#you can tell by our tiny beers (sinister)

[randombubblegum]

the antagonists of a 2011 beach-themed MTV reality show

[moonlights-inkwell]

Someone You’re Not.

Summary: You know so much about him, but really you know nothing. You don’t even know his real name.

Jaskier x Reader

Word Count: 5,947

A/N: I mentioned how Jaskier told the reader his real name in my last fic and then decided I just had to write this. I guess this is a series now.

Warnings: Drinking, Canon compliant violence, smut, unprotected sex.

For the amount of time you and the pretty bard spent together, you could safely say you knew very little about him. Well, very little might be an exaggeration. Jaskier is exceptionally open and spends so much time talking, and usually about himself, that it would be impossible to not pick up a thing or two. You know in all certainty that his favourite colour is periwinkle, that he spent a good few years studying in Oxenfurt Academy, and how immediately when you decide to stay in an inn or tavern he needs to have a bath with a very specific lavender oil.   You know the way he fingers the frets of his lute even when he doesn't play, just to have something to do with his hands, how he brightens up at even the most minute of praise and how his smile makes you swear he cannot be human because human men can't possibly be this beautiful. You know the feeling of his lips against yours and his hand on yours, but you really know nothing at all. No idea of where he grew up, if he has siblings. You don't even know his name.

It seems slightly sinister when I think of it like that, you consider as you swirl your tankard of ale, sat across from the centre of the tavern floor where he's singing for the clientele songs of Geralt's success in slaying a selkiemore not two hours before. The drunken celebration of the town people, clapping and shouting a familiar chorus of Toss A Coin To Your Witcher over Jaskier's new song, feels worlds apart from the comfortable quiet of the table you share with the white haired man- connected with these grinning locals but only through the bard's song and proximity. He's beaming, eyes glittering, and mouth turned up in the widest smile as he drinks up the praise and adulation. He looks like a child in front of a baker's shop and always does as he performs, your own lips turn up in an appreciative smile as you watch him bound around like an overly excited puppy, plucking the strings of his lute. After travelling together for... you don’t even know how long- time is almost an incomprehensible concept while traveling with the Witcher- and being in your relationship as of two winters ago, you don't even know what his given name is. Something about that strikes you as unfair. Stage Names are all well and good for Bards, needing something that can be cried out easily by an adoring audience like the one in front of you now but he’s more than just a bard to you. No matter where you go, he always charms anyone who listens to him sing. It makes sense. When you met him, working in a tiny tavern in a tiny town not far from Toussaint, you fell in love as soon as you heard him sing. Were anyone ever to ask about your first meeting you would have claimed that you felt his grip on your heart intensify when you saw him smile. Gave up on a job, friends, a life to blindly follow him in his travels with his Witcher friend, all for the sake of that smile, that voice, those eyes. Like a siren, he sang his song and into his hold came your heart. It sounds oh so very romantic- as Jaskier has said time and time again when trying to put the “tale of our love" to music- but it’s not quite true. His voice was beautiful, his eyes wild, his voice like a call to the wild, but that wasn’t what made you leave everything behind; you left because of how sweetly he spoke to you after his show, ignored the rest of the tavern to sit at the bar talking avidly to you until long after you should have closed, and how beautiful his personality was. It sounds far more romantic to say it was love at first sight, first song, than love at first conversation, love at first offer of freedom.

No matter the venue, you watch him pour his soul out into his performances and sustain himself on the praise it earns him, be it these little pubs or wedding banquets. He's like a fae or a puppy, the way he can just lap up positivity and turn it, alchemy like, into song and show. You assume the only person who hasn't fallen in love with the Bard's songs is the person he spends most of his time singing about. The Witcher is never impressed, preferring the quiet of his meditation over the hustle and bustle of a lively performance. You don't entirely blame him. Jaskier is a joy to watch performing, and his voice is like nothing you’ve known in your life; but you travel with him, and Geralt has travelled with him long before you entered their traveling party, it takes the wonder out of him sometimes, when reminded that the same man singing was only this morning composing an annoying little ditty about how Geralt smelled and needed to bathe and how you ought to smile more. Geralt makes a noise of annoyance at all the noise, and you attempt to hide your enjoyment by taking a deep gulp of your beer, only to gag and cringe at the taste. It’s disgusting.

Ale always tastes vile, always has and always will. In your younger years you drank it with friends without complaint so as not to be laughed at, though your male friends had always laughed anyway. Having worked in a tavern meant that it was the convenient to drink and serve during the busiest working hours, in spite of how disgusting it is to you. Even now, you find yourself drinking it to keep up an appearance of stoicism to impress Geralt, determined not to have him believe you delicate and useless in contracts, but even now you couldn’t make yourself like it, or even find it tolerable. If your white-haired companion notices the way your face scrunches up after taking a swig, he says nothing. In your disgust at your drink, you hadn't noticed that the songs have ended and the crowd quieted down, until you feel the press of lips against the curvature of your neck and your bard settling himself beside you, which only serves to draw a shocked squeak from you. He smiles at you with a playful wink, resting his lute on the table,  

“Well, what did the two of you think of my triumphant performance?” He asks proudly, which results in a noncommittal grunt from Geralt. He’s never been much of a conversationalist, and never has much time for the songs either, so you find yourself filling in the silence with your own enthusiastic praise.  

“It was fantastic. You know it was fantastic, Jask.” You coo to him, resting your cheek on his shoulder and watching his chest puff up with pride. “Especially seeing as you only wrote it today.” In return for the compliment, the Bard presses a kiss into your hair. You pull back and smile proudly, resting a hand on his thigh as you take another swig of the beer. The look on your face must have been undeniable as you find Jaskier gently prying it from your hand after noticing your grimace,

“Gods, Dear Heart. Don't dare drink that, it tastes of piss.” He says playfully, leaning in close to gently wipe the ale that had sloshed over your bottom lip in the sudden movement. Dear Heart. As much as you've never been one to use aliases or fake names, Jaskier uses pet names so often they might as well be your true name.  

Dear Heart, Dove, Love, My Breath, Darling Muse, My Moon and Stars; you lose track of the number of sweet names he uses for you. They’re always romantic and lyrical, the kind of terms that would sound stilted coming from anyone but him. He says them like they’re meaningful, and had taken time to construct, even more so than the time it took your parents to name you. At first you had worried that he used them because he's forgotten your name, but you know that it’s just his way. He pairs them with sweet kisses to the back of your hand, or a hand at your hip, using your true name only when annoyed or worried. He likes titles. He still calls Geralt by every pseudonym he can think of much to the ire of the other man.  

“If it gets me drunk then it's fine.” You reply quickly, cheeks flushed at the feeling of his calloused thumb against the sensitive skin of your mouth, trying not to breathe in deeply and to fight off the urge to brush your tongue across the pad. No matter how many times he touches you, however chaste the contact is, you find yourself blushing like the first time. With a melodramatic gasp, the bard pulls back his thumb to stare at you like you had grown a second head.  

“You do understand you're supposed to enjoy what you’re drinking, not just what it does to you, right?” He says, as if he's the authority on drinking, his tone of voice telling you that there's nothing you can say to dissuade him. “I’ll fetch you some of the wine I like. I can promise it tastes better than that.” And with that he smiles and pushes the thumb into his mouth, cringing as the beer touches his tongue. “Gods, I was right. You stay there, don’t touch that, I’ll be back.”  

Geralt rolls his eyes at Jaskier's proclamation and grunts for your attention before he gestures towards the door, got to his feet and walked off to bed. Despite what Jaskier's song would have the people believe, it had not been as easy a fight as either of you had anticipated. Geralt had been slammed into the river bank so many times you thought he would have broken a bone or more, and a rapid movement had seen you sent crashing into a tree and less than useless for an hour or two. He's had a spree of bad luck as of late. You almost feel bad that he has to see you and Jaskier interact with each other like this since his latest tryst with Yennifer ended as poorly as it ever does. The Witcher’s absence sees you return to your earlier thoughts about the Bard's name, or your lack of knowledge of his real name. It shouldn’t matter, and truly it doesn't matter to you, but as you watch him try and navigate his way through the crowd of people around the bar, you find yourself trying to think of what his real name could be. He's no Erik, and certainly you can’t imagine him as an Aleksander or Kacper, but you can't quite imagine a name for him but Jaskier. It suits him. Dandelion’s are bright, beautiful and misunderstood, and so is he. Were you honest with yourself, you have no idea why he's here with you. If his accent and clothes weren’t already loaded with coin and privilege, him saying things like ‘you should enjoy what you drink' just solidifies in your mind that he doesn't belong with you and Geralt. Enjoying what you drink means affording a drink that tastes so good it justifies paying for it, and you can barely justify paying for even ale when it gets you drunk. He's like a rare and beautiful songbird, sweet sounding and brightly coloured and strange to find lingering in places where they don’t belong, like with a Witcher and a girl with such little self-preservation that she'll fight monsters, such as yourself. The sight of Your Dandelion returning to the table with two jugs of wine removes every thought from your mind entirely.  

“Here, Dear Heart. You'll like the taste much more, I swear.” He says with a wide grin, still riding on the high of his triumphant performance, pockets full of coin and head filled with applause. He looks beautiful like this. The two jugs are placed in the space between your hands and his, surrounded on one side by his lute. He reaches out timidly and rests the tips of his fingers on your palm, which lets you slide your palm under his and squeeze it gently. You sip the wine without a second thought and he, in turn, takes a deep gulp. It tastes of tart cherries, cloves and how Jaskier's lips taste when he kisses you in the midnight hours, you find yourself smiling as you pull it away from your mouth, the deep red staining your mouth. He’s right. You do like the taste.  

“It’s beautiful.”  

“I told you as much, Dove. It’s delicious, the night is young, and we have coin. So drink.”

/////////

Once the two of you have reached a delicious sort of drunkenness that can only come with the coins from a successful contract, performance, and spending them on more than five jugs of the sweetest tasting wine you have ever drank, you find yourself pressed against the door on the inside of the room you're sharing with your Dandelion. His lips, chapped but soft, are pressed against your own, tongue dipping into your mouth as if still seeking out any wine that might linger still, making your fingers curl into the blue satin of his doublet and your tongue to timidly lap at his. Nights like this, where you aren’t sleeping in the open or five feet away from Geralt and Roach, are rarer than you would like but the scarcity makes you treasure them more. They feel like a gift. Nights where the two of you can just take time with one another, not just steal quick moments of pleasure when you can be sure you're alone. You wouldn’t give up this life for anything on the continent but if you could sleep in a real building more often you would do it in a heartbeat, just for moments like this, where a knee slots between your own and his lips dart down from your own to the hollow of your throat, to suck bruises the colour of wine against your skin, drawing desperate sighs from kiss swollen lips. Your hips rut against his knee to try to relieve the pressure and wetness gathering between your legs, and a warm hand rests on your hip, guiding you to move quicker still.  

“You’re so beautiful.” Even in moments like this, he can’t keep himself from talking. At this point, it must be a universal constant: the sun will rise each morning, fish live in water, ale tastes disgusting, and Jaskier is still talking. Warm breath fans against your skin as he speaks, as much to himself as to you. “So beautiful like this, Dear Heart. Blooming. Like a flower. You are fucking beautiful.” His tone is reverent and makes your heart ache for him to take from you, anything and everything he needs. He makes you feel so much more than what you are, and in return you groan weakly and pull his head back by his hair to slam your lips into his once more. He mutters something against your mouth that sounds a little like your name, then pries you from the door and against his chest, knee still between your thighs, and begins to stumble blindly towards the bed. Fingers splay across your chest, somewhere between groping at your chest and trying to undo the lacing keeping it tied together, in return you push the doublet off of him and let it fall to the floor without a thought. It’s easy to forget how well built your bard is when he spends so much time around Geralt, but now with a hand pressed against firm muscle beneath a thick thatch of hair you’re reminded that he is so much more than someone pretty with a lute. The brunette pulls back from you with a heavy sigh which turns to a throaty chuckle as you chase after his mouth to continue the kiss. When your eyes finally open to see why he isn’t kissing you, you catch sight of blown out pupils, with only a thin ring of ocean blue surrounding it, roaming along your face and body hungrily.  

“Jask,” Your voice comes out a pathetic whine, which makes him chuckle once more, deft fingers tugging your chemise over your head only to then bunch it up and toss away from you, like prolonged contact would make it catch fire.  

“Yes, Dear Heart...” He replies quickly, voice husky and verging on a growl.  

“I want you...”  

“And you have me.” He cradles a hand against his chest for a second or two, before pulling you closer once more, turning and pushing you onto the bed. “And I have you. And will for as long as you’ll have me.” As long as you’ll have me. He says it every time you’re intimate, anything from him simply pressing his fingers inside of you to bedding each other, it's only as long as you’ll have him.  I'd have you till the day I die, you think to yourself as you land on the mattress, I’ll want you till the day I die.  

“Then have me.”  

The smirk he gives you is feral as he climbs over you, knees sinking into the blanket on either side of your hips, lips pressing into your neck once more then travelling downwards. Without your chemise to keep you warm, the blushed flesh of your nipples hardened in the cold air which hadn't gone unnoticed by your lover, who slides his hands to your chest once more to gently massage your mounds while mouthing down the valley between them and towards your trousers.  

“Oh, Muse, do not worry.” He says reassuringly, pulling his hands back from your skin to the fabric at your waist. “I’ll have you. And Gods, how you'll sing for me.”  

////////

Like all nights that involve Jaskier, drinking, and privacy, you find yourself held down against the soft mattress; one of his hands cradling your cheek, while skilled fingers pump in-and-out of you at an almost agonisingly quick pace. Slick, wet, slapping sounds echo through the room, coupled with reassuring coos from him and your own gasps and sighs. The candle, dimly lit and resting on the table closest to the bed, gave out just enough light for you to stare adoringly up at him- cast in golden light like a god amongst men. He was right. Sing for him, you did, moaning loudly into his mouth as he kisses you sweetly. It's the bard in him, that sees him treat your body like an instrument to encourage noises from, your moans the tune and his sweet nothings the lyrics. Its the most beautiful song of his, you can't help but think, one that you would gladly sing every day for the rest of your lives, a song that’s lyrics consist of a call and response between the two of you,  

“Yes, Dear Heart. Sing for me, my girl.” Or “Sweet thing, you’re so bloody gorgeous.” Which is followed by your own faltering mutters of,  

“Jask... there. Oh. I'll...” and “Dandelion... please. Please.”  

The two fingers inside you curl and rub against that spot that makes your gasp grow louder still, a hand suddenly grasping his forearm tightly to anchor yourself once more.  Buried to the start of his signet ring, he grins, twists his fingers once and then pulls them out of you. Glistening digits are pulled up to his mouth and sucked on while he maintains eye contact with you, rocking backwards to rest on his knees. He's spent an hour with his mouth and fingers working your cunt to orgasm over, and over, and over again, yet the simple sight of him sucking your essence from his fingers is enough to make you flush, as if struck with the perversion of the situation all at once. Darkened eyes, framed by darker lashes rake down your body hungrily, such a hunger that any insecurity you might have felt about being so exposed is gone at once.

“You taste so sweet.” It makes you sound like a pie or tart to be spoken about like that, but you can’t help but be flattered. He says it every time he works you to completion on his tongue, and while you argued the first time or two, you've grown to believe him. Or so you say, just so you can avoid his emphatic lectures about your beauty and how he would kill or die for you to see yourself as he does. The wine has made you brave, though, letting you question him  

“I... I do?” There is an unmistakable quiver in your voice that turns Jaskier's grin wolfish. You'd almost be afraid of the look he gives you were it not for the softness in his eyes. You know his answer. It’s always the same. The swipe of his index finger across the sensitive skin of your slit, circling your clit once, twice, before pulling back and pushing it into his mouth with a loud moan, almost certainly for your benefit. He’s a performer by nature and by trade, and the level of confidence he exudes as he smirks down at you is comparable only to the confidence he has when he sings. Moving down to cage you to the bed, nose touching nose, lips near touching, his member rubs against the wetness gathering at your thighs making you gasp, feeling like you’re being touched too much and too little all at once.

“I’ve never tasted anything so sweet in my entire life.” He sounds so sincere. You know that words are his occupation, and that he’s had many lovers before you, but he speaks with such a sincerity that makes you feel like the only person to have ever existed in his eyes. It’s enough to make your throat tighten and eyes well with overly sentimental tears, so you quickly shut your eyes and press your lips against his, tongue tracing the seam of his mouth, until it opens and your tongue dips within. He tastes of sweet cherry wine, something that can only be described as Jaskier and some thing you can only assume is the taste of yourself. You should feel ashamed, a voice in the back of your mind says weakly, at such a wanton display, licking your own taste from the mouth of a lover who's taken to holding you with such a gentleness you'd swear you were made of glass, but you can’t find it in yourself to care. Lustful acts behind closed doors is hardly the end of the world and Jaskier isn’t one to judge, especially if the appreciative noises he’s making into your mouth is anything to go by, and if description of what happens find itself in his next song then even still you won’t care, save for the blush it'll bring to your face and the wink that will inevitably come as he sings. It won’t be the first time. Adjusting your legs to better accommodate him between them, his member rubs against your slit, but he keeps his touch chaste, holding your face gently before breaking the kiss to rest his forehead against yours.  

“May I?” It’s obvious what he means, but still you tilt your head as if oblivious.  

“May you what?” The playful tone of voice brings from him a near exasperated sigh, coupled with the softest smile you can imagine. He doesn't need to ask, never does, especially when he's had you crying out for him for hours now, but he does and always does. It’s sweet that he wants to ensure that you always want it, but you love teasing him.

“Please may I make love to you, Dear Heart?” The candle flickers as he says that, and for a brief second, you're dipped into pitch blackness, before the light returns once more. Make love. It’s such a pretty term, so much sweeter than calling it fucking, makes you feel loved- even if he’s never said that he does. Cheeks tinged a deep red, you nod quickly.  

“Please do.” The earnest desire in your voice is hard to hide sober, so you don't even attempt it drunk, instead opting to dedicate yourself to more fruitful pursuits like wrapping a hand around his cock and rubbing up the length quickly. The gasp that slips from his lips is musical and makes you smile, but it slips as his hand rises to grab your wrist, stilling the movement and pinning it gently to the bed.  

“As much as I love you doing that, if you keep it up, I won't be able to last.” Your heart swells a little with pride, and your mouth turns up in a small smug smirk. You understand all at once why he smirks at your moans.  

“I don’t recall saying I want you to last.” Your voice is little more than a whisper, making his eyes narrow into cat-like slits.  

“I want to make you cum on my cock. And I don’t see a way of doing that if I don’t last.” He nips at your ear, then presses a kiss to the space behind it as he pushes into you. No matter how many times he beds you, it feels like the first... especially after multiple climaxes. He's thick. You moan loudly into his mouth as he pushes himself to the hilt inside of you, and the earlier stimulation makes him feel bigger still, every inch and vein feeling massive. It’s hard to articulate how good he makes you feel in this moment, filling you and brushing his nose against the curve of your jaw, so you moan out incoherently.  

He's leaned over you, with hair far beyond tousled and hanging over his face, pupils blown out so wide you can barely make out the thin blue ring around them, and lips made plump and pink from kissing. He's beautiful, almost painfully so, covered in a thin sheen of sweat which reflected the flickering candlelight. You don’t feel worthy of the attention he lavishes on you, but it's not something you would have ever vocalised, for fear of one of his long, verbose rants about how much he adores you, loves you most ardently.  

“Jaskier-" You moan softly into his mouth as he kisses you chastely, which causes the corners of his lips to turn up into a satisfied smile. He always smiles like that when you moan, proud like each noise is a medal or triumph. Somewhere in the back of your mind, you tell yourself you should be embarrassed by how vocal you’re being, but you also know you would make a million noises just to make him smile. You couldn’t have been silent if you tried anyway.

“Julian.” He replies, hips bucking back slightly only to push back into you. What? Julian? Your eyes widen then narrow in confusion, the combination of that and the pleasure of the thrust causes you to let out a moan, tinged with confusion. He chuckles once more, but less self-assured this time. He seems to have realised that saying a name that isn’t yours, while inside you, was not likely to go down well. “It’s my name. My... name.” He becomes shy for a second, leaning back onto his knees so that he’s no longer draped over you with his body, member pulled out until only the tip remained inside of you. You push yourself up onto your elbows, staring up at him, his face childish looking in a sort of guilt you've never seen before. “I was... I was hoping you could-"  

“Julian.” You cut him off, reaching out to brush your fingers across his chest and threading through the shag on his chest. Julian. Your mind replays the name over and over again, and it's wonderful. A real name. It suits him, but it’s not Jaskier. It's not the name you know him by. Julian is a real name for a real man who would have real responsibilities, not a beautiful foppish bard who follows adventures and travels around the continent without a second thought like your Dandelion. “Julian, Jaskier, Dear Heart, Dandelion, Buttercup... It’s all the same to me.” It isn't though. Maybe to him it is, but you’re struck by how... insecure he looks now. Jaskier is never insecure, occasionally cruel and more often than not jealous, but insecure? Not your Jaskier.  

Somewhere in your mind, back, far beyond the thought of sex and satisfaction that is taking you over, you think about those names that you call him. Dear Heart, Dandelion, Buttercup, Jaskier. All of them are the same wild, beautiful, charming man. This Julian, still beautiful and charming, is afraid; you don’t like that look on him. You like his stupid, over-excited grin, and so you lean up and peck his lips.  

“It's all the same to me, Julian.” You repeat with a soothing smile. “As long as you’re mine, I really don’t mind what I call you.”

Ocean-blue eyes light up with a bright grin, and with a drunken laugh he pins you down once more, face buried in the crook of your neck at the same time that his hips snapped against yours, which draws a loud moan of each other’s names in unison.

“Oh, Dear Heart.” Jaskier, Julian, whispers sweetly against your skin and you swear in that moment that had he asked you to pull down the moon and the stars, you would have immediately done it.  

“Julian.” You moan out, clinging onto his back as his thrusts continue at a near brutal pace.  

“My Dearest...” He moans, mouthing at your collar and throat, one hand holding your thigh to his hip and the other holding onto your hand like someone will steal you away from him at any moment. The changed position makes you feel fuller still, each and every thrust bringing stars to your vision until, with a shaking gasp, you feel yourself overwhelmed by the oh so familiar feeling of your own completion washing over you once more. Julian, no Jaskier, continues his frenzied pumping into you, talented fingers working at your sensitive pearl, just on the right side of painfully pleasant. Any thought you had had even a second beforehand melded into an incoherent mess of the same few words,  

“Good. Oh fuck, Jask. So fucking good.” Then, while your mind was overtaken by the lust and wine, you whine out a weak, “Julian.”  

At that he stills, with a painful sounding whimper, and you feel the sensation of warm release flooding into your cunt. Eyes snapping open, you catch the sight of him leaning over you once more. For a moment of silence, a reprieve from the moans, gasps and wet slap of skin on skin that had filled the air, he remains leaned over you, forehead pressed to your collarbone before dropping down and collapsing on top of you. Absentmindedly, you reach up to card your fingers through his damp hair. He has so much fucking hair, you consider lazily and smile.  

“You'll be the death of me, Dear Heart.” It’s muffled, and a little hard to make out, but you hear him clear as day; it makes you smile, the image of him dying mid shag. He peaks up at you from beneath those long eyelashes and repeats it, peppering kisses along the goose-pimpled flesh of your chest and the top of your breasts, making you giggle. It was a bad idea to laugh, as it encourages him in his journey of kisses, hands moving up to tickle you while using his body weight to hold you in place.

“Gods, Dandelion. Get off of me.” You cackle, trying to buck him off without much luck. “You weigh a tonne!”  

“Are you calling me fat, Darling?” He sounds incredulous and insulted, but the wide grin on his face proves that he’s anything but. Rising slowly, he rests over you on one elbow and cups your cheek, pulling you into a sweet but deep kiss while he delicately pulls himself from within you. The loss makes you whimper under your breath, eyes slipping shut once more, and Jaskier breaks the kiss momentarily to watch transfixed for a second as some of his seed drips from you. You blush under his gaze, as you always do when he looks at you in this way. Skilful fingers scoop up some of his own seed, mixed with your essence, and push it back inside you, the sensation drawing a loud moan from you once more. Mouths pressing together once more, the mattress dips beside you, and you pull back once more to smile,

“I cannot believe you just called me fat.”  

“I would never!”  

“I weigh a tonne? That’s what you said.” His tone is matter of fact and you lean in and press a playful kiss to the tip of his nose.  

“A tonne of muscle and talent?” You offer, and he smirks, grasping you by the hips and all but flinging you on your side.  

“Flattery will get you nowhere, my love. Now sleep.” He says with a sigh and swats playfully at your bottom, pulling the sheets around the two of you. He never makes demands of you, so his light comments like sleep carries far more weight than they should. The blanket, combined with him curling himself around you, head between your shoulders, makes it too warm for you to fall immediately asleep; but you find yourself drifting into the warm, incomprehensible space between sleep and awake.  

“Julian, eh?” Your voice is little more than a croak, yet it’s enough to make him huff out a short laugh with a squeeze of your hip.  

“Yes. Julian. Julian Alfred Pankratz. I. I thought you should know.”  His confidence has faltered once more and instinctively you place a hand atop of his and squeeze it. “...I realised earlier I hadn't told you.”

“Julian Alfred Pankratz.” You repeat, testing how the name feels in your mouth. “I like it.” He nods tiredly, and you curl up into a ball, rolling onto your side to let him take his usual sleeping position, forehead between your shoulders. “...but I like Jaskier more.”  

“Same here.” He mutters tiredly and presses a kiss to your spine. “But if anyone is to call me that, I'd rather it be you.”

“...thank you, Jaskier.”  

“For what, Dear Heart?” He asks and lifts his head, resting his jaw on your shoulder.  

“Telling me? Letting me know?” In this tired headspace you're finding it harder and harder to keep any thoughts out of your mouth. “I don’t know. I appreciate you telling me more about you. You’re just so... private. I worry I barely even know you sometimes.” Voice dipping into a near whisper, sleep begins to overtake you, eyes slipping shut.  

“I’ll tell you anything you want to know, My Muse.” He whispers, the last thing you hear before falling asleep. Once you're asleep, he smiles, pressing a kiss behind your ear before returning his head to your back, “Anything you want to know from my past. My future is already yours; you may as well have what I was as well as what I might be.” Your rhythmic breathing causes his eyes to droop once more. “...I love you.” Before that confession can give him reason for concern, sleep engulfs him, bringing him to dreams of your future together.  

[stillchaoticlogic]

Descent: Chapter 3

Pairing: Leon x Reader

Leon only thought he was the most powerful trainer in Galar...

He never battled you though.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

So I was trying to find a badass gif... there are none our boy is a floof. I gave up and used the most ridiculous one I could find. Enjoy!

Chapter 3: Off with Her Head

The smirk on your lips is almost sinister as you regard the groaning Leon across from you. You delicately sip your coffee while Leon lays face down on the kitchen table. Who would have thought that the Unbeatable Champion Leon is a lightweight? It had only taken a shot and a couple of beers for Leon to be tipsy and yet the moment that Miles bought the whole bar another round ‘in honor of his new friend Leon’ you knew this would be it. That final shot had knocked the former champion out. You had struggled to get him back to your car since he was practically dead weight at that point. Also, very affectionate… Apparently, Leon is a very affectionate drunk and had it been anyone other than Leon latching onto you for hugs and cuddles you would have thought there was a hidden agenda. But honestly, you just believed that Leon enjoyed affection and you weren’t that mad at how his solid body had felt pressed against you last night. You won’t tell him that though. 

His hair is mussed up from the number of times he’s run his fingers through it. Another groan escapes his lips as you push the pain killers and water closer to him, the sound of the glass on the table apparently too much for him to bear. 

“You have a surprisingly low tolerance for someone of your height and build.”

You hear him grumble something incoherent under his breath in annoyance, but you pay him no mind. 

“You need to deal with yourself Ace, we have training to do!” You sing the last part loudly, mostly just to snicker at the groan of pain and the light thud of his head hitting the table again. You laugh outright when the thud is followed by curses. 

“Language, Mr. Former Champ! You wouldn’t want your fan club to hear such profanities come from such a pretty mouth.”

You glance over your shoulder to see the scowl on his lips and his glare. You send him a sly smile in answer before you head out of the room, “Be in the car in twenty minutes!” you call over your shoulder as you do. 

You hear a sigh from the kitchen and repress your giggle as you head to your room to get ready. Having not known where Leon lives, you had just simply brought him home with you and laid him out in your guest bedroom. You would be annoyed at the late start if not for the glee you got from Leon’s hangover. 

At half-past noon with a greasy breakfast sandwich in Leon’s hand and a warning that he will promptly be kicked out of your car if he throws up, you head down the road. Leon is wearing a pair of dark shades to protect his eyes from the bright light and despite your amusement at the situation and desire to torment him more with loud music, you need him to be able to focus, so the car ride to the training ground is mostly silent. Once there Leon seems to be feeling better now that he has eaten and taken some medication. You hand him a bag filled with supplies and a large water bottle. 

“Where are we going?” he asks, clearly not trusting you after the events of the night before. 

“There’s a mountain over there that we will be climbing.” Glancing over at the peak in the distance he groans as he regards it. 

“I’m not sure I’m up for this today…”

“Well I’m very sorry his highness got shit faced last night, but you should have stopped if you didn’t know your limit.”

Leon looks affronted before conceding that you are right. He hangs his head down in defeat before he takes the bag you gave him and puts it on his back. His team is strapped to his belt and once he seems ready you head off down the path towards the mountain.

“Do you have any other Pokemon other than the team you showed in the championships?” The question is innocent in and of itself but he seems suspicious. 

“A few others why?”

“You need some variety in your team. One of the reasons you are at a disadvantage is that everyone already knows your team. You should have a few that you rotate out so there is a surprise every once in a while.”

“What about your team?” he asks suddenly. 

“What about my team?” you ask glancing over your shoulder at him. 

“What Pokemon do you have?” he asks curiously. 

As if waiting for his moment to shine, your Gengar, Akuma, breaks free from his Pokeball and grins deviously at Leon. 

Leon grins as he regards your oldest friend, “Your partner is a Gengar?” he asks happily. 

You smirk as you gaze down at him fondly, “It is, Akuma has been with me for a long time. Isn’t that right Aku?” you ask him in a sweet voice. Akuma giggles but leans happily against you, demanding affection. Resting your hand on the top of his head he happily reaches up and takes your hand. 

The two of you happily make your way down the trail and once you get to an open field you release the rest of your team. Leon’s eyes widen at them and their obvious adoration for you. A Salazzle with a healthy glow to her scales slides up to him first in curiosity, cocking her head from one side to the other. Next, a Toxtricity comes lumbering up behind the Salazzle with a confident smirk on his face followed closely by a curious Nidoqueen. The rest of your team is sticking close to your side and consists of a Toxapex and Dragalge. The Toxapex clearly wants nothing to do with him and the Dragalge looks like it wants to attack him, but doesn’t by wrapping itself around its trainer as a sign of protection. 

Leon looks only mildly uncomfortable as he regards the Pokemon around him, “Don’t worry… they all really are quite dangerous, but very well trained.”

He sends you an unamused look as he watches the group of poison type Pokemon inspect him. When they are happy that he is of no threat to their beloved trainer they leave him alone and meander back to your side. 

“Why don’t you release your team as well? They need the exercise, this is for them after all,” you encourage as you tilt your head with a smirk. 

He nods, suddenly looking very serious before unleashing his team, first Charizard followed by Aegislash, Dragapult, Haxorus, Seismitoad, and Rhyperior. And despite how serious he is about training you can see how he loves and cares for his team. His team regards you and yours curiously if not a little warily. You notice how his Charizard seems to almost hover over him in concern. 

“Let’s go,” you say calmly as you turn to head through the field as you make your way to the mountain in the distance. Glancing over your shoulder you check to make sure they are following you. His Dragapult glides up next to you to tentatively inspect you only to be met with a hiss from Lady, your Salazzle. The Dragapult merely narrows his eyes and hisses right back. There is a roar from Charizard and Dragapult answers by floating back over to his team. 

“So you have a poison type team? Why poison?” he asks as his long strides brought him in line with you. 

“They are underappreciated but dangerous. Honestly, most people shun them because they are scared or intimidated.”

“Isn’t that why you choose them? They are intimidating?” 

“Nope… Aku was my first friend and everyone was always so scared of him when we were younger even though he was the best friend I could have asked for. The other kids wouldn’t let us play with them and when he evolved into a Haunter, it only got worse.”

Leon nods, “I see…so what did you do?”

You shrugged, “I decided that I was going to train and one day I found Sahara and Tsar. They were so cute and tiny at the time.”

“Sahara and Tsar?” he asks in confusion. 

Your Nidoqueen lets out a roar before quieting and you chuckle at her antics, “Tsar is her mate, my Nidoking.”

His eyes widen, “You have one of each?”

You nod as Sahara nuzzles your shoulder. With a giggle, you swat her away and all of a sudden you aren’t the feared High Queen of an underground organization, you’re just a trainer with her team. Leon shakes his head trying to get that image out of his mind. He can’t forget who you really are, but despite his musings, he can’t help but see you in a slightly different light. 

You both battle your way up the mountain and allow Leon to take the lead. He grows stronger with each battle but you can tell he’s holding back. 

“What’s the problem?” you ask as you regard him skeptically. 

“Is this really going to help?” he asks as he turns towards you his own brand of skepticism in his eyes.

“What do you mean?” you square your stance and cross your arms. 

“What makes this training any different than what I do already?”

“It’s probably not,” you answer calmly. 

“Then what’s the point?”

“Precisely. What is the point?” you ask.

He furrows his brows as he regards you, “To get stronger.”

“Nope. You’re already strong, you lack some stamina, but not much really. You’ve lost something though. What is it?”

He scoffs and his fists go to his hips, “You mean my title?”

“Something more important than your title.”

He frowns, “I don’t understand.”

“We are out here to find what you’ve lost,” you tilt your head as you regard him.

He grits his teeth, “The only thing that I’ve lost is my title and I’m not going to get it back out here.”

“Are you angry you’ve lost it?” you ask cooly.

He narrows his eyes, “What I’m feeling is none of your business.”

“So you are…” you murmur softly.

He looks away from you, avoiding your eyes.

“Did you know that Akuma chose me as his trainer? I was pretty isolated when I was kid, I didn’t have friends and my family didn’t really have time for me. It was all about the business,” you begin to pace back and forth in front of him as the memories flood your mind. “I would wander off and be gone for hours and no one would even know I was gone. There was an old cottage on the property and I would play inside and around it. One day there was a Gastly hiding in the shadows. He was scared and alone. No one wanted a creepy ghost type just like no one wanted to have anything to do with the little girl who lived in the house at the end of the road.”

“Why are you telling me this?” he asks in confusion. 

“Because that day a little unwanted Gastly followed a little unwanted girl home and they were never alone again. Akuma has been my partner since I was a child just like I’m sure that Charizard has been there for you. Right now you need to find what you’ve lost and only you know what that is.”

“I told you! I lost my title.”

“Your title isn’t who you are. Try again.”

“Fine! If you’re so smart let’s battle!”

“You won’t win,” you say calmly.

“You don’t know that.”

“I do,” you say simply before you turn and walk away. “You aren’t ready to battle me.”

The ride back to your home is silent as Leon fumes beside you. You roll your eyes before you go into your house and come out with an egg. 

“What’s this?” Leon asks as you hand it to him. 

“It’s an egg and your new means of training,” you say calmly, leaning against the car that Leon has yet to get out of. 

“You want me to raise an egg as training?” he asks incredulously. 

“Yes, you will know soon enough,” you murmur cryptically as you get back into the driver’s seat to take him home.  

“I don’t get it…” he murmurs gazing down at the egg in his lap. 

“You have lost something, Leon, and that egg will help you find it.”

“How?” he snaps, annoyed with you.

“If I simply tell you the lesson you will learn nothing.”

He glares over at you but keeps silent the rest of the way.

“Oh, by the way…” you say as he’s about to get out of the car, “You should pack tonight.”

“Why?”

“We’re going on a bit of an adventure.”

Leon blinks at you in confusion, “Absolutely not.”

He gets out of the car and gathers his things before shutting the door. .

You roll down the window to continue your conversation, slight annoyance in your voice at his behavior, “Be packed tomorrow morning, or be unprepared because we’re going.”

“Where are we going?!” he yells through the window as you roll it up.

“You’ll see,” you say with a Cheshire grin.

The next morning dawns and with a frustrated growl you bang on Leon’s door. You know he keeps denying your calls and quite frankly you are not having it. Walking up to the door you simply pick the lock on the door and walk right in. 

“You would think the Ex-Champion would have a better security system…” you murmur to yourself right as Charizard rounds the corner looking as fierce as ever. The moment he sees it’s just you, his fire dies and looks more tired than anything. Vaguely you wonder how worried he is for his trainer. 

“He’s not ready is he?” you ask the large fire lizard.

He just shakes his head before leading you into the next room. You see a lump under the covers of a king sized bed with long purple hair flowing out of the top. You can’t help but think it looks a bit lonely. Such a large bed, but so empty. 

“Come on, Leon,” you say in annoyance, “we have a plane to catch,”

He rolls over and blinks in annoyance at you, “I’m not getting on a plane with you.”

You roll your eyes, “And why not?”

“Because I don’t trust you. You run an underground ring of illegal Pokemon dealing.”

“Do you know who I sell those illegal Pokemon to? Your friends. I’ve made more deliveries to the people in this very apartment complex than you care to know about. The elite of Galar want what they want.”

“I don’t believe you…” he practically pouts, but you can tell that he knows. 

“Listen Big Boy… You can either accept that you have made this choice, or deny it. I don’t care either way. What I do care about is my team and my reputation. You have put yourself as well as my team in danger and I expect you to do the big boy thing and deal with it. Now get up, we’re going to Kalos.”

You turn and head out the door before you hear his questions. You glance over your shoulder as a singular ‘why’ floats from the room. 

“Because you need to see more of the world.”

“I’ve seen the world!” he pouts as he stumbles out of his bedroom and into the living area. You head towards his kitchen and start rummaging through his cabinets.

“What are you doing?” he asks mildly offended that you are just looking through his things, even if it is just his kitchen. 

“Coffee, I would assume you would like some before we head out, perhaps breakfast as well.”

He looks less offended at your answer, probably because you were going to feed him, and directs you to his coffee and the green protein infused smoothie he usually drinks for breakfast. 

“So much kale…” you murmur as you stuff hand-fulls into the blender and roll your eyes at the noise the high powered contraception makes.

Leon emerges with his bag packed looking far more put together than he did an hour ago. 

“You never answered my question about why we are going to Kalos.”

“I have business and you have training,” you say putting your sunglasses on and heading towards your car. He follows along reluctantly before he throws his duffle bag into your back seat, his team strapped securely to his belt. 

***

The tower in Lumiose city reaches up to the sky and for the first time you watch Leon forget about being a Champion or not being a Champion. He’s just being Leon. 

“You’re welcome to wander the city and explore while I get some work done. Do you want to grab dinner when I’m finished?”

“You don’t want me to go with you?”

“No, you don’t want to go with me,” you say with a smirk, “Just enjoy the day, we’ve got some training to do tomorrow.”

“What training is that?” he asks absentmindedly as he regards the shops and restaurants around him. 

“I’m taking you to a battle mansion, you’ll love it.”

“Really?” he asks, whipping his head around to face you, excitement in his eyes. You just nod with a smirk on your face as you leave him to his devices. 

Walking down the streets of Lumiose city, you come to a cafe where you are to meet your contact. Negotiations are underway to set up a group in Kalos. Certain pokemon were in high demand that are native to this region. You order a coffee and sit down at one of the tables. A few moments later a man sits down across from you, his own beverage in his hand. 

“(Y/N), I presume?” he speaks lowly a confident smirk on his lips. You narrow your eyes.

“Indeed.”

“Follow me, the boss is waiting for you.”

You nod before you get up and follow him into the back room where a man with blonde hair and striking green eyes awaits you. He’s wearing a silvery gray suit with a deep green dress shirt, the buttons around the collar unbuttoned and displaying a toned chest. Just enough to tease you. 

“Jean, I presume?” you ask your hand gripping Aku’s Pokeball in case you need him.

“No need to be so tense! Have a seat, I love lunches with beautiful women,” he says with a smirk and flirtatious wink. 

You don’t relax as you take a seat across from him and cock your head to one side, “you say that like you don’t have them often.”

“Often enough, but none quite as exquisite as you,” he purrs, offering you a bit of the food that was prepared beforehand. You know better than to eat what is before you though. 

You smile sweetly before you fix him with a look, “Down to business.”

“I was hoping for a chance to get to know you.”

“There will be plenty of time for that after I’ve heard your proposal,” your tone is light and airy, amicable, but you know how the game works. 

The male before you narrows his eyes minutely before he smirks, “Of course, business before pleasure, a lady after my own heart. I propose we open trade routes specifically for Litleos and Flabebe. My team will gather them in exchange for Dreepy and Applin.”

You cock your head to the side, “I don’t believe that’s a fair trade, Dreepy and Applin are significantly harder to find, especially Dreepy whereas both Litleo and Flabebe are almost common.”

“The heart wants what the heart wants and the hearts of Kalos want Applin and Dreepy,” he says with a shrug, as if it is entirely out of his hands.

“It sounds to me as if I would be getting the short end of the stick, Applin and Rookidee are moreso on par with your request.”

“And of Dreepy?”

“If you want Dreepys you will need to give me something better than Flabebe. I am already able to source them Alola.”

He scowls before his tone lightens, “What about Mega Evolutions?”

“What about them?” you ask flatly, acting far more bored than you actually are. 

“You can Mega Evolve your Pokemon anytime and anywhere, there are no restrictions unlike your region’s Dynamax….”

“Go on…”

“With my help you could be uncontested.”

“Are you saying you will outfit me and my team with Mega evolution equipement?”

“Your partner is a Gengar correct? Think of the power he could have…” You do consider it. You’ve heard of the power that Pokemon that have the ability to mega evolve have. Such power...

“How many Dreepy do you want for this power?”

“One hundred,” he says without flinching. 

“I will consider your proposition and get back to you within the week. I need to take it to my associates.”

“Of course!”

“I will be off then,” you say as you move to get up.

“What of your lunch?” he asks good naturedly. 

“I have someone waiting for me so I really must be off.”

“Well he is very lucky then…”

You regard the man in front of you for a moment, vaguely wondering his intentions. With a single line he has made you suspicious. 

“Indeed,” you say with a saccharine smile.

Leaving the cafe you can’t shake the feeling that something is wrong and when you are cornered in an alleyway by the lackeys of the very man you had just spoken with you aren’t surprised. There are five of them each with their pokemon at the ready to take you on. You regard the lackeys with boredom rather than fear. As if you haven’t been ambushed before, such amateurs. 

“It’s nothing personal,” comes a voice from the rooftop, “your associates are merely more cooperative.” 

Glancing up you see Jean standing there gazing down at you with a wicked smirk.

“Oh? You’ve spoken to my associates?”

“Our agreement was as many Dreepy as I would like if I could get rid of their boss. I fully expected you to be dead by now my dear.”

You roll your eyes and with a flash, Akuma is standing by your side looking all the more menacing as he regards his opponents. 

“You know what to do,” you say without even blinking. 

Akuma giggles before he seemingly vanishes into thin air, the sound of yelps and cries of pain assault your ears as Akuma in a single blow takes out his opponents.

“I didn’t become who I am by being easy to kill, you’ll have to do better.”

“How is this for better?” he unleashes a Houndoom and with a glow of the jewel around his neck he mega evolves. 

You curse under your breath as you regard the fiery dog before you. 

“Akuma! Destiny Bond!” Akuma nods before he glows a deep purple. 

“Crunch!” 

Houndoom rushes forward landing a solid hit on Akuma who just grins and bears the pain. You grit your teeth as the Houndoom effortlessly throws Akuma away. He hits the wall before he falls to the ground. He weakly stands up before hypnotizing the Pokemon before him. Houndoom shakes his head trying to rid himself of the drowsiness, but fails and falls into a deep sleep. 

“Nightmare then Hex,” you say glaring up at Jean. 

He smirks at you as Akuma unleashes the attacks unto the dark type pokemon. It doesn’t do much damage but the moment that Houndoom wakes up you know it’s over. He unleashes one more attack that sends Akuma to the ground and due to the bond forged between the two of them, Houndoom falls as well. 

“Very good…” purrs Jean, “You do live up to your reputation. Let’s see how well you do with my Garchomp.”

Garchomp roars as he lands before you, you pull your Dragalge, Silette, and ready her for battle. 

“Do you think your little barnacle can defeat me?”

“You made a mistake siding against me,” you say calmly, ”I’m going to show you how.”

The battle is over before it’s even really begun and you know for a fact that Jean relies entirely on Mega Evolution. Once his mega evolved Pokemon has been defeated the rest of his team crumble like cake. You climb the stairs on the fire escape to reach the top of the building where Jean is standing, still shocked at what just happened. You hold out your hand and he glares at you in defiance. 

“I want the band.”

“How dare you-”

A deep growl from Moxy, your Salazzle, has him handing over the band and you look at it curiously before you tuck it away. 

“Who are you working with? Who wanted me dead?” you more so in annoyance than fear. 

He smirks before he shrugs carelessly, “They called themselves Diamond and Clubs, they intended to pay me handsomely to take you out when they found out that you were coming for a meeting in Kalos with me.”

“I’m keeping the band as your payment for losing to me. I will give you fifty Dreepy each for Gengarite, Beedrillite and Venusaurite.”

“Your allies have turned against you, how do I know you can hold up your end of the bargain?”

“I have two hundred Dreepy waiting to be moved as we speak. I am the only one with access to the system housing them and my personal team is loyal. Whatever they hoped to pay you, I can pay more.”

“They said you were lethal, I didn’t think you would be this ruthless as well…”

“If I wasn’t dangerous, they wouldn't be trying to kill me…”

“Touché,” he says with a smirk, “I need an hour then we meet at the tower for the exchange.”

“Perfect.”

Once you are alone in a small department store you quickly head to the changing room and change your clothes and shoes. You heal your pokemon in preparation for what is to come and quickly make your way to where you are to meet Leon. 

You see his long purple hair and head towards him, grabbing his arm you pull him along beside you, “Change of plan.”

“What?!”

“Clubs and Diamond are trying to kill me so we have a short amount of time to gather supplies and get to a safe house.”

“Kill you!?” he exclaims. 

“Keep your voice down! I have an exchange to make, then we get out of here.”

“How are you so calm?!” 

“Panicking will do nothing. We have to get to safety, they know about you so we need to stick together and get somewhere safe. I just need you to trust me on this.”

He looks serious as he nods at you.

At the base of the tower, Jean is leaning casually against it as you walk up to him. Leon is about a hundred feet away watching the whole exchange in fear. You hold out your hand and he places the bag in it with the Mega stones you asked for. You nod in acceptance as you hand him the code to the storage unit. He checks it before he nods at you. 

“I hope we can do business in the future,” he says, pulling you hand up to his lips for a kiss. 

“You tried to kill me…”

“Business,” he says with a shrug, “And a grave mistake obviously…” 

“Obviously,” your voice gives nothing away as you gaze at him coldly. 

He merely smiles pleasantly at you before you turn on your heel and walk away. A shout from Leon has you casually snapping your fingers. Hemlock, your Vileplume which was happily hiding amongst the flowers unleashes a stun spore into the air as you casually put on a gas mask. Several people, including Jean fall to the ground paralyzed. 

“Thanks for the Mega Stones, your treachery will not be forgotten.”

You hear a wait leave his lips as you just roll your eyes, “In fact,” you say as you casually walk up to him ignoring the screams of the people around you, “I’ll take these.” You flip him over and pull another mega band from his wrist and upon further inspection pull a bag of mega stones out, “for payment.”

His eyes widen as you show him what you have taken before you quickly pull out a Pokeball and release a Weezing. 

“Smokescreen,” you say as you step into the fog. 

The entirety of the park has been thrown into chaos and if it wasn’t for the Pokemon dealers being arrested for theft then you would have had more problems to deal with. 

“What happened?!” Leon asks as he dutifully looks away as you change from the clothes you had been wearing before you hand them Moxy so she can burn them. They are ashes in the wind in a moment. You put on a charming sundress and glasses as well as a bright blonde wig. Leon stops when he turns to look at you in the cheery yellow dress as you smirk at him. 

“Close your mouth, Leon, you’ll attract Cutiefly,” you tilt your head to the side, “Unless that’s your intention?”

He glares half heartedly at you before he crosses his arms with a huff.

“Oh stop will you? Everything is fine!”

“He had a gun, he tried to kill you.”

You fix him with a steady look, “I knew what his intentions were the entire time, but we needed these,” you say holding up the bag of mega stones. 

“What are they?” he asks, taking the bag from you. 

“Mega stones, there is one for Charizard and Garchomp.”

“Huh? I don’t want these! They are stolen!”

You tilt your head, “You’re going to need them for protection and we need to get out of Kalos as fast as possible.”

He clenches his teeth as he thinks over the situation, the stress clear on his handsome face, “fine…” he concedes finally. 

You hand him the band and dig out the stones before you hand them to him. 

“You better buckle up Ace, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.”

Notes: I hope you enjoyed this! It turned out much longer than expected but I doubt anyone's complaining! Please drop some love and tell me your thoughts! A thank you to my Betas Pluto and Serene!

[schokokokatze]

Kuneris, husband to the chieftess, and chiefly annoyed by all the requests of “could you tell your wife” he seemed to be getting these days, was taken aback when Fri approached him. He had barely seen her around, just some little girl, doing girl things. It wasn’t that Kuneris didn’t like children - quite the opposite in fact - but girls seemed weirdly sensitive to him. Everybody ended up quite angry if he encouraged them to join in the boys’ games of playfighting and tag was only alright if there was no tackling and nobody got hurt. In Kuneris’ head, children had to get hurt a tiny bit every now and then, it taught them that getting hurt wasn’t the end of the world. He certainly hadn’t died from a bruised knee, or falling into mud and dirtying his clothes, although his mother had made sure he ended up uncertain if dying wasn’t preferable to her wrath in the latter case.

And now, there was this tiny wisp of a girl strutting up to him, some of the best weapons around in her hands, and looked at him with an odd smile. It was enough to make the hairs on his back stand up. Her hair was very fair, almost unnaturally so, and her skin looked as if mere contact with something as rude and garish as the sun could inflame it, but her eyes ... her eyes were dark as tar. Dark and deep like wells. In the depth ... there was an animal. A beast. Suddenly, he felt naked. He wasn’t armed, she was. He may have been able to grab her wrist and bend the sword away from himself, tackle her and overwhelm her with his weight.

“You’re ... the late chief’s girl, yeah?”, he said, in need of some sort of human noise. She nodded, the beast in her eyes couching, watching, wanting. “I’m the one who killed his murderer”, she said quietly. So far, it had been implied that the assassin had fallen to Veo Vine, her aunt, but Kuneris believed her in an instant. People had liked to joke that a restless hound lived in his head, and came howling when there was a fight. This girl didn’t have a hound. She had ... something more sinister. A sudden movement, and the cool bronze of her sword rested next to his neck. The moment froze. His hands were half-raised but whatever he did, she might end up being faster. She had to have trained doing that.

“Kuneris the Hound, who was abandoned by his chief, his ... kuningaz, for being too loud, too drunk, too eager to fight.” Her eyes caressed her blade, then she looked straight into his face, darker and even angrier than before. Beast. Little, white beast. Wolfbeast with a winter coat. “What a cruel and stupid reason for that. I would welcome someone like you, especially with what I’ve planned, shower you with honors, treat you as the warrior you are, not some ... nuisance to be tamed. It’s unfair, and it’s dumb, how you’ve been treated.” With what she had planned, huh. He cleared his throat and ignored the sword next to his face as best he could. She still made his skin crawl, but he was Kuneris, and wouldn’t be intimidated by a little girl. Not even one as dangerous as this. “You want revenge, eh?”, he guessed. Her face lit up slightly and she nodded. “I do, and I’ll have it. Once I find out where to direct it, Hound ... will you join me? I’ll give you a proper fight. Not a dumb, annoying argument with your wife. We have an enemy, and the enemy has already drawn blood. Aunt Wysha will not conquer them, but I will. You can either be there when I do, or you can be ... you know. Home. Sitting by the hearth. Listening to auntie nag.”

“I’ll think about it, you little beast. But if you ever put a sword near my neck again, you’ll have way bigger problems than your enemies having a good time in their village while your family’s weeping.” She looked into his eyes, smiled, and with a little movement of her wrist, the sword was lowered in a fluid motion. “So, you understand me. And I understand you. Isn’t that nice”, she said and took a step back. “Think about it. A bloody raid to make our enemies tremble, and tell the rest we aren’t to be trifled with. Getting drunk on their beer while watching their damn houses burn. Being ... Kuneris again. No more leash. ‘Til then.” He nodded and watched her leave for a moment, before slowly continuing his walk towards his new house. He doubted very much that he’d be able to think about a lot of other things for a while.

(Oh god, this is a wall of text. It was absolutely crucial for me to get into this moment in detail, I just really, really didn’t take enough pictures :D I had tons of fun writing this, though. His sim looking pretty worried and her sim looking inexplicably happy was something that happened ingame during their whole conversation, btw)

[whatzaoverwatch]

The Reaper of the Opera Chapter 8: Masquerade

Beginning of Act 2! Probably one of my favourite scenes from both the stage play and the film. Masquerades have always been my passion especially since my parents got me a mask straight from New York. I hope everyone is enjoying the story so far.

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Few Months Later

The Opera House was brightened by esteemed guests and party goers as they entered the building with delight. A masquerade was being held to celebrate the end of a triumphant season. People dressed in costumes and masks of various patterns and colours. After the incident that befell the theatre months ago, the Reaper had yet to make his appearance. No notes, no accidents, not even an unsettling presence was felt among the performers. Had the Reaper finally made himself scarce of the lives of the Overwatch Opera House?

That is the hopes between the two very enthused men that greeted every one of their guests with a smile. Reinhardt, with his delighted grin as he held onto a lion’s mask with every bow and handshake he took part of. Torbjorn was less spontaneous than his friend with his more composed greetings with his frowning mask. Both suited up in tuxedos and ready to celebrate the evening away. A roaring laugh came from Reinhardt as he patted Torbjorns back.

“Ah my friend, the night is perfect for this celebration! I cannot wait to show our guests my dance moves. Especially to Madame Amari.” He chimed with delight, eager to get his hands on the beer and alcohol they were serving inside.

“Perish the thought knowing how you move,” Torbjorn muttered to himself, only to pat his friends arm in return, “But I do not see the harm in having a little fun. Things have gotten successful since our ghost friend had disappeared. Maybe the bastard had finally learned his lesson.”

“Come Torbjorn! Enough talk of ghouls and ghosts! Let us make ourselves acquainted with the beer as we have with our guests.” Guiding him inside the theatre, they easily made their way to grab a few drinks.

Everyone had come in attendance to the festivities. Hana, who had since recovered from her vocal disruption, was dressed elegantly in a pink and blue ballgown and a bunny mask in hand. Accompanied by Lucio, who was more suited with a vest and dress shirt combo with a frog mask on the side of his face. Even the dancers were greeted to the ballroom to their delight. All dressed to their own preferences and masks themselves. Lena with her girlfriend Emily, was quick to introduce her to Amelie and her husband Gerard. Fareeha was alongside Ana, as they remained observers with Jesse.

The incident was far too great for Jesse’s left arm to recover. Angela informed him that the shots struck some vital nerve points. He could never use his arm again, leaving it in a rather metallic cast that took time to properly control. It was clear that he was still struggling to use it as he nearly dropped his drink in his hold. Quickly caught by the ever so watchful Ana. She was sure to keep an eye on him and allow him to keep his job at with the company. Since the incident, he was left rather quiet and bitter to what he had witnessed. Knowing he had questions that were left unanswered. Sparing a few glances over to her every once in awhile, as if he wanted to ask her something. But anytime he attempted to bring the subject up, she was quick to make her leave.

Among the crowd was you alongside Genji and Hanzo. The brothers tailored to their own yukatas. Dragon like masks to compliment their own palettes. Since that evening of tragedy and confession, you had been living with the two brothers. While the older brother was a bit reluctant to having you stay, he started to grow accustomed to you overtime. Never getting in his ways and finding time to help him with any cooking or cleaning. Although Genji insisted that you didn’t, it cleared your mind from the times you had returned to the opera house. Hanzo rarely showed his emotions around you, but you felt him lower his guard around you overtime. You had learned about what had happened between the two brothers and what made Genji they way he was today. It was a lot to take in, but you knew that Genji had suffered just as much as you had in the times you were apart. Surprised that Genji had forgiven him, but knowing he had overcome his hatred in his absence.

You found it a miracle that they had chosen to return to rekindle their brotherly bond and mend their troubles. Overtime with your stay with Genji, he had popped the question to you. It was almost a dream as he took you to the cherry blossoms you adored when you were little. Leaving you shocked as he got down to one knee under the sakura tree. With the whispers faded from your mind, you were free to make your own choices. Gently tracing the ring around your necklace, a small smile formed on your lips to the dragon craved ring grasping a tiny diamond within its teeth. It was Hanzos’ suggestion to keep the engagement private. The press was keen on prying into your social life, so the news would cause your privacy to dissipate completely. They were the last things you wanted to have upon you after everything that happened. You wore a black and white halter dress that exposed your backside. A black and white feathered mask rested on your face with little rhinestones that resembled stars.

A gentle tug from your arm was felt by the one who linked his with your own. Looking up to see Genji giving you a sweet smile at your own. Unable to hide the blush growing on your cheeks from his admiration. Giving you a subtle wink, he turns to Hanzo with a smirk.

“Why don’t you go socialize brother? Perhaps you may find someone suited to your type.” Watching the older brother leer at him.

“Are you only saying this to have privacy with [Name]?” He looks over at you, making you sheepishly plant your gaze to the ground. Hearing him sigh, he crosses his arms, “At least be on your best behaviour for once.”

“We are not children, Hanzo.” Genji pouts, letting Hanzo pass you two. He stopped to place a hand on your shoulder with a knowing look.

“Keep an eye on him for me.” You nodded with a smile, patting his gloved hand gently for assurance. Letting him leave as Genji merely snorted.

“Even now, he still thinks I will cause him nothing but trouble.” He sighs, running his fingers through his hair. You tugged his arm lightly to draw his attention away.

“He only worries about you; it’s what siblings do. I am glad he still cares after all that has happened.” Reminding him, he eyes your ring resting upon your collarbone.

“I only wish that I can tell people of our engagement,” looking discouraged, watching it glimmer in the lights, “Why can’t I show how much I love you? Even for just one night.”

You took his hand, raising it to your lips and placing a gentle kiss upon his knuckle. Knowing that everyone was distracted in their own chatter to see the display of affection. Letting the tension in his body ease at your peck. Squeezing his hand softly, you comforted him with your smile.

“I already know how much you love me Genji. I promise after tonight, we can finally tell people,” You whispered, “But let us not talk about it now. I want us to enjoy ourselves.”

He looked uncertain at the thought of waiting just a little bit longer. Although he didn’t wish to force it, he just wanted to assure that the rest of your life with him would be filled with love and devotion. He shared his upmost affection in privacy, so waiting a few more hours wouldn’t hurt.

“Of course, my blossom.” Keeping his hold on you, he guided you to where some of the guests began to dance around the main area.

Various fans and masks seen with each twirling companion. Dancing and singing to the music filling the theatre. Drinks and laughter shared among the groups observing. Even people trying to partner up to join the dancing was seen. Reinhardt trying to persuade Ana into dancing, much to the amusement from the people around them. It seemed to be a peaceful evening to behold. But all good things come to an end at some point.

The lights flickered vigorously, the doors opening wide from the powerful wind from the outside. Only to shut them tight and lock everyone inside. The music drowned by a wave of organs. Confusion and tension rose between everyone. A sudden scream was heard from the top staircase as a new face appeared before the crowd.

A man dressed in red, wearing a skull face stood at the top of the staircase. A feathered hat rested upon his had with a red cape upon his backside. Carrying a shotgun in his hand and a book in the other. Fear and terror loomed over the crowd as red death stood before them. You had felt every part of you freeze up at the familiar aura. Everyone's smiles and cheers were no longer heard as they knew who this man was. The Reaper of the Opera had returned.

His blackened gaze looking over the audience. Looking over the crowd in sinister amusement. Smoke escaping the teeth of the mask for every breath he took. Although hidden behind the mask, he could see the various looks of horror and disbelief at his presence. Stepping down the staircase slowly, he chuckled at their reactions with open arms.

“Why so silent, good Messieurs? Did you think that I had left you for good?” He hummed, his voice carrying around everyone with a deceitful sense of comfort, “Forgive me of my absence, I was preparing you an Opera to perform.”

Tossing the book towards Lucio, he scrambled to grab it as he looked at the contents inside. A score and script written with complete detail of what needed to be done. Planned and constructed every so carefully as if he had worked on this for years. Reaper raised his gun up, a silent threat to what he could do to anyone who opposed. Gently resting the side of it with his other hand.

“I suggest you follow what it says with complete obedience. There are more tragedies that await you than just a broken arm,” Turning his attention to an angry Jesse, who was merely held behind a concerned looking Ana. Continuing his steps, he halted before Hana and Lucio, “I do have more specific instructions before rehearsals start. For starters, Hana will have no part in the upcoming performance. The eager little rabbit has taken her course far too long for my liking.”

Taken back by his words, Lucio kept her steady from his words. Watching the man descend down the stairs, Genji kept close to you knowing the two of you awaited at the bottom steps. He was keen on staying by your side, until his attention was grabbed by Hanzo. Watching his brother beckon to his place quickly, he was hesitant to leave you at this very moment. Looking over at your frozen gaze, he hated the thought of leaving you exposed to this man. Parting away from you, he quickly joined his brother to see where he was heading. Disappearing into the crowd, leaving you on your own for just a moment. Reinhardt and Torbjorn were set to approach Reaper before his gun pointed towards them. Halting them from trying to take him down.

“I also advise my managers to remember who exactly runs this theatre. Know your places before you decide to run your mouths.” He warned, watching Reinhardts face look of terror while Torbjorn remained stubborn as ever. Looking down the staircase, his eyes finally found themselves upon you. You could feel him taking you in as every part of you was tempting you to go to him.

“As for our beloved star, Miss [Name]. No doubt she will do her best. Her voice is good, but it could excel if she lets it,” Praising you while also scolding you, he gestures with his free hand to your presence, “If only she will return to me, her teacher, I can continue to let her voice grow to further heights. To be my Angel of Music once more.”

Everyone’s attention drew to you. The reveal of your teacher finally being exposed. The source of your talent residing just halfway down the stairs. Hushed whispers and looks were drawn upon you. But your focus remained on him. Watching the soulless gaze upon you hardening. Even if you could truly see him, you could feel those dark eyes yearn for you. You approached ever so slowly, watching his gun lower as he moved down the stairs. His form towering over yours as you let your guard down. As if some part of him still lured you to his side.

You could never confess that you had missed his teachings, recalling how he took you away to bring light into his darkness. As much as he was to be feared, he was only ever gentle with you. He only wanted you to sing his songs. But you felt as if there was something more, something else that he wanted from you. To be with him, to be by his side.

It was almost as if you had forgotten everything else until he looked down to the ring. The glimmering reminder of who you devoted yourself to. The dragons glare mocking him of what he couldn’t have. Smoke seen around his form as his vulnerability was sealed back up. A growl escaped him as the grasped the ring and snatched it away. The chain snapping as he held the engagement ring in his hand. Startling you from his change of demeanour.

“Your chains are still mine; you belong to me!” He hissed. Leaving you wide eyed as a shout came from behind you.

“Don’t touch her!” The voice of Genji came up as he had returned with a blade in hand. Hanzo by his side with a bow to aim for Reaper. Very much prepared on their part given their past as they were waiting for this moment.

Not fast enough as he made his way back up the stairs with a laugh. Sending shots into the air to cause the crowd to scatter in fear. Causing a distraction for the two men to hesitate their strike. Shadows forming around him as he escaped into the floor on the steps. Genji running ahead, letting Hanzo stay by your side as he tried to slip into the escape. You were still left there to hold a hand to your collarbone to where he grabbed the ring. Just as Genji was about to reach him, the Reaper had finally disappeared. Jesse approached Genji quickly to see his gaze upon the closing floor below them.

“He’s getting away!” Genji cursed while McCree placed a hand on his shoulder.

“Come on, I know where he might’ve gone,” As he turned to go down the staircase, Ana stopped in front of them both. Keeping them from running, “Get out of our way Ana, I don’t need you to coddle me about my arm.”

“I can’t let you go after him, McCree.” She spoke behind the cat like mask she wore. Genji stepping in with a confused look.

“Why not? We should follow him before he attacks anyone else.” He states, trying to pass Ana before she held out her cane.

“He won’t do that unless you follow his words.” She finally claimed, drawing the attention of everyone around her. Even Fareeha was taken back by her mothers’ words.

“What do you mean by that?” She asked. Jesse cursed lowly with a glare to the older woman.

“Ana, what are you hiding? You know who he is don’t you” He questioned, watching the woman’s gaze falter with guilt. The managers approached in complete shock.

“What?” Reinhardt looked broken with a sense of betrayal appearing on his face. Torbjorn scowled as he approached Ana with a sneer.

“I knew it, he couldn’t have done all of this alone. He had an associate this entire time!” He stated. The look of horror now presented on everyone’s face. Anas attention now towards the shorter man.

“I will not be associated with what he has done,” Seeing the eyes fixated upon her, even as the men lowered their weapons from losing the Reaper. No longer able to hold her facade before everyone. She gripped her cane with resentment, sighing as she lifted her mask slowly, “I’m afraid there is much I have to talk about. Come, I will tell you everything that I know.”

To be continued

[hollywoodgothique]

Wondering what “unhinged” secrets reside within the Winchester Mystery House this Halloween? The come along with us…if you dare!

After a six-year hiatus, the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose is once again presenting an elaborate Halloween haunt, and the results are formidable. Titled Unhinged, the three-part event includes a hair-raising excursion through the historical structure, a spectacular digital light show mapped to the building’s facade, and additional entertainment on the surrounding grounds. The combination yields one of the best haunted house attractions of Halloween 2019, one that dwarfs all but the best Los Angeles Halloween Haunts.

Thrills begin before you enter the grounds. A crazy old man warns of the fate that befell his daughter when she ignored his admonition not to enter the house, and posters display faces of those lost within the corridors. Haunt-seekers with nerves of steel may decide to proceed anyway, but be forewarned: This house eats souls!

Winchester Mystery House Halloween Review: Unhinged Tour

One of the Unhinged denizens of Winchester Mystery House

The star attraction of the 2019 Winchester Mystery House Halloween extravaganza is Unhinged, a guided night-time tour of the mansion’s interior. For those who have never been, the Winchester Mystery House is not particularly mysterious; at least by daylight, it seems more eccentric than esoteric, with its odd architecture, doors that open on nothing, and stairs that lead nowhere. Even during the night-time flashlight tour we took in 2012, it did not seem particularly intimidating (dozens of people with flashlights can illuminate the rooms fairly brightly). Unhinged, however, transforms the location into the haunted house of our collective nightmares, casting a funereal pall with its sinister lighting and taking guests into dark, decrepit rooms not seen on regular tours. There’s really not an environment among Los Angeles haunts that can compare except for the Queen Mary Dark Harbor.

Unhinged is somewhat misleadingly billed as an “immersive Halloween experience,” which suggests something much milder than delivered – maybe a ghost hunt or a seance, with a few shadows and some rapping in the walls. In fact, Unhinged is a full-blown haunted house, loaded with live actors, special effects, spectral lighting, and eerie audio. The hour-long journey takes guests through a series of vignettes, where the ghosts of the past manifest to haunt the living in a variety of ways: some reenact their death, oblivious of observers; others take note of their guests, lavishing them with unwanted attention.

What these apparitions don’t do – with one or two exceptions – is deliver jump-scares. Most rooms offer an encounter, some longer than others, often revealing details of past tragedies. One clever recurring theme is seeing a character and a body and realizing they are one and the same. We don’t want to reveal a major spoiler, but one example of this is so subtle it is easy to overlook: one young woman weeps mournfully over a body drowned in a bathtub. Look closely, and you will see the body is her own. Look more closely, and you will see the corpse’s eyes open and make contact – even though she is beneath the surface of the water!

There is a narrative thread that ties the scenes together by following through on the setup seen outside. The premise is that your guide, frustrated by the slow pace of the preceding tour, has taken a detour off the usual route, taking you into the basement, where bad things soon happen. Midway through, you overhear a radio report about the Winchester Mystery House Halloween event being shut down by police because thirteen guests are missing since their guide took them off the approved route; in other words, you have gone missing, just like the faces on the posters outside, just like the little girl whose father told you of her disappearance. We won’t say much more than that, except that the thread is tied up at the end with a sort of afterlife reconciliation that invites visitors to remain…forever.

At sixty-five minutes in length, Unhinged offers much more than other Halloween haunted houses – even more than the redoubtable Reign of Terror Haunted House in Thousand Oaks. Partly that is because the experience involves some level of interaction within each room, so guests are stopping to see what’s happening, not walking through continuously. Nevertheless, this is a mammoth experience that exploits its location to fullest effect.

Winchester Mystery House Halloween Review: Unhinged Light Show

Digital light show mapped onto the house’s facade

The other highlight of the Winchester Mystery House’s Halloween presentation is the Unhinged Light Show, which is much more than just spooky lights dancing in the night. It’s a site-specific piece of digital mapping, which brings the facade of the mansion to life, telling the story of an unfortunate tour guest who suffers through an unnerving overnight stay after being accidentally left behind.

With music, dialogue, and sound effects, the eight-minute show is essentially a ghost story written on the face of the Winchester Mystery House. The mansion plays itself, with the digital projection casting shadows on the exterior and creating silhouetted figures in the windows. As the night wears on, apparitions manifest inside and out, floating through windows, and eventually a fire erupts (a historical plot point also referenced in the Unhinged tour). Eventually, dawn breaks, and everything is safe – or is it?

The digital animation is spectacular, and the simple story ties the imagery together, building to creepy climax that elicits enthusiastic applause from viewers.

Winchester Mystery House Halloween Review: Estate Activities & Atmosphere

Atmospheric settings around the Winchester Mystery House.

Besides the Unhinged tour and light show, the Winchester Mystery House offers what they call “Estate Activities” on the grounds around the mansion, including popup bars and tarot card readings. For additional fees, you can fire a rifle in the shooting gallery or hurl an ax at a target. There is also a separate area with sideshow type-games (e.g., Skeleball), though these were mostly overlooked on the night of our visit.

There is enough fog and decor to make you linger, but the activities do not warrant an extended stay. Additionally, food options are limited. There is a tiny grill in the gift shop building, which serves decent enough fast food, but you won’t be able to make a dinner out of it.

At least you can enjoy some creepy cocktails at the two bars. We sampled a pair, one called “Dark and Story,” the other called “Poisoned Apple.” The former consists of ginger beer and rum, garnished with a lemon wedge; the latter is comprised of vodka, cranberry juice, and apple juice, also with a lemon wedge. Both are excellent – a great way to cap the evening while soaking up the Halloween atmosphere outside the house. As you exit through the gift shop, make sure to view Christine McConnell miniature Gingerbread recreation of the Winchester Mystery House.

Winchester Mystery House Halloween Review: Conclusion

Except for various low-key flashlight and candlelight tours, the Winchester Mystery House has not offered a large-scale Halloween haunt since Fright Nights in 2012. We enjoyed that presentation, but it suffered slightly from placing most of the haunt on the grounds around the house, reserving the interior for a traditional historical tour, illuminated by flashlight and people by a few silent, costumed characters, who provided atmosphere but no scares.

Winchester Mystery House: Unhinged ups the ante by moving the the majority of the haunt inside the house. It far exceeds their previous effort, ranking as the most extensive Halloween walk-through we have ever encountered. Really the only reason not to attend is distance. But Los Angeles fright fans who don’t mind a five-hour drive (or a plane flight) should check it out.

Winchester Mystery House Halloween Review: Photographs

Gingerbread rendition of the Winchester Mystery House

[serialposts]

Review: “Unhinged” Halloween at Winchester Mystery House Wondering what "unhinged" secrets reside within the Winchester Mystery House this Halloween? The come along with us...if you dare!

[ourlittlesecretokay]

Hi yes hello who do I speak to about getting some more pregnancy au? Because that is exactly what I would like, please and thank you, it makes everything extra tangled up

Hi yes hello welcome to the department of bad AUs, it is I your ship captain and chef speaking. Tonight’s menu includes extra tangles, I hope you enjoy

“Are you sure it’s not just a tumor?”

“Olaf.”

“Hear me out-”

“Olaf, hair!”

Quick, he pulled her hair back just in time for her to throw up again, “I’m just saying, this seems like something much less sinister. Probably just internal bleeding or-” wincing, he looked up as she vomited again. “Maybe cancer?”

“Help me up,” grabbing his arm with a shaky hand, she began to pull herself to her feet, flushing the toilet.

“How can it be morning sickness if it’s the evening? I think we need another opinion.”

Brushing her teeth, she sighed, holding onto the sink edge silently, not meeting his eyes. Suddenly aware of just how uncomfortable he was, he looked down, hoping the way he patted her shoulder was soothing.

“If you want me to go, I will.” She spoke matter-of-factly, staring at the sink drain as she spit.

“No, it’s fine, I’m just…”

“I know.” Holding his arm again, she straightened up, brushing the hair back from her forehead. “Can you help me to the couch?”

A large part of him wanted to tease her for asking for help. She never asked for help, would bleed out before she let someone think she wasn’t strong enough. But she was so pale, so weak, and so as she leaned against him, he wrapped an arm behind her, guided her out of the bathroom.

“Are you okay?”

“As I can be.” As she sat down, he was struck again by how small she was. The dress she wore cinched together beneath her breasts, hiding her stomach, but even so, she was still tiny. “Look, I know you don’t want this, but calling me a liar isn’t helping. I’ll go, and you won’t have to-”

“No! No, I wasn’t saying that. It’s just- It’s a lot.” He shook his head. “It’s not an easy thing to hear.”

“It’s harder to do, if you can imagine that.”

“You’re right. I’m sorry.”

She couldn’t remember the last time he had apologized and meant it. Even now she wasn’t sure if he was apologizing for anything in particular or just to placate her, but she couldn’t mind either way. He let her lean her head on his bicep as he brushed his fingers through her hair.

“Can you… tell yet?”

“Beyond the constant nausea?” Opening her eyes, she looked up at him. His eyes were so brown. Like a broken beer bottle, she thought, and briefly wondered if the kid would get them.

“You know what I mean.”

“You tell me.” She slid her hand over her abdomen, pulling the fabric tight.

“Eh,” shrugging, he traced along her waist and hip with slow fingers.

“No?” looking down, she tightened her grip.

“I mean… maybe? I don’t know. You’ve always been-” quick, he stopped his sentence.

Cocking an eyebrow, she sat up, “I’ve always been what?”

“Nope. I’m not falling for that trap.”

Partially terrified, partially hoping to make her laugh, he shook his head vehemently.

“Maybe you’re right. Maybe something is wrong.” Staring down at her belly, she frowned, her forehead pinching together in consternation.

“Of course something is wrong. I thought we already covered that.” Not appreciating his joke, she stared coldly. “But I’m sure it’s fine and its just the… usual… problem.” Uncertain, he placed a hand on her stomach. “You know, now that I think about it, yeah, I can feel a difference.”

“I know you’re trying to help, but you’re just being weird,” she whispered the words, still upset.

“Here, stand up for me,” taking her hands, he helped her to her feet,. “Maybe we just need a better look.”

Awkwardly, she held his fingers, shuffling her feet as she stood before him. “Well?”

Pursing his lips, he gave her a purposefully slow perusal, “Can’t tell yet. Give us a spin.” Sheepish, she pivoted back and forth, her dress catching the slightest puff of air at the bottom.

“A real spin. Show me what you’ve got, Baudelaire,” he clicked his tongue in fake disappointment, glad when she smirked and obliged. Letting go of one of his hands, she spun out a little, albeit slowly, giving him a nice little show. “Oh yeah,” he whistled, nodding seriously, “you are positively glowing.”

“Stop it,” she laughed, actually smiling.

“Radiant, really. Who knew something so pretty could produce so much vomit?”

“Be serious. Can you tell?” she squeezed his fingers, regrounding him in her anxiety.

“Honestly? I don’t know,” he shrugged, touching the fabric of her dress. “They cut these things so strangely. Leaves far too much room for the imagination.”

Frowning again, she nodded silently, resigned. He hated when her distress went quiet. At least when she was angry, there were things he could say. But this empty fear? There were no guaranteed words for that.

“Can I?” He paused, fingers touching the hem.

“Sure,” she shrugged, trying not to seem as awkward as he felt, lifting the fabric until he could see her belly.

Trying very hard not to stare at the pink lace lining her panties, he let his gaze move upward cautiously. Her stomach was round. Not round as one might imagine when hearing the threat of pregnancy, but definitely a purposeful swell. The weight rested above her hips, a clear curve set to her waist. Truth be told, it might even be an improvement, some softening added to her form. If he hadn’t known, he wouldn’t have thought much of it at all, but since he did know, there was nothing else to think of.

“Oh my god,” looking up slowly, he stared at her in quiet bewilderment. “You’re pregnant.”

“Trust me,” nervously pained, she smiled. “I know.”

“That’s ours.” Holding her waist, he looked back to her stomach, unable to hold her too soft eyes. They were too big; too much fit into them.

“I know. I was surprised you still had swimmers too.”

Shocked and horrified, he looked up at her in temporarily mute distress, “How old do you think I am?”

Looking down again, she craned her neck to better see, “Do I look as bad as I feel?”

“Seriously, Violet, you know how young I am, right?”

“Because I feel like absolute hell.”

“Oh my god. You have no idea how old I am, do you?”

“I swear, I don’t know how I’ve gained any weight at all with how much I’ve thrown up.”

“I’m still in the prime of my life! I am still reaching new peaks!”

“And this isn’t even supposed to be the worst part! Why the hell would anybody do this on purpose?”

“For god’s sake, I was man enough to slip past your birth control! I’m the most virile person you know!”

“I can’t even fit in most of my clothes anymore. God, what am I going to do? How can something you can do accidently get so expensive?”

“Still have swimmers, my ass. The real miracle is that I didn’t do it sooner!”

“Are you saying you did this on purpose?” her gaze snapped to him accusatorily.

“Of course not,” he scoffed, offended. “But let’s be honest; if I wasn’t such a specimen of manhood-”

“Oh yeah, that’s my man. A man’s man,” rolling her eyes, she snorted. “Rough and tumble and so very, very masculine.”

“Oh, absolutely, Darling.” Smiling, he pulled her forward between his knees before both of them paused, remembered that they weren’t those people anymore. Looking away, she dropped the hem of her dress as he let go of her, cleared his throat.

“Do you want any tea?”

“That would be great,” with genuine gratitude, she sat down, thumbs fidgeting.

“Okay, I'll… be back.” Awkward, he stood, taking another moment to stare at nothing in particular before leaving for the kitchen.  

[deeeepsteep]

So the last few days have been rough - my uncle died and I’ve spent Thursday to Saturday in a funeral home, and the mood was just so bleak; I’ve been in a bit of a funk lately so it really didn’t help me, mentally and emotionally speaking

But after the burial on Saturday I had a concert to go to - I bought my ticket a few months ago so I couldn’t just waste it, and my family was okay with me going so I went. I had a friend who was on the fence about going to the show (It was The Menzingers concert in Toronto) but decided not to because he was going through shit of his own, which is fine, and I’ve been to shows alone before so I didn��t mind anyway.

I get there earlier than expected and I found myself waiting outside the venue with people who had VIP/meet and greet tickets; they paid a little extra to see the band perform an exclusive acoustic set, they get a signed 7-inch of their new singles, and they get to meet the band. They also get to go into the venue early, which is a plus because it was -2 degrees Celsius outside. I didn’t have any of that - I only had a general admission ticket - so I was forced to stay outside as I watched these VIPers go in early, which I envied.

Then, this guy comes out of nowhere and he says he has an extra VIP ticket, and if anyone wanted to go with him. He had a friend who bailed and he didn’t want this extra ticket to go to waste. There were two other girls waiting with me who didn’t have VIP, but they were together so they unfortunately couldn’t go since he only has one ticket...which leaves me. I agreed to go, mostly because I was fucking freezing and wanted to go inside, but also...well I get all the VIP perks without having to pay for it, so why not???

But I also couldn’t help but be a little skeptical because we all know men are trash, so I couldn’t help but think that this guy only asked me to go because he has some kind of sinister ulterior motive. We go inside together, we listen to the acoustic set, and then we take a picture with the band. Security only allowed us to use one phone so we used mine, and he cleverly told me that I needed his number so I can text him our photos - and I felt like I didn’t have a choice with this so he gave it to me and I texted him them the photos. After buying some merch and receiving our free autographed vinyl he buys me a drink, which makes me even more skeptical. He asks me questions about my job, about Toronto (He’s not from the city), just menial things, and I keep thinking to myself that I hope to God I didn’t just agree to something I know I’m going to regret later.

There’s about an hour before the first act comes on so I head over to the stage so I can get a good spot - and I get one right by the barricade. He joins me, he buys us another around of beers, and we continue to talk. We talk about our tastes in music, podcasts, our jobs (He went to school for engineering and got into law school afterward so he’s a lawyer now...tbh I was impressed and I knew he wasn’t lying because he was wearing the iron ring on his pinky finger and he talked extensively about his interest in legal ownership and stuff) our dogs, his kid, just general conversation when you’re trying to get to know someone better. When the two opening acts finish their sets we discuss our opinions of them (They were two bands, one called Daddy Issues and another called Tiny Moving Parts; both were pretty impressive and we both agreed that we were gonna try listening to them later). When The Menzingers finally came on we jumped around together and shouted every lyric until our vocal chords were raw. They played all of my favourite songs, both old and new; it was an amazing set and an amazing show.

But the concert eventually came to the end and I was nervous about this because even though this guy was super nice and we had really good rapport I still thought that he was gonna ask me if I wanted to hang out or something afterward, which I really didn’t want to do because A: I’m aroace af at the moment and I don’t possess the capacity to even THINK about feeling romantically or physically attracted to anyone, and B: Men are trash.

He turns to me and tells me that he had a great time, much better than he thought because he anticipated going to this show alone, and that he was grateful to have met me. He went on to say that all he really wanted was to have a friend to enjoy the show with, and someone he could talk to about one of his favourite bands. I told him that I was really grateful for this chance encounter, and he said he felt the same way, and that he hopes we bump into each other again someday. We hugged, said goodbye, and I never saw him again. He never texted or called me either.

I’ve been to a lot of concerts in my lifetime, but I think this has to be the best one I’ve ever been to - not just because the music was great and I got a front row spot to one of my favourite bands, but because of that weird chance meeting with some stranger whom I mistakenly thought was looking for a concert companion he could take home, when in reality he just wanted to enjoy the music with a fellow fan. I feel really bad making all of those assumptions now, but he really made my night and he gave me a little bit more hope for humanity at just the right time, right when I was starting to think that there’s no such thing as a good person.

Anyways that was my experience with The Menzingers and this guy - his name was Phil - and how it made me realize that there are tiny little pockets of good in this terrible world, and even though things are shit most of the time every once in awhile something really good happens...and I think those little moments are worth searching for, even if it takes us awhile to find them.

I doubt I’ll ever see Phil again but I hope he knows how thankful I am that I met him. He probably has no idea about the impact he made on me yesterday but thanks to him I feel a lot better than I have in weeks, and he restored my faith in humanity and gave me another reason to love The Menzingers lmao

Thanks Phil, you a real MVP

[samwell-actually]

Holsom Fic-Rec

Although I have my all-time favorite OMGCP fic bookmarked on my Ao3 page, I wanted to compile a master list of all of my favorite OMGCP Ao3 fic to have in one place on my tumblr. And since I’m that neurotic, I thought it might also be nice to break-up each ship as well: 

Two Minutes for Holding | halfabreath One-Shot, 2k Ransom is a team physician and Holster is a referee. They first meet on the ice during a particularly physical Aces v. Falcs game.

not funny | applecrumbledore One-Shot, 9k This whole thing feels so weird, like they're betraying some clause of the homosocial bro code that says it's only for fun, you can't actually be gay, like they're letting someone down. But on the other hand, being with each other is the most natural thing they've ever done. Like a chemical reaction, or two halves of something whole, or one of those hand puzzles where the two pieces of metal are all twisted around each other, or the logical and satisfying conclusion of a really good book.

Score | emmagrant01 One-Shot, 12k Ransom and Holster like to score goals for each other, and they like to take care of each other. It was probably just a matter of time before those two things became entangled.

What I Wanted Was to Fall Asleep | halfabreath One-Shot, 5k The gods are real, which everyone knows, but when they’re not fighting among themselves they’re usually partying and humans have generally learned to accept their meddling without too much complaining. Ransom just never thought he’d actually know someone who’d been god-touched and he never, ever expected that it would be Holster. Alternatively: Holster becomes a tree.

Five Things Adam Birkholtz Learns in HDFS 332: Healthy Couple Relationships | EllyAvon Completed Multi-Chapter, 6k HDFS 332: Healthy Couple Relationships is just the night class Holster is taking with Lardo to fulfill one of his core requirements. He doesn't expect it to drastically change his life. OR: The Weirdest Healthy Relationships PSA Ever. OR: Wholesome Holsom

In a Different Frame | sunfair One-Shot, 4k Holster is determined to become somebody's boyfriend. Too bad he's kind of an idiot. He figures it out, though.

BFFWB | emmagrant01 One-Shot, 7k Ransom's schedule this semester leaves no time for a sex life. Holster has a solution for that. (Set fall 2014)

Seasonal Drinks | rhysiana Completed Multi-Chapter, 1k An AU in which Ransom and Holster never met in college. Thank goodness for the local coffee shop.

someone as good for me as you | astrolesbian One-Shot, 7k “So tell me,” Justin’s mother says, all business, “is your boy going to propose?” “What, Jack?” Justin says, and doesn’t really think much of it, because his mother eats up the details of Jack and Bitty and JackandBitty like Holster eats up rom-coms. His mother sighs, and he can practically hear her rolling her eyes. “No, baby, I meant Adam.”

what is the meaning of this? | kleinergruenerkaktus Multi-Part Series, 13k Ransom has a system, and it was working just fine before Holster came along.

There Were Fireflies | Schuyler One-Shot, 3k Holster has never been weird about shit like this before. They’ve been friends for, what? Almost a decade? And Holster has never said anything bad about guys who date other guys. Hell, they lived in a house with Jack and Bits. But Ransom goes on two dates with a guy and Holster goes ballistic.

blink back to let me know | nighimpossible One-Shot, 4k Justin is a medical student in Boston and Holster is working in New York.Things were a lot easier before they became real people.

Here’s a Man in Evenin’ Clothes | halfabreath One-Shot, 5k Ransom's estimating that they've got another 3.75 hours until the last people trickle out of the Haus. 3.75 hours, 225 minutes.Holster grins, flushed and disheveled and handsome as Justin has ever seen him, and suddenly he knows he's not going to be able to wait another 225 minutes before kissing him. Or: Epikegster toga porn

Keep It | petals42_tumbler (rosepetals42) Completed Multi-Chapter, 18k At the start of their senior year, Ransom is dating March and Holster is okay. Of course he is. Except when he's not.

cabin fever | theghostofjamespotter One-Shot, 5k “Dude. You didn’t score a single goal.” He’s beaming, chin resting on Ransom’s thigh. “And you came in like, under five minutes.” or, the forfeit fifa fic no one has asked for. just bros being bros and somehow accidentally hooking up.

How to Romance a Hockey Player | Tintinnabulation_of_the_Bells One-Shot, 7k After Holster comes out, Ransom needs a plan. A plan to make his best friend fall in love with him. What could possibly go wrong?

the lucky ones | screamlet Completed Multi-Chapter, 17k They made the decision to drive to Myrtle Beach when Holster found the fucking sweetest cottage near the beach.

guard/hit/hammer | halfabreath One-Shot, 2k Justin Oluransi is a gold medalist, and he has no idea what he's doing. (Ransom and Holster's first kiss happens on a tiny couch on the world's biggest stage.)

first love, late spring | lehtonen One-Shot, 12k “Right.” Ransom still looks serious, but there’s a sinister glint in his eye that Holster gloomily recognises as contemplation. “What’s in it for us?”Holster whips his head round to stare at him so fast his neck twinges in three different places. “Nothing is in it for us,” he hisses sotto voce, “or did you not hear the part where we’d be dating?”

Ransom and Holster’s Guide to Shennanigans | Tintinnabulation_of_the_Bells One-Shot, 8k Ransom and Holster have been together since June, but they keep it low key. Maybe even a little too low key. Shenanigans ensue because, hey, it's awfully hard for the team to set them up when they've already been dating for months.

Just bros being bros | blue_eyed, growlery One-Shot, 7k Rans and Holster have a busy semester, so they start planning their bro-time. But its not like they're dating, right?

all my time is yours as is mine | halfabreath One-Shot, 1k No one knows how long Holster's been alive. No one knows how much time Ransom has left. Everyone knows about things. Not everyone has one, but everyone that does has a different word for it. Gifts. Abilities. Talents. Purpose. Superpowers. Quirks. Most things are small, but sometimes, in very rare circumstances, they’re all encompassing and terrifying. There’s a reason Ransom and Holster call them curses.

Give a Little Bit (of Your Time to Me) | Tintinnabulation_of_the_Bells Completed Multi-Chapter, 21k In a world where Adam Birkholtz never went to Samwell, he loses a beer pong bet to Lardo and winds up refereeing a rec hockey game for one freshly broken-hearted Justin Oluransi. For once in his life, Justin is totally out of his league.

Adam Birkholtz's Foolproof Guide to the Perfect Birthday | akadiene One-Shot, 6k On March 28th, 2016, Justin Oluransi, co-captain of the Samwell Men’s Hockey team and love of Holster’s life, is turning 23. It's also the day Holster dies.

Always Halfway to Go | halfabreath Incomplete Multi-Chapter, 33k While at Samwell, Ransom gets a job at the Rec center teaching water aerobics. Generally his class is filled to the brim with old ladies and their husbands, so he’s shocked to arrive at class at the beginning of the semester and find Adam Birkholtz, ex-hockey player, who’s there to supplement his physical therapy with gentle cardio.Things only get more complicated from there.

Detachment Studies | Tiptoe39 Completed Multi-Chapter, 4k A soulmate doesn't always mean a lover. But it does mean an attachment that's hard when it breaks. Luckily, there's the field of detachment studies -- how to mitigate the cognitive damage done when one loses a soulmate. Ransom's going to become a specialist in the field and prove that there's life after detachment. And he's going to practice what he preaches -- by leaving his own soulmate behind.

Salt-Mates | orphan account One-Shot, 4k Losing is dog in the park, Adam Birkholtz is pretty sure he's about to experience his worst day. Until he finds his dog sat quietly with a gorgeous man on a bench, a Harry Potter book in his hand, giving a lecture to the animal about the tragedy that befell Remus Lupin. That's when things get a little bit...strange.

This is Why We’re Medical Proxies | SecretGeniusShittyKnight One-Shot, 4k Holster gets sick. Then he gets a hospital stay. Then he gets high. Then he gets a boyfriend.

pH balance | alcatraz One-Shot, 2k “I can’t believe you have a crush on a white boy who unironically wears cut-off sweatpants,” she says gleefully. “This is the greatest thing that has ever happened to me.”

Have We Been Boyfriends This Whole Time? | rhysiana One-Shot, 1k Post-college socializing is harder to organize than Ransom expected. Fortunately, his best bro is there for him. In every way.

Future Perfect | Tintinnabulation_of_the_Bells Completed Multi-Chapter, 14k WANTED: COMMITTED MONOGAMOUS COUPLES Are you and your significant other in a committed, monogamous relationship? Have you been dating for at least six months? Are you living together? If you meet these criteria (and you are at least 18 years old), you may be eligible to participate in a COMPENSATED study (up to $300) on love and decision making. Please call 617-555-7864 or email romance.jenningslab@samwell.edu. The moment he sees the sign, Holster knows he's struck gold. The only problem is, he and Ransom aren't technically dating. But who are romance and technicalities to stand in the way of a business scheme that's bound to go according to plan?

Tailspinners | rhysiana One-Shot, 1k In which Holster runs a literacy non-profit, Ransom is a pediatrician new to town, and Bitty is the Youth Services librarian who brings them together.

don we now our fake romances | DizzyRedhead One-Shot, 4k Justin notices that Holster is looking a little run-down. But there's no problem that their awesome broness can't solve. Right?

wanna be your romeo | leetlebird Completed Multi-Chapter, 50k Holster's always said 'fuck the lax bros,' but when he meets Ransom, a new transfer student on the lacrosse team, Holster realizes he wants to be a gentleman and date a lax bro first. (Ransom doesn't think Holster's too bad, either.) As Ransom and Holster navigate their own secret relationship, their teams band together to get Nursey and Dex to stop fighting by any means necessary - even if that means setting them up on a date. (Romeo and Juliet AU + Much Ado about Nothing AU. Dramatic misunderstandings can only be solved with One Direction, secret make-out sessions, snickerdoodles, Jerry's dates, and - finally - some communication.)

Literary Inspirations | Tintinnabulation_of_the_Bells Multi-Part Series, 15k The possibilities of life are infinite, but time is not. Certain things, like college years, like hockey careers, like the time for your best friend to fall in love with you, have expiration dates. Justin's just afraid he's missed his chance.

the masculinisation and romanticisation of art criticism through the framework of sports-related injuries (or, gross and beautiful) | heyfightme One-Shot, 2k ransom is a gross pre-med hockey boy. holster indulges him. art is created.

The One with All the Kissing | halfabreath One-Shot, 2k In which Holster messes up, gets way more action than he anticipates, and really is Chandler.

The New Ref | rhysiana One-Shot, 1k Ransom is the on-call emergency dentist at the Falconers' games. Holster is the new ref. Lardo and Shitty are matchmaking busybodies.

The World Still Spins | lecrivaineanonyme One-Shot, 5k Justin had first learned about the theory of paradigm shifts back in junior year during his class on the history and philosophy of science. It was just another definition for one of the short answers in the midterm exam: a fundamental change in the basic concepts of and experimental practices within a given scientific discipline. It was a benign factoid to be stored away, something to be revisited in a later essay: compare and contrast the views of Thomas Kuhn and Karl Popper on the scientific process. He hadn’t understood just how jarring such a fundamental shift could be until he broke up with Adam. (Happy ending!)

Homecoming | Tintinnabulation_of_the_Bells One-Shot, 10k Each December, Justin brings Holster home for Christmas. Each time, it means something new.

Division One Defense Duo To Reunite Saturday | the ghostofjamespotter One-Shot, 1k Flyers Defenseman Justin Oluransi will play against Adam Birkholtz of the Pittsburgh Penguins, for the first time since the two were college D-partners.

Bittle Birkholtz Brousins | halfabreath Multi-Part Series, 19k When Eric Bittle is 8 years old his Aunt Judy marries a Northeasterner named Jacob Birkholtz and suddenly he’s not the weirdest cousin anymore, it’s this gangly 12 year old named Adam who Did Not Want to move to Georgia and now they’re stuck in the same town together.

Bull City Blues | rhysiana Incomplete Multi-Chapter, 11k In which Ransom chooses Duke for medical school, the boys move to Durham, and Holster has to figure out what to do with his life.

One Dance | palateens Complete Multi-Chapter, 7k If he remembers any part of them making out and promptly passing out on the couch the next morning, he doesn’t mention it. Justin would rather avoid making things weird with his best friend while he’s still searching for his soulmate. She’s out there somewhere, and she’s everything he’s ever dreamed of.

The Final Rose | Tintinnabulation_of_the_Bells Incomplete Multi-Chapter, 7k Justin Oluransi quits his job and goes on the reality dating TV show The Bachelor looking to find love. It should be simple, but what he finds is nothing he (or Bachelor host Adam Birkholtz) could ever have imagined of in their wildest dreams.

[queen-ofthe-pumpkinpatch]

The Reluctant Countess: Chapter Three

Also available to read on Fictionpress if you prefer that format.

Story Summary: When another plague outbreak arrives on the shores of the Black Sea in 1667, wealthy merchant’s daughter Rosalind is forced to flee her comfortable life for the relative safety of a remote village in the Carpathian Mountains. But she soon finds the humble village harbors a sinister secret and a haunted past.

A “Beauty and the Beast”-inspired vampire story, rated T for some violence. (The romance itself is going to be rated PG.)

<<Previous Chapter

         The interminable journey through the winding, narrow, craggy mountain roads culminated in an anticlimax. The village of Vseník appeared to be no more than a collection of farmsteads and muddy roads clustered in a hidden valley. It was still early in the day, and there was a hazy alpine mist descending from the tops of the pines. As their wagon slowly approached, Faruk tried to keep their spirits up.

          “At least your aunt and uncle’s house cannot be hard to find,” he said reasonably; “it must be one of those communities where everyone knows everyone else.”

          Rosalind sighed deeply. “I suppose. But that might also mean they’re not keen on outsiders.”

          “You are not an outsider. Your father was born here, and your only living relations are here.”

          She bit her lip, watching his serene profile with some apprehension. “It’s not me that I’m concerned about. They may see you as an enemy.”

          Faruk shrugged. “Yes, my nation has a history of invading these lands, but it has been decades since there has been any bloodshed between us. The Empire has established a treaty with the nobles of this region—autonomy in exchange for tribute. There will be no need for any unpleasantness.”

          “Small towns have long memories.”

          “Rosalind. Please do not worry about me. I am perfectly capable of tact and diplomacy in the face of rudeness. I strongly suggest that you follow my lead in that respect.”

          She absorbed this statement in sullen silence. It was difficult for her to passively accept ill treatment, for herself or for someone she considered a friend. But Faruk raised his eyebrows at her until she nodded with a grudging sigh.

          “I’ll try to follow your example, Faruk.”

          His dark eyes twinkled with amusement. “Patience will come with age,” he said, to which she rolled her eyes.

          As their wagon rolled into the village square—which consisted of a tiny marketplace, a cistern where women were washing laundry, and an incongruously immense church—the townsfolk froze and stared.

          Children gaped with open mouths. The butcher paused with a meat cleaver halfway to a leg of lamb. A turnip tumbled out of the grocer’s numb hand. The stooped, ancient priest squinted quizzically at the newcomers, unsure if he was seeing a supernatural phenomenon.

          Faruk broke the silence, and with it the trance they were all in. “Good morning, folks. Pardon the disturbance, but I wonder if you could give us some direction. We are looking for the blacksmith and his wife—”

          Before he could finish the rest of his genteel greeting, the small crowd jolted back to life. Mothers ushered their children away, hiding them behind their skirts. Storefronts and shutters were slammed shut.

          Rosalind noticed that on the heavy wooden doors of all the farmsteads and stores, strange amulets and charms were strung up—and, curiously enough, bulbs of garlic.

          Superstitious and fearful people, she thought, frowning.

          The only remaining citizen in the deserted village square was a vagabond in shabby clothes, who limped forward to speak to them. Even from several yards’ distance, Rosalind could smell stale beer on his breath.

          “You’ll be looking for the blacksmith?” he inquired of them. “He’s over yonder.”

          And then pointed to the churchyard.

          Rosalind’s heart sank. Her father had had no contact with his birthplace for decades and couldn’t have known that her uncle was already dead.

          “I would say, God rest his soul,” continued the man with an unpleasant chuckle, “but we all know it’s the devil that’s stuck with him now.”

          Rosalind jumped to her feet, indignant despite Faruk’s cautioning hand on her elbow. She had never met her aunt and uncle, but hearing her only family slandered struck a nerve. “That’s a horrible thing to say about a dead man.”

          The vagabond shrugged an apology. “I take it you didn’t know him personally, then. His wife still lives at the forge, last farmstead on the left.”

          Faruk gave Rosalind a warning glare and motioned for her to sit back down in the wagon. “Thank you, my good fellow,” he said in an artificially cheery tone. “We’ll be on our way.”

          “I would take care if I were you folks,” the vagabond called after them. “Our Lord and Master has a great distaste for outsiders. And He’s not a man I’d want to cross.”

          Rosalind tore her eyes away from his crooked grin and tried not to shudder.

          The mist was beginning to dissipate, like a veil being lifted, and she saw a dark shape solidifying to the west of them. Perched on the cliffside above the village was a castle of weathered stone. A steep, treacherous staircase carved into the face of the cliff zigzagged up to meet it—narrow and slippery enough to deter an invading army. Through the gloom she could make out tattered banners rippling from the battlements, and vacant eye-like windows peering down at them with disdain.

          She nudged Faruk. “Look. What a fortress to oversee such a tiny village. It doesn’t make much sense.”

          “Abandoned, I imagine,” he said. “A remnant of more prosperous times. You would be surprised how many glorious kingdoms have vanished through the ages because of war or famine.”

          Abandoned, yes. Rosalind shook herself. Surely no one could still live in such an unreachable place, in such grandeur and decay.

          It must have been an illusion, a reflection of the rising sun, but in the closest tower window she could have sworn she saw a pinprick of light.

          They came to a dark and dingy little farmstead with a thin ribbon of smoke rising from its chimney. Like all the buildings along the main road, there was a wreath of garlic bulbs hanging from the wooden door. Faruk brushed it aside to knock.

          A middle-aged woman peered around the door with narrow, suspicious eyes.

          “Yes? What do you want?”

          Faruk seemed to lose his nerve in the face of questioning. Rosalind stepped forward.

          “Aunt Ioana, my name is Rosalind. I am the daughter of your brother, Cezar. He sent us here from Constanta because you are the only family I have left now.”

          Ioana opened the door wider to study the strangers, stern and silent for a long moment.

          “He—he sent us with a letter that should explain the situation,” Faruk added, drawing out a folded piece of parchment from his cloak.

          “Hmm. It is Cezar’s handwriting,” Ioana muttered at first glance.

          As Ioana read the letter from her brother, Rosalind studied her aunt for the first time. The wispy strands of hair escaping from her kerchief were mostly gray, and her hands clutching the parchment were bony and red from lye. Rosalind looked for any family resemblance in her face, but it was difficult to tell with how worn and tired Ioana appeared—as if her features had been flattened and the colors drained away.

          But then Ioana’s eyes flicked back up with a shrewd, sharp intensity that Rosalind did recognize. She fidgeted under her aunt’s scrutiny, acutely conscious of her soft white hands that betrayed her lack of physical labor.

          “You’ve got his nose,” Ioana finally said in a flat voice, as if that settled things.

          “I do?” Unconsciously, Rosalind reached up to touch her slightly hooked nose.

          “I’m not one to turn away blood.” Ioana sighed. “You can stay.”

          Rosalind swallowed hard. “Thank you, Aunt Ioana.”

          The two women glanced sidelong at Faruk, who had been tactfully quiet for some minutes. Rosalind squirmed at the thought of how foreign and out of place he must seem to her aunt, with his saffron-colored turban and his moustaches that curled at the ends. His Romanian grammar and accent were, however, without reproach even to the most fastidious native speaker.

          “My good lady, I know you must have concerns about another mouth to feed,” he said in a sympathetic tone, “but I can make myself useful to you. These bones are not so old that they cannot chop wood or shear sheep or whatever must be done.”

          Ioana pursed her lips skeptically.

          “He knows how to make candles, too,” Rosalind threw in helpfully. She decided it would be fruitless to mention Faruk’s expertise as a scholar of the natural sciences.

          Ioana ushered the two of them inside the house with a terse gesture. “Well, there’s no sense in the three of us standing outside in the cold.”

          Rosalind and Faruk exchanged wordless shrugs behind her back as she shut the door behind them. Evidently this was the warmest welcome they could expect from her aunt, but at least she was giving them shelter, albeit grudgingly.

          The next day, her aunt shook her awake before dawn. Still groggy, and somewhat resentful of the birds already beginning to chirp, Rosalind fed the horse and the chickens while Ioana set a pot of porridge to simmer over the fire.

          “It’ll be done when we return from church,” she said. “Haven’t you got anything to cover your head?”

          Rosalind was too sleepy to protest that it was not a Sunday and she was not accustomed to daily mass, so she murmured drearily, “I packed my things in such haste, aunt, I’m sorry.”

          In the city, it was fashionable and perfectly acceptable for young women to wear their hair loose and flowing as she did, but in these more remote rural areas, it seemed to be frowned upon. Or perhaps it was simply impractical.

          Her aunt loaned her a scarf to tie back her dark, untamable curls and marched her along the stone path. The cool breeze and brisk walk made Rosalind alert enough to absorb her surroundings. A silvery mist lay over the valley, all of its buildings but silhouettes in the greyish pre-dawn light.

          “It seems rather a large church for such a small village,” she remarked. Indeed, the bell tower was the most prominent landmark for miles, and judging by its narrow Gothic windows and weather-stained bricks, it was hundreds of years old.

          “It wasn’t always a small village,” Ioana replied shortly.

          “How do you mean?”

          “I mean, it was a town once.”

          Rosalind squinted at the distant hills, still shrouded in mist and gloom, but couldn’t distinguish any ruins except the castle.

          “Really? What happened to it, then?”

          Her aunt, several paces ahead, whirled around and said sharply, “Lord, you’re full of questions this morning.”

          “I…I’m sorry, I was only curious.”

          “You’ll soon find that around these parts, folks learn only what they need to know, and seek no more than that. It’s all that fancy book-learning that’s turned your head, and mark my words, no good will come of it. It certainly won’t help you here.”

          Rosalind was not the sort to meekly bite her tongue, but she knew how foolish it would be to challenge or offend the relative she now depended upon. Still, the words nettled her. They walked the rest of the way to church in thorny silence.

          Inside, the congregation was taking their seats in a reverent hush. Perhaps the feeble candlelight casting harsh shadows did not help, but Rosalind was struck with how grim the church’s interior was.

          She was used to seeing images of the Four Evangelists behind the altar in a church, but the carved stone figures on horseback supporting the pillars of this church were far more grisly. They were not difficult to recognize. War carried a battered shield and battle-ax, Famine’s ribs protruded through his garments, Pestilence was covered in oozing sores, and Death grinned menacingly at the congregation, a scythe in his bony hand.

          She shivered at the apocalyptic imagery. Fear and death seemed to be a preoccupation for this community, even in their house of worship.

          The strange carvings, however, were nothing compared with the images on the stained glass windows.

          The most ornate windows drew her eye irresistibly to the west-facing wall, to a triptych of scenes. On the left, a nobleman in medieval armor held a sword aloft, a cross and a dragon emblazoned on his shield. His right hand was a bloody stump, evidently a battle wound. On the right, a noblewoman attended a poor sickbed, despite the patient’s unsightly pox. There were halos around the heads of these people, and Rosalind surmised they must be local patron saints.

          The center window, however, did not seem to belong in a church at all. It showed a crowd of peasants with outstretched, beseeching hands, approaching a shadowed figure with gleaming red eyes. The silhouette had no details, no face.

          Had these people turned to a dark, sinister power in a moment of desperation? It didn’t make sense to her.

          Her aunt nudged her to keep walking forward until they found an empty pew. Rosalind genuflected shakily. How did this congregation even concentrate on prayer with all this gruesome imagery surrounding them?

          Her mind wandered during the entirety of mass. She mumbled through the prayers and hymns, trying to keep her eyes off the statues and stained glass windows. It was not until she came forward for communion, and saw the serene faces gazing back from the pews, that it occurred to her that this village was mostly immune to the macabre. This was everyday life to them. It only bothered her because she wasn’t used to it.

          How am I ever going to get used to it? This is never going to feel like home to me, she thought bleakly.

          She met a few curious pairs of eyes as they filed out of the church. Strangers must be a rare sight to them indeed.

          On the way home, the awkward silence between Rosalind and her aunt remained unbroken, and they drifted apart on the path. The churchyard on her left was marked by a rotting wooden fence. Though it was only September, the trees in the field had mostly shed their brown leaves.

          Even after the crowd had dispersed, she still felt eyes on the back of her head. In her peripheral vision, she glimpsed a shadow passing over the churchyard.

          “Hello? Is someone there?” she called out. Her throat was dry and the words came out meeker than she intended. She shook herself and continued on her way. It was most likely a stray cat or a squirrel foraging among the weeds.

          She heard leaves crunching underfoot, even when her footsteps halted.

          It wasn’t just a vague feeling anymore: Rosalind was certain someone was watching her.

          “Who’s there?” she demanded. Her voice carried far in the still morning air. She took a few steps into the churchyard, toward the dark silhouette she had seen disappear among the graves. If it was a nosy neighbor, she would rather confront them and dispel the uncertainty.

          The headstones were very old here, overgrown with brambles and weeds. In the feeble light of the rising sun, she realized that the moss-covered headstones stretched on and on, over several hills in the distance. So many graves for such a small village—it was almost breathtaking.

          What happened here, she wondered? On many of the stones nearby, she could only make out the winged death’s-heads and the year: 1351.

          She heard a twig snap, a rustle behind a monument, and rushed toward it, eager to end this sneaking and secrecy but beginning to feel childishly unnerved. It was a heavy stone monument, presumably for a parishioner of wealth and influence, and she could only just make out the epitaph:

          Here lies the remains of Count Igor, Last of the house of Dragomir. Born 1324. Died 1352. Lord, show your favor upon your servant.

          She thought she heard a hoarse whisper—but no, it was only a faint breeze stirring the dead leaves on the stone. On the iron gate across the monument, spiked to deter grave-robbers, the bars were wrenched apart in the middle as if some unstoppable force inside had burst forth.

          She shook herself. There was surely a natural explanation. The way the iron had rusted and corroded over the centuries had probably only made it appear ghoulishly deliberate.

          Her aunt’s sharp voice cut suddenly through the silent churchyard.

          “Rosalind? What are you doing over there? Best not to linger in this place.”

          Rosalind had no trouble obeying. But as she left the darkened yard with a shudder, the sharp pains in her abdomen returned. For a moment, they were so acute that she couldn’t conceal it. She put a hand on the fence to steady herself and breathed as slowly as she could.

          It was strange, she thought, that even though she had felt the familiar pains for a week now, there was still no bleeding to show for it.           “Are you ill, Rosalind?” her aunt asked, keeping a wary distance.

          “No,” she said quickly, forcing herself to straighten and catch up with her aunt’s brisk strides. “I’m fine. Just my monthly courses.”

          “Well, you’ll get no holiday for that, I’m afraid.” The words themselves were dismissive, but her aunt’s hard face softened just a fraction, and she put a hand on Rosalind’s shoulder. “Come on. I’ll make you some willow bark tea when we get home. It can do wonders for the aches.”

          Rosalind managed a half-smile. She had never known her mother, had been cared for by male guardians all her life, and while they had done their best, she had to admit—it was unexpectedly nice, this understanding from another woman.

          Once inside the farmhouse, her aunt set a steaming cup of tea on the table between them. Rosalind cupped it with grateful, clammy hands. The first few sips spread the warmth through her limbs.

          “Thank you, Aunt Ioana.”

          Her aunt’s hard line of a mouth twitched ever so slightly at the corner. “I was lucky to go through the change early in life, but I still remember those pains, clear as day. The world of men doesn’t spare a thought for the pain of women. It’s just background noise to them.”

          There was a moment of silence between them, and for once it was neither tense nor cold. Rosalind was beginning to wonder if her aunt was just as eager for female sympathy as she was. After all, she’d had no daughters to teach and protect, no sisters to confide in. Perhaps Ioana was so guarded out of habit, out of necessity—perhaps they two could find some common ground one day.

          Ioana cleared her throat. “It’s good we have a moment alone together, Rosalind. I need to talk to you about something.”

          She frowned, troubled by the sudden mood shift. “What is it?”

          “I know what you must think of me, of Vseník,” Ioana began with a weary sigh. “You’re used to a much different life. You grew up in a big city, you’re educated, you’ve met people from all corners of the world.”

          She hesitated, and Rosalind felt her cheeks burning—her aunt was accusing her of snobbery, and she couldn’t entirely deny the justice in that.

          She mumbled, shamefaced, “Aunt Ioana, I don’t think less of—”

          “Listen to me. There are things you must know about living here if you will be staying indefinitely. No doubt our customs seem strange and even nonsensical to you, but we have our reasons, and I need you to respect them, even if you disagree.”

          Ioana’s tone was not angry, but there was a note of urgency in it which gave Rosalind pause.

          “Such as?” she asked carefully.

          “Poking around the cemetery before daylight is…unwise. I don’t want to see you in there again. Especially before the sun is up. The church is the safest place before the sun is up.”

          To Rosalind, it sounded like a morbid superstition arising from a community that was all too accustomed to death—but still, she suppressed a smile and conceded that this would be easy enough to follow. “Aunt, I’ve no intention of going there again. I only wandered in because I thought someone was watching us. I must have imagined it.”

          She tried to ignore the way her aunt’s eyebrows contracted with worry.

          “Is there anything else you’d like me to avoid?” Rosalind continued in an airy tone, as if they were merely discussing her list of chores.

          “Going into these woods without protection is also unwise. The Count has forbidden his subjects from setting foot in there, for our own protection.”

          Rosalind nodded. No doubt the nobility wanted to deter poachers on their land. “This would be the same Count who lives in that castle? It looks abandoned to me.”

          Ioana’s eyes flashed in annoyance. “It appears that way, but he inhabits it still. And we must respect his law, for he protects us from outside dangers.”

          Rosalind didn’t want to be rude, but she couldn’t entirely contain her skepticism.

          “How does he protect you without any guards or soldiers?” she asked. “How would he even know what’s going on in the valley when he’s tucked away in his castle?”

          In a voice so low that Rosalind strained to catch it, Ioana murmured, “The dead travel fast.”

          There was a pregnant pause.

          “I’m sorry?” Rosalind was nonplussed. Her aunt seemed an otherwise practical, sensible person; it was disheartening to see she had fallen prey to the superstitions and fears of her community all the same.

          Ioana’s gaze was sharp and steady, and she did not tremble with fear. To her, this was a practical matter of daily life, not the mystical folktale Rosalind heard it as.

          “The Count does not need soldiers or spies. He travels on the wings of the wind, watches from the shadows. He has guarded us from earthly invaders and the terrors of the night, and in return we keep our distance, as he commands. So as I said, wandering into a graveyard in darkness is…unwise.”

          These people all actually think their ruler is some kind of dark entity, Rosalind realized with sinking dread.

[webcricket]

It Happened Like This

Characters: CastielXReader ft. Sam and Dean Winchester

Word Count: 4521

Summary: Castiel hears the haunted tale of how the reader and the Winchesters first met. Everyone involved remembers the story a little bit differently. Tiny bit of angst with heaping helpings of fluff and humor.

A/N: This fic is a mostly factual semi-autobiographical account turned reader insert of an experience I had in college with a spirit. Some details have been altered for entertainment purposes and to protect the identities of those involved. I mean, obviously Castiel is my boyfriend and I personally know Sam and Dean Winchester because they are real people, so that part is definitely true. I blame this fic on @willowing-love who took the bait first and asked for my real-life ghost story.

Forehead resting on the cold glass of the Impala’s window, you watched the landscape fly by at 90 miles an hour – an uninterrupted blur of autumn leaves and harvested fields. Not so long ago this was your favorite time of year – nothing but crisp dewy nights, pumpkin spice everything, chunky sweaters and cozy socks with nature tucking herself to bed for the season beneath a warm-hued mantle of ruddy and golden pigments.

An unruly wisp of hair broke loose at your temple in the brisk breeze from Dean’s cracked window. It tickled your eyes and you swatted at it absent-mindedly, reverie uninterrupted as you plodded farther back into the memory of a simpler time. Not so long ago the beauty of the world shone to you in unblemished innocence. Now you understood the literal lie of the land, her sinister underbelly exposed. Now your days and nights teemed with the supernatural. Fall in particular, culminating with Halloween, or Samhain, or All Hallows’ Eve, or whatever the villain of the week wanted to call it, seemed to parade out more than its fair share of monsters, and not the adorable candy seeking variety.

Sighing, your breath misted the window. You traced the outline of a jack-o’-lantern in the fog, erasing the grinning visage with another lungful of exhaled air. You never imagined this would be your life.

A calloused fingertip gently swept the errant lock of hair from your eyes, securing it behind your ear. “What are you thinking about?” Castiel asked from beside you, astutely concerned your wakeful quietude meant something weighed heavy on your mind.

You turned from the window, focusing to meet his inquisitive blue gaze. “Just, you know, autumn…the colors…it’s really beautiful out there, isn’t it?” you softly murmured, uttering the sentiment aloud to remind yourself of nature’s splendor, to convince yourself the beauty of creation still existed despite the ever-present danger lurking below the placid guise.

Cas brushed a thumb across your cheek, eyes glinting with affection as he studied your features and ignored the passing scenery. He nodded after a moment, agreeing, “Yes, absolutely breathtaking.”

“You didn’t even look,” you blushed at the compliment, fingers delving beneath his coat to tease at his ribcage in retaliation for perpetually being so sweet. A small smile danced across your rose-tinted features as his ticklish vessel squirmed. You also never imagined falling in love with an angel.

“I did look,” he countered in a strained squeaking tone. Clutching at your wrists and wriggling away from your delightful assault, he reflected your smile, aspect softening with a tenderness reserved only for you. “I just didn’t have to look very far to see the beauty of my father’s creation.” Sliding an arm around your shoulders, he pulled you to his chest and gave you a comforting squeeze as you nestled against him.

Your regard settled on Sam and Dean bickering in the front seat about where to stop for dinner. Dean, unsurprisingly, favored a dive bar a few miles off the interstate for their amazing nachos. Sam craved real food over the neon orange faux-cheese and lukewarm beer that, at this point, probably coursed copious and congealed through his brother’s veins.

Any second now Dean would peer back at you via the rear view mirror, vibrant green eyes pleading for your vote of support in the matter. Sam would then swing a lanky arm over the back of the seat, twisting around to face you, begging you with a quirk of the brow to, for the love of Chuck, please be reasonable in your choice. Lightly giggling to yourself in anticipation, burrowing deeper into the angel’s embrace, your thoughts again drifted inexorably to the past. You never imagined these two men would become your surrogate big brothers either.

You weren’t born into hunting like Sam and Dean. Nor did you suffer some mortal wrong or tragic loss on account of something supernatural that spurred you on a hell-bent lifelong crusade seeking vengeance. You enjoyed a happy childhood, fortunate enough to possess a generally supportive family with a stable home life. There were a few awkward years between middle and high school where your hair, body, and personality were seemingly at odds with the entire planet, or gravity. Hard to say which, really; but you got through it all by utilizing the usual rebellious self-dramatizing tried and true teenage tactics. Then away you went to college, proclaiming independence by setting off for the hallowed halls of an institution several cushioning states from your roots. After a couple of unexpected bumps in the road going by the name of Sam and Dean, you graduated with a piece of paper designating you as an official English and Psychology duel major with a Russian Lit minor. The gravitas of these words in delicate black script on eggshell finish parchment, tastefully framed in gleaming cherry wood beneath frosted glass, imparted you with an enormous sense of self-importance. That is, until reality sunk in.

You became a hunter because, to your chagrin, you discovered upon exiting the cushioning bubble of academia that you were qualified to do precisely nothing in particular and very few employers offer paying positions for this interesting and generally useless skill set. Drudge work for minimum wage, or worse, the coveted unpaid internships people fall over one another to pursue, numbed your wits and barely paid the bills. You longed for excitement, adventure, and escape from the daily grind of squeaking by and getting nowhere fast. Hunting was the backup plan you stumbled into when the student loan lenders came calling. You chose to be a hunter. You chose this life.

“You’re awfully quiet back there,” Dean spoke up, he and Sam evidently having resolved the dinner plan without your input. “You good?”

“Living the dream,” you muttered.

Cas squinted fretfully down at your melancholy mien.

Sam flicked the radio off, exchanging a worried glance with his brother.

They all three knew your mind and mood were apt to wander on occasion into the disconcerting and anxiety-riddled land of the what ifs? You wouldn’t trade your relationship with the angel or the brothers for anything in the world, but that didn’t dissuade regret about everything else from rearing her ugly head and casting a malicious sneer upon you every now and then.

There was only one sure fire way to pull you out of a funk that didn’t involve a malted chocolate milkshake or a certain special angel’s worshipful ministrations of sensuously directed grace. And although well-stocked with a staggering variety of spell ingredients, the Impala’s trunk wasn’t equipped with the requisite fixings for even a paltry-by-comparison vanilla milkshake. And Dean strictly, and quite unreasonably you thought, forbade any and all angelic affection exceeding a rating of PG-13 to occur within 25 yards of the Impala or his physical person.

“Hey Cas, did Y/N ever tell you how we met?” Sam mused, implementing step one – the suggestion to share – of the story-telling distraction method for uplifting your spirits.

The angel looped a finger under your chin and tilted your aspect upward, answering, “Only in passing, but I would like to hear the details.”

“Maybe some other time,” you whined, shaking free of Cas’ caress to bury your face in the crook of his arm, preferring to wallow in woe a while longer.

Cas obligingly cuddled you closer.

“Aw, come on. A ghost story is perfect for Halloween night,” Dean stubbornly protested, whacking the steering wheel for emphasis.

“I’m sure Dean can tell it better than me,” you mumbled into the fabric of the angel’s trench.

The elder Winchester peeked back in the rear view mirror, catching Cas’ concerned gaze. Employing step two – spreading misinformation as a means of provocation – Dean snorted and smirked, “You’re probably right. And it’s my favorite kind of story too. Sammy and I swooping in to rescue the damsel in distress.”

“Hold up there, prince charming!” you huffed, extricating yourself from the angel’s hug to kick Dean’s seat. “That’s not what happened. I saved your asses.”

Dean feigned a wounded pout, muttering, “Yeah, right. Not how I remember it, princess.”

“I recall it being more of a group effort,” Sam goaded, seamlessly transitioning to step three – dangling the bait for you to set the record straight.

“Well, it’s my story,” you reproached, swallowing the bait – hook, line, and sinker, “and this is how it happened.” You began, “It was a dark and stormy Thursday night-”

“I thought it was a sunny Friday afternoon?” Dean quipped.

“Context!” you snapped. “I did have a life of my own before you two flannel flaunting interlopers showed up on my doorstep.”

“I’m pretty sure it was raining on our drive there,” Sam reminded Dean.

“When isn’t it raining?” Dean lamented, flicking on the windshield wipers as droplets coincidentally started to pellet the glass.

You sighed audibly, continuing from the top, “It was a dark and stormy Thursday night...”

Lightning illuminated the room, flashing blinding white through the oversized window panes overlooking the rain drenched courtyard. One, two, three, the thunder rumbled in retort, shaking the stone foundation of the historical building converted into a women’s dorm. The lamp on your desk flickered. “Not again,” you mumbled, closing your book – a disinteresting text on the statistics of psychology. You peered up at the ceiling in exasperation. Bam! Just as you expected. Light and noise in unison heralding pitch black as the power failed – a blazing slice of nature’s raw fury targeting the metal railing on the peak of the building and blowing every fuse in the place as it travelled the old wiring in frenetic search of the ground. You’d begun to think the college housing department had overstated the charming quirks of living in the historically rooted building – part of the original campus and used as a temporary Union hospital and soldier’s barracks during the Civil War. The lobby of the building even boasted a creepy collection of sepia-toned photographs – one with soldiers’ lifeless bodies laid out on the front lawn, another of the pile of amputated bullet and shrapnel battered limbs in the basement. This was the third time in as many weeks that a storm knocked out the power, and being alone in a site steeped in suffering and death, with the obligatory ghost stories attached to such locations, was more than a little unnerving.

“Battlefield towns are a massive pain in the ass,” Dean interrupted, whacking his brother on the arm. “Remember what Bobby used to say about them?”

“Yeah,” Sam sighed sentimentally, “he called them a hunter’s worst freaking nightmare. How do you salt and burn a body when pieces of it are scattered everywhere?”

“You don’t.” Dean let go of the steering wheel to mime an explosion.

“Anyway,” you went on, clearing your throat.

You slid carefully off the bed, blindly rummaging through your roommate’s top dresser drawer for the contraband candle and lighter she kept in there. You lit the stubborn wax-covered wick, singing the pad of your thumb with the lighter. Sucking your stinging finger, you studied the now strange shapes of furniture in the corners of the room from the safety of the yellow ring of light. You reassured yourself that your roommates would return any minute from band practice. They wouldn’t dally, not tonight, you had plans to go into town together for a late dinner and dessert at that quaint diner on Main.

Knock, knock, knock, “Campus security!”

“Shit!” you hissed, jumping out of your skin in fright, dousing the flame between your fingertips to minimize the smell of smoke. “Coming!” Scrambling, you cracked the nearest window and hid the candle on the ledge.

“No can-” the guard faltered when you swung open the door “-les allowed. Miss, I’m going to have to ask you to put out your candle.”

You batted your lashes as if to ask, ‘What candle?’

He looked behind you into the blackness, apologizing, “Sorry, from outside it looked like-”

“Maybe it was next door?” you offered helpfully.

“Rebel,” Sam coughed teasingly.

You ignored him.

With security routed, you huddled on the floor beside the door, back to the wall, listening to the thinning patter of rain on the window glass. The thunder, answering the fading electric glow of the clouds, was almost too distant to hear now.

Tap, tap, tap.

You stared up at the door, waiting for the guard to announce himself, relieved this time you had nothing to hide. No words followed.

Tap, tap, tap. Again. Maybe your roommates had forgotten their keys.

You stood, grabbing the knob of the heavy wooden door and cracking it open to peer into the hall. No one was there. A cold breeze rushed over your skin, sending a shiver down your spine and making your hair stand on end. The window in the room behind, left open in your haste to hide the candle, slammed shut. The startled cry rising in your throat died as you heard the voices of your roommates on the stair landing below. ‘A trick of the wind,’ you told yourself, taking a deep breath.

“That one girl, what was her name?” Dean pondered aloud. “Mandy? Yeah, Mandy. She was hot.”

“Yes, Mandy,” you confirmed with a punctuating eye roll.

Your roommates, Mandy and Jen, crashed after you all returned from the diner. They were leaving early with the rest of the marching band for an away game the next morning. Too hyped on adrenaline from the night’s events and sugar from the most fantastic chocolate malt milkshake you’d ever drunk to sleep, you wasted a few hours playing computer games.

“Sims, you were playing Sims,” Sam remembered with a smirk. “It was running on your computer when I borrowed it for research. They all drowned in the pool after you removed the ladder.”

“You borrowed my computer?” you griped.

“Yep, when we broke into your room on that Friday when the sun was shining,” Dean supplied, glowering at Sam. “It’s also possible I borrowed half a bag of pretzel rods.”

“Seriously?” you scorned.

“I’ll buy you a bag at the next Gas-N-Sip and we’ll call it even.”

It was nearing 3AM when you finally crawled into bed. This time of night always made you uneasy on account of a story you heard as a kid about the 3AM being the witching hour – when supernatural forces are at their most sinister and powerful. You superstitiously endeavored not to look at the red digital numbers of the clock and pulled the covers taunt.

Tap, tap, tap.

The strange almost-knocking scuff upon the door roused you as you hovered at the brink of unconsciousness.

Tap, tap, tap.

Jen, her bed closest to the door, seemed to hear it too, mumbling in her sleep and rolling over.

Tap, tap, tap.

A bone penetrating chill seizing your frame, you pulled the comforter up to your neck.

The floor creaked. Specifically, the wood plank in front of the door creaked – the plank on the inside side. The one that only creaked like that when someone crossed the threshold and stepped into the room.

You got the distinct impression there was a presence walking toward you. Paralyzed by terror, you couldn’t look. You didn’t hear the door open, you reasoned. No one could be there. You were imagining things.

Mandy joined in Jen’s restlessness as whatever it was moved past her bed.

You held your breath, eyes squeezed tight, repeating the mantra that this wasn’t real. You were only dreaming. Any second now you would wake up gasping in a clammy sweat from this nightmare. Any second now. Any. Your eyes opened in slits. Second. Your gasping throat was immediately assailed by a mass of ethereal energy. Now. It stole the very air from your lungs as you tried desperately to scream – to cry out and wake your slumbering roommates. And then, in a blink, it was over – the room silent save for your rapidly pounding heart.

The angel’s fingers sought and wove through yours, soothing the flood of fear the memory unleashed.

You trudged through your classes in a preoccupied haze the next morning, thoughts turning again and again to the terrifying episode. Surely it was a nightmare, but you couldn’t shake how real it felt. Returning to your room for lunch, focus no farther the ground between your feet as you walked up to the dorm, you ran smack into the chiseled torso of an extremely tall man wearing an electrician’s uniform with handsome hazel eyes.

“Woah, hey, hi. Sorry,” he apologized, dropping his duffle of tools to stoop to help you retrieve several fallen books. “Let me.”

“That was me,” Sam piped up to inform Cas.

You gestured at the man’s shirt, asking, “You here about the power outages?”

“Yeah.” The man stacked the books, glancing over his shoulder at the building and back at you. “Hey, you live there, right?”

You accepted the books proffered in his arms, nodding.

“You notice any strange noises, cold spots, funny smells?” another man in a matching uniform inquired as he approached.

“Dean?” Cas suggested, stealing the elder Winchesters thunder.

You gaped at the new freckle-faced arrival for a moment and contemplated his odd question. You supposed fizzing or burning wires might account for the peculiar query, but something seemed off about him. About both of them. Your gaze fell to the partially opened duffle bag at your feet, taking note of the decidedly non-traditional collection of electrician’s tools contained therein – a large quantity of rock salt, an iron crowbar, chains of varying size and length, and what looked alarmingly like the barrel of a sawed off shotgun. You peered around the empty courtyard, feeling vulnerable, reflexively stepping backward. “Um, nope, just, you know, the power outages and what not.”

“Oh, see, she must think we’re looking for ghosts.” The man with the freckles laughed, gesturing a thumb toward the dorm, trying to diffuse your nerves.

“Right, cause this place was a hospital,” the hazel-eyed man added. “Didn’t a bunch of soldiers die here, or something?”

“Uh, yeah, it’s, uh, it’s all there in the lobby,” you stuttered, waving at the dorm. “I’m, uh, I have to, I think I forgot something at the library.” You spun and fled, cutting a beeline across the grass without looking back.

“Were we really that scary?” Sam pivoted to ask.

“Were?” You arched a brow. “You guys still scare the crap out of me on a regular basis!”

You found yourself on the third floor of the library, wandering a maze of special collections with no goal other than killing time. You ran your fingers lightly across the dusty spines of rows upon rows of first edition books. Something about books always had a way of settling your anxiety. An unseen force compelled you to turn down an aisle where a thin faded sky blue tome with no title written on the spine drew your attention. You slipped it from the shelf, flipping it over in your hands to view the cover. The image imprinted there caused your breath to hitch – it was a person lying in bed with a malevolent scowling creature perched upon their chest. Fingers trembling, you opened to the first page, whispering the title aloud, ‘The Terror that Comes in the Night.’ Knees weak, you sank to the floor. You had no idea how you came to find this book, a tome that promised to reveal an explanation for what had happened to you last night.

“That was probably Clotho’s work,” Cas stated matter-of-factly.

“What?” you turned to him in surprise.

“One of the sisters of fate, Clotho,” Cas repeated. “Surely it was she who led you to the book. She’s always been fond of words as a means to direct fate. It’s an obsession of hers.”

You smiled at the angel, never having guessed he would unveil new significance to your story.

You read the book front to back, sprawled out there on the scratchy carpet of the library. The supernatural creature who visited you was known in folklore as an Old Hag. It could be controlled and sent by a witch to take vengeance on foes, or simply be a restless spirit, a human soul transfigured by agony and grief, doomed to spread misery until such time as it was destroyed. Since you were fairly certain you hadn’t enraged any witches, you guessed your problem was the latter. Either way, the lore contended this creature would plague you until you defeated it, or it killed you. Naïve and overconfident in your abilities, you figured destroying it couldn’t be any harder than getting a passing grade in organic chemistry.

You made your way back to your room as evening descended on the campus. Pushing open the door you shouted a greeting to your roommates, “Hey guys, how-” You remembered with a sinking feeling that they were gone, cheering on the football team, and not expected back until morning. You nervously flicked on the overhead light – and every other light in the room. A firm knock at the door disrupted your luminous fortifications. “Who is it?” you asked through the closed door.

“The, uh, electricians,” someone replied uncertainly. “Do you have a minute?”

‘Right, electricians,’ you thought, ‘or not.’ Your eyes darted around the room, landing on Jen’s can of pepper spray she carried when running. You grabbed the can, notched the chain of the door, and cracked it an inch, bristling, “Who the hell are you guys?”

The toe of a boot braced against the door to prevent you from closing it, “Y/N, listen, we’re not axe-murdering kidnappers or whatever you think we are, we just want to help.”

You peeked through the crack, it was the tall man speaking. “Well start with telling me who you are and how you know my name.”

“College directory, Myspace, that weird little developmental psych professor that teaches your 8AM class and pets himself while he lectures, take your pick,” the green-eyed man grumbled. “We don’t have time for the full explanation. I’m Dean. This is my brother Sam. We hunt bad things and your life is in danger and not from us.”

“I know,” you murmured.

“You do?” Sam asked.

“I kind of figured the luminescent apparition that tried to strangle me last night wasn’t exactly Casper the friendly ghost.” You unlatched the door to allow them to enter. “How did you know?”

“We ganked the witch that sicced this thing on you last week.” Dean brushed past you. “Her name was Lily Donaghue, you know her?”

“Ganked? Witch?” you gaped in disbelief, not recognizing the name.

“He means we killed her,” Sam clarified. “Her dying declaration was a curse upon you.”

“And you have no idea how many Y/N Y/L/Ns exist in this country,” Dean lamented.

“What did I do to her?” Head reeling, you sat on the edge of Jen’s bed to steady yourself. “I don’t know anyone by that name.”

“Hell if we know.” Dean shrugged. “Maybe nothing. Maybe it was for something you were going to do in the future. She specialized in destiny spells.”

“So,” you spoke up after letting their explanation sink in, “what do we do?”

“You,” Dean emphasized the word, “well you just try to stay alive, sweetheart, and we’ll worry about the rest.”

“You took it all in stride,” Dean reminisced. “I never told you that, most people freak out when you tell them an evil creature is stalking their soul.”

“Well, at the time I assumed you were professionals and knew what you were doing,” you sassed. “Had I known then what I know now-”

They expected you to fall asleep. You rolled over in bed to look at the wall. They expected you to fall asleep in your bed which, for some bizarre reason you did not think to inquire about, was surrounded by salt while they watched and waited. Like that was happening! You flipped over again. The clock read 2:59AM. You shivered involuntarily when the numbers flashed to 3:00.

Tap, tap, tap.

You heard Sam and Dean shift to readiness.

Tap, tap, tap.

The firing pin of a gun cocked.

Creak went the wooden plank.

The shotgun blasted a round of rock salt.

Sam groaned as he was thrown against the wall and pinned there, flaying his long limbs uselessly and clutching at his neck.

“Dammit!” Dean cursed as the iron crowbar he held defied gravity to clatter to the ceiling. Further curses damned up in his throat as he was tossed choking to the floor like a rag doll by the evil creature who had come for you.

You sat up, throwing aside your comforter, willing yourself to look at the hideous thing, its features distorted in agony, jaw open in a perpetual scream, its clawed limb pointed toward you as your fingers fumbled to retrieve the little blue tome from beneath your pillow. You flipped to the final page of the text and began to read in desperation as the creature simultaneously squeezed the air from your lungs, “Malo a nos libera sed tentationem in nos inducas-”

“The Lord’s Prayer,” Cas noted. “In Vulgate and backward.”

You nodded.

The book was correct – the hag shuddered and flickered, growing weaker with each word you uttered. When you reached the final line, you ran out of breath. Squeaking, tongue a useless dry lump writhing against your teeth, lungs empty and collapsed, your vision dimmed at the edges as unconsciousness loomed. The last sight you registered before passing out were Sam’s hazel eyes, brightening as the creature’s energy sapped enough to free his throat.

“Caelis in es qui noster pater!” Sam roared out, having caught on halfway through that you were reciting the Lord’s Prayer backward, and surmising you had a good reason to be doing so.

Dean released the steering wheel to mime another explosion, the hag’s demise.

“Like I said, group effort,” Sam restated.

“You forgot my favorite part,” Dean smirked, twinkling eyes catching yours in the rear view mirror. “The happy ending.”

“I didn’t forget, Dean,” you objected, “I blessedly don’t remember.”

Cas held up two fingers to your temple, earnestly saying, “I can help you to remember.”

“No!” You yelped, grabbing his wrist and twisting it away. “Thanks, but no thanks.”

“Why? What happened after the creature was destroyed?” Cas looked to Sam and Dean for the answer.

Dean’s smirk deepened.

Sam chuckled, “Dean, uh, had to-”

“-give Y/N the kiss of life,” Dean finished.

The angel’s brow furrowed in confusion.

“Mouth to mouth,” Sam elucidated. “CPR.”

“Oh.” Cas subtly scowled at the back of Dean’s head. “I see.”

You pecked a quick kiss on the jealous angel’s stubbly cheek.

Cas looked at you, blue eyes shining with love, a smile curling the corner of his mouth. “I can understand why she wouldn’t want to remember that.”

Dean grumbled something unintelligible under his breath.

Sam laughed airily.

Forgetting about the what ifs of life, you dove back into the angel’s warm embrace, humming contentment. Saving people, hunting things, the meaningful relationships cemented along the way – you never dared to hope you could be so lucky.

[chiseler]

STEVE COCHRAN: The Rough and the Smooth

The Chase (1946) opens with a broke ex-serviceman finding a lost wallet, plump with cash and bearing the name and address of its owner, Eddie Roman. Being an honest guy—or, as Roman’s sidekick puts it, a “silly law-abiding jerk”—the vet goes to return it. As though wandering into an opium trance, he enters a classical-rococo-tropical mansion, a fantasy of vulgar magnificence. The front door is bedecked with cherubs’ heads (one of which swivels to reveal a peep-hole framing the unmistakable eye of Peter Lorre). The dazzling white interior is cluttered with marble statuary on pillars, crystal chandeliers, antique chairs, banana trees, all slashed by thin bars of sunlight falling through white shutters.

Eddie Roman, a Miami gangster, is at home amid this surreal decadence. We first see him sitting regally in a barber’s chair, crowned with a pearl-grey homburg, intently studying his pencil-thin mustache in a hand-mirror. He has reason to look pleased as he contemplates his handsome face, its square-jawed and thick-browed swarthiness lightened by limpid eyes and a deceptively sweet smile. Absorbed in admiring his appearance, he pays no attention to the girl kneeling at his side giving him a manicure, until her file slips and nicks his finger. “I’m sorry, Mr. Roman, you moved,” the frightened girl gasps. “Yeah, but you didn’t—fast enough,” he replies, knocking her to the ground with a casual blow.

With a different actor, this whole set-up—the flamboyant interior decoration, the classical allusions, the dandified sadism, the ever-present sidekick played by Peter Lorre—might come across as heavily lavender-tinted. But Eddie Roman is Steve Cochran, who plays it straight in more ways than one. Cochran grew up in Wyoming and had worked as a cowboy before trying his hand at acting, but Hollywood took one look at his oily black hair and arrogant poise and pigeonholed him as a mobster. He took to the role with a patented brand of velvety menace, concluding that the way to play heavies was to assume that his characters had done nothing wrong, as they themselves would no doubt believe. Not for him the noir torments of guilt or anxiety or haunted memory. His gangsters were slick and unfeeling, and when he came to play deeper roles in films like Tomorrow is Another Day, Private Hell 36, and Il Grido, he plumbed the specific melancholy of men whose inchoate vulnerability is forced through the conventional expressions of machismo.

He was born Robert Alexander Cochran in 1917 and adopted the name Steve while acting in stock. (It suits him, perhaps for the same reason Lauren Bacall assigns it to Bogart’s Harry Morgan in To Have and Have Not, giving it a distinctive inflection that conveys, “You’re an overconfident jerk—if only I didn’t find you so attractive.”) Cochran left college and headed to Hollywood convinced he could be a movie star, but despite his looks and confidence he was no overnight success; it took seven years of provincial theater (including Shakespeare in Carmel) before he finally scored a contract with Goldwyn in 1945. The Chase was his first decent break, after a series of small parts in Boston Blackie programmers and Danny Kaye vehicles.

Directed by Arthur Ripley and gorgeously shot by Franz Planer, The Chase is a baroquely convoluted adaptation of Cornell Woolrich’s The Black Path of Fear. The centerpiece is an extended dream sequence that eschews the usual cinematic clichés but unsettles through jarring plot discontinuities; a maze of dark, disorienting spaces; and inexplicable poetic images like the woman weeping at a table bearing the half-eaten carcass of a watermelon, like something out of a 17th century Spanish painting. The film’s seemingly normal hero (the ex-serviceman, played by Robert Cummings) turns out to have a fragile mind prone to sudden white-outs. He’s almost as passive as Eddie Roman’s imprisoned wife (Michèle Morgan), who drifts around the mansion in draped Grecian gowns and a fog of hopeless terror. What she’s terrified of is her husband, and Cochran makes you believe that Roman is capable of even worse cruelty than anything we see him do. The calmer he is the more anxiously we wait for his outbursts of violence. His light voice, sweet smile, and hypnotic stillness create a deliciously sinister effect. Here and elsewhere, there’s something about the way Cochran’s hazel eyes catch the light, with a gleam that can register as tenderness or threat. It’s hard to pin down this luster, and that’s one of the best assets a movie star can have—some small thing that can’t be explained.

Though the bulk of his work was in B movies, Cochran appeared very briefly in Goldwyn’s great triumph, The Best Years of Our Lives (1946). Near the end of the movie, the beleaguered former airforce captain played by Dana Andrews—an intelligent, serious man stymied by a bad marriage and a humiliating job as a soda jerk—walks into his apartment to find another man lounging around in his shirtsleeves. It takes only moments to register the kind of heel he is: a self-satisfied, flashily handsome guy in a loud pinstripe suit, smoking and chewing gum and condescending to his married girlfriend’s husband. It’s his job to embody the crass, unscrupulous side of postwar life, the veterans who aren’t haunted by what they’ve seen, the operators who see money “lying around” for the taking. Cochran nails the type in under five minutes of screen time.

Virginia Mayo plays the wife he’s fooling around with, and they were paired frequently in the late forties, both typed as low-class, sexy but vulgar. They’re forgettable in A Song is Born (1948), Howard Hawks’s lifeless musical remake of Ball of Fire, but wonderful as a pair of greedy, backstabbing lovers in Raoul Walsh’s White Heat (1949). Cochran is “Big” Ed, a discontented second-banana to Cody Jarrett (James Cagney), who taunts him with sneering air quotes around his moniker. Cagney’s majestically psychotic performance fills the movie like a bellows, as he crumples inward under the pressure of his migraines and then explodes in gleeful violence. Big Ed is his opposite, cool and smooth, his stolid repose off-setting Cody’s trip-wire sensitivity. Cochran looks fantastic in a dark suit with a black shirt and light tie, and his best moments are tiny touches like the way he loudly spits out his gum before kissing Mayo, or blows smoke sideways in a beautifully nasty, smirking close-up as he quietly threatens to tell Cody who killed his mother if she walks out on him. If Cagney is white heat, Cochran is black ice.

He played a variation on Big Ed the next year in The Damned Don’t Cry (1950), one of those fun, full-throttle Joan Crawford vehicles that follows a woman as she claws her way out of dreary poverty, attains a pinnacle of penthouse luxury, and plunges from there into the abyss. Starting in the Texas oil fields, she winds up as the mistress of a racket boss (the terrifying David Brian), who sends her on a mission to spy on one of his regional under-bosses, whom he suspects of plotting to take over. That would be Cochran, who is not satisfied with the desert fiefdom where he lounges around swimming pools in white terry-cloth robes and saunters around nightclubs in loud sport jackets. He’s not a bad guy here, especially compared with Brian, but he remains devoted to the one Big Ed calls, “a very good friend—me.”

Cochran’s philosophy of playing heavies as though they were blameless did not mean he tried to make them sympathetic; indeed, it’s the utter remorselessness of his bad guys that makes them so bad. Still, it can be hard not to root for him in formulaic “crime does not pay” flicks like Highway 301 (1950), which opens with not one but three state governors solemnly addressing the camera, and then smothers all the action with heavy-handed voice-over. It’s tempting to just turn the sound off, because the film looks terrific, darkly glistening with rain-wet streets, sleek curves of forties cars, the matte sheen of good suits and perfect fedoras. Cochran, as the leader of a heist mob, wears an arrogant sneer as stylishly as his overcoat. When his girlfriend whines about feeling bored and neglected, he says coldly, “Why don’t you do something about your face? That ought to keep you busy for a few hours.”

He took a break from suave gangsters to play a cowardly redneck lout in Storm Warning (1950), an “exposé” of the Ku Klux Klan that proves nothing is more pusillanimous than Hollywood when it thinks it’s being courageous. Cochran cited the role as a favorite; he recalled being terrified by Klan demonstrations as a child and spoke of wanting to show how “shabby” they really were, of his pride at striking a small blow for racial tolerance. He was clearly sincere, and he later attended the 1963 March on Washington with fellow progressives like Marlon Brando; unfortunately, Storm Warning makes no mention whatever of the Klan’s attitudes towards blacks or Jews, depicting it as merely a racket to extort money from gullible hicks.

The film is further compromised by shameless plagiarism of A Streetcar Named Desire, with Ginger Rogers visiting her pregnant sister (Doris Day), who dotes on her crass but hunky working-class husband. Cochran, wearing a white t-shirt and sucking on a bottle of beer, lays on the dumb rube act a little thick, though at least he does not come off as a Brando impersonator. After a beautifully filmed opening in which Rogers witnesses a Klan killing in the deserted streets of a Southern backwater, and a powerful scene in which she is bullied into lying under oath about what she saw, the film turns luridly exploitative. Rogers is spied on and assaulted by her drunken brother-in-law, then publicly whipped at a Klan rally. This pushes the film’s wrong-headedness to absurdity: the culmination of the Klan’s evil is an attack on a beautiful blonde white woman.

In the 1950s, Cochran got tired of playing heavies and biting the dust in every movie; unhappy at Warner Brothers, he left in 1952 to form his own production company, producing a few change-of-pace films like Come Next Spring. But one of his very best roles came at Warners in Tomorrow is Another Day (1951), an unusually subtle and character-focused B noir directed by Felix Feist. Here he sheds his usual self-assurance to play a rough, unfinished man, drastically inexperienced and socially awkward—and does it beautifully. His character, Bill Clark, was sent to prison at age 14 for the murder of his abusive father. Released at 31, he’s a child in a man’s body, touchingly naïve but also insecure and truculent, readily falling back on violence.

Like Rip Van Winkle waking to an unfamiliar world, he wanders around town in a cheap, unfashionable suit, carrying his few belongings in a cardboard box. He’s drawn first to the new cars, studying one with boyish wonder; then to girls, hesitantly trying to follow one in the street. His uncertainty and sulky defensiveness are painfully exposed, whether he’s being teased for ordering three pieces of pie in a diner, or stumbling sheepishly into the dime-a-dance Dreamland, where ten cents buys sixty seconds of feminine company. Here he is easy pickings for Kay (Ruth Roman), a gorgeous, hard-shelled bottle blonde who demands trinkets in exchange for her time. When he obediently returns with a wrist-watch, she rewards him with a peck on the cheek and a “Thanks, Jim.” Still smitten, he shyly kisses her hand, and on learning she doesn’t get off work for hours, mutters, “I’m used to waitin’.”

When Bill and Kay are mixed up in a killing, he panics, knowing that with his record he’s a “dead pigeon.” They go on the lam, but their route takes them far from the usual lovers-on-the-run formulas. Without a car of their own, they sneak into one of the vehicles being towed on a tractor-trailer, hop freight trains, and hitch a ride with a Joad-like family on their way to a lettuce-picking camp in Salinas. They start out hostile and bickering, and when Bill proposes in a motel room he does so by handing her a ring and saying churlishly, “Pawnbroker gave me a good deal.” But though he implies that marriage is a sacrifice to necessity, the truth is that he desperately wants her and has decided this is the only way he can get her. In the scene that follows, as they lounge on a bank above the railroad tracks, he tells her about the murder of his father and about his years in jail, where he earned ten cents a day as a welder. “You worked a whole day,” she says wonderingly, “Just to dance a minute at Dreamland.”

Bill asks his bride if she thinks people change, “I mean, inside.” She does: dying her hair back to brunette, switching her name to Kathy, she emerges from her cynical shell. But Bill never seems to change; in the end, when he’s betrayed by a friend and threatened with going back to jail, he reacts with blind anger and panicked violence. This incorrigibility coexists with his gentleness: when Kathy tells him she’s pregnant, his sullen face delicately opens into an angelic smile, but not long after she has to shoot him to stop him from killing the sheriff who comes to arrest him.  The ending of the movie is a cop-out, but the revelation that the whole saga has been driven by mistakes, lies, and misunderstandings has a certain fitting irony.

Cochran drew even more deeply on this strain of confusion and sorrow in Antonioni’s Il Grido (1957), another movie about life on the road. The title translates as “The Cry,” and the film is essentially one long, muted howl of loss. Dubbed in Italian, Cochran plays Aldo, a simple working man who has lived for years in a common law marriage with Irma (Alida Valli), with whom he has a daughter, Rosina (Mirna Girardi). The movie opens as Irma, without warning or explanation, tells Aldo she’s leaving him for another man.

Like Bill Clark, Aldo is a muddled mixture of gentleness and violence, an aching wound papered over with inarticulate masculine pride. His reaction to Irma’s rejection is baffled and ineffectual; his instinct is to lash out, but he pulls back from hitting her. Later, desperate to assert his authority, he beats her in front of a crowd of townsfolk, but it’s he who comes away looking weak and defeated, having now sealed their estrangement. Taking their daughter, he sets out on an aimless journey, a futile search to replace what he’s lost.

The real star of Il Grido is the wintry landscape of the Po Valley. Nothing could be further from the Italy of vacation fantasies than this grey, muddy, industrial wasteland. Thin, bare branches are traced on the fog, sprouting from pollarded trees like amputees’ stumps. Desolate fields of rocks, marshes, and flat sodden riverbanks are made even bleaker by factories and construction sites, gas stations and refineries. The relentlessly overcast, drizzly weather is like an expression of Aldo’s numb, mournful mood. Cochran’s face, beginning to look worn, blends in with the landscape; he’s still ruggedly handsome, but stripped of all glamour and self-assurance, an ordinary man suddenly adrift with no bearings.

Aldo is hardly a model father, as he subjects his little girl to a tough and lonely life on the road, but there are moments when he comforts her with heartbreaking tenderness, and you always feel that in his fumbling way he is doing his best for her. (Still, it’s a relief when he finally sends her back to her mother.) The structure of this episodic film comes from Aldo’s encounters with three different women, each a possible but ultimately inadequate substitute for Irma. A former girlfriend (played by Betsy Blair) and a sexy young widow who runs an isolated service station both offer him refuge, and he has a torrid affair with the widow, but both times he drifts away. He has the chance to go to Venezuela, but inexplicably tears up his papers. He winds up with a prostitute who suffers from malaria, huddling in a leaky hut made of reeds and filled with acrid smoke. Amid this wretchedness, he remembers visiting a museum with Irma, a poignant revelation of what she represents in his barren and messy world.

He is inconsolable, and the life and purpose just drain out of him, leaving him an empty husk. In the end, Aldo returns to the town he left, to find it roiling with mass meetings over land seizures, a chaos of bulldozers, ruins, blazing fields and armed police. But for Aldo, the last straw is seeing, through a window, Irma with her new baby, annihilating his hopes. It’s hard to think of another movie in which someone essentially, and convincingly, dies of love.

Steve Cochran had a great deal of practice at dying; having succumbed onscreen to many predictable violent ends, he topped them in 1965 with one of Hollywood’s most legendarily bizarre deaths. That he was only 48 is tragic, but that he died aboard a yacht with an all-female crew is irresistibly titillating. None of the young Mexican women (whom he had hired, allegedly with a view to making a movie about a real yacht captain who had an “all-girl” crew) knew how to pilot the boat, which drifted for ten days off the coast of Guatemala after Cochran unexpectedly fell ill and died of a respiratory ailment. This story left a somewhat lurid stain on his life, though it seems to have been nothing but a publicity stunt gone terribly awry.

Alas, Cochran’s off-screen behavior rarely enhanced his reputation for seriousness. He seems to have been amiable and well-meaning, and neither his chronic womanizing nor his penchant for reckless driving and flying were anything out of the ordinary in Hollywood. More damningly, Don Siegel claimed he had trouble catching Cochran “even slightly sober” during the filming of Private Hell 36 (1954), though you’d never guess this from his sharp, nuanced performance as a corrupt cop in love with a nightclub singer (Ida Lupino, who co-wrote the script). His character, Cal Bruner, is callous, vain, and morally shifty—a plainclothes dick who tackles and fatally shoots a robber, then readies himself for a date with perfumed aftershave while complaining that the “miserable creep” ruined his new suit. He’s a guy on the make, lightly detached from everything except his own concerns. Yet when Cal falls for Lily, a canary with an exhausted voice and bone-dry sense of humor, he becomes someone we care about. He has better taste than we would have expected (Lily—who seems older than Cal, though Lupino was a year younger than Cochran—is no brainless babe), and more substance.

“You know, somewhere in my dim past I seem to have heard this before,” Lily deadpans when Cal makes a pass. “I’ve said it before,” he replies readily, “To all shapes and sizes. Only this time I mean it. Don’t ask me why.” Cochran and Lupino have serious chemistry (the scene where he unties the halter neck of her dress and massages her naked shoulders is a classic of Code-era steaminess), but Cal and Lily also connect on some deeper level, making us believe these two what’s-in-it-for-me types surprise themselves with genuine feeling. When he sits at the bar watching her croak out a hard-hearted ditty called “Didn’t You Know,” his eyes brim with a clear, soft light. In this part, Cochran layers cool selfishness and tender warmth so closely, nothing thicker than a razor could separate them.

by Imogen Sara Smith

[cksmart-world]

The Completely Unnecessary News Analysis

By Christopher Smart

Dec. 10, 2019

LIES: AFGHANISTAN — VIETNAM REDUX

We leaned a lot from the Vietnam War. In 1971, Daniel Ellsberg made public reams of classified information — “The Pentagon Papers” — that spelled out the lies the American public had been fed for over a decade about the conflict in Vietnam. More than 58,000 Americans died in Vietnam; 10 times that many came home broken. Well, we won't let that happen again. Oops. Information revealed this week shows that Americans have be lied to about U.S. involvement in Afghanistan. Since 2001, more than 2,300 have died and 20,589 have been wounded in action — say nothing of PTSD and suicide. Documents obtained by The Washington Post reveal that “senior U.S. officials made rosy pronouncements they knew to be false... hiding unmistakable evidence the war had become unwinnable.” WTF. Like Vietnam, American leaders knew little about Afghanistan and what U.S. armed forces were up against. The administrations of Bush, Obama and Trump didn't know how to fight the war or what victory would look like, according to former military leaders. As the monetary cost of the conflict approaches $1 trillion, we have to ask, when will this country stop this shit. “Osama bin Laden is probably laughing in his watery grave,” one retired Navy Seal observed. And, of course, none of it speaks to the cataclysm we created in Iraq that continues to kill, maim and displace uncounted victims.

A.G. BILL BARR — MUPPET ON STEROIDS?

Behind that avuncular uncle disguise, who is Attorney General William Barr, really? The mask slipped a bit when he reported the Mueller Report exonerated the president of everything from high crimes to misdemeanors. So, in an effort to more fully understand the AG, the staff here at Smart Bomb set out to get the skinny on the fat man: After some sleuthing and speculation, we determined that Barr is actually a frustrated Muppet on Ibogaine. This is very serious — he appears to be something like a cross between Uncle Deadly and Big Mean Carl. We're still not sure who the puppet master might be, but it's someone sinister, like Steve Bannon or Freddy Krueger. In recent speeches, Uncle Nut Barr, as we shall call him, preached that our democracy was under attack by secularist who accept heavy petting as a societal norm.  He railed against “the unbridled pursuit of personal appetites at the expense of the common good.” (And, no, he wasn't talking about Trump.) Barr insisted that liberals were “engaged in a war to cripple, by any means necessary, a duly elected government.” But the gravy on the biscuit is Uncle Nut Barr's rejection of his own Department of Justice report that the FBI's investigation into Russian collusion with Team Trump was not a Deep State coup d'etat, as Trump and his minions insist. As Barr said on Fox News Channel For Real Americans: We're not paranoid, it's just that they're all out to get us.

10 WAYS TO ESCAPE IMPEACHMENT NEWS

1 – Want to get away? Take a trip to the high plain of Bolivia and smoke quinoa.

2 – Book a two-week intensive course in mind-melding at the Mojave Oasis Spa & Zen Center.

3 – Download the entire collection of Pee Wee's Playhouse and tell work you've got the flu.

4 – Drive to the Provo Town Square, tell people you hate Trump and get booked into the Utah County Jail.

5 – Get a copy of “Kachka: A Return to Russian Cooking,” a gallon of potato vodka, check into the airbnb in Panguich and reenact every scene from “Doctor Zhivago.”

6 – Go backpacking in Afghanistan.

7 – Stock up on smoked sardines and pickled herring and binge watch Game of Thrones in your mother's fox fur stole.

8 – Hire some Rastafarians, charter an out-rigger in Fiji and go searching for Amelia Earhart.

9 – Find a bar in Oceanside, California, order a beer and a shot and tell the gnarly-looking guy next to you that Marines are a bunch of chickenshit Jar Heads.

10 – Or paddle up the Amazon River to the base of the Andes and tell the Bird People that the iPhone 11 is coming. Either that, or risk insanity by trying to equate two opposite realities.

PLEASE MELLO OUT ON THE SLOPES

A Park City man is facing felony charges after prosecutors say he choked a 17-year-old girl on the slopes. (We did not make this up — it appeared in the Park Record newspaper in Park City.) Unofficial sources close to Smart Bomb believe the young woman may have been talking about impeachment when the man, a Trump supporter, suddenly went nuts. But other witnesses claim the perpetrator had too many cappuccinos and his disgust of tourists just came out. Whatever the truth is, it's fortunate the man was not armed. In Utah, it's legal to ski with firearms. Luckily, most tourists are unaware of this tradition. Imagine the carnage if skiers began targeting snowboarders. Arguments over space in the overflowing parking lots would look like the OK Corral. In order to minimize conflict, our ski host consultants have made several recommendations: Don't talk about politics or football on the chairlift. And under no circumstances mention the president's relationship with Jeffrey Epstein; or the Runnin' Utes loss to Oregon. And if all else fails, offer them cannabis gummy bears on the way up the mountain.

Post Script — It's been another crazy week here at Smart Bomb where our staff Pagans are getting restless as the Winter Solstice approaches. In less than two weeks, the sun will begin to climb back in the northern hemisphere and the days will grow longer at tinsy, tiny intervals. This year, Christmas comes early as the Utah Legislature will soon huddle in a pre-holiday special sessions to cut taxes by $160 million. But at the same time they will reinstate a 4.85 percent sales tax on food to make sure poor people — those slackers — pay their fare share. Republicans love to cut taxes. Trump's tax cut — $1.9 trillion over 10 years — is a gift that will keep on giving (to our national debt). Between state and federal taxes, middle-class taxpayers will be rolling in dough. Now you can buy that second home in Coral Gables and live next to millionaires and billionaires who get the real tax cuts. But once they see your Honda, they may be moving out. This is America, after all.

All right, Wilson, we'll light the incense while you and the band take us out with a little something for our Pagan spirits:  Rhiannon rings like a bell through the night / And wouldn't you love to love her? / She is like a cat in the dark  / And then she is the darkness / She rules her life like a fine skylark / And then the sky is starless / All your life you've never seen a woman taken by the wind / Would you stay if she promised to you heaven? / Will you ever win? / Will you ever win?...

[persephoneandpomegranates]

flashbacks and old posts

I’m consolidating blogs so here’s some fun posts from when i was a senior in high school / freshman in college.

Sunday, July 22nd, 2012

whenever i go to the library

i always find the most embarrassing books at the very beginning so then i have to walk around with them while i peruse the rest of the library.

so then i end up grabbing up bunch of random, potentially interesting books to use as an awkward shield so no one can see that i have a stack of comic books and paranormal research and whatnot.

but then i have to check them out. even though we have self-serve, which i always choose, the librarian is always sitting right there just watching so no one tries anything sinister like stealing library books. and at some point i run out of normal books to check out and then i’m just like. … oh yeah tarot cards? i forgot i grabbed that book. that’s for my… dog… because he can read and he’s really into learning about new… nevermind.

#awkward , #library, #tarot cards, #embarrassing books

Monday, July 30th, 2013

procrastination is an onion

i like to create multi-layered procrastination.

instead of just putting off my summer homework or my online byu classes by watching tv, i like to create mind numbing projects like organizing my gruesome music or kindle collections, or cleaning my room.

but then i don’t want to do those either.

so then i realize that it’s almost august and camp nanowrimo is nearly upon me.

well, i can’t possibly organize my kindle and music collection with less than 48 hours to figure out plot, characters, and most importantly, how about genre.

but then.

it’s really hard to just do that.

so i have to get some creative inspiration, right?

so that’s how i ended up on neopets.

i swear, they used to have the most amazing writing boards and guilds. but now things just trudge along on the boards because there are less users. and i am all about the speed and instant gratification because hey, facebook.

but because the boards are so slow i find myself trying to feed my neopets in the meantime.

and then i’m like, oh i never got the pack rat avatar! i better start finding a bunch of useless items to put in my safety deposit box…

and now i have to work my way all the back down to my summer homework and byu classes by completing everything else first. because my neurosis says so.

my procrastination is an onion.

so many layers and it makes me cry.

#onion  #procrastination  #neopets  #nanowrimo  #camp nanowrimo #layered procrastination  #somebody end this miserable cycle please

Tuesday, December 18th, 2012

captain college

this one time, a girl desperately wanted to go to college.

but then she realized that she would have to do college applications and also ask for letters of recommendation.

that’s a lot of work.

so instead she watched tv and lol’d at the internet.

and spent like half an hour wikipedia captain planet because when i ws younger i thought it was freaking bad ass and captain planet was hot. or something.

the power of heart!

but seriously, can i put this on my application? heh.

#college apps  #applications  #college admissions  #captain planet

Thursday, January 24th, 2013

i am not even a good artist.

cute guy was like oh can i borrow your notes?

so i went to get my notes only to find them covered in doodles.

and not cool ones.

doodles of danny phantom.

…in a slightly suggestive v-neck.

well fuck me it can’t get any worse.

so i go to give the folder to said guy.

and i drop the folder.

papers. everywhere.

i am so slick. and by slick, i mean extremely socially inept.

my only hope is that my doodles are so terrible, that he can’t even tell what i drew.

but somehow, the fact that i also wrote DANNY PHANTOM next to the picture, does not make me feel optimistic.

#danny phantom  #bad doodles  #aww jeez  #socially awkward  #awkward #i like tags almost as much as i liek turtles.

Sunday, September 15th, 2013

Jesus, Marie

My life is a bunch of rocks.

No but really, I’m freaking out. I’m going to college in like three fucking days and its going to be my last day at this amazing parrot sanctuary I volunteer at tomorrow. All I want to do is sit in a corner and play with those fucking parrots and probably get bit at because I am not the best parrot handler but I’m  learning. Beyond the point.

I just feel so unready. All my friends are out there doing that college thing already or they’re like me and have a few days left but they are so ready. They want to meet new people and go to parties and join clubs and hangout with their new roommates. They want to get out and live life like a college student.

And I just don’t.

I just can’t picture it. Me doing laundry, making my own food, sharing a communal bathroom. I can see myself doing all these things, but it’s like watching a movie montage. It’s not actually me.

I don’t know if I can do this.  But dammit I’m not giving up. A teacher told my senior class to look around our classroom and know that while we were all going  to college, at least one person would drop out before they graduated. It wasn’t harsh, it was just a fact. The point was that it’s not for everyone and sometimes people learn that too late.

I’m just terrified that person is me.

But you know what? I love school. I love learning. I love procrastinating by organizing all my notes and color coding them when I could actually be studying which would be a lot more useful. I love commiserating with my friends during all nighters or even just glancing at my Facebook and see that twenty other people in that class are on Facebook at that ungodly hour, doing the exact same thing I’m doing- which is regretting that they put off a giant project or a huge midterm.

I am so excited that I’m going to get  to grow up and prove to my parents they did a good job raising me, despite my flaws: my laziness, my morning crankiness, the fact that I worry about everything.

I think that’s the problem, that last part. I always worry. My worrying has one level: defcon five. I think about how the supervolcano in Yellowstone could erupt at any moment and kill a gazillion people and also me. A heavy fear that wraps around me and my shaking hands inevitably weaves its way through thoughts like my immeninent demise. But it’s also what I do when I think about the scores on my latest math test might be. There’s no panic gradient with me. Just on or off. And it’s rarely off.

But you know what else I’ve learned about my worrying? Even when it is absolutely warranted, like when I get  that math score back-and yep I saw that coming- I hardly flinch.  I mean, “Ouch, I am not so good at this calculus thing” goes through  my mind, but I accept it and move on ridiculously fast, considering how much worry I put into it.

So that’s what I’m doing now. Taking everything and turning into the apocalypse.

College isn’t going to be what movie montage me expected. It’s going to be me figuring out how to talk to my roommate and still sucking at talking to boys and probably using too much laundry detergent and most definitely awkwardly trying to feed myself at 3am because I’m suddenly starving.

It’s not going to be easy. It’s going to be different  than anything I’ve ever done before.

But that’s okay. Because I can’t just spend my life sitting in my room wishing  I was 16 again and my biggest defcon five worry was never getting my license and ending up like my aunt who’s trapped walking and riding a bike or bus everywhere.

I can’t just stay where I am right now forever. That wouldn’t be living; it would just be existing.

What I’m saying is dammit. My life isn’t just going to be a bunch of boring rocks. It’s going  to be a fucking kaleidoscope of experiences.

I’m going to go to a college rager, even though I won’t  drink more than two sips of lightweight beer, just because if I don’t go, I’ll always wished I had. And you know what? Maybe I will get drunk and seriously regret it in the morning but at least  then I’ll know it’s not for me, rather than just being too afraid  to find out.

I’m going to join the pre veterinarian club even though I’ve heard it’s cutthroat and that scares me, I have every right to be there. And I’m definitely joining some nerdy fan clubs. I’ve always wanted to learn how to play D&D.

Who’s going to stop me? Myself?

Not a chance.

#jumbled mess  #college  #fuck yeah  #worries  #i can do this #even if i need to take a few xanax  #i got this

Sunday, September 15th, 2013

Whew

I feel a lot better now. Like I’m fucking capable of being alive or something.

#post rant #much better

Wednesday, September 25th, 2013

First Week of College

Great first week at UW.

So my life is pretty cool and all my worries about college have been unfounded. That being said, I did shrink some of my cotton shirts in the dryer doing laundry for the first time. Also, the lotion I brought for my legs is something I’m definitely allergic too. Oops. I have two little hives on my legs and both my shins are super itchy. Guess who is buying new lotion tomorrow?

I did almost kill myself in the shower today, though. I went to shave my legs for the first time, but because the shower is just a tiny little rectangle, I had to get creative with my acrobatics. Because I went to a yoga class today, I felt like maybe I could put my leg up on the wall and do a modified wall sit type of thing. So I did that and it seemed like a pretty good idea except for the fact my leg was a little lower than I meant it to be. No problem, I can just hitch my leg up a little higher and then we’re in business.

That’s where my shower took a turn for the worst.

As I was lurching my leg up, I lost a bit of my balance and my back slid down a little. Now I’m stuck. Well, shit.

So I struggle a little more and realize there’s no way I’m getting out of this gracefully. But I can hope, so I decide to slide slowly down the wall of the shower until I reach a point where I can adjust myself and stand up.

Of course, showers are fucking slippery when wet.

For a brief moment, I thought I was going to die.

Whooosh. Clunk. Fuck.

So now I’m sitting on the floor of a nasty ass public shower, butt naked of course and feeling sad about myself because that kind of hurt. I missed my head and whatnot so luckily none of my roommates found me bleeding and unconscious and also naked in the shower an hour later, but still. My dignity is bruised.

Anywho, since I’m already sitting on the floor of the gross shower and the five second rule has gone and past, I just decided to wallow in my self pity and shave my legs on the floor.

It actually worked out quite nicely except for the fact I probably have butt herpes now.

#how i almost died in the shower  #slippery bathroom  #college life #don’t shave your legs like i did #also you can’t get herpes like that but you probably can get something else horrible #can you get herpes in your butt