#we have the wedding

[ambassador-saru]

my thoughts on st dsc season 5, episode 3

so strange to see Rayner instead of Saru as first commander

this was your chance to show the original brigde crew.... and you missed it 💔

T'rina has bought saru a plant - what a parallel!

love their outfits

the way the talk about everything, personal and work stuff

ENGAGEMENT ANNOUNCEMENT!!!

the way they look at each other <<<3

the way they touch each other <<<3

I screamed

AMBASSADOR - I WILL NEVER OVERCOME THIS

i don't like duvin

the tea drinking is back <3

"I simply wish to protect you in all ways that I can." 🥹

how do say "I love you" without saying "I love you"

tara rosling? I love you!

"... it will be my honor to stand beside you to face them."

the touching !!! 🫠🔥

the last scene - I am crying

[theoldkyokodied]

One wedding and three funerals

Background paintings under the cut

[etchif]

Jesus imagine if we confirm the existence of extraterrestrial life the Taxonomy would be insane

[floccinaucinihilipilificationa]

[sunderwight]

Liushen AU where SY transmigrates into SJ's older brother, and subsequently nopes them right out of the slavery backstory by using his general knowledge of the story and actually being an adult in a kid's body to just leave (basically) with SJ and YQ.

SY carts them both up to Cang Qiong for the next sect trials. It's actually not all that hard, the trickiest part is getting enough to eat and finding safe places to sleep between leaving the slavers and taking the trials (SY manages just barely, with considerable help from his new little brothers.) Nobody bothers to go after them because it's before Qiu Jianluo and this style of human traffickers mostly operate by virtue of their merchandise having nowhere else to go. Chasing down runaways is an expense not worth indulging, given that most of them either come straight back or die of exposure.

Anyway, they take the trials, and as expected YQY gets chosen to become a personal disciple for the sect leader, and SJ gets chosen by the Qing Jing Peak Lord, but also as (kind of) expected (by SY alone) nobody wants SY. He's older the Yue Qi, so too old, and unlike YQ and SJ his cultivation potential isn't striking enough to make any exceptions for him.

SY, however, can't leave it at that. He's spent more than five minutes with the street kid codependency gang, so he's gotten attached to both of them. And he knows what will happen if they're left to their own devices and The Plot proceeds accordingly. (Also, they keep threatening to not stay at the sect if SY doesn't stay too, for some reason.) So with a heavy heart and internal candle lit for himself, SY heads to Bai Zhan Peak. Which is the only peak that accepts disciples by way of them turning up and refusing to leave.

SY's not much of a fighter. He actually really hates the atmosphere on BZP, he's not bad at physical cultivation (his health's pretty good in this life, ironic considering how much worse his situation was) but the random ambushes and survival-of-the-fittest stuff is just not his brand. But that's okay, because it turns out that BZP actually DESPERATELY needs disciples on the actual peak who are interested in things other than fighting and cultivating their own strength. Stuff like, filling out requisition requests for An Ding every time things break, apologizing to An Ding every time things break again, organizing schedules, browbeating senior disciples into actually teaching, educating disciples on virtually any artistic or social skill, hosting lectures on how to beat vicious beasts without just overpowering them, and etc.

Okay so some of this stuff isn't and has never actually been on Bai Zhan's curriculum but Shen Yuan is going to make this place tolerable. And stop these children from needlessly getting acid burns or lyme disease or scurvy or whatever. He keeps internally chewing out Airplane for designing a sect system that means there are a lot of largely unsupervised 12-year-olds running around the wilderness on a mountain picking fights all the time. (When he actually meets Shang Qinghua and figures him out he switches to doing it in person, of course, in twice-monthly bitching sessions that look a lot like budding friendship.)

Of course one of the worst offenders is the Liu kid, who SY would suspect was actually raised by wolves if he didn't know for a fact that Liu Qingge has a younger sister, and also the kinds of nice clothing and letters from home that strongly imply not only does he have a family, but that the family is pretty well-off. Liu Qingge is at first deeply offended by SY being a BZP disciple. He rarely fights anyone, and uses tricks and evasion tactics whenever a fight can't be avoided. And he does other annoying stuff, like pestering him about meals and baths and lecturing him on identifying dangerous plants and the early signs of qi deviation. This is not what their peak is about! He should get with the program already! Just fight stuff until you're too tired to keep fighting stuff!

Also SY's younger brother, SJ, is pure evil (at least according to baby Liu Qingge) even though his other younger brother (?) is cool and nice.

Anyway, Liu Qingge stops complaining about SY after their first mission together, where Liu Qingge doesn't lose a fight but does get into a kind of pyrrhic victory situation where he's really badly hurt, and it's SY who helps him win (correctly identifying the monster and then pointing out its weakness) and takes care of him afterwards and gets him safely back to Cang Qiong. SY expresses surprise at LQG actually being polite to him, and LQG realizes that he's been a colossal ass if people think he wouldn't be grateful to someone who saved his life, so the usual Liushen dynamic proceeds from there. Liu Qingge starts bringing SY fans he leaves behind and hunts down animals that are supposed to be useful for bolstering weak cultivation, SY invites LQG to tea and keeps the critters as pets, etc etc.

SY doesn't get the Head Disciple position, because that's only acquired via beating the current peak lord in combat and lol no. Also he's not interested in stealing it from Liu Qingge, to whom it rightfully belongs (in his mind). But that's fine, because Liu Qingge takes the position when the next generation ascends and then he lets SY exclusively handle all the peak duties SY actually likes (mainly teaching). It's perfect -- Liu Qingge gets to focus on his War God antics and occasional administration/meetings without having to deal with students his has no patience for, but the disciples of BZP don't get neglected because SY is actually teaching and organizing classes and student care. BZP hasn't enjoyed a golden age like this since it was founded!

Things are pretty good overall, but Shen Yuan knows that it's only a matter of time before The Plot shows up, and so he can't rest completely easily.

Meanwhile, the will-they-or-won't-they bets on Liushen have been going strong for a while now. The thing is, most of their martial siblings are convinced that these two are already "together", and just being circumspect about it. Those who know SY well (like SJ, YQY, and SQH) know better but think that SY's romantic obtuseness is to blame, whereas those who know LQG well (LMY, WQW, and MQF) are pretty sure that it's actually LQG's obtuseness that's the problem. Of course it's actually both of them, so efforts to "fix" matters by getting through one of their thick skulls inevitably run afoul of the other's.

An additional complication is of course: SJ doesn't like LQG (mutual), and now that he's the leader of his own peak, he wants to poach SY to come and live there. Not only so he can have one of the 2 people he trusts actually close at hand, but also because SJ also hates actually teaching the atrocious little brats on his peak, and would like to have SY come and do it for him. YQY is still a total pushover for him too, and is also now the sect leader, so YQY agrees that SY can change peaks if SY and LQG both agree to it.

Liu Qingge, of course, is a no, but he's a variable "no". He's not going to hold Shen Yuan against his will or anything.

As for Shen Yuan, it's... complicated. He doesn't really like BZP, but it's gotten a lot better than it was at the start. These days he's actually pretty proud of his accomplishments, and it's more comfortable, but it's still a rough and rowdy place with fewer creature comforts, libraries, or other appealing points than QJP. Also, if he goes to Qing Jing to teach, he can personally ensure that SJ doesn't go around persecuting any of his students!

But... SJ never lived with the Qiu family in this AU, and even though SY's not totally clear on what the PIDW backstory for SJ was, he knows he's a better guy now than the scum villain in the book was. He has a reputation for making cutting remarks, not for being an abusive snake or a lecher. SY's honestly less worried about him doing anything bad at all, and there are other people on QJP who can teach. It might even be good for SJ to promote more people to fill out a social circle he can rely on! That guy needs more friends, seriously.

And QJP really doesn't need more layabout literary intellectual types who get into pointless arguments, which is all SY would be if he went there. Just yet another nerdy scholar for the rich kids with middling cultivation that the peak favors to ignore. At least on BZP he's filling a gap.

SY is clearly torn, and the fact that SY's considering it has LQG upset, and LQG doesn't handle being upset very well, so of course they have an argument about it. SY storms off to cool his head and LQG is like, this is it, he's gone to Qing Jing Peak, I've drive him off by being too aggressive and he's probably remembering all those times I told him he didn't belong here and oh no what have I done maybe if I build him a heated bath and get him books he will come back???

Turns out that SY just went to An Ding to vent at SQH while SQH was like "I think you would have fewer problems if you and Liu Qingge just got married and my disciples could call you Shigu to your face instead of behind your back" and SY threw melon seeds at him and sulked on his fainting couch (which is always cold for some reason...)

Thus begins the Liushen Divorce Arc where SY tries to be anywhere but BZP or QJP, Liu Qingge tries to figure out what thing he can punch to fix this not-punchable problem, SJ is like "I don't see what the big deal is they should break up Liu Qingge is awful and I want my brother to teach my classes for me" like the spoiled youngest sibling he's finally allowed to be, YQY is trying to moderate this Hades vs Demeter situation and is all "well maybe SY could spend half the year on QJP and half on BZP?", and Liu Mingyan is going "I know my brother if this doesn't work out he is going to die single and pining like an idiot" and so keeps conscripting other disciples to y'know, lock SY and LQG into storage closets together (ineffective: LQG can punch through walls) or at least get them in the same room (underestimating SY's willingness to yeet himself out of windows to avoid awkward social interactions.)

By the time Luo Binghe joins the sect (as a Qiong Ding disciple), the drama is in full swing and is the main topic of gossip across most of the peaks.

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

putting my prediction on record now that the coming decade is going to see the rise of viral-marketed fancy at-home water filtration systems, driving and driven by a drastic reduction in the quality of U.S. tap water (given that we are in a 'replacement era' where our current infrastructure is reaching the end of its lifespan--but isn't being replaced). also guessing that by the 2030s access to drinkable tap water will be a mainstream class issue, with low-income & unstably housed people increasingly forced to rely on expensive bottled water when they can't afford the up-front cost of at-home filtration--and with this being portrayed in media as a "moral failing" and short-sighted "choice," rather than a basic failure of our political & economic systems. really hope i'm just being alarmist, but plenty of this already happens in other countries, and the U.S. is in a state of decline, so. here's praying this post ages into irrelevance. timestamped April 2023

[notedchampagne]

id render YOU in any universe

aus in order from top left to bottom right: we have always lived in the apartment by quinn @thatneoncrisis | harrow nova | gehenna the first also by quinn | arranged marriage au | canon

[kittysawat]

if you cant get an organic s2 wedding, then store bought is just fine!!!!!!!!

[eruptedinlight]

B E T R O T H E D ❤️

[sjyuns]

jake??? can’t even defend him on this, he’s actually batshit crazy😕

[crismakesstuff]

happy memories , happy family

redraw of these two images from the show !

The first one is from s2 and the other is from s1 (I hope we get to see a better quality version of it one day)

[seasicksilver]

off to super hell

[inkskinned]

i. about 2 weeks ago, i was told there's a good chance that in 5 or so years, i'll need a wheelchair.

ii. okay. i loved harry potter as a kid. i have a hypothesis about this to be honest - why people still kind of like it. it's that she got very lucky. she managed to make a cross-generational hit. it was something shared for both parents and kids. it was right at the start of a huge cultural shift from pre to post-internet. i genuinely think many people were just seeking community; not her writing. it was a nice shorthand to create connection. which is a long way of saying - she didn't build this legacy, we built it for her. she got lucky, just once. that's all.

iii. to be real with you, i still struggle with identifying as someone with a disability, which is wild, especially given the ways my life has changed. i always come up against internalized ableism and shame - convinced even right now that i'm faking it for attention. i passed out in a grocery store recently. i hit my head on the shelves while i went down.

iv. he raises his eyebrows while he sends me a look. her most recent new book has POTS featured in it. okay, i say. i already don't like where this is going. we both take another bite of ramen. it is a trait of the villain, he says. we both roll our eyes about it.

v. so one of the things about being nonbinary but previously super into harry potter is that i super hate jk rowling. but it is also not good for my mental health to regret any form of joy i engaged with as a kid. i can't punish my young self for being so into the books - it was a passion, and it was how i made most of my friends. everyone knew about it. i felt like everyone had my same joy, my same fixation. as a "weird kid", this sense of belonging resonated with me so loudly that i would have done anything to protect it.

vi. as a present, my parents once took me out of school to go see the second movie. it is an incredibly precious memory: my mom straight-up lying about a dentist appointment. us snickering and sneaking into the weekday matinee. within seven years of this experience, the internet would be a necessity to get my homework finished. the world had permanently changed. harry potter was a relic, a way any of us could hold onto something of the analog.

vii. by sheer luck, the year that i started figuring out the whole gender fluid thing was also the first year people started to point out that she might have some internalized biases. i remember tumblr before that; how often her name was treated as godhood. how harry potter was kind of a word synonymous for "nerdy but cool." i would walk out of that year tasting he/him and they/them; she would walk out snarling and snapping about it.

viii. when i teach older kids creative writing, i usually tell them - so, she did change the face of young adult fiction, there's no denying that. she had a lot more opportunities than many of us will - there were more publishing houses, less push for "virally" popular content creators. but beyond reading another book, we need to write more books. we need to uplift the voices of those who remain unrepresented. we need to push for an exposure to the bigotry baked into the publishing system. and i promise you: you can write better than she ever did. nothing she did was what was magical - it was the way that the community responded to it.

ix. i get home from ramen. three other people have screenshotted the POTS thing and sent it to me. can you fucking believe we're still hearing this shit from her when it's almost twenty-fucking-twenty-three. the villain is notably also popular on tumblr. i just think that's funny. this woman is a billionaire and she's mad that she can't control the opinions of some people on a dying blue site that makes no money. lady, and i mean this - get a fucking life.

x. i am sorry to the kid i was. maybe the kid you were too. none of us deserved to see something like this ruined. that thing used to be precious to me. and now - all those good times; measured into dust.

/// 9.6.2022 // FUCKING AGAIN, JK? Are you fucking kidding me?

[anonymous-dentist]

Or: the morning after

-

Cellbit finds himself getting rattled awake by the sound of an unfamiliar cell phone ringing. His pillow is lumpy, he doesn't have a blanket- or does he? His legs are bare, but his shoulders feel warm enough.

Grimacing, Cellbit squints his eyes shut and desperately shoves his face into his pillow in the hopes of drowning out the noise. Why does his pillow smell like alcohol?

What happened last night? The last thing he remembers is slipping away from Bagi and Tina and finding himself a seat at their hotel's bar, and then? Absolutely nothing.

But the phone keeps ringing.

Cellbit is mildly alarmed to feel his pillow vibrate beneath him as it groans- oh, God, it's alive. He's even more alarmed when his pillow moves and pulls him with it as it rolls onto its side and buries its face in the crook of Cellbit's neck and, fuck, this isn't a pillow is it?

Cellbit forces his eyes open and nearly has a heart attack as he discovers that he is not, in fact, in his hotel room. This isn't his bed. That isn't his window- his room isn't nice enough to have a fucking balcony attached to it.

...Those aren't his pants strewn carelessly across the floor just inches from the bed. That isn't his shirt, either.

Oh, God.

Cellbit's pillow, now Cellbit's blanket, which is probably an actual, real, living, genuine, breathing human person, nuzzles their nose into Cellbit's skin with a pleased, sleepy hum.

Cellbit absently looks down at the hands wrapped around his middle, and his stomach sharpens as he sees a shiny gold ring.

Fuck, they're married?

It's then that Cellbit notices the shiny gold ring on his own finger, his hand splayed next to his face carelessly. He stares at it in both shock and horror and an equal measure of mortification.

Fuck, they're married?

The phone is still ringing. Cellbit can see it on the floor next to his... spouse? Next to his... next to the person's pants. Its screen is lit up, showing off a wallpaper of a man and a woman and a child. Oh, God, what has Cellbit done?

He stares at the phone. He desperately tries to remember where he left his own. His pants are off, but his shirt is on. It's the same shirt he went out in, and it's really uncomfortable to be sleeping in, and the coat he wore with it is gone. Or, at least, it's out of sight, and that's where he was keeping his phone and his wallet and his hotel room key and- oh, fuck, Bagi. She's going to kill him!

The person clinging to Cellbit like a koala seems to settle down (how are they sleeping through the noise??), their breaths evening out and their grip relaxing.

Okay, Cellbit thinks, Escaping from a person can't be worse than escaping from prison. (Granted, he had "escaped" from "prison" at the bright age of eleven, and him "escaping" was him climbing out the window and watching the sunset from the roof of the juvenile hall he was trapped in, but the point stands.)

Carefully, he pries the person's arms off of him. He rolls out of bed and onto the floor and immediately gets onto his knees and ignores the rattling in his skull and the exhausted protesting of his bones and shoves an actual pillow into the person's arms.

He hesitates, just briefly, as he takes in his spouse's face for the first time that he can remember.

He's beautiful. Creases in his face from sleep, bags under his eyes, hair plastered to the side of his head, tiny bit of drool escaping from the corner of his mouth as he snuffles and buries his face into his new teddy bear.

Well. Drunk Cellbit has good taste.

Whatever, cell phone.

Cellbit doesn't think he could stand without vomiting, so he crawls over to where he thinks he vaguely remembers tossing his coat and his pants last night... or, rather, that morning. Something tells him it was entirely too late when he and his... person finally went to bed.

Blackout drunkenness be damned, Cellbit is still a detective, so his clothes are right where he thought they'd be: slung over the hotel room's desk chair.

First, he grabs his pants. He looks at them, considers the fragile state of his stomach, and decides that it probably isn't too smart to move too much. He doesn't know how much it'll take for him to throw up everything he's had over the trip so far, but he doesn't think it'll be that much.

So he abandons his pants for the moment and grabs his coat, instead. A brief search of the pockets finds all his things, plus a handful of stolen poker chips and a crushed pink flower.

Cellbit looks at the flower. What is it, amaranth? Is that it?

Whatever, cell phone.

He turns his phone on and is immediately met with a brand new wallpaper: a clearly drunk him, and an even drunker... husband(?) with his arms hung around Cellbit's shoulders. They're both smiling widely, their cheeks are both flushed, Cellbit is giving this guy a piggyback ride, and the Vegas lights are so bright behind them that it's giving Cellbit a headache just looking at them.

But that isn't what makes Cellbit sick. What makes him sick is the absolute mountain of texts from his extremely pissed-off sister. It starts with a simple, "Where are you?", and it ends with, "FUCK YOU DON'T COME BACK ME AND TINA WILL HAVE A GREEEEAT NIGHT TOGETHER BY OURSELVES WITH PAC!!"

Cellbit, deciding not to subject himself to any more torture, shuts his phone off and collapses backwards onto the floor. Even the carpet smells like alcohol; what did he and this guy do last night? ...Besides get married.

Cellbit raises his hand above his face and squints at his ring. Fake gold, he can tell. Cheap ring, glass jewels. Probably sold at the place he and the man got married at. Probably someplace cheesy with an Elvis impersonator acting as the officiant and a couple of equally-drunk tourists acting as the witnesses.

Groaning from the bed. Seems Cellbit's new husband is awake, then.

Cellbit keeps staring at his ring, anyway. It's... weird. He'd always dreamed of a big wedding, and now that he is married, he doesn't remember it. But it's fair, he supposes. He'd stopped believing he would get married years ago. Makes sense he wouldn't remember it happening.

The man in the bed swears and rolls around noisily.

"Fucking kill meeeee," he moans. "Son of a bitch!"

His voice is rough. Cellbit's probably sounds rougher. His entire body hurts.

The man keeps swearing. Cellbit listens, and he stares at his ring, and he quietly panics as the reality of his marriage sets in.

Are Vegas weddings even legal? Fuck, he's a detective, he should know this! But he's a detective in Brazil, he doesn't know American laws.

Abruptly, the man's complaining stops.

"Oh," Cellbit hears. "Hello."

Cellbit tears his eyes away from his ring and looks at the man. Their eyes meet, and, suddenly, Cellbit realizes why they got married.

If this man was beautiful asleep, he's absolutely stunning awake. His eyes are just so... and his jawline? What the hell?

Bagi always likes to tease Cellbit about his extreme romanticism. She says it's almost obsessive, but what does she know? What he and Pac had going on in high school was normal.

Cellbit just knows handsome when he sees it, and he supposes that Drunk Cellbit saw it and decided he had to put a ring on it.

It's a shame they're married. He doesn't think he'll be able to talk to this guy ever again after they sign the divorce papers.

Because they have to get divorced, right? Or annulled? Or... reversed? Whatever it is in Vegas, they'll have to do it. They don't know each other. Cellbit lives in Brazil. This guy seems like he has a family. It wouldn't work, no matter how pretty he is.

Slowly, Cellbit sits up. He winces, gags, props himself up against the desk's leg. He lets his stomach settle down. Tries not to smile back as the man smiles at him.

"Vegas," the man whispers. He sounds slightly awed. Cellbit feels the same way, but probably not for the same reasons. He's in shock over this man's beauty; this man is probably shocked that the Vegas stereotypes are true.

"Vegas," Cellbit agrees. He holds up his hand, and his ring. "Good morning. Can we get a divorce?"

The man gasps and looks down at his own hand. His eyes widen comically as he sees his ring.

"What the fuck?" he shouts.

Both he and Cellbit flinch at the volume. Ouch.

"A divorce," Cellbit repeats once the pounding in his head has subsided. "Because we got married."

The man's phone is still ringing. Cellbit kinda wants to throw it off the balcony, but he's probably already ruined this guy's life enough. (His family...)

The man, somehow, ignores it.

He crawls down the length of the bed and flops onto his stomach, head tilted just slightly as he takes Cellbit in. He props himself up on his elbows, and Cellbit can't help but admire his biceps because he's. He's shirtless. And he isn't wearing pants. He has boxers on, thank God- Cellbit doesn't know what he'd do if it turned out they'd done things last night after the wedding.

"You want a divorce?" the man asks. He shrugs. "I mean, sure, but... why?"

Cellbit stares at him. "We were drunk. I don't know you."

"Yeah but you did last night, and we liked each other enough to get married after a couple hours. That's gotta count for something, right?"

"I mean. Maybe? But- you don't even know my name!"

"Sure, and you don't know mine." His smile is blinding. "I'm Roier."

Roier... it settles around Cellbit's brain like a warm sweater.

"Cellbit," Cellbit responds. He swallows and forces his eyes away from Roier's arms. "Look, I'm sure you're a nice guy-"

"I am."

"-but we can't be married. My sister is supposed to be getting married next week and she'll kill me if she finds out I got married before she did. And we don't know each other and- dude, can you pick up your goddamn phone?"

Cellbit groans and throws his head back, eyes squinting shut from the pain in his head.

"Shit," the man swears, "hold on..."

Cellbit tunes him out as he finally answers his phone. He's a loud talker, but he's still quieter than his phone was.

He... has a nice voice. Cellbit can almost imagine hearing it daily, but that's literally just. Stupid. This is all stupid, they should be divorced already. And then Cellbit can go back to being single and miserable like he's used to.

With his eyes still shut, Cellbit flounders around for his pants. Once he has them, he starts pulling them on, desperately trying not to vomit as he does so. Fuck, his stomach...!

Bagi would be laughing if she heard about this. She'd be pissed, but she'd be laughing about it. She's been the one trying to get him to sign up for dating apps since he realized he's asexual and he stopped dating altogether. She's been trying to set him up with friends for years. She'd be furious if she found out that Cellbit went and married the first guy to flirt back with him. While drunk. In Las Vegas.

Cellbit manages to get his pants buttoned up just as Roier finishes his phone call. Out of breath and exhausted, Cellbit cracks an eye open and offers a weak smile at a very concerned-looking Roier.

"You don't look too good," Roier comments. "You can stay here until you're up to moving, you know."

Cellbit frowns. "Wouldn't that be awkward?"

"Why would it be awkward? We're married. Married people share rooms all the time."

"We aren't-" Cellbit tries to stand, immediately decides against it as the room swims around him, sits heavily back down. "Fuck. We aren't actually married, you know. We're Vegas-married."

"I know, but I'm not a dick. You look like shit, I'm not just gonna let you pass out in the hallway."

Oh, and he's nice, too. He's handsome and he's nice. Of course he's a package deal, what the fuck?

Only slightly annoyed, Cellbit lets himself flop to the side and lay down on the floor again. It isn't comfortable, but it feels better than sitting up does.

He looks up at Roier. "You're being awfully nice to a stranger."

Roier waves him off. "Nah, it's fine. If I trusted you last night, I can trust you now. I'm a very good judge of character."

"Really?"

"No, I'm actually kidnapping you."

Cellbit huffs out a laugh, a genuine smile growing on his face as Roier looks genuinely proud of himself.

"You're an asshole," Cellbit says. "I can't wait until we're divorced."

"Me, too," Roier agrees. "No offense- like, you're a really nice guy-" (Cellbit blushes.) "-but I kinda wish I got to, like, take you on a date or something before we got married."

Cellbit chokes on his own spit. "What?"

Roier's eyes widen and he sits up, alarmed. "What? Is that-"

"No!" Cellbit waves his hands frantically. "No, it's fine! I'm just... are you sure? You could still be drunk."

"I don't feel drunk."

"Maybe I'm still drunk, then."

"Maybe." Roier nods, faux serious. "We are in Vegas."

"Can you even date in Vegas? What can we even do?"

"Eh, I'm sure there's something we can do. Maybe we can get divorced this afternoon and get dinner?"

Cellbit almost turns him down. This is a bad idea. He's in Vegas. He isn't... they don't know each other. Roier doesn't know that Cellbit doesn't really do anything past kissing. That could be a problem, right? Maybe, but...

But Cellbit trusts himself to know that, even when drunk out of his mind, he would explain everything before engaging in any kind of intimacy with another man. He and Roier hadn't taken their underwear off, after all, that has to count for something. Roier seems like a nice guy. Cellbit thinks he can trust him to not be a total scumbag later on if it comes down to it.

So Cellbit swallows his hesitance and smiles and replies, "That sounds nice, actually."

(And if their divorce date could later turn into a real marriage? Well, Cellbit wouldn't complain.)

[klausinamarink]

When Life Gives You Pickles, Make It Into Soup

rating: G | cw: none | wc: 920 | tags: established relationship, domestic bliss, soup | prompt: Love is silently passing them a pickle because you know it’s their favourite

written for @steddielovemonth

“So Gareth was supposed to stay on the drums, right?” Eddie waves his hands in the air where he sits on the counter. “That’s like his whole thing since he joined the band.”

“Okay.” Steve nods, glancing over at Eddie as he starts sliding the chopped carrots and potatoes into the pot from the cutting board. 

“But during practice, which was today, he says that he wants to play bass guitar. Which, in another day, I would be completely cool with and the other guys will be like, ‘Yeah, Gareth, follow your heart’s intent and pick another instrument that calls out to you.’”

“That’s what you would say.” Steve points out just because he knows that Eddie’s that kind of person who says such long-winded compliments. He fills the pot with cold water from the sink, just barely remembering to throw in a pound of the meat bones to complete the broth. 

“Okay, yeah, I said that.” Eddie rolls his eyes. Then he raises an index finger, pointing it up to the ceiling for no particular reason. “But I didn’t! I said none of that because Gareth said he wanted to change instruments today. The day before we will have our venue show!”

Steve drops his mouth open in a wide ‘O’ because he’s that invested in the secret drama of Eddie’s band. “He didn’t.”

“He did.” Eddie shakes his head mournfully. “You can imagine our reactions.”

Steve hums, opening the jar of pickles and plucking one out to pass it to Eddie. Eddie takes it and bites it without a second thought. There’s a couple pickles left in the jar since Steve had already blended the brine earlier so his boyfriend could finish them.

After a few chews and swallows, Eddie continues his tale of mutual devastation, still oblivious to Steve’s cooking. Good. Because this has been in Steve’s plans for weeks ever since he went to the farmer’s market and struck a lovely conversation with that Polish couple. He watches the boiling pot, making sure his attention is perfectly divided between the timer and Eddie’s story.

“-and then Jeff said, ‘How about I switch with the bass, Frankie does the second guitar, and you do the drums?’ I told him, ‘Don’t you remember my last time playing with the drums?’ Jeff just said, ‘Oh yeah, right.’ Then-”

Setting the stove’s temperature down to shimmer, Steve slowly pours in the blended pickle in the broth, mixing it together. He sees Eddie has finished his pickle so Steve passes him another. 

This time, Eddie ferociously tears a chunk off, green acid spitting out as he speaks with a full mouth, “Eventually, it was Gareth who finally stood himself up and said, ‘Yeah, you’re totally right, I shouldn’t switch out before tomorrow’s gig. But I’m still doing bass after that's done.’”

“So who’s doing the drums?” Steve crosses his arms, leaning his hip on the counter besides Eddie.

“That’s the thing!” Eddie throws his hands up. Unfortunately, so does the half-eaten pickle. It hits the ceiling with a tiny splat. The two men stare up at it, Steve with genuine surprise and Eddie with horror. Before Eddie can splutter out apologies, Steve wordlessly kisses him and gives him the last pickle from the jar. Eddie carefully eats the whole thing with a bright-red face and eyes pointed downwards. Cute.

Steve double checks the soup. The lid’s so steamed over that he wouldn’t be surprised if it’s been stained completely white. He takes that cue to take it off and shut the stove for it to cool. 

Eddie finally speaks, “Yeah, we have no idea who our drummer could be. Like, Gareth’s good but neither of us are. Frankie has good rhythm but he’s better with guitar. I can’t drum for shit. Same with Jeff.”

“Bet that’s a problem for Future Eddie and his friends.” Steve quips, slowly mixing the soup around. 

Eddie barks out a laugh. He hops off the counter and stands behind Steve, peeking over at the pot. “This smells delicious by the way. What soup is it?”

Steve makes a shushing gesture to which Eddie responds by biting his shoulder. Steve rolls his eyes and contemplates if he should put in the half and half cream now. The Polish woman at the market had said it was better to wait for the soup to cool enough before adding the cream and parsley. He shrugs and just dumps it anyway. 

He retrieves the bowls and scoops a good amount of the soup. “Careful, it’s still hot.” Steve warns as he passes it to Eddie’s eager hands. “And eat at the table this time.”

Eddie sticks a tongue out at him but does so. Steve watches with bated breath as Eddie carefully blows on his spoon before closing his mouth around it. He sees the exact second when Eddie’s eyes widen and his body going stock still. For a terrifying moment, Steve worries that he had messed up the recipe and Eddie was going to spit it out in disgust.

But within a blink of an eye, Eddie’s standing in front of him. Hands clenching tightly on his shoulders while his eyes start watering. 

“Sweetheat,” Eddie says oh-so softly, “did you make soup from pickles… for me?”

Steve smiles at him sweetly and gently squeezes Eddie’s wrists. “Pickles are your favourite after all.”

Naturally, Eddie cries his eyes out with blabbering declarations of his unending love for Steve. Steve is more than happy to hold his boyfriends and return those favors.

[whollyjoly]

so aisha just tweeted this....

and im looking at those last two emojis 😐😳....

and i remember that lou said this....

...and this....

...

...what does it MEAN??