huh?” “You heard me. It’s your turn, now.” Melting is an impossibility. Like, for a human. Even so. Emma feels like she’s melting. Some of that pessimism evaporating under the warmth of Killian’s gaze and his hands and the determination in the precise angle of his chin. Same one he uses when he steps into the box with runners in scoring position.

Lumping herself into that group isn’t as insulting as Emma once believed it would be.

“God,” Emma groans, “that’s romantic.” “You’re really selling it, love.”

“This is supposed to be a hobby.” “One you’re exceedingly good it. World record good at it.” “I like you.” “That’s my end game, yeah.” She laughs. Smiles. Continues melting. Which is easier once they get rid of their clothing, and their bed is way more comfortable than any hotel they’ve encountered. And she falls asleep with Killian’s lips against her ear, Emma Swan, Olympic gold medalist whispered on loop like it’s a mantra he’s been practicing.

They postpone the Olympics.

It sucks. Everything sucks. Baseball sucks. Gyms are closed. Emma gets creative, and Killian gets research-prone. They build a makeshift wall. She tosses him BP.

People write stories about it.

It doesn’t help.

Until—

Time passes. Some things change. Others don’t. Their wall stands up to the elements of their building’s courtyard, and Killian’s hitting better than ever this season, a victory Emma’s going to claim as at least partially hers. And then the Olympics are back, and it’s qualifying and racing and a record that’s just out of reach, but she’s good enough even without it, and, this time, she’s the one packing a suitcase.

He kisses her.

Does the tongue thing.

Holds onto her like he’s only a little afraid she’s going to fall off the wall, but now the wall is international competition, and Emma’s freaking out a little.

“I love you,” she says into the crook of his neck.

His arms tighten. “I love you too.” “Gold medal?” “Gold medal.” “Hit some home runs while I’m gone, huh?” Lips graze her temple. Her forehead. The bridge of her nose. Emma might be crying, and Mary Margaret’s definitely recording, a small mob of red white, and blue surrounding them. “I’ll see what I can do,” Killian promises.

“Good.”

He hits three before her first qualifying round. So, Emma takes that as a challenge. She’s an athlete now.

It’s why, she figures, her fingers don’t slip on her first run.

Her feet are sure. Her breathing is steady. There’s no one cheering her name, but she’s long since memorized the exact way Killian’s voice lifts above a crowd. How he pushes up on his toes to watch, as if standing up taller makes sure he’s closer to her. Should she need him when she falls off the wall. Only, Emma doesn’t fall, and she’s got no intention of ever falling and—

Her laugh shudders out of her in a watery sort of way that makes the journalist still standing in front of her flinch ever so slightly. Twitter makes sure the video starts playing again as soon as it finishes, which is somehow the best and worst thing that has ever happened to her. Best because, well, Emma’s honestly not sure she’s ever seen her husband like this.

Worst because she’s very nearly goddamn crying. Again.

Bobbing on the balls of his feet in front of his locker, whoever’s recording the video — it’s Scarlet, obviously — is practically frenzied behind the camera, barely able to contain their laughter. Killian doesn’t notice. He’s holding his own phone, all five of his free fingers firmly entrenched in the back of his hair. It’s gotten softer with age, Emma thinks.

She can’t stop watching him.

Every inhale is a clear struggle, the bobbing turning into pacing and quiet mumbling she can hear perfectly. As if she’s standing right in front of him.

Or at least slightly to the side. So as not to stand on the logo in the middle of the clubhouse.

Athletes are notoriously superstitious, too.

“C’mon, c’mon, c’mon,” Killian chants, another noticeable snicker from Scarlet, “right there, right there, and pull, pull—Swan, pull up!”

“I did pull up there,” Emma mumbles. To the reporter, maybe. Or the world. Possibly her husband. Who was definitely more nervous about the first run than her.

God, that’s romantic.

Killian’s still talking. Shouting, more like. It’s a miracle Scarlet hasn’t fallen over yet.

“Faster, faster, you can go faster than that, Swan—” Emma clicks her tongue. “That’s kind of insulting.”

There’s an appropriate titter of laughter from the peanut gallery, which is a joke she was not trying to make, but she’s also dangerously close to swooning in the middle of press and she should have asked the Yankees for media training. Someone would have made sure she didn’t make a total ass of herself.

“Show me the time,” Killian yells, another demand that isn’t that. It’s too wobbly a string of words to hold any real power, just the supportive sort of desperation Emma’s felt in a variety of ninth innings and series-clinching moments. “Faster! Faster!” “Talking to the time or the judges or your wife?” Scarlet asks.

Killian nearly snarls.

Emma blinks. Hyperactively. Crying is not usually her shtick. More camera flashes...flash, Emma barely noticing them with her eyes glued to a phone screen that isn’t hers because she at least knows not to bring her phone to a press conference, and she can only imagine how many text messages she’s gotten.

Even on the other side of the world.

They post the times.

She knows because Killian gets some rather impressive height on his celebratory vertical. Fingers abandoning his hair, his fist pumps the air, and Scarlet’s not laughing so much as he’s whooping, a steady stream of yeah, yeah, yeah in the background. And for about half a breath, Emma’s worried Killian may turn one of his ankles on his landing, but he’d think that was insulting, and she’s really just full-on swooning now.

“How many people have seen this?’ she asks the reporter, already knowing the answer.

The reporter smiles anyway. Emma should learn her name.

“Pretty much the whole world.” When Emma was a kid — the sort of kid who believed alone was better, and there was strength in singularity, that would have terrified her. Bowled her over, really. Left her running without looking back, desperate to shed any sort of notoriety because notoriety meant attention, and attention meant inevitable disappointment.

Maybe that’s why she was never much of a sports person.

Sports disappoint you. They build you up and let you down, a sharp and sudden fall without a safety net. But sometimes. Sometimes, every so often, something wonderful happens. Sports lift you. Right up an indoor wall. Because, she knows, sports’ power comes from belief, from surrendering yourself to something bigger and better, and she’s back on that alliterative kick, but the tears are barely clinging to her eyelashes now and Emma herself is bigger and better, now.

In an international, decidedly romantic sort of way.

The video’s playing away.

“Let’s go,” Killian cries, and there it is. Her sound and their sound, cheering across an ocean and time zones that are still kind of messing with her sleep schedule.

Emma’s smile stretches.

“Let’s go,” she repeats.

It ends, as with most things in Emma’s gold-medal-winning life, because Anna plans it.

Stepping out of the terminal, it takes less than a full breath for the cheers to start. For the banners to lift and the tears to flow, a small platoon of support covered in the sort of patriotic gear they definitely got from the Old Navy in Herald Square.

Flashes burst behind Emma’s eyelids because she’s got to blink or she’ll definitely fall over. Her legs wobble beneath her, contending against a wave of triumph and jubilation, which is sort of the same word, but they’ve got a game at the Stadium tonight, so she doesn’t expect, she just hopes and reaches, and he has to twist around both Anna and Mary Margaret.

It’s wonderfully cyclical.

As is the way Emma slams herself against him. On purpose, this time. Killian’s arms tighten, more cheers and shouts, and people a few feet away start chanting USA over and over. Emma barely hears them. Her feet aren’t touching the ground, so she’s kind of preoccupied.

They’re all arms and mouths, and her legs wrapped securely around a body that probably shouldn’t be supporting hers when she knows he slid into second two nights ago, but Killian clearly has no intention of letting her down, and the medal around her neck bumps against her rings.

“You’re a very good cheerleader; you know that?” He hisses. In what, Emma can’t imagine. Embarrassment, if the red tips of his ears are anything to go by, and she’s got ideas as to why that is and how long the conversation about social media with Scarlet went, so Emma does the only reasonable thing.

She slams her lips against her home-run hitting husband’s, doing her best to make sure the gold medal doesn’t mistakenly impale either one of them, and the world tilts again. With victory and sports-based support and the sort of love that comes from believing in something bigger.

And better than Emma could have ever imagined.

“I didn’t want to steal your thunder.”

“Please,” Emma scoffs, “don’t insult me like that. Plus, I’m claiming every one of those home runs as my own, so comparatively—” He kisses her before she can say anything else.

That’s for the best, probably.

“Your arms looked ridiculously good the whole time.”

Her laugh doesn’t even sound like her when Emma hears it played back — another video that someone tells her goes viral, only she doesn’t care about hits or site traffic, just about the particular shade of blue in Killian’s eyes, and she wears her medal to the game that night.

Because they’re a sports power couple, now.

Or so the New York Post back page claims the next day.

Emma frames it.

[boytouya]

Can I please request an ftm reader who's in a relationship with tomura? where has a tik tok where he posts about jokes, dead memes, food. Hot topics in Japan, screaming randomly seeing a little frog at the Park all while speaking English so basically live stream where reader consumes all types of hot wings and sauces where the viewers see the LOV while seeing the mystery famous tomura shigaraki brings jugs of milk and laughter. Would tomura learn English to understand his bf tik tok? As readers fanbase they hear language barriers which is why reader can get away with it.

𝐂𝐚𝐫𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐚 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐩𝐞𝐫

a/n: if anyone is fluent in japanese please let me know if i wrote something wrong or used the wrong tone!

Warnings: me using unreliable sources for japanese, brief mention of shig’s childhood

You didn’t want to consider yourself an influencer. Sure, you had over four hundred thousand followers, some of which loved to dm you random things, ask questions about personal life, and seek out advice. You even had a Japanese following, probably because you taught phrases to your viewers every once in a while and it had peaked their interest. And okay, maybe you worked on a brand deal or two. But you hated the idea of being labeled as an influencer. You were just a man doing what he loved, cracking jokes about your favorite subjects, telling stories, sharing recipes, livestreams showcasing your favorite places in Japan. Your boyfriend, leader of the League Of Villains, Tomura Shigaraki, only knew broken English. It was often taught at a young age, but because of his childhood he never got to fully learn the subject. Plus, with barriers to his memory, it made it harder for him to understand your TikToks. Every Friday you take the time to teach him common phrases, though! He still liked every video, tuned into every livestream, and let you use his phone if you needed two of them. You never planned things out, you just went with what called out to you for the day.

Your last TikTok livestream had been a wild one, you were rambling about your spice tolerance when someone in the chat had mentioned trying the Hot Wing Challenge. It blew up overnight, and you woke up to your twitter chiming with excitement over such a simple suggestion.

That led you to where you were now, blinding yourself with a ring-light and setting up Tomura’s phone. You tried your best to hide anything that gave away your own, along with your roommates’, whereabouts. After doing so you adjusted your shirt and started your live, smiling at the camera. The chat rolled in whilst you struggled to read questions. After a failed attempt at reading them out loud, you pick up the plates beside you and hold them up to the camera.

“You guys wanted me to try it,” You hold up multiple different sauces, one of which has a skull and crossbones over it. Surely you’d be paying for this later when you need to use the bathroom. “They all ship at different times.”

Behind you, a raspy voice asks a question that the audience can't translate, but they put pieces together as you laugh and shake your head. You respond with "Damare!” (Shut up!) before making a show of putting way too much sauce on a drumstick and sinking your teeth into it with faux aggression. You chew quickly, hoping that the faster it’s gone the less it’ll obliterate your taste buds. It doesn't necessarily taste good, and even if you like spicy food it isn’t exactly satisfactory on the tongue. You must be making a funny face because there’s two more sets of laughter behind you, and the chat is moving much faster than before.

There are five levels and five different drumsticks, so only four more to go. A voice that doesn’t belong to Tomura, but a cheery teenage girl, almost breaks the sound barrier as she chants “Skip it! Skip it! Go to the last level!”

Curse Toga and her influence. She was a popular guest (though it was her voice only), lots of people had commented how they loved her when you made a collaborative TikTok with her, and she had a huge impact on your viewers. The chat that had just been telling you you needed to every wing had now jumped to telling you to move onto the spiciest level, just because Dracula incarnate had just told you to.

“Fine!” You grumble, picking up the smallest drumstick and pouring a generous amount of ‘Blair’s Ultra Death Sauce’ on the small wing. The moment you let it sit on your tongue you regret it, forcing yourself to swallow and tapping the table aggressively. “What the fuck? What the fuck?!”

Your nose is runny, tears fall from your eyes and you make the mistake of rubbing them away with your palm. Shooting up from your seat with a groan, the only thing you can say is “Water! Tsumetaimizu! (Cold water)”

Your skeleton nearly jumps from your body when Tomura (or at least you think it’s him, you can barely tell from squinting your eyes in effort to remediate the burn. He hands you a glass of milk with maniacal laughter. There are people in the chat bullying him for his laugh, calling him cute, and freaking out because they think they recognize him.

“Manuke, (Dumbass)” Tomura laughs mid sentence, the milk slightly spilling onto his fingers as you rush to grab it from him. “You should see your face right now.”

You chug the glass down, wondering if squeezing some into your eyes would help with the burn. You force them to fully open, watching as every member doubles over with laughter. Of course they’d laugh at the suffering of others.

“Our eyes match,” Tomura says quietly. Then, he picks up your half eaten drumstick and takes a bite, making a high noise in the back of his throat. You get ready to laugh in his face and call him a moron, but he doesn’t seem phased at all. Quite the opposite, really. “Totemo oishii desu (It’s very tasty).” He says with a smirk. You’d kiss the stupid look off his face if there wasn’t sauce on his lips and an audience of nineteen thousand.

[sierraraeck]

Bad Liar

Moreid (Spencer x Derek)

Masterlist

Summary: Ever since his first day at Quantico, Spencer has had only one thought on his mind: SSA Derek Morgan. He knows that any sort of relationship would be inappropriate, but that doesn’t stop the constant stream of fantasies from flooding his mind.

Category: Spicy fluff, smut alluded

Warnings: Non-graphic descriptions of sex, fantasizing, suggestive touching, kissing, very light cussing.

Word Count: 3.5k

A/N: This was inspired by the song “Bad Liar” by Selena Gomez. If you wanna give that a quick listen, go for it, if not, that’s chill too. I know that I haven’t been very active and haven’t posted anything in a while, but sometimes life just happens. Hopefully this was worth the wait…

Spencer had heard the phrase “I never stop thinking about you.” He’d heard it in reference to love and relationships when people were apparently so madly in love they couldn’t stop thinking about the other. He never really bought that. Love was just a bunch of feel-good chemicals that couldn’t affect the amount of time spent thinking about another person. Plus, how could anyone ever constantly think about a person? There were so many other things to think about like surviving high school, getting into college, graduating, of course his mom, and then getting into the FBI, and how he would surely not be able to make it all the way through Quantico training. No one could ever think about one person all the time. No, definitely not.

But Spencer wasn’t known for being a good liar.

His first day at Quantico he saw Derek Morgan, and he realized that he was wrong. He was so utterly and outrageously wrong.

Because after he saw him, heard his voice just once, his exceptional mind kept those interactions on constant repeat.

He was lucky he was so good at multitasking otherwise he would have definitely failed by now.

Not like he still wouldn’t.

He couldn’t sleep, not with someone like Derek Morgan intruding his every thought, every midnight desire. On top of that, they were about to go into the hardest week of physical training yet, and Spencer knew that this was the one challenge that his brain could not overcome.

The one redeemable thing about the humiliating experience he was sure would come during the following days was that he’d get to see SSA Morgan again. Sure, it'd be more embarrassing to fail in front of him, but at least he’d get to see him a few more times before they kicked him out for being the scrawny kid he’s always been.

The feelings of excitement and anxiety twisted his gut into a wonderful knot, keeping him from yet another night of sleep. Somehow that made it both harder and easier for him to get up when the clock hit 4:45.

Spencer looked between two blinds covering the window on the right, allowing him to see that the sun was still about an hour from rising. Slipping on his given shirt and pants, he hoped that there would be some source of caffeine at breakfast, preferably coffee.

He trudged into the bathroom to find his roommate already awake and dressed. “Big day. You excited?” Jeff, a man about a head shorter than Spencer but at least twice his width in pure muscle mass, asked.

Spencer just grunted in response.

“What? You’re not excited to get pitted against someone else so that you can flail around in an attempt to spar?”

“I’ll stick to teaching you the technique,” he quipped.

Jeff laughed. “It’d suit you better. Unfortunately your wizard brain and forbidden library won’t help you in this one. But dammit if you aren’t the smartest guy here.” Jeff shook his head as if it were a shame.

Once they were ready, along with the rest of the NATs, the group was directed to jog across campus to the building they’d be training in. The day was off to a bad start.

Spencer did his best to distract himself from the actual running bit, trying to analyze the people in his group and those they passed as they went.

Bored, hungry, important, invisible… Derek?!

He turned his head to follow the tall man with short black hair and dark eyes as the group passed him on the sidewalk.

No, that wasn’t him. Of course it wasn’t. Agent Morgan is waiting for us at the facility.

Spencer tried to hide the slight disappointment that came over him. He felt so stupid for looking for him everywhere, but he couldn’t help it. Even his own knowledge and logic was failing him when it came to this man he knew next to nothing about expect for his shining smile and intense eyes and toned biceps and amazing abs and powerful legs and delicious stamina and strong hands that could grip his neck and hold him down and his defined hips bones that Spencer knew would dig into his thighs and certainly leave bruises if he were to…

What was his issue? He couldn’t be thinking that way about one of his trainors.

Although it helped the jog pass by faster. Time flies when you’re having fun, right? Or at least imagining having fun.

When they arrived at the other facility, they were provided a quick breakfast, unfortunately no coffee today, and then led to the top floor with an entire wall traded out for floor to ceiling windows.

The room they entered was massive, large mats rolled out edge to edge, and the smell was musty. It felt humid, sticky sort of, and Spencer hated to think about why that was.

He quickly scanned the room and found his target immediately. Across the way, Derek had his opponent mid flip, landing harshly on his back with a thud. He helped the poor guy up, laughing a bit as he did so. His pearly whites were on full display when he looked up and caught Spencer’s eye. Spencer quickly diverted his gaze, opting instead to look down at his twisting hands.

“Today we will be focusing on hand to hand combat,” Derek announced once the group had wandered closer. “You never know when the perpetrator will decide not to run and instead to attack you, or when you will find yourself without any weapons other than yourself to protect you. The first thing we are going to practice are some basic jabs. Grab a partner and follow our demonstration.”

Derek and the man he’d thrown on the ground earlier, Grant, demonstrated the seemingly simple movements that Spencer and the rest of the NATs were supposed to replicate. Of course, everyone else made it look easy, but Spencer just couldn’t wrap his head around what his arm was supposed to be doing where and when. It was frustrating, even more so than he’d prepared himself for.

“Keep your shoulders here,” that velvety deep voice said, accompanied by his large hands on either of Spencer’s shoulders, adjusting them to more of an angle.

All Spencer could do was swallow hard and nod. He didn’t even dare to look back at him.

“And spread your legs,” Derek said. His breath seemed to get closer to Spencer’s neck with every word, and quieter as he went along. But surely that was all in his head? Right?

Spencer’s startled eyes turned to look at the older man. The edges of his mouth twitched before resuming that stern, professional demeanour. “It’ll help you balance.” With that, he nudged Spencer’s foot farther backwards with his own and walked away, leaving Spencer feeling unnecessarily exposed and confused.

The guy across from him, Harold, one of the only people who had been genuinely nice to Spencer from the start, was watching the whole interaction with suspicion.

The day trudged on with not much change. Spencer’s skin was still on fire from where Agent Morgan had touched him, but he tried to convince himself it was because he didn’t really like being touched. He knew that was a lie, especially in this instance, but it didn’t stop him from telling it.

After lunch, training continued. But at least it got more interesting.

“Grant just got called out on a case, so I’ll be needing someone to help me with this demonstration.” Derek waited just about three whole seconds before smirking, the mischief written all over his face. “Come on? No one wants to volunteer? It’ll be fun, I promise.” When he was met with more silence (even the guys like Jeff didn’t want to be thrown around by Derek), he was forced to choose someone. “How about… Reid.”

Spencer’s head shot up from the back of the group. No, no, this is not good.

Spencer had been dreaming about getting thrown around by Derek for a few months now, but this was definitely not what he’d had in mind.

The crowd slowly parted and Spencer had to face the music; he was going to be humiliated in front of everyone, like nothing had changed since high school.

Sighing, Spencer forced himself to the front of the group. “Lay down for me, knees bent, would you?”

I’d do anything you asked, was Spencer’s initial response in his head. What he really did was shrug and follow instructions.

“The reason we practice this move is because at some point or another, you will find yourself in either position.” Spencer wasn’t quite sure what he meant by that until Derek legitimately stood over him, a leg on either side, then proceeded to get down on his knees, essentially sitting on top of Spencer.

He couldn’t even focus on what Derek was explaining anymore. Breathing didn’t exist. There was no way this glorious man was sitting on top of him right now. All he could think about was how prominent Derek’s ab muscles were through his tight shirt and how he wanted nothing more than to lean forward and run his tongue over them. Spencer could almost imagine what they would feel like; the rise and fall of his muscles, the small hairs covering his body… Spread your legs, he had said to him.

“So then Reid would grab my wrist…” Derek’s use of his name brought him back to reality. If only he could live in his fantasies for longer.

Spencer looked up at Agent Morgan confused. Derek’s eyes got wider and looked at his right hand and then down at his own left wrist. Spencer somehow got the message and reached his hand over to grab a hold of Derek’s wrist. “Good,” he declared. “After that, he would hook his left foot on the outside of my ankle.”

Spencer quickly followed orders, trying to force his brain to supply him with the information he’d missed.

“Then, he’d use my weight against me to flip me over.” Spencer’s eyes got big when Derek said that, mentally panicking that he could never be strong enough for that. Derek nodded at him, so Spencer tried to roll over, and to his, and everyone else’s, surprise, he actually could.

Within seconds Spencer was sitting on top of a very pleased Derek. “It’ll work every time. Of course, if your unsub is skilled he’ll lock you in and flip you back over and potentially pull your arm out of your socket,” Derek explained while doing just that to Spencer, minus the arm-out-of-socket thing, “But we’ll take this one step at a time.”

Derek was back on top of Spencer with his legs wrapped around him in a vice-like grip, but quickly let go to help him up. Spencer gladly accepted the help.

Spencer doesn’t exactly have what one would consider a “big dick.” He always thought that was something to be ashamed of but standing there, getting hard in the middle of an FBI training academy, he couldn’t’ve be more grateful.

The NATs were sent back to work on the newly demonstrated move with their partners. Just as Spencer was about to flip Harold over for the third time, he looked over his head and rolled his eyes.

“What?” Spencer asked.

“What is it with you two?” Harold asked in return.

“What?” Spencer repeated. Harold nodded in the direction he was just looking, and Spencer followed his gaze. Derek was walking by, but nothing else seemed of import. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Oh please,” Harold snorted. He was a lanky man like Spencer, but just a bit shorter and with glasses. Sometimes Spencer envied his glasses, as his contacts often got on his nerves. He continued, “The touching, the constant eye contact, the word choice that could be inherently sexual, and then literally sitting on top of you? When there were plenty of other men and women he could have picked for that demonstration? Tell me you don’t see it.”

Spencer mulled over these words for a few seconds before flipping Harold over. Looking down on him, he said, “I don’t think that means anything.”

“Then maybe you need to get a new prescription,” Harold said, pointing to his eyes.

Spencer shook his head. “What do my eyes have to do with this?”

Harold sighed. “God, your gaydar is so broken.” He flipped Spencer over, stood up, and walked away.

Shortly after, class was called and they were all let go for the remainder of the evening.

“Reid, can I speak to you for a moment?” Agent Morgan called out as the first of the NATs started to leave. A few caught Spencer’s eye with unanswered questions in them, but no more than the mound of questions Spencer had been asking himself.

Without answering, Spencer walked over to the corner of the room that Derek was standing in. He could tell that he was waiting for every single person to leave the room before speaking.

Spencer thought for sure he was getting kicked out because of how horribly he performed throughout the day.

To his surprise, that’s not at all what the outstandingly attractive man had to say. “I wanted to let you know that you did a good job today during the demo. Not many people handle that so well.”

Spencer waited for him to say more, but nothing more seemed to be coming. Derek actually seemed a bit nervous if Spencer could read him right. He replied cautiously, “Thanks.”

Derek cleared his voice and said, “Yeah. And if you ever want to stay late and work on some moves I’d be happy to help.”

Spencer just got more and more confused as his interactions with this god-like man increased. “Thanks,” he repeated. “Why are you offering to help me like that?”

Agent Morgan shrugged. “You’re one of the smartest people in FBI history to come through here, and definitely the youngest. There’s absolutely no reason you shouldn’t become an agent, and I want to see you succeed. That’s all.” He shrugged again, and if there was anything Spencer had learned from the profiling section of his training, someone being over-casual was usually a sign that they were stressed about something they viewed with extreme importance, and were trying to play it off. Why would he be stressed to talk to me?

“I guess I’ll take you up on that offer. Will you be here tomorrow?” Spencer asked, trying to mask the hope in his voice. Who was he kidding; Derek was already one of the top profilers in the Bureau.

“I will be. You can plan to stay after then.”

Spencer nodded and walked away, but not before glancing back one more time. Harold was right; they did make a lot of eye contact.

The next day couldn’t go by faster. Spencer had spent practically the entire night thinking about everything that had happened, trying to figure out if Harold was right or not. There was no way. Spencer was just Spencer, a NAT, and Derek Morgan was, well… Derek Morgan.

He probably just thought that Spencer was a hopeless case and needed extra help. Yeah, that was it. It had to be.

When the day was over, Spencer wasn’t just relieved like he usually was, but he was excited too. It no longer mattered to him what the reason was for him being there late, he just wanted to spend more time in the presence of SSA Morgan.

“I was thinking I’d help you with that second move we learned today, the cross-punch jab combo,” Derek announced. His voice echoed just a bit off the walls of the training center now that it was completely abandoned.

He walked over to one of the punching bags lined up just a few feet from the wall, and Spencer followed him in a manner that could only be described as a lost puppy. Spencer could keep track of all sorts of numbers, but the sheer amount of repeating memories morphing into new thoughts morphing into full blown fantasies was even too high for him to count. He’d never known of a drug so powerful.

“I’ll show you the move again, then I want you to try and copy it.” Derek stepped closer to the bag and executed a textbook one-two combo, the muscles in his arms and back contracting in perfect unison. God, Spencer wanted so badly to just reach out and run his hands all over this pristinely sculpted man, but he denied himself, letting his hands tremble in place instead.

Spencer stepped up to the bag next to Derek’s and attempted to do the same thing. Derek watched with a sharp eye.

After a few reps, the skilled agent took long strides that landed him only inches away from the younger man’s back. “Keep tension here.” His hands engulfed Spencer’s waist and twisted them to the side with the ease of swatting a fly.

The feeling was so overwhelming Spencer thought he might never be able to move again, and honestly, he didn’t want to. Standing there in the grip of that man was really all he’d been wanting for months now.

The only thing that pulled him out of his trance was the way Derek’s fingers lingered as he walked around to Spencer’s front, drifting down far enough to send a clear message, one that even Spencer couldn’t miss, but not far enough to be completely intrusive.

But Spencer wanted intrusive. He wanted nothing more than for Derek Morgan to invade his personal space to the point of no return.

He looked at the older man with shock and a burning question, but didn’t flinch or move back. Derek simply bit his lip and scanned Spencer up and down at what felt like a snail’s pace. He felt like a helpless deer being sized up by a lion for his next meal.

Spencer swallowed hard.

He’d been wanting nothing more than to be in this very same situation, or one of the multitudes of variations he’d created in his mind, but now that it was here could he really go through with it? Was it really the best idea? Did he really want this? No, he couldn’t.

But Spencer wasn’t known for being a good liar.

The only signal Derek needed was the simple nod of Spencer’s head.

And he got it.

Like a snake ready to strike, Derek brought his lips to Spencer’s in an instant. His questioning fingers had an answer, returning to their strong hold over Spencer’s hip bones.

Spencer knew what was happening was completely inappropriate, but couldn’t find the will to care. The man he’d been dreaming about, spending every waking and non-waking moment obsessing over, was actually interested in him too.

All his fantasies were flashing before his eyes, Derek’s muscles now completely exposed to him. He frantically pawed at him, trying to feel and memorize every millimeter of the beautiful body before him, like every inch was another drop of water in his achingly dry mouth.

“Hey, hey,” Derek whispered. “Patience. Not everything can happen at once, remember, one step at a time.”

Spencer took a moment to breathe and look into the warm eyes he’d been drowning in. Only for a moment, though, as he had a lot he wanted to do, starting with kissing his way down this man’s chest.

Derek laughed a little at Spencer’s impatience when he placed his hands on his broad shoulders and lips on his burning hot skin. He didn’t mind, though. Unexpectedly, the young man knew how to use his mouth. He couldn’t wait to explore that particular skill set some more.

Within the next few minutes, bodies were slammed into walls, forced to the ground, and pushed further down into the floor than was previously thought possible. The echo of the room only amplified the intoxicating sounds and the wall of windows overlooking the campus only increased the arousal.

Spencer would have a new appreciation for the musty smell and sweat induced humidity in the room from now on.

The tension for the remaining month before the NATs graduated was unbearable. Harold made sure to point out the nauseating amount of glances passed between the two men, but was respectful enough to not point it out to everyone. He tried to deny anything had happened, but Harold wasn’t having any of it and let Spencer know he was a lousy liar, something he definitely needed to work on.

Come graduation day when all NATs would be receiving their department assignments, Derek made sure to personally hand Spencer his.

He carefully opened the envelope and pulled out the sheet of paper with one bolded line reading: “Behavioral Analysis Unit.”

Spencer immediately looked up and locked eyes with Derek. He simply smirked in return.

Maybe his fantasy of having something more with the agent would become a reality after all.

-

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@90spumkin