#this is a really lovely poem & prompt

[gluedonpapers]

Ribbons and Stars

He shined for her and she tied him together

For when she was down and he was falling apart

He loves the stars because it reminds him of her

And she loves the ribbon because he gave it to her

“Return my ribbon” she chided, chasing him

“You have my stars, therefore I shall have your bow” he replied, running

For their love burns as fiery as her bow and as bright as his stars

—gluedonpapers

[27paperlilies]

🌼 prompt - a torn love letter

I had a vision of us

Lush green met soft powder blue, flowers glinting in the downpour, i was so sure that you and i could endure.

A life without the fates, the breath of our soul we wouldn't let them take.

kind aand warm they taste,my heart they called awake , the promise of two minds entwined against fatal twists of time.

But those sands of years gone by hold stronger and i cry, for whispers of a life i have to say goodbye.

Rippingg it at the root, making it oh so mute, these words i throw to hades lonesome lands, may they live no more in my bruised hands.

[trickstersaint]

memory foam // april 19 2023

[gallawitchxx]

🖤 barber!mickey & (not so) shaggy!ian 🖤

here's the 43rd installment for this week's @galladrabbles prompt: the below poem by jewel by @sweetbee78

“I am not from here, my hair smells of the wind and is full of constellations and I move about this world with a healthy disbelief and approach my days and my work with vaporous consequence a touch that is translucent but can violate stone.”

catch up/read in full HERE -- updates weekly! [ read scenes one & two in their entirety ON AO3 ]

- - - - -

Much to Mickey’s chagrin, it’s Ian who breaks their embrace. His emerald eyes are wide and full of something he can’t quite put a tattooed finger on, but that boils his blood.

They share a set of secret smiles, despite the previous, and incredibly public, displays of their affections.

Mickey scans the man in front of him—this familiar stranger—his eyes flicking from his cherry-red lips to the button of his nose, and up to that flaming red hair, which smells of the wind, and is full of constellations. 

The cosmos made tangible, and apparently his to touch?

[salovie]

There once was a child who already knew everything.

They knew when they had to brush their teeth.

They knew when it was time to go to soccer.

They already knew how they were supposed to play the card game.

The knew what you just said was a joke.

They knew how to do the homework, and must have just pretended not to know a minute ago

so you would feel included

but three words into your explanation was all they could tolerate

before breaking the news to you that they did,

in fact,

already know

what you were about to say.

They knew so much they must’ve actually just been a mind reader and a genius.

They knew so much, so extensively, with so much expertise, in every area of life

that they were the ones who should be teaching you.

Most especially, they knew they were loved,

because that were told so

“every single day, Mom,

I know.”

[amalgamationink]

[silhouettecrow]

365 Days of Writing Prompts: Day 204

Adjective: Halting

Noun: Bow

Definitions for those who need/want them:

Halting: slow and hesitant, especially through lack of confidence, or faltering

Bow: a knot tied with two loops and two loose ends, used especially for tying shoelaces and decorative ribbons; a decorative ribbon tied in a bow; a weapon for shooting arrows, typically made of a curved piece of wood whose ends are joined by a taut string; a bowman; a long, partially curved rod with horsehair stretched along its length, used for playing the violin and other stringed instruments; a single passage of a bow over the strings of a violin or other stringed instrument; a curved stroke forming part of a letter (e.g. b, p); a metal ring forming the handle of a key or pair of scissors; (North American) a side piece or lens frame of a pair of glasses; an act of bending the head or upper body as a sign of respect or greeting; the front end of a ship

[bigphilosophercoffee]

Imagine this: Someone's in love you, they're a total green flag, they're doing their best to court you properly and they know your not ready for relationships yet so they say they will wait for you and you know they will, but you also know you're not looking for love at this time, you like them and their actions are so sweet to you that you do end up liking them a bit more and it makes you want to try the idea of a relationship, however, there is a place in your heart that cannot grasp the possibility that the two of you together would end up well as a couple. That there is something in your heart whispering in your mind that it really wouldn't work out for many reasons and the biggest one being that you don't love them the same way they love you. So you stop them from pursuing you before they, as well as you, fall any deeper. You end up thinking this phrase as you watch their walking figure fade away from a distance. Regret aching in your bones, the scream itching to be let out agonizingly quiet.

You got me romanticizing the possibility of us

But somehow it just stayed that way,

I did not grow so fond of you that I would burn cities in your name.

[2dayihaveaheadache]

prose poem prompt of day 1: Echoes of Weathered Hands

(a hand study by the very talented JC Leyendecker)

(original, written in my native tongue: Wenn ich jetzt die Hände erhebe, die Haut rau und durchweicht von Kalk und Seifenlauge, das Nagelbett wund gebissen, verschließen von nervösen Zähnen, fasernd sich auflehnend, die Handflächen entzündet, aggressiv gerötet und dann von gelblicher Scham an den richtigen Stellen bedeckt, dann würde ich die mageren Finger verknoten, falten, beten und fliehen.)

If I now raise my hands, the skin rough and soaked with lime and soap suds, the nail beds bitten sore, closed by nervous teeth, rebelling in fibers, the palms inflamed, aggressively reddened and then veiled in yellowish shame at the fingertips, then I would knot the meager fingers, fold them, pray and flee.

[brothertodeath]

let me claw open your chest

pull apart your 3rd and 4th left ribs

until I hear the sickening crack

I will tear out your heart as you did mine

we can watch the blood flow through my fingers together, my dear

you missed the last beats of my heart

but I do not return the favour

I am far kinder in my love for you

than your apathy for me

or perhaps my overwhelming devotion

makes me all the more cruel

it does not matter

I am a stray you long abandoned

growing ever hungry for your love in your absent ownership of me

and now a starved feral I will take it by force

let me crawl into your chest cavity, my love

for it is the only home I have known

let me grow reacquainted in our codependency, my darling

as I take on your burdens once more

let me be your heart, my angel

as you will always be mine

[pikahlua]

Fourteen Days of My Hero Academia

Greetings, friends! The ending has been announced for beloved shounen manga My Hero Academia by Kohei Horikoshi, and I thought it would be a nice opportunity for everyone to express their love of this amazing series! So I am posting a series of prompts for everyone if they would like to participate in this little fandom challenge.

The idea is that, on each day listed, you will create and post something with respect to the day's theme. By create, I mean whatever your heart desires. It could be a fanfic, a fanart, a fanvid, a moodboard, a diorama, a meta post, a screenshot, a poem, a drabble, a few sentences of reflection, anything really! Whatever your brain dreams up! The only requirements are that it qualifies as some sort of fan creation for MHA and that it pertains to the day's theme. The final day of the event will be the official release date of the final chapter of MHA: August 5th, 2024.

Any given day may have multiple prompts. You do not have to do all of them (unless you really, really want to), rather you may pick the one prompt that inspires you the most! And feel free to interpret each prompt however you like. For example, on day 8, you may wish to interpret "line" as a spoken piece of dialogue or as a drawn shape such as the way Horikoshi does creative paneling. On day 11, you could interpret "name" as a nickname, a code name, the kanji in a character's name, or any special meaning in a character's name. Let your imagination run wild!

You may skip out on days if you wish or need to. You may put as much or as little time and effort into this as you like. You could start working now to make some big works, or you could use this opportunity to do a little daily journal project. The sky is the limit! The goal here is to spend some time thinking about MHA before it ends and to make a collection of little fanworks for everyone to enjoy in the process!

Please tag your submissions as #14DaysofMHA (ideally as the post's first tag) so that everyone can enjoy them!

Without further ado, here are the prompts! Thank you @siflshonen for the assistance brainstorming them!

Fourteen Days of MHA Daily Prompts

Day 1 (July 23rd): Family, Home, House

Day 2 (July 24th): UA Academy, Education

Day 3 (July 25th): Weather, Light Fades to Rain

Day 4 (July 26th): The Ladies

Day 5 (July 27th): Quirk, Special Move

Day 6 (July 28th): Minor Character

Day 7 (July 29th): First Impressions, Just One Bad Day

Day 8 (July 30th): Title, Lyric, Music, Line

Day 9 (July 31st): Legacy, Story, Past, Childhood

Day 10 (August 1st): Emotion, Heart

Day 11 (August 2nd): Symbol (of), Name

Day 12 (August 3rd): Face, Smile, Humor

Day 13 (August 4th): Future, Growth, Change, Evolution

Day 14 (August 5th): Anything you want

Feel free to send asks if you need clarification on anything. I will try to edit in any new information to this original post for everyone's convenience!

[daisies-daydreams]

Ghost x shy reader? Would love a spicy scenario where he coaxes us into learning how to dirty talk with him

Pairing: Simon “Ghost” Riley x Shy!F!Reader Category: Fluff/Smut (18+) Warnings: P in V Sex (you know the drill), Dirty Talk (obvs), Pet Names (baby, sweetheart/sweet girl, hon), Swearing Word Count: 1.2k+ A/N: Hello! Thank you for your sweet request! I love shy reader prompts so much.😭I hope you enjoy! MINORS/AGELESS BLOGS DNI

"What's wrong, sweetheart?" Simon murmured in his low, gruff voice. You held your hands over your eyes and burning cheeks, his cock pushed half-way inside your slick cunt. You shook your head and raised your shoulders. Your lover sighed. "Love, am I hurtin' you?" he asked. You peeked from between your fingers as you shook your head.

"N-No," you squeaked. Simon grunted as he gently grabbed one of your wrists.

"Then what's wrong?" he asked. You bit the inside of your cheek as your heart thrummed against your sternum. You took a deep breath.

"I-I just..." you huffed, cursing yourself for not being able to just spit it out. Simon rubbed up and down your arm, his dark eyes still as he patiently waited for your reply. You inhaled deeply again as you tried to relax beneath him.  

“Hey, look at me,” Simon said. Your lip quivered before you slowly peeled your hands away. Your love gazed down at you with such deep admiration, you thought your heart was going to explode. “Love, I need you to talk to me when we're like this, remember?” he said as he cupped your cheek. You glanced away. 

“I know. I'm just not good at it,” you sighed. Simon hummed as he stroked his thumb over your cheek. 

“Well, no time like the present,” he grunted. You blinked.

"What?" you asked. Simon gave you a wry grin before he pressed a kiss to your forehead.

"I'm gonna teach you how to talk dirty," he said bluntly. Your jaw went slack.

"B-But I-I'm not good at it!" you flushed. Simon tilted his head.

"Do you want to learn how?" he asked.

"I mean...well...you know...yeah," you muttered. Simon chuckled.

"Alright, sweet girl," he said before kissing your cheek. “You comfortable?” Simon asked. You nodded and bit your lip. “Good,” he grunted. “Now, dirty talk doesn’t have to be a long, flowery poem,” Simon murmured as he brushed his cheek against yours. You gulped when he planted his lips on your neck, sucking on it lightly before letting go. 

“You taste so good, baby,” he purred. You swallowed thickly before parting your lips. “See? Simple. Let’s just start off with what we’re feelin’ and go from there, yeah?” Simon suggested. You licked your lips and nodded. 

“Okay,” you grinned. Simon beamed before pressing a chaste kiss to your lips. 

“Such a sweet girl,” he groaned as he pushed his hips forward. You moaned as his dick sank further inside your tight pussy, the stretching sensation making your toes curl. 

“Mmm,” you moaned as you gripped his large shoulders. Simon continued to kiss along your neck as he gently rocked his hips, his cock sliding against your gummy walls. 

“What are you feelin’ right now, hon?” he whispered into your ear, his hot breath falling against your skin. You blinked away a few tears of pleasure as your chest heaved. 

“I-I feel your cock stretching me,” you swallowed. Simon grunted and raked his teeth over the shell of your ear. 

“Yeah? Does it feel good?” he asked. You nodded. 

“Y-Yes! Feels really good, Si,” you moaned. You cried out when he pulled back and pressed his thumb against your puffy clit. You scrunched your eyebrows together as he drew slow circles around your bundle of nerves. 

“And how does this feel, hm?” he asked as he continued to thrust into your squelching cunt. Your walls fluttered around his thick length as you gasped for air. 

“So good, fuck,” your eyes widened before you slapped a hand over your mouth. Simon chuckled as he switched between circling your clit and swiping up and down. 

“It’s okay, baby. Just say whatever comes to your mind,” he encouraged you as he continued to massage your engorged button. 

“I-It’s not that-oh!” you mewled as Simon began to pump his hips a little faster. Your breasts began to bounce with his thrusts as he moved around your clit in tighter circles. You arched your back as he rested a hand next to your side. 

“Feel so fuckin’ good wrapped around my cock,” Simon growled lowly. You whined as you dug your nails into his ivory skin. Your mouth pooled with saliva as you heard your flesh slap against his. 

“Ahh, Simon!” you moaned and ducked your head against your shoulder. You felt his warm lips against your temple as you wrapped your legs around his sharp waist. 

“You can do it, lovie. C’mon,” he urged you as he dragged his cock along your walls. Hot tears poured down your cheeks as you bit your lip. You wailed when he snapped his hips forward, the fat head of his cock sliding against your g-spot. 

“God! Right there!” you sobbed while clinging onto his muscular body for dear life. You felt him smile against your face before he started to thrust against your sensitive spot repeatedly. “Yes, yes just like that!” you whined while hooking your ankles together. Simon groaned into your ear as he continued to paint sloppy shapes around your clit, his cock throbbing deep inside you. 

“I-I love how much you stretch my pussy, Si!” you cried out. He puffed a hot breath of air against your ear as he thrusted even faster, his balls slapping against your wet skin. 

“Atta girl,” your lover praised. You moaned as he hungrily kissed your lips, his tongue swiping over yours before he pulled back. 

“Fuck, (Y/N). Look so pretty when you’re takin’ my cock,” Simon grunted. You whimpered as your walls pulsated around his shaft. He chuckled. “You look even better when you cum,” he grinned as he gently pinched your clit. You felt the cord inside you suddenly snap.

“S-Simon!” you moaned as your pussy clamped down on his dick. You sobbed as you rocked your hips against his as waves of pure bliss crashed over you. 

“Good girl, that’s it,” you heard Simon mutter as he let you ride the rest of your orgasm on his meaty cock. Your legs shook around his waist as you gasped and moaned, your nails digging into his shoulders. You blinked your eyes open just as Simon began to thrust again, his strokes becoming more sloppy as he flared his nostrils. 

“Hold on, sweetheart. Just a little bit longer,” your lover grunted. Your limbs felt like jelly as you basked in the afterglow, your body filled with a divine sense of warmth. Simon growled into your ear as his cock twitched inside your walls. “Fuck,” he hissed. You tilted your head, your lips close to his ear. 

“Cum inside me, Simon,” you whispered. Simon’s eyes widened before he released a deep, feral groan. You mewled as he stiffened above you, his cock snug against your cervix as he flooded your tight hole with his warm cum. 

“So, good, you’re so good to me,” he murmured repeatedly as he finished releasing inside you. You caught your breath as his body went slack, his chest heaving as he gazed down at you. 

“Sorry, I don’t know if I was good,” you blushed. Simon gave you a half-lidded grin before pressing a chaste kiss to your lips. 

“Don’t worry, you’ll get better. We’ll just have to try again next time,” he beamed. Your heart fluttered at the prospect of next time. Simon hummed before kissing along your jaw. Your pussy clenched around his softening cock. 

Next time might be sooner than you thought. 

----

Thank you for reading! ❤️ Taglist: @maybethatfanfictionwriter @depressesoespressorat @yuhhtricki999 @lavenderbabu @famouscattale @thedevax @galaxy-dusk @tayleighuh @zombieblogx @mrswhitethornbelikov @migueloharastruelove Want to be a part of my taglist? Comment down below!

[roosterforme]

Covering the Classics Part 4 | Bob Floyd x OC

Summary: Anna was afraid to face her new friends after the night out at the bar. Admitting she was attracted to Bob was easier to do than explain why she couldn't have him. When she finally sends him some book recommendations, she finds his taste in books familiar in an all too intimate way. 

Warnings: Fluff, angst, adult language, eventually 18+

Length: 4700 words

Pairing: Robert "Bob" Floyd x Female OC (this story is part of the Beer Boy/Sugar and Jake/Jessica universe)

Covering the Classics masterlist. Check my masterlist for more! Thank you to @mak-32 for the beautiful banner!

Anna spent the rest of her weekend working on lesson plans and looking at Bob's number saved in her phone. She had compiled a mental list of titles she thought he would like, and she'd even pulled a few dog-eared books from her own collection and stacked them up on her narrow counter. She would absolutely love to have Bob borrow them from her, but she'd completely messed everything up.

Why, when confronted with a decent man, did she shut everything down and destroy all hope? Because of Kevin. That's why. She knew this crush on Bob was a bad idea. Nothing good could come of it, but she still caught herself looking at his contact information on Sunday evening with longing in her heart.

She made herself a sad sandwich for dinner and packed herself a second sad sandwich for lunch the next day and then she settled in with her computer. The idea of taking her sad sandwich to the quad and eating with her friends was making her anxious. What if they didn't even want her around now that she'd made a complete fool of herself in front of their friend? What if they looked up at her as she approached them sitting on the bench with their perfect, beautiful lunches and scowled with their perfect, beautiful faces? 

"Oh no," she groaned, covering her eyes with her hand. She really liked them, but they probably hated her now. And she really liked Bob, but he probably went home with that better looking woman who was at the Navy bar and hadn't thought about Anna one time since. 

She forced her attention to her computer screen which was prompting her for a password. She entered Kev1n1s@t00L and watched as the website she'd had open on her browser came to life. She sighed as she scrolled through her saved favorites on PoetsAmongUs. It was kind of pitiful that she knew what she was going to end up reading before she could actually admit it to herself. 

Your whispers call out in the darkest shadows, My heart answers like a flame, Igniting this shared space with every breath I take, Giving you a love that will never find the end. It binds me to you, pulsing through my veins, Emotions like I've never known before. I've doubted that I could reach this place, But I feel endlessly sure here now.

Anna whined from her bed in her sad little apartment as she looked at the pen name of her favorite poet before clicking on it. He either never finished filling out his profile or he was being purposely vague. Male, 30s, United States. 

"Sky Writing. The only man I would trust with my heart ever again." She read the poem once more. That was her favorite passage, but she knew everything he posted by heart and got excited every time something new from him popped up every few months. 

It was late enough that she could probably just go to sleep without acknowledging that she hadn't texted Bob and probably never would. She couldn't set foot back in that bar ever again. Maybe that other place that Jessica loved so much would be somewhere she could check out next time she had nothing better to do. Chippy's or something? She started to doze off.

When her alarm started blaring, it was almost like she had slept too well. She'd dreamed about a faceless man with beautiful hands reading poetry to her while he ran his fingers slowly up and down her bare thigh. She couldn't shake the delicious feeling even as her alarm got louder. When she managed to turn it off, she lay there wishing she had time to go on the poetry website and masturbate before work. 

"Stop it," she whispered as she got up and started getting herself ready for the day. 

At least she got to teach English 522 this afternoon. Feminist Literature was becoming one of her favorite classes, as evidenced by her well worn copy of Carmilla by Sheridan Le Fanu which was in her bag. When she stood in her kitchen and ate a peanut butter granola bar and drank some coffee, she looked at the books she had pulled out as options for Bob, but she shook her head and left for the day without dwelling on how disappointing her life truly was.

Relying solely on public transportation meant leaving a lot earlier than you wanted to, but Anna still barely made it to her office in time to grab her notebook and teach her first lecture of the week. Half of the students still looked like they were asleep while the other half were looking at her like she was a literary messiah. It was almost comical, and when lunchtime rolled around, she was in a pretty great mood. Until she realized she was still on the fence about going to the quad. 

"Just do a vibe check," she muttered as she grabbed her lunch from her office. "If they look pissed off, you can come right back here and never talk to anyone else again for the rest of your life." She could subside on sandwiches and online poetry and only speak when she was giving lectures. That sounded simultaneously amazing and also terrifying.

The college campus was bustling today. There were some guys skateboarding through the quad, and she recognized a few other faculty members from the English department who waved to her. But that didn't stop her palms from sweating and her heart from thudding in a sickening rhythm that Edgar Alan Poe would think was beautiful. When she spotted the two women on the bench in front of the weird tree, Anna was shocked to see them waving to her with smiles on their faces. 

"Anna!" called Jessica. "You'll never believe it! The vending machine just gave me my bottle of Pepsi and a bonus bottle of ginger ale! Like it knew I was about to see you!"

"Chaos Theory at its finest," said the other woman before she bit into her carrot stick and hummus. 

"It's really more of the Butterfly Effect," Jessica replied. Anna had no idea what they were talking about, but they scooted away from each other on the bench to make room, so she decided to stay.

Anna swallowed hard as she sat and opened her pack of peanuts. "How was the rest of your weekend?" she asked the two of them, and soon her nerves calmed down. 

"Excellent. Bradley and I took a tour of the library yesterday."

"Pretty good. I helped Jake make waffles for breakfast. Lots and lots and lots of waffles. What did you do with the rest of your weekend? After the Hard Deck?"

Anna accepted the bottle of ginger ale that Jessica handed to her as she said, "Um, well I did my lesson plans for the next few weeks. And I started writing my midterm exams. Nothing exciting."

She was met with a bit of awkward silence, and she could feel the two women sharing a look behind her head. "Did you happen to text Bob?" Advanced Calculus asked cautiously, and Anna knew this was the part where it was all over. The dramatic climax, except she was actually the villain in this story.

"No, actually. I think that ship has sailed," she replied softly. 

"Why?" Jessica asked, not unkindly. "When we figured out that you and he already met at the bookstore in North Park, we were ecstatic. He's the mystery guy you were losing your mind over, Anna! The handsome one with glasses who smells so good!"

"He really does smell good," Advanced Calculus muttered as she dipped another carrot into the hummus which was probably unfairly homemade. "Are you no longer attracted to him? Was it his nerdy tee shirt? Or were all the guys so obnoxious you couldn't wait to leave?"

Anna held onto the cold bottle of ginger ale a little tighter as she said, "It's not that at all. I mean, who in their right mind wouldn't be attracted to Bob? And I thought his shirt was kind of charming. And the rest of the guys were welcoming in a slightly intense way."

Now Jessica was turned to face her, eyes wide behind her glasses. "Bob thinks you ran away from him twice now because he's unappealing and boring."

Anna jolted and the pack of peanuts went flying to the ground, nuts rolling in every direction. "He does?" she asked, palms beginning to sweat again.

"Yeah. Big time. But he's quite attracted to you. Apparently the red hair is a thing."

"Oh my god," Anna moaned in embarrassment. Bob liked her red hair? "Oh no. No. No. He's just.... he's so.... and he's also.... I can't even." She took a deep breath as she kicked at the lost peanuts. "Bob is so handsome. It's hard to look into his eyes for too long,��because you start to feel like you're going to break out into song. And I don't think I've ever been around a man who smells quite that nice. And he's funny and just a touch nerdy, but that's a good thing." 

There was another beat of silence before Advanced Calculus said, "I'm not really understanding what the problem is."

Anna shook her head and unwrapped her sandwich to keep her hands busy. "Listen, none of my weirdness is because of him. It's all because of me. I can't have a crush on him. I can't be interested in him. I can't be interested in any men whatsoever."

Jessica nudged her shoulder and said, "Maybe you could just text him? Maybe making another new friend wouldn't be so bad?"

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

"Well if you can't find a girlfriend, I hope you're at least getting your rocks off with an attractive lady."

Bob was cradling his forehead in his hand and trying to escape from Suzanne's house without having this conversation. Whenever he stopped to pick up dinner instead of cooking something at home, he always brought something for her, too. It was the neighborly thing to do, especially when your neighbor was decades older than you, but right now he just wanted to vanish. 

"I wouldn't tell you even if I was," he replied, earning a laugh as she opened up the container of soup at her kitchen table. 

"Sit down and stay for a while," she told him, pointing to the empty chair. "I'll pay you back for dinner with my charm and witticism since you won't accept any money."

His phone started to vibrate in his uniform pocket, and he dug it out thinking it was probably Jessica having finished mocking up her barbarian character for their campaign, but it was a text from an unknown number. He was about to pocket his phone again, but then he saw the words book recommendations and paused. He quickly unlocked the phone and started reading the texts that were coming through.

I have some book recommendations for you if you still want them. I'm sorry I didn't send them over the weekend.

This is Anna, by the way.

I should have started with that information.

Wow. This is already embarrassing.

Bob laughed and started to type back immediately, and then Suzanne's voice cut across his thoughts. "Are you sure you don't have a special lady? You're smiling an awful lot at your phone."

He looked at her and shook his head. "I'm sure. I like this girl, but she doesn't return my feelings that way. She's just sending me some recommendations." He started to back away as he added, "Enjoy your soup. I'll see you later, Suzanne."

"Good night, Robert."

Bob ended up standing just inside his front door as he saved Anna's number and typed back a message to her. He thought keeping it simple would be his best move. Anything more than that and he'd embarrass himself once again by getting ahead of himself with his feelings. 

I would love some more recommendations from you. You're the expert.

He only had to wait about a minute for her response, which was just a list of book after book after book that he'd never even heard of. The first were the ones she'd given to him verbally on Friday night, but the rest were just as foreign to him.

Anna Webber: Persuasion by Austen. Northanger Abbey by Austen, Lady Chatterley's Lover by D. H. Lawrence, The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton, Far From the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy, Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell, and The Black Tulip by Alexandre Dumas (because you like poetry so much)

Bob quickly ate his own container of soup while he read the list over and over again. Then without changing out of his uniform, he grabbed the keys to his beat up truck and headed to the bookstore in North Park to see if he could find any of these titles before they closed.

The store was virtually empty, and when he climbed the stairs up to the slightly dusty loft he could practically picture Anna's pretty hands and painted nails gliding along all of the spines. He could imagine her pretty, wide eyes looking up at him before she figured out he was boring. He could hear her laugh as he made his way to the spot where they had been standing together.

That horrible Vonnegut book was still there which made him chuckle. "Figures nobody else would want to read it," he muttered as he reached for it. Then he backtracked a little bit to start collecting everything from Anna's list. He referenced his text messages several times, hunting all over the Classics section until he had almost everything in order. Then he spread them out along the shelf and took a photo. He texted it to her before he could second guess himself after he added a short caption. 

Did I miss anything?

He was walking back down to the poetry section when his phone vibrated.

Anna Webber: You're at the bookstore right now? The one in North Park?

Bob froze in the middle of the stairs. He embarrassed himself without even knowing it. He must seem desperate right now. Running out to the store as soon as she sent him the list. "Shit," he groaned softly. When he got another message, he was almost afraid to look at it.

Anna Webber: I LOVE that store. I wish I were there right now, too.

Bob thought that sounded perfect, actually. Maybe if she were here now, she wouldn't run away this time. He'd been playing those kinds of scenarios over and over in his head, ones where she liked him back the way he liked her. Ones where they left the bookstore holding hands.

He continued downstairs to look for the book of poems she suggested for him, which he found quickly, along with Votive by Keiran Goddard. Would Anna like a copy of his favorite book of poetry? Did he even want to ask her? At this point, he had nothing to lose. She wasn't going to suddenly want him, but that shouldn't stop him from sharing a recommendation of his own. Especially when she might really enjoy something he found so spectacular. 

Bob held the book up and snapped a quick selfie, sending it away into the universe before dwelling on it too much.

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

Anna was preparing a piece of toast with jelly for herself or dinner, desperately wishing she were back at the bookstore. Bob was there, probably smelling so nice and luring everyone else who was shopping closer to him. Perhaps he was wearing another Dungeons & Dragons shirt like he'd worn to the Navy bar. Perhaps his biceps were straining against it.

She didn't have to use her vivid imagination for very long, because suddenly Bob was staring at her through her phone screen with his crooked little smile and his beautiful eyes. And his uniform. 

"Oh my god." The toast slipped from her fingers and landed jelly side down on her plate as she took in every single detail. Navy uniforms were khaki? Why had she assumed they were all navy blue? Why didn't she know more about the Navy? She was going to take the time to learn everything she could about the United States Navy. 

When she realized her mouth was dry, she reached for her glass of water and downed it. She was in a daze. A Bob Floyd induced daze. Even all the little pins on his shirt were distracting. She wanted to count all of them. She wanted to touch them. She wondered what they would feel like if she pressed her lips to them. 

"Stop," she gasped. But she couldn't. Now her eyes drifted up to his face again, and she thought she'd only really ever seen the exact color of his eyes in a Kandinsky painting at the Guggenheim. She couldn't look away. "No. No. No!" she moaned. And then she finally read the actual message he'd typed out after gawking at his photo for five whole minutes. 

Bob Floyd: Have you ever read Votive by Keiran Goddard? It's my favorite collection of poetry. 

Anna laughed a little hysterically. She hadn't even noticed he was holding up a book at all. His graceful fingers were wrapped around the damn thing, but she'd been too distracted by him to actually look at the book. But now the fact that she'd never read Goddard before had her flushed and flustered, because Bob had sent a book recommendation to her. Nobody ever did that, and all she could think about was how she absolutely needed to get her hands on a copy and devour the whole entire thing if it was something he liked. 

Very calmly and rationally, she typed back to him.

I have not read it yet, but I'll add it to my list of things to check out of the library. 

When she set her phone down and realized her toast had become a casualty to this text conversation, she moaned and flipped it back over. Her heart was still beating a little erratically from looking at Bob's photo for too long, and she didn't think she could even eat. There was no way she could waste any food in her current financial state though, so she took a bite anyway as he texted her back.

Bob Floyd: I'll just pick it up for you while I'm here. I hope you'll like it, but if you hate it, that's okay too. It's a bit of an acquired taste.

Oh no. She couldn't let him buy it, because she didn't have any extra spending money at the moment to be able to pay him back. But admitting that to him would be excruciatingly embarrassing, and she didn't even think she could do it. Perhaps she could scrape together twenty dollars if she skipped a few meals, but then she wouldn't be able to join the girls in the quad at lunchtime. They'd notice her lack of food right away. 

"Why are you such a disaster?" she asked herself as she scarfed down the rest of her toast and typed back to him.

Thank you. I can pay you back for it later.

She would figure it out. She always did. Even when she didn't want to, she managed to find a way to solve her problems. Even when it hurt.

Bob Floyd: It's my treat. I can give it to Bradley or Jake at work tomorrow. I'm sure either of the ladies wouldn't mind getting it to you when they see you. Or if you feel like it, we could meet for coffee one day and I could give it to you in person. Just let me know.

"Oh, Anna," she whispered, already typing out a response before she could think better of it.

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

Bob was surprised Anna took him up on his offer to meet for coffee, but he found himself looking forward to it in spite of the fact that he was still pining a bit. He'd get over it in time. He'd find someone new to crush on, or maybe he'd meet another girl that he was interested in, and maybe she would be interested back. But none of that stopped him from being excited at the prospect of being around her again. And none of that prepared him for the way he felt when Anna pushed through the door of the coffee shop on Wednesday evening and looked around tentatively. Her red hair was in another loose braid, and her freckles were so endearing.

As soon as her eyes landed on him, she looked less apprehensive but also more resigned. When she approached the table where he was sitting with three books, he stood. "Hey. Anna. How are you?"

"Hi, Bob." Even her voice was soft and sweet as her eyes swept along his face and body. She blushed a pretty shade of pink as she said, "Thanks for the book. Will you let me buy you something to drink?"

He didn't respond beyond nodding and leading the way toward the counter. He listened to her order a small coffee before he ordered a large hot tea, and when she reached for her wallet, he was already handing over a twenty. When she looked up at him with wide, brown eyes, he just smiled. "You don't have to buy me a drink."

She watched the money leave his hand as she said, "Well, you don't have to buy me one either."

"Too late."

She was quiet as they returned to the small table with their hot beverages, but as soon as she sat, she said, "You'll have to let me pay next time."

Bob slid two of the books across the table as he asked, "Next time?" But she didn't respond as she let her fingers brush along Votive before she picked it up to reveal the one underneath it.

Anna's laughter filled the small space as her eyes darted back up to meet his. "You bought Cat's Cradle? I didn't think that was the kind of thing you were looking for?"

He glanced down into his tea. "Uh, it's not. I got it for you."

"Bob," she said quietly, her fingers tracing the spine now. He liked her nail polish and wanted to touch her hands. "You did not have to get me two books."

"Yes I did," he said with a smile. "Vonnegut sounds horrible. I felt bad for it because nobody else was ever going to buy it. I couldn't just leave it to rot on the shelf when I know the only person who would be willing to give it a nice home."

When she laughed again, she seemed resigned to the fact that the books were both hers. "Thanks. Money is a little tight for me right now. You know how it is when you first move," she told him while she fidgeted a bit. "But next time, I'll buy your drink. Or your book. Or something."

"You keep saying 'next time'."

Anna poked at her coffee cup and said, "I thought maybe.... we could be friends."

"Friends." His voice felt and sounded stale. The word made him feel sadder than it should have. "Of course."

She looked even more relieved now as she took a sip of her coffee, but Bob was busy trying not to memorize the pretty pattern of her freckles across her nose and the way her lips were pursed. He wouldn't look at a friend that way. 

"Which book is that?" she asked, nodding toward the last one in front of him. 

He flipped it over so she could see the cover, and he said, "Oh, it's The Age of Innocence. I'm almost done reading it, and I was just hoping to get your opinions on a few things."

Anna's eyes went wider. "You're almost done reading it? Already?"

"Yeah." His voice sounded like a groan, and he knew he should be embarrassed since she recommended it two days ago, but he said, "Once I start a new book, I can't put it down if it's good."

"So you like it?" she asked, leaning a little closer to him as a smile played along her lips. 

"It's fantastic," he replied, and her foot brushed his softly beneath the table.

Anna licked her lips and shifted in her seat as she made a soft sound that just made Bob want to get closer to her. She clasped her hands on the table in front of her and cleared her throat before she blurted out. "You're really handsome." His lips parted wordlessly, unsure how to respond, but he didn't have to as she immediately said, "And you're not boring. Not at all. I could have stayed in that dusty bookstore all afternoon, tucked away in the loft, talking to you about book after book."

"Oh," he replied, his brow furrowed in confusion. "Really?"

"Yes. Really," she said, and it sounded like she meant it. "I didn't disappear because of you. I disappeared because of me. And I'm really sorry about that."

Then he realized what was going on. His friends got to her already. He'd told Jessica on Saturday night that he was sure Anna ditched him because he's probably not as handsome or interesting as she's used to. And now he was going to have to text her and tell her to lay off. This whole thing was embarrassing enough without having to hear Anna pity him like this.

"Don't worry about it," he told her softly with his best attempt at a smile. "We can be friends."

When he got home, she texted him to thank him again for the books and the coffee. But he was still thinking about her freckles and how far down her neck they might go. Maybe they made a pretty pattern across her shoulders, too. Maybe they would disappear into her bra, a perfect treasure for another man to find. But not Bob. Bob and Anna were just friends.

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

When Anna finally got home after taking two buses, it was so late, she knew she should go right to bed. But she was wishing for another cheap bottle of wine to try to take her mind off of Bob. He was perfect, and she couldn't let herself have him. They could be friends, but nothing more. She could send him texts, but they couldn't flirt. 

She already missed his soft voice and the way he gave her his entire focus when they were together. He bought her two books! Nobody else ever bought her books! And he read the ones she recommended to him! Maybe Kevin was to blame for most things that had gone wrong in her life, but literally no man she'd ever known was as kind and thoughtful as Bob.

She collapsed back onto her bed in her sad apartment were she could look at her kitchen and her bathroom at the same time, and she opened the book of poetry. Bob's favorite poetry. Within minutes of reading the first few pages, she felt warmer and maybe a little flustered. The passages were romantic and insightful in such a familiar way. Something was tickling at her brain, trying to trigger a memory. She kept reading, making it fifteen pages in before she gasped and realized what it was. 

"Sky Writing," she murmured, reaching for her computer in favor of the book. She was reminded of her favorite novice poet from her favorite website. The poetry in the book sounded a bit like the poems written by Sky Writing, and now Anna was even more of a mess knowing that this was the kind of intimate literature Bob preferred to read. 

She wanted him. She wanted to know what his big, sturdy hands would feel like on her body. What his lips tasted like. She wanted to erase that pinch of doubt she saw on his face when she tried to reassure him that even though they were going to be just friends, she definitely found him attractive. 

The next time she went shopping, she was going to need to stock up on some more bottles of cheap wine.

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

Just friends. Okay, Anna. Sure, babe. Let's see how long that lasts. Bob's wingwomen are powerful. Thank you @lauratang for the book/reading list! And thanks to @mak-32 and @beyondthesefourwalls

PART 5

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[snailmail444]

Can I get a headcanon of the bachelors and how they'd be sexy with you when you're down? Like, if they're trying to cheer you up and be a little goofy with it but also tryna HIT. THAT. 🤣🤣🤣

Thanks Snail, ILU.

Bachelors Goofing Their way Into Your Pants

18+ 🌱 MDNI 🌱 NSFW (-ish)

This one was a tough ask Libby but I’ll do nothing if not stand and deliver 🫡 Honestly might be my favorite head cannon list for the bachelors I’ve ever done so THANK YOU for this prompt icon. NSFW? -ish under the cut (lewd?? Idk lol)

Harvey-

💚 Perhaps the goofiest about this

💚 He would not try to come onto you when you’re down unless he KNOWS it’s going to pick you up

💚 So once he’s confident let’s start there

💚 It’s a song and dance

💚 Dissappears, and when he’s back he’s got his med kit

💚 He gets out the stethoscope and all. The whole nine yards.

💚 That’s right folks. We’re paging Dr. Love

💚 Will NOT let you stop this routine. Dr. Love WILL be completing the full assessment. Listening to your heart rate, checking your throat and ears, somehow always having to complete a chest exam

💚 (M or F he will be groping your tits for this one)

💚 The diagnosis is in

💚 There’s Only One Cure for What Ails You

💚 You guessed it! You need a little lovin’ (Dr. Love’s catchphrase)

💚 Important note: Dr. Love is not a licensed medical practitioner

💚 This works a little too well perhaps. He’s so confident for no reason at all LMAO

💚 Lowkey want to write a Dr. Love oneshot now because this is really fun and cute

Elliott-

❤️ If you’re feeling down man will preform the absolute worst ad lib poetry

❤️ Silliest lymrics you’ve ever heard

❤️ Dumb dumb dummmmmb

❤️ Very dirty and stupid bad poems about you

❤️ Specifically about his favorite parts of your body

❤️ Or his favorite things you do during sex

❤️ The worse it is, the better as far as he is concerned

❤️ Raunchy dirty filthy

❤️ But like. In the most grade school mother goose style he can manage

❤️ No flowery language here

❤️ Takes off your clothes to expose the parts of you the he’s referring to

❤️ When you do x thing (then tries to make you do x thing)

❤️ Will be proving his point. Period!!!

Alex-

🤎 Physical touch legend

🤎 Wrestles

🤎 Winner gets whatever they want from the loser

🤎 Has a wrestling name and all

🤎 Does the John Cena theme

🤎 His hands end up in all sorts of places that they don’t need to be

🤎 Most wrestlers aren’t grabbing ass 🤨

🤎 Gets you in some really tight, close pins, but somehow you end up winning anyway

🤎 No I didn’t let you win don’t be ridiculous I respect the sport too much to ever—

🤎 He let you win

🤎 You can take your prize now 😌 Whatever you want 😌

🤎 And if his hard on is pressing against you? Well. Maybe he has some ideas about what your prize should be

Shane-

💙 Gets you through the hard stuff first, so once you’re on the mend he’s goofing to the max

💙 KING FLEXER!

💙 Aw babe come on? How can you be so sad when you have these guns to look at?

💙 Runs through a series of absurd poses to show off his muscly farm boy arms

💙 Lays it on really thick about being a stud

💙 “No matter what at the end of the day you have a trophy husband” (even if he’s not married to you. ESPECIALLY if he’s not married to you)

💙 STRIP! TEASE!!

💙 Showing off everything you’re so lucky to have with a big goofy grin on his face

💙 Throwing his clothes across the room and everything

💙 Making the music sounds with his mouth

💙 You HAVE to whistle or hoot at him or clap or something

💙 He demands applause from his audience if he’s not getting some singles at least

Sam-

🩷 Another song and dancer

🩷 This man was born for the stage I fear

🩷 Genuinely and truly putting on a SHOW about it all

🩷 The drama of it. Uh oh, he’s compromised!

🩷 Will end up ‘stuck’ under the couch or table or anywhere else

🩷 Uh oh! I hope nobody takes advantage of me 👀 When I’m so exposed 👀👀 and vulnerable 👀👀👀

🩷 The worst stage acting you’ve ever seen in your life

🩷 Starts stripping in the middle of the living room because he “didn’t see you there!”

🩷 Pretends to be scandalized when you finally succumb to his advances

🩷 What are you doing?! Huh? What do you MEAN I was coming on to you? I always take off all my clothes in the kitchen, that’s ritual

🩷 insists he’s been objectified and taken advantage of

🩷 That kind of turns him on though let’s be so fucking real

Sebastian-

🖤 Okay so we’re going blunt king here

🖤 Two possible options

🖤 Uses it as a way to hard reset the system mid breakdown

🖤 Full crying, upset, whatever, he’s been holding you and trying to calm you down but it’s not working

🖤 “Wanna have sex?”

🖤 DEADPANNNNNN delivery

🖤 It never fails. Tried and true

🖤 Option two?

🖤 This is ONLY if mans is super comfortable in your dynamic

🖤 A classic

🖤 Whips it out

🖤 Thinking about that one tweet of the boyfriend who was in the mood and just put his dick on her shoulder while she was watching tv

🖤 Like that but buried under sixteen levels of irony

🖤 “I know what’ll help” and then he pulls his dick out

🖤 Probably the least likely to actually hit with these methods

🖤 However, he’s maybe the most likely to help improve your mood substantially

🖤 Through sheer presentation if nothing else. Man can deliver, and knows when to hit with the absurd to make it the most impactful

[kataang-week]

Special thanks to our mod @penguinsledder for making this year's banner!

What is Kataang Week?

Kataang Week is when we, as a corner of the fandom, celebrate the ship Kataang on Tumblr! The prompts for Kataang Week 2024 were selected through five rounds of voting over the last few weeks and all prompts were submitted by Kataangers.

Cool, when is it?

Summer Kataang Week 2024 starts on Monday, July 29th - a little over seven weeks from today - and ends on Monday, August 5th.  

Who is the founder of Tumblr's Kataang Week?

@secretsecrettunnel revived Kataang Week in the summer of 2013 a few years after Avatar: The Last Airbender ended and when the fandom was itching for more Kataang during The Legend of Korra’s run.

Who are the mods?

@airbender-dacyon AKA Mod Dan: A Kataang fanfic writer who prefers fluff, but also loves some drama and angst. Mod Dan started writing Kataang stories in 2013 and has helped organize Kataang Week since 2016.

@penguinsledder AKA Mod Atarah: A writer, gif maker, and musician–she enjoys fluffy young adult Kataang and all the ways they complement and parallel each other. She first joined Tumblr for Kataang Week 10 years ago, and started helping out with writing posts and making banners as a mod since 2016!

@itsmoonpeaches AKA Mod Belle: An avid Kataanger with a penchant for angst and mild violence who likes writing. Mod Belle has been a mod since 2021 and helps write posts and social media.

@chocomd AKA Mod Celes: Fanfic writer who adores Kataang for their fun and flirty side but also their bond forged through grief and loss. Mod Celes joined in 2023 and helps with a little bit of everything - whatever needs to be done!

How do I participate?

The most common ways to participate are by creating art or writing a fic and posting it online. Some people try and create something for every day while others only fill one or two prompts.  

As always, we want to reassure you that it’s perfectly okay not to do every prompt! We just hope to have lovely pieces to share on each day.

But I can’t draw or write!

That’s totally fine - there are more ways to participate! You can sing a song, create a graphic, write a poem - just about anything really. You can also show your support by reblogging and liking other people’s contributions.

What are the prompts?

The following will be the running order for Kataang Week 2024:

Cultural Exchange/Culture Sharing/Revival of Traditions - Monday, July 29th

Protectiveness/Bodyguard - Tuesday, July 30th

Parenting/First-Time Parents - Wednesday, July 31st

Post-Battle Reunion - Thursday, August 1st

Disguise - Friday, August 2nd

Jealousy - Saturday, August 3rd

Proposal - Sunday, August 4th

Free Day - Monday, August 5th

* As a reminder, Cultural Exchange/Culture Sharing/Revival of Traditions, Protectiveness/Bodyguard, and Parenting/First-Time Parents were combined during voting as they were very similar prompts. You can interpret them as singular or separate prompts and incorporate one or both for each day.

** And as always, there is a Free Day at the end of the week. You can use this day to post anything you’d like! It can be a prompt that didn’t receive enough votes or something you’ve been wanting to work on, anything goes!

*** Kataang Week is also being hosted by @dailykataang on Twitter this year! In addition, @dailykataang will be extending Kataang Week by another week, exclusively on Twitter. Please see this post for more details on how to participate on Twitter.

How should I tag my work?

The easiest way for us to find your work so we can reblog it to this blog is by using the tag “kataang week”. Using “kataang” and “kataangtag” also help. You must tag one of the three in your first five tags otherwise it doesn’t appear in the search. It is also helpful to tag us directly with @kataang-week.

Sometimes even properly tagged posts may not appear when we search the tags, so if you do not see your content reblogged, please let us know.

Once we’ve reblogged it to this blog we add our own tags (a prompt tag and a user tag) for easy organization. This means we can find all the work for one prompt or all the work from one user in one easy click (this also means that if you have changed your username since participating last year you need to let us know so we can update your tag!).

Can I post my stuff other places online too?

Of course you can!

For those of you who will be posting your works on AO3, feel free to add your fic to our AO3 collection.

Why seven weeks? Is that enough time?

Traditionally, we like to provide our content creators seven to eight weeks to create quality content. Kataang Week is also traditionally held in the last week of July.  

If you are unable to complete a prompt in time, please do not fret. You can alert this blog by mentioning it in your post (ex. @kataang-week​) or messaging one of the mods and your content will still be shared even if it is a week (or a month - or sometimes more!) late.

We also like to post WIP for Kataang Week and encourage everyone else to do so as well - we reblog it here for motivation!

As always, if you have any questions, comments, or concerns, don’t hesitate to send an ask. Don’t forget to reblog this as well to help spread the word!

Good luck, Kataangers, and happy content creating! 😊

- The Mods

[thebestofoneshots]

Gilded Constellations | (wolfstar x reader)

Series Masterlist | Previous episode

Pairing: Wolfstar x Reader Word Count: 10.2 K Warnings: MAJOR ANGST MOMENT Prompt: Alone, desperate, lonely. How did you end up like this? How will you recover? Is recovering even possible? This IS a Wolfstar x reader fic, but it's incredibly slow burn. They won't start all dating each other until we're very deep into the story, but I promise the long wait will be worth it. Proofread by Lovely @aremuslupinsimp

Chapter 56: Who Wants to Live Forever

There's no place for us

What is this thing that builds our dreams, 

yet slips away from us

You sighed, it was a game. Your father had designed a game, and if you wanted to get to the other side you’d have to follow his instructions or solve his riddle. The weird thing was, how much it seemed to be targeted to you. As if he knew one day, you’d have to enter the chamber without him, or without the key. It was fishy, but you still wanted to know what was on the other side. 

The riddle was way too elaborate for him to have created it since Christmas, so you ruled out the chance of it being a trap. You would have gone as far as to say that he hadn’t even thought about you visiting theVault he’d given you yet, as if he expected that to be way later on. It was true that you’d gotten an obscene amount of pocket money on Christmas, and he did suggest you could save it in your vault. But still, there was something odd about the entire thing. 

You read the riddle again “In shadows deep and whispers soft, a secret lies, though hidden oft,” you muttered. “It must be somewhere in here.” You looked around, raptor-like, analytical, and cold. Solving a riddle was a brilliant way to take your mind off everything it was insistent on thinking, and you weren’t going to reject the opportunity. “Whispers soft,” you repeated. In one of the corners stood a long and tall harp. You could barely see it, it was as if it was sucking the light out of the room. You grabbed the star ring you’d seen earlier with a handkerchief and walked closer to it. Nothing seemed to move, but as you walked closer, you could hear it: the faintest sound of the harp, a soft and haunting melody. 

You instantly knew what it was, “The Song of Seikilos”. You swallowed, there was no question about it anymore, this riddle had been designed for you. The Song of Seikilos wasn’t the most common song out there, but you knew about it, and Silas knew that you knew. The summer before the trip with the Blacks, your father had taken you and your mother to Denmark for some political business. You’d begged him to let you visit the muggle museum. He said he too was interested in visiting it and told you to wait. 

A week later you were all in the museum. They had a special music-related event, and inside one of the showrooms you got to see the marble columns that held the poem. But there was also a man next to it, playing the same song on the violin while a lady dressed in Greek robes sang the song. 

You placed the ring closer to the harp, and surely, there were Greek inscriptions on its side. You breathed and took a closer look. You couldn’t read or speak Greek –let alone ancient Greek– but you were familiar enough with the alphabet, and it wasn’t hard to find the “Σεικίλος”. 

You were right, it really was The Song of Seikilos. 

You tried to remember what the poem was about, the small caption next to the piece said something about it being a dedication for Seikilos’ wife. But this had happened years ago, how the fuck would your father expect you to remember? You went back to the inscriptions on the harp. You looked through the text again, paying attention to each of the letters. Was there anything you could read? 

φαίνου? No idea what that might be. λυποῦ? You weren’t even sure how to pronounce that. χρόνος? hronos… Chronos… The titan of time! 

“Of course!” You said excitedly. “The song of Seikilos was an epitaph! A poem for his dеad wife.”

 It said something about Chronos demanding it’s due. About time demanding his due. Time… time… time… you pondered. “Through twists and turns of mind and fate. Seek the truth, but never late.” 

But what could the truth be? Dеath? That was too simple, too obvious. 

Silas would never go for something like that. You leaned closer to the harp, the ring held high illuminating as much as possible, the harp still sucked the light out of it. Either way, right in the corner of the room, under a couple of books you saw something that looked interesting. An old journal. But not just any journal, it was a dream journal. 

“In echoes of dreams untold, the key awaits, in tales of old,” you whispered and leaned in to take it in between your hands. It was heavy and old. Blue leather cover and silver engravings. You pulled it out and held it to the light of the vault. You checked the clock again. 10 minutes. it had been ten minutes since you took your bag. If only you could slow time or make yourself faster. There were plenty of spells that allowed you to do that, none of which you could perform with her wand. 

You took a deep breath before opening the dream journal. Empty. It made sense, after all it said dreams untold. But if they’re not told then… could they be shown? 

You looked at the page and placed your hand on it, closed your eyes and waited. The tick-tack of the grandfather clock and the faintest whispers of the harp the only sounds in the room. You waited a little more… tick, tack, tick, tack… nothing… No dream, no visions, nothing. 

You turned to the harp again, perhaps you missed something. Maybe on the echos old, instead of in the dreams untold, you thought. But there was nothing on the books either. You grabbed the journal, closed it and started inspecting the cover… there was something odd in some of the patterns. You slid your hand over the spine. and suddenly, something clicked. You frowned and opened the journal again, right there in the middle of the book there were a few hollow pages and inside one of them a small locket. 

You grabbed the locket and left the book on the side, on the back, in cursive so small it was almost unreadable, it said:

While you live, shine have no grief at all life exists only for a short while and Time demands his due.

“It’s the poem’s translation,” you whispered. “But why would I need the poem’s translation?” You looked at the book with the poem again. “Through trials dire and trials fair, only the wise shall find it there.” 

Echoes old, and dreams untold, you recited. Echos old, could be old books, you’d already seen a few old books, there were very many in that corner behind the harp. You pulled them out towards the centre of the room. The Tales of Beedle the Bard, The Arcanum Codex: Legends of the Ancient Wizards, The Chronicles of Avalon (that one was fae), The Divine Comedy, The Chronicles of Mistwood Manor, The Iliad, Paradise Lost and the Odyssey. So many ancient books: wizard, muggle and fae;  but how would you know which one to take? 

The poem… the poem was Greek. You took the three books. in your hands. The Iliad, The Divine Comedy and the Odyssey. But which one to take? 

The Divine Comedy was about hell, but it was also about dеath, which could have a connection to the Seikilos’ poem. On the other hand, The Odyssey perfectly reflected the “trials dire and trials fair, only the wise shall find it there” line of the riddle. 

You were hesitant as you picked the book up, you’d read it before. Your mother had given it to you a few years ago as proof of one of the best muggle-wizard collaborations. With the fact that Homer had been a wizard and because of Circe and Odysseus’ collaboration, proved that while wizards were powerful, and could be evil, they could also be benevolent and help humans. But that was before wizards had decided to seclude themselves from the world, and when they were actually trying to integrate themselves into it.

The book was the version you remembered your mother had given you; green cover, and written in verse. You flipped through some of the pages, and right in the middle of one of them, you found a recipe. 

“Shut up,” you whispered as you looked at it. It was sleep draught. “Fine then, that’s it,” you said annoyed. You were stuck. Except, what if you weren’t? You took the locket from the table in which you’d place it, and stared. The key awaits, in tales of old. 

What if the locket really is a key? But a key to what? 

You spun around in your place, paying a closer look at all the things scattered in the room. The harp and the clock jumped at you at once. 

You walked towards the clock: χρόνος. Chronos was such an important character in the poem, it made sense for it to be an equally important character in the riddle. In seconds you were right in front of it. It had been 15 minutes since you started. You placed your hand over the clock, there were many intricacies detailed all over. From a wonderfully sculpted story on the cover to details of the moon, stars, and planets on the face. It had not two, but eleven hands, 2 for hours and minutes, and then one for each planet. They were right around the clock, and moved ever so slightly each day, mirroring the real movements of each of them. 

And then, right behind the small cristal, there were the winding ports. You took the locket in your hands and cranked it open. Right inside of it, there was a small winding key. You placed it on a spot, and there was a soft chime you took in a breath. Good, now you had to find the rest of the keys. 

You grabbed the book and went over some other lines of the riddle: In silence vast and darkness deep, the answer lies, in dreams asleep. but wake ye now, and heed the call, for time is short, and darkness falls. You glanced at the clock, there was something there now that wasn’t there before. The moon phase section was changing every couple of minutes. It went from crescent to quarter in less than 5. “For time is short and darkness falls,” you whispered as you took a deep breath. “Fuck,” you said when you realised that you didn’t have much time. 

It felt like you were spinning around and around and yet you didn’t get the result you’d hoped for. You turned to the rest of the books. You frowned and turned to the riddle again. There was something about the wise: only the wise shall find it there.

“The wise,” you repeated as you pondered. Greek, the Illiad, Wise. “Athena! But where?” You thought of looking in the book, but something told you that might not be the solution, you had already found enough things in books, there was no way the rest were in them too. 

You looked around the room again, there were so many things it was like looking for Waldo, or worse yet since when you looked for Waldo you knew exactly what you had to find, a small man with glasses and a red striped shirt. Now thought? You had no idea what you were looking for. Still, you looked around and focused. 

That’s when you spotted it, right at the top of one of the huge shelves that held piles and piles of things, there was a statue of an owl. You scoffed when you realised what kind of owl it was, a fucking Athene. You used one of the hundreds of piles of books to lift yourself enough to pull the owl from its place. 

That had never been an issue before, a small spell would be more than enough to have it float gently towards you, but you had to improvise now. You almost tripped and fell, but you managed to hold your balance and took a deep breath once you were back on solid ground with the owl in your hand. You started to twist it around, looking at all his sides. But there was nothing, not a single thing. 

That’s when an idea popped into your head, you took a deep breath and dropped the entire statue into the ground. It burst into hundreds of smaller pieces, and yet they all looked like they had been designed to crack a certain way. You looked at the floor, they had somehow arranged themselves, one line towards the clock, and the other one towards a small cabinet in the far end of the room. You walked there and started opening all the small drawers. 

They had ingredients for potions, and jewellery and– bingo! A vial. Clear liquid, a simple, omnibus label: φάρμακο. You suspected what it might be, the horrifying thought sinking in like a doxy’s fangs. You sighed as you unclogged the cork and brought the potion up to your nose. 

You took a deep breath. Nothing. You concentrated a little bit more, you used the same technique you had developed lately, and while you didn’t physically turn into Vixen, you called upon her sense of smell. There it was, cleverly cloaked, clearly done by an expert, it must have been worth a small fortune. But it was clear as day: Valerian Root and Sopophorous Bean. 

Draught of Living Dеath.

Rather proper, since φάρμακο is old Greek for both poison and cure, you remembered Slughorn had mentioned that once.

If you thought it through, there was no way you were drinking to a different potion. While a simple sleeping draught would have done the trick, like the one in the small note still in your pocket, there was no way time allowed you to brew such a thing, not with the moon already being full, and with half of your time gone.

Now, you knew how dangerous draught of living dеath could be, and this is when the dire trials came back, you could either drink it, do the brave and reckless thing, or you could try and brew the other potion. With no wand, and barely enough time to find all the ingredients.

You took a deep breath, if you took only a drop, really a drop, nothing more than that, and if the potion wasn’t concentrated enough, then perhaps it would be enough for you to fall asleep and wake up before the moon was dark again. 

It was now or never, you took a small hairpin from one of the corners and dipped it in the small bottle. Your breath was short, breathing had become harder as you moved the small, poison-filled pin towards your face. It’s what was expected of you, your father knew how reckless you were, if he had left that there it was for a reason. Not many would be brave –or stupid– enough to drink Draught of Living Dеath, except perhaps someone as stubborn as you or him.

You stuck your tongue out and gently brushed the hairpin right on top of it. You placed the bottle on the side and looked around. Nothing, perhaps I should take more, you thought, and then the walls started to change, coating themselves in a black gooey substance before disappearing entirely. 

“So I’m dreaming,” you said, there was an echo of your voice, going all the way to the end of the seamingly endless room you were in before coming back to you, in a voice eerie similar to yours but also vastly different. 

Deeper, richer, sinister, “So, you are dreaming.” 

You swallowed, it was pointless to ask where this was, or anything regarding the nature of the place, you knew you had a limited amount of time and no matter how different time was in dreams, you couldn’t afford to lose any of it, not unless you wanted Chronos to demand his due.

“I’m looking for a key,” you said, your voice echoed again, louder this time, and then, out of nowhere, something, or rather someone appeared right in front of you.

“We know,” the thing said. It was a figure, almost a mirror to you but with no face, all dark and smooth like a mannequin. Only a sunken mouth, awfully reminiscent of a Dementor’s. It didn’t move as it spoke. “Why do you want it?” 

“I need to get to the other Vault.” 

“The mirror,” a whisper said.

“She wants the mirror,” another whisper returned. 

“I just want the key,” you replied. “I need to see what’s on the other side. It may be dangerous.” 

“It is dangerous, child,” the voice said. 

“It’s a terrible idea to go,” a different one added.

“Perhaps… I still have to do it,” you retorted.

The creature in front of you smiled, a sharp, shark-like grin, “that’s what we wanted to hear,” it said. 

“Two paths lay ahead of thee,” one of the voices started.

“One of us always tells the truth.” 

“The other one always lies.” 

“You may ask one question.” 

“To either one of us but not both.” 

“Ask away, little sprite.” 

“Or stay in the darkness and relent.” 

“It is your choice.” 

You sighed. You knew this riddle, your dad had given it to you when you were 10, you couldn’t find an answer and you begged him to give it to you. He’d said one day you’d guess it yourself. 

“But what if I don’t?” you’d asked, concerned.

“Then you’ll go through the wrong path and something bad would happen.”

“But you could tell me now. Then nothing bad would happen to me.” 

“And you wouldn’t learn a thing,” he had answered indifferently. 

You held back a resentful groan, as you bit your lip. This stupid game was getting beyond annoying.  If this was his way to have you solve his stupid riddle, if he thought you ought to learn something from putting your life at risk, then he might be even worse than you thought. This wasn’t even tough love, this was a reckless gamble of your safety, whatever lesson you were supposed to learn from it was in no way worth it.

And yet, you’d go through with it either way, and he knew you’d go through with it, you were obdurate and determined, and you had to know what was on the other vault. The dream beings had confirmed how dangerous it was, you could not leave it on his hands. Not on the same hands that had cast crucio on your mother. The action that made you react harshly and cause that fire, the action that had caused her demise. 

You turned around, you could hear a faint echo of the clock and the sound of the moon phase section changing again, you were running out of time. 

“I–” you staggered. How could you trick them? One question, what could you ask? 

You turned to one of the paths and pointed at it, “Would the other Omnius voice tell me that this is the way to the key?” 

There was silence, and then the voice said, “No.” 

If it was lying, then the truth would have said “yes”, and it would have changed it to “no”, which meant it was the right path. If it were telling the truth, then the lying voice would have said “no”, and it still would be the right path. 

“Then this is my way,” you said and walked towards the path. 

“Are you sure?” one of the voices said.

“You might be wrong,” the other one added.

“Or you might be right.” 

“Logic in the dream world can be different than back on earth.” 

“What if we switch?” 

“What if we both lied?” 

“Then the riddle would have always been unsolvable by logic,” you said with a shrug. You were confident in your answer.  

“And magic?” 

“Potions?” 

“Veritaserum?” you asked. “That would be cheating.” 

“Isn’t it worth it? To fulfil your task?” 

“Would you drink it voluntarily?” 

“Of course not!” the voice said, irritated. 

“Then it wouldn’t,” you replied. “Unlike Silas, I do not think things can be achieved by any means necessary.” 

The voice laughed, a loud, horrifying cackle that resonated and echoed through the entire room. “She really thinks she’s so much better for following her moral compass.”

“Where has that led you, child?” 

“Alone.” 

“Abandoned.” 

“Motherless.” 

“Loverless.” 

“Straight towards despair.” 

You looked at them, their heinous words echoing in your head, each one stronger than the last. All of them ringing truth to your ears.  But you weren’t going to put your happiness above the one of those you loved. You were not going to let them suffer at your expense. Not when you tried to help Nina and not when you broke up with Sirius. 

“Well then, I’ll walk there gladly, as long as I can still protect the ones I love,” you replied, tears prickled in your eyes as you ventured into the path. 

It was dark and it seemed to grow smaller the deeper you were. But you pushed on, after a long walk, you entered a chamber. You looked around, it was empty, except for a deep plunging drop, and a floating slab of concrete in the middle. And right there in the centre of the island, there was a small jewellery box, with the same engravings as the Grandfather clock in the real world. You knew how dangerous of a jump it was, but you had to take it. 

You took a few steps back to build momentum and you ran. You crashed chest-first into the side, it knocked your breath out and you barely managed to hold onto one of the raised tiles in the floor. Tears prickled in your eyes as you struggled up. How did it always look so much easier in movies and comics? This was almost impossibly tough to achieve. And you had relatively decent arm strength. There was a wand lying on the side, just within reach.

 You hadn’t seen it before but you took it and pointed downwards. “Confringo!” you shouted, the impulse the spell gave you was enough to flip you upside down and have you crash, back first, onto the concrete, your head slamming with an unsettling loud thud. You groaned as you looked up at the nothingness above. 

And then you heard it again, like a faraway whisper: Tick, tack, tick, tack… The ever-so-constant reminder that you had no time to rest. You exhaled wearily and groaned your way into a sitting position. You took the small jewellery box in your hands and tried to open it, but it wouldn’t budge You were about to smash it into a wall out of exasperation, a riddle within a riddle within a fucking riddle, it was getting out of hand. 

But there was a small glistening thing in the side of the box with some kind of engraving: ᾄδειν Σεικίλος. 

Of course, you thought and recalled the poem you had memorised just in case, “While you live, shine,”  there was a click inside the box. “Have no grief at all,” another click and then a twist, “life exists only for a short while,” a louder sound came from the box, like a small bell, “and Time demands his due.” 

The box opened in a second, surely, there was a key, mirroring the one that had been inside the locket there. You grabbed it, expecting to wake up, but nothing happened. You looked around, there were other trinkets scattered all around, but none of them had anything that could help you wake up on the outside.

There were unlabeled potion bottles, there were other wands like the one you’d used earlier, there were some bones in the corner and there were even a few books– the same ones that had been next to the harp. But there had to be a way to wake up, there had to be a way to get out. 

And there was an infallible one, one that you had heard of before and that your father had made sure to drill into your head in the past. 

“Darling, our little girl is having nightmares.” 

“She is?” he asked as he leaned down to look at you, you must have been four or five.

“There’s dragons, and trolls and big scary dogs that want to eat me.” 

“And where are you in the dream?” 

“Running through the forest, and then I reach a cliff, I can’t run anymore, they,” you sniffed. Those small child eyes, normally filled with wonder, were filled with tears, “they eat me. It hurts.” 

“A cliff you said?” 

“Yes!” 

“Then jump.” 

“Ju-jump?” you staggered. “But it’s dangerous and there are pointy rocks at the bottom, I would diе.” 

“Is the best way to wake up from a dream.”

“And if it doesn’t work?” 

“Wouldn’t being stabbed by rocks be less painful than being eaten alive?” 

“Silas!” your mother chided. 

Your father threw her a look and then one at you, a small smile playing on his lips, “Then… You learn how to fly!” he said as he took you in his hands and twirled with you in the sky. Your laughs filled the room, your mom was clapping and he looked at you with the purest of smiles when suddenly, out of nowhere, he let go of you and you plunged into the floor. Of course, you fell into a mattress he had apparated there, but the fall hadn’t been any less jarring. 

On the floor, you looked at him with a terrorized expression. 

“Silas!” Avis said angrily. 

“It’s so she learns it’s not that terrible to fall,” Silas responded as he pointed at you, a dismissive sort of look. “Children like it.” 

“She’s horrified!” 

“She is not! Look at her!” 

Both of them turned to you expectantly. You were small, but you knew if you said the wrong thing, the two of them would fight, and you could never tolerate their fights. With your heart hammering in your chest, you smiled faintly and then started to laugh. The tears that left your eyes, were considered laughter-induced rather than the terrified ones they actually were. “Again,” you managed to say, to sell the idea further. 

That’s when you decided you had to become an expert at flying, you couldn’t allow Silas to throw you again.   

And yet, here you were, back in a dream and you would not only allow Silas to push you down a cliff, but you were about to plunge into the dark abyss, willingly. “He always gets what he wants, doesn’t he?” 

You leaned over the edge, looking down, there was no breeze, nothing that could indicate how far of a fall it might be, if there was an end to it at all. You had learned how to fly so you wouldn’t fear the fall. You hadn’t been afraid when you fell from your broom and you wouldn’t start being fearful now. 

You extended one of your legs, your feet dangled over nothingness, you took a deep breath and then you plunged. If you screamed, the hollowness of the place made the sound disappear. The rush of the fall was there, the same plunging sensation you felt sometimes on a broom, it was beautiful and harrowing at the same time. 

And then, you woke up. Your breath was short, there was a thin coat of cold sweat over your limbs and the place seemed way brighter than you remembered. The key, was in your hands, it was lighter here than in the dream, but it was there nonetheless. 

You opened your palm, it was almost the same as the other one, except for a slightly darker colour. You stared at it as you tried to catch your breath, you wanted to laugh and you wanted to cry, but you glanced at the clock instead. Third quarter, you sprung up from where you lay and ran towards the clock, placing the key straight on its spot. The moon phase went from Third Quarter to Waning Gibbous. It wasn’t much, around 4 more minutes than before, but four minutes were enough to make the difference. 

You took the book with the riddle and went through the last lines, the ones that you hadn’t used before Paths diverge, yet all converge to where the truth and secrets surge. Choose wisely, seeker, lest you fail, and in the end, your efforts pale.

“Choose wisely, seeker,” you thought. Could he mean?

You turned around, looking for something, and right there in the middle of one of the bigger shelves, there was a golden snitch. When you stepped closer to her she released her small wings and started to fly around the room. 

You had no broom, but you had experience, if she thought you weren’t looking at her she would lean closer to taunt you, that was what they always did. You walked towards the pile of books you had left in the centre of the vault and grabbed one of them, flipping through the pages while keeping an attentive eye on the clock. The moon was back in Third quarter. You were running out of time. You were just looking at the pictures in the book, the Peverell bothers talking to Dеath, Dеath giving them the hallows, you’d heard the story many times before. You waited: one look at the pictures and a short glance at the clock, the tick-tack almost maddening as the small snitch kept buzzing around the room.

And then it happened, the small golden ball flew close to you, right in front of your face. You were as quick as humanly possible and took it with one of your hands. You could feel it melt at your touch, suddenly you no longer had a snitch but a small shiny key. Its colour lighter than the other two. 

You turned to the clock: Waning Crescent. The tick, tick of the handles seemed to get thicker as you approached it, louder, so loud it was almost deafening, but you never stopped walking and lodged the key straight into the one remaining hole. 

Three paths, three keys, they all converged into one single clock, into a master of time. The bottom door of the clock opened itself, and on the other side you could see nothing but darkness. 

You had solved it, and yet the next step was as daunting as some of the trials you’d already accomplished. You took a deep breath and walked inside. Darkness, darkness, darkness, and then… light. Not blinding but enough to make you squint. A vault, twin to the one you had been on, and yet vastly different. All the things had been piled to the side, and in the centre back there was a large something covered by a thin fabric, it draped down the sides of it, allowing you to see a shape, it looked like some kind of door. 

You walked outside of a clock, exactly the same as the one in the other room, and towards the large thing at the end. You didn’t hesitate to pull the thin white sheet from it, there was a small cloud of dust that wafted through the air due to the harsh movement and then, once the dust settled, the sheet fell on the floor with a gentle thud. Not a door, but… a mirror.

Except it wasn’t quite that either, you could see your reflection, but there was something odd about it, it was you, but, there was something about it that looked different. 

You looked at the mirror, there seemed to be an inscription at the top “riapsed dnaht urt d niflla hsuo yt ini htiwt nemrot ren niruoy tubega sivruo y ton tcel feri ” 

It was English text, which surprised you since you assumed it would also be Greek, everything seemed Greek that day. You read it aloud, it didn’t sound like Greek either –you thought it could have been the pronunciation rather than the spelling. You pulled back a little, trying to get the big picture. The mirror was tall, far taller than you, even Remus would have fit inside of it perfectly, and it would have surpassed him. It had a silver frame and it had pointy ends, it reminded you a lot of Hogwarts Architecture. 

You wondered if you’d ever seen a mirror like that, and you didn’t quite remember such a thing. Yet, it was oddly familiar as if you had seen it before, perhaps in a dream. You reread the words again, and that’s when you realised what it said. It wasn’t Greek, it wasn’t even a different language, rather, and quite proper of a mirror, it was in English, but spelt backwards.

"I reflect not your visage but your inner torment, within it you shall find truth and despair,” you read aloud. There was a slow chime as if it had come from the clock behind you and not the mirror itself. The reflection in the mirror wobbled as if the screen had turned into a silvery pool instead of glass. 

You walked closer again, you knew reading the inscription had activated whatever was inside of it, but the idea of seeing your inner torment was not something you were eager to do, it wasn’t something that you wanted to face. You’d been running from it incessantly since Christmas, and you did not want to stop now. 

But you had to.

Whatever was inside the mirror was reason enough for your father to make that dreadful riddle, and if it had been that hard to accomplish, then there was definitely something worthy inside of it. You looked at the mercury-like screen ahead of you and took another step towards it. You placed your hand on it and saw how the entire thing wobbled alongside your small push. It seemed to almost stick to your finger before releasing it and going back to its place.

You remembered what one of the voices in the dream had said, the echo so present in your head, it was as if they were speaking to you again, “Straight towards despair.” 

Right in front of you stood a mirror of despair, and you would walk right inside of it. Head high, and breath calm, even as your heart hammered inside your chest. You took a deep breath and took another step, and then another. The metal liquid surrounded you completely, and suddenly you were somewhere else. 

You were falling, and then you crashed onto a mattress. Avis and Silas were there. 

“Mum,” you said, tears prickling your eyes. “Mom, you’re here!” 

“Look what you’ve done!” She said angrily at Silas, “She’s crying.” 

“No! No, I’m–” She looked younger, far younger than you remembered, far younger than she’d been when your chimaera swallowed her. 

“She can barely speak.” 

“She must learn! She must become stronger! If she wants to survive she–” 

“Silas!” 

You knew what this was, you didn’t want to see it. You stood up in an instant, “It’s fine, I’ll go to my room,” you said before exiting the living room as far as you could. You locked yourself in one of the closets, and things were calm only for a second. The doors opened, your room was different, and you, or another version of you was there, writing something furiously on some parchment, bunching it up and throwing it on the side. 

Regulus’ letter was on your bed, you walked towards it and picked it up, you now knew what it said, how much heartache would have been spared if only you had given Reggie a chance. “Read it,” you told her. 

She turned to you, tears in her eyes and a scornful smile, “you have no business here,” she replied, snatched the letter from your hands and threw it towards the fire. 

She watched it burn with a tear sliding down her cheek and then went back to writing the letter she was working on, you looked over her shoulder “Sirius, This is the last letter I write. I’m sorry for…” you knew exactly what she was writing, what you had written. 

You sighed, and walked toward the door, next thing you knew, you were in the shack. Remus had a cloak, and he was panicking, looking at the bIood in his hands, breath sharp and desperately looking at James and Peter. 

“Where is she?” He asked, you could hear the desperate crack in his voice. 

“She’s okay, she’s with Sirius,” James said with ease. Peter was looking at the broken metal door with a confused face, and trying to place it back into place with a spell. 

“Don’t lie to me,” he pressed, there were tears prickling in his eyes, he looked livid and terribly upset. “This is her bIood,” Remus said, his voice breaking near the end. “It smells like her!” 

James licked his lips and took a deep breath. “Yes, you accidentally scratched, nothing else. You know,” he said. “You remember.” 

“No, I–” Remus breathed, he was entirely forlorn.  He frowned, “I lost track of them! She was there and then she wasn’t and then–” Remus shook his head and sat back on the bed “–There was a fox.” 

James nodded, “She’s the fox.” 

“Moony was trying to bite her!” 

“That didn’t happen,” James reassured. “There were no bites.” 

“So, she’s okay?” 

“She needs to get patched up,” James said, “but she’ll be fine, she’s tough.” 

You wanted to walk towards Remus and give him a hug, to tell him that you were all right, that you would be all right. That it wouldn’t even be the hardest thing you’d go through in the past few months, but the scene dissolved into another one. Remus, James and Peter turned into dust, so did the room, and it slowly rearranged into a larger room. 

You heard the door close behind you and then turned to the only person remaining in the room. Evan. He stared at the door dumbfounded, a mix of hatred and relief evident on his face. You weren’t sure why you were there, and you were about to follow yourself when you heard a sob. You turned around to look at Evan hesitantly, a small confused frown knitting your eyebrows together. He was crouching down on the floor, face hidden in his hands and a stream of tears leaving his eyes. 

You stared at him confused. A part of you wanted to place an arm on his shoulder and tell him things would be all right –not that you could actually interact with him– the other part, the one still sad and angry about what happened in November was almost thrilled he was crying. But the first one won over the second and you approached him cautiously. 

He was muttering incoherent things as he spoke, something about Arkalis, about you saving him, about hate and compassion and Merlin knows what else. You swallowed, when you implied to his father that he was straight, when you manipulated Arkalis into thinking you had kissed his son to get him off Evan’s back you were just doing what you considered was right, you never expected for that to mean so much to Evan. Let alone break him down into tears. 

It made sense now, that he and Barty had helped, what you’d done there was a lot more than you initially thought, your simple, almost dutiful act of kindness had meant a lot more to them than it had meant to you. You had earned the help they’d given you, simply by being kind. 

You stood up, it was not your place to be here, in fact, you assumed Barty would be here soon anyway, for some reason you seemed to be surrounded by tragic love stories. You looked at the clock in the corner, and then you heard a scream. 

You were paralysed by it, your breathing caught in your throat, a small sob leaving your lips. You knew what that was, you knew who that scream belonged to. 

“No,” you whispered, shaking your head. “No, no, no,” you repeated, breath sharp and chest heaving. “Not this again, I don’t want to go through this again.” 

Suddenly Evan wasn’t on the floor anymore, he –or a distorted shadow of him– was right in front of you. Tall and imposing and as terrifying as he seemed that night in the forest. “Go,” he said, although it wasn’t quite his voice. 

“I don’t want to,” you replied, voice small, filled with anguish.  

The world around dissolved and you were back in the hall. Nina was being held by two wizards while her mom was being tortured on the floor. 

“I don’t want to see this!” you insisted. The door from the terrace where you were with Reggie was still closed. You were both still there, this was before you arrived. Nina was crying, and screaming and her mom’s jarring shrieks were even louder. You closed your eyes, but the sounds became even more vivid, louder and overwhelming, you felt like your ears would bleed if you didn’t open your eyes again. 

Bellatrix shouted, there was a blinding green light and then Nina’s mother fell on the floor with a hollow thud, eyes shiny and completely defocused. 

Nina let out a shrilling cry, something so loud and harrowing that you knew instantly what it was. The one you had heard from the terrace. Bella started saying several things, and you saw yourself leaving Reggie on the chair and speeding to the area, determined to do something, determined to save her. If only you knew that determination would lead you nowhere. 

The second you spoke, and Nina turned to you, the entire scene dissolved. Now it was your father looking at your mother after she’d been stepped on by the Chimaera, you gulped, his screams had been swallowed by the commotion that day, but today you were closer to them. In your father’s gaze, there was anger and desperation and he looked both irked and terrified as he held your mother’s charred body. 

“I’m so sorry,” you mumbled, tears welling up in your eyes as you saw your father filled with despair. “I’m so sorry, I just wanted to do what was right, all I wanted was to–” 

The scene dissolved again, now it was Nina taking your face in her hands and telling you that you had to keep moving. You looked completely appalled, desperate, borderline hysterical; but Nina looked at you with a loving gaze, a calm, lake-like balminess emanated from her celadon eyes as she spoke, loud and clear. It hadn’t felt like that in the moment, but Nina had spoken to you for several sentences before you caught what she was saying before she told you to look at her, to really look at her and then told you how it wasn’t your fault. 

The scene dissolved as you and Nina walked towards the window. The scorching heat of the Chimera dwindled and was replaced with an eerie coldness. Your heartbeat paced rapidly, you knew what was coming, and you didn’t want to face it again. You shut your eyes as the scene around you started to darken, “Please,” you begged. “I don’t want to live through this again, please.” 

But if there was an architect to this ordeal, he either didn’t hear your pleas or chose to ignore them. You felt something cold graze your cheek, and when you touched it you realised it was snow. You sighed, you were surrounded by hedges, the moon high above you, bright but nonetheless harrowing. You knew that moon, you knew what she’d witnessed, what you were about to witness again. 

Suddenly you and Nina passed by, running fast as Lucius appeared, throwing a spell and taunting you over the dеath of Cygnus Black. You fought, fierce and determined and strong. Lucius wasn’t all that great of a duelist, but you were weak, marred and using a stolen wand. Had he been any better you would have lost to him after the first couple of spells. Then he made the hole in the ground you threw a spell on him and started to repair it. Nina saw Lucius get out, she saw him pointing his wand at you, and then she saw something else. Something behind Lucius. Whatever she saw, you hadn’t seen it then and you still weren’t able to see it now. 

She nodded and pushed you, the spell hit her and she fell on the floor. You –the other you– instantly crawled towards her with a raw scream, the bright shining light was there again and then from behind Lucius appeared Evan and Barty. 

You were crying and pleading and telling her it would be all right even if the two of you knew that wasn’t true. You turned your gaze to the side, trying to avoid looking at it again, but then you turned back, tears streaming down your face as you stared. You wanted to see Nina alive again, you wanted to hear her voice, even if it was her last breath that you’d hear.

Seconds later you were crying and trying to use the wand to revive her, but nothing worked. You knew nothing would and yet you harboured an inch of hope that maybe in this dream, Nina wouldn’t diе, that she would wake up and run the hell away from that hedge with you. 

Barty approached you and tried to pry you off Nina’s body for a few minutes before he actually managed to do it. Nina became butterflies and you saw one of them lean closer to you, to the real you, not the dream you crying on the floor; but the spectator of it all. 

“Nina,” you whispered, the butterfly batted her wings and flew along the rest of them. 

The scene dissolved and you saw Sirius, he was in what you quickly recognised as James’ bathroom. He was on the floor and panicking. He was saying something about it not being a dream and about you being in danger. 

“It was real, and she’s alone, in the snow, pretty much passed out, we have to do something. Maybe I can apparate there or–”  

“You’ll splinch.” 

“Damn it, James!” Sirius snapped. “I can’t just sit here and do nothing!” 

He looked absolutely desperate, terrified, you wanted to hug him and tell him things would be all right but then James spoke. “Remus!” he said. The scene dissolved again. Now it was Remus running through the shack, looking at the fence and then at the window you had used to save the butterfly. He ran through the snow, desperate, out of breath until he found you. 

You had been too numb to see his reactions, but when he touched you, with that tenderness that he managed to always pull off, you saw how scared he was, as terrified as Sirius as he pressed his hand onto your face and realised how cold you were. He had stuttered several times until he managed to get proper words out, he carried you. And then, just as he apparated away, the scene dissolved. 

This time it took longer for the next scene to appear, all of the mist around you changing colour and slowly solidifying into something else. It was you and Sirius, in the Potter’s kitchen. You sucked in a breath. The entire scene passed over, how you asked Sirius if he liked Remus, how you told him you would leave, and how he begged you not to do it. 

Sirius’ tears were gut-wrenching, you wanted to run and hug him and hit the person who had made him cry like that. The problem was, it had been you, you had been the one to make his eyes well up in tears, the one to make his voice crumble, and the one to cause him all of that distress. 

You held back the tears, “I get it!” you said loud and clear, your voice heavy with emotion you tried to conceal. 

“I get it!” you repeated as you turned around. “I cause despair, I’m the source of it on everyone around me, people cry because of me, people diе because of me! Is that what you wanted to hear?” 

Nothing, absolute silence. The scene in front of you, of Sirius plopping down on the floor with tears in his eyes, of Sirius crying and in distress, was there, and then it wasn’t. It dissolved, leaving you in an eerie nothingness. It was so vast you weren’t sure where it started and where it ended, there was silence, and it was cold. Not as cold as the snow but cold enough to send a chill down your spine. 

It felt like you were not only alone but forsaken. 

“You get it,” an echoing voice rang in your head.

“She thinks she does,” another said.

“She’s wrong and she’s right and she’s confused, and so, so alone,” a third voice said, mocking pity on every word. 

You looked around, but there was no one, the voices seemed to slam directly onto your head.

“But you don’t have to be,” the first voice said.

You did not like where this was going. You had read plenty of ghost stories, any offer too good to be true was probably laden with some secret evil. This place, the entire trial felt exactly like a horror story. And yet you felt so lonely, that you listened. 

“There’s rock,” the second voice said.

“It will help you bring me back, my love,” you froze, it was your mother’s voice. You turned around, tears welled up in your eyes as you saw her. It was not your mum, but the charred remnants of her that the Chimera had left, but it had her voice, and it had her eyes, your eyes.  

Your breath hitched in your throat, your heart hammered in your chest as you looked at her. Trying to think of a way to help her. You were walking towards her when there was another voice from behind you. 

“You can bring us back.” 

You sobbed and turned around, you had recognized her voice, you had missed that voice, a tear rolled down your cheek as you looked at her. She was as you remembered, cheeks pink with the cold and blonde waves stained with crimson. She was looking at you like you were the last hope she had, the one thing that would stop her from despair. 

“Nina,” you said, voice so quiet it was almost a whisper, you sniffed as you tried to breathe. 

She smiled, the smile you knew so well to be hers. “With this,” she said softly and extended her hand towards you. “Spin the stone three times, and we’ll be back.” 

She extended her hand, she was holding a ring in between her fingers. You looked at the ring, you were hesitant, but you took it. Her hands felt like Nina’s, but cold. You looked at the ring, a dubious frown accompanied your sniffing. 

“Spin it three times and bring them back,” one of the voices said. 

“Bring us back,” both Nina and your mother said at the same time. 

“You will bring me back, won’t you?” Nina asked, her voice soft, hopeful. 

A stone that can bring someone back from the dеad if you spin it three times. “It’s a Dеathly Hallow,” you said in a soft, surprised exhale. 

“It is, dear,” your mother said. Her charred hand was upon your shoulder. You turned your head to look at her, out of the corner of your eye you could see how burned her entire body was, “you can use it to bring us back,” she added, with a smile that looked so much like her and so much unlike her with all the charred skin that you shivered. 

“Mum?” you said, your head cocked to the side, your voice nothing but a whisper.

“Go ahead, pretty girl.” 

“Save us,” Nina said. 

You tried to hold back the tears, but it was useless, you took a breath that got stuck in your throat. You had read the Tales of Beedle the Bard, you had read other muggle fables, doing it was a bad idea, and bringing someone back from the dеad was about the worst thing you could do to both them, and to yourself. But with your mum being charred and with Nina’s hair turning crimson rather than blonde, both because of you, you wanted nothing more than to fix your mistake. 

You desperately yearned to have them back, to hug them again, for their scent to fill your nostrils like it had so many times before, the light wood-like smell of your mother and the blue lily and lavender perfume Nina used to wear. The images in front of you, although faithful to the last time you’d seen them both were nothing other than a brittle and shallow reflection of them. 

The imitation was almost perfect, the slight ups and downs from the way they spoke, the colour of their eyes, the way their faces moved, the way the light hit Nina’s freckles. They were so similar it was easy to be fooled by them, but beyond that and if you looked closer, they were nothing more than a mirror of who they really had been, a frail reflection of the women you’d once loved. A projection, beaming at you from the distance, light shining from a dеad star.

You had read that once in a book, and you hadn’t quite grasped the magnificence of it until you too, felt it. 

“Darling?” your mother said, cocking her head. “Spin the rock! What are you waiting for?” 

“Three times, and then we’re back,” Nina chimed.  

“Are you not going to bring us back?” Your mother asked, it sounded angry. 

“Why wouldn’t you?” Nina said, her eyes welling up with tears. “I thought we were friends.” 

“No,” you said to yourself as you shook your head. “No, no, please don’t do this to me.” 

“Darling,” your mum said, her voice was that of a reprimand, cold and stern, she sounded more like Silas than herself. “Spin it now, bring us back!” she urged. 

You were taking steps back, away from the two of them but they stepped towards you as you did. Your mother was angry, even beneath the charred skin you could tell she was seething. Nina was sad, crumbling, cheeks red and stained with the track of her tears. 

“Please,” you begged. 

Nina fell to the floor, knees crashing onto nothingness with a loud thud, “I don’t understand… We were friends. I loved you. I was in love with you, why did you not love me back? If I were Sirius or Remus you would spin that stone in a heartbeat, wouldn’t you? Am I not enough?” 

“Nina,” you said. 

“I diеd for you!” she screamed. “I’m dеad because of you!” 

You stopped cold when she said that. She was right, and she was dеad because of you. You took the stone ring in your hands, held it closer to your face and touched the stone, tentatively, only with the tip of your finger. And then, out of nowhere, a small blue butterfly landed on your finger. You looked at her, it was the same butterfly you had helped enter the shack. 

“Have you also diеd because of me?” you asked bitterly. “Do you also want me to bring you back?” 

You put your finger back in the stone, but the butterfly got in between, not letting you touch it. You frowned as realisation hit you. That was not Nina, Nina would never say those awful things to you, no matter how many times you had said them to yourself. 

The butterfly on the other hand? The one trying to stop you? That was a lot more like the Nina that tried to snap you from your destructive thoughts back at Evan’s manor. Like the Nina that had hexed Bellatrix without hesitation to defend you, like the Nina that had pushed you out of harm’s way, like the real Nina. 

Nina whispered your name, and you looked up at her. “Bring me back,” she said. “I want to live again.” 

“No,” you said. 

“What?” your mother asked, the steady but furious tone you had come to know so well. 

“I said no,” you repeated louder this time. “I can’t help you.” 

Nina’s face fell to the ground, a tear streaming down her face while your mother stalked towards you angrily. Nina looked up at you, anguish and despair so evident that it was almost heartbreaking. “Is it because I’m not good enough?” 

“It’s because you’re not her,” you said simply. “She wouldn’t want me to do it.” 

“But I do!” She said distressed. “I do! I want you to bring me back! I want to live again! I want to feel the sun on my face and hear the hollow sound of the wind and taste chocolate on my tongue and see you.” 

“I can’t.” 

“But you kiIIed me!” she said desperate, her face morphing into an expression that you weren’t sure Nina was capable of making. “You murdеred me, I diеd because of you! Why won’t you bring me back?” 

“BECAUSE YOU’RE NOT NINA!” you shrieked, your voice breaking near the end. The figure pulled back. “You don’t know how much I wanted you to be her. How much I wanted to see her again, how much I craved to hear her voice again. But your voice, although similar, is not hers. And your eyes? They might be the exact same colour, but they don’t twinkle in the way hers did. You,” you looked at the charred figure. 

“You both are nothing but an illusion of who they both were, of what they were…And you could never be anything but. Because…” you hesitated, you didn’t want to say it. “Because you’re both dеad.” 

The figures dissolved in an instant. 

You crumbled onto the floor and sobbed. The nothingness embraced you like an old friend and you allowed your tears to stream down your cheeks in a cascade of pent-up emotions. All the denial you had forced through them, all the times you had blinked them away. 

You cried and cried and mumbled incoherently how sorry you were over a hundred times. Nina was dеad. Your mother was dеad. They were both gone, and they would never come back. You pulled the ring from your fist, you’d held it so tightly that the shape of the stone had etched itself onto your hand. You held it between your fingers and stared. 

Not even this rock would bring them back, even if it was a real Dеathly Hallow, even if it had the power to bring people back from the dеad, you were sure the price you’d pay for it would be far more devastating than the crumbling ghost of the person you knew that it would bring back. 

“Truth,” a voice said, echoing in your ears the same way it had done inside the dream.

“She saw past despair and looked at the truth,” the other continued. 

“You may go now, child.” A third one said. The reflective-like screen appeared in front of you. You could see the colours of the vault on the outside. You blinked and then turned your eyes back to the ring. You extended it right in front of your chest, holding it in the palm of your hand, before turning your hand upside down and letting it fall to the floor. 

“You won’t bring it with you, child?” the second voice asked. 

“No,” you said simply. “Something like this shouldn’t exist.” 

“Destroy it then.” 

“I can’t,” you said, you had felt the power within it. It was dark and dеadly. “You know I can’t.” 

“Then someone else might take it. Use it.” 

You let out a breathy scoff and then sniffed, your nose was still filled with snot from the tears. “Not if it’s unfindable,” you said and stepped out of the mirror. When you turned back to look at it, Nina and your mother were tapping at the crystal desperately. As if they too wanted to get out as if you were the only one who could help them.

You reached inside your pocket and took Nina’s wand in your hands. You looked at it with a sort of sorrowful look, eyes glassy with tears and then pointed it at the mirror. You took a deep breath, “Reducto!” 

A flash of light came from Nina’s wand and crashed onto the face of the mirror, turning it into shreds. The wand had worked better than any wand you had ever used in your life, as if she had been made for you. 

Unbeknownst to you, your spell hadn’t trapped the ring in the mirror forever, but rather, transported it back to its original place, Gaunt House. And it would remain there for years, until someone else, someone much weaker to the whispers of the dеad, tried to use it.

There's no chance for us

It's all decided for us

This world has only one sweet moment set aside for us

Who wants to live forever

Who dares to love forever

Oh oo woh, when love must diе

Series Masterlist | Next Chapter

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A/N: I questioned myself for making them suffer so much while revising this chapter. Some of Sirius' words are just heart wrenching to me, I swear <3

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