#this is aimed at edith

[conjectureand-gloom]

i hope all aroace people had a great totally normal day and it wasn’t too insufferable surrounded by idiots in love

[nelson-riddle-me-this]

Edith head forgot the accent mark in discothèque. SLOPPY!

[danthekickingman]

It's true her muscles waxed sore, and sweat stung behind her bandages. Nevertheless, Edith gave an order to fight this mercenary, and if she were to redeem any pride lost then pushing every limit was necessary. And so Beatrix stood to her feet again.

He wasn't surprised. There was an undeniable fire behind her gaze, present there since the moment they’d first faced off. It was relentless - fierce.

Familiar.

He raised his weapons in preparation, taking a few paces to one side as he regarded the warrior before him.

She wasn’t done yet.

Naturally, then, neither was he.

With a sudden move he closed the distance between them, keeping his weapons in position to deflect a counter while readying his own attack. Given her skill with the blade, there was a good chance she’d already begun picking out patterns within his style. He’d have to mix things up if he wished to regain the upper hand.

Taking the thought into action, the kick that followed came from an entirely new angle - a swift, heavy strike aimed straight at her head.

[poisonandpages]

Watching the new Caped Crusader series and it's good but unfortunately a franchise as big and as subject to reboots as Batman can't avoid comparison between versions. So what I'm getting is that this version of Bruce is as green and as grim as Pattinson's Bruce, with the established social persona of Bale's Bruce, and the overall tone is as dark as the Keaton movies. Obvs the vague time period setting allows it to take elements from the earliest comics and the art deco style of the 90s animated series, but it's also clearly inspired by the heavier noir & gangster films of the mid 20th century so it's altogether on that line between fantastical superhero story and realistic crime drama. With a couple of added twists to make it stand out as unique. It's a really interesting approach and I've still a lot to watch but it seems to be doing a better job of certain other grimdark Batman stories I've seen or read.

[vaida-talks-about-everything]

Kailman Legacy || 19: "Babygirl"

TW: Death, Mentions of grooming

Edith Dean's first gig began with unexpected tragic news, as Jada arrived telling her that Octavia wouldn't make it. Upon asking why, she somberly shared that she'd gotten into a wreck while in the valley and was killed on impact. A million different thoughts raced in their minds: What about her youngest, who's only just started walking? Or is her oldest overseas filming? How is Thorne handling this, especially since the two were close to divorce? Despite the weight of sudden grief for the loss of a friend and potential mentor, Edith Dean knew Octavia would want her to keep the show on in her honor. So, she swallowed her tears and a quick drink from the bar and gave it all she had, earning the crowd's attention, including her brother and his mentor, Noah John James.

Noah John, a violin fan, was overjoyed to hear her talent and sufficiently impressed. Meanwhile, Emerson was happy to see his sister in her element, as he hadn't seen her play in quite a while. He eagerly introduced her to those he'd met in Chestnut Ridge, with both Amberleigh and Abigail already being fans of hers from social media. The girls asked for photos, which Edith Dean happily obliged and became the fixation of Albert, who was immediately taken with the older, beautiful musician. While he was plenty cute, a guy fresh out of high school was the furthest from her type, and she took the compliments in stride.

However, Edith Dean made her way to Noah John, as he was much more in her wheelhouse. Similarly disinterested, he was flattered by her confident approach and let her down gently. She wasn't too hurt, as she knew full well another fling wouldn't do her much good, and to have one with her brother's mentor would only lead to awkwardness and drama. Despite her best efforts, that would soon come when she heard the affectionate name she'd been called by only one man.

"Hey babygirl."

Frozen where she stood, Edith Dean breathed and turned to meet the eyes of that man, Wendell Verbeek. Her stomach was in knots, reminded of her youth, her eager innocence, and his sly, honey-dipped compliments shared when she was most tender-hearted and felt invisible. She gestured for the two to go outside and talk, unsure what would come of his conversation. No one in her entire family, let alone Emerson, knew about the two of them and she had every intention of taking that to her grave. He was her biggest regret.

"I made it perfectly clear I wanted nothing to do with you."

"I remember. But do you remember how good we had it?"

"No. And I have no interest in walkin' down memory lane with you. We're done and have been for years.

"Edie, come on, don't be like that. We had our fun; you were the most perfect girl I'd ever met, and still are."

"Am I, or am I the only one who kept you secret?"

Wendell continued talking in circles until Edith Dean simply couldn't muster the energy for it any longer. Realizing he would get nowhere, he abandoned his pursuit of her for the night. She thought of Albert, who was only a few years older than she was when she met Wendell. While in an entirely different situation, she could never think of him more than her little brother's friend. She wasn't like the man she considered the death of her innocence, but still, the ghost of what they were to each other lingered on her skin like fingerprints she couldn't wipe off, and it ruined an otherwise decent night.

Meanwhile, Jada remained by the speakers, snapping photos of the two's conversation, knowing it would be valuable evidence for another scandal. Edith Dean soon discovered she wasn't Wendell's last "perfect girl." Jada knew precisely who his current girlfriend was because she was the one Octavia planned to compete with Edith Dean for the title of country's up-and-coming star.

[ice-creamforbreakfast]

::Download:: (Patreon - Free from 13th of February)

I've managed to mysteriously avoid Valentine's CC up until this point, but Decade Themed Date Night won the Patron poll and I'm so glad it did, as this was such a fun set to research and create! I went for a 50s theme and aimed to make it look like Valentine's Day on steroids. No regrets.

Details below:

Flossie Dress - A sleeveless silk dress with a cowl neckline, bows on the shoulders, heart details on the skirt and a lace underskirt

Eugenia Dress - A fitted dress with a matching jacket and heart shaped pearl button details. Comes with a jacket overlay

Eva Dress - A fit and flare shirt dress with a heart print and piping detail

Burt Outfit - A short sleeved shirt paired with high-waisted trousers to represent the tax bracket your sim might pretend to be in on the first date

Eva Hat - A felted, heart shaped hat with a golden arrow pin. Comes in both left and right options and is hat slider compatible. I would strongly recommend using hat sliders with this so it can work with most hairs.

Elizabeth Hair - A wavy bun hairstyle with set curls in the front

Audrey Gloves - Wrist-length gloves with bow detail

Edith Earrings - Lucite, heart-shaped drop earrings

Lydia Earrings - Heart shaped pearl studs

[selfaware-bungou-stray-dogs]

Hello, for the event (congratulations) may I request chuuya, kunikida and Nikolai please. Were they are protesting reader (gn adult) from people trying to kill them please

Thank you 💖

If you were not alone

Part VII

Characters: Self-Aware! Chuuya Nakahara, Self-Aware! Doppo Kunikida, Self-Aware! Nikolai Gogol

Reader: GN! Adult! Reader

Warning: English is my second language

🍷🤡📒 Whoever were responsible for getting you four in Teyvat made a terrible job in pinpointing locations. Because, somehow, all of you ended up on Vanessa's tree.

After some struggling, you four were on the ground, unharmed. Unfortunately, someone of you scared Dr. Edith (you aren't sure, if it was the landing itself, Nikolai's jokes, Chuuya's curses, Kunikida's demands of " be serious, you two" or your attempts to make everyone calm down), making her ran away. Your first impression on locals already weren't good.

Still, it wasn't the reason to stay in the wilderness. You four decided to go to Mondstadt, and ask for help.

🍷🤡📒 The walk wasn't that bad. Weather was good, Kunikida was talking about what he knew about survival in the wilderness, just in case, if you need to camp outside.

Then, something strange happened.

You have met Chloris. You thought, that you got lost and wandered too far from Mondstadt. But, the girl bowed before you, and, with "Star born All-Creator, I was ready to go to the Cathedral, and gave you today's offerings! Thank you for gracing me with your presence. Let me gave you my offerings to you right now."

Chloris particularly shoved a bouquet of windwheel asters into your hands, bowed again and skipped away, before any of you can react.

Chuuya raised an eyebrow.

"Mmm... [Y/N], My Symphony... Do you have any idea, what happened?"

You shake your head.

"No... And I have a bad feeling about it."

🍷🤡📒 Good news, you didn't get lost, Chloris simply get too close to Mondstadt, that she usually did in the game. You reached Cider Lake in ten minutes after meeting with the girl. Bad news, you were 'welcomed' with a pitchfork mob, with shouts of "Imposter! You and your sinful servants will be purged with holy fire!"

Kunikida, Chuuya and Nikolai, probably, could ignore the mob's treats, if they were aimed only at them. But, threats towards you were the biggest mistake, people of Mondstadt could have made.

Kunikida stayed near you, while Chuuya and Nikolai were creating chaos in the crowd.

At the end, you four left, and Mondstadt city required a major renovation.

🍷🤡📒 Before you could leave Mondstadt region, Albedo found you. You get a lot of valuable information from him and camp equipment. The journey won't be an easy one. You wanted to left Chloris's bouquet with Albedo, asking him to bring flowers to the church of that mysterious Creator, but the alchemist refused. He insisted, that you should keep it. That that bouquet, prays, everything, that people brought to the church and Ivory Throne should have been yours.

You were sure, that Albedo was mistaken about you. You weren't Creator.

Right?

You will think about it later.

You have an Alice to catch with.

Four of you left Mondstadt.

__________________

Your friends saved you three times...

__________________

🍷You were in Liyue. You four were camping in the wilderness. And everyone were doing their best. You were careful. And you always have either Chuuya, or Nikolai, or Kunikida near you.

You and Chuuya were trying to gather food. While you were trying to catch fishes, Chuuya was trying to catch a boar. You don't know, how far Chuuya went, but, he was far enough to not notice Beidou immediately.

Claymore of Crux's captain was pressed against your neck. She bared her teeth.

"Got you, Sinner..."

Chuuya, with a loud yell, dropped from above, landing close to you. He immediately grabbed you, saving from the crumbled earth under your feet. Beidou wasn't that lucky. She fell down, buried under rubble and earth. You can see, how she tried to claw her way up. Still, it will take her a few hours to get back on the surface.

Chuuya picked you up, running with you towards the camp. The familiar red glow of "Upon the Tainted Sorrow" covered you both.

"Sorry, [Y/N], for being late. Are you okay?"

You nodded, leaning your head on Chuuya's shoulder.

"Yes. Thank you for saving me".

///////////

📒 Beidou's defeat leads her to have a number of serious injuries. It also robs you from the chance of getting to Inazuma. According to Xingqiu, you four had to travel in empty crates, hiding, until the ship reach Inazuma. And Crux's captain will be fine with taking shipping crates without looking into them, if Feiyun Commerce Guild require not to touch them. But, the team refused to sail without Beidou and other ships have stricter rules.

So, you went to Sumeru.

Everything was fine.

Nahida tried to help you. Collei went against Tighnari's orders to help you (Kunikida, as a 'thank you', helped her with mathematic).

And, yet, you were discovered. And gad to flee.

You don't know, in Tighnari supposed to be in Apam Woods.

But he was here, it was raining, and you had to be cautious both of his arrows and Bloom reaction.

You hardly managed to jumped away from the Dendro Core explosion, and Tighnari already had the next arrow ready.

Kunikida, who threw the next forest ranger on the ground, finally had a moment to grab a prepared list from his notebook from his pocket. Kunikida barked.

"Back off from My Ideal! The Matchless Poet: stun gun!"

With one hand, Doppo grabbed you by the collar and yanked behind him, with the second hand, he aimed and fired.

Electricity stan Tighnari, and forest rangers, that stood near him. Nearest Dendro Cores turned into a Sprawling Shot.

The commotion gave you four a good opportunity to ran away.

When you were somewhat safe, Kunikida checked on you.

"You weren't stunned, [Y/N]?" Kunikida was panicking. You reassuringly pet his shoulder.

"I am fine, thanks to you."

////////////

🤡After Sumeru come Fontaine. Melusines were real sweethearts, letting you four stay in Merusea Village. Nikolai with his magic tricks became a new star for melusines. Furina, who, with Navia, helped you with getting here, confessed you, once, that she would like to see Nikolai's performance on Opera Epiclese's stage.

Melusines supposed to keep your stay a secret. Yet, somehow, Lyney, Lynette and Freminet learned about you four.

Were it Freminet, who was diving near the village, who got a glimpse of you?

Were it illusionists duo, who saw, how some melusines tried to re-create Nikolai's tricks?

It doesn't matter "how".

What matters, that you were captured. On Opera Epiclese's stage, with Freminet, Lyney and Lynette not letting you escape. You saw people of Fontaine, sitting in the audience, waiting for your demise, for Arlecchino's and Neuvillette's arrival.

Yet, different people arrived.

In a golden-white tornado, Nikolai appeared. Chuuya and Kunikida, who arrived with him, fall on the stage, still not experienced with traveling by "The Overcoat".

"IT'S SHOWTIME! ASSISTANT DOPPO?" Nikolai's voice echoed through the Opera.

Everyone was stunned. Kunikida stand up, glared at Nikolai, but took a small MP3 Player from his pocket and pressed "Play". Sounds of "Entry of the gladiators" filled the air.

Chuuya tried to release you from your bindings. While Nikolai...

"QUIZ TIME! WHAT MUST BE QUICK RIGHT NOW?"

Nikolai, with a mad grin, disappeared again. With an explosion of confetti and streamers (they were probably made of documents, angry at Neuvillette melusines gave Nikolai), he appeared behind Lynette. He leveled her with a frightful, delightful roundhouse kick that made Nikolai's cape whip about whilst he circled.

"RIGHT! YOUR THINKING!"

Nikolai disappeared again, leaving behind confetti, streamers and a broken jaw.

"HEY, DRIVER BOY, WANNA GO FOR A MARRY-GO-ROUND RIDE?"

Nikolai grabbed Freminet by the legs and swung him at Lyney. Males collide with a terrific meaty smack.

Nikolai, with his makeshift weapon, disappeared. And reappeared in the audience.

Making several three-hundred-and-sixty-degree swipes, Nikolai sent people tumbling all around him, and then he tossed away Freminet on unconscious Lynette, jumping over the heap of bodies that were piled around him.

Nikolai returned to the stage, bowing.

"Ah, what a nice performance..."

Then he immediately grabbed your shoulders, take a good look at you, and hugged you.

"Are you okay, Birdy? They didn't hurt you, right? Should I hit them more?"

You quickly shushed him.

"Everything is fine, Kolya. You made it in time."

_________

And then you sawed them.

_________

🍷📒🤡 You knew, that Neuvillette and Arlecchino were on their way. But you hopped, that you will leave Opera before they arrived.

You weren't that lucky, so you four had to fight again.

Chuuya was a literal tank in your group, dealing with the strongest attacks.

Kunikida's stun gun made a good weapon against Neuvillette's hydro attacks.

Nikolai, with "The Overcoat" and, this time, with unconscious Luney, gave a hard time to Arlecchino.

You were tried. You wanted to go home.

Your emotions reached its peak.

Portal appeared under your feet.

______________

🐾 BSD Cast expected, that you four can be anywhere. They don't expect you four appeared in the barn. With two unconscious people on the floor. With Nikolai, hitting a strange woman with a third unconscious person. With Kunikida, aiming a stun gun at said woman. With Chuuya, protecting you from the said woman. And with a circus music playing.

🐾 It took time to calm everyone down, to find a place to lock Arlecchino and House of Hearth's siblings. And then you four start talking.

🐾 Perhaps, one day, you will return to Teyvat. You have people to help here

__________

Tag list: @withered-blossoms , @myluckymoon @cocodrilofeliz @c4xcocoa @vvyeislazzy @whisperingwinters @nervousinfluencertidalwave @ayameshu

[read-write-thrive]

edwina / edith in her lingerie as inspired by @hannaloony and @arisprite ‘s fanart !!! this one’s on the simpler side but I’m planning to do a companion piece with charlotte (and might do more with the backgrounds to really sell the whole “getting ready in their respective eras” thing, not sure yet) and hopefully doing something a little more suggestive with the both of them, again inspired by @hannaloony ‘s piece but using my own interpretations of fem!payneland w/ butch!edwina and fem!charlotte bc i love them

(side note: I know everyone is using Edith and not Edwina but I think Edwina suits my interpretation better for some reason ?? something about ppl hearing “Edwina and Charlie” and getting jumpscared when Edwina is the butch is funny to me,,, still undecided if she uses any nicknames but I’m open to suggestions lol)

previous artwork I’ve done of these characters can be found here: part one (original duo piece) ; part two (alt outfit for Edwina, Edwina sketches)

notes on the costuming choices for anyone interested:

- i specifically designed these undergarments to work under either of the outfits I’ve given her so far!!

- I decided on combinations as her base layer as they were seen as younger/more casual/athletic, all of which im aiming for with this design. technically these are probably too plain for the era, especially if she was attending a girl's college/finishing school where sewing and adorning and the like would have been taught, but I wanted to keep the masculine energy so I figured some ruffly hems and blue ribbon was a good enough middle ground

- the color palette is inspired by several reproductions I’ve seen online as well as keeping with Edwin’s blue color motif/existing palette

- researching the corset took AGES so here’s a rundown: I wanted it to keep with the casual/sportswear look so I went with a sports corset, meaning it wouldn’t have any hard boning (it was just the hella reinforced material without the actual bones/metal), would have elastic at the sides, and would most likely be an overbust corset despite that not being the trend during the Edwardian era (for the most part/to my knowledge). the examples I was inspired by of sports corsets technically didn’t have visible garters, but literally every other corset I saw did and I can't imagine why sports corsets would have to have the more impractical thigh garters ??? surely you also want to keep your stockings up when running around ??? so I gave them to her anyway

- im keeping the socks/stockings the same as my other illustrations but honestly i struggled to find similar historical examples :/ surely someone at some point wore some heavy duty knit stockings, but maybe my idea of knit is just different from how knit garments, especially socks, were in the era ? regardless im keeping them like this, especially since Charlotte has pantyhose on and I feel like silk/cotton stockings would look too similar

- i went back and forth on a corset cover, but ultimately went without one bc 1. it gave me a more interesting way to pose her lol and 2. i couldn't tell if corset covers (and similar garments that went over top what we have here) would have been worn with athletic attire ? like I have her in bloomers in both of her outfits thus far so I figured no petticoat or slip, but early brassieres/corset covers/bust improvers/etc are just a big ??? from me

- a note on her hair: so if you look at all three of my illustrations of her you’ll see that her hair is totally consistent and while I can try to say that’s intentional it’s really just bc I keep going back and forth on little details about it. for example, in the first illustration her ears are completely exposed vs in the second they’re mostly covered—the exposed ears read as more butch to me but also would’ve been pretty inappropriate and I wasn’t sure if that’s an area would Edwina would rock the boat too much, hence me going back on it in the second illustration. also, I’ve gone back and forth several times before on it her hair is actually cut short or if it’s worn in a faux/“nervous” bob (which I just learned that name for lmao). on one hand, having it actually cut short is 100% more butch and leans into the practical/athletic vibes. on the other hand, it would be a drastic move for a repressed, bullied, 16 year old at an all-girls school to pull, plus it would put her ahead of the trend by several years. in the end, I think of it this way: the Edwin that we meet reads as effeminate to a modern audience, but 80% of that is through mannerisms, not direct costuming, and even what we do get from costuming is skewed bc we are a modern audience perceiving an Edwardian subject. so I figured sticking Edwina with traits she could wear as either masc or fem but chooses to wear bin a more masculine style would shorthand that sort of how-you-wear-it approach to gnc (plus I’ve been there done that when closeted so it felt extra fitting)

- that whole rant aside: I went with the faux bob but, in the name of her being in the process of getting ready, wanted to show it in a half-done state that we would never see Edwina in otherwise ! the idea with the undone side is that she’s taken out the rags she wore her curls in overnight (I don’t see her using heat but if she did it would be before this) but only tucked half up before putting her corset on. is that the actual order of how you would/should do this? fuck if I know. I also am not 100% certain if the curl pattern/hair density is accurate between one side of her head and the other, but without an exact reference this is the best you’re getting

- speaking of things being out of order, I do know that if you’re deciding to don a corset anytime soon, it’s best to put your shoes on beforehand! especially if they’re lace-up boots like our girl here wears, as bending over in a corset to tie them is not fun. thankfully, she’s in a sports corset so it wouldn’t be too bad, plus she has to step into her bloomers so I figured keep her in her socks was the right choice

- there’s a halfhearted attempt at a background here with some dark wood panelling and red/orange/brown tones thats honestly just me wanting some contrast/interest while also keeping it simple. we'll see if i do anything more complicated than that anytime soon lmao, these pieces take long enough as is !!

hopefully tumblr doesn’t fuck up the cut (again) so not everyone has to read all of this, but tysm to those of you who do!! I put a lot of thought and research into these pieces and love sharing what info I find so feel free to talk to me about any and all of it !!!! and hope you enjoyed ofc

[theswordwrites]

PART ONE (the alchemy)

Juniper receives good news and has no choice but to celebrate with her closest friends, leading her right into the path of Aemond Targaryen (again.)

(TW: 18+ partying, drug use, nothing too crazy!)

word count: 4.3k

NEXT PART

By midnight, June’s feet ached in the heels required by her uniform. It was ridiculous, truly. The gala attendees barely looked at her for longer than a few seconds, so why was she squeezed into a cocktail dress that had probably been handed down a dozen times and shoes that made her calves tense and sore for days? As she ran drinks to and from tables, flashing her best million-dollar smile, she reminded herself the paycheck would be worth it. Her rent would be paid, her credit card debt knocked down, and she could finally buy the cat tree that had been sitting in her online shopping cart for weeks. Maybe she’d even splurge on a night out at The Velvet Throne with her roommate, Arianne, and their friends.

After a night working the Green Party’s latest altruistic-yet-off-putting kickoff gala, she would need at least four martinis and a cigarette. She had spotted Alicent Hightower, as beautiful as ever, gliding through the room in a deep sage silk gown. June wasn’t sure what the gala was raising money for, but they had raised a hell of a lot of it. She had to admit, Alicent was so stunning she might have emptied her own pockets for her, too. The Targaryen-Hightower children had made an appearance. The eldest—whose name escaped her—was drunk by the time the opening speeches began. Helaena had left early, trailed by three bodyguards. She’d seen the second son, Aemond, only from behind. Taller than his older brother, and surprisingly, not wearing green. Odd, considering the rumor was he was at odds with party advisors ahead of the election.

That morning, Arianne, Edith, and Seraphina had dissected the election over bagels and coffee. Edith claimed he seemed different from his father, with more progressive policies aimed at gaining the younger generation's vote. Arianne rolled her eyes and insisted he might put on a good show, but he was just as much a Targaryen as his father, with his scheming grandfather pulling the strings. “I’m sure he’ll say anything to get into office, and once he’s there, he’ll line his pockets like the rest of them.”

June had stayed quiet, editing her thesis on her laptop and mulling over her use of the word "delve." She had no faith in the system, nor those who upheld it. But she had heard a speech Aemond had given about student debt, arguing that education shouldn't have a price because knowledge was power, and everyday people deserved to hold it. It intrigued her—how young he was, and the impact that could have. She promised herself she would research more closer to the election and do her duty as a citizen of Westeros. Her brain was too full of edits and deadlines to give it much space now.

“June, we need more champagnes to the front table, like right now,” one of the other servers hissed at her, voice anything but subtle. She nodded and forced her aching legs to move.

At the table sat the Hightowers and their equally powerful, politically savvy friends. She spotted Larys Strong, who had served the late Prime Minister, looking as intense and off-putting as ever as he leaned on his cane. Jason Lannister's spray tan was a shade too deep, and June had to bite back a giggle. How could someone be so rich and yet so blind? Surely, he could hire someone to remind him that a few hours was more than enough.

She set the glasses down gently, adding a smile and a dragon-embossed napkin. June tried to ignore that Alicent Hightower was looking at her but managed a polite, “Is there anything else I can get for you?”

“I think we’re okay for now, thank you,” Alicent replied, her voice as graceful as her movements.

June smiled again, hoping her lipstick hadn’t smudged, and glanced around the table. The eldest Targaryen son sat to Alicent’s left, and next to him was Aemond, the current parliamentary candidate. He was all sharp lines and elegance, with blue eyes that were now fixed on her. June paled, frozen in place. Her gaze traveled from his silver hair to the scar etched over his eye and then to the gold signet ring on his pinky.

He was a Targaryen in every sense of the word, elegantly leaned back in his chair, hands folded on the table, eyes like steel.

The seconds stretched into an eternity before her brain caught up with her body. With another awkward grin and a slight tilt of her head, she turned—no, scurried—away.

Nothing embarrassed June more than feeling out of place. And that had been mortifying.

Back in the kitchen, she sipped water and fanned her face, hoping she wasn’t too flushed. She quickly asked the manager—an older woman with a sharp determination to break in the new servers—if she could take her first break. The manager nodded, and June didn’t waste a second before slipping outside. The cool air of a late August evening felt refreshing against her skin, drawing out some of the heat as she leaned against the brick wall. Her phone dinged.

TO: JUNIPER GREYSONFROM: DR. ORWYLE

Miss Greyson,

I apologize for the late correspondence. I have just received confirmation that your dissertation has been approved by the committee. Please call my office tomorrow morning to set a date for your defense.

CongratulationsSent from my iPhone

She squealed—a high-pitched, elated sound that escaped before she could stop it. It didn’t matter who heard. She had spent three years on that thesis, hours upon hours of research and writing and scraping by, and now she’d done it. Her fingers found Arianne’s contact, and she didn't care if the brunette was with her “so-not-my-girlfriend” girlfriend.

After a single ring, Arianne answered, “Junie! Are you off work yet?”

“No, not yet. Another hour, maybe. Do you have a second?”

“For my beautiful, smart, strawberry blonde best friend? Of course!” June could picture her now, animated, hands moving as she spoke. Arianne always had a flair for the dramatic—and for flattery, which June usually appreciated.

“It got approved! My thesis, I mean. Dr. Orwyle just emailed. It’s going to committee as soon as I set a date.”

Through the phone came another excited, ear-piercing squeal.

“Oh, Seven! June, that’s incredible! I knew you could do it!”

“I—” June stuttered, adrenaline catching up to her, “I think I’m in shock. I expected another round of edits, you know? The conclusion didn’t feel right on the last read—”

Arianne cut her off before she could spiral into self-doubt. “Breathe, Junie. You got approved! That’s the only thing that matters right now. Any chance you can leave early so we can celebrate?”

June glanced from her phone to the open kitchen door. “Give me twenty minutes, and I’ll be home.”

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

Arianne, Edith, and Seraphina were waiting for her with wide grins and a drink in hand when she finally stumbled through the front door. In the mere twenty minutes it had taken June to get home, they had somehow managed to drape a glittering “Congratulations!” banner across the mantle, fill the room with balloons, and crack open a bottle of champagne. The faint scent of perfume and laughter filled the air.

Her heart swelled as they swarmed her, squealing and hugging her like they hadn't seen her in years. "Junie, we are so, so proud of you!" Edith sang, throwing her long arms around June in a hug that rocked them back and forth. The others echoed their congratulations, their voices bright and cheerful, brimming with the kind of excitement only best friends can muster.

They didn’t give her a chance to catch her breath, herded her straight to the bathroom, insisting she shower and change. She let them fuss over her, laughing as they debated outfits, finally settling on something so skimpy it would’ve made her mother clutch her pearls in horror.

For a moment, June thought of her mother, a sharp pang tugging at her chest. She should call her, share the news— but just as quickly, she shoved the thought away, burying it deep. Her mother had been so distant since the accident, so different from the bubbly, over-involved PTA mom who used to cheer too loudly at every recital, every bake sale. It broke June’s heart, but it had been three years, and she had learned to lock those feelings away in a box that she only opened on rare, quiet nights. She was different now too—tougher, more self-reliant. Or at least that’s what she told herself as she swiped concealer under her eyes and dabbed on a thick layer of blush.

"Come on, Junie, let’s go!" Arianne urged, grabbing her arm with a grin. "The Velvet Throne is gonna have a line out the door!"

She barely had time to grab her purse before they were out the door, tumbling into the warm night air. The city buzzed around them—cars honked, street lights flickered, and the distant thrum of music seemed to pulse from every corner. They giggled like schoolgirls as they raced down the street in their high heels, their excitement infectious. After a few glasses of champagne, the ache in her feet had disappeared and she was ready to dance.

When they reached the Velvet Throne, the line was indeed snaking around the block, a mass of people dressed to impress, chattering with anticipation. But Edith, ever the charmer, knew the bouncer. With a coy smile and a flutter of her eyelashes, they were whisked inside and escorted up to the VIP level.

The music hit her like a wave, a deep, pounding bass that vibrated in her chests. One drink turned into two, two into three. The bartender, hearing their redheaded friend was on her way to becoming a doctor, poured them free shots. June held her breath, pinched her nose, and downed it, wincing at the bitter taste but reveling in the warm, numbing sensation that spread through her limbs. The music was so loud it seemed to drown out her thoughts, and for the first time in a long time, she let go.

She danced like she was weightless, the beat coursing through her veins, her friends spinning around her, hair flying, eyes sparkling under the neon lights. They were all in their own little world, a blur of laughter, movement, and joy. At one point, she caught sight of Edith slipping a small baggie from a man in a dark jacket, his expression unreadable.

Edith grabbed her hand, pulling her into a corner and shouting over the music, "Cregan’s at a party at the Keep! He said we’re invited." She opened her palm, revealing the little baggie with a sly grin. "I say we take our new little friend here," she gestured to the baggie, "and head over! Lots of sexy, rich men and free drinks!"

The girls cheered, their excitement infectious, and June felt a surge of adrenaline. This night was far from over.

The Keep was the heart of King’s Landing, home to the city’s wealthiest and most influential residents. The girls had been to a few parties there before, the most memorable being the one where Seraphina ended up spending the night with a Prince from Dorne. They hadn’t let her live it down for months, teasing her with “Your Majesty” until they were breathless with laughter. The prince had texted her the next day, practically begging her to hop on the flight back with him. Sera had only shrugged, saying that while he was amazing in bed and seemed like a nice guy, living in the public eye wasn't for her.

Arianne and Edith had disagreed, dreaming up all the scandalous headlines they’d make if they were ever involved with someone so high-profile. "We’d be the perfect all-Westerosi girls," Arianne had insisted, her eyes sparkling with mischief.

June, as usual, had just nodded and giggled along, content to listen. But now, with the buzz of champagne and a little powder still fresh in her system, she was feeling more chatty. “How did Cregan manage to get into a party at the Keep?” she asked, her voice louder than she intended, her words slightly slurred.

Edith shrugged, adjusting the hem of her skirt. “Old money, babe. His parents have a house there. I’m sure he’s got connections.”

June leaned in closer, her eyebrows raised, chin tipped playfully. “So, are you two ever going to date? Or finally address all that crazy sexual tension?”

Edith laughed, tossing her hair back, her eyes gleaming under the streetlights. “Ask me that tomorrow,” she replied with a wink, just as a car pulled up to the curb. She quickly touched up everyone’s lipstick and hair with a practiced hand. “That’s us!” she shouted.

The Uber ride was a blur, the city lights whizzing by in streaks of neon and gold. It took only fifteen minutes, thanks to the late-night traffic, but it felt like a heartbeat. By now, it was past three in the morning, and though June wouldn’t admit it, she could feel the exhaustion creeping in, the night beginning to weigh heavy on her bones. Still, she was committed to the bit, the thrill of the night pushing her forward.

Cregan was waiting for them outside, leaning casually against the wall in his usual outfit: an open button-up shirt and jeans that clung just right. They exchanged quick hellos, June’s eyes flicking to Edith, who was already batting her lashes and nodding eagerly at everything Cregan said. She nudged Sera with her elbow, tilting her head toward the two of them.

“He’s definitely ending up at your place tonight, I hope you can sleep through it.” June whispered, twisting the silver ring around her middle finger. Sera managed a quick eye roll before they were whisked inside.

The drunk crowd sprawled across the plush living room seemed almost out of place, like they’d stumbled into the wrong kind of party. The room felt like it belonged to someone who read classic novels by the fireplace or debated politics over brandy. June noticed a distinct lack of personal photos; instead, the walls were adorned with stunning artwork, pieces that seemed to glow under the soft lighting and made her mouth water with envy.

She glanced up, her eyes following the endless ceilings that stretched toward a glittering chandelier, so ornate it looked like it belonged in a palace. Above it, a second level.

“Who’s place is this anyway?” she asked, turning to Cregan.

He tore his gaze away from Edith, though his hand remained comfortably on her lower back. “One of the Targaryens,” he replied with a casual grin. “I play ball with Aegon on the weekends. He’s around here somewhere.”

June raised an eyebrow, amused by the casualness of his tone, as if dropping the name of one of the city’s most influential families was no big deal, “He’s the oldest, right?” Cregan nodded, “I worked their gala event tonight. Rumor has it he left early because he was smashed.”

An arm slid around her shoulder, the weight of it startling her. She could see blonde curls from the corner of her eye. A voice, smooth and amused, spoke close to her ear. “Smashed would be correct, little red. But I have sobered up enough to throw one hell of a party.”

“June, meet Aegon. Aegon, meet Juniper Greyson.” Cregan interjected, gesturing between them. The blonde took his arm away from her shoulders and offered his hand to shake.

June took it, taking him in. While he and his brother shared the same icy hair and serene blue eyes, there was a softness to Aegon’s features that set him apart. His nose had a gentle slope, and his eyes, though strikingly similar in color, lacked the hard edge she’d seen in his brother— but were identical to their mother’s set and shape.

Aegon turned his attention to her friends, his grin widening as he introduced himself. His blue eyes stuck to Seraphina as they walked to the kitchen. June withheld her giggle, watching Sera blush under his gaze.

The girls chatted and the boys eventually drifted away to find more of their friends, not before finding the girls cans of seltzers and bottles of water. June watched as her friends chatted, feeling that odd sensation of being inside the conversation, but also outside of it. She figured the drinking, dancing and coke had caught up to her.

“I’m gonna find the bathroom— be right back.” She gave her friends a tightlipped smile.

“Want me to come?” Edith offered, but June shook her head.

“No, I’m alright. Go talk to Cregan again, he’s been staring at you this whole time.” She nodded her head at him across the room, and he quickly looked away, almost embarrassed that he’d been caught.

The first bathroom had been occupied but what she could only assume to be the raunchiest couple in King’s Landing with the sounds that they were making. She scoffed, sure she hadn’t really ever had mind-blowing sex, but that level of noise was just so obviously unnecessary. The second had just been locked with no answer to her knock. She sighed as she made her way up the stairs, finding not a single bathroom, but a bedroom with one connected. 

After taking care of her business and washing her hands, drying them off on the fluffiest hand towel she had ever touched, she wandered around the bedroom. It felt wrong to snoop, but with the lack of trinkets or personal belongings she assumed it must have been a guest room. The bookshelf was full of classics and history books, a few well-loved first editions she could guess by the aged and worn spines. Now, in the silence, her head began to pound as the music faded away. She counted the drinks in her head. 

One at home. Three at the bar. Add two shots at the bar. One downstairs. Two lines in between. 

She realized she had definitely overdone it. While June enjoyed nights like these with her friends—welcomed them even—it wasn’t something she wanted to make a habit of every weekend. The way her vision blurred told her it would take weeks to muster the courage to drink again. Sitting on the bed, she ran her fingers over the dark green quilt and giggled.

Green. Of course it was green. Like the hand towel and the bathroom rug. She wondered if that’s what the owner of the room had told the interior designer, “Well, you see I like green. And I’m so, disgustingly rich.” She said aloud in the poshest accent she could manage, making herself laugh even harder.

The door swinging open seemed to sober her up quickly, pulling any laughter out of her chest.

She looked up, horrified to find Aemond Targaryen in the doorframe. He was wearing the same dark suit from earlier in the evening, but his jacket had been shrugged off and tossed over his arm and the first few buttons of his shirt were undone. “You.” He said, something like recognition washing over his face.

“Me,” June stammered, feeling a flush rise to her cheeks. “I, uh, just needed to use the bathroom and get away from the crowd for a moment. The one downstairs was occupied by a couple making the most disgusting noises, and the other one was locked—someone probably doing coke or something. I thought this was a guest room. I’m sorry. I should go. My friends might be looking for me.” She rambled on, the alcohol making her spill a play-by-play of how she ended up in his bedroom.

Aemond remained in the doorway, his expression unreadable. Despite leaning against the frame, he was still a head and a half taller than her. “You were at the event tonight, and now you’re in my bedroom. Stalking me?”

“You’re a very tough guy to stalk, Mr. Targaryen. I spent all night knocking on doors until Aegon let me in here,” June found herself looking down at her feet, the carpet much easier to maintain eye contact with. 

“So, you’re friends with Aegon then?”

“No, not really. One of my friends is kind of seeing Cregan Stark, and he’s friends with Aegon. We were out celebrating and he invited us. I didn’t realize whose house it was—or that you must live here with Aegon.”

“I don’t live here with Aegon. The place is mine, but Aegon thought it’d be a good joke to throw a party here.” He crossed his long arms over his chest, and June tried to ignore the enticing hint of skin peeking from his undone shirt.

“Oh, that’s kind of shitty.”

“Kind of shitty should be Aegon’s middle name. I’ve already kicked everyone out. Your friends might be gone, but if my driver is still out front, I can have him take you home.” He gestured to the hallway and began to walk. June followed, too tired to argue.

“You don’t have to. I can call an Uber.” She said, not wanting to be a bother. But she did think, in the back of her mind, that Elide would have a fit if she knew Aemond Targaryen’s personal driver had taken her home. Arianne would pretend to be less impressed, but would hound her later on the make and model; asking if there was a privacy shade and free champagne.

“Ride-share crime has gone up 10% last quarter, I can’t in good conscience—especially not to a constituent.” 

“Trying to win my vote, Mr. Targaryen?” She asked, grinning.

“I was hoping I already had it.”

“You probably do. I saw your student debt speech and liked it, but I’ve been putting off thinking about the election until school settles down. So I can make a well-informed decision of course.”

They descended the stairs. Indeed, Aemond had kicked everyone out, and only Aegon lay sprawled on the leather sofa. “Little red! I see you met my brother, charmer isn’t he?”

Aemond’s gaze was cold as he replied, “Go back to sleep, you oaf. I’m going to have Criston take her home.”

“Oh, I sent Criston back home. Oops.” Aegon giggled, clearly drunker than the last time she saw him. Aemond only sighed as they reached the door.

“I can take you home. I don’t drink, so I’m as sober as can be.”

June nodded, too tired to argue. The liquor made her pliant, and she was eager to get home. Aemond led her to a sleek black Mercedes, opening the door for her with a practiced ease. She found the gesture oddly intimate.

As he turned on the engine, the hum of the car snapped her out of her daze. She glanced around at the luxurious, leather interior. “You’re a PhD student at KLU, right?”

“Stalking me, Mr. Targaryen?” She peered at him.

“Aemond,” he corrected, his tone softer but still firm, glancing over at her as he handed her his phone, maps open and ready for her to enter her address. “Call me Aemond, please. ‘Mr.’ makes me feel old. I stepped out for a smoke this evening and overheard you on the phone. Congratulations, by the way. Dr. Orwyle is not an easy man to impress.”

“Oh.” June’s lips curled into a smile at the praise as she handed his phone back to him. She watched as the map popped up on the car’s screen, showing it was only a ten-minute drive home. “Thank you. I’m excited for it to be over, I think. You studied under Dr. Orwyle?”

She found herself looking at him again, her gaze lingering on his muscular hand gripping the steering wheel. “For my first PhD. He was a hard-ass, but pressure makes diamonds, and I couldn’t have done it without him.”

“Were you nervous for your defense? I know you do speeches all the time now, but I can’t shake the feeling that it’s going to be the hardest part.”

“Can I tell you a secret?” He asked, his voice dropping close to a whisper, as if anyone else could hear him. “I still get nervous. Every time. Whether it's a crowd of twenty or two thousand. But I remind myself that it’s not about me; it’s about the content, about getting people to listen. All the other stuff—the cadence of your voice or your posture—will come naturally.”

She hummed in response, her head resting against the cold window. The city lights blurred past, and she wondered if Elide had gone home with Cregan. “That’s good advice, thank you.”

“If politics doesn’t work out, my mother thinks I should go into consulting. Perhaps I have a knack for it.” He glanced over at her, his gaze intense. June tried to imagine the setting of that conversation. Was he worried about losing, or was the confidence from his team (or his family) faltering?

“You might, but I think politics might suit you better. The whole country seems to be buzzing about you.”

He shrugged, a flicker of something—appreciation, relief?—in his eyes. “We’ll have to see if that's the case in a few months.”

“Oh, this is me, with the red door.” She pointed out, and he brought the car to a slow stop. Before she could unbuckle her seat belt, he was out of the driver’s side and rounding the car to open the door for her. She found his chivalry oddly compelling, a sharp contrast to his earlier indifference to seemingly everything and everyone.

“Thank you for giving me a ride home, Aemond,” she said again, her voice tinged with genuine gratitude and something more. He just nodded, watching her unlock the door and step inside,

Juniper and Aemond failed to notice the blacked out SUV across the street, a long camera lens poking out of the passenger side, snapping away.

okay part one is out! I see this being 7-12 parts, depending on how much i daydream about it in class tomorrow. please leave comments questions etc! so excited to share this <3

[heavenlymorals]

Arthur's Redemption: A Reflection of the Dregs of Idealism

(Warning: Spoilers for RDR2)

Arthur's redemption is the reason why RDR2 is as loved and coveted as it is. It is the reason why it is in the videogame hall of fame and it is the reason why I'll never forgive the game awards for giving GOW 2018 Game of the Year instead of RDR2.

But what I find very interesting is exactly WHERE his redemption is aimed towards, because remember, Arthur never gives up the gang life until the VERY end when he has to confront Micah on being a rat.

One of the first things that the game tries to remind us of is is that Dutch's gang is different. It isn't savage, or heartless, or "as bad" as the other gangs like the O'Driscolls and the Del Lobos. In every single mission that involves robbery, the VDL gang either robs crooks, corporations, robber barons, rich people, slavers, people with fucked up political views, etc. Etc. That is what puts them above other gangs in terms of their reputation, alongside the fact that they, before the Blackwater massacre and before they got so desperate, would give away portions of their proceedings to the poor and destitute.

And the thing is, the VDL gang's philosophy isn't really different from what you see today, especially here on Tumblr. Kill the rich, eat the rich, tax the rich, etc. Etc. Only real difference, honestly, is that the VDL gang carries out those philosophies violently when we don't.

Does intense violence continue to make philosophies and beliefs just? That's ultimately up to you, I don't want to get into that discussion, but this is very important to take note of because Arthur's redemption isn't realizing the gang life and violence is bad, but by going back to the original thought processes and beliefs that guided the VDL gang. He goes from apathetic to passionate.

Notice the "redemption" missions of chapter 6. You forgive debts and kick out Strauss because he represents all the evils of money lending and usuery. Arthur begs Edith Downes to allow her to let him help her, but he doesn't want her forgiveness as he knows he doesn't deserve it. He teaches a grieving woman how to hunt and survive in the wilderness. He befriends a veteran and connects with the great American wilderness. He gives people his blessing to get out of the gang and ultimately sacrifices his final moments to get John, Abigail, and Jack to safety.

Arthur focuses on people and their personal lives. He focuses on their struggles, their dreams, their hopes, their stories, and just all the things that make them human.

Let's look at the debt missions in chapter six. There are three of them. Mrs. Londonderry, J. John Weathers, and Edith Downes. Arthur either comes to face with how morally bankrupt the business of usury is, which then relates back to the more political side of the VDL gang, which is the resistance of the predatory upper class, or he tries to mend the wrongs of being in that system without the expectation of forgiveness.

Those debt missions, though side missions, are super important to Arthur's redemption.

Other than the debt missions, there is also the more personal aspects of missions. Some missions are completely personal, like the Charlotte missions or the Hamish missions, while others are slid in such as Arthur lecturing John after blowing up the bridge.

Arthur cares about the people, the everyday people, and he loses his apathy that makes him violent and mean, which is where his redemption lies.

But the gang life? He doesn't quit that. He doesn't have any qualms, morally, about blowing up bridges, fighting against the government, the army, and anyone who may support the organizations that Dutch taught him to hate from such a young age. There is no guilt there. Arthur only has guilt towards hurting those the gang was originally there to help.

His redemption isn't him realizing what he is doing is wrong, and that the gang life is wrong. His redemption is him going back to the original ideals that Dutch taught him.

I just think that's really interesting. It also opens up a discussion on the philosophical nature of the blurred line between violence and Idealism, and whether or not someone can still be good whilst being on that line.

In any case, yapyapyapyapyap

[justinsentertainmentcorner]

Edith Olmstead at The New Republic:

Fans of 11-time Grammy Award–winning singer Dolly Parton came to her aid this week, in response to a tacky, homophobic hit piece published by a right-wing magazine.

The Federalist is a conservative outlet that has previously taken aim at Taylor Swift, accusing her of indoctrinating her listeners into man-hating feminism, a thinly veiled grievance about their inability to control the thoughts of young women. Now it’s taken aim at the Queen of Country herself, likely for much the same reason. The newest article took issue with Parton using her Christian faith as a rationale for her acceptance of all people, including those who identify as LGBTQ+. “Parton’s version of love, which includes condoning immoral sexual behavior, (be who you are she said), is unaligned with God’s vision for humanity,” the author wrote, going on to compare Parton to a secular leader spreading “false gospel.” Trying to cut down such a beloved figure and awarded philanthropist is pretty ridiculous, and especially ironic for a publication that previously published an article pushing for her to be the next president of the United States.

The Federalist’s Ericka Andersen went after Dolly Parton in her column, and she got rightly dinged for blaspheming the good name of Dolly Parton.

[dilemmaontwolegs]

Seven Seconds || Bucky Barnes

Summary: In seven seconds you see your entire future laid bare. Warnings: pregnancy, old age death WC: 1.5k

In seven seconds your life completely changed. 

The elevator door had only just begun to open with Edith’s voice announcing the level number that opened out in the common room where most of the team had gathered. Though you had not met all of the Avengers during your induction training, you had met most at least in passing as you were given a tour of the compound. This would be your last stop on the way to the apartment that would be your home while you stayed to train your precognition powers with Wanda. 

Noise spilled through the widening gap of the doors and you looked around at the lively group of people bustling about in the kitchen and dining space. They moved harmoniously between each other as they made dinner and drinks, like a family.

Past the kitchen lay the oversized lounge suite and the largest tv you had ever seen, Animal Planet playing on silent. There was only one person watching the Great White shark stalking its unsuspecting prey and he turned towards the elevator as the jaw of that predator opened wide for the kill.

Blue eyes connected with yours and a flash of pain lacerated your head as you stumbled forward.

–

One.

“Are you alright?” he asked with concern written on his face.

“I haven’t seen Bucky care about anyone since Steve,” Sam teased with a nudge of his elbow. “Whatever you are doing, keep it up.”

Sam walked off, leaving you with Bucky and you noticed the frown lines in his forehead had eased away along with the sadness that tinged his eyes whenever you looked into them. 

“I’m fine,” you promised with a reassuring smile, “it was just a headache but it’s already gone.”

“You should still get it checked out.”

“No time,” you said as you slipped out of his hands and straightened the lines of your dress, “we are almost late.”

Bucky took a deep breath and turned towards the venue that was lit up like the Fourth of July, though it was only fitting for the memorial of Steve Rogers. He had been dreading the moment but with Sam waving at him from up ahead, and the rest of the team waiting inside he could finally take those last steps. He had been dreading the event after feeling like he would never get over the loss of his one constant in his life but with the support around him he had the strength to carry on.

Two.

The vision came too late as you saw the man take aim at Bucky. 

Your scream could do nothing to stop the impending doom as the man squeezed the trigger.

Thankfully Sam had been keeping an eye on his friend and threw his vibranium shield out to ricochet the bullet away. The air in your lungs exploded with relief and you returned to focusing on the torrents of possible futures passing through your head, searching for the proverbial needle in a haystack to save the hostages inside the building. 

You trusted that those two would take care of each other and protect you while you had your own job to do.

Three.

“You like like her,” Sam stated before you rounded the corner to the kitchen. “Just tell her.”

Bucky’s cheeks were burning red and he shovelled another spoonful of cereal into his mouth.

“What’s happening?” you asked as you took a seat beside Sam.

“Well-”

“Nothing,” Bucky spluttered with a cough as he choked on his breakfast. “Sam’s just talking nonsense.”

Your shoulders dropped with a pout and you turned to Sam to get the gossip but he had already made himself sparse. You caught Bucky staring at you when you turned back and cocked an eyebrow at him in question.

“Do you want to go for a walk?” he asked with a quiet reservation that wasn’t uncommon when it was just the two of you. You chewed your lip wondering if you should tell him about the thunderstorm about to arrive and he saw the hesitation, clearing his throat. “Nevermind, you’re probably busy.”

“I’d love to,” you rushed to say as you saw him backing away. “It’s just, it’s going to bucket down shortly.” You pointed to the window that had been full of blue sky only moments earlier but was quickly darkening. “How about a movie instead?”

The shadows on his face disappeared as one of his rare true smiles replaced them. 

Four.

You were dizzy as you twirled around until the blur of the crowd came to a stop. 

Dozens of familiar faces and even more unfamiliar ones circled you and clapped loudly as you settled back on your feet. You broke away from the grinning faces to find the only one that mattered, smiling back at you.

The tuxedo fit him perfectly and the boutonnière of pink carnations were fragrant in the air, the colour of his suit a contrast to the white dress you wore. 

A wedding dress. 

Behind Bucky towered a cake as tall as he was and beyond it was a banner congratulating Mr & Mrs Barnes. 

Five.

“Bucky!” you screamed as you saw the blood trail through the backdoor and into the laundry.

Heavy footsteps thudded across the wooden floors upstairs before Bucky dropped over the railing, bypassing the steps entirely as he rushed to your side. He expected to find an alien invasion given the shock on your face but all he found was a few smears of blood, a half eaten mouse and Alpine proudly licking his chops. 

The scent of the dead animal made your stomach turn and you gagged as Alpine placed his paw on it before tearing another chunk of meat away from the bones. 

“Nope, can’t do it,” you croaked and turned to the laundry sink to upheave your stomach's contents. “Please get it out of the house.”

Bucky frowned in concern and pressed his warm hand to your forehead. “That’s the second time this week you’ve been sick.”

“And it’s the second time Alpie’s decided to get takeout this week,” you groaned, replacing Bucky’s flesh hand for his colder vibranium one.

“Are you sure it’s not something else?” he asked, his eyes dropping to your stomach. 

Six.

“Nat, no silly faces. Steve, look at the camera,” Bucky warned as the photographer made a final adjustment to his tripod. “Your mother wants at least one good photo before you go.”

The backyard was crowded with friends, celebrating the twins going off to college. It would be the last time you would all be together under the same roof until the mid-semester break but the ache of missing them had already settled in your chest. 

The camera clicked and you knew whatever moment it captured would be perfect; even if Steve was looking over at his girlfriend, Nat was sticking her tongue out, you had tears in your eyes and Bucky’s mouth was open with another warning to the twins. 

Seven.

Your bones ached as you hobbled down the hallway with a cup of tea in hand. Hot water splashed over the rim as your hand trembled uncontrollably but no matter how hard you tried you could not steady them anymore.

As you always did, you stopped to admire the framed photos that lined the walls to the bedroom. 

You smiled as you saw the latest family portrait to be taken at Bucky’s 169th birthday only a few months earlier. He had still been able to walk at that stage and stood with the support of Steve in the centre of the photo beside you. Nat flanked your other side and every other inch of the photo was taken up by the grandchildren and great-grandchildren that had blessed your life in the last 35 years.

Water splashed over the lip of the cup and burned the wrinkled skin on your hands. A small gasp of pain had you concentrating on reaching the bedroom and delivering the drink while there was still some liquid left in it. 

“Here you go, my love,” you rasped as you reached the bedroom but the cup slipped from your fingers and smashed across the floor. “Bucky?”

He looked peaceful in a way he had not for months after his body started to dramatically deteriorate. The painlines on his face had disappeared in the minutes since you left the room and his chest no longer rose with shaking breaths. 

Your chest tightened as you stumbled towards him and took his hand that was still warm. Darkness was creeping into your vision as you struggled to pull air into your lungs but it didn’t matter as you clung to Bucky’s hand one last time.

–

You were thrown back into the present and found yourself teetering on your feet but a pair of hands caught you, one warm and one cold. 

“Are you alright?” he asked with concern written on his face.

You blinked dumbly as you stared into the pair of blue eyes of the man you had just spent a lifetime with. But these eyes were different. These eyes held the sadness from losing Steve and the loneliness that came with self-isolating. These eyes did not hold any love for you. These eyes didn’t know you.

But they would.

You had seen it.

[numberonecodwomenfan]

Mama’s Boy

my first writing on this account!! im actually pretty proud of this, despite the fact that i wrote it on my phone in probably 2 hrs lol.

TW for mentions of alcoholism and guns

König’s mother taught him to shoot. Before he even thought of joining the military, back when he was simply Edie’s boy- “the tall one, not the blond,”- from down the street. No one in the small town of Heugraben bothered with his all-too-common name. There were probably three Lukases from down the street, and he had yet to think of using his middle name, so Edith’s boy he became.

Edith was a small, stocky woman, with dark hair that had begun to gray at the roots. Her calloused hands guided König’s fingers to wrap around the trigger of the BB gun he had received for his twelfth birthday. He had been asking for one- his father would take him on hunting trips when he was sober enough to care, and König, young, naïve König, still held out hope that the man would return one day. He wanted to be able to impress his father with his marksmanship.

Edith had finally relented, and after a lengthy safety lecture that König barely paid attention to in his vibrating excitement, Edith set up some of Cristoph’s old practice targets in their vast backyard.

“Your hands are shaking, little prince,” she chastised, and reached out to steady him.

“Sorry, Mama.”

“No need for that,” Edith scoffed. She maneuvered König’s arms to the proper position and flicked the safety off. “Hold it up so the butt is against your shoulder,” Edith said. König received an admonishing flick to the back of the head when he giggled at her phrasing.

“Ow!” König turned to his mother with a pout. “If you keep flicking me like that, I’ll have a hole in my head!”

“Hm, maybe if you did I could finally dig around in there and get the cobwebs out,” Edith knocked on the crown of König’s head with her knuckles. He grumbled under his breath and Edith chuckled. “Alright, enough of that. Hold the end of the gun against your shoulder.” König did so, and Edith nodded. “Now look down the barrel of it. See the bump at the end? That’s the sight. That’s how you aim.”

König squeezed his left eye shut and pointed the sight at the target. His vision was a little blurry up this close, but he didn’t mention it.

“Now what?” He asked quietly.

“Now you line up the shot, and shoot.”

König tightened his grip on the gun, aimed, and hesitantly pulled the trigger. The sound startled him a bit and he stumbled back into his mother’s chest.

“Good job, Lukas!” Edith planted a kiss on top of König’s head (though she had to pull him down by the shoulders to do so) and clapped him on the shoulder. “Look- you hit it.”

König looked, and sure enough, he hit the target. Not a bullseye, but he hit it. A grin spread across his face, all crooked teeth and chubby cheeks, and he turned around to his mother.

“Papa’s gonna be so surprised when he comes back- he’ll finally let me help him on his hunting trips!”

Edith’s smile pinched and she took in a deep sigh. “Of course he will, my little prince.” She patted König’s shoulder and tried not to let her smile waver, lest she ruin König’s hope.

His brothers were older- they knew Cristoph wouldn’t come back. König, sweet, shy, wide-eyed and cherub-cheeked, in all his childlike innocence, couldn’t possibly imagine such a thing.

But of course, Papa never came back, as papas tend to do. Edith’s graying roots became salt-and-pepper, and the bags under her eyes deepened. König grew into his body, shooting up like a beanstalk even more than he had already, and by seventeen he had reached a mammoth six feet nine inches.

He had finally realized that being Lukas G. was frustrating, so suddenly, he was König. His middle name was fitting, as he certainly looked the part of a king- a towering, broad boy, with a crown of red hair, courtesy of Cristoph’s genes. His baby fat had mostly sloughed off, replaced by muscle, but his Oma still pinched his chubby cheeks as he said his goodbyes. He leaned down, nearly doubling over, so she could kiss him on the forehead.

“Stay safe, little prince,” she said with a smile.

“I will. I promise,” König shouldered his duffel bag and turned to his mother.

“Don’t go growing up on me while you’re gone,” Edith choked out through tears, “Come back for Hanukkah. And call, or write- I need to hear from you, okay?”

“I know, Mama. I will, I promise. I promise.” König hugged his mother as tightly as he dared. “I love you,” he said, face pressed against her hair.

“I love you too. So, so much,” she sighed, “now go.” Edith pulled away and shooed König off, into the military truck where his future laid.

[precious-little-scoundrel]

Where can i read Both sides now? If i click the link in the old post you reblogged i cannot find the post :(

Alas, stupid deactivated links. Here, I shall post it anew for you 💋

Sweet like Cinnamon

Warnings and Summary: the entire theme of this is loving on Elvis’ chief embarrassment: his uncut cock. So, be warned, ahead lies body consciousness, savoring of foreskins, edging, talking to cocks, Elvis in subspace and bad safe word etiquette 😆 also suspend your belief that he didn’t get past this with multiple women before in the 60’s

Repost of an old fic

“Gentle now, no need to thump it, it ain’t got a spirit you can animate by kickin’ it like that.”

Susie huffs at him and aims another whack at the motorcycle’s exposed engine with her dainty hand, like she can slap it into submission. “Well then you try!” she whines at him and Elvis woulda done so first if she hadn’t beat him to it. After that he’d gotten distracted by watching the way her bottom looked in those jeans while she was bent double.

“I’ll do just that if you’d get up and stop thumpin’ it.”

“I am not ‘thumping it’, Presley, merely cajoling.” she points her little chin in the air haughtily and Elvis is filled with the desire to grab it between his fingers and shake it. She’d wrinkle her nose at that and all the little freckles on it would fold up.

“Mhmm, well, get outta the way Susie, let the ole man have a shot at it.”

“Good luck.” she grins and moves to stand up and he watches a little too long as she hikes her jeans back up so her tied shirt meets the top of them. He mourns the loss of that sliver of skin and bends down to take a look himself, conscious of her eyes on his ass.

They’re fair like that, Susie and him, he doesn’t watch nothin’ on her that he hasn’t let her watch on him. That’s what good buddies do, they don’t begrudge a mate. So he doesn’t begrudge her much when after getting the offending part off he feels the pointed toe of her shoe slide against the seam of his pants. It gets boring stranded on the side of a country road in the middle of the Californian desert, and little girls need their fun.

“Almost done,” he tells her, “this just came loose, s’why it’s rattlin’ like that. Didn’t help that somebody smacked, too.” he looks up at her out of the corner of his eye, making sure to layer on the patronizing airs so that she’ll break and smack him. She does, lightly on his shoulder and he chuckles and ignores the way the gravel digs into his knees and chalks up his slacks.

“We’re going be late.” she observes, and it’s not a whine, it’s just statement.

“Thought your landlady didn’t know we were comin’?” he grunts, working on the obvious problem he can perceive now, scorching his fingers on the hot metal.

“Careful!” she fusses as he hisses from the burn, rising to his feet and brushing off his slacks, readying to try cranking the motor again.

“You know what I meant,” Susie goes on, admiring him as he swings those long legs to straddle the bike, elegantly swathed as they are in pants tailored to the last inch by darling Edith, “This has thrown us off by an hour and knowing you and your propensities when in the company of little old ladies -we’ll be late at the studio. I’m calling it now.”

His face clouds over for a moment as he ponders the prospect of getting chewed out by the director for taking a brief and condoned break. Just to zip over and wish Susie’s landlady a happy birthday. The shriveled little munchkin was starry eyed the one time he swung by to pick Susie up, and with her son overseas it seemed the nice and gentlemanly thing to do, to use the break to brighten her day. The motorbike breaking down on the side of the road wasn’t part of the plan.

“I ain’t turnin’ back now,” he mutters, frowning at the horizon that wavers in the scorching afternoon sun, “They’ll find somethin’ to bitch about anyway, and you needed the break. Say, you alright with that? With playin’ hooky? I’ll tell ‘em it was my idea.”

“Oh hush now, ‘course I don’t mind and I’ll take full responsibility for myself, Presley.”

They both know he’ll get in between her and anyone trying to chew her out but she tries, really tries to take some of the brunt of the condemnation directed at them when they go off the rails together, lost in their own little world. One where midnight dancing, helicopter racing and practical jokes are king.

She cozies up behind him on the narrow seat, her thighs bracketing his famous hips and the bike cranks to life. They make it to Doddi’s birthday party before it’s in full swing. Susie spends the next hour and a half on Elvis’ knee as he chats with her landlady who informs him she had her son, the one overseas, at the ripe age of fifty five.

“Well I’ll be!” he whistles and that starts a very earnest discussion about modern medicine and the wacky new advice to cut back on fats. Doddi is adamantly against it, as is Elvis. Susie gets her opinion asked after awhile and she informs them that whatever they’re both doing now is obviously working for them. That earns her a ticklish kiss on the neck from Elvis and a sage smile from Doddi.

“You know something, Miss Dean,” Doddi addresses Susie, “I have seen you starring in three films alongside this man.”

“Yes ma’am!” Susie nods, they've got dynamite chemistry and Hollywood isn’t one to let a thing rest until it’s dead from overuse. As for Elvis and herself, well, contracts are contracts and just maybe they’d rather kill their careers alongside each other, out of anyone else in the world.

“And in each one,” Doddi goes on, “you begin as an innocent until finally succumbing. It’s a testament to your skill that you can begin again, three times at that, as a virgin with each new start, when you must have been plundered at some point in real life.”

Elvis had said something equally insightful to her ages ago, something about her doe eyes and gentle face making him feel like the first time each time. Each time they do a scene, of course. Because they’re just buddies. No matter if her real first time was with him. And a good costar is meant to make you feel some kind of way so that you can play off it. It’s just good sportsmanship.

Elvis pats her on the back as she chokes on her mimosa, unable to take Doddi’s inquiring gaze for much longer, seems she’s asking as to when Susie herself got plundered and it’s a memory best left buried. Blessedly, Elvis changes the subject with his typical, stuttering charm.

Drifting on a wholesome high, they slip out together, a good three hours and multiple slices of cake later. He’s pensive on the drive back, speed limit actually being observed and Susie lays her cheek on his shoulder to watch the thoughts flit along his nobel profile.

“What’s wrong, Mopey?” she asks him.

“Nothin’, jus thinkin’.”

Gloomy thoughts by the set of his pouty lips. “Well I want some breeze to help with this heat, so gun it, Presley.”

Those lush lips curve up at that, his shoulders shaking out his mood a little as a rivulet of water the folks around here call a creek comes into view. He doesn’t take the bridge over it, he plunges the motorbike down the bank with Susie shrieking out her joy behind him, gripping his belly for dear life as the motor fights to get them back up the opposite side without tipping them backwards.

It’s damn good fun. Pity their director doesn’t agree when they get back wet and a little muddy, hours late. Filming has been canceled for the evening, and choice words are had about tardiness and Susie’s poor delivery of a inane line of script she hates with a passion.

Elvis takes all of this with dogged sullenness, only biting back when Susie’s name gets drug through the mud. She succeeds at hauling him away and up into his suite, badgering him about helping her with the line.

They’ll end up eating too much hotel food and philosophizing on the how each subsequent film they’ve made has diminished in artistic quality. If they really feel brave maybe they’ll end up kissing, just for practice, just because they’re lonely and the other understands. And won’t hold them to it.

This time he disappears into the shower, a quicker one than usual and when he comes out in nothing but a towel, swearing over having forgotten his clothes, he looks like the proverbial stormcloud is hanging over his wet and sleeked back hair. Susie has got burgers and cola at hand on the bed and is ready for the mood to be over. She’s worn out, too.

“What are you so sore about Presley?” she asks, gently because he might as well have a sign hanging around his neck reading: “fragile! handle with care!”

“You wanna know what it is?” He grunts, rubbing at his face, rosy and gleaming from the shower.

“Yes!”

“I’ll tell ya honey, I’ll tell ya. It’s that I had a grand time with you today and yet I couldn’t stop thinkin’ about how if we would just stop foolin’ around then-“

“-hey now, it was your idea to fool around!” she protests.

“-I know I know, but as I was sayin’ I was preoccupied with the thought that I just wanted to get the next damned scene over with.”

“The one scheduled for tomorrow now?”

“Yeah that one. Another windshield scene.”

“Another what?”

“Windshield scene, honey.” he insists, a little hurt she didn’t get his meaning right away, it was the thing digging at him for awhile now, making him sore. “You knew how many scenes I’ve done where they’ve got a camera on the hood shootin’ through the windshield, while I’m sitting in the driver’s seat pretendin’ to drive while a screen flashes scenery behind me, and I sing a song that sounds a lot like the ones I’ve sang doing the same damn thing in the same damn movie before it? And I’m talkin’ just movies since I been back stateside.”

“Quite a few I gather.” Susie’s mouth sours in sympathy. “So, New Years resolution, no more windshield scenes.”

“Add jet-skies to that list.” he flops back on the bed and blows out a breath, making his lips flap with all the dignity of a five year old.

Susie has long since learned to humor him when he’s in this sort of mood and she contents herself with leaning against the wall and watching the long line of his body, bronze and sturdy and interrupted only by the stark white towel around his waist. He manspreads even in a towel and she is tempted to take a peak. She’d probably get spanked for it and tonight she’s unsure it would be a jovial slapping around, he’s testy and nearly looking for an excuse to blow up. Or pout face first into his pillow until he gets hungry -he’s shockingly petulant for a man dually capable of the occasional bout of astounding maturity.

“Eat your burger.” she nudges his bare foot and the feel of her shoe against his skin gets him to raise his head and give her a once over.

“Get comfy honey, you don’t need to be all in your heels and such.”

“Well, i wasn’t sure you really felt like having me stay.”

“Don’t be silly, lil girl.” he rolls his eyes, and sits up, abs rippling and scrunching as he hunches into himself and starts gnawing down on the burger. “This ain’t cooked enough.”

“You weren’t cooked long enough.” Susie tosses back and takes a seat next to him on the foot of the immaculately made bed, kicking her shoes off, and she doesn’t miss the way a pleased smile creeps over his face. He puts the burger up to her mouth and looks so expectant that she takes a bite and lets the mustard and onions and beef ruin the spearmint aftertaste of her gum. “It’s cooked perfectly.” she admonishes him and he sneers at her though his eyes twinkle. “Alright mopey! Nothing else for it, I’m putting on a record.”

Susie abandons him and he watches as she bounces up and across his sterile hotel room to the one comfort he hauled with him, the record player and its case of records. She flips through it until she pulls out the man she commits infidelity against Elvis in her heart with, night after night. Sam Cooke.

She messes with the needle. “Ooh you’ve stopped it at ‘Only Sixteen’ -you thinking about me when all alone, Mopey?” She grins at him so sly and knowingly that he rolls his eyes, and actor though he is he, he can’t feign indifference. “Thinking about sweet little me and how you came in and bamboozled me? Had your naughty, naughty way with me?”

“Don’t remind me!” he groans and flops back on the bed, half eaten burger in hand. “That weren’t my most upright behavior but I was left contendin’ against the sight of your pretty butt in those frilly little swim shorts and I-“

“-couldn’t help yourself?” Susie recites from her stance between his splayed legs, her hands planted on her hips and he really does adore the way she looks when she’s fed up with him. Her face puckers up and she looks at him determinedly, like he’s a project and she’s a contractor. Like he’s some human sofa she’s gonna refurbish or somethin’. Sends a little shudder through him and he braces for what she says next because he feels it comin’ before those red lips start moving, he just knows her that well by now. “I didn’t mind it Elvis, you were a bit boorish about it but look at us now, we’re the best of friends ever since-“

“-damn funny way to make friends.” he scrubs his face and tries to get rid of the mental picture of baby fresh Susie with her cheek pressed to the janitor closet’s door, and the feel of those frilly swimsuit panties shoved to the side and scraping him as he buried himself in her again and again.

“I guess I more wonder why we haven’t done it again.” she honest to god pouts down at him, half a decade worth of platonic hanky panky wearing her down.

“What!” he sits up with an ungainly flail and Susie relishes the way his pupils blow out and his eyebrow quirks in indignation as if he hasn't stared at her with intent written all over his face, day after day, for the last five years since. “What, hang on now Susie, we’re buddies you and I,” he gestures back and forth between them, his hand knocking against her belly as she towers over him for once, “we’re buddies.” he repeats as if he didn’t have his head buried beneath her skirt two nights ago. That’s apparently on the list of things buddies do for each other.

“Buddies can make sweet love too, Presley.” she teases.

“Sure-“

“And grindin’ and lickin’ and jerkin’ off to the thought of me does not give you the moral high ground here.”

“How did you know-“ he looks comically appalled and it’s too adorable a look on a grown man.

“You’re loud as hell, Elvis.” she giggles and he grips her hips and hauls her down to do -well, he’s not sure what he intended, he just feels like wrestling her and she obliges, probably had planned to trick him into this after all.

Her legs flail and she’s liberal with the elbows against his ribs and he grunts and huffs and slaps at her hands and let’s her wriggle enough to keep it fun, and this is why he loves her, she loves rough housing, she loves curling up with a book and she forgives him for a whole load of horseshit he’s put her through. Susie is a woman for all seasons and he loves her in a way, grappling with her on the fresh made bed as Sam Cooke croons:

She was only sixteen

Only sixteen

With eyes that would glow

But she was too young to fall in love

And I was too young to know

Woaaah

She was only sixteen

He gets her pinned beneath him and he leans his forehead against her forehead and gives her a heart melting smile that she savors through nearly crossed eyes. He slowly lowers the rest of himself to lay against her and they give into what they’ve been longing to do, lips meeting as they savor each other, ignoring the lasting taste of the burger and indulging in soothing each other with eager presses of kisses and long, slow licks with hands that cling to each other. He starts to grind against her through his towel, her jeans making him slide roughly. That makes her pull away with a huff, and it’s not her usual pleasurable huffing. Elvis can tell she’s peeved before he can even pull back far enough to get a good look at her exasperated face.

“Why is this teenage fooling all we do?” she huffs.

“Well, Lord honey, if that’s how ya feel-“ he gripes and starts to slither down between her legs, ready to prove her a brat, and maybe torture her a bit. Death by orgasm. It wouldn’t be the first time.

“No, no.” She kicks and rolls away from him in a move he vaguely recognizes as from the “My baby is a swanky cat” choreography. “Nope, Mopey, tonight is gonna be about you.”

“About me?” he deadpans.

“Yup.” She nods and her hands are back on her hips and she’s back to eyeing him up like a plot of land freshly leveled for a subdivisions construction. “But first dance with me!”

She grabs at him and suddenly they’re in the middle of a vigorous and precarious dance off atop the mattress. Sheets and soft down cause two of hollywoods most sought after groovers to fall all over themselves and each other, hands clasped in a good Spanish pose, arms stiff and bracketing each other.

Everybody loves to cha cha cha

Little children like to cha cha cha

The cha cha cha

My baby couldn’t do the cha cha cha

Elvis forgets the renovating gleam in her eye and those unspoken refurbishing plans for a hot minute while watching Miss Susie Dean as Susie goes

I told her one, two

Cha cha cha

And one, two

Cha cha cha

And up now

Cha cha cha

And baby back now

Cha cha cha

And turn now, cross now! Oooh

I taught my baby to cha cha cha

Hearing Elvis sing along to someone else’s music is an entirely special experience Susie thinks more people ought to get the chance to watch, but some jealous and longing part of her is thrilled she’s one of few who’ll ever see Elvis belting out to Cooke while a boyish smile takes over his face, and his hips wiggle atop his swanky hotel bed in nothing but a resilient white towel. She grips his forearms harder and fully unleashes the little girl locked deep inside her. The one who misses goofing around and who only seems to thrive in the company of this very seductive, very goofy angel of a man. His grunts and groans and moans and trills shiver right through her and she longs for him, worse than most nights.

He executes and guides her in the cha cha steps perfectly, even as their bodies wobble towards the bedside lamp and then towards the TV set, a broken leg always in the cards with one snag or trip in the sheets. That would delay the windshield scene for him.

It’s that melancholy thought that has her swaying up closer to him and holding his hips comfortingly as the record turns and

I love, love, love you

For sentimental reasons..

The way men wrap towels round their hips and flip them over and over into indestructible loin clothes has long puzzled Susie, but she loves watching the way the dark trail of hair on his belly disappears beneath the white terry cloth, and how the v of his hips rolls and pumps his pelvis into the air in a mindless sort of entrancement. As if hypnotized she leans her head against his chest and looks down at him from above, perceiving the outline of him, that part of him that’s been inside her once but she’s never actually seen. She trails a finger down his chest, pink fingernails scraping lightly and trailing down to the towel and hooking inside, tugging a tiny bit, just to test the durability of that fold.

“Susie.” he murmurs warningly and she’s tired of that and not a little hurt at how he rebuffs her offers again and again.

“I’m a woman now, you do realize that don’t you? And I’ve got womanly tastes. Just want to make you feel good, Mopey.” she speaks earnestly into his chest.

“Thumper, you know I prefer lovin’ on you-“

“Is it so hard for you to imagine then, that I might want to love on you the same way?” She lifts those dark and perfectly lined eyes to his beseechingly and gah, it makes it worse than anything for him to deny her again.

“I-I-I’ll m-make love t-t-to ya t-tonight, if if that’s what you- you want-“

“Oh good lord,” she throws her hands up in the air, “you’re so thrilled at the prospect your tone sounds like you just got assigned latreen duty!” she gesticulates some more and nearly wobbles off the bed doing so. He grabs at her and saves them both, but his towel is a casualty.

He clutches her close to him standing on the mattress, and she’s surprised by that, the way there’s panic on his face and how he seems to plaster the naked length of himself against her clothed form, as if he’s safer that way. Gone is the Elvis who loves to joke off an embarrassing or saucy moment, Elvis who shoots her a dirty wink when she feels him growing beneath her during a steamy take. Gone is ole Mopey who, as a grown ass man, still refers to his cock as “little Elvis.”

Speaking of, she can feel the chubby length of him against her belly and she goes to grab ahold of him, maybe she’ll squeeze him a bit and lead him around by it like the petulant puppy he is. She can’t fully enact her plan as only part way down he arrests her movements with a gentle but inflexible grip around her wrist, hauling it back up between their chests.

“Elvis, what on earth is wrong?” she cries out, craning her neck to look him dead in the eyes and resolve his jumpiness over her touching him bare, once and for all. For a smug ‘lady killer’ he sure does act like a shy boy when a gal makes a move herself. “Are you sick?” she whispers as the thought strikes her suddenly that maybe he went a little hog wild with a couple hundred willing fans in the early days…

“What?” his eyebrows shoot up, “what? Hell naw, Susie I-I-I there never was a good time to say this but I just. I never wanted to disappoint ya-“

“Oh! Are you one of those baby Bella mushroom sizes?” Susie hasn’t had personal experience with a tiny knob but has always thought it might be fun to work one in her mouth. It’s an idiotic thought to apply to him the moment she gives it a second thought; she had felt him when he first met her and took her in the janitor’s closet. He felt mighty big then. She had been nearly a virgin but still, it felt big. That couldn’t be it…

“S-Susie.” he stutters real bad and she can feel his hands flexing against her upper arms, kneading the soft flesh in his anxiety, “it’s silly really but I just- it’s that…” his eyes pinch closed and he takes a deep breath before blurting out on the exhale, “I ain’t cut, Susie.”

Cut. She thinks of the director yelling “cut” at the end of countless scenes. She thinks of the barbed wire he hopped over the other day that sliced him real good on the hand. Cut. What the- oh. Uncut. He’s got an uncut cock. Her mouth dries out before it floods again in anticipation and she can feel her eyelids growing heavy as she yearns. Yearns for him badly and it’s no artifice when she licks her lips, trying to formulate a sentence that won’t make her sound half feral. As if he wasn’t alluring enough, now there’s this, and tonight is the night she’s going to have her way. She’ll devour him for once and make him let go of that obnoxious grip he has on every aspect of his life from how his burgers are cooked to how all sexual encounters go.

“-nice little girl like you probably-“ Meanwhile, Elvis is adding some stupid and defensive commentary to her youthful crisis, “-mama couldn’t really afford-“ as she thinks about and processes how this impossibly smug and suave cool cat has a hillbilly cock. And she wants it in her mouth, down her throat, nibbled to a angry, cherry red until he realizes she couldn’t care less that he isn’t like every dime a dozen heartthrob here in the city of angels. Actually she does care, she cares immensely, so much she’s gonna wreck him to prove it.

“Oh god.” Is all she manages initially and her voice sounds utterly fucked out even to her own ears. That gets him to stop his dumb monologue on how he’s more than happy just to mess around in other ways, and he’d never expect her to deal with that. “Oh god.” she moans into his mouth as she seizes the back of his head and brings him to meet her lips again, his stunned eyes still wide and blue and open. And little Elvis is beginning to grow brave and firm up, poking a little at her belly.

It’s not a joke as her knees begin to buckle and she lands on them with a hard bounce, a puddle at his feet, sheets crumpled beneath her knees. Dumbly she stares in reverence as she is finally face to face with him and -oh god, he’s exquisite and unmaimed and his initially unimpressive size is swelling into much more before her very eyes. It’s like watching the primal proof of his attraction grow beneath her heated stare. She places her hands lightly on those strong hips of his, holding him close and savoring the way she can feel the muscle flex beneath her palms. He’s so sturdy and she adores that about him.

The fact that he’d have rather hidden this from her, her! who he admits all sorts of shit to, who he’s cried on innumerable times, his Thumper, his ungentlemanly mistake turned bosom friend. It makes her vengeful almost, not towards him but the image of him. She feels a wave of anger for him and all the glitzy weight that’s rained down on him since he first caught the eye of the sleek and shiny machine. Forever unable to just be. Always in need of a touch up or a rewrite, a second take. Tonight is going to be impromptu, even if she has to bully him into it.

Sweet Susie is taking this vulgar aspect of him better than Elvis had anticipated. In some ways, that is. In others she’s acting batshit insane, looking like a fever has gotten to her, eyes gone glassy and then there’s the way she just slumped down the length of him and is now in a staring contest with little Elvis. It’s, well, it’s a lot for a man to shrug off, particularly when he likes and respects Miss Susie as much as he does. When he would like to be at his best for her and is severely lacking in the basics of that.

“We meet at last!” he hears her whisper down there to little Elvis, and it’s so goddamn weird yet she looks so hungry that he’s spooked by it. The spike of fear rips down his spine and his hardening cock jerks in response because he’s a twisted bastard.

She presses a kiss to the angry vein running along the underside and his own knees buckle at that. He grabs at her hair for some steadying balance, careful to not dislodge the pretty pink bow still holding her dark locks in a windswept bouffant.

“Yeah. You’d better sit down for this, partner.” She grins up at him from down there, teasing his accent.

“Susie-“

“Nope, this is happening.” she’s back in renovating mode and his chest feels a little tight and he’s not sure what he’s so scared about anyway, it’s just Thumper. Maybe it’s because it is Thumper that he’s so queasy about it. She’s a tomboy sure, but she’s always so put together, dainty and proper even in improper scenarios, she deserves the best and hell! -he’s pretty sure her parents are devout Catholics.

He lets his legs give out and he flops on his back, legs spread and a defiant look on his face, daring her to admit she’d rather not. But she doesn’t even look at his eyes, she just blows him an air kiss and then she's back to making conversation with his cock and Elvis wants to die or go back to eating his burger. Or her pussy, that would be nice -but no, Thumper is a stiff necked mule of a girl.

She gets down on her belly between his legs and props up on her elbows, nose close to touching him, “You’re as tanned as the rest of him!” she coos to it and it wobbles appreciatively, the length finally swelling enough to hold itself upright.

Elvis is turned on enough to get stiff but disconcerted and untouched as he is, it’s a slow process. He can’t remember the last time he watched it take its sweet time to get up. “Has he been sunbathing you, too? What a vain bastard! All golden and gleaming, even his pretty cock is all tanned. Does he spread suntan oil on you too? Does he forget himself and start jerking you off? Lord, has he ever burnt you like the silly, forgetful boy he is?”

The feeling of her breath huffing over him and her blatant ignoring of the rest of him is working way too well. Pretty in reference to his hillbilly cock is a goddamn lie but still, Elvis hates that she knows him this well, and he hears himself make a funny noise as she gossips about him to his own cock. “I’m gonna call you Coco, alright?” she makes this pact with little Elvis, reaching out to touch him for the first time, gripping him steadily and Elvis forgets for an second that “Coco” belongs to him, nothing is there to remind him he isn’t floating off the goddamn bed, leaving only his cock with Susie to discuss and tease his vanity and silly inhibitions.

This funky dream state gets jarred when she slides her hand up catching the fucking foreskin and begins to pull it back, farther and farther as it ought to go if his weren’t so tight and fucking weird.

“Ouch!” he hollers, fully back to earth and starts to pull away from her attentions, but she looks so grieved by that he reconsiders and takes a steadying breath before explaining, “It hurts to pull it back too far, very far at all, actually.” he admits, apologetic because that would get the wrinkly shit out of her way at least, but she doesn’t bat an eye. She just keeps looking at that swelling part of him with heavy lidded eyes, false lashes fluttering wildly at the corners, making her look like a love drunk animation. He’s seen girls look at his face this way but Susie hasn’t met his eye in a good 60 seconds or more.

“Aha right then.” she gives a vigorous nod, “Let me know things like that, I wanna know what it is you like.”

He doesn’t really know what he likes, beyond his own hand and grinding and being inside a woman. He’s never had someone have their tongue nearly loll out of their perfectly painted lips at the prospect of licking at him: not once they see what they’re dealing with. Usually this is when the lady politely glances away, maybe lays back, suggests a change of pace, a slight adjustment in the script. Those are the ones who aren’t revolted. Once he’s inside a dame, they tend to forget he’s a hick child from Tupelo, or at least they forget the more unseemly, economic realities of that, of being too poor to get trimmed up like all his fellows. Just another thing to make him set apart -odd. But Susie now, Susie’s an oddity like him and as he watches her lick her lips and stare little Elvis down, he’s uncertain he’s actually comfortable with this much devotion coming out of someone who oughta be getting worshiped by him.

She’s still eyeing him up, hungry as ever, and Elvis starts to wonder if he’s got it in him to handle this, if he might have got a freak on his hands.

This thought process comes to a halt as she does the unthinkable, bringing her hand around him and smoothing the skin forward, up and up until it is fully stretched out and only a round little disk of his pink head and his weeping hole is visible. And then he watches as if in slowed time as she takes him in her mouth just like that, her insistent suction tugging the skin further into its natural state, a state long denied it when in this context and Elvis is very much afraid that if he were a woman the sound he just made would be classified as a shriek.

She politely ignores his hollering and drags her tongue around his puffy head, flattening it suddenly like some goddamn gecko, slithering it inside the hood to lick round his pink glans and it’s, well, -it’s too much of a new thing to feel at 30 somethin’ years old and his knee jerk reaction is to plant his foot on her shoulder and shove her off.

She catapults backwards from his shove, back crashing into the TV while wearing an unphased Cheshire Cat smile. He tries not to sob from the sheer amount of feelings he is feeling about it all, his hands coming up to cover his face.

Poor Susie, poor him. Goddamn it all..

He knows if he tries to talk now it’ll be nothing but stuttering gibberish so he waits for her to come and sit beside him on the bed, hands gently petting his shoulders and raking through his tidy hair, pressing soothing kisses to what parts of his face she can reach through his hands.

“Hey, hey Mopey, you’re alright.” she coos and he thinks about shrugging her off for a minute, his pride a little hurt but he never was much good at shrugging off a comforting woman, not since mamas been gone, so he pulls his hands from his face and wraps his arms around Susie’s middle, catching his breath with his head cradled in her lap. “This is why I love an uncut man, so, so sensitive, aren’t you? I’ll be gentler.”

“No one’s ever done that weird ass tongue wriggling thing you just did.” he tries to justify the fact he threw her across the room. “Did I hurt you? You ok? -Wait!,” he sits up suddenly and his mind is whirring from putting puzzle pieces together, “you’ve done this before w-with some, some o-o-other man?”

“Yeah.” she gives him a soft grin, hand rising to his face and her long fingernails scratch at his sideburns like he’s a cat that can be pacified. Maybe he is, for her he’s close to purring.

“When?“ he demands, feeling very fatherly or some such shit. He wants to kick some ass.

“Remember that movie I shot in the Italian Riviera?”

“You were playing some Roman empress or somethin’, right?”

“Yes, that one,” she smiles dreamily, “well, the Italian producer took a shine to me. And you know that most Europeans aren’t cut either.”

“Really?” he pulls a funny face, mouth folding down dubiously, disgust at the thought of some wrinkly Italian having touched his Susie warring with the fact little Susie compares Elvis and his hick embarrassment to some exotic mogul. “And you liked that shit?”

“Oh I prefer it! So responsive!” she nods eagerly, and they’ve had this same talk about pistachio ice cream before, and Elvis really thinks he might go to hell for having been the one to put that hungry gleam in her eye. Over cock. His cock. A sort of vicarious damnation

“Damn right about the ‘responsive’ bit.” he grumbles.

“Now,” she is back to business and Elvis is back to being scared and horny, their brief cuddle session apparently at an end, “I’ll be sure to be gentler and ease you into it, maybe even give you a word to tap out if it gets to be too much. But you, you’ve gotta promise me that if you really want to explore this, you’ll be good and not throw me again.”

“I-“ -he ponders that and long buried memories of highschool jokes, cameras in the milltary barracks and snide comments from costume designers crowd in, the stupid patheticness of a man of his success and worldly confidence having trouble with this-

“You man enough, Presley?” Susie’s sprightly little dare cuts right through the static of his mind and the truth of the matter is, deep down, he wants her to thump him like she thumps his bike. Make him like it, force him to let go for once. But like hell can he actually manage to say that to her doll-like face. “Or are you gonna be a little bitch about getting your cock sucked?”

Alright maybe he can.

Susie is all woman in this moment and he realizes his little girl has grown up, she’s grown up watching him, learning him, and now she knows him too damn well. He loves a challenge and put that way…”You’re on.” he grins at her dangerously and she tries to keep her triumph subdued, just a little bounce back on her heels and a fierce kiss pressed to his lips.

“Thank you!” she whispers against his lips, eyes up close to his and he can see they are very giddy before she finally pulls away from him, pushing at his shoulders until he’s laying out all vulnerable again in the crisp sheets.

Bemused, he watches Susie bite at two manicured nails as she takes his submission in. They’re the prettiest shade of pink and he’s been trying to find the right name for it since filming began. Elvis asked her over lunch one afternoon and she said she didn't know, the makeup artist had chosen it. All he’s come up with is “nipple pink” -and that didn’t do him any favors sitting in the canteen in tight slacks, watching her Bambi soft eyes go wide when he actually said it out loud.

Now she gnaws on them while sizing up plans of torture for poor “Coco” and he grabs the sheets in his hands as a defensive measure.

“You ever been edged, Mopey?” she asks him.

“Not, not like this, nah. Not this way” he shakes his head, sucks in a breath, deciding to pull his legs up and plant his feet on the mattress, feeling a little steadier that way, “I mean, I’ve held off for a couple hours before, in between rounds or, ya know-“ he trails off because, no, he’s never done this, whatever this is that she has planned. He is sure of it without even knowing..

“Ok.” she gives him a sweet smile, “Well I’m going to be nice about it, so you’re lucky, but if it gets to be too much let’s have a word or phrase. Because we both know that your whiny little “no’s” don’t mean anything in the heat of the moment.”

He grunts and quirks an eyebrow to urge her to go on.

“So,” her tone is entirely fake in its soothing, “so if you just can’t stand being loved on without getting all macho and taking control, all you gotta say is ‘I’m a pussy’, ok?”

Oh goddamn. What a brat. He growls at her and thinks about flipping her up and over, having his way with her until she can’t form a coherent sentence. But that would just prove her point and this is a competition now, not just sex. The stakes are as high as the time she almost beat him at the corn toss last year. “Ok.” he grits out.

“Good boy.” she murmurs and it sends a shudder through him that he doggedly ignores, wary of that floaty feeling she inspired in him a little while ago. If he’s gonna best her at this crooked little game then he needs his faculties clear. “You all good, Elvis?”

“Yeah,” he gives her a cocky grin and forces his hands to relax, game face on and smug smile back in place, “have at it little girl.”

He hopes she’ll shed some of her clothes and she does but only her stiff blue jeans. Leaving her in her panties and that white crisp shirt which is very wrinkled now. The pink bow remains in her hair and serves to really fuck with his mind, along with her sweet face settling back between his legs, and Elvis is man like any other and he really, really wants to cum at the mere sight of her

“Now where were we, Coco?” she asks his weeping head and his hands start to tingle and he gets a really alarming feeling akin to stage fright, so he digs his heels further into the mattress to anchor himself. She blows on the wet head and the chill makes it twitch futilely, about as fed up as Elvis is over being teased this excessively. “So sensitive! I’m gonna have some fun with you baby. That silly man has been hiding you from me hasn’t you? Real mean of him to keep a toy like you from a girl he professes to spoil.”

It’s vague but also keen, this feeling of being ignored for his own good. Like Susie has kindly decided to remove Elvis and his goddamn lady killer reputation from the room, stripping him down to brass tacks, unmaning him to hopefully rebuild him. He really determines to give it the old college try by forcing himself to accept it, to remember that this is little Susie who’s got him in a such a vulnerable state, and while she might be a stinker, she hasn’t got a cruel bone in her body. He makes himself take steadying breaths and focus on the way her tiny hands grip him and move up and down, never ignoring the hood, always incorporating it in the sweet, slow drag. The way she rolls his foreskin up and over his weeping head again and again is just the right amount of friction, like she’s been watching the way he does it himself and he can’t help but start thrusting a little. His hips flex on their own and his mind settles into the well worn groove of needing to finish, the: “fuck it, who cares I need to cum” mentality that’s had him risking plenty of scandals in public or with the wrong lady, just because he can’t stop once it gets this good. He can taste each roll and grip and drag of her nails, and he needs more.

He lets out a heartfelt moan when her mouth starts running up the crease of his thigh, and that makes her give him a responding one. He can’t overthink now, can’t object to the way Susie has started to lick the pulsing vein underneath, collecting the salty taste of him, moaning all the while like she’s getting a deep Swedish massage or some shit. She looks like she’s in heaven kissing his balls and he whines at that, can’t help it because she looks so defiled right now.

His thighs begin to quiver as her lips drag over his tightening balls, her hands along his cock feeling too good. She’s been nice like she said she would be, no more tongue dipping into the glans and he thinks he might get through this unscathed until her hands stop and she pauses from licking at him like he’s a lollipop, to murmur to wobbling length,

“Oh pretty Coco, you look ready to pop! So soon? You can, you know, you can whenever you want, but I’m not stopping after that. We made a deal.”

Elvis heaves a breath in and somehow it sounds as loud as a wheezbag. He holds it in hopes that maybe the tunnel vision he’s got will calm down, the sheets feeling very foreign against his fingertips.

“You ok you there, Presley?” Susie checks in, raising her eyes from his engorged cock to watch his flushed face, because he hasn’t said anything in minutes as his body grows more and more desperate, all he’s been giving her are pained noises and shocked little gasps. “If you can’t talk baby, tap my hand.”

“I can talk, dammit.” he snaps, “Just wanna cum.”

“Oh alright, we’ll get you there then.” she smiles at him, pleased with the petulant set of his mouth that she’s about to erase.

“Wanna be in you.” he tries, hoping maybe her jaw is getting tired and she’ll abandon this science experiment. “Make you feel real good, lil one.”

“Later. If you’re good for me.” she assures him, “Remember, Mopey, nothing’s getting you out of this but a tap on the hand or our agreed upon phrase.”

“Later then, I’m gonna ruin you.” He snarls.

She watches his face closely as he threatens and then accepts with a roll of his eyes and a head toss against the pillows, setting his face like he does when he just wants to get a scene over with. Poor man, he needs this badly, and Susie figures that maybe edging isn’t his cure, overestimation seems more like the ticket to make him lose his mind. His true mind, the one that needs to give in for an hour or two and let himself be wrung out.

With that ambition in mind she starts stroking him in earnest with one small hand, first focusing on the base until he starts to settle and relax. “C’mon, that’s it, you can thrust baby, let’s get you there.”

He gives a little nod and a moaning assent, broad and gleaming shoulders melting back into the bed even as those snake like hips start to work in earnest with her subdued motions. She spares her left hand to place it on his thigh, just to feel the muscle work, dragging her thumbnail on the soft inside. The scrape makes him shudder, more slick seeping out of his foreskin and dripping down his length and she figures it’s now or never.

He’s distracted with bucking up into her grasp and with his eyes clenched closed he doesn’t see when she props herself up and opens her mouth to swallow him down. Predictably the lower half of him jolts clear off the bed, shoving his cock further into her mouth and she’s ready for it, swallowing him down and keeping her teeth clear.

His breath catches before his voice booms with a plaintive, “Oh god, oh no, oh god!” His hands are shaking like they’re motorized and he grips the edge of the bed in one while the other restlessly roams his chest and throat in a strange and soothing sort of tick.

Keeping the majority of his length snug against her tongue, Susie does the nice thing and rubs her hands along his shaking thighs in a soothing gesture, humming to him with his length still down her throat and his neck snaps back so fast in response he looks mildly possessed.

“God, Susie, I’m gonna!-“ he sounds very worried about it and she’s not having that at all.

She rubs the firm line of his lower belly and takes him out a little so it’s mostly just the tip and its sensitive hood left in her mouth and she works him him gently, lolling him around patiently and she’s rewarded within the minute by his pleas coming back in high pitched whines, like the kind he playfully uses in his songs and it’s the sweetest recompense for her efforts.

“Where, where d-d-do you, where do you-y-you want m-me t-to-“

She pops off him for a split second to chirp, “In my mouth baby.”

Then she gets back to it, sucking gently and working the foreskin this way and that, harmless little nibbles to it that has him sitting up straight in the bed with a sudden rush of adrenaline. His belly shaking he’s so close but he has to watch this, has to see for himself that little Susie is moaning like a paid whore while worrying his extra skin with her painted lips. He starts shaking so badly at the sight of her and gratefully she looks up and meets his eyes right when he needs to see her soul, her doe eyes are full of nothing but assurances, lust and enjoyment. Disbelieving but incapable of anything else, Elvis has all he needs in this moment,. He takes his Thumper at her word and cums against the roof of her mouth in long and steady spurts, his strength giving out as he sags back against the sheets.

“Oh goddamn, little girl.” he groans and hopes he’ll hit ground gently because right now he’s close to the moon he’s so heady.

“My word Presley, you taste Devine.” she moans back to him as soon as she is done slurping him up.

He feels his cock give an indecisive twitch at hearing her hoarse praise before it starts to soften. He’s really quite busy digging his fingers into his eye sockets in hopes that he’ll stop seeing stars so he misses it when she reaches up to her hair and tugs the pink bow out, bringing it down to his slick length and wrapping it around the base.

Hyper aware of everything relating to little Elvis right now, he flails at the feel of velvet sliding along it and before he can crack his eyes open and asses what the hell Susie is up to, his freshly sucked cock is being subjected to the hellish sensation of a hairbow being cinched around its base.

Through the pounding in his ears he hears her sweet little voice mummering: “Don’t get soft on me now, ole man. We aren’t done.”

“For fucks sake, Susie!” he thunders and launches up in a sitting posture, just in time to watch her add the finishing touches to a pretty little bow at the base of his vibrantly angry cock. “Susie, I swear, no, just no I-“

“There’s a word for ‘no’ here, Mr. Presley, and it isn’t no.” she kneels there between his legs, transatlantic accent sounding very commanding and her hands folded primly as if she didn’t just force all the circulation to stay in his aching cock. “Dost wish to tap out?”

He glares at her, shooting daggers and vindication that has made grown men shrink before him. She just keeps batting those Bambi eyes and takes to trailing a fingernail up the seam of his balls and he swears he didn’t sob from the feel of it, he just took a weird sounding breath, is all.

Elvis is almost where she wants him, he’s alarmed that he has more in him, but terrified that giving in to her will result in him really letting go. She wants him just past that, in just enough pain to be begging for her to end it by helping him chase his pleasure again. His bottom lip starts to wobble and watching it closely she moves her fingernail with unhurried determination down his balls, passing them and to that smooth stretch of skin right behind them, leading to his puckering hole. His eyes blow wide as he suspects her destination and it’s comical to see the relief on his face when she goes no further, just keeps rubbing that smooth stretch of skin until he sucks in a deep breath from something other than nervousness. Too late he realises his mistake, his stupid worry that she was going to play with his ass blinded him to the fact that rubbing right behind his balls is painfully good and he wasn’t ready to feel this good, this needy, this soon.

Susie finds that watching his balls draw up snug against the velvet bow is really the cutest thing, they’re having a grand time and their owner is making incoherent sounds and hand motions that suggest he wants her to climb up on the bed with him, be closer to him as he lays back down, his body trembling too hard to hold him up.

She feels a great deal of satisfaction at having him so overcome, she has seen him performing and at play, he has astounding stamina and a shocking amount of toughness when it comes to pushing through that pain threshold. She can tell now that it’s that very gift that was keeping him back in this setting. He nearly sinks down to blissful surrender but that mechanism keeps hauling him back out like he’s getting waterboarded instead of loved on. But he’s trembling now, hands reaching for something and his eyes look utterly lost, he’s sinking and she’s there to catch him

Settling on the bed between his splayed legs she leans over him and takes a moment to soothe him, trace his face and swipe the tears she is astounded to find on his cheeks.

“I’ve got you Mopey, we’re gonna let you break free, together, I promise.” he clutches at the back of her neck when she gets close to his ear and she only hears moans from him for a while. “You trust me?”

His hand is shaking badly where it rests on the back of her neck but she feels him starting to rut against her belly, pain having been overcome by need. “Please, mama” he chokes out. “Please, I wanna be good.”

“You’re always good for me, baby. Always.” she drags her mouth against those high cheekbones and tastes salt. “You’ll be good and tell me if it’s too much, right?” She pulls away to stare him down, make him focus on her eyes and when he does they’re shimmering sapphires in the lamplight. Her breath hitches in awe of him.

“W-wa-want y-you t-t-to ha-have f-fun.” he gasps out and that is a different voice, one she hears when he’s playing with children or making voices up for the sock puppets. It’s a little boy’s voice and she’s sure now he’s gone at last. “W-want t-to make m-my lil Susie p-p-proud.”

“I’ve never been prouder, baby boy. I love you.” she swears and now is not the time for it but it slices through his haze and strikes him as just what he needs. He looks all of 17 himself right now and her heart warms.

“I-I know!” he cries low and anguished, and his lip really is wobbling in earnest now, lashes clumping into dark little spears, “You, you a-always s-s-show me.”

“I’m gonna show you now.” she vows, “I’m going to show you how perfect and lovely and beautiful you are to me.” she kisses down the length of his sweaty chest, his hands never leaving some part of her. Her shoulders, her hair, her arms, constantly petting her and clinging as she goes further downwards. “Wouldn’t be such a challenge to get you to be selfish for a second if you weren’t the most giving man on the planet, Mopey. Look at the production you made me go to just to love on you!”

He does look at his vibrant pink cock and the bow around it and the way Susie won’t suck it like a normal human, she keeps kissing his thighs instead and sucking his balls with loving devotion and he cries from it, unabashedly whining and whimpering from how horribly lovely it feels.

Minutes go by and he tries to savor the white noise in his ears, the pounding of his pulse and the feel of her smearing her lipstick on his sack, all the while dreading and needing the moment she finally takes his jerking cock back into her mouth. She grins at the way it’s wobbling and twitching, like a white flag of surrender begging for her terms, anything she asks for and he’ll give it. It’s shining in the lamp light as precum sputters out of it almost as plentiful as seamen in an orgasm.

“Oh mama.” he keeps groaning in between sobs and she rubs her breast harder against the top of his hairy thigh, nearly insane herself from the sight of him this wrecked. Suave and smug Elvis Presley is weeping and thrusting his uncut cock into the air, a hand gripping the strands of his immaculate pompadour until it’s falling into his face, all in hopes she’ll let him cum sometime soon.

“Dear god, you are exquisite right now.” she moans, uttelry moved that he trusts her this much.

“B-be good to me, mama, I-I need-“ he stutters out, voice shaky, switching course part way through his sentence, “-a-am I-I what y-y-you wanted?”

“You are better than my wildest fantasies, sweet man.” She swears earnestly before giving in to the thing he needs. And dreads.

He was right to dread it. When she does envelop him again, it’s like fire and lightning shooting straight up his spine and the ache in his balls resonates with the ache in his chest and he howls, ass clenching, trying in vain to pump out the seed she’s clamped off. She rides him with her mouth like a damn bullrider, going with him as he makes a bridge with his hips, his whole body strung taut in the moment of denial before slumping back again, eyes wild and chest heaving, unable to release.

His body is eel-like as he writhes in the sheets, svelte and lithe, undulating and seizing up in preparation only for the cruel hairbow to dash him back to earth. Susie is losing her mind right along with him, watching this morphing of a man into his most primal state. She tastes nothing but his salty precum and she rolls his foreskin around in her mouth like a chocolate, occasionally diving down the length of him until her nose is buried in his dark thatch of hair.

It’s suckling the tip that sends him wild, so she spares it often, making sure to give him a chance to breath in between her attentions, but there’s nothing more gorgeous than watching him shake and writhe with no aim in mind, gown dumb with need. The minutes begin to bleed for him and all he can think is that he’s being good, that he’s powerless and weirdly he takes some pride that his sacrifice, each shudder and burn of holding back, makes her pleased with him.

A shaky hand comes down to where she’s scratching his thatch of pubic hair and after a brief moment she catches on to his need, entangling their fingers together as he swims to the surface long enough to shudder and mouth incoherent praises at his lil friend.

“You’re a keeper, honey.” he pants, eyes glittering and his neck strained with the effort to hold his fuzzy head up off the pillow.

“And you, Presley,” she grins at him as bright and joyous as ever, “you look awfully pretty like this, mouth hung open, eyes rolling back. Coco downright weeping for me.”

“I-I-I’m glad.” he whispers hoarsely. “T-thank y-y-you, ma-mama.”

She chuckles, because even teetering on the edge of brainless he’s still a darling. It seems he’s forgotten he even has a need at this point, hips stilling and whines ceasing as he pants, his eyes wavering in and out of focus. They’ve finally passed that line and it’s just him and Susie floating here in white sheets while she tells him he’s pretty and good. She starts to consider that maybe she should start pulling him back up in case he’s forgotten the code.

Then the hand limply holding her own squeezes tight and he mumbles into his pillow, head turned away from the bedside lamp, “I needs it bad mama, please mama!” he whines, hand clutching his own hair and his whole body starts to vibrate as if revving from deep within.

“You wanna let go?” she whispers, spitting gently on the head of him, adding to the gooey mess pouring out of him.

“P-please, oh please, I aint gots it-“ he sobs, baby talk slurring through.

“You’ve been so good baby,” she coaxes, “mama is gonna get you there.”

“Need-n-n-need to pee mama.” He whimpers bewildered.

Good lord he’s so far gone.

She makes sure to grip his hand tight and assuring as she takes him in her mouth once more, tonguing at the leaking slit and his scream is deafening and on pitch, shifting into a wheeze as she yanks the bow loose and takes her mouth off to watch the fountain of seed that comes spewing out of him. His jaw works frantically and his mouth is agape as he tastes freedom and epiphany and trust and all he knows is that he can let go at last. So he does, his muscles locking up for ages, emptying himself and he’s entirely unaware and uncaring of where he’s spraying until he hears Susie’s shocked cheer,

“Mopey you’ve hit the ceiling!” and to his misery and relief her mouth comes back to swallow what he’s giving up, warm and wet and rhythmically swallowing down his spend until it’s making him frantic for nothingness and he cries out,

“I-I-enough, enough, i I like, no I- I I am a pussy! Goddamn it!”

She stops immediately and he feels nothing at all for a few moments. He might as well be dead he is so lost to his reality, numb and his sight gone until he feels her slide beside him, soft, small hands that he’d know even in death, gentling him back to earth.

“Can I quote you on that, Presley?” she grins and he only knows that because he can feel the curve of her cheek against his own as he shudders and relearns how to breath. “Look, you’ve ruined mama’s pretty bow!” she dangles soaked pink velvet in front of his face, and for some reason that’s what makes him blush scarlet.

He lifts his eyes to find that there is a glistening wet spot on the ceiling. Oh goddamn. He moans and gives into the need to burrow, deep deep inside of her, this nasty little girl who knows and loves him. He settles for pressing his face into her breasts, the near suffocating dampness of her flesh a comforting transition after being deprived of air by his own hyperventilation for so long. She obligingly gathers him in, throws a leg over his trembling body to bring him closer and he makes himself small and savors it. Nuzzling into her skin and pressing lazy kisses to her skin, trying to say what can’t be said.

Susie finds words first, “Thank you.” she whispers into his hair, “You just gave me a precious gift. You should have seen yourself, a force of nature, Presley.”

He knows his smushed face is blushing and he tries to raise a hand to bat at her face, waggle her chin teasingly but it just flops aimless and enervated. Gah he’s really wrecked. And sleepy. He grabs at her harder as things start to slip in mushy and cloudy softness. She squeezes back just as hard.

“That’s it Mopey,” she gives him head scratches and that’s when he slips away, downwards but it’s not into blackness, it’s into warmth, “drift off, I’ve got you. I’ll be here when you wake up. Maybe hold you to that ‘later’ you swore to me.”

[jtl-fics]

Foxhole bake please! Happy WW!!!

8/21/24 WIP Wednesday (Closed) | Foxhole Bake AU (2/10)

“As Neil begins his third attempt at a treat that even I, Noel Fielding, has made successfully before, the other bakers are all working on their finishing touches for their various dessert bars. Whether that be cooling them down,” the camera cut to an image of Sabrina Doyle and Edith Powell both rushing to the fridge to cool their lemon curds.

“Or heating it up.” the camera cut to various individuals who had chocolate over a double broiler.

“In the end, they’re all aiming to make our judges something delicious this week to really ‘Wow’ them since this will surely be the first elimination week.” Noel finishes his narration as the camera settles on Kimura as he works on hsi raspberry almond cookie bars.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

The ineffable Charles P. Pierce on truth and presidential health.

From the CPP Weekend newsletter:

The First President To Tell The Truth About His Health

On July 1, 1893, a certain Commodore Elias Benedict prepared his yacht, the Oneida, for an unusual mission out on Chesapeake Bay. The yacht’s saloon was repurposed as a surgical suite. A team of six was recruited to perform the surgery, including a dentist named Ferdinand Hasbrouk, who would serve as the anesthesiologist. The patient, a rather obese man, 56 years of age, was suffering from a carcinoma of the mouth.

The patient was named Steven Grover Cleveland, and he was the 24th president of the United States, having already been the 22nd president of the United States, guaranteeing him a place in every trivia contest until the end of time. The operation was performed under maximum security. From the Health Sciences Library of the University of Arizona.

However, there were political considerations. A nationwide depression had just gotten underway and in the name of strengthening the economy, the president was leading a movement to repeal the Sherman Silver Purchase Act and uphold the gold standard. In August, the president had to address Congress and thus, he had to be able to recover from the surgery’s effects by that time. It was already late June. Furthermore, the president was concerned that reports of his condition could prove even more unsettling, so the surgery would have to be done in secret.

The economy was sinking into the bust cycle of the boom and bust financial system of the age. (Today, we know it as Project 2025, section 4.) The Panic of 1893 had struck in February, and it would last for the next four years. In addition, it was gradually coming to light that Chester Arthur, Cleveland’s predecessor the first time around, had been debilitated by Bright’s disease throughout his term of office. Arthur, in fact, was already dead. Cleveland’s political concerns were well-taken, but he never was the same after the surgery.

Twenty-six years later, in the middle of a barnstorming railroad trip aimed at raising support for the new world he wanted to build, President Woodrow Wilson collapsed in Pueblo, Colorado, and then collapsed entirely six weeks later with a stroke that permanently disabled him. The rudimentary political spin system of the time went into action almost immediately. Wilson was said to have suffered an attack of medical gobbledegook–“a nervous reaction in his digestive organs.” Upon returning to Washington, Wilson went into seclusion, and his wife, Edith, pretty much ran the country. From PBS:

Everything changed on the morning of Oct. 2, 1919. According to some accounts, the president awoke to find his left hand numb to sensation before falling into unconsciousness. In other versions, Wilson had his stroke on the way to the bathroom and fell to the floor with Edith dragging him back into bed. However those events transpired, immediately after the president’s collapse, Mrs. Wilson discretely phoned down to the White House chief usher, Ike Hoover and told him to “please get Dr. Grayson, the president is very sick.” Grayson quickly arrived. Ten minutes later, he emerged from the presidential bedroom and the doctor’s diagnosis was terrible: “My God, the president is paralyzed,” Grayson declared.

Protective of both her husband’s reputation and power, Edith shielded Woodrow from interlopers and embarked on a bedside government that essentially excluded Wilson’s staff, the Cabinet and the Congress. During a perfunctory meeting the president held with Sen. Gilbert Hitchcock (D-Neb.) and Albert Fall (R-N.M.) on Dec. 5, he and Edith even tried to hide the extent of his paralysis by keeping his left side covered with a blanket. Sen. Fall, who was one of the president’s most formidable political foes told Wilson, “I hope you will consider me sincere. I have been praying for you, Sir.” Edith later recalled that Woodrow was, at least, well enough to jest, “Which way, Senator?” A great story, perhaps, but Wilson’s biographer, John Milton Cooper, Jr. doubts its veracity and notes that neither Edith nor Dr. Grayson recorded such a clever rejoinder in their written memoranda from that day.

Edith Wilson insisted to her dying day that her role in the last two years of the Wilson administration was nominal. This is almost assuredly a barefaced non-fact, as the work of subsequent historians has shown.

Everyone knows about how FDR’s people, aided by an acquiescent press, kept a lid on the president’s inability to walk. What they were less able to conceal was how truly sick the president was during his last years in office. From the University of Arizona:

On March 28, 1944, Roosevelt received a complete physical including a cardiac examination. Dr. Howard G. Bruenn handled this. Bruenn’s diagnosis was that the President was suffering from “hypertension, hypertensive heart disease, cardiac failure (left ventricle), and acute bronchitis. (Bruenn, p. 580). Bruenn recommended a week or two of rest, the use of digitalis, a lighter, salt-free diet, and codeine for the cough and a moderate loss of weight. However, given the president’s schedule, this was not carried out right away. McIntire thought the use of digitalis was going too far. In Ferrell’s account, Bruenn found himself against the Surgeon General and a team of leading doctors at Bethesda, including Officer in Command John Harper, Executive Officer Robert Duncan, radiology head Charles Behrens, and Paul Dickens, a professor of medicine at George Washington University. Also involved were two honorary medical consultants, James Paullin and Frank Lacey. These latter two conducted another examination of the president on March 31st. Bruenn held firm on the need for digitalization and after three meetings and a threat to remove himself from the case, he was authorized to begin. Within ten days, Roosevelt showed remarkable improvement. Bruenn found himself making frequent visits to the White House.

Since then, we’ve had Eisenhower, whose doctors were relatively upfront about his major heart attack, in 1955, but buried the news of his stroke two years later. John Kennedy’s myriad concealed medical conditions would fill a book, and indeed has filled several. What’s less well known is the fact that Kennedy’s successor, Lyndon Johnson, felt so ill that he had to be talked into running for his own full term in 1964. From The Political Effects of Presidential Illness: The Case of Lyndon B. Johnson:

More serious, Johnson was rushed to the hospital at 2:26 a.m. suffering from chest pains and a cough. Vice President Humphrey was telephoned at 3:30 a.m. in Minnesota with the news that the president had been hospitalized with chest pains. Humphrey was not alone in his fears that Johnson had suffered another heart attack, a prospect he found "particularly frightening because Lyndon had suffered a serious one ten years before." Many years later, Humphrey complained that Johnson “for some bizarre reason, refused to let any medical facts be given to me immediately. Instead. The orders came to me that he wanted me to fulfill my scheduled weekly commitments so that no one would think his illness was serious." When Humphrey left home later that morning, he still did not know whether Johnson had suffered another heart attack, how critical his condition might be, or whether he would soon be succeeding Johnson as president. He later wrote that "it was an awesome prospect, a terrible shock, compounded by not knowing what precisely was happening" (Humphrey, 1976, p. 314). Perhaps the shock was further compounded by the fact that although Johnson had intended to enter in arrangement with his vice-president, he had not, at that time, done so.

More recently, it was an open secret in Washington that President Ronald Reagan was probably a symptomatic Alzheimer’s patient throughout his second term. Interestingly, given our current state of affairs, the first real public manifestation of it came in his first debate against Democratic presidential nominee Walter Mondale in 1984. From the AP (via the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette):

For Reagan, the age issue faded in his first term as any health questions focused on his recovery from a nearly fatal assassination attempt in 1981. He seemed headed for an easy reelection. And debates seemed natural settings for the smooth-talking former Hollywood actor. But his performance in the first showdown with Mondale in the 1984 campaign brought the age issue roaring back. The president, then 73, rambled and hesitated. He seemed to lose his train of thought at one point, and appeared tired at others. No one had seen him perform publicly in such a way, recalled Jaroslovsky, who co-authored a story headlined: “New Question in Race: Is Oldest U.S. President Now Showing His Age?”…

…Then, as now, Mr. Jaroslovsky said, the embattled president’s supporters provided vigorous spin. Reagan’s operation said he had been tired. There was sniping about the staff overpreparing him, Mr. Jaroslovsky said. Mr. Biden’s team cited fatigue from two overseas trips that had exhausted even younger staffers. It was a bad night, they said. Blame flew at the president’s aides. Democrats on Capitol Hill griped that Mr. Biden's performance had damaged their chances at the polls. And press critics asserted that reporters had failed to hold the president and his staff to account.

Reagan managed to deliver a spoon-fed wisecrack at the beginning of the second debate, and everybody loved good ol’ Dutch again. But, in Washington, there were real concerns. In their book Landslide, an account of his second term, authors Jane Mayer and Doyle McManus revealed that an aide to then incoming White House chief of staff Howard Baker named James Cannon had been dispatched to discreetly investigate whether or not the provisions of the 25th amendment regarding forcible presidential abdication might be in order and, more spectacularly, Cannon believed that it should be considered.

I bring all of this up to prove a point–namely, that the next White House that is completely honest about the president’s health will be the first. (Do people really believe the big ship of fools that was Donald Trump’s medical team?) The concocted melodrama around the president’s dismal showing in the campaign’s first debate–Hi, Dutch!–has served nothing but to obscure the clarity necessary to make what is a terribly difficult call. If I seem to wax overly historical, it’s because I find it more edifying than the hysterical.