#ESPECIALLY since jo would be the person MOST likely to understand what he is going through

[jimmyandthegiraffes]

Where’s that post I made about Mike being the companion that broke under the horrors bc I’m still right. When I think abt the THINGS some companions have had to endure and have still seemingly been fine, and then I think of mike losing himself and his values to a festering psychological wound that left him open to radicalisation, it’s like he is the evidence that actually everything isn’t fine.

Which is why it’s so important that he should be next seen in meditation, in the seeking of peace, in quietness and healing because not only is he a character that needs it he’s also a character that knows he needs it and seeks it out for himself, because he doesn’t recognise who he is anymore and he wants, not to redeem himself in the eyes of others (he won’t even go near UNIT, not even when he needs their help, he goes through Sarah Jane instead!), but to become a better person, to stop being a threat, and to heal for his own soul’s sake.

And so he goes from someone who was willing to see the entirety of human history erased, to someone who will risk his life for one person and the fact that that ultimately saves his life always imo comes across as a bit easy if you watch planet of the spiders without this context in mind. But when you do think about where Mike has been, psychologically, from the green death through to planet of the spiders, it doesn’t seem easy at all but actually a significant if understated character moment.

#mike yates #waxing lyrical about my blorbos in the middle of the night #but for real mikes healing arc is SO much to me #I think one of the crucial things about the green death is firstly that the doctor asks him to go back #like I genuinely think Mike would not have been as traumatised by his experiences as he was if he hadn’t IMMEDIATELY been forced back into #the traumatic situation #and the second thing is that Jo leaves at the end #mike is straight up NOT having a good time #like he goes through an extremely traumatic event and then has to immediately reexpose himself to it without any chance to process what happ #ened to him #and then he loses one of his best friends almost immediately afterwards #ESPECIALLY since jo would be the person MOST likely to understand what he is going through #and they both know that #the first day they met Jo was manipulated into attacking her friends by a power beyond her own will #which is exactly what has just happened to Mike #and Mike witnessed All of that so he knows. he KNOWS that jo would understand #but he can’t talk to her about it because she’s getting married and leaving

[bisexuallsokka]

jo. bestie. hi. i’m holding your hands and asking u to please if u want deal us all permanent psychic damage with “you’re just as beautiful as the day i lost you” (the httyd divorced zukka agenda has to continue and nobody can do it as well as u <3)

Sokka had spent the entire journey to the Fire Nation imagining himself being so overwhelmed with emotion at the sight of Zuko that, decorum be damned, he would run into his arms as soon as they made eye contact.

The sting of disappointment he felt when he realized that Zuko wasn't even there to greet him and Katara was enough to extinguish most of the excitement he had felt and make him second-guess everything about this trip. It was odd enough that after over a decade of being broken up they had rekindled their relationship over letters, what would it be like when they saw each other in person for the first time in years? Did they only know how to be in love again in theory? Was Zuko truly ready to leave the throne and his home in a few months and start a life with Sokka?

He's hiding out on some balcony that the two of them frequented in his Ambassador days, and he jumps when he hears the door open behind him. It's probably Katara telling him to stop moping, and he's about to tell her that he just needs a minute when he sees Zuko there, giving him a tentative smile.

"Hey," he says.

"Hi," Sokka says, the corner of his mouth twitching in amusement.

"Sorry about," Zuko gestures, and Sokka knows what he means.

"I get it. You're a busy guy," Sokka says.

That makes Zuko frown, and he walks over and takes a seat on the bench next to him. "Not too busy for you," he says. Which, historically, is kind of a lie, but Sokka appreciates the sentiment all the same. Especially since soon, they won't have to worry about the Fire Lord nonsense ever again.

Zuko seems to be thinking the same thing. "For what it's worth, it wasn't 'official business' keeping me away again," he clarifies. "Izumi was getting a little overwhelmed with everything going on to get ready for the party, and I spent longer in the garden with her than I realized. She's with Uncle, now."

Sokka softens at that, his doubts slowly starting to fade away. "That's understandable."

"Thanks for coming all the way here," Zuko says quickly. "It means a lot and it...it's really good to see you."

The sincerity in his tone is a little overwhelming. "Wouldn't miss it for the world," Sokka says, despite having missed the last ten or so of Zuko's birthday celebrations.

It makes Zuko smile, though, which Sokka relaxes at the sight of.

"You look good," Sokka says, smiling back.

"You look..." Zuko trails off, a strange expression on his face as he just keeps staring at Sokka.

"What?" Sokka asks suspiciously. "Is there something on my face?"

"You're just as beautiful as the day I lost you," Zuko says, so softly Sokka might have missed it had he not been hanging onto every word from those lips.

"I..." Sokka says, feeling speechless for once as heat rises in his cheeks. "That's...great, thank you."

As soon as the words leave his mouth he groans, putting his head in his hands as Zuko laughs loudly at him.

"You can't just say things like that," Sokka complains, even if he can't stop smiling.

"I can and I will, especially if that is the kind of reaction I can expect," Zuko teases. Sokka looks over at him and feels his cheeks flushing again at the soft look on Zuko's face.

Sokka takes a shaky breath, calling upon every ounce of bravery he's ever possessed to help him reach for Zuko's hand. "Twelve years?" he asks, giving it a squeeze.

"Twelve years," Zuko confirms, squeezing back. “It’s not that I haven’t seen you that whole time. I just…never let myself really look.”

Sokka nods. “You’re sure this is what you want?”

Zuko raises his eyebrow. "I've started packing."

Sokka rolls his eyes and shoves Zuko's shoulder with his own. "Oh, so romantic, run away with me just because you're already packing."

Zuko laughs again, and Sokka feels lightheaded. He's not going to get used to constantly hearing that sound anytime soon.

“I've had all this time to think about it, and my answer is still the same," Zuko tells him seriously. "This is best for the Fire Nation, best for us. Are you sure, though? Six year olds are pretty crazy.”

“Raising a kid with you?" Sokka asks. "That's all I've ever wanted. Craziness and all."

The way Zuko looks at Sokka erases any of the doubts, the questions, the worries Sokka had about this. About them. After the years of heartbreak and separation, Sokka knows that's behind them, and the future looks much brighter.

#hello ash beloved sorry this took me so long you sent this ask and i blacked out for like five weeks thinking about them #anyway #zukka #divorced zukka #my writing #prompts #ash and starlight #ask me stuff

[anxious-witch]

What a year, huh? We all know I have to be emotional on tumblr.com whenever the opportunity arises because that's one way I allow myself to have an emotional catharsis (for legal reasons this a joke)

In all seriousness though, this year has been a lot for me. Both in a good and bad sense, but Käärijä and Joker Out improved it significantly. And more importantly, their fandoms. (More inder the cut bc this is long af)

I have never really been someone who knows anything about the artists' whose music I listened to. Before this, I don't think I ever listened to a full album of someone, just random songs that I liked. Finding stuff from personal life of bands/musicians I liked usually made me depressed so I didn't bother.

Then, ESC 2023. happened. I frankly have no idea what flipped the switch in my head. Bojere interactions? The way people on tumblr were so welcoming even back when I was mostly posting about Let 3 and Käärijä only? I don't know, I only know that we are here now, regardless.

Another thing about me is that I used to be very pessimistic person. Likez genuinely. I have been "unofficially"(long story) diagnosed with depression and anxiety since I was 11, which is over a decade now. I always had a lot of bad experiences with people and really awful trust issues. I have been doing better for some time now, but it is very hard to let go of the feeling of pessimism and helplessness. In a world where awful things happen every second, what can I possibly do that would change anything?

Then ESC happened. Käärijä lost and I thought "another injustice that will never be corrected". Except, instead of feeling defeated, everyone just loved him more. In those weeks after and later on months, all I have seen had been unrelenting love and acceptance of Jere. Reminding him that despite not winning Eurovision, he is our winner and we'll forever think of him as such. Jere who has a wonderfully belly and strong thighs and is short and by no means is he conventional in any sense. And people loved him not despite all that but because all that. Because we all found ways to relate to him, or to what he went through.

His story of almost dying and still getting where he did only served to highlight that more. Because of he did it, why can't we get to what we want? Why can't I? It shifted my whole perspective.

Then, Joker Out. It is so, so funny to me how I barely paid any attention to them during ESC, except for bojere interactions and was dragged in it by the shared fandom, when now I post most about them.

But yes, JO. A band from Slovenia that while tehnically isn't Balkan, felt so close to me. Like they could understand all the things I kept to myself because of where I was. And then they showed me there is still hope.

I have never seen a band from around here take a pride flag on the stage. Never. I know it's a thing, especially abroad, but God I have never seen that happen here. And with how much love they always took it! That's...wow. It gave me hope that not only is it possible for injustices to be corrected, but that ot's possible to do it even in the environment I'm in.

And then...the Virtual Letters Project happened. Or well positive confessions that @spockowhales turned into Virtual Letters Project.

That's when I knew it's truly possible. I have seen tumblr posts, yes. But getting stuff so directly addressed about or to JO made me realize how much of a "wave" they all created. So many people said they helped them with their depression, with viewing their world differentky with meeting new peoplez with daring to do something new.

I have no words to describe how much that meant to me and I really hope that when they read those letters, they understood the impact they had.

But even that aside, I want to thank everyone in this fandom. People I have talked to, people I have interacted with it any way, through replies, reblogs, likes, anon asks. I appreciate every single one of you for helping create such a wonderful space. We had our ups and downs in the fandom, but we are all here because we love these fandoms, these people so much to keep talking about it even months after.

Thank you and I wish everyone here a wonderful New Year with even more laugh, love and positivity ❤️ have a good one

#rio rambles #käärijä #joker out #man this is so long but I couldn't stop myself #rio writes a love letter to jere JO and the fandom in general I guess lmao

[iheartcake123]

Hello! 😅

Could I request a gwinam x reader where the reader is the class president who is dating gwi and always looks out for everyone ,according to her gwinan has changed into a better person, just before hell broke out in the cafeteria she figures out about everything and also about him se*ual*ly h*rrasi*g eunji (who is probably her best friend)

Just something angsty with a happy ending:D

hi, this will be split into 2 parts! this is the first part for you <3 sorry it took so long :)

☁️liar-yoon gwi-nam☁️

warnings: mentions of sexual harassment, bullying, cursing and zombies

Masterlist

Part 1

y/n had noticed eunji’ sudden change in behaviour. she barely spoke to her anymore and avoided y/n like the plague.

she didn’t understand why, especially since they were best friends. she loved eunji like a sister but now it seemed like they were just strangers.

“im surprised to see you without your annoying boyfriend” gyeong-su teased as he and cheong-san approached her.

“yeah yeah, whatever….we aren’t together all the time” she rolled her eyes playfully while holding back a small laugh “anyways what can i do for you both? you guys aren’t usually the type to just randomly start a conversation with me so im guessing you need something”

“yeah..actually i was wondering if you could get on-jo’s name off of the late list. just for today though!” cheong-san explained with an awkward smile “well you see, usually it doesn’t bother me that i sometimes make her late but i don’t want to deal with her telling my mum again ”

“ah i will do my best to get her name off of the late list but i can’t promise anything as the gym teacher makes my life difficult too” y/n told him with a bright smile and he nodded in response.

“even if you try, it’s better than nothing..honestly, thank you” cheong-san smiled as he knew that y/n would most likely succeed in getting on-jo’ name removed from the list as she cared about her class mates and always went beyond for them.

when y/n arrived into class, she immediately sat in her seat and checked her phone.

she had gotten a good morning text from gwi-nam and she hadn’t yet replied so that’s what she did. a smile on her face as he replied instantly wishing her a good day and that she would see him at lunch.

“why are you smiling at your phone so much” nam-ra suddenly appeared and sat in the seat next to her.

“i was just messaging gwi-nam…he’s really sweet and he’s changed so much from the bully that he used to be” y/n told nam-ra to which she just nodded before pulling out a text book and beginning to study.

as she stretched, su-hyeok approached her desk and she immediately raised an eyebrow.

again he wasn’t usually someone who would start a conversation with her.

“have you spoken to eunji recently?” he questioned and y/n gave him a confused look.

“no…why? we don’t really speak anymore” she sat up straight to pay attention to him.

“but you were her best friend? anyways it doesn’t matter just- it’s just gwi-nam- this morning at the construction site- they were- look when you get a chance, speak to her, okay?” su-hyeok told the girl and she nodded in response.

a pit of nerves grew in her stomach.

was something happening with gwi-nam or eunji?

she didn’t know but she would definitely find out.

these were the moments where she wished she was in the other class with eunji and gwi-nam so that she could talk to them immediately but no she would have to wait until lunch.

when lunch finally came around, y/n speed walked to the classroom where eunji and gwi-nam were but gwi-nam was already gone.

she instead walked up to eunji, stopping her in her tracks.

eunji looked confused and hurt by this.

“can we speak please?” y/n asked with a small smile and eunji reluctantly nodded “thank you, let’s go to the rooftop”

as they made their way onto the rooftop, y/n noticed how nervous eunji was.

she visibly looked sad and wouldn’t look directly at y/n.

“how have you been?” y/n tried to break the awkward silence.

“what did you want to talk about?” eunji cut straight to the point causing y/n to let out a sigh.

“its just that we don’t talk anymore and you seem so sad these days..su-hyeok mentioned to me that-” y/n was suddenly cut off and eunji went wide eyed.

“what did su-hyeok tell you? he didn’t mention anything about me right?” eunji seemed panicked as she held onto y/n’s shoulders in urgency to find out what su-hyeok had told y/n.

“no, he just mentioned that i should talk to you…is everything okay? you know you can trust me with anything, you’re my best friend”

eunji let go of y/n’ shoulders before just staring at the floor holding back her tears.

“i can’t tell you..i don’t want to ruin your happiness. you’re my only friend and i just wish you were in my classes” eunji said quietly before gesturing to the girl in front of her to leave.

“i promise, you won’t ruin my happiness. just please tell me so that i can help you deal with whatever it is” y/n placed a hand on eunji’ shoulder.

eunji thought about it for a second but she just shook her head “please just leave me alone”

y/n usually would’ve kept trying but she knew eunji wouldn’t budge once she decided something so instead she gave up and sent eunji a small smile.

“okay..just know i care for you okay?” y/n turned on heel while eunji turned to walk and lean on the rooftop ledge.

y/n took once last glance at eunji who now had her back turned to y/n. on her school shirt there was writing on it and she couldn’t help but wonder who had written on eunji’ shirt.

y/n knew that eunji used to get bullied by myung-hwan but they hadn’t bothered her for a while. maybe they started again and that’s why she was so withdrawn from the friendship?

y/n didn’t know.

a soft sigh escaped y/n’ lips as she made her way down the stairs to walk go the cafeteria.

luckily the walk to the cafeteria was longer than usual as she was on the other side of the school, so this gave her time to think.

su-hyeok had mentioned gwi-nam when telling her to talk to eunji so she tried to think why that was.

was gwi-nam bullying eunji?

there’s no way as he’d changed, right?

he didn’t bully anyone anymore, right?

as she approached the cafeteria y/n saw su-hyeok making his way out and that was her opportunity.

“su-hyeok!” she called and quickly went up to him.

“hm? oh hey y/n” su-hyeok smiled and y/n returned it.

“can i ask you something…please?”

“go for it”

“earlier you mentioned gwi-nam and eunji at the construction site. did something happen?” y/n finally asked and she felt her heart beat race.

she hoped that nothing bad had happened.

“well..i saw myung-hwan bullying eunji and cheol-soo. gwi-nam was helping bully them and they took a video of eunji without her shirt on” su-hyeok then said and as su-hyeok said those words y/n felt her heart drop.

she was angry and hurt that gwi-nam would help do those things especially to her best friend.

he’d told her that he didn’t bully anyone anymore but here she was hearing that he was bullying people.

after quickly greeting su-hyeok goodbye y/n walked into the cafeteria and up to her boyfriend.

“took you long enough to finally join me” gwi-nam teased leaning in and kissing y/n’ cheek.

she faked a smile as she thought of a way to gently approach the subject of him being a bully again.

“aren’t you getting anything to eat?” gwi-nam then asked as be swallowed some rice.

“no im not hungry, um do you mind if i borrow your phone so that i can post a picture of us on your story?” y/n then said reaching for his phone that he kept hidden in his pocket.

“oh uh, can you do that later? i don’t want my phone to be taken away” gwi-nam gulped slightly and y/n raised an eyebrow.

“i’ll be quick, don’t worry” she sent him a smile before reaching over again except this time gwi-nam held her hand to stop it from getting the phone.

“come on, i said later okay?” gwi-nam was now visibly nervous and that was y/n’s confirmation.

he really had bullied eunji.

“you’re a liar” y/n then said retracting her hand and gwi-nam’ facial expression completely changed.

he was now confused.

“what are you talking about?” he questioned turning his full attention to her.

“you’re a liar. you told me you don’t bully people anymore but you’ve been bullying eunji…”

“i don’t know where you heard that from but-”

y/n let out an amused laugh.

if she didn’t, she probably would’ve started crying instead.

“you know that i really care for you and like you but instead-” y/n was suddenly cut off as student began flooding into the cafeteria screaming. she immediately stood up in shock as she watched people cry and scream in desperation. her heart began to beat fast as the glass soon broke and suddenly students started biting other students.

she was frozen and her body couldn’t move.

was what she was seeing really happening?

it was only when she felt a hand grab hers when she broke out from her frozen state.

gwi-nam was begging her to follow him and of course she did. he lead her through the cafeteria pushing away zombies and into the cooking area where he made the pair hide.

“listen to me y/n.” he whispered to her rubbing her hand as she was zoned out.

“th-those are zom-zombies” she breathed out eventually looking at gwi-nam.

it was an understatement to say that she was scared.

it was beyond scared at this point.

“we can’t stay here forever, when it gets quieter we need to leave okay?” he explained and she just nodded in response.

it was their best chance for survival.

#all of us are dead #kdrama imagine #all of us are dead imagines #writing #all of us are dead fic #all of us are dead x reader #aouad imagines #kdrama x reader #aouad x reader #gwi nam #gwi nam imagine #gwi nam imagines #gwi nam x reader

[todayisafridaynight]

Sorry to keep throwing Miscellaneous Asks your way, but I finally had a moment to get my thoughts in order on one of the points on your Venn diagram I wanted to talk about! I always kind of debate whether or not to send other, semi-unrelated long asks like this when we've already got a chain going, but oh well. I'll try and address anything brought up in response here in the main one and hopefully it doesn't get confusing lol.

So I was thinking about the extent of Jo and Arakawa's relationship. It is completely true there's not much you can say that's concrete, especially since most of what we see is from Jo's perspective. Although his perspective is crucial to forming an understanding of their relationship, it's not sufficient. This is particularly the case because, coming back to giri-ninjo for a moment, Jo is largely bound by giri; it's clear his loyalty runs deep, but it's not a choice for him.

Arakawa, on the other hand, can choose who he places his trust in, especially early on. And I think it's incredibly important that, despite having men who've already been with him from day 1, men who've already been helping him with his son, Arakawa chooses to "place every confidence" in Jo (per an old Famitsu profile, one of the first official ones) and chooses to make Jo his captain.

Similarly, he kind of chooses Jo "over" Ichi in sending Ichi to prison "instead of" Jo. Perhaps the family really would collapse without Jo's talents, but… does it have to collapse entirely? Didn't Arakawa make it pretty far on his own? I guess it's neither here nor there, but I've always wondered if things would've really played out as feared if Jo went to prison instead. Not to understate Jo's role in the family, of course.

Anyway, I think that trust shows not only in overt gestures such as entrusting Masato and the family's finances to Jo, but also in more subtle behind-the-scenes ways, such as what we were talking about before with regard to New Year's 2001. There's also the fact that leaking information to Aoki was Jo's idea; for that to be the case, Arakawa would have to discuss Aoki's threats at length with Jo. (Unrelated, but come to think of it, "complying with him [to] make him see value in keeping us around" is very often the strategy of victims of abuse and neglect…)

And this one's an underrated detail many people miss, but after Arakawa shot Ichi, while he was able to come up to Ichi to tell him he's counting on him and sneak in the fake bill, if the goal was to not arouse suspicion, I don't think he would exactly have been able to excuse himself from the dinner to drive Ichi to Yokohama. Time was of the essence in terms of Ichi's survival, so that leaves Jo, who was conveniently already at the scene and who was certainly in on the "secret rule" that constitutes part of the Arakawa Family's agreement with the homeless camp. Overall, there is a pattern of Arakawa approaching Jo before anyone else, isn't there?

Sort of branching off of that, I would personally feel comfortable saying that Jo knows Arakawa better than anyone else. He seems to know details about Akane and New Year's 1976 no one else does, details Arakawa would have had to volunteer himself, and that plus his own experiences are what allow him alone to have the most complete picture of that night.

I also get the impression Jo understands Arakawa better as a person than anyone else--certainly better than Aoki, but perhaps even better than Ichi in some cases. There are multiple instances where he defends Arakawa and challenges their perceptions of him--that he's "betrayed" the Tojo Clan, that he's betrayed Aoki, that he's the type to scheme and make power-plays behind Aoki's back. He hasn't. And, despite how little Jo's "allowed" to say, he turns out to be right every time. Also worth noting Arakawa does something similar in asking Ichi to try and understand Jo's frustrations, though he's more or less enabling Jo's abuse in doing so.

Lastly, The Smallest Detail that drives me kind of insane. Them arriving at the office in the back seat of the same car in one of Ichi's flashbacks. I wouldn't think too much of it if it were any other time of day, but the first-thing-in-the-morning quality and the fact Jo isn't driving (thus it's not as an act of service but as an equal) is like… Okay. You're carpooling to work. And if you're not carpooling, you're honest-to-god living together. What the hell.

So a lot of it is this web of inferences--it has to be, at least currently--but I really do think there's a lot to chew on. More than meets the eye, anyway. I've also been stewing in all of this for years, especially since drafting Jo's relationships section, so I might just have inhaled the fumes for too long lol

Thank you for coming to me about the nature of their relationship! Although I did put it down as being more-or-less 'uncertain' on my chart, I do agree that their relationship isn't as cut-and-dry as other relationships might be (it's going back to appreciating the complexities of RGG relationships, especially in the case of the Arakawa's where for every party involved it really IS complicated)

I wanted to exclude making any definitive statements on things that couldn't be verified without making a detour on the original post (I know I already mentioned frequently that Arakawa is able to joke about Jo being 'softer' on Masato, but I do think about their relationship often and the implied depth of Jo's loyalty if- as you said- he was able to climb through the ranks of the Arakawa family much quicker than preexisting members), but there are clear points in the game that due allude to a great trust between the two (and I also note that carpooling detail during Ichi's flashback- or at the very least I know I'd find myself noticing Jo sitting in the back opposed to the front/driving). It's definitely not hard to assert that Jo knows Arakawa well either, it's hard not to come to that conclusion when we have evidence from the game to infer that.

#long post #fave #i should prob come up with an actual tag for these asks so i can easily find them and not sift through my other fave'd posts #ill do it in the morning im right about to go to bed but i just saw this pop up on my notifications #and well. we know me i've been presented an itch i have to scratch LMAO #snap chats #i feel a bit silly now- i know that their relationship isn't exactly. 'uncertain' but i didnt want to put that so i didn't appear #hmm.. i dont know the word for it. #i guess because it's not AS blatant as daigo and mine's relationship was #i didnt want to make it appear as though i was saying theres more when there isnt?? tho there definitely is.. #its a little evident i Am interested in the depths of their relationship so i promise ive thought about it #maybe i just wasnt sure how to exactly word it.. though in review the way i worded it on my chart #wasn't HORRIBLE. to most standards anyway i think however it definitely undermines the bond they have and for that #'ashamed' is hyperbolic i feel like someone would say so we'll go with 'embarrassed' to meet in the middle #but thats the benefit of peer review isnt it- just to help catch your mistakes or to help reaffirm ideas so im grateful! #but x2 again in review im a silly coward for doubting my gut on that #tho i sort of do want to torch that post- i wont tho. it's not supposed to be SUPER deep just very quick notes #so i guess i'll save the Deep Dive on jo and masumi's relationship for a future post. is what ill tell myself to keep myself sane #thank you for compiling- i suppose i'll call- their moments together ! #it's a great way to keep track of every important note on their relationship that i hope people will take note of if they havent

[hvrbingers]

[ quintessa swindell | non-binary | they/he | twenty-five ] ——   welcome to grimrose, hunter king. it’s cool that you’re here, you know. haven’t you heard of the history of this place… anyway, how’s being a newcomer who has been in town for one year, especially since you spend most of your days as a firefighter/paramedic at grimrose firehouse? also, not that it’s a bad thing, of course, but i’ve heard people say you can be a little impulsive more than you are loyal… but that’s just coming from people who are bored here, i promise. to me, you remind me of (i just) died in your arms by cutting crew and flirting on the edge between life and death, finding comfort in chaos, not knowing who you are anymore but trying to find it, and missing a person so much you pretend it doesn’t exist, hope to see you around, hunter.

full name — hunter king nickname(s) — hunny ( only by their brother and it’s to annoy him )  name meaning — one who hunts, pursuer age — twenty-five date of birth — november 3rd place of birth — bronx, nyc current location — grimrose, nh gender — non-binary pronouns — they/he sexual orientation — bisexual religion — atheist  occupation — paramedic/firefighter  education level — paramedic school  family — roscoe king ( father, estranged ), marianne tinley ( mother, estranged ), jordan king ( brother ) finances — could be better spoken languages — english, spanish  voiceclaim — quintessa swindell powers — oxikinesis , the power to manipulate oxygen 

inspos: rue bennett ( euphoria ) , tk strand ( 911 lone star ) , meredith grey ( greys anatomy ), jo march ( little women ), amy antsler ( booksmart ), jeremy gilbert ( the vampire diaries ), crystal ( marvel, 616 ), willow rosenberg ( buffy the vampire slayer ), steve harrington ( stranger things ), hayley marshall ( the originals ), nick miller ( new girl ), ian gallagher ( shameless ), sarah ( palm springs ), shawn hunter ( boy meets world )

tws: parental negligence, npc character death on the job non descriptive

hunter was raised by their aunt and brother, and new york city was their playground. it wasn’t a magical childhood by any means but it was so because their brother tried to make it one for them. they are thick as thieves in every sense, trying their best to make a bad situation good, and most often did. 

their parents weren’t meant to be parents, it was just their unfortunate draw of the cards, but sometimes they’d send a postcard to where their parents ended up, but after a while they stopped coming, and phone calls would get shorter and shorter, but you can’t miss something that you never had. 

hunter was always a very active child, could never sit in one place too long, and it would later bite him in the ass during high school, making friends with the wrong people and doing reckless things that would land them in trouble, but their brother would always bail them out no matter what it was. 

when you live your life in the fast lane it’s easy to get caught in it, but by the time they graduated high school ( barely ), it was time to make some choices. the best thing that hunter ever did was become a paramedic, they were smart enough to do it, but no one else believed in them too which drove them to be the best. 

long gone were the days of recklessness, and traded for a uniform that fit them nicely in nyc. their partner joined when they did and everything was going just fine. it was like the other could think about what the other was going to do without saying anything, they had balanced each other out in ways that hunter would never understand–they were each other’s best friends and person. and if there had been feelings there, well, hunter would never say it. 

life is easier as a young adult, their brother was just starting to become someone and hunter was finally making enough money to get a place of their own, and those bad decisions that used to haunt them as a teenager weren’t as bad, and whenever their parents would come unannounced it didn’t put them in a spiral that it used when they came around. 

a lot of that changed during a bad call, the details are blurry to hunter, they’ve blocked a lot of it out to protect themselves but their partner died on the job, and there’s just a small inkling that they could have prevented it. it would lead hunter into a spiral of ‘what ifs’ that they could never fix or leave behind even if they tried. 

they spent that first year without their partner deteriorating but doing their best, whatever partner they were given never lasted long, hunter had always been an easy person to get along with but after the fact something had fundamentally changed within them. they found it hard to trust people, and more importantly, trust themselves, they thought about quitting but then that would prove what all his old teachers had thought about him, so he had stayed in the job. it didn’t help that his partner’s family always reached out to ask if hunter was okay when all they wanted to do was isolate themselves. 

a lot of that changed about a year ago, when they got a postcard from a town that their father grew up in with nothing else. it had been a couple of years since hunter had heard from their father, and despite how things were going back in nyc they knew that they needed to follow their gut. 

this is how they find themselves in grimrose now, working at the fire station, still as a paramedic, with a new partner, and a power that they don’t understand that can make or break someone. 

headcanons: 

generally hunter is easy to get along with, but they have a lot of regrets 

with their powers it truly is make or break, it’s dangerous and could make hunter the luckiest paramedic or feels like a curse, but they don’t even realize that yet 

hunter changed their name before high school and their brother jordan was very accepting of it, they are very close and probably rely on each other too much. 

very much into snakes & reptiles, owns a mexican black kingsnake and will talk your ear off about it 

lowkey a slut, truly trying to fill the void in anyway but like it’s fine they’re hot i cannot blame them 

despite their powers – they’ve always been a good paramedic, they take a lot of cases and patients to heart, it’s a tough job with little pay but they think that it’s worth it 

honestly probably just needs a hug

#grimrosehqs.intro

[acollectionofficsandshit]

Chapter 2: Three of Us

Max Verstappen x Reader (Single Dad AU)

Chapter 1 

Chapters: 2/?

Rating: Teen and Up

Word Count: 9,726 Words

Masterlist

I’d like to thank @lightsovermonaco​ for being my beta and for more importantly keeping me sane because without her influence it’s anyone’s guess where I’d be. I also owe @sassybatflowerpaper​ an enormous thank you, not only for being my friend but because this story, at it’s very core, is our love child.

Saturday, September 1st, 2018- Monza, Italy

Italian Grand Prix, the Autodromo Nazionale di Monza

Max had never been great when it came to emotions, and he was more than well aware that amongst the vast majority of people in his life, and regardless of whether he knew them professionally or personally, whether they were friends or family, or they were coworkers or fans, there existed a general and widely held consensus about his degree of proficiency at emotional intelligence.

Most wouldn’t even go so far as to categorize him as anything beyond just barely qualifying at be considered mediocre at best with his emotions, with his feelings, with remembering to read the room and to react strategically to what he’d learned, rather than simply relying upon blind, incendiary impulse alone to guide him.

As far he was concerned, the fact that he could admit to that, that he could grudgingly bring himself to acknowledge his substantial lack of emotional wherewithal and permit himself to operate under the basis of that crucial understanding, was the most crucial component of all.

Life had been easier since he’d finally brought himself to cop to that particular shortcoming, and not just because now that he’d accepted that he had a problem in the first place he’d been more amenable to accepting help from others, something which had made a world of difference when it came to press briefings and interviews, but most significantly, it especially mattered because it meant that his father had been wrong.

Jos had been incorrect in his absolute certainty that to do as much would be tantamount to waving a white flag, surrendering himself to the judgement of others, and he’d be infinitely far from the truth because Max had conceded to the assertion that he was indeed bad at being personable, had admitted he needed assistance and still, no one thought less of him for it.

Not that any of this was really at the forefront of Max’s mind when he clambered out of the car, feeling slightly drunk off of the adrenaline high he’d built up to and pushed aside for the duration of qualifying, and had only allowed the full force of the rush to hit him now, when the clock had run out and his boots were firmly planted on the cool, concrete floor of the Red Bull garage, relishing the way his blood seemed to be singing with the surplus of anticipatory excitement he always had left over after any time spent out on the track.

Since, as roughly three and a half seasons in Formula 1 could attest to, his body and its chemical response both couldn’t have cared less where he’d finished on the grid, because as far as it was concerned, as long as he was in the car, that was all that really meant a thing.

Because to say that Max wasn’t overjoyed with where he’d ended Q3, finishing in 5th place and falling just outside of the 1:19 threshold that had booked out the first two rows of the starting lineup, would be more than bordering on a falsehood, and yet it still didn’t mean quite as much to him as he knew it would to Jos.

There was no part of Max that doubted, even for a moment, that his father was waiting impatiently for a chance to pull him aside, lurking off in a far corner, lost amongst the crowd of mechanics and engineers, and already overly eager to tell him the nitty gritty details of every single thing he’d done wrong today, of every mistake he’d made, all but dying to remind his son that in spite of whatever Christian or GP might have to say, and whatever Helmut or Daniel might have to contribute, Max still hadn’t have done well enough today to be permitted to do something so foolish, so simple, so inconsequential as to be proud of what he’d accomplished.

And yet, even as he pulled off his helmet, his balaclava following it in quick succession, and began to peel off his gloves as the world rushed back in, Max couldn’t help but to take note of the fact that he felt good right now, that he was content with himself and what he’d managed to do today, but still no less ready for tomorrow, already setting his sights on the race and, critically, on everything he needed, or wanted, to go over with the team before lights out.

But then he made the grave misstep of looking up and suddenly, without any preamble or so much as a hint of a prelude, Max found the entirety of his attention abandon him without a trace of forewarning, his gaze resolutely locked in on the strange sight of you, of all people, without a phone in hand or pressed to one ear, and instead holding a child.

The little girl was balanced on your hip, an arm curled protectively around her middle with one hand cupped at the back of her head and her face buried in the crook of your neck, her tiny body neatly cocooned in what appeared to be an adult sized Red Bull jacket in such a way that all he could discern about the young interloper was her pale blonde hair and how tightly she was clinging to you.

The oversized coat, which Max thought looked suspiciously like the rain jacket he’d donned this morning when he’d woken to light rain showers and fractured, heavy clouds hovering in the above sky above Monza, and then had promptly shed and discarded at random when the overcast weather had given way to weak sunlight and an irregular smattering of clouds.

He had half a mind to go over there right now and start making demands to know where you’d found his jacket and how it had ended up being used by the unidentified child but, at present, Max was more interested in trying to glean as much information as he possibly could about the current situation and the role the two of you play in it, before he made any attempts to cross the garage and start asking questions.

A moment later, Max discarded all his previous surreptitiousness, leaving all prior inclination to wait and see exactly where it belonged, behind him in the dust, without the merit of any genuine concern on his part, and instead, just opened his mouth and said the first thing that came out.

“Where the hell did you get a child?” Max only has a second or two to think belatedly that he probably should have left the expletive out of his question, considering there was a kid present, and he had just hollered the question across the bustling garage, not that anyone here would normally have cared but still, optics and all, before three things happen at the exact same time.

Though it all coincided in the same stretch of time, there was no getting around the fact that, by however small a margin, your reaction and your reply beat out the others for first place. Max was only capable of noting this minor discretion in timing because out of yourself, his father and his team principal, he couldn’t realistically deny that he’d only really been paying attention to you, and on his better days, he could bring himself to divulge the whole truth, no holds barred, that in reality, as far he was concerned, you and the little girl were the only people in the entire space.

But now was not one of those days. In fact, today was on a direct course to be one of his more erratic days.

“Funny, I asked your dad the same thing,” you called back to him, shielding the kid’s ear not pressed tightly to your shoulder with the hand that had been cradled at the base of her little blonde pigtailed head.

You and Max might not still be close like you once were, hell, you weren’t even friends anymore, let alone what you’d once been, what he’d thought you two might be or on the way to becoming- not that any of it still means shit, he reminds himself- but, if nothing else, he hadn’t forgotten how to read you.

He could tell, without any difficulty, that you were holding back laughter as you replied, and you were doing a damn sight better of a job at suppressing the mirth than you were at smothering the grin that was now slipping through your defenses, the corners of your mouth twitching with the urge to curl upwards and out.

Then, before he had any proper chance to capitalize on the abrupt change in your demeanor towards him, to process that for the first time in over a year you’d given him so much as a hint of a smile, comes a sudden maelstrom of emotions crashing down over Max’s head, threatening to smother him where he stands, before half a beat later, two voices, one from either side, evidently decide that now would be the perfect time to take their own crack at taking him out at the knees.

The emotion cresting high in Max’s chest is not one he recognizes, it feels unfamiliar and foreign, feeling so out of place and turned around that it nearly steals the breath out of his lungs to take even the weakest swing at trying to understand it. It’s too much, the abrupt dawning of jealousy, that raises its ugly maw and roars for recognition, that demands he divest what little attention he hasn’t squander on you and that child to it, that insists in no uncertain terms that he turn a blind eye and lend a deaf ear to whatever the fuck it is that his father and Christian are all but shouting over each other to tell him.

Max tries in vain to ignore the rising level of commotion, of outright chaos that consumes his thoughts as all hell seems to break loose within the confines of his skull, putting up a valiant effort to suppress the sudden, unbidden questions now clawing at the inside of his head, like they’re determined to find a way out of his mind and they’re more than willing to go through him, to fight their way out, if he continues to stubbornly stand by the decision to keep them imprisoned exactly where they are.

It’s a fucking mess, the unanticipated provocation to concern himself with sorting through the wreckage to piece together the exact reason why what had only just been a level of jealousy he’d thought unbearable and was only now discovering had been manageable, was now dead set on consuming him whole, as a voice from the furthest, darkest, deepest depths of his brain began to whisper to him, asking unprompted, unwanted, unsound questions he had no business dealing with right now.

He’d meant it when he’d said he was mediocre at best with feelings, he was complete and utter shit at sorting through the cluttered, debris strewn monstrosity that makes up the scope and reach of his emotions, and yet, in flagrant disregard for every single word to the wise or word of warning, that little voice in Max’s head just kept on talking.

Don’t lie to me, I know how you work, how you think… I know at first you were only surprised, taken aback to see her with that child in her arms but now, after such a touching tableau has had time to soak in, to trickle in through the cracks of that rough exterior, you’re just jealous.

Admit it, Max, you’re fucking filthy with it, with the jealousy and envy and the regret… and to think, it’s all because you wish, because you know, that if you hadn’t fucked things up that royally then maybe, just maybe, that baby in her arms, would be yours and hers… and then you'd finally have something you could call 'ours' like you've always wanted.

No, absolutely fucking not. Not today, not tomorrow, not a million years would he ever want- no. To say Max had no clue, not in the slightest of how in the hell he was supposed to go about with thoughts like echoing around inside his head, thoughts that didn’t even feel like his own, that only sounded like his because that was undeniably his voice speaking-

But it didn’t matter, it was inconsequential in the scope of things because he didn’t feel like that, so it wasn’t a problem at all, Max reminded himself, this was just some random, isolated event that meant nothing and had no merit, sharply dismissing any dissent like he could somehow delude himself into genuinely believing that this entire train of thought had been nothing more than the result of dehydration and an adrenaline rush, working in close quarters with exhaustion.

If nothing else, at least he knew that he could never, would never, feel anything like that about you, you, of all people after everything that had happened, after what you had said and what he had done, when there had been that look on your face, an expression of agony that ran bone deep, the pain tainted at the edges by what felt like the inevitable end of things.  

So, Max had been left with nothing to keep him company but the unquestionable certainty that for whatever your friendship had or hadn’t been, or what it could have been or might have become, it all was done now. He had accepted the hand he’d been dealt, had shoved every last shredded scrap of himself he collected as far down into the abyss that cracked open somewhere in his chest as possible, all with the intent for none of it to ever see the light of day again.

Yet, he’d never smothered anything as quickly as he chokes out every idea, every passing thought, every sentimentality whispered to him by that little voice in his head, and without any sense of ceremony, buries the embers of what remains as far back into the shadowy, dark recesses of his mind as possible, trying desperately not to let himself get any further along down the path to figuring what the fuck all that had been about.

It all seemed to converge in on him at once, crumbling inward into nothingness and leaving Max feeling remarkably exposed, he's dragged himself forcibly out of his head and back into the moment that surrounds him, encompassing him on all sides with an abrupt overload of jarring sound, the racket of the crowds outside the pit lane and the ones inside the bay of garages crashing over him, accompanied by a jumbled mess of colors and movement, that left him feeling a little out of depth.

Still, Max was at least comforted to find that, once he had readjusted to the current setting and tore his gaze away from it, he’d been staring blankly in your direction, the world and the people in it that had been standing nearest to him when he’d retreated into his thoughts, yourself, Jos and Horner included, were all still roughly in the same place they’d been when he’d left them.

“He’s not listening,” you say, somehow managing to keep your voice at a reasonable volume and still be heard over the ongoing barrage of shouting Jos and Christian were contributing. “Let’s try inside voices maybe?”

Max nearly forgets himself and as a result just barely stifles the bark of laughter the suggestion invokes in him, the warning usually reserved for the likes of school children and not Formula 1 team principals or men like his father. While he can deprive himself of a good laugh, which he can’t seem to shake the gut feeling that there won’t be another opportunity for one for quite some time after this, he can’t keep himself from meeting your eyes, which glimmer with the same amusement he knows must be reflected in his own.

“She’s right but I am now. What the hell-”

You jerk your head down at the little girl, reminding him to speak appropriately and giving him a glare that made it abundantly clear that while you’d excused his first slip up, he’d end up regretting making another one. He tosses you a sheepish grin, knowing that once upon a time, that grin had been his best defense when it came to staying out of trouble with you and keeping him in your good graces, but he doesn’t bother to watch long enough to see if the expression had helped, just as afraid of what he might see there as he was of what he might not see there.

“I mean, what is all this about?” Both men cut out mid-sentence in favor of just staring at him, mouths gaping open and silent like the wind has just suddenly gone out of their sails. It’s a strange reaction in all honesty, and a quite off putting one at that, because Max cannot, for the life of him, figure out what could have possibly happened to instigate the present situation.

“Why don’t we try one at a time,” Daniel appears beside him, evidently intent on playing the voice of reason, and Max nearly sags with relief, already impossibly grateful for his teammate’s presence, who has had his fair share of practice at being the buffer between Max himself and countless others in the past, a role that he can’t understand the elder’s man’s willingness to fill, but that he can’t quite bring himself to live without now. “Let’s not overwhelm anyone, I’m sure we can figure all this out without breaking Max’s brain in the process.”

“This really has nothing to do with you, you know,” Jos immediately snaps at Daniel, his face clouded with agitation, eyes narrowed to unapproving, cruel shards of black, his pupils consuming all color around them and giving him an eerie, inhuman appearance. It sends a shiver of chilled foreboding down Max’s spine, a physical response to an expression he’s seen and barely survived a hundred times. “You’re free to leave, and you can take your unsolicited advice with you when you go.”

“Jos, sir,” Daniel manages to squeeze every ounce of his distaste for Max’s father into the honorific that it sounds derogatory, so thoroughly saturated with two seasons worth of ire and disgust that the word seems to have a new, considerable weight to it. “Can’t say I’m surprised I’m having to explain this to you again, but I’ve never set much store by anything you have ever had to say so there’s not much point starting now. Do you know why?”

It’s crystal clear to anyone stood in the little misshapen circle of people that has taken form as the minutes have trickled by since the end of qualifying and Max had extricated himself from the car, and, no doubt, to any of those that lurked at the outskirts of it, that Daniel was not asking Jos the question out of any genuine desire to hear his answer.

There was no question in Max’s mind that something had happened whilst he’d been on the track, that much he was certain about, but what exactly that had been was anyone’s guess. He didn’t bother himself with trying to figure out the details on his own because he already knew that would be an exercise in futility, what when what he could suss out from context clues and body language would be useless when inevitably things went to shit.

Which, even by the most conservative of estimates, would be just about any second now, if the palpable and nearly tangible tension that hovered in the air between the four of you was anything to go by. Whatever it was that had gone down prior to his arrival at the scene had already been more than sufficient because Daniel hadn’t hesitated, he hadn’t even considered alternative measures, and he certainly hadn’t even contemplated with an intent to show restraint- he’d just fucking gone for it.

He himself didn’t trust his father entirely to yield to the expectations of polite conversational guidelines by letting the rhetorical question go unanswered, knowing that deference, of any variety, had never been his strong suit. But, because the world seemed dead set on maintaining the day’s general theme of doing anything and everything possible to confuse Max, his father didn’t make a further ass of himself by responding, instead merely constraining himself to a non-committal jerk of his head and grunting quietly.

“It’s because Jos, after nearly two seasons of knowing you, I have yet to hear a single thing of any fucking worth come out of your mouth and I can’t imagine why that should change now,” the damning assessment is met by a smattering of laughter, by snorts of approval and mumbled agreeance with Daniel’s sentiment, the sources shielded from his father’s wrath by the anonymity uniquely provided to them by the overcrowded, hectic nature of the garage at present.

The hush that dropped over the scene was almost a tangible thing, settling over the space like a thick, opaque layer that Max wouldn’t have been surprised to find he could cut clean through it and come away with a healthy slice of taken aback, utterly startled delight.

Unable to help himself, Max severs the staring contest he’d been having with toe box of his racing shoes, which had suddenly become a significant interest for him in the last few moments, and takes a carefully executed glance in your direction, his head now raised, and his face turned towards the gap of neutral space created by the degree of separation between Horner and Jos.

Max doesn’t know what exactly he’d been expecting to find when he looked at you, his eyes just barely trained on your features, but his mind had supplied him with a handful of possibilities,

“If anyone wants to know what’s wrong with this sport in the current day and age, and where things went wrong, they don’t have to work particularly hard to find an answer. They don’t need to look particularly hard either, not when you make yourself fucking impossible to escape,” Jos is stony faced, the flames of his fury burning so hot that they’d turned the corner and gone cold.

From personal experience, Max knows that this is when his father is at his worst, when he’s his most unpredictable and volatile, fully capable of wracking the kind of damage that has you dreaming of trading his particular brand of white hot torture for being bound to the dry kindling of a pyre and burned at the stake, if only because the flames turn you to ash because it’s their nature while Jos does it just because he can.

“I don’t know why I’m even wasting my time on the likes of you, not after that fucking pitiful scene you made earlier,” his father’s voice shakes slightly as he speaks, the flow of his words made irregular by the just barely audible current of cold, cruel amusement that runs underneath them.

It’s almost as if the syllables are being played over an old Hollywood style laugh track, one where the laughter feels forced and hollow, like all warmth and sincerity has been sapped away over the years, the once ample wealth of contagious laughter squandered away with it, until all that’s left behind is a haunting phantasmagoria, where a shadow of an audience, like a collective of ghostly apparitions and phantom figures float, is held eternally captive, their souls doomed to spend their time in memoriam trapped here, their laughter heard by the living.

Jos looks at Daniel like he’s the filth on the bottom of his best shoes, like the patent ones Max had accidentally tread on when he was five or six, during the reception of some wedding or another, the details of which he couldn’t quite remember because between the dancing and music, the thickly frosted cake and the excitement of getting to stay up past his bedtime, of doing something that wasn’t just school or racing, it had all merely paled in comparison to the memory of the absolute fucking walloping he’d received for scuffing those god damn ugly ass shoes the moment they’d gotten home.

“Actually, you want to know something funny? Well, I think it’s funny and I could be mistaken but I believe that you find it funny too, don’t you?”

You turn to Daniel, who nods in agreement, not bothering with a verbal reply when your voice cuts through the arrant sounds and noise pollution without any effort, the unbridled, unapologetic hatred Max knows you harbor for his father, and have always harbored for him, your words leaving a metallic taste on his tongue, each and every one of them crystal clear and wickedly sharp.

His gaze sweeps down the length of your body at opportune moments, Max couldn’t quite manage to put his finger on the way he felt when he discovered that the little girl had remained where he’d left her, her tiny figure neatly bundled away in your arms and hidden from view beneath the navy jacket he could now definitively tell was his, thanks to the cramped embroidered ‘M. Verstappen’ that was now visible on the cuff of one sleeve, the empty arm hanging slack at your hip.

“I think what you’ll find, Jos, is that quite literally no one has ever actually asked you to be here, not even once,” you beam at him like you’re informing the man that he’s just in fact won the lottery, instead of dressing him down with brutal efficiency, “because let’s say the team were to make the decision that they want to make an addition to the staff, that what they believe Red Bull needs is a mentor, a former, accomplished and well respected Formula 1 driver to help guide their drivers to greatness, to give advice and provide technical input when needed.

"There is just no doubt in my mind that a lifetime career of no wins, no pole positions, no fastest laps set, and no laps lead, who’s most outstanding, only, achievements are two podiums, both of which were gained by luck, not on merit, and 17 total points earned across 107 odd races, is the last place they’d start.”

You know full and damn well that the only thing Jos would detest more than being put in his place publicly, would be if it were to be done by a woman, and you hadn’t shied away from the opportunity when presented with it.

Max has a million things he wants to say, that he’d like to contribute, torn between how deeply he agrees with the scathing words that have been flung at his father by Daniel and you, while the other half of him, the one that he’s not particularly fond of, that’s reverent of Jos, that idolizes him, the side that still, even after all these years, craves his approval and his affection, that wants to speak up in defense of his father.

“Hey, for what it counts, that's the kind of career you’d never dream of ever forgiving your son for having but luckily for you, he accomplished by 17 what it took you 32 years to do,” Daniel looks as close to losing control of himself as Max has ever seen him, which feels like a considerable feat to invoke in the older man, and in his defense at that.

Because in their two years as teammates, Max has had a handful of opportunities in which to see the Australian at his worst, at his lowest on occasion, which as seldom as those instances have been, he’s become well enough acquainted with Daniel in a dark mood to safely say he’s not someone to be trifled with when he gets like this.

So, like the coward Jos says that he is and Max tries to convince himself that he isn’t, he just stays quiet and watches, a silent bystander in what is blatantly hinged upon some crucial, critical mass disaster centered around him, simply playing the part of the impartial third party until he either loses his temper, a self-foretold prophecy that he’s currently careening towards fulfilling, or someone takes control of the situation and forces the conversation back on course.

“Is this really the kind of team you’re running here, Horner?” Jos rounds on the team principal, evidently keen to find a way out that doesn’t require him going through Daniel or you, and foolishly still of the belief that Christian, of all people, was still in his corner.

“I want them out, gone, they need to be out, now so that the three of us,” he gestures to himself and Horner, before apathetically waving his hand in Max’s general direction, “can talk man to man about the situation my son has gotten himself into.”

“I think you misunderstand the situation we’re currently in,” Max’s reflexes fail him, his response time a second too slow to catch his mouth as it falls open, almost in slow motion, the expression pure shock too genuine for him to capable of doing much at all about preventing, when Christian Horner laughs in his father’s face, “because if you’re looking for shoulders on which to lay the blame, that responsibility is yours to bear, not for you to saddle Max with.”

The sound of the team principal’s laughter seems to echo off the walls, reverberating through the space until the entire room seems to ring with the mocking frigidity of it, utterly devoid of any mirth, until the exact tone of it feels like it’s been permanently ingrained into Max’s brain.

“They won’t be going anywhere at all until I say the word, nor will any other person that is standing within in boundaries of this garage at this very moment because, as you have seemed to have forgotten, this is my team, they are my employees, they are my drivers, and you will follow my rules because it’s my fucking garage you’re stood in."

Jos just stares at Horner, like his brain is still bogged down in processing the current state of affairs as they unfold.

And if Max didn’t know better, he’d say Christian was actually enjoying himself right now, however begrudgingly he was trying to get away with it by just playing things off.

“Nothing to say? Lovely, I needed my luck to turn around,” Christian scoffs at him, before turning slightly to his right, cheating his body towards somewhere in between the place where Max and Daniel stand together and the secondary spot where you stand holding the toddler, your arms showing no sign of tiring that Max can see and the little girl doesn’t seem to mind remaining exactly where she is for a while longer.

“Well this isn’t something I’d ever thought I’d have to hash out when I signed up for this job but fine, let’s figure out how this kind of thing is supposed to go,” Horner’s face lacks any hint of strong emotion, his expressions not particularly leaning one way or the other, and leaving Max with absolutely fuck all to go on to try and put together where the hell whatever this ill-matched, horrendously timed meeting of the minds was heading.

Because at the moment, all he could really think about was the verbal reaming Jos no doubt had in store for him later, his preternatural sixth sense about the intensity of these post grid reviews was already leaning towards being historically horrific, and that he was pretty sure he could smell himself, the combination of his perspiration and that god awful smell that this particular set of fireproofs seemed to have woven into the fabric, the weave of which was soaked clean through and clinging uncomfortably to his skin.

The only thing he wanted in the entire world was to get out of his racing suit, preferably burning it because it had realistically been a dead set a month or two prior, into a shower and then to put on a clean clothes but none of that seemed particularly high on anyone’s to do list save his, so, whatever, he’d just have to wait.

“Let’s not do this here,” you have the tact to make sure your words read like they’re merely a suggestion, instead of just immediately presenting as what it actually is, a directive to be followed, so as not to get anyone’s back up about it, minimizing the likelihood for any push back about it.

“Fine, whatever,” Max makes sure he sounds disinterested and impassive as he mumbles his assent, not wanting to come off like he cares all that much about where this conversation happens, which proves to be an easy enough task, thanks in large part to the fact that he actually doesn’t give a shit about that component of things, “by all means lead the way.”

It hardly seems to be of any consequence, and certainly not worth acknowledging or mentioning, that the only reason he’d spoken up was because it had been your idea in the first place and he may or may not have acted upon his sudden impulse to head off his father, who if Max knew anything at all about the man, had been gearing up to throw some sideways fucking comment at you.

Because the thing is, he’s not in any particular mood to learn about the finer details of how he’d react to any comment made by his father if it were ever allowed to be made. So, in the interest of progress and keeping things in line for as long as was feasible, which is the line that he’s fed himself and will be sticking to, Max had thereby seen fit for him to intervene.

“Too many eyes in here, too many cameras,” he points out, hoping to satisfy the looks of curiosity his impromptu comments have earned him, “they’ll never learn to be good at their jobs if we just make things easy on them.”

He couldn’t care less about the media, about what’s being broadcasted, or about what anyone has to say about him beyond the people already gathered around him, that make up the weak circle he’s huddled up in, with the exception of his mother, his sister and GP, if he’s being thorough about it.

But that doesn’t mean he permits himself the leniency to actually look at you, not while he’s still speaking and certainly not once he’s fallen back into the listless, stoic silence he’d been safely ensconced in just a moment prior. In spite of himself, Max can’t quite bring himself to ignore entirely what the tiny voice tucked away in the back of his head, half hidden in the shadows of the farthest flung recesses of thought whispers to him softly, as if confiding in him about a secret, one he’s not quite ready to accept just yet but is powerless against.

Max isn’t stupid, he knows the weight of words, the worth of them, the way they can own you if you let them. He doesn’t particularly care of what people have to say, he’s never set much store by what is said or isn’t said- he’s always been of the opinion that what you do is what should matter in the end but that seems to be a point of contention between himself and the ways of the world. He can pretend till he’s blue in the face and grey haired, but he can’t run from the truth.

You think, you know, that if she asked you to, you’d probably be willing to follow her just about anywhere she wanted to go. It’s funny, isn’t it? The way things work, the way people work, the way the heart wants what the mind doesn’t… that what you wish you detested, what you should resent and rebuke, is more often than not the very thing you could never truly hate.

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

If Max had been confused before, he was well and truly lost now, and somehow felt even further removed from ever finding his way out of the labyrinthine maze of corridors that seemed to make up whatever the hell it was that was going on today.

The group was now standing awkwardly in the fluorescent lighted, narrow hallway that was just off the garage. It wasn’t necessarily the kind of place that he would have chosen, the lack of privacy afforded by the open space and the doors at either end that didn’t require more than a team badge to open were less than favorable features.

Not to mention the fact that the acoustics of the space seemed to amplify every tiny little noise tenfold, and to such an extent that every step, every sigh, and every quietly mumbled word that passed between you and Dan felt uncomfortably loud, echoing in his ears and grating at his nerves until he felt rubbed raw and overstimulated in record time.

But while it may not have been his pick of locale for such an undertaking, especially in light of such glaringly obvious downfalls, Max refrains from vocalizing any of his concerns, regardless of how valid they might seem in his mind, as no one else seems to share his reservations and that matters more than anything else.

It’s an old habit, one he’d love to be free of, that he can’t quite seem to successfully break himself of, that had been ingrained in him at an early age, when he’d realized that he had a tendency to see the world and the people that populated it in a different light than those around him, and he had quickly learned that it was better for himself, for everyone involved, that he simply keep his own council on the vast majority of thoughts that crossed his mind.

He knew it was wrong, that it was foolish and childish of him just how quickly he’d invalidate his own thoughts, feelings or observations when he didn’t think that the people around him shared them, but he seemed powerless in the face of such a long held, time honored tradition of keeping his own council. It didn’t matter how deeply he believed something, how important it had been in the moment, how critical it had felt, he would dismiss it all entirely, suddenly absolutely certain that if he was the only one that had been of such an opinion then it was worth anything at all.

You, Daniel and Horner had claimed one side of the hall without a moment’s hesitation, falling into place like you’d been here before, like this was known territory and giving him the impression that more likely than not, whatever it was that had happened early, while he’d evidently been the only person at Red Bull that had been focused solely on qualifying, had happened here.

Uncertain of where he should stand, feeling like the odd one out, and not having any particular interest or patience at present to bother with sifting his way through the politics of picking between the two opposing sides that had already been established, Max simply consigns himself to the most neutral options left open to him. He assumes position in no man’s land, which in this circumstance happens to be the dead center of the hallway, paying painfully close attention to the exact stretch of floor he finally settles on, going so far as to start counting tiles until he’s absolutely sure of the middle ground.

It doesn’t take long at all for Max’s initial theory to be confirmed, that this space had already been witness to some conflict, because in the time it takes for him to break the staring contest he’d been having with the ground, now feeling quite confident that his feet are safely planted in unbiased, unclaimed territory, and get his first good, proper look at the room around him, his eyes land on the fist sized hole in one wall.

His father had evidently given the mangled mess of drywall and plaster a wide berth, stepping around from the spot like it had done him some personal injustice, before coming to a halt a few feet away, which was all the evidence that Max really needed to start drawing rational conclusions as to what exactly had happened here. Glancing away from the damaged wall, Max casts his eyes around, looking for further explanation without having to ask it of anyone.

Apparently, it’s not all that difficult to figure out where his head’s at, almost as if his train of thought is just scrawled across his forehead in bold capital letters, like his mind is an open book that’s been ready-made available for public perusal and appraisal because when he looks up, Daniel’s eyes are already on him, his right hand raised in silent answer.

Max stares blankly at his teammate’s proffered fist, taking note of the black and blue bruises already blooming across the back of his hand, taking in his bloodied knuckles, the skin damaged and torn in a jagged mess, watching the way Dan flexes his hand, as if to prove to him that nothing’s broken, that there will be no lasting repercussions for his temper, but doesn’t quite manage to smother the soft wince the small motion pulls from the older man’s lips.

He doesn’t have to be able to see him to know with absolute certainty that when Jos scoffs, and that derisive sound reaches Max’s ears, the entirety of which is just riddled with the unsophistication his father’s more subversive gestures always are, utterly rife with all the sloppy, apathetic hallmarks that are to be expected of a man with a wildly inflated sense of self-worth, that he’d been watching the exchange between the two teammates and seen something there that hadn’t met his standard.

“What’s that about, hm?” You ask Jos, your head cocked to one side and eyebrows raised, assessing the other man’s expression with such razor-sharp intensity that there was no detail of his face, no facial feature, no skin imperfection and no wrinkle that could hope to conceal the answers from you.

Max can’t help himself, he groans when he hears your voice raised in challenge because whether he likes it or not, and regardless of the fact that you’d in all likelihood maintain until the end of time that he doesn’t have a single clue what he’s on about, he knows that tone and the cut of your words, and the inflection that stays cool and collect as it slips past the question, don’t precipitate anything good.

“What were you laughing at? I think we could all use a good laugh,” you give him a small grin, the expression all teeth and poison, “so… share with the group.”

“Leave it,” Horner snaps, warning blazing in his eyes.

“One of these days, Christian, you’re going to have to stop trying to protect her from the world. You won’t always be here to save her from herself,” Jos remarks snidely.

“She’s not the one I’m protecting here,” Horner doesn’t miss a beat, his face unreadable, “eventually, one of us,” he waves his hand to Daniel and Max, “won’t be here to keep her from getting her hands on you.”

“She is standing right here,” you cut in smoothly, but Max isn’t quite so easily misled by your callous flippancy, “and she is an active part of this conversion.”

Because he sees it instantly, he can read it in the lines of your face, catch it flickering in the corner of your eye, Max knows you’re unable to resist indulging in the classics, the old standbys. He can practically hear you now, your voice coming to life inside his head, the way you’d be holding back a giggle as you explain that ‘there’s just something about a ‘she is right there, so don’t speak about me like I’m not here, she has a name, she can speak for herself’ moment that I can’t turn down.’

“Seriously though, I do have a name, that is not she, and you all know it- this is not news, so let’s try using it.”

Max whips his head in your direction so violently he cricks his neck but it’s not the self-inflicted injury that forces him stifled a groan, no, that’s entirely thanks to his failure to catch him, to keep himself from reacting to the sound of your voice like he had, he’d given himself away in an instant. 

“You alright over there, Verstappen?” You’re toying with him, Max knows exactly what you’re trying to do here, to get him all riled up over nothing to lessen the stress of present situation, which he could only assume had to be fucking dire since it had necessitated the five of you be in such close proximity in an enclosed space. 

He also knows he shouldn't give into it because that would be encouraging you, it would be indulging spoiled behavior, and it’ll come back to bite him in the ass at some point but Max doesn’t really care, not right now. 

Everyone around him is being so fucking weird right now, Dan is looking at him like he’s just found out that Max has a terminal illness and only has a few weeks to live, his father is standing next to a hole his teammate had put in the wall, and for some reason, there’s a miscellaneous child here- and Max can’t take another second of it. 

So, Max comes to the conclusion that if you’re so willing to get up on the pitcher’s mound and start a game in front of present company… then he’ll play ball. 

“Do I look like I’m alright?” If he needed any assurances about how perfectly he’d nailed the delivery of that line then the wrinkle in your forehead, and the eyebrow arched in surprise would convince him because both are the hallmarks of assessment, like you can’t quite tell if he’s actually annoyed right now or not.

“Do you want me to answer that honestly?”

“No,” Daniel and Horner answer at the same time, their voices pained, like they’re both dreaming about deliverance from this life’s mortal constraints through the sweet release of death.

“Yes,” Max finds he really does mean that.

“You know I’ve always thought that when you’ve just recently been in the car and you haven’t gotten to change yet, like how you are right now, that you look like you know exactly what’s entailed when-” 

“No, no, no,” Horner shakes his head, the horrified laughter that bubbles up between his words is that of a man that has seen some shit, who’s just taken one glance at where things were headed and said absolutely fucking not, “we are not- no, this is not why we are here, just- no.”

Christian looks around at everyone, utterly mystified as to how things had gotten so far off track with such little resistance. 

“I am just,” the team principal trails off mid-sentence, rubbing at his temple with the heel of one hand, “Daniel, please, can you…” 

“Me?” His teammate sounds genuinely surprised by the suggestion but the expression on Horner’s face tells Max that he’d intended for Daniel to have the role all along, “really?” the Australian turns to you, as if he’s expecting you to back him up on his but instead his features fall flat when you nod your head in confirmation.

“Let’s just get this over with already,” Max has had more than enough of being the odd one out, of being the only one here who’s still completely in the dark. 

“Max,” Daniel reaches out towards him before catching himself, his arm retracted almost as quickly as he’d extended it, like he’d been intending to rest his hand comfortingly on Max’s shoulder but then thought better of it. The Australian clears his throat, pressing his lips into a thin line, like he’d trying to find his voice again, like he doesn’t quite know where to start.

“All I ask of you is this, that you believe what you’re about to hear, and that you remember, regardless of everything else, we,” he gestures first to himself, then waves his hand in Horner’s direction, who’s refusing to meet Max’s gaze, and then to you, your gaze fixed steadfast on his face, watching him knowingly, “we are here for you, we will figure all this out.”

“Okay seriously, what the fu-” Max has had more than enough of this, enough of the worried expressions, of all these gun-shy words, of all the gazes trained on his face. He feels like he can’t breathe, like the oppressive weight of being at the center of attention, of finding himself the unwilling subject of discussion, has seen fit to settle itself squarely on his chest, suddenly determined to ensure that the only way he’ll be leaving here is on a stretcher.

And if you don’t stop looking at him like that, like you care or like you have any fucking right to look at him like you are, Max is going to lose his goddamn mind. He knows it’s stupid, that it’s childish and petty that this is the factor that’s threatening to send him toppling over, to push him careening over the edge into the abyss of his temper but that doesn’t change matters in the slightest.

“This is Kaia,” you tell Max the name of the girl tucked into your side, her little toddler’s body cradled in your arms, her tiny delicate features still half hidden from him by the hood of the jacket tucked over her. He tries to not think about the way you said ‘Kaia’, about the way you’d offered the name to him like it was something to be cherished, to be handled with kid gloves, like you wanted him to understand the weight of it, the worth of it.

His heart almost ached to hear that much tenderness put into a name. Almost.

“She, Kaia, she’s y-’ Daniel doesn’t even have a chance, no, Max’s father makes sure of that.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake! The girl is yours, Max, she’s your daughter. You and that empty headed, little Italian-”

The words crash over his head like the surges of white peaks of the breakers churning against the seafloor as they rush in, slamming into the shoreline with an unrelenting brutality, this sudden revelation washing away the wreck of waterlogged, ruined emotion that threatened to drown Max if he’d let it, carrying away all his conflicting desires and misplaced loyalty and maligned intentions on the same undertow that had brought in the current of glacial, ruthless determination.

There’s no time to think, he just moves. Because where one moment he’d been stood frozen in place, his feet rooted to the floor, feeling entirely certain that he’d likely remain exactly where he was until such a time came that he was forcibly removed, somehow, in the next, he was moving, crossing the short distance that separated his father from where he’d been in two sweeping steps.

Max, leans into the motion mid-stride, letting his momentum flow through him, pouring the force his body carries forward into the smooth, upward arch of his right arm through the air, ensuring that when his fist connects with his father’s face in a sharp, powerful uppercut, there’s not much that remains to be said.

Blood drips steadily from beneath the hand Jos has gingerly raised to his face, his palm protectively cradling his nose, the fracture in the bridge already swelling, but Max really doesn’t fucking care.

He finds that he’s quite a bit regretful that they’d traded in the arena of the Red Bull garage for this inconsequential hallway, if only because here there are no camera lens, there’s no flash of photographers, there’s no commentator’s to immortalize what Max already knows is a complete loss of temper and control that’ll fated to live on in infamy in the sport for decades regardless of whether or not it was caught on TV or it is relegated to being the stuff of anonymous, insider knowledge.

Because, the thing is, this moment, this very moment was the first time in quite a long time that Max would not have minded being recorded, he would not have minded being out there on the internet, to be brought up at inopportune moments or find its way into YouTube videos, he would have dealt with being haunted by the snippet for the rest of his life, in the way that only becoming a F1 driver had shown him a handful of seconds were more than capable of doing, and he wouldn’t have complained once.

But he supposed that the memory of the sickening crunch Jos’s nose had made when his knuckles had connected with it, of the startled yelp of pain his father had made or the savage, exhilarated grin he’d flashed him the split second before he hauled back and swung again.

“I- You-” in the nearly 21 years that Max has been alive, he can’t think of a single instance, not a single once in the entirety of his life, can he recall a time in which he has heard his father stutter, absolutely at a loss for words. It feels like an accomplishment, like it’s something to be proud of, that he should remember.

“How long?” Max doesn’t know what else to do to keep himself from taking another shot at his father, so he takes the course of action that comes to mind and asks the first question that comes out of his mouth.

Jos doesn’t reply, his eyes sliding slowly shut as if he hopes the answer will vanish, will fade away into nothingness if he can no longer see his son’s face and the righteous fury etched on it.

“I said how long?” Max hardly recognizes his own voice and cannot bring himself to trust entirely the control he’s somehow managed to maintain thus far, knowing already that what comes next, what will rain down, when he finally loses that restraint will be an ugly, terrible thing and not one he’ll be particularly proud of.

“You will speak when spoken to, Jos,” Helmut Marko strides down the hallway with the swagger and gravitas of a much younger man, his presence made commanding force that has Max reacting despite himself, drawing himself up to his full height, his shoulders pushed back and his head held high, his spine now ramrod straight, and his chin raised proudly like a man readying himself to pass muster.

“Don’t take that tone with-”

“Do as your son tells you to. Do it now.” Marko refuses to back down, cutting off Jos without a second thought.

“Fine,” his father forces the word out through clenched teeth. “But he’ll have to be more specific than that.”

“How long have you known?”

“How long have I known what? That you’d fucked up? That you had a daughter? That you are nothing without me?”

“Do. Not. Fuck. With. Me.” Max presses his forearm to his father’s throat, pinning him to the wall.

“Think about your actions here, Max. Don’t do anything you’ll regret because I’m not a forgiving man,” his father says, acting for all the world as if all's well and his son doesn’t have the upper hand.

“Get her out of here,” he doesn’t have to turn around to give the order, Max knows you’d heard him, and you’ll obey in this, only in this, because it’s already been made abundantly clear you’ll do whatever it takes to keep Kaia safe, “now.”

“You should say goodbye to Kaia because this is the last time you’ll ever be in the same room as her again, that you will ever see her again.”

“If you think you can keep my granddaughter from me-”

“She’s not your granddaughter, she doesn’t have a grandfather,” Max counts your footsteps as you walk swiftly down the hall, not trusting himself to look at your retreating figure with his daughter balanced on one hip and not follow after you. His resolve shatters the second your steps falter as you round the corner, the sudden halt jarring.

“There’s people, cameras, outside?” Your voice falters as you reappear, backtracking into the safety of the bleak stretch of hallway.

“It’s alright mate, I’ll go with them,” Daniel gives Max a comforting smile, not unlike the one you were quietly giving the little girl- no, Kaia, his daughter- he corrects himself, trying valiantly not to let on to the sea of people around him just how deep of a chord the words strike in his chest.

Unashamedly, Max downright refuses to tear his eyes away as you sway delicately side to side, alternating back and forth between balancing on one foot and then the other, with her perched on one hip and her tiny face that is so like his own is cradled soothingly in the curve of your neck.

Max would be lying if he said he didn’t momentarily feel as if he were trapped in a free fall, like the final tether to his sanity and to reality itself have just been severed by Daniel’s decision to go, to leave him alone to handle this, to force him to fight his way out all on his own and to find the answers he so desperately needs as a solitary figure, isolated and standing alone in the midst of the melee.

“I can’t do this alone-” he starts, only to be cut off by Daniel, who fixes him with an unwavering, unyielding look stretched taut across his face, the expression seemingly so entirely out of place on his features that there’s appallingly little which feels truly familiar about his unnaturally closed off characteristics.

“You can and you will. I’m going to go with them,” Daniel says patiently, gesturing to you and Kaia with a wave of his hand like this is nothing at all to him. Yet, the tone of his voice makes it abundantly clear that his teammate has absolutely no intentions to broker any disputes or to hear a single excuse or complaint further escape from his lips. “And you will be fine, Max. You know where to find us when you’re done here.”

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

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42 Hours

Content: an enemies to lovers au in which Harry and Y/N are forced into a cross country road trip to make it to their best friends’ wedding on time

Warnings: language, mentions of nsfw content

Pairing: Harry Styles x reader

Word Count: 20k 

A/N: I actually cannot believe that this is finally being posted over almost a month of working on it!! originally, I was going to make this one long stand alone fic, but once I hit 35k with no end in sight, I decided to split it into two parts so that it would be easier to read for you guys.  I’m hoping to have part 2 posted within a week, so keep an eye out for it!! this fic was partially inspired by this post by @avhrodite​ (thank you miss bailey!!) and can I just say that I had so much fun writing it!! I love road trips!! it makes me so sad that I had to split this fic because there are so many fun music scenes in the next part but those will all come in due time!! I would also like to give a big thank you to miss andrea @adashofniallandasprinkleoflunacy​ and miss alex @darthstyles​ for putting up with me bouncing ideas off of them and for proof reading for me!! and miss andrea again for editing this stunning header pic!! also everyone I tagged is a wonderful writer and if you’re looking for more to read after reading this then I HIGHLY suggest taking a look through their masterlists. and as always, if you like this fic, please like and reblog it!! and shoot me a message!! feedback is always appreciated, not just by me, but by all content creators <3

{masterlist}

also!! if you want to set the mood for a road trip with Harry, here is a link to the playlist that is mentioned and referenced in this fic!!

When she was a little girl, Y/N’s grandmother had told her about Murphy’s Law.  Grandma Sarah’s favourite activity was staring at her granddaughter over the kitchen counter, a knife in one hand and half an onion that she’d been cutting in the other, spouting various wisdoms at the young girl, who would often be sitting and peeling vegetables for her.  The old lady had hoped that, after being lectured enough times on life’s difficulties, Y/N might be able to avoid making the same mistakes that she had made in her own time.  She always had a list of advice that she’d cycle through, as if she were a record on a loop.

“Always look both ways before crossing the street.  Your great uncle Albert didn’t, and he never regained full function of his left hand.”

“Beauty fades, but there’s no shelf life on your mind.”

“The grass is always greener on the other side, so stop staring at it, and focus on taking care of your own lawn.”

All of the advice was, by any accounts, useful for anyone to know, especially a young girl.  Of course, sometimes the advice would get a little scrambled after Grandma Sarah had had a few glasses of wine, but even her tipsy thoughts were useful to Y/N in her later years.  To this day, Y/N still sets a glass of water on her nightstand before going out to a bar, and her hungover self is always grateful the next morning.  And Y/N had yet to find anything that smelled as sweet as a vanilla dabbed behind her ears and on her wrists when she runs out of perfume.  However, perhaps the most important piece of advice Grandma Sarah ever gave her came one afternoon when Y/N was eleven years old, and her older cousin Grace was due to get married the next week.

Grandma Sarah had cracked egg after egg into her mixing bowl, always without getting any unwanted pieces of shell in the egg whites, and gave her granddaughter a long look across the kitchen counter.

“When you get married, Y/N,” She had said, voice firm. “Remember Murphy’s Law.  Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong, and at the worst possible moment.  When Murphy’s Law comes into play, there’s nothing you can do except roll with the punches.”

Eleven year old Y/N had nodded her head seriously, as she always did when her grandmother told her seemingly important things.  The advice, despite its usefulness, however, didn’t stick around in her head, and Murphy’s Law didn’t cross Y/N’s mind for fourteen years.

It takes fourteen years for Y/N, who is standing in front of a flight check-in at LAX, two large suitcases next to her, one of which contains two gold wedding bands, passport in hand, and a distressed look on her face, to remember the law her grandmother had once told her about.

“When you get married, Y/N…anything that can go wrong, will go wrong, and at the worst possible moment.”

Taking a deep breath to calm herself, Y/N pushes the echoing words of her grandmother out of her head. “I’m sorry, just—” She gives a pained smile to the lady working the check in. “Can you explain that to me again, please?”

The lady also takes a deep breath, the smile on her ruby tinted lips just as pained as Y/N’s. “There’s a storm system moving through Utah and Colorado.  These systems have the potential to become tornadoes, and because of that, the conditions for flying are too dangerous right now, so all flights through that area are grounded until further notice.”

“So my flight is cancelled?” Y/N holds up the ticket in her hand that’s stamped with LAX – JFK. “This flight, this flight to New York, which is nowhere near Utah—that’s cancelled?”

The check-in lady, whose name tag reads Brynn, gives another tight smile. “Yes, ma’am.  It’s cancelled.”

“Okay, no, I’m sorry, Brynn, but that doesn’t work for me.” Y/N shakes her head fiercely as the manic rush of emotions through her begins to set in.  The denial, she finds, keeps the oncoming panic at bay, and so she decides to focus on that to ground herself. “My best friend is getting married in the Catskills in one week.” Y/N holds up one finger, as if her words are hard for Brynn to understand. “That’s one week from today.  I’m the maid of honour.  I have to be there to help organize, keep her calm, and make sure she actually makes it down the aisle, because—between you and me—she’s got some commitment issues—” The more Y/N speaks, the more her panic begins to spill out in her words, like a dam with a leak that’s about to burst. “And she forgot the goddamn wedding rings, so I have those too, and I just—I really need to get to New York, like, now. Right now.”

Y/N finally pauses to take a sharp breath, and Brynn, who had been waiting for her to finish, speaks again, her voice flatter than before.

“I’m very sorry to hear that, ma’am, but as I said, all flights are grounded right now.”

Pinching the bridge of her nose between her fingers, Y/N takes another deep breath.  Roll with the punches, her grandmother had told her.  What else is there to do? “Okay.” Y/N is careful to keep her voice in check when she speaks again. “Alright.  Do you know when they’ll be ungrounded?”

“As I’ve said,” Brynn’s smile is more of a grimace now, and Y/N knows that she’s treading on thin ice. “All flights are grounded until further notice.  We’re not sure when we’ll be able to open them again.  It could be a day, or it could be five.  If you’d like, I can put you down on a list to be called when flights are available again, but I’m afraid that’s the best I can do.”

“Let’s do that, then.” Y/N relents in a tired voice, already making plans to pick up a coffee on her way back to her apartment.  In the back of her mind, she begins to wonder if she has any Baileys Irish cream liqueur left in her kitchen cabinet—and if 8:30 A.M. is too early to be drinking Baileys with her coffee.

…

It takes Y/N two cups of coffee with Baileys (it had been 10 A.M. by the time she arrived home, thanks to L.A. traffic, and she had decided that 10 A.M. was a fine time to drink when one’s flight gets cancelled indefinitely) to work up the courage to call Jo and tell her that she isn’t sure if she’ll be able to make it to the wedding.

Josephine Waters, or Jo to anyone who doesn’t want to get punched in the arm, has been Y/N’s best friend since the girls were five years old.  They became fast friends on the first day of kindergarten, as Jo liked how Y/N could already colour inside the lines, and Y/N liked how Jo tackled a boy who tugged on Y/N’s pigtails.  From the very beginning, the two were a perfect match for each other; where Y/N was reserved, Jo was wild.  Where Jo was disorganized, Y/N was focused.  Each girl balanced the other in the most natural way, and it’s this fact that Y/N and Jo credit for the two of them staying friends for twenty years. As they grew up together, they grew together, taking the very best traits from the other and using it to help themselves develop.  Y/N had been the first person that Jo came out to, confessing to her best friend during an eighth grade sleepover in a quiet and nervous voice.  To Jo’s pleasure, Y/N had been completely supportive, and returned the favour from the first day of kindergarten by punching a boy in the nose for calling Jo a homophobic slur.  Jo helped Y/N through her parent’s divorce.  Y/N helped Jo manage her ADHD.  Jo talked Y/N through discovering her bisexuality in university. Y/N answered every 3 A.M. phone call to comfort Jo after a panic attack.  In every sense of the word, the two girls had been there for each other.

And now Y/N is going to miss Jo’s wedding.

The harsh realization digs a pit in her stomach as she opens her phone and clicks on Jo’s name.  It’s noon in L.A., which means it’s 3 P.M. in New York time, and Y/N knows Jo will answer.  She always does.

Sure enough, after three short rings, Jo’s voice chirps through the phone. “Hey, Y/N!  Has your flight landed already?”

“No, there’s—there’s been an issue.” Y/N downs another gulp of her coffee, wishing she had added more Baileys when she had the chance, and clears her throat before continuing. “There’s, um, a storm in Utah, and apparently it’s bad, and so all flights from L.A. to New York are grounded until further notice.”

Jo makes a scoffing noise, and Y/N can practically picture the indignant look on her face that she’s seen so many times before. “That’s ridiculous.  Did you tell them that New York is nowhere near Utah?”

“Uh huh.”

“What about that my wedding is in one week?”

“I told them that, too. Brynn didn’t seem to care.”

“Bitch.” Jo mutters under her breath. “Okay, just wait a second, Laure just walked through the door, so I’m putting you on speakerphone—”

Y/N hears rustling on the speaker, as well as muttering in the background as Jo speaks to her fiancée, and then Jo’s voice is back, sounding slightly more distant.

“Okay, so I told Laure what happened—”

“That’s awful, Y/N.” Laure’s voice is laced with stress, and Y/N can only imagine how much anxiety this information is adding to her already full plate. “They won’t tell you when flights will be leaving again?”

“Nope.” Y/N pulls her knees to her chest and wraps her free arm around them, leaning her head against the back of her couch.

“Okay, well, planes aren’t the only way to get here.” Laure says, always the more rational out of the two. “Maybe a car—?”

“Y/N doesn’t have one.” Jo chimes in, a hint of teasing in her voice, despite the serious problem that’s in discussion. “She’s scared of driving—”

Y/N sits up, an indignant look on her face. “I’m not scared of driving!” She says hotly, setting her empty coffee mug on the table with a thud. “I just hate L.A. traffic, and honestly, there’s no point!  I can walk to work, and Uber anywhere else I need to go!  A car would be completely useless to me!”

“Except now, when you’re about to miss your best friend’s wedding.” Jo points out. “What about renting one?”

Y/N sighs, her moment of indignation already fizzled out. “I tried that already.  There’s nothing available for a cross country trip.”

“And the drive is so long.” Laure murmurs, and Y/N knows it’s more for Jo’s benefit than hers. “It’s over forty hours.  She can’t do that by herself; it’s not safe.”

“But—”

“Look, Jo, don’t worry about this, alright?” Y/N cuts across her best friend’s anxious voice, assuming her usual role of protector. “I’ll figure this out.  I promise you; I will make it to your wedding on time, looking pretty in my dress, and with your wedding bands.  I promise.”

“We’ll keep thinking about it and see what we can come up with.” Laure promises through the phone, her voice sounding further and further away. “This is just—it’s a bump in the road, but it’s fine.  We can work around this.  We’ll find a way.”

…

The way that Laure finds for Y/N pounds on her door at 7:30 A.M. the next morning.

Y/N, like any exhausted and stressed out adult who has already begun her ten days of vacation time that she booked off for the wedding, is fast asleep in her bed when she hears the knocking.  The loud noise pulls her out from her dreams abruptly, and she cracks one eye open, squinting through the sunlight that’s lighting up her room.  When the knock echoes through her apartment again, she pulls herself from her sheets with a groan, grabbing her robe from the back of her door and tying it around herself as she makes her way to the front hallway to yell at whoever has the audacity to wake her up.

When she opens the door, Harry Styles is peering down at her with an irritated look on his face.

“Took you long enough, Y/N.” He rolls his eyes as he speaks, finally stepping back from the door that he had been pounding on a moment ago. “Are you ready to go?”

Y/N rubs her eyes, suppressing a yawn as she does so. “Styles, I have no idea what you’re talking about.  What are you doing here?” She demands.  She doesn’t have the energy to deal with him right now, she thinks, let alone the mental capacity to listen to anything he has to say.

Harry crosses his arms across his chest, and it’s then that Y/N notices the duffel bag strewn over his shoulder. “It’s a forty-two hour drive from L.A. to the Catskills.” Harry’s eyes scan over Y/N’s appearance, the very corner of his strawberry pink lips twitching, and Y/N tightens her robe around herself with a glare.

“A drive?” Y/N asks, uncertainty growing in her voice as she crosses her arm over her chest. “What are you talking about?”

“Your flight was cancelled, right?” Harry’s voice grows more impatient as Y/N’s half asleep brain struggles to piece together what’s happening. “So was mine, so I decided to drive to the wedding, and then Laure called me last night, begging me to take you with me.” He shrugs a bit, fixing his sunglasses on top of his head as his jade eyes scan over her appearance one more time. “Not my first choice of road trip partner, but I don’t think the best man can say no to bringing the maid of honour.  And splitting the cost of gas will be nice.”

“Okay, wait, I…” Y/N’s finally coming out of her fog of exhaustion, and the newfound clarity of her mind is causing a newfound pit to develop in her stomach. “Laure and Jo didn’t tell me any of this.”

“Well, I expect they’re a bit busy, given that they’re getting married in a week.” Harry adjusts the strap of his duffel bag on his shoulder with a sharp sigh. “Look, are you ready to go or not?  It’s over a five day drive, so we need to leave as soon as possible.”

“I—yeah—” Y/N nods before taking a hesitant step back from the doorway, positioning herself to the side so that Harry can get by her. “I just have to get dressed and grab a couple last minute things, so…come in, I guess.”

Harry flashes an insincere smile to Y/N as he steps into her apartment, his eyes darting around at the furniture and home decor.  Y/N watches as his gaze lingers on her library of books, her yellow bicycle leaning against the wall, and every other little touch of herself that she likes her home to have, and she can see the judgement that’s clearly apparent in his eyes.

“You can sit, if you want.” She mutters, turning on her heel to go back to her bedroom. “I’ll only be a few minutes.”

The first thing Y/N does when she shuts her bedroom door behind herself is assess the situation in the analytical way that usually calms her.  Alright.  So a road trip across the country isn’t exactly ideal, and a road trip across the country with Harry Styles is even less ideal.  But, at the present moment, being stuck in a car with Harry seems to be the only sure way that she’ll be able to make it to Jo’s wedding on time. And for Jo, Y/N would put up with anything.  Even Harry.

As she rummages through her drawers for some leggings and a tank top, Y/N wonders what she could have possibly done to bring this much bad karma into her life.  While she gets dressed, her mind flickers back to Murphy’s Law, how everything that can go wrong will go wrong, in the worst possible way, and then she thinks about being in a confined space with Harry for five days, and—yeah.  That seems to be the worst possible thing she can think of.

Y/N remembers the first moment she’d met Harry seven years ago, and the unfortunate circumstances under which that meeting had happened.  Jo and Laure had just barely met back then, and Jo had begged Y/N to come out on a double date with her and “this really hot girl from my women studies class who I’m, like, 83% sure swings my way.”

Y/N had groaned at that comment, flopping back on her bed in the tiny dorm that she and Jo shared. “No! I have an essay due in three days that I haven’t even started!”

Jo rolled her eyes as she flopped down on Y/N’s bed as well, ignoring her own half-made bunk that was across the small room, favouring her best friend’s bed like she always did. “We both know you’re not starting that essay until the day before it’s due, and that it’s just an excuse because you don’t want to go!”

“I don’t want to go.” Y/N had agreed with a sharp and fervent nod.  She shut her laptop and pushed it to the side of her bed, knowing from experience that she wasn’t going to be able to focus and argue at the same time. “Why would I want to hang out with a complete stranger while you make googly eyes at a girl from your class?”

“Okay, first, I don’t make googly eyes.” Jo made a face at that comment, nudging Y/N’s calf with her own foot. “And second, he’s her best friend from high school, and he’s coming to visit all the way from London!”

“So?  He’s still a stranger!” Y/N pointed out, her eyes drifting to the sticky note covered novel beside her.  She picks it up and begins to flip through the marked pages as she speaks. “Knowing where he’s from doesn’t change that!”

“It should, because he’s only going to be here for a week, and Laure almost cancelled the date because she doesn’t want to miss spending time with him—” Jo grabbed one of Y/N’s pillows and tossed it at her arm, knocking the book from her hands. “Focus! So I said that he could come, but she said that she didn’t want him to be left out, so I said that I happen to have an incredibly beautiful and witty best friend who would be able to entertain Harry while we all hang out together.”

Y/N inhaled deeply as she gave Jo a withering look. “Did you already tell her I’m going?”

Jo, in return, gave Y/N her most dazzling smile. “Yes.  We’re meeting them for dinner at 7.”

Y/N shakes herself from her memories as she runs to her bathroom to toss her toiletries back into the bag she’d taken them out of the day before, working as quickly as she can. It does her no good to think of Harry in the past, she thinks, because the present Harry is currently sitting in her living room, probably snooping through her stuff, and the longer she takes to get ready to go, the more he’ll go through.  Not that there’s anything incriminating in her apartment, really—or at least, nothing incriminating in her living room.  When Y/N makes it back to her bedroom, however, to quickly zip up her suitcase, she does make sure she grabs her favourite vibrator from the box under her bed, tucking it between her half-folded underwear.  If she’s going to be gone for a week, she’ll need something to help her relax.

Within a few more minutes, Y/N is repacked and ready to go.  Her hunter green bridesmaid dress is carefully arranged on the very top of her clothes in her suitcase, all of her makeup and toiletries are packed inside, and Jo and Laure’s wedding rings are secured in little velvet boxes stashed between her socks.  As far as physical preparedness goes, Y/N is ready to go on a coast to coast road trip. As far as mental preparedness goes, however…that’s the thing that Y/N’s not quite sure about.

…

“What are you doing?”

Y/N glances at Harry from the corner of her eye, her hand still half stretched out to the radio dials in his car.  Although Harry’s green eyes are hidden behind his sunglasses, and his face is turned towards the long road in front of them, he still somehow manages to catch her motions, and it irritates her to no end.

“I’m changing the radio station?” Y/N answers after a moment, giving him a puzzled look. “I don’t know why you listen to this weird oldies station, but—”

“First of all—” Harry’s hands turn the steering wheel slightly to guide his car over the curve of the road, his jaw twitching as a smirk works its way onto his pink lips. “This isn’t a radio station, it’s my Spotify playlist.  I put a Bluetooth connection in Stevie a year ago. Secondly—”

“Stevie?” Y/N repeats incredulously, twisting her whole body as best she can to look at Harry straight on. “You named your car?  You’re one of those guys?”

Harry finally gives Y/N a flicker of a glance, the glare obvious in his eyes even behind his dark sunglasses.  He turns his attention back to the road before replying. “Secondly—” He continues from before, ignoring her comment as his right hand readjusts the gear shift. “Driver picks the music.”

Y/N makes a face, the corners of her lips pulling down into a grimace as she settles back into the passenger seat with her arms crossed. “So we’re just going to listen to ‘Tiny Dancer’ for the entire drive, are we?”

“Not the entire drive, no.” Harry flicks on his turn signal with a ringed hand before shoulder checking to change lanes.  Y/N glances at him, her eyes training on the strained muscles in his neck as Harry continues. “We’ll listen to ‘Don’t Go Breaking My Heart,’ too.”

“Great.” Y/N exhales slowly and presses her head back into the seat’s headrest, closing her eyes as Elton John’s voice continues to float through the speakers. “Really looking forward to it.”

“You know, maybe you should try to sleep.” Harry says, his voice prickled with irritation as Elton John bleeds into The Zombies. “I think you’ll be in a better mood after you take a nap.”

Y/N readjusts her crossed arms as she mutters a short reply. “Don’t tell me what to do.” Still, she shuts her eyes again, twisting her body towards the window in an attempt to get comfortable enough to sleep.  Being in the car with Harry is already giving her a throbbing migraine, and they’ve only been on the road for less than two hours.  Sleeping through most of the trip will probably be the only way she’ll be able to survive it.

Despite that realization, however, her phone vibrates in her lap three minutes later, pulling her away from her thoughts.  Y/N glances down at the now lit screen, catching her bottom lip between her teeth when she registers the name on the message.  Opening her phone quickly, she reads over the reply as a guilty feeling begins to build in her stomach.

BRANT: Hey, what are you doing tonight?  Want to grab some dinner?

“What’s wrong?”

“Hm?” Y/N’s head snaps back up, her eyes jerking in Harry’s direction.  Like before, he’s watching her from the corner of his eye, catching every one of her movements, and the constant surveillance is annoying to no end.

Harry, it seems, is either oblivious to her annoyance, or is choosing to ignore it. “I asked what’s wrong. You have a weird look on your face.” Harry’s blunt words are accompanied by the sound of him tapping his ring covered fingers against the gear shift. “Everything alright?  Is it Laure and Jo?”

“No, it’s just—” Y/N glances down at her phone again, fingers poised over her keyboard as she crafts a reply in her head. “It’s no one.”

Harry snorts once, a short and harsh sound that grates against Y/N’s nerves like nails on a chalkboard. “I don’t buy that for a second.”

“It’s no one to you.” Y/N updates her retort, turning her full attention back to her phone. “My personal life is none of your business.”

Y/N: I’m sorry, I can’t!! Caught a last minute ride to New York with somebody.  Maybe once I’m back?

“Personal life, huh?” Harry clicks his tongue once, and the childish noise is even more irritating than his snort. “What, you can’t talk to me about whoever you’re shagging?”

The blunt remark hits Y/N like a shot to the chest, and she sputters for a moment as she struggles to form a response. “I—we’re not—” Taking a moment to gather herself and clear her throat quickly, Y/N avoids Harry’s gaze as her cheeks begin to burn. “We’re not like that. We’ve just…had a few dates, that’s all. There’s nothing…official.”

“You don’t need to be official to have a shag, now, do you?” Harry lifts his hand from the gear shift to fix his sunglasses, settling it back down on his jean covered thigh once he’s done. “If you don’t want to date the bloke—”

“I didn’t say that.” Y/N cuts over him, pulling herself from her embarrassment enough to give him a cold glare. “He’s very nice—”

“Boring, you mean—”

“And I—this is none of your business!” Feeling the flush of embarrassment rise back to her cheeks, Y/N once again turns her attention to her passenger seat window, avoiding Harry’s pressing gaze. “I’m done talking about this.”

Harry gives an indifferent shrug. “Whatever.” He says casually, tapping his finger against his thigh as his shoulders once again lift slightly beneath his fitted black t-shirt. “I just feel bad for the guy, that’s all.”

The comment is bait. And the thing is, Y/N knows it’s bait.  She knows that the only reason Harry is saying it is to get under her skin and keep her talking about Brant, further embarrassing herself in the process. She’s been around Harry enough to know how he works, and she knows that the only reason he would say that is to bait her.  She knows she shouldn’t take it.  And yet—

“There’s no reason to feel bad for him.” Y/N scoffs as she fidgets with the position of her seatbelt, trying to stop the strap from cutting into her chest. “We’ve been talking for a month, and there’s nothing official happening.  Just because you can’t go that long without trying to stick your dick in someone—”

“You have no idea what I can do, Y/N.  Don’t pretend that you do.” Harry’s tone of voice is just as scoffing as hers, his eyes still set on the road in front of them intently as he gives his sharp response. Y/N watches as he shifts the gears of the car and speeds up, just enough to make the engine roar, but not enough to lose control of the car.  Part of Y/N wistfully wishes that he would just slip up and crash the car, just so she wouldn’t have to continue this conversation.

“All I meant,” Harry continues, unaware of the dark daydreams running through Y/N’s head. “Is that I feel bad that you’re clearly not interested in him, which is proven by the fact that you haven’t wanted him in your bed.”

Irritation flares through Y/N’s body again, stronger than the embarrassment of discussing her sex life (or lack thereof) with Harry, and she half considers just grabbing the steering wheel and yanking it into a passing cliff so she can finish them off herself. “For Christ’s sake, Harry, sex isn’t the only way to—”

“I don’t mean actually having it, that’s not a given.” Harry rolls his eyes from behind his sunglasses as he slows down for a curve in the road, his practiced hands once again changing gears with ease. “You don’t have to fuck him.  But you should want to, especially if you’ve had a month of dates, and you clearly don’t want to.”

Y/N doesn’t hide the incredulous stare of disbelief on her face as she turns to look at him. Harry’s face, though turned towards the road still, has a look of amusement mixed with contemplation on it, and it takes all of Y/N’s self control not to smack the expression off of him. Although there’s the ghost of a smirk on his strawberry coloured lips, his brow is furrowed behind his sunglasses, as if he’s thinking hard about the conversation between them.  Normally, Y/N would be amazed that Harry is thinking hard about anything.  However, given that their conversation is apparently turning into whether or not she wants to have sex with someone, Y/N’s not too thrilled about his sudden investment and serious contemplation of the topic.

Shaking her head decidedly, Y/N finally spits out a finishing phrase. “You don’t know what I want.” She says decidedly, reaching into the backseat to grab the sweater she stashed back there.  She clumsily pulls it over her body without taking off her seatbelt.  Harry keeps the AC cranked as high as he can, and she knows that he’ll kill her if she tries to change it. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“I know more than you think.” Harry counters, the tip of his tongue running along his bottom lip. “And I’m pretty good at reading body language.  You don’t really want him.  He—what’s his name?”

Despite her better judgement, Y/N answers in a flat voice. “Brant.”

The corners of Harry’s cherry lip twitches. “Brant.  Yeah. It’s clear you don’t really want him, and you’re wasting your time.  You’re wasting his time, too.  Poor Brant.”

“Poor—you’re such an ass, you know that?” Y/N’s irritation bubbles over as she gives Harry a nasty look, her hand squeezing her thigh hard in an attempt to ground herself in their conversation. “You can try to pretend otherwise, but you don’t know anything about me, or him, so—”

“You think I’ve been friends with Laure and Jo this long and haven’t learned anything about you?” Harry cocks an eyebrow, risking a glance at her as he presses a heavier foot onto the gas. “I told you, I know more than you think, and that includes your type.”

An incredulous scoff leaves Y/N’s mouth, and she shakes her head in obvious disbelief before responding. “My type.  Right. What is my type, then?  What’s Brant like, exactly, since you seem to know everything?”

Harry goes quiet then, his brow furrowing again as he returns his full attention to the road.  With his incessant chatter gone, the only sounds in the car being “Maps” playing quietly in the background and Harry’s ringed index and forefinger tap on the steering wheel.  Y/N breathes out a long sigh of satisfaction as she relaxes back in her seat, her attention turned back to the blurred landscapes speeding by her window.  Finally, she’s managed to get Harry to stop with his ridiculous assumptions—

“You like someone that’s stable and secure, so he probably works in some corporation, or an office job. Majored in business, I’d think, but has a minor in something like mathematics.” The side profile of Harry’s nose wrinkles in disgust at the thought. “He wants to work his way up in the company, but never wants to actually start anything on his own.  He likes the stability of a blueprint. You’re obsessed with punctuality, so he’s probably always on time to pick you up for dates—and he has to pick you up, because you don’t drive—and your dates are never really dates. Dinners, or movies, or something like that, but they never really have that spark.” Harry’s shoulder lift slightly as he continues to make his conclusions. “Which, honestly, is probably a big reason in why you don’t want to fuck him, because as much as you like stability and safety, you also like the idea of a grand gesture, or something like that.  And you probably split the bill a lot at dinner, right?  Because it just seems fair, but really it’s because you know it’s not a real date.  But it passes the time, and he’s nice, so it’s fine.  But it’s only fine.” Harry licks his lips once more as he collects his next thoughts, his teeth catching his bottom lip just barely as his tongue retreats back into his mouth. “And he’s probably already talking about you coming to meet his family for some holiday.  Not in a romantic way, but just because he likes to plan everything in advance to every minute detail.  Just like you.”

Halfway through Harry’s speech, a flush had begun to creep up Y/N’s neck, continuing to warm her jaw and ears before settling on the apples of her cheeks.  She keeps her eyes trained on her window and her mouth pressed into a tight line, refusing to look at Harry and give him any hint of just how shocked she is that he’s guessed so much.

Harry, however, doesn’t plan on letting her get away from his inquisition. “Well?” He impatiently prompts after a moment, and even though she’s not looking at him, she can feel him looking at her, his emerald irises burning into the back of her head. “Am I right?”

“I—” Y/N clears her throat quickly, but her voice is still strained and tight when she replies. “No.”

Harry hums low in his throat, and his voice is laced with curiosity with he replies. “Really?” The irritating tap of his fingers on the steering wheel to the beat of the music continues. “What did I get wrong?”

“He—” Y/N hates the way her skin is burning from his interrogation, how her voice shrinks smaller and smaller the more she speaks.  If Harry knows her so well, then he knows how much she loves being in control, and in this situation, with Harry managing to pull every one of her most secret inner thoughts and feelings out of her without trouble, she feels anything but in control. “He has a minor in accounting, not mathematics.”

The laugh that leaves Harry’s mouth is loud and bombastic, and his whole body curves over the steering wheel as the sound rolls out of him, his eyes just barely managing to stay on the road while his sunglasses slide down his nose. “Right.” Harry says between belly laughs, his voice stretched out in amusement. “But everything else was spot on?”

Y/N keeps her stiff body turned towards the window, refusing to engage in the conversation any further. That doesn’t stop Harry, however, who fixes his sunglasses as chuckles continue to roll out of him.

“I take it back. Maybe he’s the one wasting your time.” His hand runs through his hair lazily, fixing the curled strands that had fallen into his eyes as he laughed. “I don’t blame you for not wanting to sleep with your bore of a boyfriend—”

“He’s stable!” Y/N breaks her silence to protest Harry’s words, her voice heated. “And he’s not my boyfriend.  We’ve been seeing each other, but we’re not—it’s not exclusive, or—nothing serious—”

“You don’t have to explain yourself to me.  It’s fine.” Harry waves off her arguments with a flick of his tattooed hand. “Besides, like you said, it’s none of my business, right?”

Y/N can practically picture what Harry looks like in this moment.  His chestnut curls are probably a mess from fidgeting with them, and his cheeks are most likely rosy beneath his stubble from the peels of laughter that left his equally red lips a moment ago.  Most infuriatingly of all, his dimples are probably present, making little indentations in his cheeks to show how entertaining he’s found embarrassing her. Bastard, she thinks, clenching her fists so hard that her nails dig into her palms, pressing them into her sides beneath her makeshift blanket.

She refuses to let herself confirm if her suspicions about Harry’s appearance are correct, and instead keeps her gaze on the blurred trees whipping by outside her window. “Right.” She mutters, leaning her head against the headrest as she closes her eyes. “It’s none of your business.”

…

As soon as the paint-peeled door to the motel room swings open, Y/N knows that she’s not going to be sleeping soundly tonight.

She’s not sure what her first hint should have been.  Perhaps it was the half-flickering blue and red light of the Motel 6 sign that should have tipped her off, or the front-desk attendant who looked as though he was hiding a few secrets himself.  When Y/N and Harry had first approached the front desk of the tiny, vaguely mildew-smelling lobby, their clothes rumpled from the drive and their attitudes just as bothered, the employee in the Motel 6 uniform had barely raised an eye at them, not bothering to look up from his computer until Y/N and Harry were directly in front of him.

“Hi.” Harry had said, his voice taking on a cautious but polite tone that, Y/N remembers thinking, she would have appreciated hearing throughout their eight hour drive that day. “We’d like two rooms, please—”

“Here.” The attendant’s gum snapped in his mouth as he reached behind himself and grabbed an old key with a flimsy blue plastic tag from a wall of empty pegs. “Queen sized bed, the first door on the left.  It’ll do you two nicely.”

“Um, no.” Harry cleared his throat loudly as he gave a slight shake of his head. “We need two rooms.”

Finally, the attendant looked towards them, his eyes scanning Harry before Y/N.  The latter had self consciously pulled her sweater around her, as there was something in the attendant’s eyes that had bothered her. “Don’t have two rooms.  I got one room left.  Everything else is booked.”

Harry had glanced at Y/N then, and she knew that his thoughts mirrored hers: there was no way that they’d share a queen bed together.  No way in hell.  They’d barely survived eight hours in the same cramped car without one of them driving them off a cliff.  If Y/N had to share a bed with Harry, even for just one night, she’d probably end up smothering him in his sleep before the first snore left his obnoxious mouth.

“That’s really not an option.” Y/N had stepped forward then, crossing her arms around herself as the attendant’s eyes canvassed her again. “Isn’t there something—”

“Look, lady, I’m telling you what’s available.” The attendant’s eyes continued to flicker between her face and her chest, making Y/N’s skin crawl more and more with every word that fell from his gum-filled mouth. “The room might have a pull out chair—some do, but I couldn’t tell you which.  Now do you want to share the room with him or not?  If you don’t want to share, then I could try to find something else for just you—”

Before Y/N had the opportunity to respond to the lewd suggestion, Harry was already stepping forward, his body angling protectively in front of her own.  She watched from behind as his broad shoulders squared beneath his black t-shirt, his shoulder blades flexing as he straightened up to his full height.  When Harry answered, his voice was just as firm as it was dark, lacking its previous polite tone.

“We’ll take the room.” He had said coldly, reaching into his back pocket to pull out his wallet before tossing a few bills on the front desk. “Thanks for the help.”

Yes, Y/N thinks, all of that should have been a sign for the state of the motel room that they now find themselves standing inside.

The same mildew smell from the lobby surrounds them, permeating through every inch of air that Y/N breathes in. Dust seems to coat every surface as well, with thick layers of it covering the decades old TV and stand, the small coffee table, and the ledge of the window to her right.  To her relief, there is a small arm chair in the corner, which must be the pull out that the attendant had mentioned.  However, her relief is short lived when she sees the ratty beige comforter on the bed, and wonders if maybe sleeping in Harry’s car, which she had sworn to him that she didn’t want to do, might have been the better choice.

Harry shuts the door behind them with a firm thud, turning the deadbolt lock before attaching the chain from the door to the door frame. “Let’s keep that locked, yeah?” He mutters, walking to the window and making sure the beige curtains—everything in the room is a sea of beige, like some sort of khaki coloured nightmare—are pulled closed tightly. “I don’t trust that front-desk prick not to sneak in here.”

Y/N nods, fixing the strap of her duffel bag with her overnight clothes on her shoulder.  She’s not quite sure where to set it down, as everything around them seems to have been sitting stagnant and uncleaned for a while. “Yeah. Thanks, by the way.  For that.”

Harry acknowledges her thanks with a small grunt, barely lifting his head to look at her. “You don’t need to thank me.”

Despite her gratitude for his actions, Y/N can’t stop herself from rolling her eyes at his gruff response. “Jesus, can you not just say you’re welcome?”

Harry chooses to ignore her comment, and instead sets his bag down on the arm chair, unzipping it roughly. “You can take the bed.” He says simply, tossing his sunglasses into his bag before pulling out a small bag filled with what Y/N assumes are toiletries. “I’ll take the pullout.”

“Fine.” Y/N reluctantly sets her own bag down on the creaking bed, pulling back the covers to check for anything unsightly.  To her relief, the interior of the bed looks cleaner than the exterior, and she returns the covers to their previous position before grabbing her phone charger from her duffel.

Harry glances at her as she gingerly sits on the bed and plugs her phone into the wall. “I’m going to shower.” He says slowly, as if gauging her reaction to the simple phrase. “Do you, um, need in there, or—?”

“Nope.” Y/N shakes her head, her cheeks flushing slightly as she checks her messages. “You’re good.” She keeps her eyes glued to her phone until she hears the click of the bathroom door behind Harry, signalling that she’s alone.

Taking advantage of what she knows will be a rare moment of solitude over the next week, Y/N changes from her tank top and leggings into her pajamas, wishing that her past self had realized how likely it would be that she’d be sharing a room with Harry. She’d brought exactly two pairs of pajamas with her on the trip, and neither pairs were something she wanted Harry to see her in.  The first pair, a baby pink silk set she’d bought on a whim from her favourite lingerie shop, is eliminated before Y/N even considers them, leaving her with just her usual casual pajamas.  Unfortunately, Y/N’s usual casual pajamas consist of an old sports bra that she’d had since moving to L.A., and a pair of men’s boxers that she stole from an ex in college.  Still, despite her hesitancy, she knows that plaid boxers and a faded grey sports bra are better than pink silk and lace, and she changes into them quickly before sitting cross-legged on the bed and dialing Jo’s number.

Jo, like she usually does, answers on the third ring, her voice extra chipper to compensate for the verbal lecture that she knows is coming. “Hey, Y/N!  How was driving today?”

“It would have been better if I’d known Harry was driving.” Y/N sighs, rubbing her palm over the cold skin of her exposed thigh. “Shouldn’t I have been informed of that decision?”

“It completely slipped my mind, actually.” Jo says casually, and Y/N can just picture her leaning her chin into her palm. “How was the first day?  Are you calling to ask me to help bury his body in the desert?  Because, like, you know I would in a heart beat, but I think it may put a damper on mine and Laure’s nuptials if my best friend murders her best friend.”

“No one’s been murdered. Yet.” Y/N glances at the bathroom door, the sound of the shower echoing through the vents and into the bedroom. “Although a ‘help me hide the body’ phone call may be coming soon.”

“Uh oh.” Y/N hears something crackling against the speaker, and pictures Jo shifting the phone from one ear to the other. “Is it that bad?”

Y/N pinches the bridge of her nose as she contemplates the easiest way to answer Jo’s question. “He’s such an irritating ass.  He really is.” She lowers her voice, but only slightly.  If Harry’s eavesdropping, she thinks, then let him hear.  It would serve him right. “He wanted to pick a fight over every little thing, and he’s so particular about his car—did you know he named it?  He named it, Jo.  He talks about it like it’s a person!”

A loud sigh echoes through the speaker. “That’s really not that weird, you know.” Jo replies in her best peace keeping voice. “And, by the way, did you know that you’re really the only person who finds Harry irritating?  Laure adores him, and I really like him, and everyone who meets him thinks he’s very thoughtful!”

“Then they haven’t been trapped in a car with him and his playlists for eight hours.” Y/N begins to tap her fingers against her knee in a quick staccato pattern. “He practically interrogated me about Brant today, as if he has any clue about the people I date.”

“Did he?” There’s a trace of curiosity in Jo’s voice now, and Y/N can imagine her leaning forward in interest. “What did he say?”

“He said he thinks he’s boring.” Twisting a lock of her hair behind her ear as she speaks, Y/N leaves her hand resting against her cheek. “He was rude about it, too.  I didn’t ask for his opinion.”

“Well, honestly, Y/N…” Jo’s curiosity twists into hesitation. “Brant isn’t exactly the most thrilling person.  You know that.”

Y/N tugs her bottom lip between her teeth, her cheeks flushing for what seems to be the millionth time that day. “I’m aware of that.  But he didn’t need to be so smug about it!”

“Okay, well, what’s done is done.” Jo says as she takes on her mediator persona once again. “So there’s nothing else to do now except go to sleep, get back in the car tomorrow, and continue driving.”

The sound of the shower stream cuts off, leaving just the pitter patter of rain beginning to hit the roof of the motel as ambiant noise. “I guess.” Y/N mumbles, fidgeting with the waistband of her bra. “I’ll talk to you later.  Love you.”

“Love you, too.”

After the line clicks dead, Y/N flops back on the squeaking mattress and begins to scroll through her phone, opening her work email to check if everything is running okay back home while she’s gone.  On top of all this, the last thing she needs is for her work to completely blow up in her absence.  Within minutes, Y/N becomes so engrossed in her phone that she doesn’t even notice the bathroom door creaking open and Harry walking out with just a towel around his waist.

Until she looks up, and then her mind goes completely blank.

Immediately, Y/N feels overstimulated.  There’s just…so much going on that she doesn’t even know where to look first, let alone have the ability to remind herself that she shouldn’t even be looking at Harry like this in the first place.  

Harry’s curls are soaking wet, curling down around his flushed cheeks in a way that, if it were anyone else, she’d immediately describe as attractive.  Droplets of water are clinging to every inch of his skin, his toned and tanned and tattooed skin, that seems to continue forever as her eyes travel down his bare chest, noticing every curve of his muscle.  His jade cross, which is almost the exact shade of his eyes, sits between his pronounced pectoral muscles, moving ever so slightly with each step he takes.  Y/N notices tattoos she’s never seen before, like the giant butterfly across his toned stomach, and—her mind goes blank for just a moment—two vines that are tattooed over his prominent pelvic muscles, which just barely dip beneath the white towel that’s wrapped loosely around his hips.

As Y/N’s eyes glue themselves to the way Harry’s towel is moving as he walks, arousal begins to pool in her stomach, travelling all the way down to her core and back again.  For a split second, she thinks that maybe Harry is right.  Maybe she doesn’t want to fuck Brant, because she knows for certain that she’s never thought about him the way she’s thinking about Harry in this moment.

But it’s Harry, she reminds herself, as she tries to force herself to snap her gaping mouth closed. Underneath all those muscles and tattoos—and there are a lot of muscles and tattoos—it’s Harry, who annoys her to no end, who is one of the most self-absorbed individuals she’s ever met, and who has had it out for her since the day they met.

“Sorry.” Harry’s low accent snaps Y/N from her thoughts and pulls her wandering eyes back to his face. “Forgot my clothes out here.”

“It’s—” Y/N’s voice cracks in the middle of the word, still hyper-focused on just how it’s possible for one person to be as attractive as they are irritating, and she clears her throat before trying to speak again. “It’s fine.”

If Harry notices the slip in Y/N’s voice, he doesn’t say anything.  Instead, he just walks to his open bag, locking one hand firmly over his towel as the other searches through his clothes.  He pulls out a t-shirt and a pair of shorts, examining them for just a moment before nodding in satisfaction and heading back to the bathroom. Y/N almost swears that she sees him glance at her one last time before he shuts the door, but then she gets lost in the taut muscles of his back, and forgets what she’s thinking entirely.

She’s only just begun to contemplate that maybe she should pull herself together when the door opens again, and Harry exits the bathroom in a way that’s a little more presentable.  His hair is still damp, but his body is dry, proven by the faded Rolling Stones t-shirt that’s now clinging to his arms and the boxers that are hanging low on his hips. His tattooed hips.  His incredibly sexy tattooed hips that could probably—

“What are you wearing?” Harry asks, raising an eyebrow at her as he moves his bag from the chair to the ground.  He begins to unfold the bed from the armchair cushions to reveal a creaking twin bed, carefully stretching it out as he waits for an answer.

“I—pajamas.” Y/N glances down at herself self consciously, fixing the strap of her sports bra as she does so. “I just—I didn’t think we’d be sharing a room, so…”

Harry nods tersely as he finishes setting up the bed, his expression unreadable while he walks to the closet and grabs a set of sheets and a blanket. “Cute boxers.” He says casually. “Are they Brant’s?”

Within a flash, the intense rush of attraction and desire Y/N had been feeling is gone, and is instead replaced by the familiar irritation as she watches a smirk grow in the very corner of Harry’s mouth. “No.” She says flatly, turning her attention back to her phone.

“Interesting.” Harry says slowly, laying the sheets and blanket on the bed in a haphazard manner. “Whose are they, then?”

Y/N gets up from the bed and grabs her toiletry bag from her duffel before answering. “An ex.” She says shortly, tucking the patterned bag under her arm. “And why does it matter to you?”

The sound of the rain against the roof and windows gets louder and louder as they speak, and Harry raises his voice to be heard over the precipitation. “It doesn’t.” He shrugs as he maneuvers his lanky body under the blanket without causing the bed to fold in on itself. “Just curious, that’s all.”

“Well, you don’t need to be curious.” Y/N opens the bathroom door, sparing one last withering glance at Harry over her shoulder.  He’s sitting up on the bed with one leg hanging out from beneath the covers as one hand plays with his hair, the other fiddles with a ring on his finger, and the way he looks at her from the corner of his eye lights a fire in Y/N’s chest.  Except she can’t tell if it’s a fire of anger or arousal.  

When she slams the door behind her, it’s her own confusion over that distinction that frustrates her more than anything else.

…

“Took you long enough.” Harry scoffs while leaning against the side of his car, his white t-shirt a contrast to the dust covered body of the black Chevy Impala.  His dark sunglasses are perched on top of his head, keeping his unruly curls out of his eyes, while his arms are crossed over his chest impatiently as he waits for an answer. “I dropped off the keys ten minutes ago.”

By way of explanation, Y/N holds up the cardboard drink tray in her hands, a brown bag balancing in between the two coffee cups. “I was getting us breakfast, Styles.  Calm down.” She walks to the passenger side of the car, opening the door and climbing in one handed. “I figured you’d be even crabbier hungry.”

“You mean you’d be crabbier without caffeine.” Harry retorts, climbing into the driver’s side in one smooth motion. “Here—” He takes the tray from her so she can buckle her seatbelt, carefully removing the two coffees and setting them in the cup holders between them. “Just be careful not to spill anything.”

Y/N rolls her eyes as she picks up the coffee closest to her (she’d gotten them both black). “Why? Worried about me ruining Stevie?”

Harry reaches into his pocket, pulling out his keys as he gives her an irritated look. “Yes, actually. I’ve put a lot of work into her.” The car roars to life as Harry turns the key in the ignition, buckling his own seat as the motor warms up. “Adding on two thousand miles to her in five days is already worrisome enough, and that’s not even counting the other two thousand she’ll get on the way back.”

Y/N doesn’t respond to the comment, and instead lets the sound of Harry’s playlist fill the silence of the car as Harry peels out of the Motel 6 parking lot.  She’ll be glad to leave that place behind, she thinks, and focus on finding something better—and more private—for tonight, wherever they end up.

Harry, however, doesn’t seem content with letting silence fall between them. “How did you sleep last night?” He asks after a few moments, one hand on the steering wheel as he takes a sip of his coffee.

Glancing at him from the corner of her eye suspiciously, Y/N reaches into the paper bag and grabs her Danish, taking a small bite before answering. “Not great.”

“Was the bed bad?” Harry asks curiously, his brow furrowing while his eyes stay glued to the road, moving only to glance at the occasion sign directing him back to the highway. “The pull out wasn’t great, but I’ve slept on worse.  I would’ve thought the bed would be better than that.”

“No, it—I mean, the bed wasn’t amazing, but it—” Y/N clears her throat and swallows the bite of pastry in her mouth. “I, uh, I don’t sleep well when it’s raining.”

At this new information, Harry’s eyebrow quirks up, and he risks a look in her direction to attempt to read her face.  Y/N’s own eyes are focused on the Danish in her hands, refusing to meet his gaze as she lifts the pastry to her mouth to take another bite.

“You don’t?” Harry asks after a moment, the confusion in his voice almost visible within the space between them. “But it’s like white noise, isn’t it?  Supposed to be relaxing, and all that.”

Y/N gives a half shrug of her shoulders. “It’s—well, it’s not the rain, exactly, just—what it’s usually paired with.” Y/N hopes that her clear hesitancy to answer will be enough of a signal to Harry for him to drop the subject.  Harry, however, doesn’t seem to pick up on the reluctance in Y/N’s voice; or, at least, he doesn’t care enough to acknowledge it.

“What do you mean, what it’s paired with?” Harry takes a small sip of his own coffee, careful of the temperature of the liquid. “Like…wind, or—?”

Y/N debates back and forth with herself internally, but she knows that Harry won’t drop the subject without getting a satisfying answer. “Thunder.” She answers finally, setting her coffee down in her cup holder before turning her gaze towards her window. “I don’t like thunderstorms, ever since I was a little kid, and when it’s raining, it always feels like thunder is around the corner.  Puts me on edge, like I’m waiting for it.  And I can’t sleep.”

“So you never sleep when it rains?” Harry asks slowly, and the tone of incredulous disbelief in Harry’s voice is enough for Y/N to be able to imagine the expression on his face. His forest green eyes wide, strawberry pink lips agape, brow furrowed in confusion, his jaw slack as he contemplates a response to a grown woman admitting that she’s afraid of thunder. The image in her head is enough to make the back of her neck flush.

There’s a tightness in the back of her throat, and Y/N attempts to clear it again before answering. “Never.”

“Huh.” Harry taps his fingers against the gear shift in succession three times. “You’d hate London, then.”

The casual comment catches Y/N by surprise, but she doesn’t allow herself to lower her guard. “That’s why I don’t live in London.” She mumbles the words as her fingers pick at the napkin wrapped around her Danish. “I picked L.A. for a reason.  It has lots of heat, barely any rain, and I’m reasonably close to Disneyland whenever I feel like I need something magical.” The last part slips out without Y/N thinking, and the flush creeps further up her neck as a surprised laugh leaves Harry’s mouth.

“Something magical?” Harry repeats, new crinkles appearing next to his eyes as he laughs, as if the dimples that crease his cheeks aren’t proof of his amusement enough. “Do you frequently feel like you need something magical?”

It’s Y/N’s turn to give an incredulous look now, her body half twisting towards Harry to observe his confusing reactions. “How did I just admit that I’m afraid of thunder, and the thing you’re focusing on is that I like Disney?”

Harry shrugs at her words, flicking on his turn signal to exit towards the highway. “I don’t know.” He says as he peers over his shoulder to check for oncoming cars. “I mean, everyone has fears.  Not liking thunder isn’t exactly uncommon, you know.  However, hearing that Ms. Serious Type A Perfectionist likes magic—” His grin grows bigger by the second. “Now that’s surprising.”

“Oh, shut up.” Y/N mutters, finishing her Danish in a few more bites.  She waits until she’s entirely finished chewing before continuing the conversation over the voice of Billy Joel coming through the speakers. “Since I’ve admitted something I’m afraid of…” She starts, glancing at Harry from the corner of her eye. “I think it’s only fair that you admit something, too.”

Harry snorts in response, his hand freezing its movement with his coffee cup still half lifted to his lips. “Is that so?”

“Mhmm.” Y/N hums as she slips off her shoes in order to pull her legs beneath her to fold into a cross-legged position on the car seat. “Not so much fun when it’s your turn, huh? C’mon, what’s the Brit scared of? Not enough biscuits for afternoon tea?”

A short and harsh breath of air leaves Harry’s nose, half a snort as he sets his coffee down in his cupholder. “No, actually, diminishing biscuit levels are a low level fear for me.”

“Then what’s a higher one?” Y/N prods, watching as Harry’s neck muscles tense as he shoulder checks to change lanes.  There’s something about the movement that catches her eye, but she can’t quite figure out why—or rather, she can, but she’d rather pretend that she’s unaware.

“Uh…” Harry’s fingers nimbly switch on his turn signal before he transitions to the left lane, his right hand moving the gear shift to its desired place. “Crowds.  I’m not a fan of big crowds, really.  Like when everyone’s pressed together, so tight that you can’t breathe, and you can’t hear yourself think because it’s so loud…yeah. I don’t like that.”

The simple answer surprises Y/N as much as she imagines her answer surprised Harry. “Crowds?” She repeats back to him, a forgotten memory of long gone conversations coming to the forefront of her mind. “But what about, like, concerts and stuff?  Laure always told me when she’d go to shows with you…”

“That’s different.” Harry shrugs as one of his ringed hands comes to his lips, rubbing over them slowly as he contemplates his next words. “I…When I’m at concerts, I always go with someone, and if we’re in the general seating area, where there’s a lot of people, I always stick with them.  Like, sometimes, if it’s getting crowded, or people are pushing, Laure will hold my hand, so…” Redness begins to creep up Harry’s pale neck, staining the tops of his ears a deep berry colour as he trails off.

Not for the first time since their conversation began, Y/N is surprised at how candid they’re being with each other.  As she watches Harry’s blush grow, she feels her own diminish, a physical representation of her trading her embarrassment for something more empathetic.

“I get it.” Y/N says after a moment, once it’s clear that Harry isn’t going to continue. “When there’s thunderstorms, um, I feel better when I’m with someone, or talking to someone. It makes me feel less…”

“Alone?” Harry finishes for her, his eyes flickering from the road to her profile.  His green irises capture hers for longer than they should, his focus completely gone from the stretch of highway for at least five seconds before Harry’s attention turns back to driving. “Yeah.” He says slowly, pulling his sunglasses down from his hair to hide his eyes. “Yeah, less alone. It helps.”

Y/N nods slowly, unable to look away from Harry’s side profile.  It’s apparent that he’s on edge after their conversation, and she knows her body language is the same.  Tight in the shoulders, hands clenched, back rigidly straight.  And yet, seeing her own body language reflected in front of her bothers her.  Part of her wants to reach out and take Harry’s hand, soothe him like Laure does in the crowd of a concert, but she knows that’s ridiculous.  It’s ridiculous, and it’s Harry, and Harry, of all people, does not need her comfort.  Not in the slightest.

She watches as Harry clenches his fist on top of his thigh.

…

“Is this really necessary?” Y/N asks, slamming her car door shut as Harry does the same on the other side of the vehicle.  She leans over the roof of the car, crossing her arms on the cool metal as she tilts her head to the side in an inquisitive manner.  The clouds in the sky are getting darker by the minute, signalling the beginning of the storm that canceled her flight, and the angry black colour above their heads is making Y/N anxious.

Harry, however, seems unbothered by the gathering storm, and nods tersely as he pushes his sunglasses up onto his head before opening the door to the backseat and grabbing his army green jacket. “Of course it’s necessary.” He says, slipping the jacket over his broad shoulders before slamming the door shut and locking the car. “I’ve never been to Utah before.  I want a souvenir.”

“Okay, but—” Y/N follows Harry as he walks towards the dilapidated building in front of them. “Here? Really?  Does this seem like the best place?”

Harry glances at her over his shoulder at her, pausing his long strides to look up at the building he spotted from the highway.  If the chipped grey paint that was once pastel blue and dust-coated windows are any sign, the structure is probably older than Harry and Y/N combined, with a splintered front porch wrapping around its small perimeter.  The building has one faded sign above the door that reads “SOUVENIRS/SNACKS” in hand-painted capital letters, and seems to be hanging onto the outside façade by three small bolts and sheer willpower.  Y/N’s almost certain that she’s seen this exact building in a horror movie before someone gets murdered, and while getting back into the car with Harry isn’t at the top of her list of wants, it’s certainly preferable to getting stabbed to death by a serial killer.

“It’s fine, Y/N.” Harry waves off her concern without a second thought about the appearance of the shop. “If you’re really bothered, you can wait in the car.”

Y/N considers it for a moment, but decides against it.  She needs to stretch her legs, and honestly, Harry seems too trusting.  He probably wouldn’t be able to tell if someone was sketchy until their knife was in his back.  And, seeing as how he has the keys to the only getaway car available, Y/N kind of needs him around without a stab wound carved into his flesh.

“Let’s just get this over with.” She sighs, pulling her own jacket around her tighter as she steps over the worn wooden steps to the door. “We’re on a schedule.”

When Harry pushes open the door, the smell of stale air hits Y/N before anything else.  Despite one open window and a fan in the corner of the shop that’s being used in a weak attempt to circulate the air, it feels like nothing fresh has been in the shop for a while.  Y/N shoots a glance at Harry, caution and warning written all over her face.

While Harry sees her glance, he waves off her concern, turning his attention to the few shelves and wire racks around the small shop that are lined with inventory.  Within a few moments, he’s entertaining himself in the post card section, comparing different photos of the Utah landscape to each other with great care and concern.  Y/N observes him for a few moments before wandering off on her own towards the snack section of the shop.  Although there are a few items that she thinks about picking up, the thick layer of dust over the packaging puts her off from purchasing them.  She grimaces as she continues walking, stopping in front of a tower of silver key chains in the back corner of the shop.  Most of them, she finds, are crosses and bible verses, and all of them give her an ominous feeling in her stomach.  Y/N runs her finger over a miniature silver version of the Ten Commandments, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth as she does so.

“I think we should go, Harry.” She calls to him without turning around, setting the key chain back down on the rack carefully. “Just pick your post card and—Harry?”

When Y/N turns around, Harry’s broad figure is nowhere to be seen.  She walks back over to the post card section slowly, her brow furrowed with confusion as a knot tightens in her stomach.  Where could he be? She wonders, running her hand along the dusty wire rack in front of her.  It’s not like there’s anywhere for him to go in the small shop, and she would have heard if he left, or if he drove away.

“Harry?” She calls again, her steps slower now as worry fills her voice. “Where did you—fuck—!” Y/N screams as something grabs her from behind, its fingers digging into her sides harshly.  She whips around to find Harry standing over her, loud outbursts of laughter spilling from his strawberry pink mouth at the look on her face.

An indignant flush rushes over Y/N’s face. “You’re such an ass!” She hisses, gripping his shoulders and shoving his laughing frame away from her. “I swear, you’re like a five year old—”

“Did I worry you?” Harry snickers between his words, a wicked look of mischief alight in his dark green eyes. “Were you afraid something happened to me?”

Y/N’s cheeks burn with anger as she turns away from him, crossing her arms defiantly. “No.  I wish something had happened to you.  Then I wouldn’t have to deal with your immature antics.”

Harry’s lips stay quirked up in a smirk as he follows her, his voice falling into a singsong tone. “You were worried.” He insists, chuckles still rolling out of him every few moments. “I could tell.”

“Oh, fuck off.” Y/N snaps at him in an irritated voice. “Just pay for your stupid post card and let’s go.”

“I already did. There’s a sign on the desk saying the clerk is out for lunch, so I left some money.” Harry nods to the small desk in the corner with a few dollars left tucked under the dusty service bell. “I think that’ll cover it, yeah?”

“Whatever.” Y/N can’t resist shoving Harry one last time before walking towards the shop door. “That’s enough.  Let’s go. I want to make it to the motel before the storm hits.”

…

The nice thing about Grand Junction, Colorado, Y/N realizes, is that their motels have multiple single rooms available on short notice.  While she didn’t realize the importance of this fact before this trip started, having an evening of solitude and her own stable space away from Harry for the first time in two days is nothing short of a blessing.

When she gets inside her private motel room, which, while still shabby, is leagues above their previous motel, Y/N locks the door before breathing a sigh of relief.  Just the silence in the room is wonderful, and even though she knows Harry is right next door, having a wall between them is a luxury that she doesn’t take for granted.  When she showers, she doesn’t have to worry about being quick, or toweling off as fast as she can so she can get dressed inside the bathroom without Harry seeing. There’s no need to worry about anyone hearing Y/N sing quietly to herself under the (albeit weak) stream of the shower, nor is there an uncomfortable stick of her sports bra to her back caused by water droplets that she couldn’t reach in her hurry to dry off. And after her shower, with some of the knots from her back finally worked out, Y/N is able to stretch out on the double bed in the center of the room, her phone in her hand as she reaches for the takeout menus stacked on the bedside table.  She peruses the menus available before settling on Chinese takeout, and within five minutes, her order of a two entrée plate and fried rice is on its way.

Y/N sighs gently as she leans back on the pillows, wishing that she and Harry had stopped at a liquor store before coming to the motel.  She knows she could probably walk to one, but now that she’s showered and comfortable, the last thing she wants to do is wander around Grand Junction until she finds a bottle of Moscato.  Instead, Y/N flicks on the TV with a click of the ancient remote, and begins scrolling through the channels until she finds a rerun of Dirty Dancing that’s just starting.

An amused yet wry smile appears on Y/N’s lips.  It’s this movie’s fault that she and Harry are on an impromptu road trip, really. Jo and Laure both loved it, and were insistent that they had to get married at a resort in the Catskills similar to one from the film.  As her two friends cross her mind, Y/N settles into the sheets as Baby begins her narration, contemplating whether or not she should call Jo to check in.  Just as the thought pops into her head, however, the phone rings.

Y/N answers within a moment, not bothering to check the caller ID.  She and Jo had a strange habit of calling each other the moment the other thought of it, and when she raises her phone to her ear, she expects to hear her best friend’s familiar voice reply. “Hello?”

What voice she actually hears, however, surprises her. “Hey, Y/N.  I’m glad I got through.” Brant says easily, his voice crackling slightly through the speaker. “How are you?”

“Brant!” Y/N jerks up in bed in surprise, the remote falling from its perch on her stomach onto the sheets. “I—I’m fine.  How are you?”

“Oh, alright.  Just busy with work, but that’s the usual.” Y/N can practically picture the neutral expression on his face, and how he’d shrug his shoulders as he speaks. “How’s the road trip?  I can’t imagine driving for as long as you have to drive.”

“It’s…it’s alright, yeah.” Y/N speaks slowly as she puts her phone on speaker, balancing it on her knee while her hands begin to fidget with her rings. “Long, but not too bad.”

“Well, that’s good.” Brant clears his throat thickly, as if what he’s about to say makes him uncomfortable. “I miss you, though.  And our weekly dinners.”

A feeling of guilt washes over Y/N.  Truthfully, besides Harry’s inquisition on the first day of driving, Brant has barely crossed her mind.  Granted, he isn’t usually at the forefront of her mind while she’s in L.A., either, but for the last few days, her thoughts have been constantly consumed by the stress of making it to the wedding and her annoyance and frustration with Harry.  

“Y/N?” Brant’s voice crackles through her speaker again. “Are you there?

“I—yeah.” She says quickly, pulling herself from her thoughts. “Sorry, just—long day.  I’m tired.”

“I can imagine.” Brant says sympathetically, but there’s something in his tone that almost sounds patronizing. “Who are you driving with?  Have you been taking turns?”

Y/N pauses the fidgeting of her rings before snatching her phone from its balanced place on her knee. She quickly opens her messages and scrolls to her thread with Brant, searching through the text bubbles for a reminder of what she’d said to him.  Had she not told him that she was traveling with Harry?

Within a moment, Y/N confirms that she hadn’t.  All she had said was that she was getting a ride with someone.  Why had she done that, she wonders?  She’s sure she’s mentioned Harry in passing to Brant at least once.  When she talked about the wedding, probably.  As she thinks about it more, however…what had she told Brant about the wedding?  About Jo? How much does he actually know about her personal life?  Most of their dinner conversations revolve around work, or some book both of them have read.  Had the topic ever come up in detail?

“I’m, um, I’m driving with one of Laure’s friends.” Y/N brings the phone closer to her mouth as her other hand works its way to her mouth.  She begins to chew on a hangnail absentmindedly between her words, something she always does when her nerves begin to get to her.  She can’t count the number of times Jo has grasped her wrist and pulled her hand from her mouth to chastise her about the habit. “We’re…we’re in Colorado now.”

“Oh, Colorado.  That’s nice.” Brant says over the rustling of papers. “Listen, Y/N, I’ve got some work to get back to, but I’m glad we had this talk. I’ll call you again soon.”

“Uh, yeah.  Sure.  I’ll talk to you later.” Y/N nods, and then the line goes dead.  Out of curiosity, Y/N checks the length of the call.  The time 3:09 blinks back at her.

Tossing her phone back down on the covers, Y/N resumes her relaxed position in bed, despite being anything but relaxed after that phone call.  She should feel guilty, she thinks, for not telling Brant about Harry. But then again, what’s there to tell? She said she was getting a ride with one of Laure’s friends, and that’s true.  She hadn’t lied.  And even if Brant did know that the friend is Harry, why would he care?  It’s just Harry.  There’s no reason for Brant to be alarmed, because there’s nothing going on. And she and Brant…Y/N glances down at the call time again.  Things are different between them.  There’s…they’re comfortable as they are, she thinks.  They’re not dating, and they’re comfortable like that.  So there’s no reason to tell him about Harry, because there’s nothing to tell.  Nothing at all.

Y/N refocuses on the TV screen, where Patrick Swayze is dancing in a tight black tank top. Right.  Nothing to tell.

…

When Y/N leaves her motel room the next morning with her bag over her shoulder, Harry is already waiting by his car, leaning against the dusty black body with two coffee cups in his hands.  He’s dressed in another black t-shirt (Y/N wonders just how many identical copies of the same shirt Harry has) with usual jeans covering his long legs.  His curls are tied out of his face with a dark green bandana, and Y/N knows that if his eyes weren’t covered with his black sunglasses, the bandana would make them even brighter than they usually are.

“Hey.” Harry calls to her, extending a ringed hand that holds a coffee cup towards her as she walks over. “I got the coffee this morning.  You drink it black, right?”

Y/N nods as she takes the cup from him, careful not to brush over his fingers with her own. “Yeah. Thanks.”

“No problem.” Harry crosses around to the back of the car, opening the trunk with a turn of his key. “Here.” Harry holds out his free hand for Y/N’s bag, taking it from her and setting it down on top of the suitcases in the back. “I got it.”

Y/N regards Harry with a bemused look as she wraps both hands around her coffee cup. “Thanks?” She says again, more questioning this time as she looks at him strangely. “I can do that myself, you know.”

“I know.  I’m just trying to be polite.” Harry’s voice takes on its usual bite like he’s flipping a switch. “Is that alright with you, princess?”

Within a second, the familiar irritation with Harry returns to Y/N, and it’s almost comforting to snap back at him in a testy voice. “Don’t call me that.”

Harry snickers under his breath, and although the sound makes Y/N’s annoyance grow, she detects a different tone in it than a few days before.  Before she can place a finger on why it sounds different, however, Harry is climbing into the driver’s side of the car and starting the engine.

The two of them are silent as Harry finds his way back to the highway, and they stay in that silence for the first few hours of that day’s leg of the trip.  As the third hour begins to pass, Y/N is content listening to the throaty and captivating voice of Stevie Nicks fill the cab of the car. By the second chorus of the song, Y/N is humming along quietly, her foot tapping to the same beat that Harry’s fingers are spelling out against the steering wheel.  It’s comfortable, she thinks after a moment.  The silence between them.  It feels different than it did on their first day, when Y/N was questioning her choice to get into a car with Harry and commit to a 42 hour drive. The silence seems to be fueled more by comfort than tension.  It’s…refreshing.

A memory from the first day ignites in the back of her mind, a spark so bright and obvious that she can’t believe it took her so long to see it. “Stevie.” Y/N says suddenly, turning to Harry as a smile spreads over her face. “You named your car Stevie, as in Stevie Nicks?”

Harry laughs, his shoulders moving up and down beneath his black t-shirt from the motion.  One hand lifts from the steering wheel and points a finger gun at her. “Took you long enough.  I was wondering how many days you’d have to listen to my music to get it.”

Y/N gives his hand a light shove. “I was too distracted by the fact that you named your car.” She rolls her eyes, bringing her bottle of water to her lips for a short sip. “I still think it’s weird.”

“It gives her character.” Harry defends himself as he rubs a hand over the steering wheel absentmindedly. Y/N can see the mirth swirling around in his light irises. “A bit of personality.  Just because you don’t value personalities doesn’t mean anyone else doesn’t.”

“I don’t value personalities?” Turning in her seat to stare at Harry head on, Y/N raises an eyebrow in question. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just your taste in men, that’s all.” Harry says it casually, like it really can just be a “that’s all” type of sentence.

Within a heart beat, the comfortable atmosphere in the car turns to ice as Y/N straightens in her seat, her spine tense, tightening every nerve in her body along with it. “What the fuck does that mean?”

When Harry glances at her again, his eyes darken, his guard going up as he senses the shift in Y/N’s tone. “Nothing, just…motel rooms have thin walls.” Harry mumbles, having the decency to keep his eyes on the road as his ears redden slightly. “And from what I overheard, Brant doesn’t exactly seem…stimulating.”

Y/N sputters indignantly for a moment, unable to form a coherent response as anger rises in her chest. “You—” She sucks in a quick breath that hits the back of her throat harshly. “You eavesdropped on me?”

Harry licks his lips once, clearing his throat once before answering.  The tapping of his fingers against the steering wheel has resumed, his nervousness apparent in his movements as well as his facial expressions. “Not on purpose.  I told you, the walls were thin.”

“So put in head phones!” Y/N exclaims, gripping her water bottle so tight that her fingers begin to strain in protest against the metal exterior.  She has half a mind to throw the bottle at Harry in her anger, barely able to talk herself down from the ledge of the idea.

Harry’s posture shifts in his seat as his shoulders square, and Y/N can practically see his defensive side emerge from within his chest. “It’s not like you two were having phone sex.” He rolls his eyes at the idea. “It was the most boring conversation in the world, and lasted, what, three minutes?  Makes you wonder how long he lasts in other ways, doesn’t it?”

“Stop the car.” Y/N’s voice is low and void of emotion as she replies, her body turned back forward in her seat.

“Am I wrong?  It’s not like you know for sure—”

Anger bubbles over in Y/N’s chest, cancelling out any rational thought she has inside her and leaving pure, unadulterated fury. “Stop the car, Harry!  Now!”

Harry half jumps in his seat when Y/N yells, and he quickly jerks the car to the side of the highway without so much as a turn signal.  Pulling her seatbelt off as he pulls over, Y/N is out the door before Harry can so much as put the car into neutral.  While her more rational mind would tell her that she has nowhere to walk to along a highway in Colorado as the sky darkens to an angry black above them, the only thing she’s thinking of is getting away from Harry.  Stupid, self-absorbed, ignorant, and rude Harry.

“Y/N—” The sound of Harry scrambling out of the car and slamming the door behind him pushes her to walk faster. “Y/N, come back—”

Y/N turns around on her heel fast and hard, heart pounding so fast that she thinks it might break through her ribs. “What is your problem?” She hisses, pointing an accusatory finger at him. “Why do you insist on being so—so nasty about him?  You don’t even know him!”

Harry freezes where he is as the wind whips his hair around his face, his bandana barely keeping the messy curls in place. “I don’t—” His speech falters, and he sucks in a sharp breath before continuing. “I don’t think I’m being…nasty.”

“Well, you are!” Y/N takes a deep breath in, placing her hands over her stomach as it expands with air.  It’s a trick that Jo taught her back in high school, as a way to ground herself to her body. Feeling the movement of air in and out of her lungs helps calm her, even if by just a fraction. “Brant is just—he’s someone I’m talking to.  We’ve gone on dates, but we’re not dating, and even though we’re not dating, that doesn’t mean that you can insinuate things about him, or eavesdrop on our private conversations!”

Harry’s jaw tenses as he listens to Y/N speak, waiting until she’s finished her speech to respond in a harsh and clipped tone. “I already told you, I didn’t mean to eavesdrop. And I’m teasing you.  It’s supposed to be a joke.  Isn’t that what friends do?”

“But we’re not friends, Harry.” Y/N’s voice is flat, the fury in her tone replaced with a hollow emptiness. “We’re not friends.  I don’t need you teasing me about a boy like we’re buddies, or whatever, because we’re not.”

Although Harry opens his mouth to respond, no words cross over the edges of his pink lips.  His jaw tightens even more as he closes his mouth again, and Y/N can see a million things flitting through his green irises, which are getting darker by the moment.  Y/N’s not certain if the darkness is from her words, or the black sky rolling above them that’s sapping the light of day from the atmosphere, and she’s not sure if she can take the answer either way.  Part of her knows that maybe—just maybe—she’s blown this whole thing out of proportion, and maybe she should examine why Harry making fun of Brant bothers her like it does.  It’s not like she’s unaware of his shortcomings, she thinks, but then she wonders why she’s now seeing them as shortcomings, when a week ago, she saw them as positives.  Y/N never has to worry about Brant being too much for her, or forgetful, or scatterbrained—he’s organized, and secure, and stable, and that’s what she likes.  It’s always been what she likes.

Harry’s delayed response tears Y/N from her thoughts. “Not friends.  Got it.” He mutters, rubbing his hand over his stubbled and taut cheeks. “Just get back in the car, then.  Let’s go.”

…

“Hello!  My name is Gracie, I’ll be your server today.” The waitress in the tiny diner smiles at Harry and Y/N, a notepad in one hand and a half filled coffee pot in the other. “Can I get you guys anything to start?”

“Coffee.” Harry and Y/N speak at the same time, each person’s eyes flickering to the other before looking away.  Y/N keeps her eyes focused on her off-white ceramic coffee cup as Gracie fills it, refusing to make eye contact with Harry again.

The last hour has been almost unbearable.  After they got back in the car, Harry had turned off his playlist, and for the first time since the road trip had begun, true silence had fallen between them. Y/N had thought she would like it, but truthfully, it had been the worst thing she’d ever heard.  Every few minutes, she’d hear Harry shift, or sigh, or tap a tense finger against the gear shift, and she wished that she could say something, but she didn’t.  She couldn’t.  She’d been grateful when he wordlessly exited the highway and parked in front of a diner, as the conversations of stopped truck drivers and the clatter of a kitchen was a good distraction from their argument.

A movement in the corner of her eye catches her attention, and Y/N glances up just enough to watch Harry slip a pat of butter into his coffee, stirring the contents of the cup with his spoon until it’s melted together.  She wrinkles her nose in disgust, and almost opens her mouth to make a comment (“Really, Harry?  Just add milk like a regular person, instead of drinking a cup of grease.”), but bites it back before it can fall off her tongue.  They’re not exactly in the position to make quips to each other, she thinks, especially after she told him that they weren’t friends.

Which they’re not. They’ve never been friends; that fact isn’t exactly news.  Not getting along has been Harry and Y/N’s signature since the day they first met. So why is there a pit in Y/N’s stomach that gets deeper every time Harry looks away from her?

The click of heels alerts Y/N of Gracie’s returned presence before her voice does. “Have you two decided what you’d like to eat?”

“I’ll have a turkey club, please, on whole wheat bread.” Harry folds up his plastic menu carefully. “And a glass of water on the side.”

Gracie nods, taking the menu from him before turning her eyes to Y/N. “And for yourself?”

“Um—” Y/N had barely glanced at the menu, too lost in her thoughts to think about it. “I’ll just have a burger, please.  And a water, as well.”

Gracie nods as she writes down the order, taking Y/N’s menu and giving the pair one last smile before disappearing to the kitchen.  A fresh wave of silence falls between Harry and Y/N as each of them sips their coffee, both of them doing their best not to look at the person sitting across from them.

Y/N’s best, however, is not up to her usual standard, as she can’t stop herself from stealing a few quick glances while Harry looks out the window.  He hasn’t shaved in a couple days, she notices, as the stubble on his cheeks and chin is even darker than it was the day before.  There’s a permanent crease between his eyebrows, his face as tense as she’s ever seen it, and a darkness over his whole expression overall. It’s like there’s a new wall up between the two of them, and Y/N’s never felt more detached from him.  Which, honestly, is saying something.

She’s looking back down at her own half empty coffee when Harry finally speaks a few minutes later, his voice just as tense as his expression.

“Shit.” He says in a low voice, and then the next sound Y/N hears is that of someone ruffling through pockets.  

She looks up to see Harry doing just that, his hands digging through the outer pockets of his army green jacket. “What?” She asks, her curiosity outweighing her need to continue the silent treatment. “What is it?”

“I had the vows in my—my pocket, but they’re—” Harry jams his hands inside a pocket sewn into the lining of his jacket, and Y/N watches as his face visibly relaxes. “Oh, thank God. I thought they fell out.”

Harry removes his hand from his pocket, two folded up notes clutched within his hand.  Each one is labeled carefully, one with Jo written in Laure’s neat penmanship, and the other with Laure scribbled in Jo’s quick writing.  

Y/N recognizes the papers immediately.  It’s easy, really, considering the amount of time she spent helping Jo rewrite draft after draft of the same sentiments. “You have Jo and Laure’s vows?” She questions, her eyebrows raising in surprise. “Why?”

“The same reason you have their wedding bands.” Harry shrugs as he turns the papers over in his careful fingers, making sure not to crease them. “They forgot them.”

A small smile plays on the edge of Y/N’s lips at the memory of her forgetful friends. “Right.  Of course.”

Harry’s eyes flicker to Y/N’s mouth at the sign of movement, and he tugs his bottom lip between his teeth before responding. “Want to take a look?”

“At their vows?” Y/N looks around, as if someone could be watching and monitoring them. “I—that doesn’t seem right.”

“Fine.  Then don’t look at them.” Harry says easily, setting the note labeled Laure on the table between them.  His nimble fingers unfold the paper labeled with Jo’s name as his green irises begin to scan across the sheet. “I’ll read them.”

It only takes a few seconds of watching Harry read over the words for Y/N to crack. “Wait.” She brings her thumb to her mouth, chewing anxiously on her cuticle as Harry quirks an eyebrow at her. “Will you read them to me?”

When she asks, Harry spends so long staring at her that Y/N thinks he’ll refuse.  His jade eyes meet hers with an intensity that almost makes her flinch, but Y/N holds his stare, refusing to be the first to back down. Finally, after what seems like an eternity, Harry gives a sharp nod, looking down at the note before he starts to read from the beginning.

“‘My darling Jo’,” He begins, his voice soft and low, his accent thick. “‘It seems so strange that this day is finally here.  I feel like we’ve been building up to it ever since the day we first met, and yet it’s always seemed so far away.  When I was a little girl, I always’…” Harry trails off as his eyes continue to move across the words, and he clears his throat before attempting to continue to read aloud. “‘I always thought that there was something wrong with me.  I thought that the things that I felt, and the way that I loved, was dirty.  I thought it was wrong.  I thought that—that I was going against God, and against nature, and that I was going to be punished for it.  And then I met you’.”

Harry pauses to take a sip of his coffee, and Y/N does the same.  There’s a shine beginning to appear in his eyes, and Y/N recognizes it as the beginning of tears because she feels the same thing brimming in her own eyes. She feels a bit guilty for reading the vows, but reasons that it’s for the best.  If she were to hear them for the first time at the wedding, she doesn’t think she’d be able to keep it together.

“‘The moment I met you, I knew that the way I loved could never be wrong, or be dirty, because I was loving you’.” Harry’s accent grows thicker the more he reads, and although Y/N hasn’t seem Harry in many different emotional states, she can tell that this is a sign of how the vows are affecting him. “‘Being with you could never be wrong, and God could never get mad at me for it, because only God could create someone as perfect as you.  I promise to love you when you wake me up at 3 A.M. because you’ve stolen all the blankets, and I promise to love you at 6 P.M. when you almost burn down our apartment while trying to cook for me.  I promise to support you through everything, listen to your stories, and watch in wonder as you make a difference in this world.  I promise to never let my anger get the best of me, and to always give you the benefit of the doubt.  I promise to love every version of yourself that you grow into, just as I’ve loved all the versions you once were.  I promise to love you in every way humanly possible, and even in ways that aren’t humanly possible.  I promise to love, period.  I’—” Harry’s voice cracks, and he glances up at Y/N as he clears his throat to continue. “‘I love you’.”

Y/N doesn’t realize just how emotional listening to Harry read Laure’s vows has made her until the first tear wells over the corner of her eye.  She turns her head towards the window to wipe it away as quickly and inconspicuously as possible, but from the way Harry is looking at her when she turns back around, she knows that he caught what she was doing.

“That, um—” Now it’s Y/N’s turn to attempt to clear the emotion from her throat. “Wow.”

Harry carefully folds Laure’s vows back up, taking extra care to re-crease the paper exactly how it had been folded. “I didn’t know she…felt like that.” Harry says after a moment, his voice quiet. “Like she was…wrong.”

Y/N, unsure of what to say, just nods while reaching for Jo’s vows in front of her.  Like Harry, she takes great care when unfolding the paper, smoothing it gently between her hands. “I’ll read Jo’s, then?”

Harry nods as he takes a sip of his water. “Sure.”

Y/N licks her lips once, wetting them with what little saliva she has in her mouth before beginning. “‘Laure’,” She starts, emotion already rising up to form a lump in her throat. “‘I don’t even know where to begin.  I’ve tried to write down all the ways I love you a million different times, but I can never seem to find the right words.  The problem is, I don’t think that there is a big enough word to describe what I feel for you.  ‘Love’ is only four letters, and four letters is just not enough to contain everything I feel.  ‘Adoration’ is nine letters, but even that doesn’t come close.  I think the best way I can describe it is ‘permanent’.” Y/N pauses her reading to take a long gulp of water, the coolness soothing the dry and parched feeling in her mouth and throat. “‘Anyone who knows me knows that I have trouble committing.  The idea of having something forever, of being in one place, normally terrifies me. But the idea of having you forever, and being in one place with you forever…that’s all I want.  I want us to be permanent to each other.  Even when we struggle, and we will struggle, I know that we won’t fall apart.  Committing to you isn’t any trouble.  It’s as easy as breathing.  I’m sure of you, and I’m sure of us.  I love you, permanently.  I’ll love you when you’re sick and gross, and I’ll love you when you’re old with a bad hip.” A small laugh falls out of Y/N’s mouth before she continues. “I’ll love you when you haggle at flea markets for the best prices, and I’ll love you when you do something so stupid that it makes me want to tear my hair out.  I love you permanently, and I want all of our family and friends to witness me saying that.  I’ll never back out, or bail, or run away from you.  You’re the one thing in my life that’s never felt hard. You’re my home base, and my north star, and you bring me back down to Earth whenever I need it.  I love you permanently, Laure.  I’ll never stop’.”

As she finishes reading, Y/N folds the paper back up, wiping her eyes on the back of her hand before grabbing the other note sitting on the table.  She pushes them towards Harry, her misty eyes unable to meet his. “Here. Put these away again, somewhere safe.”

Harry takes the vows from her, slipping them back inside his inner jacket pocket for safekeeping. “It’s probably—” He clears his throat once more, and Y/N knows that the vows have caught him in his chest just as they’ve caught her. “It’s probably good that we read them now, so that we’re…prepared for the ceremony.”

“Yeah.” Y/N wraps her hands around her coffee mug, the warm ceramic surface heating her cold fingers. “You’re right.  They really…love each other.”

Harry taps his fingers against the table top, a concentrative and thoughtful expression on his face.  His eyebrows are knit together above his stormy green eyes, and his pink tongue swipes over his pinker lips once before he speaks. “You know, Laure is my closest friend.  I don’t want her to get hurt.”

Immediately registering the tone of Harry’s voice, Y/N’s head snaps up, her own eyes becoming stormy as they meet his own. “Jo would never hurt Laure.” Y/N says defensively, the hairs on the back of her neck pricking up at even the suggestion of her friend hurting someone. “Didn’t you hear her vows?  I’ve never heard her sound so sure of something in her entire life.”

Harry’s jaw flexes at the cadence of Y/N’s voice, and his is just as agitated when he responds. “I’m just saying, if anything ever happened—”

“And I’m just saying, it won’t.” The tension between them doubles as Y/N shoots Harry an icy glare. “Do you just look for the worst in people?  Is that all you do?”

“You think I look for the worst in people?  Really?” Harry barks out a harsh laugh, pressing one hand flat against the table as the other fixes his bandana. “Christ, if that’s what you think of me—”

“Why would I think anything else?” Y/N asks incredulously, tilting her head to the side as she regards him. “All you’ve shown me is—”

“Alright, I have the turkey club on whole wheat, and the burger here.” Gracie appears suddenly to Y/N’s right, her tray loaded with food. “Here you guys are…” She sets the plates down in front of Harry and Y/N, her gaze darting between them nervously as she reads the tension in the booth. “Is…there anything else I can get you two?”

“No.” Harry’s voice is hard. “We don’t need anything else.”

…

By the time Harry pulls the car into a motel just off the highway in Lexington, Nebraska, all Y/N wants is a moment alone.  The strained atmosphere during that day’s drive had been unbearable, and between the anxiety from her confrontation with Harry and the sound of thunder beginning in the distance, Y/N just needs some space to herself to relax and calm down.

Of course, just because that’s what she needs, doesn’t mean that she’s going to get it.  When Harry returns back to the car with a single key in his hand and a sour look on his face, Y/N knows for sure that the universe is against her.

This room, at least, she’s pleased to find, has two actual beds, which are pushed up against the wall perpendicular to the door with a small night table between them.  However, that’s where her pleasure stops, as the click of Harry turning the lock behind her just reminds her that she’s trapped in here, with no chance to get away from Harry, the oncoming storm, or any one of her problems that have developed over the last four days.  The reality of the situation hits her all at once, and it takes all of Y/N’s self control to toss her bag on the bed and walk brusquely to the bathroom, slamming the door and locking it behind her before she allows herself to show a sign of her emotions.

The rest of the evening passes in silence.  She showers before changing into her sports bra and boxers, but the amount of exposed skin sends a vulnerable shiver down her spine.  Y/N opts for pulling a sweatshirt over her body, and then sets herself the task of braiding her hair to distract herself.  After that’s done, she busies herself with her skincare routine, taking up as much time as she can in the bathroom before she absolutely has to leave its private interior.

Harry, however, seems to want to see as little of Y/N as she wants to see of him, and pushes past her to enter the bathroom the moment that she steps out of it.  His routine, it seems, is designed to take up just as much time as hers was, because by the time Harry exits the bathroom, the scent of his shampoo trailing behind him, Y/N is already tucked under the covers of her bed, although she’s far from asleep.

In the time it took for her to shower and get ready for bed, the storm had picked up, and the only thing audible in the room was the sound of rain pelting against the roof and window, the wind howling through the trees, and Y/N’s shallow, uneven breaths. She wraps the sheets tightly around herself, pulling them taut to her chin with clenched fists that tighten every time a clap of thunder echoes through the room.  Although she’s turned to face the wall, away from Harry, she can hear his footsteps pause as he gets a glimpse of her shivering form beneath the blankets, and she does her best to will herself to appear asleep.  Breathing in as deeply as her tight chest will allow her, Y/N attempts to even her breathing, forcing her shoulders rise and fall in a way that appears natural and normal.  But all it takes is one clap of thunder for the controlled motion to go out the window.

“Y/N…” Harry’s voice is low, but despite its raspy cadence, it lacks the rough edge that it had earlier. The bed behind her squeaks, signalling that Harry’s taken a seat on the edge of it. “Are you—?”

“I-I’m fine.” Y/N says quickly, pulling the sheets tighter to her chin as another shiver rolls through her body. “Go to sleep.”

There’s another creak of Harry’s bed, and Y/N imagines him climbing under the starched linen covers, his damp curls flopping into his eyes as he lays back on the lumpy motel pillow. The image is almost enough to distract her until there’s another clap of thunder.  The sound seems to shake the motel room, and Y/N can’t stop the small whimper that leaves her lips as her body jumps in response.

“When I was a little kid, my mum took my sister and I to the fair every year.”

Harry’s deep voice cuts over the rain, and Y/N shifts in her bed, turning over to face him.  She keeps the covers pulled up to her chin, but readjusts herself so that she can keep her head on her pillow while looking Harry in the eye. “What?” She asks, confusion audible in her quiet tone.

Harry shifts himself as she does, continuing to move down until he’s completely horizontal, with one hand tucked under his pillow as he speaks. “My mum took my sister and I to the fair.  It came to Holmes Chapel every spring, and there were always rides, and games to play, and so many things to see.  It drew crowds from nearby villages every year, really big crowds, and my mum always held my hand tightly so I wouldn’t get lost.”

“I don’t understand, what—” Another clap of thunder shakes the room, making Y/N flinch halfway through her sentence.

“You’re okay.” Harry says immediately, his calm jade eyes focused on her as the reassurance slips from his mouth.  He waits a moment, gauging Y/N’s body language and waiting for his examination to be positive before resuming his story. “So…my mum always told me not to wander off, but when I was six, I did.  I saw some older kids playing games that I wanted to play, and Gemma was busy playing some sort of game with a ball—I can’t really remember what—and when my mum turned her back, I ran off.”

Y/N’s about to open her mouth to ask why he’s telling her the story when the answer clicks into place in her head.  She thinks back to the conversation in the car the day before, how she told Harry that it helps when someone talks to her to distract her from the thunder.  That’s what he’s doing, she realizes, as she forces herself to focus on his quiet and level voice.  He’s trying to keep her calm, even after everything she said and did today.

“I don’t look like it now,” A small smile flits across Harry’s blushed lips. “But I was pretty scrawny back then.  And all the people around me were so tall, my eyes were barely level with their hips. Everyone was rushing around, going in all directions, and I kept calling for my mum, but she couldn’t hear me.  No one stopped to help me.  I felt like I was…trapped.  Like it was a huge forest of legs, running all around me, circling me, and I couldn’t get out.  I was probably only gone for five minutes, but to a six year old, it felt like an eternity.  And just something about it…I don’t know.  It changed me.  I still don’t like crowds because of that day.”

Y/N’s shoulders unclench the slightest bit as another gust of wind blows against the window. “That must have been scary.”

Harry’s own shoulders lift in a slight shrug as he shifts the sheet to cover him more. “It was. But I can’t change it.  I just have to deal with the repercussions of it. That’s all a fear is, really.  A side effect.  We just have to deal with them as best we can.”

More thunder booms loudly outside, but Y/N manages to keep her flinch to a minimum, despite her hands curling into fists again under the covers. “Harry…” She whispers his name into the darkness between them, his outline barely visible save for his green eyes. “I’m—I’m sorry about today.”

Harry shakes his head, his damp hair rubbing against his pillow. “You don’t have to apologize.” He whispers back, his tone as gentle as she’s ever heard it. “I was an arse.  I shouldn’t have pushed the topic.”

“I shouldn’t have been so uptight about it.” Rubbing her eyes with one fist, Y/N lets out a low sigh. “I felt so shitty all day because of our fight.  I’ve never…none of our fights have ever made me feel like that.”

“Maybe it’s because…” Harry’s tentative voice trails off, his eyes flickering to the ground for a brief moment before staring back at Y/N nervously. “I don’t know.  I thought we were getting along better.  For a moment, at least.”

“We were.” Y/N’s teeth tug on her bottom lip, and she feels a sudden shyness overcome her at the admission. “I’m sorry I said that we…weren’t friends.  I think…I don’t know.  I’ve been stubborn for so long, but I can see now that you’re different than I thought you were.”

“Yeah.  Me too.  I was wrong, too.” Harry runs a hand through his damp curls, a soft laugh leaving his mouth. “How did we even end up like this?  I barely remember what made us hate each other so much in the beginning.”

“Seriously?” Y/N raises an eyebrow, barely peaking out from beneath the sheets as another clap of thunder sounds. “You don’t remember?”

Harry mimics her expression. “Do you?”

“Yes!  It was the very first night we met.  We had that double date with Laure and Jo.” Shifting beneath her covers, Y/N moves herself into a better position on her side, so she can be more comfortable while still maintaining eye contact with Harry. “And you were rude, and made inappropriate jokes, and you left in the middle of the date to go chat up a sorority girl!”

“Wait a minute, no!” Harry protests the memory, half sitting up in his bed as he speaks. “That’s not what happened!”

“Yes, it is!” A small laugh falls off Y/N’s lips at his indignant reaction. “I remember it perfectly!”

“No, you remember it wrong!” Although a flush creeps up Harry’s neck, there’s an amused smile playing on his lips, a tiny hint of a dimple just barely appearing in his visible cheek. “I was making jokes to try and break the ice, which didn’t work on the Ice Queen, it seems—” Harry motions to Y/N teasingly. “And you’re the one who started talking to some bloke before I started talking to that girl!”

Another clap of thunder echoes through the room, but Y/N hardly notices as she thinks back to the night they met, and who Harry could possibly be referring to. “A bloke—?  He was a classmate of mine!  I had to talk to him!”

“Yeah, well, you didn’t have to enjoy it so much.” Harry grumbles, crossing his muscled arms over his sheets. “I had been so excited when Laure said she had an American girl for me, and then—”

“You were excited?” Y/N asks, her voice laced with surprise. “Really?”

The flush on Harry’s neck works its way to the apples of his cheeks. “Well, yeah.” He mumbles the words as his eyes drop from Y/N’s, slipping both hands beneath his head. “She said that you were funny, intelligent, witty, beautiful—”

“And then you met me, and realized that it was all a lie?” Y/N finishes for him, rolling her eyes in the darkness.

“No.” Harry gives a small shake of his head as his body shifts, the motel bed creaking under his weight. “No, she wasn’t wrong.  You were all of those things.  But I wasn’t, and it seemed like…I don’t know.  Like you didn’t think I was good enough for you.  I couldn’t keep your attention.”

The teasing smile slips from Y/N’s face as she registers Harry’s words. “You thought that I thought you weren’t…good enough?”

The nervousness is clear in Harry’s voice now, even over the pounding of rain against the window. “That’s what it seemed like, yeah.”

“I never—I didn’t think that.” Y/N says slowly, managing to relax her body beneath the sheets as she keeps her focus on the memory of meeting Harry. “I wasn’t exactly thrilled to be there, but that’s because Jo set the date up without telling me.  I thought you were handsome, and I liked your accent, but then you started to act weird, and you started flirting with that girl, so I thought you were an ass.”

“You still think I’m an arse, princess, be honest.” The teasing tone replaces the nerves, and for once, Harry’s joke has the intended affect on Y/N.  When she rolls her eyes again, it’s more playful, and the same tone is in her voice when she responds.

“I told you, don’t call me princess.” She replies, running her teeth over her lip gently. “So…I guess we both kind of fucked up that day.”

“Yeah.” Harry nods, a sheepish smile playing over his red lips. “I guess so.”

“Can we just restart?” Y/N’s voice is small when she asks the question, barely audible over the sounds of the storm raging outside. “Like, all the way from the beginning. No more grudges, no more yelling. Even if it’s just for this trip, for Jo and Laure—”

“It doesn’t have to be just for this trip.” Harry cuts in, his eyes catching Y/N’s again. “We’re going to have to be around each other for a long time.  It’ll be a lot easer if we get along.”

Y/N nods in agreement, tugging down her covers to extend one arm towards Harry.  She makes a fist, holding out just her pinkie finger to him with half a grin on her face. “Truce?”

The space between their beds is small, and Harry’s long arm easily makes it across the no man’s land to meet Y/N’s pinkie with his own.  He loops it together with a smile that matches hers, tired and content and just at the edge of a humble new beginning.  Harry’s response is almost inaudible as thunder booms loudly outside the room, but Y/N can still pick out the cadence of his accent under the noise.

“Truce.”

(pt II)

#feedback is appreciated!! #harry styles x reader #harry styles x you #harry styles x y/n #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles fic #harry styles imagine #harry styles blurb #harry styles preference #one direction fanfiction #one direction fic #one direction imagine #harry styles smut #harry styles fluff #harry styles angst #enemies to lovers #road trip au #fine line #fine line album #dreamwithharry #42 hours #writing

[autisticandroids]

here is that “the world of supernatural is tiny” post i’ve been promising

the thing about supernatural, the thing at the core of a lot of our collective frustrations with supernatural, stuff like side character culls, what-if-there-was-an-even-bigger-gunism, the lack of institutions and governments and interpersonal politics, the nonsense worldbuilding, the fossilization of the brothers’ relationship, all of that, is that the world of supernatural is incredibly small. like it really is just... two brothers against the rest of the world, or eventually team free will against the rest of the world. 

and this is in every aspect of it.  this is why the side characters must be culled, obviously, and not just culled: it’s why the side characters never ever get the focus they should, why an episode told from bobby’s point of view is as weird and unique as the fucking episode told from the car’s point of view, why the side characters almost never become meaningfully part of the narrative. and the culling/squashing of the side characters is why the brothers can never develop: the only meaningful relationship they’re allowed to have long enough for it to grow and change is with each other, and eveeeeentually cas, and eventually eventually jack, but mostly just each other. if they were allowed to have more meaningful relationships with the outside world, they wouldn’t have to turn to each other for everything and ultimately fail, or take out all of their problems on each other.

this is why the solution to the problem of the season is always an even bigger gun: it can’t be building a bigger army, nor can it be diplomacy, because both of those require opening the world slightly to outsiders. it needs to be a weapon wieldable by a single person that they can use to destroy the enemy, or, at best, quid pro quo a deal made with one very powerful ally who can singlehandedly destroy the enemy.

this is why there are no governments or institutions, and no truly ambiguous parties: every powerful force is, in the end, a single person, or an organization with a single all-powerful charismatic leader. there are no organizations with organizational interpersonal politics. like, do we know the names of any of crowley’s underlings’ names? NO! why the fuck don’t we, he’s supposed to be the king of bureaucrats, mr. organizational. but nope! he’s just a despot like everyone else. do we know any of naomi’s underlings’ names before she fakes her death? raphael’s in season six? abaddon’s? fucking...... who else, every other big bad i can think of is just crowley. i digress. anyway in the end it’s always just one big scary guy with a big scary power, and sometimes that power is “an army” but that’s just. a superpower. it’s exactly like having a big raygun.

and like this is one of the reasons why the worldbuilding on spn is so nonsensical like. on top of the normal bad tv scifi reasons. it’s because nothing on spn exists in a society, everything exists in atomized isolation because the world can only include one thing which isn’t the winchesters at a time. there is no such thing as a wider world on spn.

and like here’s the thing. here’s the thing. there are good things about spn’s tiny, closed world. in particular, it allows really a lot of tight character focus on the protagonists and their closest relationship(s). like, if the world of supernatural was bigger from the start, would dean winchester still be the most compelling, most tragic character on television to me? i don’t think so. he wouldn’t have the depth.

but the thing is, you can have both. supernatural could have started in a tiny, closed world which slowly opened and blossomed to include both a larger universe and an ensemble cast. it almost did, but then it lost its way.

like, the first two seasons of spn are an intensely personal story, all about a family and its trauma. and all about the brothers, and their father. then the third season is about the fallout from the conclusion of that story, still personal, still all about the brothers. 

but then season four comes along. the story is no longer quite so personal. now it’s about saving the world. it’s about heaven and hell. and along with that, the cast opens up, too. ruby and cas become main-ish characters. this is exactly the right direction to be going in, a natural progression towards a bigger world and a larger cast. bobby, too, becomes a main-ish character, though he was already headed there in s3, and he doesn’t get the screentime of ruby or cas.

then, season five: we start to wobble. the world continues opening up: we’re still at a global scale, but now the supernatural is having an effect on wider society. in season four, we were preventing the apocalypse, but no one was seeing it but us, and maybe a few small towns. now there are demon omens on the news. but the cast is stuck again. ruby is dead. bobby does have a slightly increasing role, which is good. cas is there, but he’s also less of a character and more of a useful tool. and no one new is added. in fact, two of the people who it would be most natural to add to the cast - ellen and jo - are killed off for shock value. 

but then we really go down hill in six and especially seven. the world continues to open: six is about the fallout of five, a concept which i love! you can’t have an institutional war machine like heaven thwarted in its billion year purpose without a bit of fallout. conceptually, that’s wonderful! that’s why i have a good season six au. but by execution, it’s a mess, because the world of supernatural is actively shrinking again. in order to do the premise of season six well, your world needs to have a society in it, and season six can’t manage that. like, it should have been an exploration of the supernatural world with a sociological bent; a look at how averting the apocalypse, eve, social unrest in heaven, affected the paranormal parasocieties of spn. but it couldn’t manage that.

worse, the cast is also shrinking. cas isn’t around much anymore, lisa is there but she doesn’t really get to be a person, more just the idea of a wife, and side characters are dropping like flies. they killed off rufus for no reason!

then in seven it’s even worse! because the world is still opening! the supernatural world is finally crashing into ordinary society in earnest. godstiel killed homophobic pastors! he etched his own face in stained glass! he actively went around interfering in normal society! and then the leviathans came along and totally broke down the supernatural/normal distinction. they use ordinary societal channels to acquire their power! they’re politicians and corporate executives! they put their poison in the corn syrup! 

but in terms of felt sense it’s closing. the winchesters are not living in the society that’s being attacked, they are totally outside it, alone in the world. isolated. and the leviathans are still defeated by shooting their leader with an even bigger gun!

and here’s the thing: this still could have eventually built towards something, a larger universe for supernatural. with sera gamble and her side character murderboner out, season eight could have dealt with the fallout from seven in a way that kept the universe big and built the cast back up. instead, jeremy carver gave us kevin tran only to kill him a season and a half later, and decided to just completely drop all of sera gamble’s new worldbuilding, which in the case of season six is kind of understandable, since she made a total hash of heaven, but in the case of the leviathans is deeply, deeply frustrating. like, where was the fallout from that! did it change society at all? the answer, it appears, is no.

after this, the world of supernatural is fairly static. it’s neither opening nor closing. heaven and hell are constant forces, occasionally there are other threats, but everything stays basically the same in the carver era, and the dabb era too even though dabb made a few strides towards increasing the size of the cast with mary and jack.

but yeah. basically the universe of supernatural is tiny, and that’s why it’s frustrating. once again we come back to the basic problem of supernatural being that it simply is not star trek.

#spn

[fantasmalresplendent]

Dean died at the ripe old age of 85.

In his lucid moments during the days leading up to his passing, in which Dean was just as sharp and as bright as he was fifty years ago, he remarked that people must think he’d robbed the cradle with a “hot piece” such as Castiel hanging around him. 

“You don’t mind that I’m a wrinkly, senile, crotchety old bastard?” Dean had asked, more than once, but he had always said it with a smile. And Castiel would smile back, replying with the same answer the answer many times, in many ways:

“You’re not senile.”

“Old, but not a bastard.”

“I thought I was the crotchety one.”

“I don’t mind.”

Then Dean would smile, and it would light up the room, and Castiel would wonder again how he came to deserve the focus, let alone the affection, of such a man.

“It’s not about deserving, Cas,” Dean had said, half-whispered in the middle of the night a few short months after they had begun to share the bed they laid in. “It’s… fuck, well I don’t know what it’s about. But people don’t get what they deserve, not most of the time.”

Castiel frowned, furrowing his brows. “They should,” he grumbled.

“Well if people got what they deserved, they’d… I don’t know, Sam would’ve actually become a lawyer, stayed in school. Jo, Ellen, Bobby, they’d all still be here. I’d get mauled by a werewolf or something, go out with a bang, and Baby,” Dean said sternly, as though chastising the universe itself for such an injustice, “Would never get so much as a scratch on her.”

“You think that’s what you deserve?” Castiel’s voice was soft, not wanting to disturb the still of the night, but steely as he considered even the possibility of Dean’s violent end. 

Dean registered that, swallowing, “I don’t know. I guess I just never thought I’d even make it this far. Hunters have the shortest lifespans of any human subspecies,” Dean cracked a smile, but his heart wasn’t in the joke. Castiel knew Dean was doing the math in his head. He knew Dean was mentally recalling how long it had been since Bobby left for heaven. Tallying up the number of people who were gone because of self-sacrifice, mistakes, pure dumb luck. Counting exactly how many years he had outlived his own mother. 

Castiel had wrapped his arms around Dean then, embracing him, surrounding him, and they curled into each other completely. Burying himself in Castiel’s neck, Dean had never felt so close to him, and yet so far away. “You don’t have to follow the same patterns if you don’t want to, Dean,” Castiel stated, as if it were that easy. “Do you want to?”

“Want to what?”

“Get mauled by a werewolf?”

Dean sniffed in laughter, and that was answer enough.

Castiel found himself stroking Dean’s hair, an action he felt suited him. He thought for a moment in the stillness and in the space between their breaths. “Maybe it’s idealistic of me, but I still think people should get what they deserve. Even- no, especially you.”

Dean took his time answering, opening his mouth several times before actually saying, “Sometimes I don’t think I know what I deserve.”

“I guess we’ll just have to figure that out together then. We have time,” Castiel kissed Dean’s forehead and he sighed at the touch. “We have plenty of time. Heaven will wait for you, no matter how long.”

Dean looked up at him then with a pout, “You sound pretty confident in that statement for a dude who hasn’t shown up to heavenly chorus practice in a few years.” 

Castiel smiled, “I’d rather be here with you. Always have.”

The man blushed. “Well, if I go… I mean, wherever I go… Where will you end up?”

“I could go with you.”

“Where?”

Castiel closed the distance between them fully, thumbing across Dean’s cheek as they kissed. “Anywhere. If you want me there, I will be there, whether it’s here or heaven. I’ll be there.”

“For how long?”

“For however long you want me to be.”

Dean kissed back, his fingers tangling in Castiel’s hair. “Yeah. Okay.”

  Sam went not long after Dean. It wasn’t a surprise; it was his time as well. His children were grown, his grandchildren almost grown, Castiel knew they’d miss him but that they’d be all right. And they knew to call on “Uncle Cas” if they weren’t, even the little ones who didn’t understand exactly how they were related, or why Great Uncle Dean's husband was only about as old as their parents.

“I mean I love the little gremlins,” Dean had said, cracking open a beer after a long few days of babysitting Sam and Eileen's girls while the expecting parents were in the hospital. He was exhausted, they both were, but beaming from meeting the newest member of the Winchester clan: a healthy baby boy named Robert. “But have you seen Sam’s house? Goddamn mess in there.”

“You… don’t want to have some of your own?” Castiel had asked carefully, taking the beer Dean held out for him.

“You’re making them sound like trading cards. I don’t know, I- I guess I never thought too hard about it.” Castiel could tell this was a lie by the way Dean didn’t quite meet his eyes. “Wouldn’t know what to do with a kid if I had one.”

“Do you think you’d be a good father?”

Castiel had met John Winchester, in Hell. Well, he hadn’t exactly met him. He had really only passed by John’s cell, stole a glance at the infamous hunter on his way to retrieve Dean’s soul. He’d never told Dean what he saw, they were not close enough at the time. He wasn’t sure if Dean would even want to know. Castiel had almost spoken about it many times, but whenever Dean talked about John, “Dad,” a look crossed over his face, sometimes for only a second. A furrowing of brows, a tight smile, a quick transition to happier subjects.

The same look crossed over Dean’s face as soon as Castiel had asked the question.

“Wow. Um, loaded question there, Cas.”

He waited for Dean to meet his eyes before continuing, “I think you would be.”

“Do- wait,” Dean shook his head, trying to understand where Castiel was going with all of this, “Do you want kids?”

“I want you to live a normal life, Dean. I want to be able to give you what you want.”

“Okay, lots of stuff to unpack here. First of all, a normal life isn’t and never was an option,” Dean leaned back against the counter, “I think we can agree on that. Second of all, you didn’t answer my question.”

“...And third of all?” Castiel prompted.

“No, second of all first. Do you want kids?”

Castiel sighed, taking a swig of his beer, considering his words. “I’m an angel, Dean-”

“Is that so!” Dean raised his eyebrows, then squinted as if in deep thought, “Weird, somehow I never noticed.”

That deserved a well-placed eyeroll, but Castiel still had a point to make. “We don’t- I’m just trying to…” he set his beer down. “I don’t know. But that doesn’t matter, what matters is that I would love and care for a child, if it were ours. If we decided that was something we wanted, I would be so happy to raise them, with you. I’d be terrified,” Castiel admitted, “At the enormous and important responsibility, but I would love doing it, if… if it was with you. I just want you to know that, I guess,” Castiel shrugged, “I don’t want you to think it’s not an option for us, if you want it to be.”

“Okay…” Dean was thinking, swirling the beer around his glass. He pointed the mouth at Castiel, “You’re still avoiding my question,” Castiel really rolled his eyes this time, “But I don’t really think it’s for me, all that white picket fence stuff. If you really wanted a kid, I would definitely hit the library and read all those, I don’t know, fucking parenting guides, and take the Mommy and Me classes, whatever. And I think you’d be a good father, better than me, I’d just let them eat gummy worms and shoot slingshots.”

“Children love gummy worms. They listen and will behave better when offered gummy worms,” Castiel knew this for a fact from very recent personal experience, “I don’t see how gummy worms could pose an issue. Slingshots, however-”

“Okay so maybe I’m overestimating your abilities a little,” Dean held up a hand, “But still, I… I like this,” he gestured to the space between them and around them, “I like us. I like waking up to a clean kitchen and sleeping in on weekends. I like not having to ask more than one person whether or not I can take a drive by myself or crank my music really loud at midnight. And I fucking hate Paw Patrol.”

Castiel smiled.

“Sam and Eileen always need babysitters. That’s good enough for me right now.”

“You’ll tell me though, if this is something you really want,” Castiel insisted, “If you think about it and decide something else.”

“Sure.”

“Promise.”

“Okay, fine, I promise,” Dean took a step forward and leaned in for a kiss then. Castiel could taste the beer on Dean’s tongue and sighed. Dean smiled against Castiel’s lips, lowering his voice to a comical level, “We could, uh, you know, try and make some babies,” Dean waggled his eyebrows and Castiel pushed Dean’s laughing face away, but grabbed his hand, turning towards their room.

They hadn’t spoken about it again, not seriously anyway. They got a dog. Dean opened a vintage car garage. Castiel learned how to bake. They took long road trips to the beaches in California, wandered through roadside attractions like Carhenge in Nebraska and Cadillac Ranch in Texas. They bought decidedly way too much merchandise at Oklahoma’s National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum. And maybe they killed the occasional vampire, the wayward poltergeist, but the occasions became less and less. There were younger, more spry hunters on the road now, always welcome at the bunker to look through their library or ask advice on a particularly troublesome spirit. Sam even coerced Dean into holding what became a yearly “conference,” “What are we, a tech startup?” for the next generation of hunters to learn from the legendary brothers.

So maybe they spent more time at home than on the road, but home suited them. Routine suited them like Castiel never could have predicted it would. It wasn’t a white picket fence, but it wasn’t a lonely highway either. Dean would joke about how “boring” they’d become, but Castiel reveled in the repetition. The three hundredth time Dean brought Castiel coffee in bed was just as lovely as the third. The five hundredth time Castiel cooked dinner passed without fanfare, though Dean hugging him from behind, chin hooked over Castiel’s shoulder as he whisked, felt like fanfare enough. The one thousandth kiss they shared was in their bed, lazily breathing each other in as the first beams of sunlight shone through the window after a week of straight rain. Home, a thing he and Dean had never known in their youth, held the majority of their most precious, most banal memories. But still, Castiel always looked forward to those moments speeding down a desert highway when Dean would reach for his hand, turn his head to meet Castiel’s eyes, and smile.

Time took its time with them.

It seemed the opposite with Sam’s children, who grew up faster than Castiel could keep track of. And as they grew from waddling toddlers to full-fledged human beings, Castiel was fascinated, enamored, but Dean was simply proud. He attended their tournaments, their decathlons. He went to their graduations, weddings, barbecues, and Castiel went with him. They took the kids to concerts and movies, parks and shooting ranges, and Castiel never got tired of the smile on Dean’s face when they threw their small arms around Dean’s neck and called him their “Cool Uncle.” “Hear that, Cas? That means you’re the No Fun Uncle. The No-Funcle.”

And as the crowned Cool Uncle, he teased Sam mercilessly about his minivan and his “#1 Dad” mugs, but Castiel knew how proud Dean was of him too. How glad he was that Sam got the future he wanted, and how grateful he was that that future included him.

The brothers still fought. They still bickered, pranked, and glowered. Sam complained that Dean let his kids use power tools too young when they visited, and Dean complained that Sam’s kids were too old to have never heard “Stairway to Heaven.” The usual, the routine, many times over. But they never lied to each other, at least not about the important things, not anymore. And Castiel was welcome in Sam and Eileen’s house and lives, an honor he felt he didn’t deserve, but as Dean said, maybe it wasn’t about deserving.

It was Eileen who noticed Castiel first as he entered the hospital room the day he'd been informed that Sam Winchester was finally coming home. He didn't have to tell Eileen; she saw it on Castiel's face. They’d already spoken, he’d prepared her for the eventuality a few days prior. Eileen smiled, looking back at her husband, teasing him lightly, but Castiel knew she was holding back on her usual snark because Sam looked, well, tired. Turning away from Sam, Eileen signed, “Are you here for him?”

Castiel shook his head. “No, but someone will be here soon.” 

“You mean they haven’t given you reaper duty yet?” Sam joked from his horizontal position, speaking and signing with his usual quick wit, but not with his usual articulation. Castiel had seen him argue with Dean for fifty years like it was his job, he was accustomed to the precision with which Sam had always wielded his words. Not today.

“I don’t think I’d be very good at it,” Castiel stepped closer so that Sam wouldn’t have to crane his head, “I’m not very persuasive.”

“No kidding,” Sam shakily clasped Castiel’s hand and grinned. “I’m surprised Dean even went with you.”

“It took less persuading than you’d think.”

“How is he?” Eileen asked, but she was smiling, so she knew the answer.

“He’s good,” Castiel smiled back, “Getting what he deserves.”

Sam smirked, but his head sunk back into his pillow as if relieved. “And I bet he’s complaining about it non-stop. Asshole never knew how to take a vacation.”

“Neither do you,” Eileen levelled her husband with a fond look.

“We’ve taken vacations!”

“You always wanted to go somewhere exotic and then you’d just end up in the library. Remember Berlin?”

“They had… well I wasn’t going to find those editions in America, and-”

Sam and Eileen bickered for a bit, and Castiel did end up backing Eileen’s points more often than not, so eventually Sam recognized that he was outnumbered on this particular case.

Castiel bid his goodbyes just in time as the nurse entered the room to check Sam’s vitals. Her tone was cheerful, but Castiel could tell that she too knew what was coming. 

“Well… I’ll see you soon, buddy, huh?” Sam smiled at Castiel as confidently as he could muster for Eileen’s sake, but Castiel knew behind those laugh lines Sam wasn’t so sure of himself. Castiel supposed that worry wasn’t to be unexpected from a chosen one of Hell, Lucifer's vessel, the boy Castiel had once called an “abomination.”

But Castiel smiled, giving Sam’s shoulder one last firm squeeze. “You will.”

  When Dean died, at the ripe old age of 85, he knew what to expect.

He’d visited heaven before. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt. Not an exciting place, but exciting wasn’t necessarily good. Hell had been exciting, and he was in no hurry to return there. Purgatory had been exciting in a different way, years later he swore the stench still lingered on his skin. Sometimes, when he would lose himself in his “senior moments,” he thought he was back in that bloody in between. Or back in hell. Or had gone to heaven. “Times and places are difficult to navigate when your brain’s turning into gummy worms,” he told Cas once. He didn’t remember saying this a few hours later, but that didn’t make it any less true.

His brain was sure full of them gummy worms now as he clung to his body and to his life. He wasn’t completely sure where he was. Bobby’s? The bunker? His childhood home? Sammy had come to see him earlier, at least the kid had looked like Sammy… No, fuck, that was his grand-nephew, Cas had reminded him of that. Sam, his brother Sam, was in the next room. That's right, he’d told the asshole to give him some space, stop smothering him. He sort of wished he was here now though. And Cas, Cas was here, he knew that, but only because the angel was right in front of him. Cas, his friend, was holding Dean’s hand, talking about what their grand-nieces and nephews were doing in school. Dean could swear he already knew these things, but they still sounded new when Cas said them.

Dean looked over at him, and Cas was smiling.

He tried to speak, but the words stuck in his throat. Cas helped him swallow some cool water. Dean cleared his throat, “Bet you’ve been waiting for this for a while.”

Castiel cocked his head, the smile fading. Fifty some odd years and he still had that same confused look. “Waiting for what?”

“Me to beef it, finally. I know this hasn’t been easy, watching me… seeing me like…” Dean took a shallow breath. “No matter where I go next, at least I won’t be a senile senior citizen.”

“Dean,” Cas said, rubbing the back of Dean’s liver spot-covered hand, “Please listen to me very carefully.”

“Got my hearing aids in, go ahead,” Dean joked.

Cas smiled softly again. “It has been the greatest privilege of my life, my existence, to watch you grow old. I feel honored that you allowed me to experience that. Time’s different for me too,” Cas kissed Dean’s hand, “Space and time were never precious to me, not in the stretch of infinity. Not until you. Not until I was able to see you live your life and live it well.”

Tears welled in the corners of Dean’s eyes. He furiously tried to blink them away, but Cas was already there, dabbing carefully with a handkerchief. “I’m… I’m scared, Cas. I know I shouldn’t be, I’ve seen it all. I’ve beefed it a few times already. But maybe that’s why I’m scared? Because… I know what comes next. What could come next. And this is it, right? No more resets?”

Cas nodded.

Dean took a deep, shuddering breath. “If I don’t end up in heaven-”

“You will.”

“If I don’t, that’s fine, maybe it’s what I deserve, and that’s fair. But… will I see you again?”

“Dean,” Cas said sadly, but with his trademarked firmness, “You are going to paradise. And if for some reason, a completely incorrect and insane reason, you don’t? I dragged your soul out of the flames once, I will do it again. I would do it as many times as I needed to.”

Dean shook his head slightly, “Not fair.”

“It’s not about fair. It’s about the truth. Whether you believe it or not, ET goes home.”

Dean chuckled weakly. He was tired. He didn’t want to let go. He wanted to let go so badly.

He felt the bed move as Cas climbed under the covers with him. The angel curled around him, enveloping him. Dean could swear he felt the brush of feathers cradling him and pulling him closer, but he couldn’t muster the ability to reach for them, stroke them like he used to. “Sleep, Dean. I’ll be here when you wake up. Wherever, whenever here is. That’s where I’ll be. Wherever you go, I’ll go with you.”

“Swear?”

Castiel kissed his forehead. “I swear.”

  Dean opened his eyes.

The phrase, “I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore” popped into his head, but he suspected, greatly, that he was, in fact, in Kansas. The blowing fields of wheat tipped him off to that.

No, wait. That wasn’t a field, it was a… sandy beach. It looked kind of like that beach he and Cas had stumbled upon driving down the Pacific Coast Highway, what was it called? The one where they’d had to hike down from the lookout point? The one where after they’d trudged back up the trail, they’d sat in the car and looked out over the sea as the sun set? The one where Castiel had smiled at him and the light glinted in his blue eyes and Dean had kissed Cas for the first time ever because he just couldn’t stop himself?

Muir Beach, Dean remembered, blushing at the memory. 

But just as soon as he’d reached the end of that thought, it wasn’t the ocean anymore. It was a lake. On the lake was a pier. He’d seen that pier before, couldn’t remember exactly where though.

Then without warning, but without alarm, Dean saw someone standing on the end of the dock. A young man with light brown hair and a sweet smile Dean would recognize anywhere.

Jack waved, walking up casually, “Hey, Dean.”

Dean grinned and pulled him into a solid hug. “Jack. I missed you buddy, how have you been? Where, uh… are we in…”

Jack chucked, “I think you know where we are.”

“Yeah, but I don’t know know, this could… I could be dreaming or some shit, and I guess even in a dream you could say whatever I wanted you to say, so-”

“Dean,” Jack stopped him, “This is heaven. You are in heaven.”

A relieved but small smile spread over Dean’s face. “Cool…” 

“I’m not usually here to meet people who pass on, but we weren’t going to miss your arrival.”

“We?”

“Hello, Dean.”

Dean turned around. There was Cas, beaming at him.

“Cas…” Dean reached to embrace him too, only now noticing that the hands that reached out were not as wrinkled as they’d been when he last saw them. He hugged Cas tightly, relieved more than he wanted to admit. “You’re here.”

“I’m here,” Cas’s hand went to Dean’s cheek, holding him in a kiss. They separated, foreheads resting against each other. Cas’s eyes twinkled, “We had an appointment.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Dean took a step back, seeing Jack grinning out of the corner of his eye. “Is, uh… is anyone else coming? Or is this the welcoming party?”

“They’re all waiting for you,” Cas put his hand down, and as he did, it was stopped mid-air, as if resting on something solid. Dean blinked, and there was Baby, new as the day she was made, parked on a long, long road that stretched far out of sight. “Any time you’re ready,” Cas tossed something in Dean’s direction, “we can go.”

Dean caught the keys on instinct, they jingled on the simple ring. 

Any time you’re ready, we can go.

He twirled them around the end of his finger a couple times, a thought itching at his brain. Or a couple dozen thoughts.

Cas gave him a look, then turned to Jack, “Could you give us a moment?”

“Yeah, I’ll go get everything ready,” Jack blipped out. 

“Get what ready?” Dean asked.

“Dean,” he turned around to face Cas whose brows were knit in worry, bright blue eyes narrowed, “Are you okay?” Dean realized he hadn’t seen Cas clearly for a few years, not since before the cataracts. He’d never gotten completely used to that piercing gaze. 

Dean blinked. “Yeah, I… I just… I’m here. Really here.”

“Yes, Dean.”

“And… you’re here.”

Cas gave him that look like he was being patient on purpose, “Yes, Dean.”

“And… fuck,” Dean stood at sudden attention, “I left Sam down there, is he okay?”

Catching Dean's hands in his own, Cas rubbed comforting circles into Dean's skin. "Sam is fine. He was there when you left. That's why I was a little late, Eileen had only just gotten home and I didn't want to leave before she could be there beside him.

"Okay," Dean took a deep breath, concentrating on the physical contact, grounding himself in Cas’s movements, "Okay. I mean I know he's gonna be fine, he was always fine without me," Dean said, almost to himself.

"And you'll see him soon."

The abrupt return of Dean’s panicked look made Cas smile a little, shake his head, "Not that soon, Dean. Don't worry." 

"Right. Of course, yeah,” Dean looked around, down the road, the back to his car, out past the waving grain that had returned inexplicably. “Well,” Dean flashed what he thought was a very convincing smile, letting Cas’s hands go as he tossed the keys once and caught them, heading towards the car, “Time to hit the road, huh?”

"Wait,” the suspicious squint was back as Cas caught Dean’s arm, “Something else is bothering you."

Dean turned around, and the ocean was back. The ocean he’d taken a trip to see, had selfishly insisted Cas come along for the ride for.

He sighed. "I just…” Dean ran a hand through his hair, “I don't know, I guess it just don't sit right that I’m… I'm gonna see Mom and Bobby and Jo and Charlie and… everyone. How am I going to look them in the face and not feel guilty that I got decades that they’ll never have? And what did I do with that time, sit on my ass? Judge local car shows? Go to freaking baseball games?"

Cas nodded slowly, simply listening. He then hopped up and sat on the hood of the Impala, shoes and all. Dean shot him an offended look.

“She’s a memory of a car, Dean,” Cas rolled his eyes, “She isn’t going to dent.” He patted the spot next to him.

Dean hesitated, but under Cas’s stare, relented. When he was settled, Castiel laced their fingers together.

“I’ve been trying to convince you for all the time I’ve known you that you’re worthy. That you deserved to be saved. That you deserved to rest.” Cas looked down at their entwined hands, “I don’t think I ever really succeeded.”

“Sorry,” Dean muttered.

“You don’t have to apologize. I know you’ve been doing a thankless job ever since you carried Sam out of your burning home. Shit, even before that,” Dean cocked his head, Cas hardly ever cursed, “you were always trying to be the hero for your mother. Some people are at fault for that,” Cas’s eyebrows furrowed briefly, “but it’s human nature to be hard on ourselves and praiseworthy of others. You, in your limited experience, could not possibly know all of the things that you’ve done that have made a difference. But we’re-”

Jack suddenly blipped into existence, giving Castiel two big thumbs up, then blipped out again.

Dean turned, looking from the space Jack had stood back to Cas then back again, “What-”

Cas shook his head with a smile, “I could never tell you exactly what you’ve meant to the world. But we had a, uh, few volunteers that wanted to show you.”

“Cas, could you quit monologuing for a second and-”

Out of the corner of his eye, Dean saw movement. The endless sea became endless plains which became endless trees, the landscape changing at a rapid rate.

Dean looked back to Cas in confusion, but he didn’t look alarmed. He gave Dean a timid smile, kissed him behind his ear, and whispered, “Just watch.”

Dean watched. For a moment, the scenery couldn’t seem to decide what it wanted to be. Then, it decided not to decide. Grains of sand took the form of towering trees, a picnic table, a bench. Green lake water formed the shape of a small boy, hunched over and scribbling on the table. Lastly the wheat twirled and spun and became an all-too-familiar-looking young man wearing a jacket too big for his frame, walking over to the bench and sitting down across from the kid.

Lucas. The name came to Dean from deep in his memory, he was that quiet kid who drew Dean pictures of the ghost in the lake. The grain animated Dean’s smile as he talked, the figure of Lucas showed Dean his sketches. Their forms dissolved as the scene changed and Dean's form was pulling Lucas out of the water, the sheriff having paid his due.

The figure of Dean left, but Lucas stayed and was joined by his mother, Dean remembered her too. They embraced, and the figure of Lucas grew, changed into a young man, a husband, a father. Soon a half dozen figures were standing there, waving to Dean, and then they disappeared, melting back into water. Lucas was the last to go as he was the first to arrive. He signed a phrase to Dean, and Dean knew the words: Thank you, Dean Winchester.

Then the sand reformed into a schoolgirl, the shapes in the green water plaguing her with images of mirrors and Bloody Marys until Dean stepped in front of her, holding a mirror of grain in front of the cruel, refracted specter. It dissolved, and Dean’s form bade goodbye, but the girl remained. She grew too just like the boy did, becoming a professor, graduating with honors, writing dozens of books, and changing dozens of lives. She smiled, and waved, and dissolved as well.

The shapeshifters appeared next, the sand in the form of Sam’s friend Zach, his sister Becky, and even Dean’s false shifter form, but the true form in the too-large jacket blew them all away, leaving Becky waving goodbye. She too welcomed a family that appeared by her side, and they all looked so happy and grateful to have each other.

Again and again the scenes changed. Green waters showed the cities he had passed through, the homes that were kept from destruction, entire communities that were healed. The water formed and reformed into smiling faces and waving hands. Some of the people, Dean had known on Earth. Many of the places, Dean had remembered driving through. Most of the people and places, however, were foreign to Dean. He lost count of the number of strangers who appeared, the cities he’d never been to. He struggled to keep track as they cycled faster and faster, as numerous as the grains of sand and droplets of water they were made of. It seemed that a whole generation of people, all over the world, would-be victims of an apocalypse they never even knew was happening, knew him. Through words and cheers and song, they retold the tales of Dean and Sam Winchester, the tales they had only learned once they had passed on. 

Throughout all of this, Cas pressed his shoulder to Dean’s, his presence grounding but not distracting. Dean’s grip on Cas’s hand grew tighter and tighter. Cas did not let go. 

Eventually, the images and figures departed. The sand blew away, the waters swirled and dispersed, and the landscape made its final decision. Only a simple field of golden wheat remained, waving and rippling in the wind.

Only in that newfound silence did Dean notice he was crying. He shook his head, wiping the tears away furiously.

“Dean,” Cas whispered, and Dean turned to face him, vision blurred, Cas looking at him pleadingly. “You sacrificed so much for so many for so long. You don’t have to be strong right now. You don’t have to be strong ever again if you don’t want to. You have done enough.”

Castiel wiped an errant tear from Dean’s cheek, holding his face between his hands firmly, tenderly.

“You are, and always were, enough. Your job is done. Let. Go.”

Dean did.

Cas silently pulled Dean into his shoulder as he sobbed. Dean didn’t even know why he was crying, didn’t know what for. Maybe he was happy. Maybe he was grieving. Maybe he just felt… relief. He wasn’t sure the last time he felt such relief. He wasn’t sure he ever had truly felt it.

After some time, longer than he’d like to admit, Dean sniffed, wiped one hand over his face, and raised his head. Cas was waiting for him, looking at him with care. With love.

“I, uh… I don’t gotta sign any autographs, do I?”

Cas smiled, and pulled Dean in for a kiss. They stayed like that for a bit on the hood of the car, feeling the breeze, breathing in the fresh air. Dean thought he could hear music coming from somewhere, realizing that it was the car’s radio playing softly from the cab. He knew that any time he wanted, he could hop down from the hood of his car, slide into the driver’s seat with the love of his life on the passenger’s side, and carry on his wayward way. Down the road, through the endless fields, towards the ones he had loved and lost. But not yet, not quite yet, because he had time. Maybe in the end, time was all he had ever really wanted, even if he could never allow himself to ask for it. 

Infinity stretched out in front of him like the fields of grain. It wasn’t an exciting infinity, but it was his. It was a long road, a family that waited for him, a shoulder to lean on. It was, at long last, a place to lay his weary head to rest.

#destiel #deancas #dean winchester #castiel #destiel fix it #destiel fic #like fields of grain #this is on ao3 but i know if I post an external link tumblr will nuke it so #if you can't tell #I'm taking canon hostage and forcing it to pay reparations

[asexual-abomination]

Plat!Yan!Chrollo x Autistic!Reader x Plat!Yan!PT - Soulmate AU Part 5

The final part is finally here! It did manage to delete itself a couple of times, but I was finally able to recover it! I really hope you can enjoy this end to the series!

As always, this idea was inspired by the lovely @kiame-sama! I have no traditional education in writing, so any and all advice is appreciated!

Requests will be opening shortly after this goes up, I'm just writing up some final rules!

Hope you enjoy reading!

-----

Night had fallen over the city by the time you were left alone.

You could feel your heart pounding through your body, scared beyond reason by the insane situation you found yourself in.

It seemed to have become a theme in the past few days, carefully setting forth a plan only to be thrown into some absolute catastrophe.

Over the course of the day, you had been dragged around to many random people, security workers and police officers all asking you questions and getting irate when you couldn't tell them everything. Some of them had tried to be kinder to you, speaking in lower tones and going slower, but they were all showed that they were upset when you refused certain details.

You couldn't tell them now, but all you wanted was to keep them safe, hoping that your soulmate would take mercy on them if you were found now. Marnie had been kind enough to keep you company through the entire day, though she wasn't the nicest either, and she had been the last one you saw when she dropped you off at this meagre hotel.

It was a large, cement high rise building on a dimly-lit street, with cheap furniture that probably didn't even get washed between visitors. When you first considered trying to sleep, you found that the blankets were made of scratchy, harsh material that made your whole body cringe away in disgust. That wasn't even to note that they were too light and thin to provide you with any comforting weight.

Anyone would think that you had no more tears to spare today, but as you finally sat on the worn-down chair, you began to choke up with stress. You had heard many counselors and friends say that anxiety could be much like droplets in a bucket, slowly building up in the mind until it could burst into tears, but you had never thought that you would feel stress as immense as this.

There was no need to move right now, you could just cry and choke on your breath, and there was almost something comforting about the all of the emotion of the moment.

That peace that you were trying to enjoy as you sobbed was quickly broken by a new voice in the room.

"(Y/N). I'm sorry."

With a sharp gasp, you looked up to find the intruder, only to see Jo leaned against the far wall of your room. They were looking at you, apologetically staring with sadness in their expression.

"I didn't - I didn't predict that there would be an issue with the airship. Now they've found you." They continue to speak with almost ominous tone, voicing their concern with a tired sigh.

They've found you? Your soulmate? Already? Who were these people, and why were they so obsessed with finding you?

As if you hadn't been overwhelmed enough, Jo had truly decided to drop a bombshell on you at this moment. In utter confusion, you looked towards your friend for any explanation.

Jo sighed again, looking away with despair, "They're minutes away as we speak. We can't run or fight." They paused again, contemplating as they look at you with a soft expression, "I - I don't know what to do."

-----

"Alright! This is where (Y/N)'s being held!" Shalnark's cheery voice rang out through the dark street, cutting through the tense atmosphere surrounding the other Troupe members.

"Would you like one of us to accompany you inside?" Pakunoda asked Chrollo, who stood closest to the building's doors.

The Troupe leader sighed as he turned towards his friend, his expression dropping at her question. He could understand the obsession that the rest of his subordinates had for his soulmate, but he knew that he had to be the first one to see his (Y/N) in person.

They had all seen your little friend sneak in through the window of your room, and Chrollo knew that he wanted the joy of getting rid of them himself. Pakunoda watched his expression carefully, and quickly stepped back, as if to give up on her own question, knowing better than to irritate her boss further.

The remaining members on the scene all took a step back, allowing Chrollo the freedom to enter the building, with a silent promise that no one would be leaving or entering while they stood guard.

-----

To both Chrollo and Jo, there was a deafening silence in this moment. Chrollo stood in the doorway of the small hotel room, not even glancing at his rival, as his eyes were immediately fixated on his soulmate, now finally sat before him.

To you, still sat between these two, there was not quite a silence, as you could hear the soft hum of old electrics hidden in the walls of this dingy place, almost comforting in the face of such intimidating auras.

"(Y/N)!" Chrollo's voice cut through the room, overflowing with joy as he stared at you. He had known that he would be happy in this moment when he could finally lay his own eyes on you, but he could have never predicted the way his heart would twist and flip with bliss in your mere presence.

That bliss was quickly cut off by Jo stepping in front of you, though their breath was shaky with fear at the prospect of fighting in your presence. The second that they had stepped out, Chrollo's expression darkened, as he immediately allowed his aura to flash out, quickly met by Jo's in an equal amount.

Not wanting to hesitate for a moment, Chrollo drew his knife and summoned his book, ready to kill at a moment's notice.

"I let you run once, I think you should be grateful for that, you little pest." His voice had a threatening tone, and though he wouldn't admit it, he almost hoped that Jo would run scared, so that he wouldn't have to kill them.

Against his hopes, your valiant guardian stood firm, though they were shaking just slightly. It was no secret that Chrollo would win this fight, Jo was heavily out of practice and stressed from days without sleep, and Chrollo would stop at nothing to reach his treasured soulmate.

"Wait." Your voice was hushed in the tense atmosphere.

-----

The Troupe had begun to worry when there was no sign of their boss for nearly 15 minutes, especially given that there hadn't been any sign of violence from within your room.

"Do you think that the boss got ambushed?" Shizuku wondered aloud, not expressing any real anxiety just yet.

"I do not think boss would get ambush that easy." Feitan was more suspicious of the silence, knowing that Chrollo had been very cautious when entering the hotel.

They continued to wait outside of the building, patiently watching every possible exit. Only a few members of the Troupe were here to see the new soulmate, with the rest searching the city for a decent place to keep you temporarily.

"Oh, look!"

Their heads quickly swiveled to the doorway, watching with a level of shock as Chrollo stepped out of the hotel, holding a new figure very close to his side. This new person was hunched, as if on the verge of pulling away from his touch, and was anxiously tugging at something in their hands.

Most of the members present recognized the sweet face of the sought after soulmate, and those who hadn't seen them before promptly caught on. However, that didn't clear up any confusion among the members.

"What happened to their friend? Did you kill them?" Shizuku was once again the first to break the silence, making you flinch at the bold and brash question.

Chrollo was swift in shutting down further questions, pulling you towards the getaway car, before suddenly telling everyone else to leave.

"Everything has been sorted, I'll tell you the details later. Where are we staying?" Chrollo was incredibly brief, a sharp tone to his voice that most Troupe members only heard after they almost botched a mission.

"There's a hotel in the city center that works for the mafia, we've booked you a couple of rooms!" Shalnark tried to walk over towards the car, wanting answers to this whole situation like the others. However, the quick spike in his boss' aura put him off immediately from that idea.

"Good. Send me the details, and I'll contact one of you tomorrow sometime." Once again, the Troupe leader sounded just slightly angered, a great change from his usual demeanor.

Chrollo quickly stepped into the car, breaking his anger for just a moment to glance at you with a soft smile.

"Don't worry about a thing, dear. Thank you so much for working with me here." He quickly began driving, shooting towards the new hotel and away from your friend's solemn gaze in the window.

"We've got our whole lives ahead of us now. Don't think about them too much."

-----

"Wait." Your voice was hushed in the tense atmosphere.

No amount of breathing exercises could have kept you calm in that moment, but you knew that there was no other option in this situation.

"I'll - I'll go with you. Chrollo." You surrendered yourself with fear, wanting to be careful with how you worded every part of this.

As both of their gazes fell on you, every nerve in your body felt as if it froze up, not wanting to speak another word, but knowing you had to.

"If I can prevent one of you from dying, I'd rather end this situation without a fight."

These two were supposed to be the closest people to your heart in the whole world. Jo, your oldest friend who had always protected you from what you couldn't understand in this world, and Chrollo, your destined soulmate, the one that the universe itself claimed would be the greatest friend that you could ever have.

You had understood since you were young that you wouldn't often be able to truly affect the world around you, always to slow to catch on or say something, but in this moment you could save someone you love, so you had to do something.

"(Y/N), no! Don't be stupid for me!" Jo was quick to interject, evidently trying to drag you back to your senses.

"I think it's their choice to make." Chrollo's deeper voice rang out through the room, reverberating through what felt like your whole body, a soft smirk appearing on his features.

"Look. I..." You trailed off, almost not ready to be so bold in what you were going to say next, "I want to keep both of you safe, and, well, from where I stand, the best way to do that is to end this... peacefully."

"Well then, come here." With his small smirk growing into a wide grin, Chrollo opened his arms just slightly, welcoming you in.

You felt almost to weak to stand, and as you did many times when you felt weak in the past, you looked to Jo.

"I won't stop you, I mean, I can't." They spoke after a brief pause, "But this is the wrong decision."

Although your heart was pained by their words, you knew that you had to take this next step on your own, for their own safety.

So, with shaky strides as Jo stepped to the side, you moved towards Chrollo, right into his waiting arms. As soon as you were close enough, he pulled you in tight to his chest, not letting you see the evil grin he sent Jo's way.

"Let's go, dear, everyone's waiting."

With all that had happened, you felt a lot less need to hold back your tears.

-----

Thanks for reading!

#hxh #hunter x hunter #yandere #yandere hxh #chrollo #yandere chrollo #phantom troupe #yandere phantom troupe #shizuku #pakunoda #shalnark #feitan #autistic reader #x reader #original character #hxh x reader #gender neutral reader

[scorsoneamelia]

HIIII!! i wrote something fun and cute about amelia bringing scout to work with her :))) 

           It was only two days, three nights without Link but according to Scout he has been gone foooorever. Scout says it’s been years since he’s seen his father, even though it has been two days and he even saw Link over Facetime the day before. He had to fly out of Seattle for a surgery because the patient wasn’t stable enough to travel to the orthopaedic surgeon, so Link had to go to them. Scout was upset, saying he hadn’t seen daddy in a very long time and that he missed him, so Amelia let Scout share the bed with her that night.

           She was woken up from the morning sunrise rays creeping through a space in the closed curtains, the little bit of sunlight managing to light up the bedroom. There was a soft breathing beside her and it was Scout, in the middle of the bed and curled into her side as if he didn’t have any room on the other side of the bed. The corner of the blanket was only covering his legs, the rest of his body uncovered and he was laying on his back. One of his arms was laid across his belly, and the other was laying flat above his head and his shirt was slightly bunched up, revealing his belly button.

             He looked so calm and peaceful, and his sandy brown hair was messy, pieces of it falling in front of his closed eyes. The day before, Scout refused to go to school because he didn’t want to, and his excuse would be because daddy wasn’t here, and that was all he would say when Amelia would ask why. It took her to promise him that he could join her at work for the day if it meant he would go to school, so today, as she promised, it was bring your kid to work day.

              “Angel,” Amelia whispered softly, sitting up from the bed and sitting up, her back against the head board. “Scout.” She said a bit louder this time, a free hand brushing through his hair.

               His long eyes lashes revealed his deep blue eyes, matching Amelia’s, (she likes to think he has her eye color, even though Link would disagree saying they both had blue eyes) and he was letting out a huff, before stretching his body out. “Good morning, angel.” She saw Link in him so much, and no matter how many people said they saw her in him as well, all she could see was a mini Link and it made her heart flutter everytime.

                “As I promised, you’ll be coming to work with me today,” she said, the corners of her lips curling into a soft smile. “But we have to get ready.”

                 There was excitement all of his face and it was like he forgot why he was so sad the previous night, because he was already jumping—-literally jumping out of bed. He squealed out a yay and was already running to his bedroom to try and find himself some clothes, even though Amelia knew she’d soon have to go and help him because the clothes he’d be pick would be awful.

                After the two of them finished getting ready for their day, they both stood facing the mirror and Scout was standing on a stool because otherwise he would have barely reached the sink. (His height is definitely from her.) Scout pulled out his own toothbrush and mirrored his mom, the two of them brushing their teeth and Scout was messy, but at least he was doing it. There was toothpaste all over his face and it was running down his hands and he wasn’t exactly clean when he was spitting it into the sink. He made sure to match his mom, brushing his teeth for the same amount of time as she did before they had to leave.

               She gave him the run down on the way to work, saying he had to be on his best behaviour because she was working and that sometimes her job can be busy. She’s never had an issue with Scout misbehaving but sometimes, his energy, especially when he’s excited, can be high and around patients she needed him to know that he had to be good.

               She didn’t have any surgeries scheduled today, she made sure that her day was light, a couple consults and follow-up on post-ops. Scout was going to be her lefthand, assisting her whenever she needed, or at least she was going to let him think he was helping her.

              He wore a white coat, Link’s to be specific, and he was drowning in it. It came down past his knees and the sleeves were longer than his own arms but Scout insisted he continued to wear it because it was his dad’s.

              He came with her on rounds, and she allowed him to carry around the tablet, it being too big for him to carry with one hand. They were stopped in between patients because nurses and other doctors would stop them, introducing themselves and because some would just squeal and talk about how cute he was.

              There was a consult in the pit that she got paged to, and she brought him along. He was no longer carrying the tablet, instead he put both hands in the front coat (very large) pockets because his mom had her hands in her coat pockets and he wanted to be like her.

             “What do we got?” Amelia asked, pulling the curtain open to reveal a patient on the table, a few scratches and bruises covering his body and Meredith was there, giving a consult as well.

             “MVC,” Meredith started, pulling her blue gloves off of her hands. “Has a head lac.” Turning around, she bent down to get eye level with Scout before he was giggling and throwing his arms around her neck.

             “Auntie Mer!” He was yelling now, excitement flooding his face. Amelia was examining the patient, using her flashlight to check his pupils.

             “It just looks like a mild concussion, but order a head CT to rule out any bleeding, just in case.” She told the nurse, her hand was put back into her pocket along with her small flashlight.

             “Dr. Shepherd-Lincoln,” Meredith nodded, a smile pulling at her face because the look of her nephew in an oversized white coat was too cute. Meredith could see Link in him, as well, but he had some of Amelia’s qualities.

             “He looks so much like Link,” Meredith commented before she stood up, facing Amelia. “He’s got your smile though.”

             Scout went to stand next to his mom, matching her posture, (trying to) with arms crossed over his chest, just like she was. Amelia looked down at him while Scout was looking between the two, happiness radiating from him. “He’s definitely going to be a heartbreaker.” Amelia joked, causing a chuckle to come from Meredith.

            “Mommy let me come to work with her today, instead of school!” He was cheering, his smile reaching his eyes.

             “Well, I think you’re going to have a lot of fun here!” Meredith replied, her smile was warm and her eyes met Amelia’s. They were both thinking the same thing; if only Derek were here to see this.

             After they shared their goodbyes, they were leaving the emergency room and making their way to the attendings lounge, because she needed a coffee. Upon entering, Scout was talking about her job as if he was a doctor, saying that he was the best worker in the whole building, better than her, too. In the attendings lounge they were met up with Bailey, Webber and Jo, who squealed and immediately stood from her seat.

             “Oh ..my ...god,” Jo said, pulling out her phone to take a picture. “He’s a mini Link!” Bailey and Webber adverted their eyes from each other, to look over at Scout who was smiling for the camera, the smile taking over his face and one arm of the jacket falling off of his shoulder.

              Pouring herself a coffee, she also grabbed one of the doughnuts that were provided and handed it to Scout, who looked like he had just won the lottery. “Someone is one lucky guy.” Bailey spoke up, walking over to the three of them. “I’m Miranda—Dr. Bailey.” She held her hand out as a casual greeting, as Scout’s small hand grabbed her and they were shaking hands.

               “I’m Scout!” He introduced himself, as if nobody in the building knew him. “Dr. Shepherd-Lincoln!!”

               “Well, it’s nice to meet you, Dr. Shepherd-Lincoln.” Bailey was laughing, Scout gently shaking her hand. He was making his way around the room, going up to each person to show them the flashlight he borrowed from Amelia, and showing off his jacket.

                She was watching him in awe, he was perfect. She never imagined her life with kids, but now she can’t imagine her life without him. It was crazy to her that it was possible for her— anyone, to love someone this much. Sometimes she could feel all of her love in her entire body, she just wanted to hug him so tightly and never let him go. He is her entire world.

               “Alright, well,” Amelia was heading towards the door. “We’ve got work to do.”

_____

                It was her lunch break, Link made sure to call at least twice today because he wanted to talk to Scout and he wanted to remind Amelia that he loved her. The two of them had rounded on her post-up patients, Scout putting a smile on all of her patients faces. For most of her patients, Scout would try and repeat whatever his mom was telling them although he failed because he couldn’t pronounce half of the words; nor did he understand. Amelia ended up finding a second flashlight and she let Scout hold onto it, shining it into peoples eyes at the same time she did it, pretending he knew what he was looking for. 

              At the table sat her and Scout, as well as Meredith and Maggie. Scout was telling Maggie about her day, and the sleeve of the jacket was getting into the ketchup and fries that was on his plate, and she’ll made a mental note to wash it before Link saw it. “Baby, let’s take Daddy’s jacket off before it gets dirty.” She was reaching over now, pulling the jacket off of both of his arms and placed it in her lap where it will be safe.

              Link called just before he had gone into surgery, mentioning that Jo had sent him the photos of Scout earlier and he made sure to tell Scout that the jacket looked better on him than it did on himself. So now, Scout was telling everyone that the jacket was no longer Link’s but that it was his. He told Maggie about how he looked into everyone’s eyes and how he helped her treat a patient (even though he didn’t), and he also told her that he was the best doctor in the whole entire world. 

             Before she had a chance to finish her lunch, her pager was going off and she was being paged to a surgery, her now light day not being so light. “I’m being paged to OR 3,” she was standing from her chair. “Okay, Scout, you’re going to have to stay with Aunt Maggie just for a bit because I’m needed somewhere and you can’t come with me.” She was glancing over at Maggie now. “That’s okay, right?

“Perfectly fine.” Maggie nodded and she was kissing Scout before she left, making her way to the OR. Scout continued talking about his day with Meredith and Maggie, completely forgetting about the french fries and hot dog that he begged Amelia for. 

#amelink #ameliashepherd #link and amelia #atticus link #amelinkfics #ameliafics #amelia #link x amelia #amelia x link #greysanatomyfics #greys anatomy #stories

[arcturusreads]

you are such a good writer. everything you write makes me want a part 2. possibilities has me on the edge of my seat rn. part 2 is needed please

Possibilities Part Two - Merhayes

Thank you so much, lovely! I hope this is the part 2 you needed! You guys can find part one here!

Eventually, Meredith had managed to find the strength to leave the supply closest. Furiously, she had wiped away her tears and tried to steady her breath. After giving herself a few moments and praying that her eyes were red and puffy from the tears, she opened the door and looked around to see there was no one else nearby. She straightened out her scrub top and began walking down the corridor to the elevator.

There was no plan of attack. Meredith had no clue whether she should go and fin Cormac now or give him some time to cool down. He had been so angry with her, a feeling from him that had never once been directed towards her before. But he was angry under the misconception that Meredith didn’t care about him, that she didn’t want to be with him and that couldn’t be further from the truth.

The argument in her head went back and forth, not sure whether to see him now or text him later. It made her feel overwhelmed to the point she could feel the blood pounding in her ears. Everything had been going so well between the two of them. It never felt like an effort to talk to Cormac, to find the open opportunities in her day to spend time with him. It was just easy with him but never boring. No, Cormac Hayes constantly kept her on her toes.

Meredith wasn’t quite sure how, but she had made it up to her ward, autopilot had kicked in to take her to the place in the hospital where she felt in the most control, bar the OR. This ward was her queendom and no one questioned her rule. This was her safe place whilst other areas of her life felt like there were falling apart. Right now, when she felt so out of control with the situation with Cormac, she knew that this place would calm her mind for long enough to get through the rest of her shift.

“Dr Grey!”

Meredith was jolted out of her thoughts and found Miranda standing next to her. She knew that the Chief of Surgery only ever called her Dr Grey in two situations, in front of patients and interns or when she was in trouble. With no patients or interns around, the latter could be the only reason, but Meredith couldn’t find herself caring.

“Yes, Dr Bailey?” Her tone was weary, voice still a little croaky from the crying.

Taking a proper look at Meredith’s face, Bailey could see something wasn’t quite right. Her Chief of General Surgery was normally a battle-axe of a woman. Sure, she had seen Meredith annoyed, angry and frustrated at work but today she looked broken and that just didn’t sit right with her.

“Can we go to your office?”

“Uh, sure?” Meredith wasn’t quite sure why Bailey wanted to see her privately but didn’t even have the energy to question it.

Silently they walked into the room. Meredith shut the door behind them as Miranda took a seat on the teal two-seater.

“Look, if this is about the schedules I’m sorry but we’re down two general surgeons since we haven’t filled in Andrew’s or Jo’s posts so-“

Miranda cut her off, “Meredith, just breathe for a second. I’m not here to have a go at you about the schedules, I don’t care about that right now.” She patted the spot next to the sofa. “I’m more concerned about you. What’s going on, Grey?”

“Nothing’s going on.” Meredith crossed her arms over her chest defensively.

Pursing her lips and arching a brow, Miranda didn’t let up. “Mhm, and the sky is purple. Sit your butt down and talk to me, Grey.”

Begrudgingly, Meredith took a seat next to Miranda. She had that tone of voice that she had used the entire way throughout their intern year. The one that told Meredith that there was no room for arguments. You were going to listen to Miranda Bailey or not live to see the end of the day.

“I don’t know what you want me to say.”

Stubborn babies. Miranda Bailey had raised a bunch of stubborn babies who didn’t know what to do that was good for them.

“I’m not your boss here, Meredith. Just your friend. You and Richard were there for me when I miscarried. Now, I know that something isn’t right with you so we can sit here all day but you’re going to tell me what’s going on with you.”

Sighing, Meredith uncrossed her arms and began to fiddle with the hem of her scrub top. “As my friend, not my boss, right?” She knew that as the Chief, Bailey would have been less than impressed that Cormac and Meredith kept their relationship from HR.

Miranda nodded at her, hoping that Meredith would trust her enough to open up. As long as she hadn’t done anything illegal that would put the hospital and her medical licence at risk, then Miranda could take of the Chief of Surgery hat for a minute to be there for Meredith.

Taking a deep breath, Meredith knew that she needed to get this off of her chest and talk to someone else about it. “It’s me and Cormac,” she muttered quietly.

“You’re gonna have to speak up, Grey.”

“Me and Cormac.”

Miranda nodded in understanding, “You two finally got your act together and started dating yet?”

“Ye- wait, what?” Meredith took a moment to register what Bailey had said.

When she looked up at her, she was wearing a knowing smirk on her face. “We’re surgeons, Meredith. We’re not dumb and we’re definitely not blind. This whole hospital has been holding their breath waiting for the two of you to stop being such chicken and do something about what we all know is between the two of you.”

“I-uh,” Meredith wasn’t quite sure what to reply.

Her sisters and Jo had teased her about Cormac ever since he had started working at Grey-Sloan. She’d always thought it was just because she’d stupidly mentioned that Cristina had sent him as a ‘gift’ but maybe they had seen something there that she had been blind to for a while. Apparently, the whole hospital staff had seen it.

“You aren’t denying it,” Bailey continued as she waited for a response.

Relenting, Meredith decided to come out and tell Miranda everything. Like ripping a plaster off a wound. “We’ve been together for four months.” She didn’t miss Bailey’s eyebrows shooting up but didn’t stop for her to comment. “Or we were together? I don’t know, Bailey. I feel like I’ve messed it up. He’s so angry and I’ve never seen him like that before.”

“Okay, honey, just breathe for a second.” Seeing that Meredith was visibly shaking, Miranda clasped her hands around the general surgeon’s. “I can’t help if you don’t tell me everything but I’m sure that whatever’s gone on to make him that angry can’t be that bad.”

Miranda knew that her Chief of Paediatric Surgery had a bit of a temper at times. His passions for his work and his patients often meant he would end up in arguments. So, surely, whatever had happened between the two of them couldn’t have been that bad.

Taking a few deep breaths with Miranda, Meredith stopped shaking and began to tell Miranda of the argument that had happened only moments beforehand. Miranda listened carefully, not interrupting and making sure that Meredith didn’t get overwhelmed again.

“I’ve ruined everything between us, Bailey. The look on his face when he left…”

If there was one thing that Miranda Bailey was known for, it was tough love. Especially when it came to her intern class and today was no exception to the rule.

“Meredith Grey, you’re telling me that you’re just going to sit here and not fight for that man? I know you better than that, Grey.”

“What if he doesn’t want me to fight?”

“You’re going to let that stop you? Meredith, you might not have told anyone that you’ve been together the past four months, but I can tell you now that I’ve seen you around this hospital recently. I haven’t seen that same spark in your eyes since… since Derek.”

Miranda slowly softened her tone, “Meredith, I know you’re scared of what’s between you and Cormac but when are you going to stop telling yourself that you don’t deserve a second chance at love?”

“I didn’t say that!” Meredith jumped in, defensively.

Miranda rolled her eyes, “You don’t that I haven’t known you for long enough to know what you’re like? To know what you’re thinking? Meredith, you be honest with me here because it’s only the two of us, how do you feel when you’re with Cormac?”

There was a time where Miranda Bailey would have shut down any conversation that came close to knowing about the personal lives of her colleagues. Especially their love lives. But there she had learnt that there was no getting away from it. People like Meredith and Richard were a part of her family now, she found herself caring about them, including the parts of their personal lives she used to dodge like the plague.

“You don’t need to do this, Bailey.” Meredith was hunched over, staring at her trainers and Miranda took that opportunity to quickly shoot a page to Hayes.

“Oh, I know I don’t. I’m busy, I have a hospital to run but I want to. So, how about you stop evading my question and give me an answer.”

Meredith rubbed her “I don’t know. Good, I guess.”

“Good? You guess? That’s the best you’ve got, Grey? For a man that you’ve secretly been dating for the past four months. If you don’t give me a better answer, I’m suspending you.”

“You can’t do that!”

“You kept a relationship with a colleague secret for months and didn’t inform HR. I can and I will.” Miranda knew she wouldn’t, but she also knew that right now, Meredith wouldn’t want to call her bluff.

Meredith pushed herself up off of the sofa and began to pace. “This is ridiculous!”

There was a silence as Miranda didn’t respond and Meredith knew that she wasn’t getting out of this one. Letting out a huff, she turned away from Bailey and rested her hands on her desk.

“It feels like home when I’m with him. I could be having the worst day possible and if here’s there, next to me, I feel like everything is going to be okay. And he believes in me, but he won’t let me settle, he’s always there to keep pushing me to be better, to be more. It’s scary, Bailey because I haven’t felt like this since, Derek. I didn’t think it was possible. I knew I could fall in love again, but I didn’t know I could feel like this again. And now I feel like I’ve just thrown it all away before we could even have a proper chance. I was scared and I didn’t want to push him into something he might have felt uncomfortable with but I’ve just pushed him away altogether now. I don’t know what to do.”

Meredith turned around, hoping that Bailey would give her some answers but instead, standing in front of her was Cormac.

“You couldn’t have just told me all that yourself?” His voice broke slightly, and Meredith could see that he’d been crying as well.

“How…?” She wasn’t quite sure how he’d come to her office and Miranda had disappeared.

“Bailey paged me, told me to come up here.”

“So, you heard everything?”

Cormac nodded, “I don’t understand why you couldn’t tell me all of that, Mer. If you were scared, all you had to do was say. You didn’t even have to say why.”

Silent tears fell down Meredith’s face, “I’m sorry.” It was all she managed to get out.

Cormac stepped towards her and wrapped his arms around her small frame, kissing the top of her head.

“I love you too, you insane woman. You drive me crazy but I promise you, you’ll never push me away.

#grey's anatomy #merhayes #meredith x cormac #meredith grey #cormac hayes #hayes x grey #excuse me whilst i rearrange the alphabet

[quwarichi]

heard from your mother au - The Ripple Effect

this is my early birthday gift for @schmuzz1 Ever heard of the ripple effect? you probably did but let's go over it once more; the ripple effect is like if you took a rock and threw it into a lake. Where the rock would hit and sink a ripple would be created, and from there it would only grow bigger and bigger, taking over more space, until the water settles again.

HFYM is the ripple effect ficsonified. The premise is simple, for those who watched the episode Despair in the last season of Supernatural. Castiel confesses his love to Dean, gets taken by the Empty. He wakes up in 2003 in a motel room, without his memories and only a memory saying “Don’t do this, Cas” which helps him figure out his name is Cas, and that he’s a hunter. Simple.

Then he meets Dean.

Now, we’ve all read various pre-series fics, haven’t we? It’s a token when giving fans a time-gap that we don’t know much about, they’d try to fill it as best as their imagination limitations will help them. So what is so special about HFYM?

In a word; Cas.

Meet this angelic being, who without his memories fully believes his humanity, and drives around the US not looking for answers, exactly, but just trying to help out to the best of his ability. By putting Cas in a setting pre-series, and letting the readers know that this Cas is their Castiel, the story already kicks into gear with a race to see when and how Cas will affect the story.

We didn’t know about angels until season 4. We didn’t THINK there was a better way to kill demons other than the Colt until season 3. Characters and themes that we would’ve taken years to get to know in the show are being used and constantly appear throughout what HFYM would call season 0 (or is that just me? make some noise). But Cas changes all of that just by being. For this next part, I recommend you stop reading this post if you haven’t read this fic, go read it in its entirety, and come back here after you’re done and had time to adjust.

We good? Good.

Pamela Barnes, the love of my life and a five-episode cameo in the Supernatural show. In HFYM, she acts as Cas’ best friend most of the time, teaching him the highs (hehe) and lows of having what they all figure is a really developed psychic ability. Bringing Pamela in chapter 16 was not only a brilliant use of character but a ripple effect. But I get ahead of myself. To understand why Pamela is suddenly there, we need to identify the biggest ripple of them all; Dean fucking Winchester.

Dean and Cas, from the start, develop a sort of kinship. It’s reminiscent of their first meeting in Lazarus Rising, where Castiel rescues Dean but also has its own charm. Here, Cas has no idea he’s an angel, and that’s why humanity is so strange to him. Dean views Cas as a weirdo that is not to be trusted, and later as a weirdo that he can kinda trust but make sure to watch his back around him.

In a way, they’re mirrors. Cas’ effortless way of creating acquaintances highlights just how isolated Dean is from people because of John’s influence. Whenever they’re together, Dean finds himself surrounded by others too, but apart it’s clear that Cas (to much of my, and probably his, surprise) is the social one.

Quoting the fic tags: “like maybe if he [Pre-series Dean Winchester] got a boyfriend he would have calmed down” is the very abstract explanation of the ripple effect. By being isolated for so long, without even Sam to keep him company, Dean couldn’t develop properly, resulting in the Dean we get in season 1. But ripples (courtesy of Cas) reach him and that’s where it all comes together. By meeting Cas pre-series Dean is given two things; one, no more isolation, time to grow sunshine. Two, a romantic subplot.

Now I don’t know how much you know about media - but romantic subplots are usually very character forwarding if done right. The best thing about the romantic subplot in HFYM is that it’s not immediate. Fuck no. It’s built on months of friendship and a bond forged in hunting, in putting each other’s lives in the other’s hands like it’s nothing. When they finally get together (I did the math, they get together when the story is like, halfway over. 52% to be exact) it makes sense because you watched them forge the bond and thus pushing their character development further. Romantic subplots are one of the best ways to push a character to their limits (looking at you, chapter 49) and then break those limits. So the biggest ripple was basically Cas and Dean thinking “huh, lemme smooch” and then doing it instead of eye fucking for twelve years.

But that’s not what I’m talking about, exactly. The biggest ripple effect that Cas did with Dean is that when season 1 starts (did I mentioned this was a canon rewrite? We love multitasking), when Dean goes to get Sam for Jericho and everything is put into hyperdrive, Dean is different. It affects how people around him act, especially Sam. The first season is very Sam-driven, but the main character will be changed by changing the “supporting” cast. It doesn’t help that Cas ripple effect number 2932#: Save Jess has definitely quelled the grief-rage thing that Sam has going on in canon since she’s not gone, and is actually around them for a while before leaving to work with Bobby and Jo. Sam immediately notices that something’s different about Dean, but he can’t put a finger on it. Requoting tags: “he would have calmed down”. Gone is the aimless rage and loss that makes him reckless and drinking too much. Gone are the women chasing days because he’s in a committed relationship. Heck Dean has a bit of self-esteem now, having bagged that (points at frog-shirt wearing Cas) and it affects the story in the way he and Sam interact.

Sam can feel that Dean’s hiding something from him (Cas) and it makes a rift between them because he doesn’t get who’s this hunter Dean hangs out with that is definitely replacing Sam in Dean’s eyes - the same guy who used weird powers to save Jess from a demon. Dean is still hurt over Sam leaving for Stanford and anxious about him finding out about Cas and John and everything. Basically, take season 1 brother dynamics and throw a live grenade in the mix. That grenade is Cas, btw.

Ripples, man.

Cas affects the story - he gets Dean to get back in touch with Bobby because he’s looking for an explanation for why he heals from mortal wounds like it’s nothing, why he doesn’t need sleep, and why he’s never hungry. Bobby connects Cas to Pamela, thinking Cas is an odd psychic, and Pamela becomes inherently important in the way that she helps Cas control his powers and provides his first real… non-platonic experience (off-screen, dw they’re friends) that later helps him discern what Dean is to him. Through Bobby, he also meets Ellen and Jo, in the Roadhouse. He goes on hunts alone, and finds a knife that helps him save a possessed girl named Taylor who is later a part of an actual episode (Hookman) and there’s recognition, she’s not just a standby person and that connects with Jess’ storyline, that connects with Sam’s storyline that connects with Dean’s storyline. By being him, Cas creates ripples everywhere he touches because he’s not supposed to be there.

The otherwise undisturbed surface is broken because Cas is there to break it and create ripples that connect with each other, all unknowingly, and the way it’s constructed is incredible.

I could add more about Dean’s bisexuality journey or realization, or how lack of trauma makes Cas a lot more narrative-free but it could all come crashing down on him if he remembers the past, or how Sam and Jess are so interesting like yes girl flesh out the revenge reason we see in three episodes, but this is getting long and I could always make new posts about this fic that I love so much.

Happy birthday, Jenn, you’re an incredible friend and writer and I’m so lucky to have found you in this mayhem of a fandom.

Go read heard from your mother (she don’t recognize you) on ao3, you magnificent people.

#happy birthday jenn #i couldn't think of what to get you so i wrote a fic meta about your fic that gives me life so thank you #i tried really hard to think about what drew me to the fic and ripples was the answer so here have some ripple effect drama #could i have written a fic? yes but fic meta is something that can be so personal sometimes #love finding themes in here that you probably didn't think about when you wrote this totally 50k fic #love you so much babe i hope you enjoyed this #heard from your mother au #hfym au #fic meta #destiel #spn #destiel fic

[hutchhitched]

Walk Back

Written by: @hutchhitched​

Prompt 143: The girl of my dreams asked me if I needed a ride home from campus so I obviously let her drive me home then walked back to campus a couple of hours later to get my car. [submitted by anonymous]

Ratings/Warnings: G

A/N: I’m continuing to post the nine @everlarkficexchange prompts I took and then sat on throughout the early months of the pandemic. This is the sixth of the nine. Thanks for your patience, and I hope you enjoy. Huge thanks to @javistg for understanding the delays. Only three more to go!

 Peeta Mellark knows he’s got it good compared to a lot of people. He really does, but that doesn’t stop him from wallowing in pity every once in a while. He’s in college, the first in his family, on a hefty scholarship; his grades are good; he has a lot of friends and a good work study job that actually does give him some time to study. Those are all good things. They really are, and he doesn’t dispute it, but…

 He’s also had a rough home life with a mom who’s never satisfied with anything he does and a father who loves him but can’t stand up to his wife long enough to protect his three sons from her emotional abuse. He’s a first-generation college student who’s excelling in courses for his major but isn’t doing so great in all his other general education courses. He has to work a lot more than he should for someone with his course load. Worst of all, though, he’s madly in love with a woman who likely doesn’t know his name. Well, that’s probably not true, but still. She’s certainly not crazy about him the way he is mad for her.

 There’s just no way Katniss Everdeen, fellow Panem University student and the smartest girl in his biology lab, would ever give him the time of day. Not when she already has a boyfriend, Mr. Tall, Dark, and Rugged, who’s about to graduate with a promising career. That’s unlike Peeta, an art major. He’ll never amount to anything, or so his mother likes to remind him every time he’s stupid enough to visit his family.

 Besides, Katniss is beautiful and sassy and shy and so many other wonderful things. She has no idea the effect she has on him or any other male within a mile radius, including their biology professor who’s proclaimed her the most brilliant student he’s had in his twenty-two years of teaching. Peeta spends the better part of their class together watching her from across the room, which is probably why his lab partner hates him and his grade in that class absolutely sucks.

 So, while Peeta knows he’s got some things going for him, it’s not surprising that he finds himself a little down in the dumps occasionally—especially on days when his crush shows up at his workplace. It’s even worse when his co-worker knows about his hopeless infatuation and has no shame. Johanna Mason may be his least favorite person on days like that. Today happens to be one of those days. He’s cursing his life when Jo comes up behind him and leans down to whisper in his ear.

 “Oooooooooh ooooooh. Katniss is pretty, isn’t she? Look at her over there. So serious. What do you think she’s getting ready to check out, and is there any way to make it sexual when gets over here?”

 “Shut up, Jo,” Peeta hisses as his cheeks flush, and he curls into himself, trying to hide behind the circulation desk so Katniss won’t see him.

 The last thing he wants is for the girl he’s been crushing on for months to hear his co-worker tease him about his hopeless attraction. The problem is that he told Johanna in a fit of self-loathing, and she coached him through it, built him up so his ego was a little higher than the floor and prepared him some for what to say to a girl when he likes her. While it was very kind of Jo to offer, Peeta isn’t that hopeless. He’d had a number of girlfriends in high school, but none of them compare to Katniss Everdeen. She is a goddess.

“What time’s your shift done today, hot buns?”

 “Don’t call me that! What is wrong with you?” he hisses. “Why are you so terrible?”

 “Terrible? I’m trying to get you laid, buddy. It’s certainly never going to happen if I leave you to your own devices, although I’m sure you’re taking care of yourself plenty. You’re a guy, after all.”

 Peeta’s face floods with heat, and he wants to slide onto the floor and hide behind the counter. She’s not wrong—he is a healthy, twenty-one-year-old man who hasn’t dated in a while—but Peeta doesn’t want his co-worker to know that. She’ll probably tell the whole world if he confirms what she suspects. Or say something to Katniss, which would be horrifying.

 “Why do you want to know?” he asks, suspicious.

 “Knowledge is power, my friend. Knowledge is power.”

 Still not convinced, he welcomes a patron and scans the student ID he’s handed. “Exactly ten minutes,” he mutters as he types in the bar codes of the pile of library books in front of him before sliding them across the counter. It’s almost midterm, so everyone’s trying to finish projects and bibliographies for research papers before they leave for spring break. The library’s been slammed for days.

 “She’s on her way over here,” Johanna nudges him.

 He whips his head up, and his eyes widen as he realizes Jo’s right. Katniss pages through a book as she strides toward the circulation desk. Johanna turns to busy herself with a pile of returned books, and he squeezes his legs together under the desk. If he can just stop his hands from shaking, things will be great.

 “Hi, Peeta,” she says with a guarded smile as she hands him her student ID. “How’s it going?”

 “K-katniss! Hi!” His voice squeaks, and he cringes internally. He sounds like an idiot. “It’s good. I’m good. How are you?”

 “Fine. I’m fine.” She hands him her student ID, and he glances down at the book she set on the counter.

 “History of Sculpture? That’s…”

 She laughs wryly and nods. “Yeah, I know. I’m not sure how I managed to get myself into it, but I signed up for an art appreciation class. I have zero artistic ability, so it’s painful.”

 “Oh,” he says. “That’s…yeah.”

 Johanna snorts behind him, and he tosses her a warning look. He should have known better. The woman doesn’t have a tactful bone in her body. Instead, she comes to stand behind Peeta and surveys Katniss.

 “You know, Peeta here is an art major,” Jo announces with her hand on his shoulder. “I bet he could help you with your art appreciation class. He’s great at that kind of stuff.”

 “Are you really?” Katniss asks, her eyes widening in pleased surprise. “I didn’t know that.”

 “I am,” he confirms. “I’m more of a painter than anything else, but I know quite a bit about all the different media. It’s kind of in the curriculum for my major.”

 She looks impressed, but she shakes her head as she picks up her book and tucks her ID into her pocket. “I couldn’t ask you to help, but that’s cool. I thought you were a biology major like me.”

 Johanna smacks him on the back, and he glares at her before wiping his expression clean and flashing a closed mouth grin at Katniss. When nobody says anything, Katniss turns to go.

 “Nonsense!” Jo cries. “Peeta’d be happy to help. I’m sure there’s something you could do for him to repay his generosity.”

 He swears under his breath and elbows Jo in the gut.

 “Oh, I don’t think there’s anything I have that Peeta wants—”

 “A ride home?” Jo interrupts. “Peeta’s car’s in the shop. He asked me for a ride, but his shift is over now, and I’ve got another two hours before I can leave. Poor guy. He’d really appreciate the lift.”

 Relief colors her face, and she nods. “I’d be happy to do that. My car’s on the street. I snagged one of those metered ones that are always full. Must be my lucky day.”

 “Oh, I’d say it certainly is,” Jo says, a wide self-satisfied smile plastered on her face. She practically shoves him out of his chair and adds, “Peeta, why don’t you go clock out. I’ll finish this up for you.”

 “I can—”

 “No, you can’t. You’re too close to hours. Besides, you wouldn’t want to keep Katniss waiting, now would you?”

 “You really are the devil, aren’t you?” he hisses as he grabs his stuff. “My car’s in the parking garage, not the shop. What the hell are you doing?”

 “Getting you some time alone with the girl of your dreams,” she explains with a withering look. “Now, let her give you a ride home so you can schmooze her.”

 Still disgruntled, he shuffles to the door and meets Katniss on the steps. She shifts uncomfortably, tugging on her braid and hunching her shoulders. He wonders if she’s trying to hide or if she’s cold in the chill of the early spring day.

 “I really appreciate this,” he says.

 She nods and leads him to her car. “No problem. It’s the least I can do.”

 “You don’t have to do anything at all.”

 She’s silent as she starts her car. Hesitating, she glances over at him and asks, “Does that mean you don’t want to tutor me? I understand if you don’t. It’s asking a lot for someone you barely know, especially since I can’t really afford to pay you.”

 “Except in rides.”

 “Well, yeah. I can do that.” She smiles at him tremulously and shifts the car into gear. Glancing over her shoulder, she signals and pulls out of the parking spot and onto the street.

 “You could help me in bio,” he blurts and his cheeks heat.

 “Really?”

 He cringes and shrugs. “Yeah. I can’t seem to get the hang of it. I think I’m one of those people that understands it in theory but not in practicality. I’m doing fine in the lecture, but lab is really confusing.” He doesn’t add that most of that is her fault, but not really, because he can’t stop mooning over her.

 “I can do that.”

 He glances at the pleased curve of her lips and wonders how he can make it happen again. The joy of seeing her happy sinks into his bones and gives him life. It’s ridiculous, but it’s true. He has no reason to think he should except common human decency matched with his overwhelming crush. He feels like a middle school boy who’s just figured out that girls and boys have different parts.

 Katniss stops at the intersection and glances over at him. Bashful, she admits, “I don’t know where I’m going.”

 Peeta’s eyebrows furrow and he motions out the windshield. “South?”

 “No,” she answers with a nervous laugh. “I mean, I don’t know where you live.”

 He’s an idiot. Of course she doesn’t know where he lives. “Sorry! Sorry. Turn left here. I wasn’t thinking.”

 “If you want…”

 “If I want?” he prods.

 “Well, maybe, if you don’t mind, that is.” She clears her throat and then words burst from her in a torrent. “I know a coffee shop that no one else really goes to. It’s quiet and the coffee’s good. They know me there, and I have a table they kind of save just for me. If you wanted to go over some of this sculpture stuff today, that’d be a good place.”

 “Oh. Okay,” he answers, fighting to keep his face clear of the glee he feels. Katniss Everdeen just asked him to go out with her. Well, she asked him to go somewhere with her, but that was more than he’d dreamed would happen any time he imagined actually speaking to her. Not only is he going to sit at the same table with her in a public place, but he’s at her mercy with transportation. She’s got him captive, and he approves.

 “Maybe I can take a look over your lab notes with you, too. You know, if you want.”

 Oh, he wants. That’s never been in question. He absolutely wants when it comes to Katniss Everdeen.

 “That’d be great. Really great.”

 The place itself is an independent coffee shop in an older area of town called The Seam. The properties tend to be more run-down than those closer to campus, but the café is cozy and humble and has great choices in both coffee and tea. He chooses a black peppermint he’s loved since his father made it for him when he was sick. His father had also snuck cookies to Peeta despite the disapproval of his mom. He adds sugar before taking a sip that transports him back to childhood. He breathes in as he swallows and blows out a heavy sigh.

 Amused, Katniss asks, “That good?”

 Nodding, he inhales the aroma and smiles softly. “Yeah. It’s that good. Thanks for bringing me here.”

 Pleased, Katniss drops her head and shuffles in her bag for the book on sculpture and her class  notes. They work together for over an hour before reviewing information from their biology lab. He finds she’s a good tutor, knowledgeable and skilled at breaking down the concepts into sizable chunks that seemed overwhelming previously. When he compliments her on it, she waves him off but returns the sentiment.

 “I already feel like I appreciate art more.”

 “Glad I could help.”

 “That doesn’t mean you’re off the hook, though,” she teases. “I’ll still need you after break’s over, but I think I can pass the final now, anyway.”

 He shivers at her claiming she’ll need him. It’s closer to genuine interest than anything he’s ever gotten from her, and it gives him a small thrill of hope.

 Reluctantly, she packs up her bag and sighs. “I really need to get home, but this was fun.”

 “Yeah, I should be getting back, too. Got a lot to do before bed.”

 They’re quiet as they slide into the car. Contemplative, Peeta almost forgets to provide instructions so Katniss knows where to take him. As he guides her through unfamiliar streets that turn into those he sees every day, he sends silent thanks to Johanna for her brashness and refusal to let things go. He only hopes he doesn’t have a ticket on his car when he retrieves it—hopefully before it’s towed.

 “This is it,” he says with a wave at his front door. None of his roommates are home, which means he’s stuck until they return. He doesn’t want to say goodbye, but she’s antsy, unsure what to do with her hands or where to look. “Thanks again for the ride. Come find me at the library after break, and we’ll do a repeat of tonight.”

 “Sounds great,” she says warmly. “Hope you get your car back soon.”

 “Yeah, me too,” he grumbles.

 He watches her leave, lifting his hand in farewell until her car turns the corner and heads back the way she came. Fishing his cell out of his pocket, he sends his roommates a group text asking when they’ll be home and if one of them can give him a ride back to campus. As each of them gives a reason for their absence, he realizes he’s on his own. He does stow his bag inside and grab a drink before heading back outside. Squaring his shoulders, he shoves his hands in his jacket pockets and begins the walk back.

 It takes an hour, and he does have a parking ticket. Still, Peeta has no regrets. The afternoon with Katniss was the best of the year with the promise of more to come. She’s worth the inconvenience. 

#everlarkficexchange #springtime edition 2020 #prompt 143 #everlark #everlark fanfiction #peeta mellark #katniss everdeen #walk back

[just-a-whumping-racoon-with-wifi]

Shame in the way that I am - Tool

As with everything involving Tool, this is more intense. Please heed the warnings and feel free to dm for more info or for an overview of what happens.

This piece is most about self-hate and shame. Dead dove, do not eat.  

CW: loss of bodily autonomy, self-hate, low self worth, forced intubation, force feeding, restraints, very brief noncon touch (nonsexual), angst, shame.  

Every moment was endless. They dragged on, uncaring of the person they dragged along with them. JJ had always relied on the fact that time passes, but it was impossible to ground himself in anything anymore. There was nothing, no handholds for him to grab onto as the horror continued. 

There was nothing but the Machine. 

It was darkness, noise, weight - control. It felt as if there wasn’t even the smallest portion of JJ left. Every sensation, every breath wasn’t theirs. It was whole and all encompassing. They shivered, unable to continue like this. Their mind would snap long before their body would. 

In some ways, JJ was afraid it already had. 

The Machine inflated his lungs, deflated them when it determined the breath was long enough. It was robotic, sickening. They had tried to fight it at first, but they were no match for a machine with no sense of compassion or respect. 

And yet, JJ still tried to fight. 

He fought for his family. They were waiting for him, they would notice that he was missing. Doubt and guilt stabbed at his chest even as he tried to dissuade it. They would know he was missing - but how would they find him? He hadn’t texted, hadn’t told them about the last minute call. They were expecting him in a few days for family dinner. What would they do when he didn’t show? 

JJ fought for their friends. They would notice first, they were sure. They would notice when they didn’t show to game night, when they didn’t return their texts or dms. Charlotte sent them game requests nearly everyday. They had a server. She would notice - she would know. But she wouldn’t be able to find them. 

He fought for his classmates. His professors would notice the very next class session. When JJ wasn’t in the front row, when he didn’t talk their ear off after class. The club, all the organizations that he was a part of. They would see when the reminders weren’t sent out, when there was no shared doc link or meetings. Even the slackers that texted him a day before the test would notice. But they wouldn’t suspect his internship mentor - especially since he hadn’t officially started the internship yet. 

JJ fought for their own future. They fought because this wasn’t what they wanted. This wasn’t what they were meant for - they knew it. The world was bigger than this, bigger than they had barely even began to understand. There was still so much to learn and see and experience. There was so much that they still needed to do - all of it outside of this room. 

He had tried to fight - he had tried with everything. But his everything wasn’t good enough. Wasn’t strong enough, wasn’t enough. JJ still wanted to fight, wanted to struggle and scream and kick, but his body had shut down. 

He couldn’t help but hate it. Hate how it froze and went still. He still had things to do! People that loved him! Why didn’t help him, why did it stop fighting? 

Even before it started, JJ could feel the slight vibrations from the tube that trailed across their cheekbone and into their nose. It meant the pump was turning on, and that they had scant moments to try and prepare themself for the next horrific sensation. They squeezed their eyes shut at the last moment, balling their hands into fists. 

There was no taste, no sensation or satisfaction. All it was was weight -  invasive, unwanted weight that easily flowed through the tubbing and into his stomach. Tears streamed down his face as his throat still tried to swallow, still tried to find the slightest sliver of normalcy in this nightmare. Even that was taken, only reminding him of the other tubes and devices that were forcibly stuffed inside. 

By the time the pump stopped, JJ was trembling and nauseous. They would never get used to this, could never get used to this. How could someone do this to another person? How deranged, how sadistic and inhuman do you have to be to do this? To create this? 

They knew about instincts. They had taken classes, listened to experts and resources out of curiosity. They had thought it fascinating, thought it a mere topic of research or conversation. Fight, Flight, Freeze, Fawn. Something they discussed - not experienced. Not loathed. 

They wanted to fight. Their body froze. 

And in the moment, they couldn’t accept it. It wasn’t fair, it wasn’t right. They wanted to fight. They wanted nothing more but their body had other plans. It shut down, it betrayed them. Instincts were supposed to keep them safe, to keep them out of trouble, to keep them alive. 

The table they were strapped to shifted slightly, the electrodes on their legs buzzed to life. Not painful, but enough to force their legs to twitch slightly. To force the blood to keep moving, to force their muscles to not go lax, to keep their body healthy while their mind shattered. 

With the next controlled breath, he whined out a small sound. Something, some other input besides darkness and control. The man had come by a few times, and each time he had struggled or cowered away. Now, he would have given anything for a moment of company, for a moment of comfort and being worthy of being looked at. 

Time didn’t exist in hell. It didn’t exist between the breaths or the cycles of the pump. There was no order in suffering - just suffering. He tried to think, tried to occupy his mind but the thoughts spiraled, floated in and out as if on the waves. There was no time, no use, no life outside of this. 

Eventually, the anger and resentment at their instincts faded into something else. Shame. Their body was keeping them alive, was keeping them safe the best way that it could. It was trying in the only way it was equipped. Who were they to say that that wasn’t good enough? If they had fought, they may have been killed. No, no it wasn’t their body’s fault. 

It was theirs. 

They were the one that was weak. They were the one that wasn’t enough, that wasn’t right. How could they face their friends, their family, their classmates - their future when they were the weak link? When times got hard, they resulted in turning on even their closest ally, to blaming their own faults on it. 

No, he was the one at fault. He was the one that was useless and broken and worthless. The world would be better off without him, better off without someone so spineless and weak. No one needed a needy thing following them around, begging for attention and help. He didn’t deserve it. He didn’t deserve anything. 

This, this is what he deserved.  

The next time the footsteps clicked in the halls, the next time his world began to brighten and there was another form in the room, he was desperate for it. The man, the Mechanic chuckled, gently running a finger across his cheek bone. He shivered, desperation for interaction overwhelming any hate he could muster. 

“I came up with a little name for you. Tool. Do you like it?” 

Tool nodded immediately, without consideration. It was all he was worth.

~

@unicornscotty @as-a-matter-of-whump @starnight-whump @whump-me-all-night-long @whump-it @rippedjeansandfadeddreams @valkyrie-whump @cupcakes-and-pain @whole-and-apart-and-between @misspelledwitch @fanmanga1357-blog @jo-doe-seeking-inspo @just-a-raccoon-in-a-party-hat

#tool #tool and the machine #whump #self-hate tw #low self worth tw #restraints tw #the machine tw #force feeding tw #loss of bodily control tw #i always try to make sure if i'm gonna post something #i like it #and every once and a while I feel like I do something that I reALLY like #this is one of those I really like #not to tag ramble #but it was a very cathartic one for me #comming to grips with what your panic response can be very hard #and hard to get through #I love projecting my own pain onto my whumpee #it's great #that's why i have so many #so that no matter what I want to project #it'll fit with their temperment and story :) #but yea #your body isn't out to hurt you; i promise #it just might not be equiped to deal with what happens #and that's okay #there's no shame in it