#the whole point of transitioning is to finally feel like yourself and do what feels good and authentic

[castielfucks]

theres actually no rules to transitioning and youre allowed to want contradictory things for your transition. it's fine if you only want some of the changes that come with hrt and take preventative measures for the rest (like wanting bottom growth but not body hair or vice versa). you can want to have vagina AND a dick. you can be a woman and want top surgery, or wear a packer. you can be a man and want to have a pussy. you can change your transition goals one or a million times or not have any goals at all and just take things as they come or as they feel right.

there are no rules.

[mysecretlittlelibrary]

After The End

Pairing: Bucky x Reader/former Steve x Reader

Word Count: 3.2k

Warnings: idk... there's lots of arguing and resentment

Genre: mostly angst some fluff here and there

Summary: It took you ages to put yourself back together when Steve chose to stay in the 40s, what happens when he comes back two years after

***

Life after Thanos was hard. Watching some of your closest friends disappear was not something you would ever be able to forget. Especially with those of you that were left scattered around trying to patch up what could be saved. Those five years were hard, but harder still was having almost everyone you loved return only to lose others. If you had known that beating Thanos would mean losing your boyfriend you might not have tried so hard. It's selfish to think that way, you know it is but you had a whole life planned with Steve, and being heroes you knew there was a chance you wouldn't get to see it through but losing him like this was- almost too much to bare. All he had to do was return the stupid stones to where you'd gotten them from to save the universe. It was supposed to be simple and there was something soul shattering about him choosing not to return to the team, to you. He took the stones back and then he stayed. Chose a life with Peggy that was never his rather than the life with you that he already had. It was agony, for months you were heartbroken. But you got through it. You mourned that life you envisioned, you mourned him, and while you'll probably always love him, you refused to let his choice destroy you. And you considered yourself lucky because Bucky was there for you through it all. On nights that were really bad, Bucky would stay with you even if you were up all night.

You aren't entirely sure when it happened, even now, looking back on it you can't pinpoint the moment late night conversations and afternoons completing chores became... more than that. You guess in spending so much time together you started to see Bucky in a different light. You'd always cared for him but what happened with Steve seems to have created a level of closeness you didn't expect. That first night that you kissed him was unexpected even to you. You'd been talking about nothing of consequence, he was lying on the floor of your room while you were in your bed, both of you staring at your ceiling for the most part. There was a lull in the conversation so you said the thing that had only clicked for you the week before at that point.

"I can't believe I let myself feel inadequate for so long." You sighed. You'd convinced yourself, for weeks, that Steve leaving was because you weren't enough, and only now were you coming to your senses about it.

"I'm sorry." Bucky had whispered it so quietly you almost thought he wasn't talking to you.

"You're sorry? For what? You didn't make him leave." You scoffed at him.

"For letting you feel less than perfect."

"Come on Buck, that's not on you." You'd rotated onto your stomach with a chuckle at his words. He'd cracked one eye open to look at you when he realized you were staring at him. Before you let yourself think about it too hard, you had leaned over the edge of your bed and kissed Bucky. It was quick and a bit awkward because of the angle but you made sure not to shy away from his surprised stare after.

"Did you just-" Bucky didn't even finish the question.

"Yeah. I guess I did." You'd smiled slowly watching a slight pink warm Bucky's cheeks.

You wish you could simply say 'and the rest is history' but that makes it seem like things were way easier than they were. It wasn't a smooth transition by any means. That night neither of you spoke for far too long, and when you could muster up something to say it wasn't to address the rapidly growing elephant in the room- it was to dispell the tension. You and Bucky spent two weeks dancing around the subject before he finally asked you if you were even ready for another relationship after Steve. That's when it clicked, why he'd been avoiding it in the first place, he was considering the possibility you were rebounding. Understandable concern but nope. It had been months, almost a year actually, since Steven had left. You knew you were in a place to begin again and you wanted to do it with Bucky.

Now the rest is history. You've been together ever since. About a year and a half at this point and you can't remember the last time you were this happy. The two of you meshed so well you can't believe there was a time you thought your future was with another man. You smile to yourself as you think about it while working on a painting. There's a knock at the front door that you almost don't hear.

"Y/n can you get the door? I'm in the bathroom!" Bucky shouts.

"Oh shit, of course!" You put down your brush and head to the door. You can't describe the shock that gripped you when you open the door.

"Steven." You blink at him.

"Hey. Nat- told me you'd moved. Luckily she uh, had your new address so-" He trails off with a shrug.

"Look not to- sound rude or anything, like I'm glad to see you, I think but, what are you doing here?" You ask.

"I thought- I thought I knew what I wanted but I got it wrong. I got it so wrong. My life- my happiness, it's here. With you." Steve steps towards you and you instinctively step back, placing a hand up gently to indicate your boundary.

"Hang on a second Steve. Just because your plan didn't work out doesn't mean you can just waltz back into my life like nothing's changed."

"Y/n! Who's at the door?" Bucky's voice calls from inside.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you." You call back.

"I- didn't realize you'd have company." Steve mutters.

"Oh I don't. That's-" Before you can explain, Bucky's asking something, now walking over to join you at the front door.

"So who's this unbelievable surprise guest of-" Bucky's hands drop from where they were just about to settle on your waist when he finally glances out your door. "Steve." He says stepping back.

"Told you, you wouldn't believe me." You toss over your shoulder.

"Hey pal. Long time no see." Steve says. You can't tell if he's totally put it together yet but the strain in his voice tells you he at least knows something's changed between you and his best friend.

"I'll say. What happened to growing old with Carter?" Bucky asks, stepping around you to half hug Steve and offer a shoulder pat.

"I realized that- wasn't the life I wanted. I mean it was once upon a time but, not anymore. Things have changed." Steve shrugs.

"I see." Bucky nods.

"Well, Steve you're welcome to stay here with us while you- get back on your feet in the 21st century! Right Buck? Or I can send you over to Sam, he's back in Louisiana with family right now but I'm sure he'd love to see you too." You say.

"Oh, yeah, we can set him up in the extra room although- your art stuff is in there, did you want me to move it into my office or should I put it in your room?" Bucky hums.

"Do you have space in your office? Cuz I definitely can set it up in my room-"

"There's tons of space in my office." Bucky shrugs before you can finish. Steve clears his throat and you turn your attention back to him.

"Sorry to interrupt your- logistical discussion about all this, I j- I didn't realize you two were living together." Steve says.

"It's been two years. Like you said, things have changed." You say.

"You haven't told him?" Bucky looks at you.

"Well in my defense I was about to when you walked over here and the conversation kinda pivoted." You say.

"Okay well, do you want to do it or should I?" Bucky asks.

"I mean I don't want to but- it should be me, yeah." You mutter.

"Okay, can we stop doing this sidebar thing you guys are doing? Tell me- what exactly?" Steve asks. Bucky's hand settles comfortingly against your back, it's out of Steve's line of sight and you appreciate it greatly.

"Bucky- Bucky's my partner." You say.

"In the- you go on missions together sense or the 'my girlfriend is dating my best friend' sense?" Steve asks.

"It's been two years Steve-"

"So you replace me with my closest friend?"

"No. I moved on and yeah it was with Bucky but that was by chance it wasn't about you at all. Don't make it personal."

"You just happen to move on with my best bud? It feels pretty personal." He scoffs.

"Okay! Let's settle down. Steve, if you're gonna take our offer to stay I will show you to your room. Nat has some of your things at her place, the rest of it is in a storage unit. I'll take you down after." Bucky interrupts the would-be argument by changing the subject. You step out of the doorway to let Steve walk in as Bucky tugs him along.

"Why are my things at Nat's?" Steve asks.

"Well some of the more valuable things y/n held onto for a while but when she didn't want to keep them around here anymore we gave them to Nat to look after until we came up with a better plan since we didn't wanna leave them in a storage unit we'd barely go to." Bucky explains as the pair walk further into the house. You can't hear Steve's reply as you walk into the kitchen to regroup. Letting him stay here is going to make shit so weird. You sigh to yourself, with any luck he'll get on his feet pretty quickly and this will only last a couple of months. You can do a couple of months.

The first few weeks are, tense. You're not sure if Bucky is as aware of it as you are but your house is awkward and quiet most hours since Steve showed up. It's like most of your routines have been disrupted and you're not sure which ones are best left for after he's gone. Right now you're on your balcony with a cup of tea. When you glance over the ledge, you see Steve trudging into view. You watch curiously to figure out what he's doing, not even realizing Bucky's snuck up behind you until his arms settle around your waist.

"Penny for your thoughts my darling?" Bucky asks.

"Things are weird. Maybe I shouldn't have offered to let him stay here." You frown.

"Don't be silly. You wouldn't be you if you hadn't offered." Bucky chuckles.

"Sure but- now I'm worried I've put us- put you in an uncomfortable situation." Bucky spins you around to face him. His hand comes up to the side of your face, fingers grazing your cheek softly.

"I'm fine. Are you uncomfortable with him being here? Because I can suggest he spend some time checking in with the others if you'd-"

"No, I don't want to kick him out. I just- I don't want you to lose him because of me." You say taking his hand in yours kiss his knuckles.

"If 70 years and Russian brainwashing couldn't destroy our friendship I think we can make it past this." Bucky winks at you. You glance over the balcony again in time to see Steve toss some wood at a growing pile.

"What is he doing? Why is he piling wood?" Your eyebrows scrunch up.

"You can just ask him you know." Bucky muses.

"It's not harming anyone. I don't need to know." You shake your head.

"You wanna ask don't you?"

"It's just strange." You say fighting a smile.

"Just ask." Bucky laughs leaving you to your tea on the balcony. A moment later you let your curiosity get the better of you and lean against the metal railing of the balcony.

"Steve hon, what on earth are you doing?" You ask him.

"A tree fell, so- I'm breaking it down into firewood."

"Stevie it's August, we're not using the fireplace." You shake your head with a laugh.

"Better safe than sorry." He shrugs.

"You must be incredibly bored." You muse.

"No, I just like to be prepared." He says. "Alright, I'm a little bored." He adds with a sigh after a moment.

"Well if you need something to do- I was catching up with Nat the other day, she said a couple of the tenants in her building moved out for whatever reason, you should talk to her about applying." You tell him.

"I'll give her a call." He squints up at you.

"Good." You nod heading back into the apartment. That's honestly the longest conversation you've had since the day he moved in. Usually, you spend all day avoiding him- or he spends all day avoiding you- you're not sure but you don't speak really, except you make a point to ask him about dinner, if he has plans, or if he'd like to join you and Bucky. You're a good host, but you don't talk to each other much. Not that you expect any different, you were together for six years and he up and left but he's back now- and things are not what he thought they'd be. What else could be said honestly?

You actually don't mind the silence between you two, because the day Steve decides to break that pattern brings forth the worst conversation. The type you've been dreading since the moment he appeared at your door. You're cleaning around the apartment and Steve offered to help, first you worked in silence, just the music from your speaker filling the air until a particular song came on. One you played for Steve once that he immediately fell in love with. It became your song. You only recently stopped associating the song with him but you forgot it was in this playlist otherwise you would've picked another one.

"You still listen to this song?" Steve asks. You keep your back turned to him as you wipe down the coffee table.

"Of course I do. I knew the song before- it was, ours." You say.

"This is the first time I've heard it in a while." He muses.

"Duh the song didn't exist until the 2010s." You scoff.

"Yeah I guess that's- that's true. It's strange though, that awareness of what's to come."

"Yeah that's why most of sci fi warns you not to go time jumping."

"You clean with different products now." Steve points out. You're not sure what he's trying to do here but you are in no mood to dance around awkwardness with him.

"Scented products are easier for Bucky. He says plain bleach  smells too sterile." You mutter. It's Bucky that buys most of the cleaning products anyway, but he always buys citrus stuff.

"It's not easy, you know, seeing my best friend with the love of my life every day." Steve says after a stretch of silence. At this, you turn to face him, trying to stifle that frustration bubbling inside you.

"You left me. Left us. Not the other way around Steve. You don't get to complain about us having picked up the pieces." You tell him.

"I still love you, that's not something I can just pretend isn't there." He says.

"And I love Bucky." You shrug.

"Not me?"

"It doesn't matter." You shake your head.

"It does."

"If it mattered to you at all you would've never left." You grit out.

"So say it." He says quietly.

"What?"

"Tell me you don't love me."

"Steve-"

"Say it. If what we had is truly all in the past for you tell me you don't love me. That there's no place in your heart for me and- I'll move on."

"This isn't fair." You shake your head.

"No?"

"No! You got the life with Peggy that you thought you wanted. You abandoned me. Now you're asking me to choose you when you didn't choose me. How can you expect me to do that?"

"I'm choosing you now!"

"And I've chosen Bucky. I wanted the world with you. All you had to do was come back to me. And you didn't. It's too late now Steve. You needed to choose me two years ago."

"You still haven't said-"

"I don't love you. That's what you want to hear? You lost me the day you chose not to come back. I shouldn't have to spell it out for you. I chose Bucky, yes. But you-" Deep breath. "If you can't handle me and Bucky together in our home then- maybe you should go stay with Sam or Natasha." You say. You're not going to argue with him.

"Are you kicking me out?"

"I'm offering you an alternative- because, I will not be choosing you. Not now, not ever again, you had your chance and if you can't come to terms with that, if it's too difficult to be around reminders that you fucked up and I kept living life without you then by all means don't destroy your mental health staying here. You have other friends."

"How can you expect me to just- pretend what we had means nothing? How can you pretend it means nothing?"

"I'm not asking you to pretend shit. I also am not pretending it means nothing I'm just aware of the reality that it's over and that's something you need to come to terms with because you left and Bucky made me feel alive again when your leaving nearly killed me. It's been two years, did you think I would simply be waiting indefinitely for you to decide I was worth something to you again?"

"Wait a second you have always been worth something to me. You've always been worth everything." Steve frowns.

"You don't get to say that! You don't abandon people that are 'worth everything' to you. You chose someone else and that's a choice you have to live with." You say, your finger practically in his face. The sound of the apartment door opening disrupts your anger enough that you step back.

"Hey guys- did I miss something?" Bucky frowns looking between you two even though you've already stopped back over to the coffee table. Bucky's quick to come to your side, scanning your face for any clues as to what's going on, although he heard the last bit of what you said as he was coming down the hall. "Baby?" He coaxes gently, his fingers stroking against your side.

"I'm gonna go to Sam's for a little while." Steve grits out.

"Feel free to stay there." You clip before you can stop yourself. Steve's footfalls pause for a moment at your words but he doesn't respond before eventually he trudges out the front door.

"Feel free to stay there?! What... happened while I was out?" Bucky asks with a disbelieving chuckle.

"He has... a lot of nerve." You force out through clenched teeth.

"You're gonna have to give me more details than that so I can understand what's wrong doll."

"He just told me how hard it is to watch his best friend with the 'love of his life' every day. The love of his life that he left to be with a woman that lived and died without him. He asked me to choose him. Because after two years I'm supposed to still love the man that left me. Because it's not enough that he almost destroyed me the last time. Because for some reason he thinks I'd rather be picked two years too late."

"He's hurting."

"Yeah well, so was I. Two years ago. He'll live. I did." You shrug. Bucky pulls you into a hug, kissing the top of your head as he gently sways you both back and forth. You lived through hell that day you realized Steve chose a life with Peggy. You'd be damned if you ever let that happen again.

***

[fuctacles]

Trans is fine, but you better not be a Swiftie!

For @subeddieweek Day 5 | T | 1502 | cw: hinted transphobia | transfem Steve, PDA, rockstar Eddie, jealousy, possesive Stevie, bitchy Stevie | Ao3

It took the whole of Corroded Coffin to convince her to go to the concert. It may make her sound like an unsupportive girlfriend, but she hasn't been to any of their gigs in months. Eddie never complained about it, aware that metal concerts aren't for everyone, even if they do like the music. She's also hit a weird stage in her transition when she didn't feel like going to public events. 

But here she was, at their first solo concert, no festival to crutch on. In the newest band t-shirt, one she saw through every stage of designing, her tits barely making a dent (Eddie had a different opinion on that topic), while two skanks next to her had her cleavages on full display in their tiny cut-up t-shirts.

They were in the VIP lounge, waiting for the band to emerge from backstage. Stevie could have been there with them, but the rush and heat behind a concert like this gave her a worse headache than the actual music. So instead, she had to sit there with two textbook examples of a groupie. And one of them looked meaner than Carol, back from high school, when she didn't get her chocolate pudding.

"You sure you're in the right place?" one of them finally speaks up.

Stevie looks pointedly at her band t-shirt. 

"Is this not a Taylor Swift concert?" she asks, eyes going wide. The second girl presses her lips, holding back a laugh. The first one narrows her eyes, though. 

"Don't sass me, girlie, you know what I mean," she hisses. "Wearing plain jeans and a hoodie to meet Eddie Munson? That's so disrespectful."

Stevie wouldn't call her jeans plain. They were expensive mom-cut and made her ass look good. The girl didn't need to know she treated them like a premium version of sweatpants. And the hoodie was Eddie's. He gave it to her before going on stage tonight. 

She shrugs off her words.

"I don't think he'll mind."

The girl scoffs. 

"Oh, he's too nice to say anything, but he'll know you're a poser. Who goes to a metal concert dressed like that? He'd never go for you."

Stevie raises her eyebrows, taken aback.

"Excuse me?"

"Excuse you," the girl barks back, nonsensically. Her friend touches her arm as if giving her a sign to back dial it down, but she either doesn't notice or chooses to ignore her. "You don't look like you're here for the music, hell, you probably can't name a single song!"

(Stevie named some of them herself.)

"So you must be here for Eddie," she concludes with a sneer. 

"Well, I am here for him," Stevie deadpans truthfully. This seems to further fuel her VIP lounge companion.

"Keep dreaming. He's into real metalheads," she says haughtily, popping the collar of her battle vest. It's so cartoonish it takes everything from Stevie not to burst out laughing. "What do you even listen to? Country?"

"Taylor Swift, I already told you."

"See, Eddie hates normies like you. Swifties are so fucking mainstream, you'll just embarrass yourself. Maybe you should go," she suggests with a pointed look.

Stevie gives her a pitying smile back. Clearly, she wasn't as big of a fan as she claimed to be if she hadn't seen the photos of Eddie in official Taylor Swift merch that were trending just a couple of months ago. 

"Eddie's looking for someone real, not a fake bitch like you."

She was going to play nice, but that was taking it too far. She felt her hackles rise and her face turned into a frown.

But before she could say anything, the second girl slapped her friend on the chest.

"What the fuck, dude?! You can't just say shit like that!"

"Like what?!" She slaps her back. "Do you think she actually cares about their music? She screams fake pop shit!" She throws her hand back, motioning at Stevie.

Who was too taken aback to react at this point.

"Fuck, I thought you were being transphobic." The girl lets out a nervous laugh. "Sorry."

"What?" The first girl takes a glance back at Stevie like she hasn't noticed before. It was kind of flattering, considering she wasn't that far in her transition, but she wouldn't take an idiot's oversight as a compliment. "I don't care about that! Mainstream music is a bigger sin than being transgender!"

"I'll drink to that."

The band chose this moment to appear at the steps to the lounge, Eddie raising the water bottle in his hand in a mock cheer. 

"Eddie!" The two girls stand up in unison, and it takes all of Stephanie's willpower not to roll her eyes. Instead, she gives a wry smile to Jeff, who seems to be in a similar state of mind.

"We're here too, you know," he murmurs under his breath. 

Gareth nudges his arm.

"Well, I'm glad they're not here for me," he whispers back.

Stevie snorts after hearing that, but the girls are none the wiser, too preoccupied with their beloved frontman.

"Hello ladies, hope you didn't wait too long," he greets them, accepting their enthusiastic hugs and letting them kiss his cheek. 

Stevie keeps her face carefully neutral.

"It's okay, we know you're exhausted after the concert." The first girl smiles sweetly at him, and it's becoming increasingly difficult for Stevie not to gag at the shift in attitude. "I'd wait the whole night to meet you." She might need a bucket right now.

Eddie laughs nervously, taking a step back to put some distance between them.

"Ashley and Xena, right?" he asks.

"I'm Xena!" The girl exclaims, clearly proud of her unusual name. Stevie does roll her eyes this time.

Gareth appears in front of her, snickering, and she punches him softly in the thigh before raising the same fist to fist bump him. He offers her the tray of cookies he picked up from the table.

"Hi. How are you doing?"

"I'm fine." She shrugs and picks up one of the cookies. "Thanks."

He nods and retreats to one of the couches. There are three of them, set up in a triangle around a table with snacks and drinks. Which is very convenient, making Stevie think Chrissy has planned it out.

"You already know them, but it's rude not to introduce my friend." Eddie grins, making room for the rest of the band to properly greet the fans. "This is Jeff, Gareth, and Grizzly the Teddy-bear. He gives the best hugs," he says with a grin. Ted rolls his eyes.

"Just Ted is fine. But I do give the best hugs." He grins.

Eddie leaves them to it and finally goes to sit next to his girlfriend, throwing his arms over the back of the sofa and sinking into the cushions.

"I'm so tired," he groans. 

"Too tired to greet me properly?" she asks with a raised eyebrow. She can feel the eyes of the other girls on them.

"Never." Eddie raises his head immediately. "Sorry, baby." He leans in to kiss her on the cheek, but she moves her head away.

"I said properly," she repeats, but her tone shifts into her more authoritative one. He hesitates for a millisecond, but his eyes don't even shift away to look at their surroundings. Stevie enjoys the power trip, seeing him uncaring of who's looking and where they are.

"Of course, sorry," he amends, straightening up to go in for a proper kiss.

He lets out a surprised whimper when she dominates it immediately, grasping his chin and claiming his mouth like she's been starving for it throughout the whole concert. Eddie goes limp in her grasp, but she wants to make it clear who he belongs to. She grabs his knee possessively, angling him even more towards her, and her other hand moves from his chin to his hair. His locks are damp with sweat after the concert, but she doesn't mind, because it's exactly how she likes him. Dirty, unkempt, falling apart under her hands. 

She tugs at his hair, messing further the haphazard bun he's tied it into. He sighs, melting further into her, and it makes it easier to grasp his thighs and pull him into her lap. They finally part with a wet smack, and she can look into her boyfriend's glossy eyes.

"There's my good boy," she praises. "Hi."

"Hi," he croaks back with a dazed smile.

"Booo, get a room!" one of their friends speaks up. 

Eddie groans and hides in the crook of her neck, too weak from the kiss to face the teasing yet. So Stevie takes over the social interaction for him, lacing her hands together at the small of his back while he collects himself. She sticks out her tongue to Gareth.

"Shut up, we'll behave now," she says, before turning to the two girls, her jaws shattered on the floor and there to stay for her to stomp on. She smiles charmingly at them. "You guys were saying?"

Shameless plug: @stevieweek

[wangxianficrecs]

Tell Me To Stay by YilingSani

Tell Me To Stay

by YilingSani (@yiling-sani)

G, 14k, Wangxian

Summary: With heavy steps, Wei Ying walks back to the living room and plops down on the sofa again. His silver eyes travel around the room for a while, mind flooded by memories of sunny mornings, meals and cosy evenings together and all the surfaces they fucked each other on. Then they stop at the door of Lan Zhan's study. If he walked out right now... If Lan Zhan walked out right now and spoke to him, Wei Ying would throw the backpack away, hold his boyfriend close and never let him go. He begs. He begs it would happen. He begs Lan Zhan to somehow feel how much on the edge Wei Ying is balancing right now. "Please," he whispers - the tightening feeling in his throat is slowly choking him while the silver eyes threaten to fill with tears. "Please, Lan Zhan." Kay's comments: AKA the story that made me cry on public transit. Absolutely loved it though. A Wangxian break-up and make-up story and often those tend to bash Wei Wuxian or force him to do all the emotional labour, but this one doesn't. Instead, it's Lan Wangji who has to work on himself and start fighting for them. The worst person in this entire story is actually Lan Xichen, so if you like him... Maybe skip out on this one. Really loved the relationship development here, Wei Wuxian putting himself first for the first time and Wangxian finding their way back towards each other and that not magically fixing everything. Excerpt: He places the plate on the table and sits down on the edge, right next to Lan Zhan. "Sweetheart, you need to stop this," he finally says. "Stop what?" Lan Zhan asks, eyes never leaving the screen. "Working so much," Wei Ying points out. "You're hurting yourself. Why can't Huan-ge help you with this?" Lan Zhan exhales in frustration. "Because Huan-ge was the one who screwed this up in the first place." "You cannot fix the whole company by yourself." "I can try." "Lan Zhan," Wei Ying shakes his head and raises his hand to caress Lan Zhan's cheek. But the other man grabs his wrist, the golden eyes darting up, filled with sudden anger. His grip is so strong Wei Ying feels like his wrist will break in half. "I need to do this, Wei Ying," he says through gritted teeth. "You don't understand. The whole company depends on me. People depend on me."

pov wei wuxian, pov lan wangji, modern setting, modern no powers, established relationship, breaking up & making up, lan wangji has issues, lan xichen bashing, getting back together, developing relationship, angst with a happy ending, therapy, hurt/comfort, emotional hurt/comfort, good friend wen qing

~*~

(Please REBLOG as a signal boost for this hard-working author if you like – or think others might like – this story.)

[ri-writing]

Ri rants about Northanger Abbey

Now that I have finished Northanger Abbey, I'm reading/watching/listening to academic thoughts on it. I do not have a degree in literature, but it feels like a whole lot of people are missing that Henry and Eleanor's dad is emotionally abusive. ??? I'm not the only one noticing this, right? It seems to be The Thing To Do to criticize Catherine for thinking he's a bad dude and I'm here going, "but he IS a bad dude."

His kids are afraid of him. They pull into themselves when they're around him. Eleanor doesn't have any friends when we meet her. At one point, she's scared about being a few minutes late to dinner. In her own house. Meanwhile, Henry's got a massive ironic-humor-defense-mechanism.

Catherine picks up on this. She's aware that Something Is Wrong. Her only knowledge of the sorts of people whose children are afraid of them comes from books and she doesn't have the vocabulary to express what she's picking up on. She's trying to figure it out. When Henry finds her in his mother's room, she isn't immediately forthcoming about her concerns. He pries it out of her. She tries to change the topic numerous times; he keeps coming back to it.

It's not like Catherine ran into dinner and did a whole Grand Detective Reveal accusing General Tilney of being a murderer. She's noticed his children - her friends - are afraid of this man and she's trying to figure out why. It seems unlikely she'd have said anything but-for Henry not letting it go when he found her.

Catherine isn't stupid. She's not letting her imagination run away with her. She's got a bad feeling in her gut that she doesn't understand but her gut feeling is correct. General Tilney is not a safe person. We see this for ourselves when he turns on her and puts her in a dangerous situation. She's seventeen, and has never traveled by herself but he sends her out of the house to fend for herself. He refuses to send anyone with her, so there's no one to protect her if someone wants to rob her or harm her. She doesn't know how the public transit works. She didn't even have money to get home; Eleanor has to sneak some to her. He throws her out and he doesn't care what happens to her. (That she figures out how to get home safely evidences that she's brave and clever).

So basically: (1) Catherine's gut is suggesting this guy is a bad guy; (2) the guy is a bad guy; and (3) the guy even puts her in a situation where she could be harmed. And if something had happened to her because she was forced into this situation - if she fell in front of a coach and got run over or if something more nefarious happened - that's at least partially General Tilney's fault and would mean he was...negligent or even worse.

Have none of these great academic minds ever considered that it's Henry who changes? When Henry finally gets Catherine's fears out of her after finding her in the hall outside his mother's room, he defends his father. This is a really common thing with people who are emotionally abused (I defended my abuser for years even when I knew deep down something was off). Because the abuse is not physical, it's harder to identify. You start to think that maybe you misunderstood or are exaggerating things in your mind, that you're being overly emotional or that you're reading into things that aren't there. An abuser even knows how to play into those thoughts until you find that it is easier to explain away and lie to yourself (he cares "in his way"). Henry knows deep down that his father does not treat him or Eleanor right, but he's lived his entire life in this abusive situation. I wonder how much of Henry's speech to Catherine about being reasonable is actually him voicing the things he says to himself.

When General Tilney puts Catherine in danger, Henry's finally able to admit the truth to himself. Once that happens, he's able to free himself.

That's the book I read. I'm still not sure I read the same book the academics read.

[serenefreakgeekao3]

Ambivalent Days

Jim Halpert x Trans Man Reader (PART TWO) Can be read alone, but I do reference part one, so read that HERE if you want to be caught up!

Summary: You’ve finally come out as trans to the entire office. It’s gone a lot better than expected. But now you’re faced with a serious problem- or rather, a serious crush. On none other than Jim Halpert, leading supporter of your transitions and quickly becoming your best friend in the office. But are you willing to risk that friendship just for some silly little feelings?

Tags: FtM!reader, Gay!Jim (for narrative reasons, I think i wanted him to be bi in the first part but switched it around, whatever), implied gay!reader (all i said was ‘not straight’), trans supporter Dwight, peacekeeper!Pam, supportive!Kelly Kapoor, bisexual!Kelly, drinking in moderation, happy ending Warnings: Michael being absolutely ridiculous and attention-hungry to the point that he does bad things (so, like, normal episode?), some general swearing

A/N: This has been requested so many times, both in asks and requests. I’ll try my best to tag everyone who asked for this, sorry if i forgot any! I was excited to write this because I loved the first part, but figuring out where to start was the trickiest part. I hope you all enjoy!  (this entire fic ended up just writing itself once i got going. I had no clue what i was gonna do until it happened so… enjoy lol)

Life was great, working as a Customer Service representative for Dunder Mifflin paper company. Wow, you never thought you’d say such a thing, but it really has become something appealing, something that had you smiling and willing to come to work every single day. Of course, it had its own ups and downs, times when you felt overwhelmed or frustrated at certain people. You still ended up enjoying the majority of the day, and sometimes the rough days turned out to end up better than the rest.

It had absolutely, wholeheartedly nothing to do with James Duncan Halpert, otherwise known to his work colleagues as ‘Jim.’ You continued to lie to yourself, nodding along to this thought process on your drive to work. It was rainy, just like most days, and you were bored out of your mind waiting in the traffic. You just enjoyed going to work, because… Because of all of your friends, that’s why! Sure, that might include Jim, but that also included Pam, and Oscar, and god forbid, even Dwight. He’s certainly grown on you over time, having completely accepted your identity, even defending you against anyone who said anything. You couldn’t be sure, but you suspected that Dwight had even lost a customer through those actions- but when Mr Dellicker had called for customer support and you had answered the phone, saying his name out loud, Kelly had rushed around the divider and ripped the phone from your hand, immediately transferring it to her own phone. You tried to listen in, curious why this was so important to her, but you kept hearing her say the same thing over and over.

“Thank you for your consideration, but we no longer want your business with us. I completely understand that you think so, but we no longer want your business with us. While that may or may not be true, this whole conversation is futile considering we no longer want your business with us.”

Mr Dellicker had become a hushed topic around you, but you had managed to catch a private whisper among your friends one day when he was brought up again. They’d ask Kelly if he had called yet, and she assured the situation was handled. Pam had whispered, “I can’t believe some people’s views on trans people. It makes no sense.” So, while it wasn’t likely due to you specifically, you were almost sure that you were the only trans person they knew. If they were defending trans people, they were defending you alongside it all.

You pulled into the parking lot finally, shaking your head to rid yourself of those thoughts. Mr Dellicker’s whole deal had been a problem a month ago and was no longer an issue. You shouldn’t dwell on those thoughts, you weren’t likely to ever have to worry about it again. You managed to snag a semi-decent parking space. It was only the second from the front, but it happened to be right next to Michael’s own car, and as you placed your car into park, you glanced over to notice he was still sitting there. You tilted your head in confusion, watching for a moment.

You couldn’t tell if he was psyching himself up, or singing along to one of his weird songs. He seemed ready to open the door, then leaned back once more without actually doing it. He lowered the visor on his car, flipping open the little door to reveal his mirror and looking at himself in it. He continued, probably, speaking to himself, and you just shook your head and decided to leave it be. You reached for your suitcase and umbrella, then began making your way inside.

You were stuffing your umbrella into the little holder by the door after you entered the office, taking off your long overcoat and hanging it on the coat rack by Pam’s desk. She smiled, asking about what you did over the weekend, and you answered that you didn’t really do much besides binge the next season of your current obsession. You agreed to tell her about it later, moving toward the break room for your normal cup of tea. You pat Jim on the shoulder on the way, and he reaches up quickly to touch your hand before you slip by. It causes a smile to cross your face as you continue on your path, a happy feeling welling up inside.

“I. Am a girl.” You spin around quickly, eyes widening in fright. There stood Michael Scott, wearing a short, pleated pink skirt with his normal yellow button-down dress shirt, as well as a crooked ginger wig that he had most definitely not been wearing in his car. The room falls completely quiet, and you hear two people put their calls on hold. Jim stands, and you can’t see his face from this perspective, but you hear a hardness in his voice.

“Michael, this is not a funny joke-”

“It’s not a joke!” Michael yells out, crossing his arms. He purses his lips before speaking again in a higher tone. “I’m a girl, and so I decided to say it. That I am.” He looked around the room as if expecting something, but no one moved a muscle. Pam broke the silence, clearing her throat and talking in a tone that was both cautious and unbelieving.

“Alright, so what would you like us to call you, then?” Michael sputtered at the question, throwing his hands outward and looking around the room again. His eyes settle on me, and Jim sidesteps to block off his vision. You can no longer see Michael, but the image of him has burned into your mind anyway. You could feel yourself panicking, your heart trying to beat its way out of your chest. This had to be a prank right? He was making fun of you? Now? After all this time?

“What do you mean- Y/N didn’t change his name when he came out!”

“This has nothing to do with Y/N,” Jim quickly tries to interrupt him after hearing your name, but you heard his sentence all the same. Jim walked closer to Michael, leaning down to whisper, but even you could still hear his words in the silence your boss caused. “How about we talk this out privately and continue this announcement later?”

“But-”

“I think that’s a fantastic idea, Jim,” Pam calls out quickly, circling her desk and corralling Michael into his office. He was putting up a fight, but not much of one. Jim followed closely behind, closing the door behind him. You could see multiple faces turn to look at you- as their current entertainment had been dragged away- out of the corner of your eye, but you were still there, shell-shocked. Before you realized what you were doing, you were standing directly outside Michael’s office door, peeking around the side to look in through the window. You could hear them talking still, considering the rest of the office was waiting to see what you would do.

“No, no, no!” Michael yelled out, plopping down into his seat. “I’m serious about this you guys!”

“Alright, let’s assume you are,” Pam begins, but Jim looks at her with an aggravated look.

“Pam-”

“Let’s assume you are,” Pam repeats, pushing Jim away and leaning closer to Michael. “How did you come to this decision?”

“I-” Michael hesitates, looking at his computer, then back to Pam. “Well, I really like girls a lot.”

“Sure, sure, but sexuality and gender are different.”

“I know that, Pam! God!” Michael starts flipping random pens on his desk, trying to distract himself. “I just like their clothes a lot.”

“You like to wear the clothes, or see them on women?”

“See them-” He stops, looking up to her. “I mean, wear them! Yeah, that’s what it is!” His stuttering and determination caused Jim to huff in a humourless laugh, no longer just standing by.

“What’s really going on here Michael?”

“And,” Michael begins, ignoring Jim’s question, “What was that question about what I wanted to be called? Y/N didn’t change his name when he came out?”

“Sure,” Pam agrees, trying to maintain the peace, “But Michael isn’t a very feminine name. Doesn’t that make you feel a little, I don’t know, dysphoric?”

“What does that word mean?” Michael asks, causing Jim to huff again, moving forward to slam his hands onto the table.

“What is really going on here, Michael?”

“Fine!” Michael yelled out, throwing up his hands, his fake hair swinging around wildly. “I don’t think I’m a girl! I don’t like wearing dresses or skirts or-” He spits, swatting away the fake hair that had managed to catch itself in his mouth, “And I’m so uncomfortable in this,” He pulls the wig off finally, throwing it onto the ground. He stands next, reaching for the skirt he was wearing, “Or this-”

“No, no, no!” Pam calls out quickly, keeping him from ripping the skirt off in front of them. “I’ll fetch you your spare pair of pants here soon, it’s at the desk. Just,” She sighs, shaking her head, “What could’ve possibly made you think this was a good idea, Michael?”

“Well!” Michael huffs, pouting as he sits back down. “Y/N got all sorts of attention when he came out. He became cool, and popular, and now I’m not even allowed to make jokes about him! Everyone hates me now, he took my thunder!”

“You can still make jokes about him,” Pam continues cautiously, raising her hands up in a plea to calm him down. “Just, not about the fact that he’s trans.”

“My thunder Pam!”

“This is fucking ridiculous,” Jim begins, reaching forward and grabbing hold of Michael’s shirt. “That stunt you pulled was mean-spirited and heinous. Do you have any idea how you could’ve made Y/N feel? How hard it was for him, not only to accept himself for who he is but to become confident enough in himself to come out to the entire office? Do you realize how much you probably just put him back?” Michael’s face was terrified, and Pam was too stunned at this action to do anything at first. By the time Jim was done talking, she reached forward quickly and pulled him back.

“Jim, that’s unnecessary.”

“I feel it was completely necessary, Pam.”

“He doesn’t realize what he’s doing, he just wants attention.”

“He gets attention every single day Pam! He demands it, hell, he goes out into the office and-”

“Jim,” Pam interrupts, nodding toward Michael. You watch Michael visibly sniff, raising a hand to rub at his nose.

“No, no, he’s right. I’m a nuisance, everyone hates me.”

“No one hates you, Michael,” Pam starts, and Jim scoffs.

“You’re babying him.” She shoots him a threatening look, and he just shakes his head and crosses his arms. Pam moves closer to the desk, looking down at Michael.

“Hey,” When Michael looks up, his eyes are red and glossy. “What you did just now, was that a good idea?”

“No,” He whines out, drawing out the vowel.

“Good, that’s the correct answer. And why was it a bad idea, Michael?” He huffs again, moving to play with a different toy on his desk and avoiding her eyes.

“Because I lied for attention.”

“And?”

“Because I probably made Y/N feel bad. And Jim.”

“So what are you going to do?” Pam asks, and you can’t see her expression but Michael finally meets her eyes and breathes in a deep breath.

“I’m going to tell everyone that it was a horrible prank and that I’m sorry.”

Even Jim startles at this, both Pam and Jim- even you, yourself- having never actually heard Michael apologize for one of his many failed pranks or skits. Pam straightens up, glancing quickly at Jim before looking back. Her voice was full of surprise as she nods, “That’s right. That’s completely right, actually. Good job Michael.” You could see him smile before looking down at his lap, then back up at Pam.

“Can I do it after I change?”

“Of course,” Pam moves quickly to the door, and you don’t think fast enough to move out of the way. The door swings open wide and you are revealed to be standing there, right outside of it. All three occupants turn to look at you with varying expressions, but they all share a similar surprise. You swallow hard, locking your eyes with Michael. You are about to speak but can feel eyes digging into your back, so you take a few steps into the office, past your two friends.

“What you did just now,” You begin, sucking in another deep breath, “Was horrifying- for everyone involved. I’m sure we want to see you in a skirt just as much as you want to be in one.” You lean forward onto the desk, watching Michael shrink away from you. “But let me ask you, how does it feel to wear that skirt?”

“What?” He looks startled at the question, looking to Jim and Pam for help. None arrived for him.

“How does it feel, wearing that skirt? Why aren’t you wearing a blouse with it? Couldn’t find one that fit, or did it feel too uncomfortable? What about the hair?” You nod down to wear the wig laid on the ground. “Was it annoying? Kept getting caught in your mouth, right? Drooped in front of your face, obscuring your vision?” You leaned forward, your breath coming out harsher. “Imagine you had breasts attached to you- and push past your sexuality. Imagine you had them and they couldn’t be removed.” You whisper this last part, your own eyes tearing up. “How would you feel?’

You hear Jim say your name softly behind you, realizing what you were referencing. Michael shook his head for a few seconds before he stopped, widening his eyes. You nod, continuing your speech. “Yeah, exactly.” You lean back, picking your hands off of his desk to rest by your side. “That’s how I feel every single day. Or, did. Until I came out.” You take a deep breath, steadying yourself. “I became confident because I was finally comfortable with who I was. I’m sorry if you can’t find that confidence in yourself. But don’t try to steal mine. Don’t make a mockery of my struggles.” You turn, heading toward the door, toward your desk- to anywhere but here. But Michael’s voice stops you before you’re able to leave.

“I’m sorry, Y/N.” You turn, looking into his eyes. He seemed genuine, but you knew he didn’t really understand.

“Think about why you are. Then get back to me.”

You pushed your way past Pam, who stood in the doorway with shock and pain written across her face, and ignored Jim’s call of your name as you kept going. You wanted away from these stares, this was not what you meant by loving this damned office. You continued past the breakroom, ignoring your daily cup of tea. You enter into your side of the annexe, seeing Kelly on the phone and hearing a whispered but high-pitched, “What? No! He didn’t?” Before she suddenly looks up, widens her eyes, and quickly says, “Gotta go,” Before slamming the phone down. You sigh and walk around the divider, taking your seat.

Kelly has more social sense than most people in the office, you’ve come to realize. It was why she had applied for customer service- unlike you, who had just taken up an ad from the newspaper. So, she knew better than to try to ask you what happened. She remained quiet on her side of the partition, something that was extremely odd, and it almost felt like you were in your own little world, in your tiny corner. Your desk was pressed against two walls, and the partition blocked the other two sides except for the small gap for your entrance. The partition walls weren’t very high, but sitting down they reached above your head. You felt isolated- something you first loved, then hated, and now feel grateful for once again. It gives you time and privacy to calm down.

After some time, you hear a throat clear nearby, and Kelly’s chair roll as she likely stands to leave. You look up at the top of your divider, waiting for a face to come into view. Luckily, it’s Jim’s face. He smiles softly at you, and you can tell he’s trying to keep the pity from his face, but it's not working very well.

“You didn’t make your tea?” He raises a cup- your favourite cup, no less, that no one else has used since your incident with Dwight- and offers it to you. “I figured I’d make you some. Can’t go a day without your tea, right?” You can tell he was trying, and it warmed something inside of you. Trying for a smile, you reach out to take the cup, taking a sip. It was made perfectly.

“I’m sorry about that,” You begin, sighing and placing the cup aside. “I kinda went a little overboard, didn’t I?”

“Not at all,” Jim rushes to comfort you, circling the divider completely to be inside your little cube. He rests himself against your desk, looking down at you with earnest eyes. “If anyone was overboard, it was Michael.” You just shrug, looking away.

“I mean, what did I expect, really? Everyone in the office has been so good about the whole thing. Ever since I’ve come out, it's been nothing but positivity.” You bite your lip, shrugging. “This office isn’t exactly a positivity-friendly environment.”

“You being trans should have no bearing on your workplace,” Jim insists, leaning forward toward you. “I know the world is fucked, but I want to make sure that at least your world isn’t.” You huff a laugh, shaking your head.

“Oh, c’mon Jim. Don’t be too hard on yourself.” You look up, meeting his eyes with a self-deprecating smile. “It’s not like it's because of you that all of this ended up so easy until now.” Jim’s eyes widen slightly, then wander away as he wiggles his head and bites his lip. You wait for him to agree, then narrow your eyes. “You… Didn’t tell everyone to be nice to me, did you?”

“Well,” He begins, drawing out the word and wincing. “I didn’t quite do that. But I did explain that they shouldn’t act any different, what jokes they shouldn’t make about it, and to look something up before asking any questions. If they couldn’t find the answer online, then they could ask me, and then I would allow them to ask you.” You blink a few times, tilting your head.

“But no one ever asked me anything?” He nodded along, sucking his lips inside his mouth before popping them, sighing.

“Yep.”

“Did they have questions?”

“Oh,” Jim scoffs, laughing. “So many.” He places his hands between his knees, palms together. You couldn’t help but laugh with him.

“Like what?” You feel curious but also dread at the prospect.

“Oh, y’know,” Jim shrugs, moving to mess with some pens on your desk idly, not meeting your eyes. “Just the usual dumbest shit on the planet. I told them all they were absolutely not allowed to ask you, of course, and had to explain why sometimes.” You nodded along, huffing out another laugh.

“I suddenly don’t want to know.”

“Oh, no, you really don’t.” You laugh softly along with him, feeling your chest bloom open, your crush developing further. For the second time today, you were moving before realizing you decided to. You stood, then reached forward and pulled Jim into a hug. He had straightened when he noticed you standing, then stood stiff as you wrapped your arms around his shoulders. You hesitated, about to pull away when Jim moved quickly, wrapping you in his arms and pulling you in tighter. You relaxed once more, laying your head against his chest and closing your eyes.

“Thank you, Jim,” You whisper, turning your nose to brush against his dress shirt. He smelled clean, with a hint of cologne that you couldn’t place. His arms were warm and strong- comforting in a way that you hadn’t felt in so long. He moved one of them up, cupping the back of your head as he straightened up more, pulling you in closer.

“It’s nothing,” Jim stutters out, and you can hear his heart beating under your ear. “Someone’s gotta make sure these folks don’t chase you away.” You laugh, leaning back to look him in the eye. He seems sincere, solemn, as he adds, “I think I would be devastated if you quit.” You chuckle once more, shaking your head as you pull away.

“Oh, I’m sure.”

“No,” Jim lowers his head, trying to catch your eye once again. “I’m completely serious. You are probably the only reason I still show up.” He laughs, shaking his head. “I mean, I’m this old and stuck in this job?” You laugh along, shaking your head.

“You make good money here, Halpert, don’t deny it.” You feel slightly upset you had pulled away from the hug so soon, but you had to look at him after he said that. You had to see if he was serious- Jim is hardly ever serious, always joking around. It was part of the reason your crush developed so fast, and also why it’d always remain a secret. He was so funny, making you laugh constantly. But he was also a bit of a jokester, and you didn’t know if he had a serious bone in his body. Today was showing he certainly did.

You weren’t sure if you’d be able to handle it.

You both spend some more time chatting, and his presence is a balm that soothes your panicked heart. He tries his best to make you laugh- which you do, often- and you finish your morning cup of tea in the meantime. You were sure you could’ve talked to him forever if only your phone hadn’t rung. You shrug with helplessness, reminded that you’re technically at work and still have a job to do. You reach to pick up your phone, apologizing to Jim who waves you off. You watch him walk away as you answer the phone, “Dunder Mifflin paper company, customer service representative speaking.”

It ended up being a quick call, with someone complaining that their shipment was late. You only had to find their account to let them know that the delivery was scheduled for today and the time. Once you placed the phone back in its slot, you raised your cup to your mouth before remembering it was empty. ‘Eh, might as well,’ You think to yourself, pushing to stand and make your way to the breakroom. Kelly is back at her desk as you circle around, and you make sure to say a soft greeting to her to make up for your earlier rudeness. She says a polite and short greeting back with a gentle face, still conscious of your rough morning.

You’re about to pull the door to the breakroom open when you notice the back of Jim standing at the counter. He was hefting a freshly brewed pot of coffee, and you couldn’t help but stand there and watch his arm flex as he hefted it with no problem. You didn’t see the other door open, but suddenly Kevin was walking directly into Jim’s space.

“I have another question.” Jim sighs visibly, shaking his head.

“Haven’t I told you enough-”

“No, this is a different question, Jim!” Kevin seems adamant, and after Jim puts the coffee pot away he takes a side step to regain some personal space. “And you said yesterday there’s a limit of stupid questions I’m allowed to ask a day so I couldn’t ask yesterday!”

“You have until I finish making my coffee.” You’ve never seen Jim quite so indifferent and snappy before, raising your curiosity. For some reason, you still stood there, barely peeking through the window of the door, still holding your empty cup.

“Ok, so if he still wanted breasts-”

“Nope.” Jim was already shaking his head, stirring sugar into his coffee.

“Alright fine, but also. Can he sow a penis-”

“Nope.” Kevin huffs in frustration, flapping his arms for a split second.

“Why do you keep saying no to all of my questions?” Jim finishes stirring his coffee, placing the spoon in the sink and turning to look directly at Kevin finally.

“Because all of these questions are way too personal.”

“How are they personal?” You tilt your head, furrowing your brow. How would they not be personal? Jim seems frustrated, running his free hand through his hair.

“You can’t just ask someone about their breasts or genitals, Kevin. You wouldn’t want anyone asking about your dick.”

“Actually, it’s kinda itchy-”

“Nope!” Jim pushes away from the bar, leaving immediately. You’re stuck between sympathy for both of them. You don’t think Kevin actually knows any better at this point, but you also just felt too awkward to even try to come up with an answer to those questions. However, were these the types of things that Jim had to put up with daily just to vet the office for you? Why would he put himself through all of that?

“He’s really trying, you know?” You startle from your thoughts, turning to look at Kelly still sitting in her rolling chair. You tilt your head in confusion, but also shifted on your feet, hoping to play off the fact that you’d been standing there this whole time.

“Who?” Kelly just gives you a look you can’t quite decipher, continuing.

“Jim, obviously.” She sighs, pushing herself away from her desk and standing. “He’s even asked me for help on occasion. Little things here and there, but he recruits the allies where he can find them.” You purse your lips, leaning back against the wall next to the door, crossing your arms while holding your cup upright still.

“Asked you for help? Doing what? Who else has he asked?”

“I knew you’d figure it out at some point, I just didn’t think it’d be when someone slipped through his fingers. Though, Michael is pretty unpredictable like that.” She shrugs with a smile like she’s trying to hold back a laugh. “His main ask for me was just to intercept anyone trying to bother you- most likely to ask the dumb questions. I just had to send them right back through the breakroom over to Jim’s desk.”

“Did that happen often?” She shrugs again, wiggling her head.

“Not often, but a few times. Mainly Kevin, he has a lot of questions.” You nod, glancing briefly toward the breakroom’s door before resting your eyes on her once more. You study her posture, then try to make a guess.

“The other was Mr Dellicker, wasn’t it?” She winces but nods nonetheless.

“He was a real ass.” She sighs dramatically, moving to lean against the wall next to you and bunching up one of the random, typical office posters that hang around throughout the floor. “He was Dwight’s client, actually. The moment Dwight heard him be even a small bit transphobic, he hung up the phone. This, of course, caught Jim’s attention. I mean, have you ever known Dwight to drop a client? Like, ever?” You shake your head in agreement, and she nods with you. “Yeah, right? Anyway, Jim asks, Dwight answered. To Dwight, that was the end of the entire thing. To Jim, however,” Her smile begins growing as she leans closer to you, “Well, he knew that Mr Dellicker would call back to complain. And who would be picking up the phone?”

“Customer service,” You mumble, absorbed into her story.

“Exactly!” She giggles now, unable to hold it back. “It was adorable, really, the way he begged me to make sure I took his call. He actually asked me to call the man first, but I told Jim I wouldn’t go out of my way just to aggravate someone who, as far as we knew, wouldn’t be calling back after such a rude hang-up. But he wouldn’t let up, so I agreed to keep an ear out.” She huffs now, widening her eyes with a far-off look. “Good thing I did, too. He was such an ass.”

“Thank you,” You say softly, bringing her back to the present. She tries to brush it off but you just shake your head, placing a hand on her arm. “No, not just for Mr Dellicker. For agreeing to help out at any point, just for me. For not making a big deal about my whole coming out, for never treating me any different or- just-” You hesitate, shaking your head. “Just everything, Kelly. You’re an amazing coworker.” You watch her eyes begin to water, and she lets out a wet laugh.

“Wow,” She raises her hands, wiping the corners of her eyes. “You’re going to make my makeup run.” She pushes up from the wall, circling you and entering into the breakroom, heading straight for the girls’ bathroom. You widen your eyes at this reaction, unsure, but take a deep breath and enter into the breakroom yourself. You still had some tea to brew.

You didn’t mean to idle, standing near the exit of the breakroom toward the annexe, but stuck in place watching Jim lean against Pam’s desk through the door’s window on the other side of the room. They were talking back and forth- a lot of laughing involved- and you couldn’t quite place the feelings whirling in your chest. It felt similar to jealousy, but you knew that wasn’t it. Envy? That perhaps she was his type, and not you after your transition? Insecurity?

You startle as Jim suddenly meets your eyes, watching him straighten up quickly. You try to act nonchalant, moving out of his line of sight to grab your lunch from the fridge, and sitting at the break room table. You’d finished your second cup of tea hours ago, and you were a tad overdue for your lunch break considering you had a whole host of emails that you usually respond to in the morning, but had to answer during your second cup of tea since you’d been just a tad distracted that morning. You bite your lip as the events from that morning fly through your mind, a whole host of emotions attached to them.

The door across the room opens, stopping your train of thought in its tracks. Jim walks in with a smile, moving toward the fridge. “Hey,” He greets you, scanning you with his eyes while you just sat there, slowly removing your lunch from its brown paper bag. “Was starting to worry you’d forgo lunch.” You laugh, then proceed to explain your lateness. As he sets his own lunch on the table, you begin to wonder if he waited for you. Then your eyes flicker back toward the door you’d been staring at him through.

“So, how’s Pam?” Jim seems a bit taken off guard at the question, turning to look at the door himself before looking back to you. He shrugs, taking his own lunch out of his lunch box.

“Uh, good, I guess?” He raises his sandwich, ready to take a bite before hesitating and adding on, “She’s excited to hear about that one show you mentioned this morning.” You nod along, watching as he begins to eat his sandwich. You take your own small bite, looking toward the door again.

“She’s cute, isn’t she?” Jim’s eyebrows furrow immediately, and you watch him swallow. He seems to be planning his actions in his head before he performs them, placing his sandwich down.

“What?” He looks around the room aimlessly, wiggling his head. “I mean, yeah of course. She’s cute.”

“You two get along really well.” At this he chuckles, shrugging.

“We’ve worked together for a long time.” You both fall silent, taking more bites of your food. Jim breaks the silence with a resounding, “I’d probably have developed a crush on her by now if I wasn’t gay.”

Gay.

You end up lightly choking on your bite from surprise, playing it off with a cough and a sip of your water bottle. You can see Jim staring down at his sandwich at the table, taking a deep breath. “So, I can see why someone would develop a crush on her. If he was straight.” He glances briefly up at you, then back down to his sandwich. You tried your damndest to keep the look of shock from your face, that it takes an extra minute before you understand what he’s not saying. Did he think you were asking because you had a crush on Pam? You take another sip of water, letting your eyes wander away from him.

“Yeah, same.” Out of the corner of your eye, Jim glances up at you quickly, a look of concentration on his face that indicates his thoughts roaming a million miles an hour. You shrug for show, moving your own food closer so you can take a bite once you finish speaking. “I’d probably have developed a crush as well if I was straight.”

You only recognized the signs of Jim choking since you’d just gone through the same thing, as the man turns to cough into his arm as if to play it off. At least the poor man hadn’t been chewing food like you were. By the time Jim finished drinking from his own bottle, and moved to lean forward and say something, he was interrupted by the door opening and someone entering inside. He leans back, looking self-conscious, and you feel such a deep curiosity about what he was going to say that it burns in your chest. You don’t even register who walked in until she was taking a seat right next to you.

“I don’t know how you can stand it, Jim,” Kelly begins softly, and you look at her with confusion. Kelly never talks softly? “Working right next to the receptionist's desk all day. How do you get any work done?” Jim’s eyes flicker between you and Kelly, clearing his throat.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, she’s so hot!” You and Jim meet eyes suddenly, listening to her continue to talk in a soft voice. No wonder, considering she was essentially coming out to the both of you. “When I first started and had to work over in that area, I was getting nothing done. Toby had to ask me what was wrong, and I sorta kinda told the truth that I was extremely distracted. He moved me to the annexe-” She pauses here, resting a hand on your arm with a sympathetic expression, “Sorry, Y/N, that’s why you’re confined back here as well.” You shake your head quickly, rushing in.

“No, it’s fine. I like it back here.”

“You do?” Jim asks with a smirk, and you give him a look essentially saying ‘Shut the fuck up Halpert I’m trying to console her.’ He just laughs noiselessly, his chest shaking as he moves to take another gigantic bite of his sandwich.

“Anyway, it’s so distracting. I had to go get something copied and I stood there an extra five minutes trying not to stare too directly at her. Oscar literally had to nudge me and remind me what I was doing!” She groans, letting her head fall onto the table. “So embarrassing.”

“Oscar knows?” You ask gently, unsure whether she actually realized she told you both. She lifts her head with a sigh, seemingly unfazed.

“Well, yeah. Oscar knows about everyone.” You hear Jim scoff softly, mumbling quietly under his breath.

“Not everyone.” This only causes Kelly to raise an eyebrow at Jim, smirking with humour.

“Oh, he knows about everyone, Jim.” His head was quick as it whipped toward Kelly, leaning in.

“Wait, what?”

“I mean,” She shrugs, glancing toward you briefly before meeting his eyes again. “You’re kinda obvious, Jim.” You can see his eyes widen, but you only feel confusion.

“Wait, how many people are gay in this office?” Kelly only shrugs, refusing to meet your eyes.

“Not my place to say.” You nodded along, obviously that being true. You meet Jim’s eyes once again, and you can see red peppering his cheeks.

“I’m sure it’s fine, Jim.” He nods as if agreeing, flicking his eyes between you and the rest of his sandwich throughout the rest of lunch. Kelly takes the initiative in the ensuing silence, talking about everything yet nothing at the same time. Just as you and Jim are both cleaning up to get back to work, Kelly sighs loudly with an eyeroll before looking toward you and plastering on a smile. The look only made you feel wary.

“So, Y/N, what are your plans for after work?” You swallow roughly, glancing at a wide-eyed Jim, then back to her.

“Uh, nothing really?”

“Oh,” She draws out, reaching forward and placing a flirty hand on your arm. “So you’re free tonight? Want to go out for drinks?” You stutter, pulling away from her arm, your head already shaking as you try to come up with an excuse. ‘Didn’t she just say that she found Pam attractive? What the hell is going on?’

“Uh, Kelly-” Jim tries to intercept, but she pulls away as if nothing happened, shrugging.

“I just meant with the lot of us. Jim will be there too, won’t you Jim?” She looks directly at him, raising her eyebrows as if she was expecting something from him. You look between the two as an awkward silence settles before Jim startles, trying (and failing) for a normal smile.

“Oh! Those drinks!” Jim laughs awkwardly, looking back and meeting your eyes. “Yeah, we’re all going out for happy hour at Poor Richard’s Pub, you should join us!” You relax slightly as Jim was the one offering, no matter how weird this entire interaction ended up being.

“Oh, uh,” You hesitate, still slightly wary. There’s obviously something you’re missing here. “I mean, sure. I have nothing else to do. Who all will be there?”

“Just a couple people from the office,” Kelly quickly answers, standing and moving to throw her own trash away. She turns to look at both you and Jim, still sitting in your chairs. “Well, c’mon! We have work to do, people!”

“I know why I’m sorry now.” You startle at your desk, turning to look directly at Michael Scott with wide eyes. You hadn’t even heard him approach. He circles around your desk, motioning for you to stop your work as he leans against your desk- an unknowing imitation of Jim that morning. “If you’re willing to listen?”

You can feel yourself swallow roughly, the beginnings of a familiar panic starting in your chest. You’re unsure what to say, so you just nod. He nods as well, taking a deep breath before continuing. “At first, I had no clue what you meant. I knew I was sorry, and I knew it was because I had hurt you.” He looks into your eyes, regret deep within his own. “But that wasn’t enough for you. So I started thinking.” He chuckles softly, leaning back on his hands and letting his own gaze roam the walls behind your desk. “And when that didn’t work, I remembered something Pam said when she tried to play along with my- well, yeah. A certain word I didn’t recognize. Dysphoric.”

You feel yourself tense, suddenly remembering the tightness around your chest where the binder lays under your clothes. You can feel the tie around your neck like it was trying to choke you. Michael, unaware of your inner struggles, continues on. “That search was enlightening- it was like everything you had expressed to me. And everything I had felt, trying on those clothes.” He hunches inward, his expression becoming stormy. “I felt so wrong wearing that skirt. And you were right- I had tried a blouse on. I bought one at the store that fit and even brought it home, but it just felt so weird when I tried to walk out of the door with it on. So I switched to my normal shirt.

“Then I was sitting in the parking lot, and I knew that the moment I placed my foot out of my car, everyone would see the skirt. I was-” He laughs humourlessly, shaking his head. “I was terrified. I tried to ignore it- like it was just stage fright, something I had to talk myself into.” You began to nod, intrigued by his story. “I don’t know how I convinced myself to get out of the car- I guess something along the lines of, ‘Well, I’m the boss. The ship will sink without me in there.’” He takes a deep breath, patting his legs loudly. “Anyway, I was jealous.” He shrugs, looking at you with wet eyes. Was he really getting emotional over this? “I mean, you did kinda steal my birthday away from me.”

Memories of that night flash quickly through your head. You’d come out during a party- a party you didn’t know the purpose of. That pink quinceañera cake… You didn’t get to taste it, but they could’ve gotten it because it was his favourite flavour? You hadn’t even seen Michael there. Was he trying for a grand entrance? Memories from this morning flash through your mind’s eye, Michael yelling at Pam, ‘He stole my thunder! My thunder, Pam!’

“It wasn’t planned, Michael,” You try to assuage, wincing despite yourself. “I’m sorry, though.” Your apology causes Michael to blow a sigh out roughly, then laugh and slap his thighs again.

“Wow! I didn’t know how much I needed to hear that.” You’re both silent- you studying Michael’s face, and Michael looking anywhere but at you. Then you start laughing.

“Michael,” You try to talk through your laughter, but you just shake your head and try to get it under control. You wouldn’t want him to think you were making fun of him- you only found him ridiculous- so you try your best to calm down. “Michael. You were upset that I ‘stole your thunder’ on your birthday, so your response was to… Pretend to be a girl? Instead of, oh I don’t know,” You try to hold back your laughter again, choking lightly on your words, “Throwing another party?” Michael seems to take a moment to absorb this- then begins to laugh alongside you.

“Well, that would’ve only been easy, Y/N. When have you known me to do things the easy way?” You both laughed again, and you began to shake your head.

“Never.” When your laughter finally dies down, you meet his eyes once again. Staring at each other, it's like you both finally understood. You thought he was just ignorant, but you had been missing out on important information as well. He began to nod, glancing over his shoulder toward the nearby wall clock.

“Well, looks like I kept you long enough. Time to clock on out!” He jumps up, shooting finger guns before backing up. He trips over the edge of the divider, tries to play it off, and then groans loudly when he sees Toby walking by. “God, every time!”

You chuckle to yourself, then begin the process of shutting down your computer and packing up. Kelly skirts around the divider quickly once the door closes behind Michael, leaning into your space. “Let me drive you.” You hesitate, widening your eyes.

“I’m sorry?”

“To the pub! Let me drive you!” You laugh nervously, beginning to shake your head.

“Oh, uh, no. I have my own car, but thank you-”

“If you drink, you won’t be able to drive home.” She counters, raising her eyebrows at you. You laugh again, shaking your head.

“Well, if we’re all drinking, wouldn’t you drink too?” She shakes her head immediately, crossing her arms.

“I don’t drink at all.” You still feel hesitant, and it must show on your face as she sighs and then leans in. “I’ll tell you Jim’s whole deal.” This catches you, looking back at her to study her.

“What do you mean…?”

“I’ll tell you if you let me drive you!” You huff a laugh, smiling despite yourself. “Yeah, alright. But if I don’t drink, you gotta’ take me back here so I can drive myself home.”

“Deal! And if you do, then I’ll drive you home and pick you up for work tomorrow morning!” You laugh again, shaking your head as you pick your briefcase up, finished with closing down your desk for the day.

“You seem excited about this.”

“Absolutely! I’ve been waiting forever!”

You were still unsure what she meant but followed along with the hyperactive girl as she burst through both of the doors to the breakroom. You watch Jim straighten where he had been leaning against Pam’s receptionist's desk, and smile toward you as you made your way to the exit.

“You know,” Jim starts, huffing a soft laugh and smiling in a way that took your breath away, “I was thinking.”

“Oh,” You draw out, smiling despite yourself, “Dangerous territory there, Halpert.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Jim begins, laughing again. He takes a discreet look around before reaching forward to almost take your hand, his fingers tangling with your own but not quite grasping. “I was hoping that maybe I could drive you down to the pub? I know you have your own car and all, but I just want to make sure you’re safe with getting home, y’know?” Your face falls just as you hear Kelly’s voice behind you.

“Oh, don’t worry Jim! He has a ride already.” Jim looks toward Kelly over your shoulder, then back to you with wide eyes, pulling his hand away.

“Already?” Jim looks back to Kelly, confusion clear across his face.

“Oh, don’t get your panties in a twist, Jim!” You feel her small hand wrap around your bicep, pulling you toward the door. “We’ll meet you there!”

You take one last look at Jim through the glass doors as Kelly drags you along to the elevator. You hesitate, mind trying to catch up, before you finally clear your throat and look at her. “No offence here, Kelly, but I honestly think I would’ve preferred riding with Jim?”

“You’ll have the rest of your life to ride with Jim. Just let me tell you what I need to tell you without the risk of Jim hearing us.” You both step onto the elevator, as Kelly begins mashing the button for the lobby.

“Uh,” Your mind is stuck, repeating ‘rest of your life’ and ‘Jim’ over and over. “This feels… Is this nefarious?”

“‘Nefarious,’” Kelly mocks, pulling you once the doors open again. “You say the oddest things sometimes.” You didn’t know which car was hers, but considering she was dragging you along, you didn’t have to guess. She pulls your briefcase from your hands, finally letting go of you, and you just stand in place. She throws your suitcase and her purse into the backseat, then opens the driver's door with a look up at you. “Well, get in!”

It was quiet for a long portion of the drive. You didn’t know what to ask, or how to even broach the subject. Did it seem too eager, to ride along with her just because she promised to tell you about Jim? And what was she even talking about- how would Kelly know more about Jim than you? True, you both hadn’t been friends for very long just yet, but you didn’t know Kelly and Jim were friends?

“So, it started when you started transitioning,” Kelly said, bursting you from your whirlwind of questions. “We all got pretty curious. I was the one who had the theory you were trans first.” She winces, looking over to you. “Sorry. I didn’t know at the time how true I was. I honestly didn’t even know if you knew about it, but- well, obviously you did.” You tilt your head, brow furrowing.

“You all were talking about me before we were friends?”

“Well, you know how the office is. You were changing, and people were noticing. Especially Pam and Jim. Pam, who is such a sweetheart and just wants everyone to be comfortable. She had a feeling you were never quite comfortable at the office but didn’t know how to help. Jim found you hot, which was throwing him for a loop considering he is gay, and normally not attracted to-” She hesitates, tilting her head. “Well, we did think you were a girl at the time.”

You nod along, unoffended. “Right, but-” You scoff, shaking your head, “I don’t know if I believe this story now. I mean, Jim? Finding me-” You almost say the word, then scoff softly and look down to your lap. “Attractive?”

“Well, you are hot,” Kelly confirms, and you look up quickly at her. You aren’t sure what expression is on your face, but Kelly just laughs. “What? Don’t look at me like that! You were hot when we all thought that you were a girl, and you’re even hotter now that we know you’re a boy!” You laugh in disbelief, shaking your head. Kelly continues on, pushing through your awkwardness. “I mean, c’mon! Confidence is sexy as hell.”

You look away, feeling a blush rise to your cheeks as you remember Jim saying something similar. “Sure, but-” Kelly interrupts you, continuing with her story.

“So once you finally came out, Jim had his own little freak-out because it wasn’t just a theory anymore. It is true, you are a dude, and Jim didn’t know if he could handle you getting hotter and hotter every day.” You flashback to another scene in your head, Jim saying something similar to Pam and you laughing, accusing him of finding Dwight attractive. Was he talking about you at that time? Kelly’s voice brings you back.

“Anyway, I finally told him that he needed to get his act together and ask you out already, or I’d do it first. Either ask you out for myself or for him, but either way. I don’t know if I could stand any more of him spewing about you, I mean- all I heard was Y/N this, or Y/N that, or ‘Wow he’s wearing the tie I gifted him!’ I mean, that man can talk.” You hold back a laugh, shaking your head. The one and only Kelly Kapoor, complaining about someone talking too much. That’d be hilarious to tell Jim- if you ever got the nerve together to tell him about this little conversation.

“Ok,” You huff out, shaking your head, “You’re asking me to believe that Jim not only finds me attractive but wants to date me?”

“Well, that’s where we’re going now! So you better believe it.”

“Going now- but you’re here? The office will be there, how would it be a date?”

“It’s going to be a date,” Kelly starts slowly, looking at you with a grin, “Because it’s not an office hangout. I’m going to drop you off and leave, and then Jim can take you home. I only did this to get you both together outside of work, you’ll be all alone with him.” She huffs, squeezing the steering wheel around her hands. “And I’m telling you all of this before the date because I don’t trust Jim to admit anything to you without pushing him for it. If I’m not there to pressure him, then-”

“Woah woah woah,” You interrupt, shaking your head quickly. “I’m not about to pressure my best friend for- for some wild hope that he might feel the same. And I-” You can feel the panic again, pulling at the seatbelt around your torso. “I don’t know if I can do this, I didn’t know it would be just us, I mean-”

“Calm down, it’ll be fine. It’s just Jim, remember?” ‘It’s just Jim,’ You repeat to yourself as Kelly turns the car into the pub’s parking lot. You take a few deep breaths, nodding your head. ‘Yeah, I can do this. It’s just Jim, just normal ole Jim.’ Kelly backs her car into a space, waiting for Jim’s to arrive. It doesn’t take long to notice Jim’s car pulling in, parking in one of the front parking spaces, directly in your line of sight. You take another deep breath, nodding.

“I can do this,” You whisper, and Kelly reaches over to squeeze your arm. That’s when you watch two of the car doors open, Jim and Pam stepping out to take a look around. You hear a squeak beside you, Kelly’s hand tightening on your arm. You look over with concern, watching panic written across her face.

“Oh, Jim, you bitch,” Kelly whispers, shaking her head.

“This wasn’t part of the plan, was it?”

“Absolutely not,” Kelly whispers, then moves to get out of the car alongside you. You both approach the other two, smiles on your faces. They finally notice you, and it’s almost like you and Jim have locked eyes and thrown away the key. You’re unsure what’s really happening between the two girls, not registering the words exchanged. You walk a little closer to Jim, smiling up at him.

“Hey,” You whisper, and his smile widens, reaching his hand out in an imitation of earlier, tangling your fingers together.

“Hey.” He glances over to the other two girls, wincing and looking back to you. “I wasn’t sure- is it okay that I brought Pam?”

“Apparently,” You whisper, leaning closer and glancing briefly at Kelly to make sure she’s sufficiently distracted, “That wasn’t part of the plan. She told me she was throwing me out of the car and driving off.” You note the blush lighting up Kelly’s cheeks as she talks with Pam, before turning your attention back to Jim. You hadn’t realized you leaned in this close- or did he lean in as well? His face was next to yours, close enough to share a kiss.

“Shall we head inside? Guys?” You both jump apart, and you look guiltily over to Pam, who spoke. She only smiled in response, throwing a thumb over her shoulder. “We could grab a booth?”

The night was going well. It didn’t really feel like a date like Kelly had hoped it to be, but instead a nice get-together of a couple friends. You all laughed constantly, telling stories and jokes from the office, while also sharing your own life’s stories. No one really talked about their own life outside of the office while they were working, so it was a refreshing twist on things. You felt drawn even closer to the lot of them- Jim, especially, as he couldn’t seem to drag his eyes away from you for too long. You weren’t sure, but you thought it was Jim’s leg under the table pressing against your own. You hoped so, anyway.

“But, yeah, Toby is so weird! You guys don’t get that vibe?” Pam continues, giggling as she sips her mixed drink. Jim and Kelly were the only two keeping away from the alcohol, but you had ordered your favourite mixed drink and had slowly been sipping on it. You knew you weren’t drunk yet, but you were pleasantly tipsy.

“No?” You hesitated, trying to think back over the times you’ve interacted with him. It was more often than most since you worked in the annexe, but he always seemed like a nice, if tired, man.

“It’s cause he has a crush on you,” Kelly nods, laughing alongside Jim. Pam blushes, shaking her head quickly.

“Oh, no, of course not.”

“Well, Kelly would know,” Jim points out with a grin, raising his glass to his mouth and taking a large gulp. You watch confusion rush across Pam’s face, while Kelly’s turns a bright shade of red. She mouthed his name behind her cup, giving him a stern look.

“What does he mean by that?” She asks, looking between you and Kelly, then back at Jim. “What do you mean?”

“Oh,” You begin, laughing under your breath. “Just that Kelly has a lot of experience talking with Toby. He was the one who moved her into the annexe, after all. It almost seems like they have a lot in common?” You end it with a question, trying your best to be vague. Jim almost spits out his drink with his laugh, turning to cough into the crook of his arm.

You hear Pam question, “Yeah, why were you moved into the annexe?” Right as Kelly mumbled from beside you, “Not that much in common. Like one thing.” You and Jim meet eyes, trying to keep the humour from your faces.

The rest of the night passed in much the same way. You still were unsure about the whole ‘Jim liking you’ bit but found yourself pleasantly hopeful. And it seemed like- if that was true- maybe Jim was trying to get back at Kelly by teasing her about liking Pam. You began to wonder if that was his plan all along, showing up with Pam randomly. Honestly, whether this was a double date or just a hang-out with friends, you found yourself enjoying the time immensely. But the night was wearing thin, and all four of you had work in the morning.

As you and Pam were helping each other out of the booths, making sure she hadn’t forgotten her purse, Jim and Kelly had run off to pay the bill. You glanced over at Jim- probably with a longing look since you can’t exactly help it, being slightly inebriated- and watched him lean in close to Kelly as they began whispering back and forth.

“He’s a good guy, y’know.” You look back over to Pam, eyes widening. “I don’t know you well enough yet to know your thoughts on him, but he is a good guy. And he deserves the world.” You chuckle softly, nodding.

“Yeah,” You say breathlessly, looking back over to him. He glanced up at the same time, and you can’t help the smile crossing your face. “I think so too.”

“Then tell him,” Pam insists, and you look back down to her. “He deserves to know that. He thinks he’s not worth your time, apparently.”

“That’s ridiculous-”

“What’s ridiculous?” Jim asks as the other two rejoin you and Pam. Pam smiles brightly leaning over to take Kelly’s arm.

“That you have to drive all the way across town just to drop me off, Jim!”

“Actually, we were just talking about that,” Kelly mumbles, and you smile watching her attempt to hold eye contact with Pam unsuccessfully. “If it’s okay with you, then maybe I could take you home? And Jim can take Y/N.”

“Yes!” Pam practically yells out, and you chuckle softly. You look over toward Jim, seeing him already looking your way.

“If that’s alright with you?” He whispers, and you nod immediately.

“Of course it is, Jim.”

“Good,” Jim says, releasing a breath as if with relief.

“Good,” You parrot, reaching forward boldly to take his hand. “Lead on, then.”

Once you and Jim make it to his car, you both wait before getting in to make sure Pam and Kelly are in their car safe and buckled. Once Kelly begins pulling out, Jim turns to you and leans in closer. “I had a fantastic time today.” You laugh, nodding along, leaning against his car and gravitating toward him.

“I did too. ‘Was surprised that Pam showed up, though.”

“Well, Kelly did say it was ‘the office’ going out for drinks. I thought it’d be fine.”

“Well, she didn’t actually mean the office, apparently. She was just trying to get us alone.” You shrug, smirking up at him. His deer-in-headlights look was gone now, for some reason. He seemed bold, leaning closer and taking your hand.

“And if it was? Would that have been fine?” You laugh again, nodding slowly.

“That would’ve been perfect.” His face slowly loses his teasing look, turning serious- but soft.

“Y/N,” Your name is husky in his mouth as he begins leaning closer, and you can smell his cologne in the air. Everything was so much, his smell, his body heat, his honey-brown eyes as he took up your entire vision. “Can I kiss you?”

“Please,” You whisper in return and meet him halfway as your lips crush together. He pulls the hand not holding yours to your face, lightly caressing your cheek throughout the heated kiss, and you grab hold of his hip with your own free hand, pulling him closer. You can feel him moan through the kiss, turning his head to deepen it. This was nothing like you’ve dreamed of- but oh, so much better.

When you two finally part, breathing heavily, he’s pressing you against his car with the length of his body. You both pant as you stare into each other’s eyes, and your grip slowly loosens on his hip. Eventually, he pulls away, clearing his throat with a blush. “Wow,” He whispers, a smile growing as he looks at you bashfully.

“Yeah,” You agree just as quietly, and Jim moves to open the passenger door for you. “Oh, right. Thank you.”

As you sat down in Jim’s car, ready to be driven home, you can’t help but think: ‘Man, I love working for Dunder Mifflin. Even the bad days can turn into the best ones.’

Tag List: @ltnoscara @zombieboyevan @cursedashes

[wrotelovelytears]

They stare cause they know

IT Girl from ATL

👀Honestly I'm grateful for this Saturn in Pisces transit. I've learned so much about myself and the world around me from isolation. I'm not going to lie and say it's been easy because my mental health has taken various directions and without this time completely alone, I would never have the personal understanding I do now.

‍💀This transit has been about learning to be alone and what it means to be oneself. I see this as a preparation for the Saturn in Aries transit which entails taking those lessons learned and helping others with it through leadership. And I will be starting my Saturn return then too

👀I've noticed as we get closer and closer to Neptune in Aries the world gets more and more... Violent. Like there's no other word to describe it but just pure malice floating in the air. While I could use only astrology to explain it, I'm not going to pretend like there's no big social things that happened that are also making the world this way. Ever since the beginning of the pandemic human behavior has taken a turn for the worse. Add in "forced" isolation from the masses and you get a world ripe for conflict. Yes Neptune is about illusions and honestly it shifting to a more active sign, yeah we might just have to take that L collectively.

👀 I also peeped we will have Aries ruling Neptune, the North Node and Saturn all at the same time at some point. Not saying the world gonna end or nothing, just saying prepare to see more of the current things you see.

👀 So are we gonna talk about how everyone was going the Age of Aquarius is gonna push society forward in good ways just to end up having degenerate behavior become the norm. I understand that Aquarius is the sign of change and "futurism" and it also is the sign of headassery individuality to extremes. Aries is more about individuals leading (ie group work) while Aquarius is more individuality rediscovered and using that to lead (being yourself and that making change). Unless we all course correct this newfound sense of hyper individuality the world is gonna get worse.

Y'all my sons

👀Since my solar return is coming up (this may or may not be posted around or on it), I want to reflect on my past solar return chart. (I will be using whole sign and sidereal chart as a heads up if your wondering why certain planets are in certain signs)

‍💀This time last year I was working two jobs at once, two separate times, I'm blaming my first house mars. Like I have never in my life made a decision so short sighted and yet I managed it because not only is my mars in my first house but Taurus as well. I'm stubborn already but when I was told it was impossible to do both, yeah I doubled down.

🤭That Taurus Mars also made me very conscious about my appearance and how I see myself. This wasn't a negative thing however, I've done so many things to change my appearance to fit the version of me I think is best. Including getting various piercings, doing another big chop (also didn't want long hair no more), buying clothes that made me feel attractive and saying more affirmations in the mirror. The biggest change (that I had little to do with) was finally achieving my body goals. With it being in a 29 degree, I believe this is almost certainly my final form.

‍💀I find it funny how my Moon is in the 22° (which is also the natal degree it's in) and in Cancer because when I tell you I fucking cried all the time and for everything. I did. I know I'm naturally very sensitive but it's like someone turned the dial up and broke it. This has led me to happy tears as well. I also did emotional eat a lot or vice versa. I think combining this with Taurus Mars did make me a little more suspectable to food and emotion related ups and downs.

🤭I also made a lot of progress in therapy due to just wanting to finally process and get over certain shit. I'm going to say the third house holding it is what made me more willing to talk. However this also led to me randomly remembering some tragic thing that happened to me at some random ass time and going "wow, that's kinda fucked... Whomp whomp".

‍💀The crazy thing about this entire transit year is starting it off with a head injury that's kinda led to some long-term neurological issues. Literally didn't even get a day into the year and got the shit knocked out of me because Aries wanted to chill in the 12th house.

🤭Even though I had to stop working due to multiple head and neurological injuries, I at least learned what jobs, bosses, and work environments I do and don't like. I also learned how to easily see when someone is not in my corner and rather be headstrong then correct.

‍💀My MC happened to be in Capricorn that year and yeah, I definitely worked my ass off. I wanted to focus on longevity and stability. That's honestly been my theme this year (and moving forward). That did mean I might've let my relationships struggle because I was working and constantly outside.

‍💀Back to appearance (let me be vain in peace), my Sun and Aphrodite transiting the 6th house probably played a big role in why appearance was so important to me. Having them being in Libra made it just double down.

💀As I am editing this I also have my Ascendant in the 6°, I already said my current sixth house is ruled by Libra so yeah. Being hot n sexy was my goal this year. I achieved cute and "uwu" in the end tho.

‍💀This has honestly been the first year (since I was like... 12) that I haven't had any type of romantic relationship, I think this leads back to Saturn being in Pisces mostly. I also think it's me having a Scorpio Venus (which happens in my natal chart) but in the seventh house. See that's squares my natal Venus despite being in the same sign. {Actually my whole chart this year squares my natal but that's not the topic at hand.} I honestly didn't know what to do in the beginning of the year, I wanted a relationship and understood how important they are to me (sorry I'm a romantic at heart, I love love and being in love. Transiting the seventh duhh) AND I did almost no work to seek one out partially due to things I had to work out from my past (there's that pesky Scorpio in me popping up). Anytime I was approached for a romantic partnership I automatically questioned the person's intent and if it was self fulfilling prophecy or my intuition being OP, I never had anything pan out. In the beginning that annoyed me and I realized one I wasn't done doing work on my lack of trust in people, two seventh house rules open enemies and them people did not have my best interest at heart.

‍💀My Jupiter was in retrograde which could've played a part in why I dropped most of the spiritual aspects of my life and tried to raw dog it. That was a terrible idea, I ain't never felt so lost before lmao. While I could have religious talks, the spiritual aspect was lacking. It was like belief without practice for me and that's not really believing. As the year is coming to a close I've been getting more "lucky" and spiritual again. I had to learn that certain aspects of my life just work and others don't. And that my definition of my religious beliefs are vastly different than what others of my faith might be.

🤭All in all I learned the lesson of the importance of individuality within community. Not community without individuality. Or individuality before community.

‍💀Another reason for my struggle with religion, spirituality and all that was Saturn being in my 9th house. My will to continue higher education and be involved in anything literally besides work was gone. Now my life long dream has been multiple PhDs but when I tell you I avoided any conversation around finishing my first degree, one PhD was looking real unattainable.

‍💀Saturn really beat my ass this year as it was also the ruler of current profection. Hopefully my luck will truly change (in literally every aspect of life at this point) by the time my Jupiter year comes around.

‍💀Another note about my third house Moon, I fell back in love with the things of my childhood. That included gaming, socializing (on my own accord), "weird core" related things like the backrooms and analog horror and so on. The moon transiting certain houses can honestly unlock new (or old) things about you that bring comfort.

‍💀I'm a fixed Dom in my natal chart so being a Cardinal Dom for a year has been very exhausting. I'm used to finishing and quickly learning things. The way I was constantly tested this year had me always on edge. I think it is a good thing however because even though I did end quiet a few things, I also picked (back) up even more things. This has been a year of change without bounds (thanks Aries Uranus ), change that was honestly needed.

‍💀My chart is also pretty evenly distributed. Like I wasn't lacking fire, earth, water or air which explain why change was whooping my water Dom ass. Yes I know water ain't still (even ice isn't unless absolutely 0), and damn how do the fire and air people live like this? I could barely take a break to process anything. I had to process on the move and always be on it.

🤭I'm hoping next year it's more relaxed and stable, I can't handle all this change and movement.

‍💀Funny how my PoF was in Leo fourth and I worked with kids. It was beyond rewarding because I witnessed everything from first steps and words to the start of public (or private) school.

🤭Ceres might have also played a role in how invested I was in my jobs and the children I worked with. However my ovaries might have been on one because I started wanting to have a baby myself and that really isn't a good decision at the moment.

🤭Ceres also might have helped me connect more with my own mother as well which surprised quite a few people but I'd say it's been worth it. Learning how to mother myself has been greatly useful and even helpful with understanding my own.

‍💀This year I found out that I'm Chinese, Japanese and Peruvian, through DNA testing (again). And while doing so caused both my parents to have an identity crisis, I knew of my Asian heritage and somewhat of an Indigenous one as well. Problem is the countries were all wrong from family stories. (At the end of the day I'm still Black, that hasn't changed at all). I find it unironic China and Tokyo conjunction in my 8th house while Inca (what I used as a Peru substitute) chills in my third (almost second). To further that China and Tokio trine my Ceres and yes it is my mom that's half Chinese Japanese (and Vietnamese but couldn't find nothing for Vietnam, we taking what we get). And Inca trine my Jupiter (which I personally associate with my Father because he's a Pisces). My parents on the other hand hate this news because it did bring up old things they wanted to bury in their past (8th house coming through). My only lasting question is how the hell-

💀See I had a strange aversion to taking pictures of myself and even moreso posting the ones I did take. Turns out my Photographica was conjunction my Saturn and opps with my Moon. Anytime I'd take a picture I'd automatically feel disgusted with it despite feeling "pretty". Self image has been difficult this year, despite a lot of improvement.

Asteroids mentioned: Ceres(4)(ur mom) , Photographica(443), Aphrodite(1388), China(1125), Inca(8275), Tokio(498)

This my first actual post in idk how long. This year was.. A lot for me on a personal and societal level. While astrology may not be my source of a ton of dopamine anymore, it's still an interest to me. There's so much organizing I have to do with this page, so please be patient with me as I try to get back into the swing of things.

(If you learned something new or would just like to support me you can leave a wittle tip via the tip button or one of the links in my masterlist. Kofi: nymphdreams🧸)

[cuntycheol]

(Teaser) Shadows of Rememberance (K.MG)

Idol!Mingyu x Reincarnated!(afab)Reader

Summary:

In 2017, your first love Mingyu's hardwork and a couple of years worth training finally turns to fruition when he sets to debut the next year and hopes to have you by his side. Difference is he debuts, and he has 12 members beside but no you. 4 years later, smaller in size, you got paws for hands, a tail, and limited time to solve your own death. So how do you exactly get to your boyfriend?

WC: TBD (teaser wc is 500)

Genre: more of like fantasy romance? With a small thriller into it?

Theme: lovers!au(childhood sweethearts) typical idol training au (we do not letting the green room slide by :) ) in the beginning, my style of writing is a bit 2017 :3 , flashbacks and transitions(I'll try to make it less confusing as possible), humor, some murder mystery, angst(major), implied smut (no details) Tsundere!Mingyu but eventually turns a new leaf in attitude, alterated seventeen debut timeline (they debut in 2017 with DWC)

A/N: hello readers, carats and gyuldaengies! This one is for you! Not too long ago, I finished See you in my 19th life and you know the phase where you're unable to get out of a particular fantasy-romance lore for a while! Its basically what inspired me to create this whole Korean setting of sojus and starry nights :) I'm actually enjoying the showcase of my work on tumblr even though it's just the beginning but thank you so much for reading my work and liking it! Unconditional gratitudes 😔💙 here's a small teaser from somewhere, in the fic. Feel free to drop comments/or if you're interested for a tag!

From the twelfth-story vantage point of his dormitory building, Mingyu stood on the balcony, his thoughts mirroring the expanse before him. "Is this how the height felt that day?" he wondered, his gaze drawn to the distant city lights that spread like a sea of stars. Beside him, Wonwoo, his roommate and fellow member, along with Seungkwan, offered silent companionship, their presence a comforting assurance.

"You'll only hurt yourself, so cry as much as your heart has always desired to, Mingyu" Wonwoo's voice, soft and understanding, carried the weight of empathy. The full moon hung in the sky, its luminous glow casting light on the scene below. A subtle shift in the atmosphere seemed to whisper that this was an opportune moment to unburden himself, to relinquish the facade he had worn for so long.

And so, within the embrace of the moon's radiant embrace, Mingyu let his emotions cascade forth. A torrent of feelings, suppressed and concealed behind his persistent smile, surged from the depths of his being. His tears flowed, an uncontainable torrent that mirrored the city's night lights, shimmering with raw vulnerability. Each teardrop he shed resonated within you, a mirror of the emotions you felt, transcending the boundaries of species.

Unbeknownst to Mingyu, the same Calico who had been jumping in and out of the balcony railings, silently witness Mingyu's vulnerability of the misunderstood turmoils he's being put into. He leans on his members, and let the tears paint his pain more vividly than words could.

Your feline instincts yearned to leap across the balcony and into his arms, to nuzzle against him and purr your concerns and comfort him. But the confines of your new existence held you captive. A silent observer.

"Trapped within these fur and paws, I long to bridge the divide, to whisper words of understanding to you, Mingyu" even if you're in your feline form, your heart and mind worked as how it used to when you were a human. But it was this very struggle that fueled my resolve. You couldn't stand idly by, separated from him by a veil of existence. You yearned to show yourself, to bridge the divide that separated our worlds and provide him with the reassurance that he must overcome you. He must live.

Yet, the question of how remained a daunting puzzle. "How could I convey my presence, my empathy, without words or gestures he could perceive in the conventional sense?"

Another glance at Mingyu, your heart beats with a fierce determination. You knew that time was of the essence, that the threads of fate were aligning in a way that demanded action. The moonlit night seemed to hold a promise, a promise that if you could find a way to breach the boundaries that constrained you most certainly could offer him the comfort he so desperately needed. And that's when you muster your courage, in the same moonlit of mystery and determination.

《《______________________________________》》

[sciderman]

When i transitioned i had to give up my versatile singing voice and all my skirts and heels. I miss them all equally even though i dont regret a single thing about transitioning. I haven't worn a dress in five years but that doesn't mean i don't want to. My four-inch-heeled blue sequined boots still fit me and sometimes i wear them around the house even if i'm too shy to be gnc in public.

These feelings stopped me from transitioning for a long time and they didn't change when i finally did. I hope that resonates with you

bless you anon! i'm really glad that it's something you don't regret, and i'm glad you're living closer to the you that you want to be - but i also hope you can conquer any fears you have and present to the world the way you want to be seen. i think life's too short to make compromises!

me, i don't think i could go all the way - i think there's a lot about myself i just - i don't want to change. (i'll be honest, the biggest thing i'm scared about with T is what goes on between your legs. i'm terrified of that. i know it's different for everyone, but that makes it even scarier. i'm so familiar with what's down there. i don't want to wake up one morning and it's different. the horrors of one puberty was enough for me. i'm still recovering from my first puberty. i don't want to go through it again. not again. oh dear god.)

i think that's another part of why i thought "oh, i must not be a boy. because i don't want to transition. i have top dysphoria, and Dear God I'd love Top Surgery, but i like what i have between my legs. i like my voice. i like being soft. i like my girlish hobbies. if i like being feminine so much, how does it make sense to claim i'm a boy?" and i think that's a silly line of thinking i had. and i only realised how silly that sounded when other people said it to me. someone said they were worried about identifying as non-binary because they're very pink and very femme. i said - the whole point of non-binary is that it's something you define. pink and femme have nothing to do with it. it's a label you don't have to qualify for! you don't have to qualify to be trans. i know a lot of people trick you into thinking that but - it's just not true. whatever shape you are, whatever preferences you have, whatever you're comfortable wearing, whatever you're comfortable proclaiming - it's on your terms. nobody can tell you what you're meant to feel or how you want to be seen. that's you. you have to define yourself, i guess. nobody else should be able to do that on your behalf!

so i'm a boy, i guess. right now. i'm allowed to be. i declare it so! i'm allowed to be a boy. even in my pink sneakers and my little love-heart chains and all my girlish ways.

[gasolinerainbowpuddles]

𝑭𝑬𝑹𝑨𝑳 𝑾𝑶𝑴𝑨𝑵 ║ Chapter 5 - I Hold a Beast, an Angel, and a Madman in Me

| FERAL WOMAN | series masterlist | main masterlist | | PAIRING(s): Joel Miller x fem!OC/reader

| RATING: explicit material | 18+ | WORD COUNT: 7.7k | CHAPTER WARNINGS: typical canon violence, mild self-harm

| CHAPTER SUMMARY: Pushing yourself out of your comfort zone doesn’t come without risk. Multiple incidents threaten to be a substantial setback in your hard-earned progress, and you rely on Joel to help you keep pushing forward.

║ＰＲＥＶＩＯＵＳ ║⋄── •✧• ──⋄║ ＮＥＸＴ ║

Please read with caution if you have difficulties with works concerning: SA, physical violence, torture, captivity, trauma, and similar topics as they are discussed throughout the series. All highly sensitive portions WILL BE MARKED with my sensitive material banner if you wish to skip the more challenging portions. The sensitive material banner looks like this:

“I ate a piece of jerky at 2:17 last night when I woke up to go pee,” you announced as soon as Joel answered the door.

His face pulled back for a moment, not expecting such a unique greeting, but he quickly recovered. “Wow, one whole piece? Got ourselves a daredevil in Jackson now, huh?” he deadpanned. 

You wheezed a nervous laugh when you realized how silly you must have sounded. You dug into your depleted reserves of self-confidence and pushed through the conversation.

“Y-Yeah, that’s right. It’s a– I had a whole piece. A whole entire piece. Maybe I’ll, um, maybe it will be TWO pieces next time,” you boasted. For good measure you popped your hands on your hips and gave a lopsided shrug.

Your spirited, clumsy attempt at bragging and trash-talking over eating a single piece of jerky elicited a genuine belly laugh from Joel. The stilted guffaw was a clear indication you had caught him off guard with your unique style of casual, playful banter. You grinned ear to ear, excited just to have made him react in such a way. It was your new favorite hobby, seeing if you could get Joel to smile or laugh with a bit of back and forth.

“Fuck’s sake, get in here,” he laughed, shaking his head.

He propped the door open wider for you to enter, and you scooted past him quickly. It was market day again. After your failure of a first attempt, Joel helped you lay a bit of groundwork so you weren’t doomed from the start. He worked with you to organize your list so that it was one continuous path with no circling back or crossing aisles. “In and out” as he had told you. It sounded easy enough when he was in charge.

You wanted to try navigating through the store on your own, and Joel obliged with the sole condition that he could step in if he felt it was necessary. So far, he had only had to intervene once. Kevin the store clerk tried to strike up a friendly, casual conversation with you, and all you could do was fumble over your ration slips and blabber incoherently. Small talk seemed to be a tipping point for you.

Still, you worked through your nerves and went twice a week with Joel and Ellie to the market. Maria was quite pleased that Joel had offered to help out with such a clear gesture of commitment, and you wondered why she had made it sound like it wasn’t something she would expect coming from him.

Around the one month mark, your boots had finally started to get broken in. You, too, had molded a bit to the demands of “normal life.”  The routine Susan had established for you proved to be crucial in your progress. Knowing what to expect and when to expect it gave you the comfort to build up a little more confidence each day. You had even discussed a sort of part time job with Maria - something to help you feel like you weren’t just a freeloader.

She considered it for a few days before returning with an offer. Patrol shift changes happened near the front gates, and there were a few tasks and odd jobs that would make the transition smoother for everyone. It would only be a few hours at a time here and there, you didn’t have to interact with people for very long, you’d be around some familiar faces, and it was enough work to make you feel useful. It also felt nice to have a bit of purpose other than keeping Susan company - not that you didn’t enjoy it.

Your new job wasn’t anything complicated. The assignments were pretty straightforward: keeping the supply closets straightened, setting up log books for shift change, opening up the handoff stations, keeping track of everyone’s recorded hours for Tommy to review, doing some light housekeeping like sweeping and wiping down surfaces. When you earned your first ration slip, Susan had insisted you keep it and put it in a small picture frame somewhere readily visible in your room. A reminder to yourself of how far you’ve come, she had said.

It was a bit ironic looking at the framed slip as it sat on your dresser in front of a covered mirror. You had draped a blanket across it, along with almost every other mirror in the house, just to avoid your own reflection. You couldn’t stand seeing yourself. It didn’t feel like it was you who was looking back. It felt like someone else. You much preferred just focusing on your internal workings and not worrying about the flat look in your eye every time you caught sight of yourself in a mirror.

When you had asked Susan if you could cover the mirrors, she was kind enough to not question why. In fact, she had offered to take some of the bigger ones off the wall entirely, but you insisted she not go through that sort of trouble. You didn’t want her to get hurt doing it, and there was something that felt so heartbreakingly final about removing them that you couldn’t condemn yourself to it.

You held onto the hope that one day you would be able to see you when you looked into a mirror. For now, you only had to avoid eye contact with the bathroom mirrors, which you had agreed to leave uncovered at Susan’s request. You had come far in your first month, but there was still so much further to go.

You finished up sweeping the hallways and busied yourself with small tasks as you waited for the patrol groups to switch over. Joel was scheduled today, and that meant you would wait for him to get back with the rest of the group so you could walk home together. You had come to look forward to your walks with just you and Joel. The addition of Ellie during your trips to the market were nice, too, but there was never the comfortable silence you craved when it was the three of you.

Joel wasn’t the most talkative person, you had come to learn. You had seen him several times speak barely a word to others around town or during patrol shift change. Even people he enjoyed the company of, like his brother Tommy, would only garner two or three word sentences from him at times. With you he seemed a bit more open, although you weren’t sure why. It was always pleasant whenever you had a conversation here and there, but really it was the way you could walk side by side in silence that had you eager.

It was the only time you could recall that there was quiet, both outside and inside your head. Your mind wasn’t closed off into that safe spot you had carved out for yourself. You had retreated to it so many times when you needed to disconnect from reality long enough for the bad things to pass. But you hadn’t gone there in weeks. Weeks!

When you walked with Joel, it was just stillness and calm. Your thoughts weren’t racing. You weren’t on high alert. You could just enjoy the much too short walk home, side by side with your silent companion.

Then the times that you did want to talk, Joel didn’t seem bothered by that either. He never made you feel like an idiot when you tripped over your words or struggled to figure out how to express yourself. You hadn’t done it in so long that you were relearning much of the skillset. He even let you practice small talk with him, even though both of you hated engaging in it. It was one of those necessary evils that you had to tolerate if you were going to be sociable with others in Jackson.

Three weeks into your part time work, and you were offering simple greetings to some of the more familiar faces. Most of the ones you were brave enough to interact with had been part of the original patrol group that discovered you. They knew exactly what sort of circumstances you had come from and as such gave you a wide berth whenever you interacted. They all seemed to be rooting for you and wordlessly cheering you on as you found it in yourself to branch out and feel more confident addressing people.

There were others that made you feel on edge, although it was your history to blame rather than anything on their end. Some of the men got too close for your comfort but mostly backed off if they sensed you were ill at ease. In general it was just a lot of people focused on getting ready to start patrol or intent on finishing up whatever they needed to in order to end their shift. You could stay in the fringes, unnoticed and unbothered by the majority of people coming and going.

You straightened the chairs against the wall for the third time in the handoff room when at last you heard the sound of doors and footsteps. A glance up to the clock confirmed it was finally time for shift change. A few of the oncoming members shuffled in wordlessly while others gave you a quick nod of acknowledgment.

You gave Jason a friendly wave when he came through the door, and he flashed a quick smile back at you. He was probably more privy to the extent of your connection with Joel than anyone else. He’d been there that day at the market, eyeing yours and Joel’s hands clasped together during your panic attack. He’d never brought up that day to you, for which you were incredibly grateful, and it was in line with his general disposition.

He was one of the few people you’d recognized as someone Joel respected and cared about what they had to say. At first you thought it was because Jason was a sort of boss or manager with patrol shifts and personnel, but you quickly realized it was because they held a mutual respect for one another.

Jason never sought out more interaction than was necessary. Never pried. Just focused on whatever task was at hand and minded his business. He was a bit of Tommy and Joel combined, when you considered him. Not overly friendly but had a warmth in his eyes and smile. When he would occasionally ask how you were doing, you knew he genuinely wanted to know and wasn’t just asking to be polite.

You gathered up your things as you readied for Joel’s arrival. You picked up Tommy’s coat to put over the more fitted one Maria had found for you.  Her balmy insistence at Tommy’s behest that you keep his jacket permanently still made you smile. You were looking over the jacket with fondness when a newer acquaintance appeared at your side.

“Hello, hello, and hello again,” Nathan purled. His toothy grin went right along with his loose, overly familiar communication style. 

“Hi, Nathan,” you greeted in a short snip.

“It’s Nate, babe. C’mon, what’s it gonna take for you to call me Nate instead of being so formal?” he teased.

Nathan had been seeking you out more frequently with an exponential, energized interest each time. He was just an overenthusiastic nuisance at first, but his cocky youth had made him more brazen than usual this past week. It was never aggressive or hostile, but you didn’t enjoy the interactions. There was a clear shift in him around a week ago, and it was either an inability to recognize or a refusal to acknowledge on his part that his behavior was veering from plucky into pushy.

“Fine. Nate,” you quip.

“Atta girl,” he hooted. “Now how about you let me take you to the Tipsy Bison sometime? Get to know each other a little better, huh?” He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively, and your stomach started to tighten.

“No th-thank you,” you decline, cursing your stammer for ruining the firm delivery.

“Acting all shy, huh? You don’t have to keep playing so hard to get, sugar. It was sexy at first, sure, but I think we’re past that by now, don’t you?” His arrogant toying of the words dripped from his tongue like a rotten pour of molasses.

Your fingers tightened around Tommy’s jacket in your hands as you felt yourself freeze up at Nathan’s advances. A molten heat spread across your chest and cheeks, and you worked to get your tongue functional again so you could tell Nathan to leave you alone.

Breathe breathe breathe breathe breathe.

Some of your fingers started to cramp and twitch with how tightly you were gripping the jacket. Nathan’s eyes swept lazily across your face in a way that had you wanting to bolt.

It’s okay there’s people around–you’re okay–just breathe breathe breathe–Joel will be here soon—

Nathan’s tongue drew across his bottom lip with a languid pass, and you felt like you might throw up.

It’s okay you’re okay it’s okay– Jason is at that table nearby–you’re okay— nothing’s going to happen– it’s okay

“Damn, you’re pretty when you blush,” he muttered, tilting his head in admiration and skimming his knuckles across your cheek. You made a noise of horror and rejection that you’d intended to come out as a “DON’T TOUCH ME,” but it got stuck in your throat.

“Leave her be, Campbell,” Jason cautioned from across the room.

“What? Can’t a gentlemen help a lady into her coat?” Nathan sneered at him. Without asking, he yanked Tommy’s coat from you and straightened it out with a jerk as if to assist you into it. You flinched at the abrupt motion after being frozen from his unwanted contact to your face.

Your breathing was picking up to an audible push and pull from your lungs. You were struggling to concentrate on breathing evenly with Nathan so close to you and being so insolent. You felt yourself become wholly petrified of what he was going to do next and if there was going to be anything you could do to stop him. “I-I don’t. No. No,” you stutter.

“You don’t know? You don’t know what?” Nathan questioned, again either willfully or ignorantly overlooking your meaning and visible distress.

“Campbell, goddammit,” Jason snapped, sounding a little closer than before.

You shrunk away from Nathan who had started to approach you with the jacket opened. You couldn’t discern if his enthusiasm was in bad faith or not. Your lip was trembling by the time you turned your face away from him and dropped your eyes to the ground. His steps were closing the gap between you quickly even though you had taken several steps backward, and your last ditch effort to make him stop was to put your hands up in a plea for him to stop.

Before Jason could round the table and intervene, Joel’s foot slammed into the back of Nathan’s knee and buckled him to the ground in a brutal drop. You jumped back at the unceremonious appearance but felt relief erupt in your gut.

“What the FUCK, man?!” Nathan bellowed. He grabbed at his leg in a crumpled heap, but Joel callously stepped over him and snatched Tommy’s jacket back. He lobbed it onto a nearby chair before meeting your eyes. He was zeroed onto you and rushed to cradle your face in his hands.

“This asshole hurt you?” Joel demanded with a stormy look. His eyes darted over you as though he was assessing the possibility himself before you could confirm or deny. You shook your head side to side in quick snaps, feeling jumpy with the rush of adrenaline coursing through you.

When Nathan made the novice mistake of trying to get up from the floor, Joel was quick to hand out a souvenir for your brash admirer’s serious lapse in judgment. Joel dropped his hands from your face and connected the sole of his boot squarely into Nathan’s chest with a hard drive, sending the recipient hurtling across the room. The panicked expression on Nathan’s face and his fruitless gasps for air indicated Joel had knocked the wind out of him.

“Turn around for a minute, honey, and close your ears, okay?” Joel requested softly. He cupped his hand around your shoulder and gave a small squeeze before sliding some of your more wily strands of hair behind your ear. It was a stark contrast to the crippling display of violence he had just exerted, but it was consistent with the rest of this whirlwind of a shitshow.

You yielded to Joel’s request and pivoted away from the scene with your fingers plugged into your ears. Your breaths were coming more steady now, and Joel’s reassuring rub between your shoulder blades brought you back to sanity. 

You waited quietly, focusing on the comforting heat from Joel’s hands on your body. It wasn’t more than 20 seconds when a chair slamming into the one just off to your side pulled you out of your dutiful obliviousness. You could hear Joel’s menacing growl before you even turned back around.

“–outta your fuckin’ mind. You’ll be shitting out teeth for the next week when I knock ‘em down your fuckin’ throat if ever you try that shit again.”

“Okay, man! Jesus, okay! I’m s-sorry, man! I didn’t know she was your girl!” Nathan’s puny groveling almost made you feel guilty. Almost.

He sounded terrified, and for good reason. Joel outsized him by leaps and bounds, and the anger fueling his dealings was nothing but bad news for Nathan. You tucked your head down at an angle as you turned to see the altercation.

Nathan’s upper half hovered over the floor, swaying only with the movement of Joel’s hand where it was firmly locked onto Nathan’s collar. Joel’s free hand was balled into a fist and ready to dole out as many souvenirs as Nathan needed to remember and comply with the expectations regarding his interactions with you. He coughed, still trying to catch his breath. His left eye was starting to swell, and the skin around it was reddening with damage. A few drips of blood were slithering down his chin, and upon second glance you could see his entire mouth was awash in blood.

“Alright, Joel, that’s enough. You’ve made your point,” Jason interrupted.

“Not done yet,” Joel bit out.

With that he turned towards you, something of a sheepish smirk on his face when he saw you were no longer in your bubble, and dragged Nathan across the floor before dropping him at your feet.

“Apologize,” Joel snapped down at him.

Jason was muttering something to himself behind Joel’s back and pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration. Joel clearly wasn’t going to let this go until Nathan satisfied all the stipulations of his clemency.

Everyone had huddled to get a closer look, and not a single soul attempted to mediate the situation, other than Jason’s half-hearted attempt just now. It was then you realized this entire room full of people didn’t want to risk running afoul of Joel. There would be no hesitation on his part in allocating “souvenirs”for anyone interested in testing his patience when it came to your safety and comfort.

“Make it good, dumbass,” Joel growled, ramming the tip of his boot into Nathan’s thigh. Nathan yelled out again in pain and clutched the spot as he swiveled to look at you. You flinched again at Joel’s physical violence against Nathan and tried to stop shaking as you stared at all the blood.

“Fuck okay! Jesus christ, I am!” he relented. “Look, I’m sorry. I’m really fucking sorry! I swear to god, I didn’t know that you and Joel were–”

Joel slapped the back of Nathan’s head impatiently. His tone was equal parts indignant and caustic when he spoke. “She’s entitled to some civility regardless of any attachment, you fuckwit. Goddamn, who the fuck agreed to let you stay in Jackson? You are about as useful to have around as a screen door on a submarine.”

You couldn’t help but sputter a laugh at Joel’s creative barb. You were so keyed up that the moment of levity was a welcomed reprieve, although fleeting. The muffled snickering around the room let you know you weren’t the only one amused by Joel and appreciative for the blip of eased tension. 

Joel caught your eye and shot you a questioning smile when you laughed. “You okay now, hon?” It was verbal whiplash, going between the hostile berating directed at Nathan and tender soothing words for you. You nodded and looked down at pitiful Nathan, who launched into an edited solicitation for your pardon.

“I’m– yes, of course. You deserve it. You deserve civility. You don’t have to be his girl for me to be polite. I understand. I get it, I swear. I swear to god I’m never gonna talk to her again. I swear I’m–” he rattled off, directing his pleading back to Joel to assess if it was adequate.

“What about my jacket?” you interrupt.

“Huh?!” Nathan gasped. His eyes snapped back to yours.

“You didn’t e-even ask. Didn’t even ask-ask about it. You just, you just took it from me without asking,” you challenged right back. “You-You can’t do that. To people. It’s not– It isn’t right. You c-can’t treat m-me like th-that.”

You were nervous to be this confrontational, but Tommy’s jacket meant a lot to you. As baffling as it might have been to anyone else, Nathan taking Tommy’s jacket from you without your permission was probably the most upsetting thing he had done to you today.

“I’m sorry! I’M SORRY! Please, I’m sorry!” he begged, watching Joel from the corner of his eye in anticipation of correction for this new grievance.

“Okay. Th-Thank you,” you said. You looked up to Joel and cupped his elbow to get his full attention. “Help him up, Joel, okay?” Joel’s face softened, but you could tell he felt Nathan didn’t deserve to get off so easy.

Joel snatched Nathan up with both hands on his collar now and brought him nose to nose. Even if it was done with the intent to protect you, the verbal altercation and physical violence made your stomach turn.

“If I see you actin’ like a creep with any women around town, we will pick up right where we left off, you understand me?” he snarled.

Nathan garbled nonsense and nodded emphatically. Joel released his hold, much to Nathan’s relief, and offered one parting remark. “Now go tell Tommy he has to call up the standby to cover your patrol shift because you’re a fuckin’ dipshit.”

Nathan didn’t need to hear his assignment twice and bolted from the room.

“Point made, Joel,” Jason sighed. “You okay?” he turned to you and asked. 

“Yeah, I’m-I’m good,” you reply.

“Alright, good. Now get your attack dog outta here before he gets put on leave for interpersonal workplace violence,” Jason grumbled.

You scooped up your jacket and extended your hand to Joel, wiggling your fingers in an encouraging gesture for him to meet your grasp. His remorseless expression only strengthened as he reached out and took it. Once you made it outside and started your walk home, Joel appeared regretful for at least some of his actions. 

“I, uh, I know I shoulda corrected him when he said we were together, but I was so pissed off I wasn’t really thinkin’ straight,” he admitted.

“It’s okay, Joel. Really,” you assure him. You rubbed your thumb along his hand in a soothing motion.

“No, it’s just that… I don’t want you gettin’ the idea that you’re only safe so long as you, I dunno how to put it. So long as you’re attached to somebody, I guess,” he explained.

This was the first time you had ever seen Joel unsure of himself. 

“I really did try to hold back. Wanted to bash his damn head into the wall. Seein’ how afraid he made you,” he muttered. “Just, not exactly too proud of myself for actin’ like that in front of you. I know it bothers you, that kinda stuff.”

“It does…” you admit, “–but, I’m not upset you stepped in.”

“You sure?” he pressed.

“Yes. Very,” you reply.

Joel let out a deep sigh of relief and gave your hand a small squeeze. You looked up at him, but his eyes stayed focused on the walk ahead. “Just wanna be sure. You’ve dealt with enough shit. Don’t need me addin’ to it,” he said.

For the second time today, Joel garnered a surprised, sputtering laugh from you. He glanced down, curious at your reaction.

“Adding to it? Like, adding to my troubles?” you balk. “You serious?”

Joel shrugged your comment off. He didn’t find it as implausible as you did. You came to a halt and waited for him to look at you before speaking.

“If I could do that for you? What you did back there? I would,” you assert with as much conviction as you could muster. “Not that you need it. But, if you did. If you needed somebody to try and, and stick up for you? I would. I would try my best.”

The line of Joel’s mouth curved ever so slightly when you squeezed his hand for emphasis. “I know you would. I know you would,” he trailed off as the two of you started walking again.

“Know you’d give ‘em hell for me, honey,” he finished.

You hugged yourself around Joel’s arm, gripping his hand all the tighter, as you walked the rest of the way home in your usual comfortable silence. The clarity it afforded your mind only produced a single thought: Know you’d give ‘em hell for me, honey …  for Joel, you would.

Closing in on your second month in Jackson was the perfect time to host a celebration dinner. According to Susan, at least. “What better way to show Tommy and Maria all your progress?” she posed to you two weeks ago. In that time, she had worked you through her own little charm school curriculum and proclaimed you “ready to be co-host” to a nice meal.

It was your idea to invite Joel and Ellie, a suggestion that Susan readily gave her stamp of approval, and before you knew it you were fidgeting with the hem of your shirt in anxious wait for your guests to arrive.

You heard Joel’s leaden gait as he and Ellie walked up the front stairs, and you swung the door open before he could knock. “Wow. Host so good you don’t even hafta knock to be let in,” Joel teased.

“Hi. Welcome. Please come in,” you parrot from the dialogue you had practiced with Susan. 

“You sound weird,” Ellie heckled. She scrunched her nose in amusement at your stiff imitation of the mistress of ceremonies.

“Ugh. I know,” you mumble. “Just tell Susan I sounded good, okay?”

Ellie cackled but joined forces with your hostess farce without any begging necessary from you. Joel wore his usual amused grin for the evening. “Not sure you’re ready for this, but I have a feeling Susan’s got enough experience under her belt to keep up,” he said as he handed you a glass bottle of dark brown liquid. 

“Thank you for this gift. How kind.” Your wooden delivery wasn’t selling any of the warmth it was supposed to. Ellie started off down the hall, inspecting whatever doorways were open along the way, leaving you beside Joel.

“Please don’t tell me you’re gonna keep that up the whole night,” he groaned. You glared at him with put-on exacerbation as you shut the door.

“Shutup, Joel. Susan has been putting me through the, through the hanger or whatever, for the past two weeks,” you huff.

“Through the wringer,” Joel corrected with a barely contained smirk.

“Whatever. I really want to do a good job, okay?” you admit with a skittish bounce onto the balls of your feet.

“Alright, alright. We’ll play nice,” he chuckled. “And, since you’re such a gracious host ‘n all and asked what gift was delightfully bestowed upon you, that’s some of Seth’s older batch of whiskey. Good shit.”

Your cheeks warmed a bit at Joel’s apparent familiarity with hosting etiquette. You accepted his gentle attempt to steer you the right way. “Oh. Yes. Well. Thank you. I’m-I’m sure this will go with– pair well with the … with the, um–shit, I can’t remember what’s for dessert.”

Joel covered his howl of laughter with a strained cough, and you couldn’t help but giggle along with him as you scolded him. “Shutupppppp,” you groan.

“Why yes, I would love to be shown to the kitchen to greet the other guests that may have arrived and or to say hello to the other host for this evening,” Joel chortled.

You sighed and rubbed your forehead against the palm of your hand. This was going to be a complete disaster, and you can’t believe it was falling apart already after you’d put so much work into it.

“C’mon,” Joel encouraged with a quick arm around your shoulder and a gentle shake. You leaned your head against his middle before pushing off and heading down the hallway together.

Joel did his usual work of charming the pants off Susan on your behalf. You were lost on the reference he made to some television episode where the main character Lucy and her friend went to a charm school and failed miserably. Joel and Susan joked how you were leagues above Lucy and Ethel’s attempts, which didn’t make a whole lot of sense to you, but you took it as a compliment all the same.

“Don’t tell me you’ve never seen I Love Lucy,” Joel chastised.

“I’ve heard of it?” you offer. 

When Joel scoffed, you swiftly reminded him that it was before his time, too, if you were remembering correctly. Ellie as always chipped in with her helpful takes and said that if it was “just the grey TV before they got colors” then it was “definitely Joel’s time.” Joel grumbled something under his breath about “pain in my ass” and “talkin’ outta the side of her mouth” at Ellie’s remarks, and you and Susan could only giggle at their banter.

“How old were you when the outbreak happened, anyway?” Ellie wondered.

You were shocked it had taken her this long to ask you such a basic question that you had prepared yourself a little bit for it. “Eight.”

Joel choked on the single finger whiskey he had poured himself. You’d only ever told him you’d been a kid on outbreak day but never got into the exact details other than escaping to safety with your parents.

“Poor Bug. Just like my daughter, not even out of elementary school,” Susan murmured softly. You shot her a sympathetic look and squeezed her arm in consolation. “But at least I’ve got you now, Bug,” she added with a squeeze back to you.

Tommy and Maria arrived a little late, and Maria owned the blame entirely. “Baby Miller makes it summertime year round,” she quipped as she freed herself of her jacket when they arrived. Apparently she’d run her head under cold water for 10 minutes straight before she felt cool enough, and then had to change clothes so she wasn’t left in damp, sweaty fabric.

Susan sat at the head of the table, and you were opposite as the cohost. Maria sat next to Susan as the “guest of honor” with Tommy to her right and your left. Joel sat across from his brother and Ellie across from Maria. 

“What a quaint gathering,” you comment stiffly, hoping you remembered the line correctly. Joel choked on his water but straightened up when you shot him a look.

“Oh. Yes. Wow. Yes, quaint. Susan, you’ve been making an impression on her, I see,” Maria chuckled with a wide-eyed grin. 

“Bug has done so well. I’m so proud of her. And Joel can tell you all about how she’s doing, too. Can’t you, Joel?” Susan prompted. 

You couldn’t help the nervous face that met Joel’s gaze, but you really weren’t sure if he would give you a rave review. Not that it mattered. But still, it would feel nice to know he thought you were meeting some sort of unspoken expectations.

“Best company in Jackson, in my opinion,” he said softly, never tearing his eyes from you. Your watery smile made him grin in return, and you only looked away when Tommy cleared his throat. 

“Proud’a you, sweetheart. Come from a hard place, no doubt about that. Made lotsa strides since you got here, and we can all see that,” Tommy said.

You really had to hold yourself back from getting emotional now. Tommy seemed to detect your precarious emotional state and rubbed your hand for encouragement. You gave him a double scrunch of your fingers against his hand in return, and he offered up his crinkly smile you loved so much.

“Really. It’s so great to see you out and about. And helping out with patrols, too,” Maria added.

Tommy shot Joel a devilish look when Maria brought up your patrol job. “Yeah, heard a lotta people talkin’ just the other day about your help up there. Makin’ quite the impression.”

Joel didn’t look up from his plate and opted to just roll his eyes at Tommy’s nettling. Oblivious to what Tommy was actually referencing, Susan clapped her hands together with an enthusiastic expression. “Bug, how wonderful!”

“Probably just being nice,” you mumble before staring off and taking a few sips of your water.

“No no, believe me, there was enough hullabaloo about’cha that I can guarantee you’ve carved out a little piece of Jackson for yourself that people aren’t soon’ta forget,” Tommy chuckled, never tearing his eyes away from his increasingly irritated brother. 

You chewed on your lip thinking about Joel’s run-in with Nathan. You wondered how many people knew about it now and what they thought of you and the role you played in it. You felt Joel’s foot make swift contact with Tommy’s shin underneath the table, who sat up straighter immediately and glanced your way. Apparently Joel had taken note of your dour mood and wasn’t keen on the effect Tommy’s words seemed to be having on you.

“Ah, really, though.” Tommy cleared his throat and flushed a little. “Might not feel like you’re doin’ a whole lot up there, but it does make a difference. Things been smoother since you started,” he said in earnest.

You thanked Tommy for the compliment but adjusted yourself in your seat awkwardly. All the built up nervous energy inside you was demanding to be channeled somewhere. Susan gave you an encouraging wink, mistaking your fidgeting as feeling bashful at all the good things everyone had to say about you.

“Can I get a thing, no– Can I get anyone anything?” you fumble, trying to shift back into co-host mode.

“I’d actually take some ice water if you don’t mind,” Maria said. She had peeled off her long-sleeved shirt and was down to the tanktop she’d worn underneath it. “Just another round of my own personal summertime.”

“Oh, of course. Let me just– I’ll be right back,” you announce, standing and heading to the kitchen. You were just glad the first real request of the night was so manageable. You emerged with a pitcher of ice water and a new glass for Maria that had extra ice in it. 

You felt bad that she had been dealing with these unpleasant bouts of heat for at least several weeks. At least as far back as when you’d overheard her and Tommy’s conversation through their kitchen window after you’d arrived. You sympathized with her recurrent discomfort and made a mental note to ask Susan later if that sort of thing would go away once she had the baby.

“Ugh, perfect. Thank you,” Maria said when you made your way back to the table.

“No problem.” You picked up her new glass and began filling it with ice cold water. The freezing bite against your fingers helped to steady your hand as you worked.  You were trying your best to not overthink this and get nervous, but you really wanted to do a good job for Susan.

“So what, you just get like internal lava from the baby or something?” Ellie wondered.

Maria and Susan both laughed at the description but didn’t deny its accuracy. “Something like that,” Maria agreed.

“Ugh gross. That sucks. At least this winter keeps dragging on, I guess. Somebody said the other day at school that it’s normally a little warmer by now. But that’s good for you, right? Even some snow still coming every now and then?” Ellie reasoned.

You felt a sprout of confidence blooming in your chest, and you took up on it immediately before it went away.

“Yeah, but that just means Maria has to talk Tommy out of filling the bathtub with snow to help her cool off. Can’t just hang out of your kitchen window every time.” You laugh a little at your tongue-in-cheek contribution as you go between Maria and Tommy to fill his glass with water next.

You feel them both still on either side of you, and you glance at Tommy in search of a reason. He had a confused, sad look that you couldn’t understand until you realized what you’d said. You sat the water pitcher on the table without filling Tommy’s glass and reflexively crossed your arms over your lower belly in subconscious effort to self-soothe.

“How do you know about that?” Maria asked behind you.

You took a big step back and removed yourself from between their chairs. “I-I …” you stammer. “Shit.”

“How much did you hear?” she quickly followed up. She knew. It was all over her face. Tommy’s, too. They knew you had eavesdropped on their conversation. Their private conversation about you and how bad off you were. Something you were never meant to hear and had no right listening in on.

“Something wrong?” Susan asked with a confused frown.

“Yeah, what the hell? Why’d everybody get so weird all the sudden?” Ellie chipped in, helpful as ever.

You opened your mouth a few times, but your tongue felt heavy and unwieldy. You didn’t know what to say, so instead you turned on your heel and abruptly exited the room, climbing the stairs two at a time until you made it to your room and locked the door.

“You fucking idiot,” you snap at yourself with a soft headbutt against the back of your door as you leaned into it. You bury your face in your hands and fall into your mattress. It was bad enough that your instigation of Joel and Nathan’s fight had been a topic of vague discussion over dinner, and now you had just outed yourself as an eavesdropper and a liar.

You could only imagine the conversation downstairs with Tommy and Maria letting everyone else know you had apparently spied on them and made yourself privy to their private conversations. Everyone would discover you couldn’t be trusted. Your mind was hurtling towards that ever present and endless expanse of panic that was apparently going to be rooted in you forever. 

You shuffled around your room in search of a rubber band and quickly dragged the first one you found over your wrist. You pulled the band taut and released it with a stinging snap against the softest part of your wrist. The faded scars from so many hours in restraints left little pale patches as the surrounding skin welted up around them with the repeated, calming snaps of the rubber band.

A hiss of satisfaction hummed from your throat at the grounding sensation it gave you. A soft knock on your door tore you from your self-soothing. “Uh, just a minute. I’m– I don’t think I’m coming back down Susan, I’m sorry,” you call out.

“Not Susan, but I’ll give you another guess,” Joel’s muffled voice came from the other side of the door.

You sighed and walked across your room but only stared at the doorknob after a few steps.

“Gimme two minutes, and I’ll leave you alone after that,” he bargained.

It was laughable that he’d think you didn’t want to see him. You wanted nothing more than for him to be right beside you. You were afraid of the possibility that he was going to look at you differently now after learning that you were a liar and a sneak. 

You reluctantly opened the door for him. You close and lock it after he stepped inside your bedroom. You kept your eyes downcast and settled back into your bed, curling up into yourself on your side without a word. You couldn’t take a look of disappointment or rejection from him right now. It would absolutely gut you.

Joel approached slowly before asking your permission to sit on the bed next to you. You gave a short sound of approval and felt the mattress beneath you sink down with Joel’s weight. You stared at the wall in front of you, hyper aware of Joel’s measured, calm breaths behind you.

“Your mirror’s covered,” he noted.

You let out a resigned sigh. Of course he’d notice. Susan had taken the coverings off all the mirrors downstairs in preparation for tonight’s dinner, but you hadn’t considered any of the upstairs ones.

“Yeah. Too bright. In the mornings. Lots of light,” you lie.

“You’re gonna have to pick between not lookin’ at me and not tellin’ me the truth, ‘cause I’m not gonna put up with both,” Joel said with firm candor.

You stirred at his provocation and rolled over. Joel sat facing forward, still taking in your decorative alterations. When he looked down at you, you instantly covered your face with your arms. It was too much.

“Quit it,” he urged gently, brushing his fingers across your lower arm. You dropped your safeguard and willed yourself to maintain eye contact.

“Are they going to kick me out?” you sniffle.

“You seriously think that?” Joel shot back. “You think even if that was the case me’n Ellie would just stand by? Or Susan?” Your lack of understanding at the extent of how much people cared for you had clearly struck a chord.

“No,” you mutter. You clear the lump in your throat with a few swallows.

“Exactly. So you can stay up here and take yourself outta the equation of your own life, or you can come back down with me and have a little liquid courage and enjoy the rest of this dinner,” he said.

When you didn’t answer after a few moments, Joel doubled down. “So what’s it gonna be? You gonna hole yourself up here? Or are you gonna pull yourself together and come back downstairs with me?”

He wasn’t being unkind, you knew that. It was the truth of your options, and he wasn’t going to let you skirt the issue by forming your own bastardized version of events where everyone hated you and you weren’t capable of doing hard things.

“I guess… I guess staying up here won’t do much. For showing how I’m doing better since I got to Jackson,” you reason. “And I’ll probably just drive myself crazy up here, alone with my th-thoughts.”

“Your call, honey,” Joel reminded you. He meant it. You knew if you really decided to just have a pity party for yourself upstairs, he wouldn’t stop you, and he wouldn’t chastise you over it either. 

You sat up and poked Joel’s thigh, prompting him to stand. When you swung your legs over the edge of the bed, you looked up to see Joel’s extended hand waiting for you. He smirked and wiggled his fingers, mimicking the gesture you gave him after his altercation with Nathan. You huffed a small laugh and knocked his hand away in feigned annoyance before quickly grabbing it back up.

“Oh, one more thing.”

You shot him a curious look. “What?”

“This?” he said, gingerly wrapping his hand around your wrist where you’d snapped the rubber band. “You’re not doin’ this anymore.”

Your cheeks burned. You’d already forgotten about it, too distracted to think about hiding it. “Joel, it’s not– I just do it to help me–”

“No.” He cut you off without hesitation. “You aren’t gonna do it anymore. You’re gonna find somethin’ else to help calm you down. You come to me in the meantime while we’re figurin’ out what you can do to replace that. Don’t care if it’s the middle of the night. You come see me. Is that understood?”

You gulped at the frankly enthralling way Joel commanded you to not mistreat your body, even if you only did it because it brought momentary calm. He raised his eyebrow in a persuasive, demanding motion, waiting for your acknowledgement.

“Okay,” you promise. You hug his arm for a moment and don’t pull away when he sweeps his knuckles down your back in a single, delicate pass.

“Let’s get goin’,” he says, and you think just maybe there was a hint of reluctance in his voice at the mention of ending the moment and going back downstairs with other people instead of staying up here alone. 

You made it to the bottom of the stairs and were sad to let go of your hold of his warm, comforting hand, but you really didn’t want to reemerge with such a pointed, suggestive display before you could even smooth things over from your last faux pas.

“Ready?” Joel murmured lowly so everyone in the next room over couldn’t hear.

“Yeah, I’m ready,” you whisper back.

And you were. You could do hard things. You could handle the awkward social situation you had created. No one was going to send you away. You weren’t going to have to fend for yourself. No one blamed you for Joel’s choices in dealing with Nathan. You weren’t somebody that stirred up trouble. You were just learning how to be yourself again, and it had been a long time since you were yourself.

The "WHAT TTTOOOWWWNNNNN?!" side of Joel makes my pussy bottom out, sorry not sorry. If only it wouldn't be too upsetting for Feral Woman® to witness Joel get more violent, we might have seen Nathan get all of the ass whooping he deserved. Oh well. We'll just have to settle for what we can get, I suppose.

Also, I just know Susan would give Joel a run for his money if anyone actually tried to kick Feral Woman® out of Jackson. Some true mama bear shit 100%.

As always, ty ty ty for reading and for commenting/sharing/reblogging my work!

Catch ya later,  ♥Puddles♥

[obsessivevoidkitten]

Surprise Adoption

Platonic Yandere Male Harpy x Male Child Reader (CW: Orphan reader, harpy man, kidnapping, soft yandere themes) Word Count: 1.6k (Tumblr is no longer allowing me to make posts from or reply directly to anything in my inbox so this is the anon request this fic is for:  “Hi! Are you willing to write Platonic yanderes? If you are could you write a (male) Platonic Yandere Harpy with a (male) child  reader senerio? The Harpy lost all of his eggs due to hunters and while mourning he sees the reader and believes that it’s one of his young?”) (I hope this is okay, maybe not my best work, but I tried. Sorry it took so long. I made him just have one egg so he could stop searching instead of multiple, I made the reader an orphan so the ending could be happy instead of the reader being taken from a family)  Holden was so distraught, even years after the loss of his egg he was still grieving. Humans had raided his nest and he had barely escaped with his life. Harpy eggs take a very long time to develop and hatch and the time he devoted to nest building and to his egg and then the lost of them had mentally broken him.  It had been over three years, he still thought about his child every single day. His egg. Did it even hatch without him? If it did then what became of his hatchling?  He scoped out human cities and villages relentlessly when he finally found you. His beautiful son! In a field between the forest and a fenced building on the outskirts of a town. You had grown so much! Harpies did mature really fast after all. But what did they do to your legs, your feathers, your WINGS!??! They somehow made you look completely human!!  But that’s okay, he would not love you any less at all just because you were a bit different now! He was your parent and it was his job to love and care for you.  He had to resist the nearly overwhelming urge to snatch you up right then and there. You had lived with humans your whole life now, you even looked like one, Holden was no bird-brain, he knew that it could cause more harm than good to you if he forced a transition without being prepared first.  For now he would stick to the trees, shadows, and sky and silently observe you.  You were a 10 year old living in an orphanage, it was pretty lonely. You had been left on the orphanage doorstep as a baby and had spent your entire life here.  You supposed that it wasn’t so terrible, it wasn’t like the movies. There was no sadistic director, no evil psychopathic teachers, no terrible and relentless bullies. Everyone was nice enough, but you distanced yourself, no point in making friends. It just caused pain for everyone when they inevitably got adopted and left you behind. It happened a few times before you got the memo to stick to yourself.  You always got your chores and homework done quickly so you could spend extra time out in the yard, and when the coast was clear you snuck past through a secret hole in the fence and spent time in the field and forest beyond it.  There wasn’t much else to do. You were sitting at the base of a huge oak tree, listening to the birds and bugs as you doodled in the dirt with a stick. Before long you got sleepy and dozed off peacefully against the tree. It had been a pretty tiring day between classes and chores and the cool breeze made it feel just right for a quick cat nap even if you had not intended to take one.  A sudden chill made you reach for your blanket subconsciously, not finding it you woke up fully in confusion. You were moving over one hundred feet in the air. What the…? You must be dreaming! You finally noticed a tight grip on your arms and looked up.  Above you there was a huge bird-man holding your small arms in his large pink bird-like feet. Each toe was tipped with a wicked looking talon which sent a shiver down your spine. You could not see much of him from your angle but you saw the white feathers that covered his upper legs and his pink lower legs.  You screamed, you started to thrash but then thought better of it, if he dropped you here your head would certainly crack open like an egg.  “Wh-what are you doing!? Please don’t kill me!” You were utterly terrified, you did not even believe that harpies were real! And if they were real then they would nearly be extinct by now. “Am I dreaming???”  “Oh, I am so sorry (Y/N), I did not mean to scare you! Please don’t struggle. This isn’t a dream. You don’t need to worry, you have been asleep for a long time and we are almost home!” He spoke in a chipper, almost bubbly, voice with an upbeat energy.  “Why did you take me!? How do you know m-my name? Wh-what’s going on???” You began crying in confusion and terror. Your heart pounding in your chest. You were going to die, you were sure of it.  “Awe, please don’t cry! I have pizza at home, I know you don’t never miss pizza day so I made sure to make some for you so you won’t be grumpy! You’re my son and I have been watching you so I could prepare for your return to live with me.”  “W-what? That’s insa… I’m n-not a harp-” You could barely get the words out as you sobbed.  “We can talk more inside! We are almost there.” A few minutes later and you had managed to calm down a little bit as he flew you into a forest of colossal trees. It did not take you two long to approach a wooden building in the trees.  He put you down gently on a porch that wrapped around the entirety of a large tree house that was built around four massive trees before landing beside you. It was pretty impressive, there were solar panels on the top and you were at least 100 feat up above the ground with a nice wooden bridge that went from the porch to a hill near the house. The hill had a dirt trail that lead down to the forest floor.  You could easily make a run for it. There was no telling what this kidnapper had in store for you. You started to take a few steps backward but before you could bolt the yellow harpy grabbed your wrist and pulled you inside excitedly.  The bird man closed the door behind you and flipped on a light, the house was huge! It was all wood and very spacious. The room you were in was furnished with shiny little trinkets and baubles hanging from the ceiling, a couch, and a small TV.  Now that he was standing in front of you and not carrying you through the air you could see him clearly for the first time.  He resembled a cockatiel, like the one the director had in his office at the orphanage. Plumage covered almost his entire body except for his face and his legs below the knee. His legs were pink and ended in the foot of a bird with sharp talons, his face had orange circles on his cheeks and his hair was long and yellow. His feathers around his neck were grey but the rest were white except for his wing tips which were as bright and yellow as the sun.  He pulled you into a tight hug and you squirmed uncomfortably. “oh, uh, sorry, I am getting ahead of myself, I forgot to even introduce myself, I am just so happy. I am Holden. Your father!” He guided you to the couch and had sit and he took a seat beside you.  “Uh, well, I think you have the wrong boy. I am not a h-harpy, I don’t even have wings! Or a single feather, I can’t be your son!”  At this he looked at you with sincere sympathy and spoke softly, “Hey, don’t worry about that! Just because they altered you doesn’t mean I love you any less okay? I know you were taken and raised as a human and that’s okay.” Holden gently ruffled your hair.  “Are you insane? I am a HUMAN! You can’t keep me here!” You were scared and annoyed and overall confused by the events of today. You just wanted to go back home and crawl into your bed.  “I know it will be a rough transition and hard to accept (Y/N), but I am your father and I know best and I promise to be patient, anyway, you’re probably famished! I know I made you miss pizza day but no worries~ I made you one earlier, let me go heat up a slice!” The harpy smiled and hummed happily as he went off into the kitchen to get you food.  You considered bolting out the door, but it was dark and you had no idea how to get back home. And truth be told you were starving, maybe it wouldn’t hurt to grab some food before planning a later escape. You couldn’t flee on an empty stomach after all.  After a few minutes he came back into the living room as bubbly and chipper as ever with a plate of food he handed to you with a couple slices of your favorite type of pizza, except unlike at the orphanage it had cheese stuffed crust.  “I hope you like it! I learned how to make it myself for you, I cannot expect you to live like a harpy after living among humans so I will live more like a human for you! I made sure we have electricity and that everything is accessible with stairs, and of course I got human furniture. I know you’ll be happy here eventually my little nestling!” His voice held his normal upbeat optimism, but there was something more in his eyes, something like desperation for you to be happy here.  You could tell he was really putting all his effort into making you accept life here. The way he looked at you with love and acceptance made you feel odd. You had never had anyone care about you like this before.  As you took a bite into your homemade pizza baked with love while Holden started rubbed your back soothingly you started to think that maybe living here as his son wouldn’t really be a bad thing. You had just been adopted in a slightly different manner than usual.

[tanoraqui]

Notes for the 5th and final season of Crownless, the Young Aragorn show that has lived rent-free in my brain since a slightly insane message to a friend at 1am sometime in 2019:

[s1&2, s3, s4]

A few quick notes before we get juicy:

- Gandalf still appears once per season this whole time

- hopefully Stephen Colbert has been doing the same thing, as a random assortment of unrelated very minor characters

- the man who's herb-loremaster of the Houses of Healing in RotK, who explains the linguistic history of athelas rather than producing any of the plant, is a junior apprentice with the healers. We met a young Ioreth in Lossarnach in a MotW episode in s4 I think

- reminder that the theme song is a setting of the "All that is gold does not glitter" poem and that young Aragorn is SO hot. We WILL cast someone who could slam open the doors of Helm's Deep and swagger in like sex on legs.

- I am definitely playing fast and loose with canon timeline and geopolitical events this season

Okay, real stuff now:

Until now I’ve mostly just described character arcs and plot points but now it’s time for MAJOR THEMES. As manifested by character foils.

[maniacal delighted laughter]

Note: this season, Aragorn is like 40% protagonist and Arwen and Denethor are both 30%, and Dúnawen, Halbarad and Roddis are solidly secondary cast - but, to an extent, more notable than in s3-4, because we're spending less time on monster of the week with all its minor 1- or 2-ep characters.

Yes, we've completed the slow transition from pure MotW to nearly pure season-long plot. There's still an element of new problem and/or location each week, but the driving issue all season is the increasingly unavoidable war with Umbar. There is at least one episode where Aragorn is back in the northern woods with Halbarad and Dúnawen and they save a random hamlet from trolls or something...but it's not as simple as it used to be...but maybe it still feels more right than all the work Aragorn has been doing in the south...

[we'll get to that]

So, ideally, this show is a 5-season musing essay on leadership…and Denethor is a good leader. He is a good Steward of Gondor. I WILL die on this hill. He is too proud to bow his head to any other and he looks first to Gondor's advantage and only sometimes beyond that, but these are not terrible failings in the Steward of Gondor. By the time we meet him in LotR, he has led his country in an increasingly hopeless war for four decades, and they love or at least respect the hell out of them -

No, actually, let's talk about amdir vs estel.

Both are forms of hope. Amdir, as defined in the Athrabeth Finrod a Andreth (courtesy of Tolkien Gateway) is "an expectation of good, which though uncertain has some foundation in what is known." Denethor, I posit - I write in this show - has a good capacity for amdir. He believes in the strength of Gondor and its people...but Sauron overthrows his hope of victory by showing him the seemingly overwhelming forces set against him. Denethor isn't pessimistic by nature, but even when he's optimistic, he's realistic. He cannot bring himself to believe in goodness beyond what there is at least a glimmer of evidence for.

Estel is an unfortunately symptom of Tolkien's Catholocism more synonymous with "faith" than "hope." Finrod describes estel as, "not defeated by the ways of the world, for it does not come from experience, but from our nature and first being. If we are indeed the Eruchin, the Children of the One, then He will not suffer Himself to be deprived of His own, not by any Enemy, not even by ourselves." Or, if we strip out some of the religiosity for network television and my own preference: estel is hope beyond reason or any real evidence, save perhaps gut instinct. Estel is sending 2 halflings alone to take the Ring to Mordor and hurl it into Mount Doom, and in the end using yourself as bait to give them more time. Estel is the belief that joy always lies on the far side of sorrow, no matter how long the journey through the dark.

Aragorn, of course, is literally named Estel.

And estel is the empirically correct choice in Middle Earth, because that's how the world and story (same difference) is built. The characters do not and should not know that, but it is - we the audience knows that the answer to the question "who should rule Gondor, Denethor or Aragorn" is 100% "Aragorn." But the characters don't! And therein lies the conflict.

(Ecthelion is still here, being the actual Steward of Gondor. But Finduilas's death and the loss of his friend Thengel, and the mounting stress of the rising power of Mordor and how it's riling up all their southern and eastern neighbors, compound with his genuine age...he is still mighty in heart and mind, but his time is passing and everyone knows it.)

The question of the first 4 seasons, for audience and characters alike, was, "can Aragorn be King of Gondor?" Is he wise enough, is he charismatic enough, is skilled at diplomacy and at war, does he know how to care and command without being overbearing, he capable in a practical way at bureaucracy, tolerating fools and the hundred little tasks which a king must do daily...

By the end of s4, we all know that the answer is "yes." He still lacks experience, but he always will until he starts the job - Aragorn did some clever stately thing at the end of s4, and when Thengel fell he took able command of the battlefield before handing it gracefully to Theoden, and if Ecthelion died tomorrow Aragorn could successfully claim is crown and lead Gondor in the war they all know is coming...

The question now is: should Aragorn be King of Gondor? This is really multiple questions: Does Gondor need a central ruler at all? (What about democracy?) If so, does Gondor need a King, when they have a Steward? Does Gondor need a King right now? What about Arnor?

The answers, which will be clear by the end of the season, are in order:

1. Yes Gondor needs a central ruler; this isn't even really a question the show poses. We are NOT dropping modern political theory into my medievalesque fantasy show, thank you very much. We will continue to explore hte internal Gondorin politics set up in s4, though - the Steward's power isn't absolute; there are fiefs to the south and there are always other lords, merchants, scholars, craftsmen, farmers and laborers with their own power...

2. Gondor doesn't necessarily need a King...but it does need Aragorn more than it needs Denethor, see: amdir vs. estel. It will especially need Aragorn more, Aragorn's personal and political philosophy more, when at last the war is won and there is rebuilding to do for nor just Gondor but all Middle Earth...

3. But the sort of unlikely alliances at which Aragorn excels (because he is capable of thinking of other nations before Gondor) will not save then now, or, will not save them when Sauron truly begins to attack, except with Rohan. Rhun might be convinced to neutrality, but there is too much bad blood with Harad, with Khand, with Umbar... Aragorn can be king of this realm, he should be king of this realm, but there is nothing he can do for it for now that Denethor cannot...

4. And there is still trouble in Arnor, where there is no glory to be had for dealing it [see: aforementioned 'back in the woods' episode]. S5 is based out of Minas Tirith, but there is more travel - the designated "land of the season" is really the Kingdom of Gondor and Arnor as they will be in the Fourth Age. it opens with a 2-parter diplomatic mission to (Rhun?) to avert whatever war would otherwise have started from the attack on Rohan at the end of s4. Aragorn spends a lot of time in the southern fiefs (Lossarnach, Lebannin, Dol Amroth, etc), especially as the threat of the Corsairs of Umbar becomes paramount. And he returns to Arnor, as he has only a couple times since s1...

Though mostly it's Arwen who spends time in Arnor this season. Arwen's questions are different than Aragorn's. She's been competent this whole time - she has studied wise, strong, gentle rule with some of the greatest stewards Elvenkind ever knew. She did have to figure out how to adjust to Men, but she's done that, and moreover, she knows she wants to do that. She loves Aragorn, she loves Minas Tirith and Gondor, its hills and shores and people; she could make a life here, even if a short one, and something in her trills at the mystery of what would come next...

It also scares her. That she wants it, the ferocity with which she wants it, scares her. And the cost is so high...

The show's 100th episode would happen this season, and I would beg, I would blow half my budget, I would ritually sacrifice an unpaid intern...I would hopefully have proven myself enough with s1-4 that I could convince the Tolkien estate to sell me the rights to the extended Tale of Beren and Lúthien, or the Lay of Leithen or whatever complete form they're willing to share, for just one episode...so the 100th episode would some sort of flashback/dream sequence/illusion cast by a skilled elvish minstrel of the complete tale of Beren and Lúthien with Aragorn cast as Beren and Arwen as Lúthien, and etc. characters in corresponding roles.

(I'd do it with just what we have in LotR+Appendices, but I want the full rights so bad. For just 1 episode!)

With literally 22 episodes per season, this would be ep 12, in which case it is the final straw that prompts Arwen to flee Gondor and the fate she feels drawing in on her. If it's earlier, same. If later, she might've gone already, and this flashback/imagining comes as Galadriel tells her the story as she literally saw some of it.

There's also some sort of plot for Arwen to get involved with, maybe Dol Guldur again, or the barrows...Arwen with the Dúnedain, because she will be their queen, too - much easier than Gondor, for she has long been their cousin! but still a new thing. We ABSOLUTELY get 1 episode of pure Arwen, Elrohir and Elladan being a badass team.

She also discusses her Choice with them, and goes home to Rivendell and discusses it with Elrond. I forget what fic I read suggested that Arwen consciously makes the Choice not of Lúthien but of Elros, but it's SUCH a good point/interpretation and it 100% comes up in some conversation.

(I dunno if each episode is showing events in the south and north or if they wholesale switch back and forth or what.)

Throughout this, Arwen and Aragorn also start to develop the long-range dream-sharing they sometimes do in the LotR movies. They haven't done any of the traditional things elves do to bond telepathically (sex, cooperative meditation, etc), but they've grown close and the Great Song pulls them closer.

BACK TO THE SOUTH...

There’s an early-season episode in which Aragorn and Denethor both go back to Rohan to help young King Theoden with [stuff], and they both start to get competitive over it. Theoden ends up telling them both, “Full offense but I’m the King of Rohan actually, so thank you for your help and get the fuck out of my court.” Aragorn is duly chastised, and reminds himself to keep his pride in check. Denethor is chastised…for a while, and his pride will not forget this, we it has never forgotten any slight.

S5 is kind of a tragedy, and the tragedy is that Aragorn and Denethor could achieve so much if only they could get along. Or rather, if only they didn't naturally occupy the same ecological niche, that niche being ruler of Gondor.

Could Denethor ever serve Aragorn as Steward to King? No, because Denethor's pride is too great - he will never bend the knee to one he considers unworthy, and he will never consider anyone worthy above himself. Could Aragorn stay anonymously in Gondor forever, serve as Captain to Denethor's Steward? (This is Ecthelion's plan.) For Aragorn's pride...yes, Aragorn is capable of that with someone he deems greater than himself...but Denethor just does not qualify. Equal, perhaps, but not greater, and inevitable Aragorn would feel the need to step up and do what he thought right, and then there would be trouble...

Could they be true equal partners? No, because this, too, would try Denethor's pride, and Aragorn's more humble but also more righteous pride - and then Gondor would be lost, because if you took a poll in late s5 for who should succeed Ecthelion as Steward, Denethor or Thorongil...Denethor would win, but it'd be pretty close. Civil unrest–close.

(It needs to be clear why Aragorn could walk into this city 50 years later with no warning and be hailed and accepted as king)

(Denethor knows he has his father's support. He also knows he doesn't have many of his people's. This stings bad.)

(Aragorn is hurting his popularity a little by a couple times this season disappearing back north for Things up there)

(Also, to be clear, Denethor and Aragorn are both predominantly focussed on the growing problem of Mordor and its allies, and too wise to sabotage each other/themselves in that with rivalry...much.)

Btw the existence of the Minas Tirith Palantir was introduced in s4 (someone stole it maybe, and Aragorn had to get it back ASAP?). S5 sees Denethor start to use it...secretly. One time he's nearly found out; another time, he nearly tells someone...but he is not and does not. He promises himself he will only use it in diremost need, and he does hold to that promise (in these early years)

Then, late-season, Denethor finally figures out who Aragorn is. What Aragorn is. A comment let slip? A sketch of Isildur in the archives? A comment Finduilas made, before she died, about how Arwen plans to be a queen of somewhere someday soon? The Palantir?

Before he can do more than digest it, however, Ecthelion is assassinated! (Or, a harbor is deliberately attacked while he was visiting? They were aiming for him but it wasn't a 'knife in darkness' thing.)

Gondor is now AT WAR with Umbar and probably Near, maybe even Far Harad!

Yet on the eve of a big fight - or a month or so before, because travel times - Aragorn is needed urgently in the north! He must choose!

...He chooses to ride north. Just before he goes, Denethor confronts him about this abandonment of his duties to Gondor - and about his heritage. It ends with Denethor spitting, "Come back for your crown or don't come back at all!"

(Denethor regrets his words as soon as Aragorn is out hte door. What if he did come back for his crown? Would they tear Gondor apart between them? Denethor tells himself that for Gondor, he would hand over his scepter of office peacefully...but he knows he wouldn't. What right has Aragorn's ancient blood to the country that Denethor's family has served with blood and sweat all these generations! ...Anyway, he has more important things to worry about. The Corsairs besiege the coasts; the Haradrim advance from the south.)

Aragorn rides north as fast as can be, with (Dúnawen or Halbarad? Both work for different reasons). They meet up with Arwen and the Dúnadain to deal with the rising barrow-wrights (threatening the Shire, ultimate symbol of peaceful civilians!) Meanwhile in the south, Denethor, Halbarad and Roddis go to war--

Aragorn wraps up the fight in the north...for now. It'll be a problem again in the future...

He borrows a ship from the Havens and he and [whichever OG Ranger Trio friend] race the wind back south. (Arwen stays in the north)

Gondor has had victory in pitched battle on land, but the main problem is still the Corsairs. Was always the Corsairs, as Aragorn warned Ecthellon ago. Gondor has a navy, but not enough to win a pitched sea-battle, much less enough to guard their whole coastline.

Aragorn reaches Umbar ahead of the bulk of the army (which Denethor is with). He meets the vanguard, containing his friends (skilled scouts that they are)

Aragorn: I have an idea. Dúnawen: Is it another of your impossible plans based on ancient history. Aragorn: Maybe.

With a dozen-odd small ships as bait, they lure the bulk of the Corsair fleet into a vulnerable position... and then they burn the motherfucking pirates to the waterline.

When the Gondorin army catches up, they are met by Roddis, Dúnawen, and whoever else walked away from that naval escapade...with a message from Aragorn. [this text is pure canon!]

"To the Steward," Dúnawen said, and bowed to Denethor (though her voice was pitched to carry to all those watching). "He said, 'Other tasks now call me, lord, and much time and many perils must pass, ere I come again to Gondor, if that be my fate.’"

Denethor internally: what the FUCK does that mean. Is he coming back or not? If he comes back after this dramatic victory, the people will surely support him...

But he says something gracious and grateful, and goes home to be Steward of Gondor, watchful and warlike ever toward Mordor

Dúnawen stays in Gondor and marries Roddis. A couple weeks later, though, she hikes up the mountains behind Minas Tirith, where she spent much time in s3, and meets Halbarad, who spent much time there with her, and who left with Aragorn after the battle in Umbar. They catch up a little, clarify that she's staying, he's going north...

Dúnawen: You'll visit, I hope? Halbarad, looking out over Minas Tirith and the lands stretching out from it: No. The next time I lay eyes on these fields shall be the last.

(But he comes south anyway, in the War of the Ring! He knows he'll die there and he comes anyway, because there is Aragorn to aid and evil to fight!)

Dúnawen says, "Ah. Then Roddis and I shall have to visit you - and our crownless king, of course!"

Halbarad warns, "He meant his words, you know, and more. He will not return until the need is greatest and the time is right."

Dúnawen says, "I know. Aragorn always means his words. I did say we would visit you."

Halbarad laughs. "Indeed you did! Well, wait a few years - when we parted ways, he was paddling up toward Lothlórien, in expectation of meeting a lady there. Who knows how much time will pass in that enchanted wood, ere we see either of them again!"

The camera lifts as the music swells - Gondor's theme, Arnor's theme, the theme of the King as the camera flies through Gondor up the Anduin, passes a boat pulled over below the Falls of Rauros, passes the status of Anárion and Isildur by Amon Hen and Amon Lhaw, and catches up with a Man in a dark green cloak as he steps at last beneath the boughs of golden Lothlórien. He knows where to go, though they never discussed it, only shared a dream. The music changes to the theme of Aragorn and Arwen as he comes to where she waits on the white-flowered hill of Cerin Amroth. They take each other's hands while looking deeply into each other's eyes, pledge their troth, and embrace with a long kiss as the camera pulls out and twilight fades to dark...

And the dark turns to the flipping pages of a closing book, as the camera pulls out further to show once more a middle-aged Sam Gamgee - comfortably portly in his fireside armchair in Bag End - reading to half a dozen children.

"But aren't they going to get married?" a young hobbit-lass asks.

"Not in this story," says Sam.

Rosie comes in from where she was leaning contentedly on the doorway and says, "Not until after the king helps your Da and Mr. Frodo save the whole world. But--"

[young hobbits clamoring for that story! Nine-Fingered Frodo and the Ring of Doom! Samwise the Brave! I wanna hear about the spider!]

"But," Rose repeats more loudly and firmly, picking up 1-2 children at once, "that's a story for another night. Right now it's bedtime."

"Listen to your mother!" Sam says, puts the red-bound book on a side table and gets up to lift a slightly larger protesting child. "This Da is getting too old to be reading at all hours anyway!"

They usher the children out, to bed. The camera lingers for an extra moment the cheerful living room: where Sting hangs on the wall above the fireplace and on the adjacent wall, a small but expertly woven tapestry, with gems-encrusted threads which almost glow with their own light, of a star breaking through dark clouds to shine on a small figure holding a mirrored-shining glass in a dark land [implication: personal gift from Arwen]. There is a mayoral sash draped haphazardly over the back of one sofa, toys and a late-snack plate or two scattered about, and the thick red book from which Sam was reading, with the bookmark only about 3/4 though. The tale is never over, you see.

Fade to black for real this time, credits roll over a choral cover of the full poem: All that is gold does not glitter, Not all those who wander are lost; The old that is strong does not wither, Deep roots are not reached by the frost. From the ashes a fire shall be woken, A light from the shadows shall spring; Renewed shall be blade that was broken, The crownless again shall be king...

[ronearoundblindly]

Sweet Sunday or whateverday for ari fluff?. ari and reader friend/now gf I guess we are?. when she sick how does ari cope or help

This one got away from me like they all have and makes me pretty nervous to post. So even though I hate to spoil it, I gotta put that there are warnings for unplanned pregnancy and mild language. WC 1.2k

Calling From the Office Of... a Bedrock and Blueprints tale

The rule when you don't feel well is two missed meals and then it's time for the doctor. Ari doesn't mean eating a little and then stopping because you just 'are done;' it's the 'I do not feel well enough to eat' or the 'I can't keep down food' type of skipping. It's 'can't get out of bed' or 'can't lift my head to eat' skipping. That's the type he immediately insists it's time for the doc, even if it's just a visit to his friend Sam's clinic.

Ari always drives you to the doctor, too, since at that point you shouldn't take public transit if you're that unwell. It's rare that you surpass the two-meal rule, but this time is different.

You've not felt right all week. The first few days you chalked it up to stress or something off you ate, but the nausea doesn't get any better. It lingers. You finally just can't stand the idea of eating for a while. You tell yourself you'll eat when something sounds good again. Unfortunately, that puts your first refused meal at the time when Ari hosts a boys' poker night.

It's easy to excuse yourself to let the men have fun. You thought Ari wouldn't notice that you never touched any of the snack food and bite-sized eats around the kitchen and table, but he did. When you refuse his offering of breakfast in the morning, that's it; you're going in. Get in the car.

Ari doesn't care if he's in the room or not. He's not worried. The few times he's brought you to the doctor have been pretty straightforward, a mild infection, a nasty stomach bug that he surprisingly avoided getting, and food poisoning with enough dehydration to warrant an IV. He wasn't happy about any of those things, but they were easily manageable.

All those were after an incident with a cut on your leg. You went to the hospital for a few days. No big deal. Ari made a big deal out of it, and now he airs on the side of making a big deal out of everything. That was the one and only time he has not stayed with you (at least in the building) for the whole appointment.

So this time, after a relatively easy chat with the doc and a quick bit of blood taken, out you shuffle with gauze taped to your arm and a prescription in hand for an anti-nausea medication. You explain they are running a precautionary test panel, but the gist is rest, fluids, and these meds.

Good enough for Ari.

You're in decent spirits although you eat like a rabbit the rest of the day, and you call off work in the morning, not feeling quite right yet.

Ari goes to his job site but takes the first opportunity to leave early. He finds you sleeping, so he heads to work on your She-Shed out back, knowing the noise won't disturb you from that distance.

The doctor's office call wakes you. It's a short call that you stay silent through 95% of until the news, and you robotically walk to the front door, hanging up while the nurse is still speaking.

You see the truck, but no Ari in the house. Out back you stare daggers at him smoking while swinging his feet along a wooden ledge not yet finished with paneling.

Storming up to his side, you rip the cigarette out of his mouth and stomp it to the ground.

"WHAT HAVE I TOLD YOU ABOUT THAT?"

Ari is, of course, very confused because it's always been the rule that he can't smoke inside...but he's not inside. Before he can start to say that, though, you're yelling.

"Enough. You can't do this anymore."

"Can't what," he asks, jumping down to the grass. "You said it was fine--"

"It's NOT. It's not fine. Nothing's fine, Ari!"

You no longer look sick; you look upset, tears welling up in your eyes and hands wringing furiously in front of you.

"Honey, what's wrong? The smoke can't be bothering your stomach from all the way--"

"I'm..." You mumble something he can't hear.

"What?"

"I'm...fuck," and you finally break down into full-blown sobs, leaving Ari even more concerned.

"Okay." He lifts his arm to guide you inside. "I think more rest is in--"

"Preg--" you can't get the whole word out the first time "--preg...nant."

Well.

That's.

That's just. Not possible? That's...

"You're pregnant," he repeats, and you sniffle over a nod.

"Okay," he slowly says. "But you're on--"

"The pill, yeah." You wipe your cheeks.

"And we--"

"Used condoms until after I started. I know."

"But...so you're..." Ari can't figure out what on earth he was going to say there so he just freezes in place.

"Oh. Ah, I'm so sorry," you squeak out, clasping your hands over your mouth and nearly collapsing in tears.

He rushes forward to take you in his arms. "What--what are you sorry for?"

"I shou--I--done this to--not ready--" and then he can't tell if it's the word 'sorry' again or a clipped word with 'Ari' at the end. Either way, he's not making himself clear.

"Hey, okay, hey," he coos, supporting you in his hold while tilting your eyes to meet his, "you're okay. Are you upset because you think I'm mad or because you're scared?"

Your head moves up and down, lip quivering as more tears fall.

"Well, I'm not and you don't have to be, although I am a bit terrified and you seem pretty upset." He rubs your back while he pulls you in close, resting his chin over your head. Inside he really is floundering, but his voice sounds steady enough that he rolls with it.

He leads you to sit on the porch step and tucks in beside you. He reaches out a hand to wipe your cheek until your nostril flare and swat him away.

His hands and breath still smell of smoke. He immediately dreads having to quit entirely, but then he suddenly thinks he'll need his lung capacity to chase around a...wow.

Ari sighs and runs his fingers through his hair. "We do everything backward, don't we?"

"I'm sorry," you repeat, the words catching on bubbles in your throat, "didn't mean to."

"You have nothing to be sorry for, kid--I mean...not...shit, you're gonna need a new nickname."

You slap his chest and shoulder. "Is not funny," you whine.

"No," he agrees, "it's not funny," but something deep in Ari's gut is stirring. He's a bit confused, a lot baffled, and mildly proud. He can't help it. He's happy even though his concern for you is crushing his world down to the area of this one backyard, a porch with a rickety board he needs to fix ASAP, and his best friend, the friend who happens to be the love of his life, the friend who happens to be carrying the other love of his life.

Maybe Ari hasn't successfully planned a damn thing but, shit, has he gotten lucky. You like him enough to stick around. You love him enough to share your life. Now, all the cards for a full house have fallen into his lap, and Ari's never looked forward to playing a hand he's been dealt more.

He carefully plants a kiss in your hair so no (less) smell bothers you.

"'Old man' still works though," he adds softly near your ear.

You use your shirt to wipe your face.

He rubs your arms and back, asking to take you back inside. He needs to go to the bathroom.

Your huff of annoyance is adorable, and Ari's chest strains that much tighter.

"Not like that," he chuckles. "Have to brush my teeth so I can properly kiss you, hot momma."

Okay, maybe Ari jumps ahead too far with that one. Your sobs start anew, less pained and more cathartic than before, turning into a soft laugh. You swat at him again, ending up tangling yourself into a hug. He waits patiently a while longer before taking you back to the house for rest and reassurance.

Uh. Not sure I even saw that coming up until the moment I typed this out. Either way, I love him, your honor. I want one. Ari, not a baby.

Find more on my Main Masterlist.

[mousiefrotting]

(sorry should have specified kinky but if u want to answer non-kinky that's cool too 👀)

OKAY now that i've got my thoughts out. time to get my even messier thoughts out.

riddle is absolutely one of my favorite characters. favorite housewarden for sure. and so, so repressed. every time i look at riddle rosehearts i think "I need to ruin him" . i believe that he is very well-loved by his card soldiers even in spite of the fear that he projects. something i made up in my head is a thing between riddle/trey/cater/che'nya. there are not labels and there are preferences but the preferences bounce around all the time so are there really? making sense? what fun is there in making sense? it's heartslabyul!

but i think that riddle is perfect for kink situations. when you consider his tight-woundedness combined with his admittedly strong personality, you get a short-fused queen of a boy who has never had any grasp at intimacy!

i think he should be stuffed. i think that he should get to enjoy all the lavish treats and culinary treasures he was denied as a child. i love the concept of someone who has never gotten to taste certain foods, be it from poverty or other restrictions, coming into a new environment and being given the opportunity to have what they never thought was possible. i don't think i'm far off, considering riddle's OB flashback.

i think he should get to eat whatever treats he wants, as many of them as he wants, without restriction or fear of punishment. i like the idea of him with a cute stuffed tummy, bulging at the seams of his blouse and peeking red at the skin from just how PACKED it all is.

he would be a mess, denying any sort of pleasure and insisting he detests any kind of behavior so uncouth and unbecoming, but i just know he would love the feeling of his gut gurgling while weighed down with the remains of whatever he ate, protruding so hard that he has to unbutton a little just to relieve some of that pressure, and the relief of that pressure would be the end of him. he would melt for it, and he would be embarrassed and ashamed the whole time. riddle would LOVE being stuffed (however secretly that might be), but the point remains that i think he should be well doted upon by his most loyal soldiers.

leona is really really hot. and an imperious and mean royal glutton. and a lion. i GOTTA admit it here he's so hot actually and i really like him. as a character he interests me so much. i wanna know more about what his reputation and family dynamic is actually like, i want to know more about his actual royal desires, stuff like he mentioned in tamashina-mina, about installing more infrastructure and how farena was too sensitive upholding the circle of life (iirc). Oh yeah i also want him to eat me. really badly. being just a scrap of fat to his majesty, while he makes SURE that i know it? and how no matter the brutality or the thrill he'd put forward before finally gobbling me up, he'd probably end up just falling asleep? NEED. and it would be really hot if he bottomed while stuffed

ruggie is attractive to me in a similar way that leona is, both in the sort of natural-therian pred way. i don't like full-feral preds, but characters like the beastmen in twst are honestly kink heaven. i love the thought of a vicious predator who looks like and IS a cute boy. ruggie himself is someone so endearing to me too, seeing how he spent his entire life around poverty and never really got to see better until NRC. his general scheming nature always telling you he'll do anything to fend for yourself but for a bad guy he's really not much of a BAD guy, and i like seeing him constantly resorting to underhanded methods. the rugster can take care of himself and he has every reason to flaunt the skills. in general his appetite reminds me of that whole college-transition phase, the wonderful change of environment where foods that were dreams are finallly here? but not just that, he finally gets to eat well? someone should stuff him immediately. and burping is really really hot with him, actually. someone should stuff him to the brim bones and all and he should burp right in their face i believe .also his love for donuts is just <3 such a simple food and so realistic for someone of his background (as realistic as it can be anyway) and he is just so...? i love the idea of hugging someone shorter than me who might slurp me down in seconds if he could get a single limb in his mouth.

(i headcanon that beastmen have more distinct noses than we get shown ingame!)

azul is attractive to me in an entirely different way than either one of his henchmen. the countenance he carries, the put-together charismatic businessman who's always there to lend a hand because he just can't STAND to see you suffer? like even if you know he's lying if the delivery is good it gets you crawling. like, yes, please lie to me and seduce me and buy me out of my house and my car because of how kind you are <3 he is just such a perfect amount of hedonism. i would love to be swallowed whole by this octopus. swallowed whole and digested while i get crammed against the walls of his gut and he mocks me the whole time with fine print that was too fine to notice..

i also enjoy the idea of azul KNOWING that someone has affections for him. it would give him a reason to be just that much worse, teasing them however they may like, in ways he may want to strangle himself for considering but will do just to get a squeak out of his victim? Yes.

soul binding, tentacles, ... his greed is actually really hot i got horny typing this

vil is someone i would love to put in a situation .i woul dput vil schoenheit in a situation. i read a vil/neige burp kink by @moraygrotto once and it was DELICIOUS. vil would be someone truly repulsed by the burp kink. he has one to me now. dental health matters to keep up beauty anyway! i genuinely cannot imagine vil stuffing himself willingly. other circumstances might have a way into that, but i don't think he'd be crass or brutish or boorish on purpose. not ever. i can imagine him getting flustered in the most inconvenient moments too, like...stomach growls, a soft stifled burp here or there...god he would be a mess. Want

[iwanthermidnightz]

After watching +20 shows (via livestream of course) i can finally gather my thoughts around it:

-Damn the people that made other people believe that Lover was a bad album for just one or two songs. Lover is the perfect opener and its really sad we didn't get Loverfest, the way Cruel Summer gets the crowd all hyped up within minutes wow just imagine 2hrs of just that

-Since the release i'd always favored folklore over evermore but i was so so so wrong! Evermore (in my opinion) is the strongest set of the tour, it really elevates and completes the album. The songs order is perfectly curated, the performances are distinctive but cohesive, and the public interaction during CP takes the cake. (and y'all may hate me but folklore set feels all over the place in comparison)

- The whiplash from the transition to Rep is necessary bc Rep is just in a league of its own. Reputation is THAT bitch and will always be THAT bitch, period. The crowd goes the loudest and the whole thing is just iconic.

- 1989, you will always be the be the perfect pop tracks, nothing more to say.

- At this point Midnights feels kinda rushed but for me the tour version sounds waaaay better than the studio version (at least for my ears). I think she should do a tour only for Midnights (idk when, she needs to rest too lol) but this set and performances have great potential, it just needs to be exploted. Also Karma is the perfect song to close the whole thing.

Sorry i think this thing got way too long 😅What are your thoughts? (if you already wrote them down could you link me to them so you don't have to repeat yourself)

My thoughts? I mean the show is incredible. It makes sense in the long run because timing is everything. It’s strategically timed. There’s something for everyone. The visuals are a huge part of it.

MAATHP into Cruel Summer was the perfect opener. Somehow I'm craving more Lover. Her entrance is goddess-like.

I thought it was funny how one minute people are crying at the end of evermore and then the snake comes on stage and everyone has to wipe their tears like brave little soldiers to get …ready for it 😂 I bet that was strategic.

For the evermore section I feel like tolerate it should be replaced with ivy (ivy truther forever). Not a tolerate it hater, it makes for good theatrics, I just like ivy better.

You can tell in pictures how sparkly and magical the folklorian woods look, it makes sense. I personally love the visuals of the cardigan music video so that would’ve been cool to incorporate. mad woman would be fun to add to folklore too. I see evermore as a continuation of folklore so its hard for me to separate the two.

1989 is flawless.

What I enjoy the most is seeing her with her guitar for the surprise songs. She plays so beautifully. I wish that part was longer. So many of her songs come to life for me when its just her and her guitar. Theres only lover, fearless, all too well and betty that she plays guitar on. But I get that she has so much ground to cover.

For midnights we basically get clouds, closet visuals, vs stage for mastermind, burlesque energy for vigilante shit and rainbows for karma. I’ll take it, but I think there could have been more trippy visuals if time allowed.

I probably didn’t fully answer your question but basically, I accept the eras tour for all that it magically is and I’m just happy that Taylor is back out in the world. It’s nice to see her more than once every few months 😜

[genderisareligion]

My url has finally been restored to its first one, which I changed years ago after messing with @terf-records (RIP asshole lol) and convincing it to change its name from "terf-receipts" by calling it a racist who was using claims of transphobia to hide that with receipts, including proving to some of his followers who were calling me white that I was indeed Black, and after doing so receiving harassment on both this sideblog and my main that convinced me to adjust privacy on both

That whole thing is why you don't see me going back and forth with TRAs and if you ever do see it come yell at me and remind me that I'm not supposed to lol. In 2020 I got shadowbanned as this URL because I asked these and a bunch of other questions on another popular TRA post claiming that "A TERF is [always] a white supremacist" and learned the same lesson: it's inconceivable to me to be that misogynistic and paranoid and it must be just as inconceivable to them that I didn't just buy gender hook line and sinker and still have questions so we're not going to be the ones to convince each other of our points as strangers on the internet. Gonna have to come from real life experience and it's a waste of my word generating

I wanted to name myself this and not have the words "TERF" or "(anti) porn" anywhere in my name because people will immediately discard what you've written because of the label you've given yourself. Then I ended up doing that and again learned my lesson lol. I laugh at y'all's TERF puns but it's sad that so many of you have so many brilliant insights into how we as females can deconstruct misogyny even if we don't all get along or agree that get trolled and death threated even though you're showing nuance. Also sad that if you don't have a TERFy url you'll get complains that you're "trying to lure people into radicalization" as if the kind of radicalization that takes place with white supremacists is what radfems mean when we say "radical"

Gender is a religion is also just true...imo mind body duality is religious regardless of whether or not you believe in a god or gods. I still struggle with it even as an Atheist because of a dissociative disorder and religious trauma and the West is becoming so brutally capitalistic in the face of an ongoing worldwide pandemic and now the beginnings of international war it looks like that I can't blame young people for feeling like disconnecting from themselves and treating their body like a product that the capitalists can leech money off of. I don't think physically transitioning in and of itself as a concept is wrong (such as transmeds or people who proudly call themselves transexual or otherwise GNC people who just don't want to pass) but I have concerns about the safety of the procedures as they are now because of Big Pharma.

Sex Not Gender, gender was supposed to be a concept belonging to grammar and linguistics, not our identities.