#I went to Rome at some point when I was in high school

[cerise-on-top]

What kind of dates would Gaz, Laswell, Valeria, and Alejandro take you on? (Assuming they had the time lmao)

I'm sick as hell but your blog gives me lots of lovely things to think about while I recover- have a wonderful day ❤️🙏

Hello! I hope you'll get better soon, being sick is just about the worst thing you can be, I was sick not too long ago as well! I'm glad to hear my blog can give you something nice to think about, that was my intention!

Dates with Gaz, Alejandro, Valeria and Laswell

Gaz: He’s a simple man, so he’d likely take you on rather simple dates. Something along the lines of going to the cinema, or maybe taking a walk in the park with him. It doesn’t need to be anything fancy for him, sometimes he just likes being able to spend time with you alone as well, so it’ll be an indoor date where you watch a movie  and cuddle with each other on the couch. Gaz can be a rather touchy guy if you allow him to be, so he’ll likely nuzzle into you a bit as he holds you close. If it was up to him you’d be blankie burritoed until you couldn’t move and would be reliant on him to carry you to bed. However, he also loves watching movies. While he may not be the biggest fan of anime he’ll watch it with you if you absolutely insist on it. Loves, and I mean loves, discussing the movies you’ve watched together afterwards. From the soundtrack to the visuals, the story to its message, he loves spending time with you and telling you all his thoughts about the movie. Saying something sophisticated makes him feel smart, and you actually agreeing with him makes him feel good too. Even if you’re not as movie-literate as he might be, he can still appreciate you listening to everything he has to say about it. If you do listen to him then he’ll invite you to another bucket of popcorn, it’s all on him, even if you insist on paying for him instead. Gaz just loves winding down with the one he loves, so he doesn’t always need to have the most exciting dates. As long as he gets to spend time with you, even in complete silence as you both do what you want, he’s a happy man.

Alejandro: I can see his dates being a bit more exciting than Gaz’. Alejandro is a rather active man and loves some action, so he’d likely love something along the lines of going to an amusement park. His stomach can handle quite a lot, so even the rougher rides won’t be too much of an issue for him. He just hopes that you can take just as much as he can. However, if you like going to amusement parks then you’ve scored with him. It doesn’t only have to be the rollercoasters you’ll be riding, though, sometimes he just loves going to a haunted house with you as well. He’d love it if you’re a scaredy cat about this sort of stuff who clings onto him for safety and reassurance. He’ll laugh a bit about you being so absolutely adorable, and call you out on being a bit scared, but he won’t shoo you away for holding onto him. In fact, he’ll encourage it. Alejandro doesn’t scare easily, he thinks haunted houses to be quite funny, especially with you. Please do hold onto him, though, he loves feeling like the stronger, trusted person who’s with you until the end of it all. He wants nothing more than to be someone you can rely on, even if it’s just something stupid. He certainly also wouldn’t mind going to a tunnel of love with you. Since he doesn’t need to always be so serious with you, he likes goofing around and giving you a big old kiss when he can. His favorites are the rollercoasters, though. He’s loved those ever since he was a child and wants to share that joy with you. Just hearing you scream and laugh with joy makes his heart flutter. He enjoys looking at you as the rollercoasters get to the scary part, all the while you’re either pale or laughing. It warms his heart to spend such a wonderful day with you and no one else.

Valeria: Unlike Gaz and Alejandro, even on date nights she needs to show off just how powerful of a woman she is. Ergo she’ll take you on dates where you’ll be eating some fancy food. Don’t even think about paying yourself. Besides, chances are if you’re a normal worker, then you likely won’t be able to afford the food anyway. However, going to a restaurant every once in a while would be kind of boring in and of itself, so Valeria would like to couple something like that with something else. The Christmas market is in town? There’s a musical you’d like to see? You just wanna go stargaze? Valeria is down for it all. Although she’d need some convincing to go stargazing with you since being outside is a huge risk for her, being seen even more so with you. Other than that she’d amuse herself greatly upon watching a play. She never got to see any when she was a child, even if she had always wanted to see something along the lines of a good musical. And now that she can she won’t let anything at all take that away from her. You better be ready to hear about some new musical or opera in town that you’ll be visiting. An opera she’s always wanted to see would be Carmen, so if that one’s ever in town she’ll be taking some days off to watch it with you, doesn’t matter what she has to do. As long as she gets to be fancy with you and show off to you just how great of a partner she really is, she’s happy. Besides, would you really pass up the opportunity to see her in either a beautiful gown or a fancy suit? Whichever she wears entirely depends on how she’s feeling that evening and how dominant of a person you are.

Laswell: Like Valeria, she’d prefer something fancy. Laswell can afford it these days, so she, too, would take you to a fancy restaurant before going somewhere else. I guess it would entirely depend on what you’re into. If you’re really into astronomy then you’ll go to a planetarium, if you’re really into marine biology then she’ll be taking you to the biggest aquarium nearby. Laswell is flexible like that, but she does prefer something where she can learn a thing or two as well, so she’d love it if you were into going to museums. Doesn’t matter what kind, it’s hard to gross her out with anything, or even bore her with whatever it is you’re into. As long as there’s a museum or an exhibition nearby you can be certain you’ll be going there at some point. However, if she has a few days off, then Laswell isn’t above flying somewhere with you either. A vacation with her is also her ideal version of a date. Just you and her spending time with each other, in the city, in the mountains, at the beach. Doesn’t matter where, Laswell has seen enough in this world, but she never gets to see any of it with you, which is a real shame in her eyes. Besides, she knows a lot of languages as well, so it’s not like you’ll ever have to actively worry about not being understood wherever it is you’re going, she’s got you covered. Laswell loves getting to see all sights with you, so you can be certain she’ll take a few pictures with you as well. Whether you’re doing a goofy pose in front of the tower of Pisa, looking tiny in front of the Sphinx, or absolutely beaming as you regard a temple in Kyoto, Laswell will treasure all of these moments in her entirety for as long as she can. The pictures are just an added bonus.

#cod #cod x reader #kyle gaz garrick #kyle gaz garrick x reader #gaz x reader #alejandro vargas #alejandro vargas x reader #valeria garza #valeria garza x reader #kate laswell #kate laswell x reader #this reminded me of the fact that I haven't been on vacation in almost ten years #I went to Rome at some point when I was in high school #but that was roughly six years ago or so now #I wish I had someone who I could travel around with a bit I wanna see the world as well #Laswell would be the best person to go on vacation with #she knows a lot of the local customs and can speak to just about anyone. I like to think she too knows eight languages #maybe she knows even more than eight though who am I to say~ #either way I just like the idea of going on vacation with her it would be lovely and relaxing since she can handle herself #you will not be robbed as long as she's with you I can assure you of that. you will be safe and sound with her #Laswell is a good woman like that. another reason why I like her as much as I do: She knows what she's doing #I can't say the same thing about myself haha

[bookshelf-dust]

the hurt is good

part i part ii part iii part iv part v part vi

billy hargrove x fem!reader

word count: 5,163

warnings: swearing, cops, talk of jail/billy's abuse, neil, fluff and love

a/n: well, here it is. this is the very last part of my very first series. i am very proud of the ending i've created for these two. i like to think i've given billy what he deserved. i'm so grateful for all of the feedback and support you've given me on the previous parts. also, a part of this relies heavily on hopper’s letter from season 3, so that’s that, and then some of his other dialogue. i’ve found that it fit billy effortlessly. i really hope you enjoy this and maybe find some solace in it. i love you all <333

before you read, listen to: time after time by cyndi lauper and/or the promise by when in rome

————

The first night without Neil, Hopper sits in his car outside the house. He promised no one would hurt them. He means it.

Nicky went to high school with both Hopper and Joyce. In fact, she was suspended for dealing them weed under the bleachers at one point. She regrets nothing to this day.

Because of that, it really wasn’t too difficult to have a heart-to-heart with the man, to get him to sit down with Billy. And Max and you. Susan.

Hopper had shown up at the house to speak with Neil. When he arrived, he told you to keep Billy in his room, though that hadn’t mattered. The second Billy realized he might actually get out of this, that he might live without fear of his own father, he buried his face in your chest, tears wetting your collarbones, your t-shirt.

You’d let him get it all out, stroking his loose and frizzy curls, occasionally laying your hands over his ears to muffle any shouting. Billy squeezed you each time you did so.

Even if he was a little hopeful this might work, Billy couldn’t help but think about that night when he was a kid. When his mama left him with Neil.

He’d sat on his bedroom floor, trying to be quiet while his dad showered, pleading with her.

“Please mom, don’t do this. Please come home.”

“How long? How long?”

“I miss you.”

She was the last person he felt safe with, before you. And she’d gone, leaving her boy with him. Trapped. Part of him wasn’t sure this would work out. He’d hoped for so long that his mother would return, and she hadn’t. Neil had dictated everything in Billy’s life so far, so how was it possible for anything to change?

Hopper had given Neil Hargrove one option.

“You’re gonna sign these papers,” he’d said, gesturing at the divorce packet lying on the table, “and I’m going to quietly take you down to the station and expose you for the piece of shit you are. Lock you up for abusing your child.”

Neil had started screaming about how Hopper had no right to do any of this, to barge into his home claiming all of this.

“Sure, yeah, pitch a fit. Like that’s gonna change anything,” Hopper said, entertained by the fact that Neil was acting like the victim.

During one of the intervals where your hands were pressed to Billy’s ears, the hoop in the left one biting into your palm, you’d caught something Hopper said.

“I suggest you shut your mouth before you give me something else to report.” By the tone in his voice, you could imagine that he was inches from Neil’s face.

“You’re a coward,” Hopper had said. “Beating on your kid because your life didn’t turn out right. Well let me tell you something, that’s not his fault. It’s yours.”

There’d been a knock on Billy’s bedroom door followed by Hop’s gruff voice. 

“Y/N, kiddo can I have a minute with you?”

Billy had looked up at you, eyes puffy. “I’ll be right back baby, I’m not leaving, I promise.”

You’d pressed a kiss to his forehead, and he’d held onto your hand until it was too far out of his reach.

Shutting the door carefully behind you, you’d looked at him. “We’re taking him away,” he said.

You blinked. “Really?”

“Really. He signed, so Susan is good to go.”

Hopper considered letting Neil run away, making him just disappear, but he didn’t want to chance him doing this to someone else. He’d already done that once though, hadn’t he?

“I’m really proud of you for helping him through this, kid. You remind me of your mom.”

His hand had been warm on your shoulder.

“If you want me to be honest, he’s lucky this prison isn’t very big. But that doesn’t mean nothing will happen if others figure out what he’s in for.”

You nodded, knowingly.

“Powell and Callahan just got here. We’re gonna be quiet. No lights, nothing. I don’t want to make this worse for Billy. But if he wants to see, we’re going soon.”

“Thank you, Hopper,” you’d said, hugging him. He’d let you. He’d had his fair share of a shitty father as a kid. Helping someone like Billy is something he’d always wanted to do.

Back in Billy’s room, you’d taken his face in your hands.

“Baby, they’re taking him now. Do you want to watch or stay inside?”

His back had straightened. He knew what he wanted, and he told you as much, so you led him through to the back steps, holding his hand the whole time, Max behind you, resting her chin on her brother's arm.

Billy got to watch them shove his father in the back of a police car, hands behind his back.

He was finally free.

————

Susan pawned most of Neil's more expensive things, that way she'd have money to cover bills for a while and have something to put towards the house payment. She hadn't really been trusted with the financials when Neil was around, aside from basic spending. Now that she had two children to look after, she really didn't want to be in a bad spot.

She had a feeling most newly divorced women would use the money to buy themselves something nice, but she didn't see any point in that. This wasn't about her. This was about making a life where Billy and Max could feel safe.

Even if Billy had whined about it to you at first, having dinner with Max and Susan at least three times a week to start was helping. And he would never admit this, but Susan was actually a pretty damn good cook. Whenever she'd prepared food pre-inmate Neil, they'd been kind of shitty. Billy supposed this had been her tiny form of protest.

It's pretty late now, but Billy is sprawled on the couch watching reruns of whatever. He's really not even entirely sure what's happening on tv. He thinks this might be Cheers. It's the fact that he can be on the couch that he's doing it. He doesn't have any particular reason to hide in his room unless he wants to.

He's missed this couch. It's the same one he's sat on since he was a kid. Since his mother was still around. It was one of the few items that made it to Hawkins when they moved.

Susan has the day off tomorrow. She said so at dinner. Hence why she's still up.

Billy hears her footsteps and looks up when she walks into the room. She gives him a gentle smile.

"I'm making Max some hot chocolate. You feel like some? I have marshmallows too, if you want those."

"Uh, yeah, sure. Thanks."

She smiles again and then disappears for a while before returning with a mug that has a six-year-old Max's hand print on it.

Billy sits up and takes a sip. He can't remember the last time someone made him someone other than you or Nicky made him something like this.

Susan sits down a little ways away from Billy in an oversized chair that Max usually claims as her own. The only time anyone else gets to sit in it are in times like these when she's being forced to do science homework with Dustin yapping in her ear. She'd asked for help, not an entirely new lesson. Dustin did not care.

Susan starts to read a book, and Billy almost forgets she's in the room when she speaks.

"Billy?"

His eyes rove across from the television to her over the top of his mug. She sets the book down.

"I just wanted to apologize. For not doing anything to protect you from your dad. I don't really have a reason other than selfish ones, like I was afraid he'd start on me, or Max. I guess I just thought if he got it out things would be okay." She buries her face in her hands.

"God, I'm so sorry, Billy. This is your home, and I came into your life and took you away from where you'd grown up, and I never stopped to think about what it was doing to you. I was only thinking about myself."

“I should’ve helped take care of you. You were just a kid. You’re still just a kid. And I’ve done nothing but let you down. I want to be better. I’m not saying I want to replace your mom or anything, but I don’t want you to feel unsafe or unwelcome here anymore.”

Billy keeps drinking his hot chocolate but he has to hold it with both hands because they’re shaking now.

“I feel like I don’t even know you. And maybe that’s because you didn’t want to know me, or maybe because I just avoided you.”

“I’m just so sorry, Billy. I want to try. I am trying. The both of you deserve so much better and you don’t have to accept this. I just wanted you to know that and that I care about you.”

Billy is quiet and for a moment it scares Susan, but she understands he might not have anything to say. He might not want to say anything. He might be waiting until he can afford to move out of this fucking house.

But Billy finally sets his mug down. It’s empty. He looks at Susan and he nods.

“It’s okay,” he tells her. “I understand. I don’t blame you and I appreciate that you want to try. I want to try, too.”

Susan nods back, a sweet smile on her face. It’s gentle, the look she’s giving him.

Billy does understand though. His being the target of Neil’s abuse prevented both Max and Susan from it. He understands that Susan was afraid of her husband and the man that she might not have known he’d unveil to be. She was scared. He understands.

He’s willing to try. To let her in.

She stands and picks up Billy’s empty cup. “Was it okay?” she asks, “It’s just the store bought kind.”

“Yeah. Yeah it was great.”

When she grins at him she looks young. She looks tired and upset, but maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe it means change. Maybe it means she’s learning. She’s trying.

————

“Wear mine.”

Billy looks at you through the mirror in front of which he’s been primping. He claims he doesn’t like it when you say he’s “getting pretty.” His blush says otherwise.

“Yours?”

He rolls his eyes and puts down the hairspray he was holding. “Yeah. It’s fuckin’ cold tonight. Just put mine on. I don’t want you to walk all the way back to your house just to get something I have.”

You snort, making for his closet door. “All the way back?”

He bumps your hip with his, a common you-little-shit gesture.

“Because I live so far away.” You greet the pornstar taped to the thin wood before sliding it open.

“Should be on the right,” Billy says, ignoring your comment and shoving cologne down the front of his pants while you aren’t looking. It’s a habit at this point. Shit, he doesn’t even think about it, and he knows he doesn’t have to impress you.

You push around the clothing hanging in his closet, a couple button-ups, leather, a sweater you’ve never seen him in. It’s this cream color, thick and cable knit. You pull it out. 

“How come you don’t wear this?” you ask, holding it up to him. He unsnaps another button from his shirt and your eyes follow the movement even though you don’t mean to ogle. 

Billy looks the sweater up and down like it’s grossing him out. “I wore it once,” he tells you.

“Once,” you mock playfully, putting the shirt back into his closet.

Billy’s hands are on your hips in an instant, spinning you around. “I thought you were getting a jacket, not raiding my belongings.”

You stick your tongue out at him. It’s childish and you know it, but you do it anyway. He smacks your ass in retaliation, and you go to squeeze his but he grabs your wrist, pulling it to his mouth so that he can kiss your pulse point.

“Barf.” The voice makes you turn your head, and Max has pushed the door open fully where it had been cracked. 

“Hi, Max,” you say, pulling your hand from Billy’s grasp, even if he pouts, and moving to actually retrieve the denim jacket you’d been instructed to wear. 

You can feel Billy and Max staring at each other. “What do you need?” he asks her. 

“Just came to see if we were planning on leaving today or if I should maybe hitch a ride elsewhere.” She enters the room and sits down on the edge of her brother’s bed. 

Billy glances at his watch. “You said to have you at El’s by seven-thirty. We’ve got time.” 

She crosses her arms and Billy faces the mirror again. He thinks he’s finished. “Did you even finish packing your bag, shithead?”

You shove your arms through the jacket sleeves, looking at Max. She raises her eyebrows. No, she definitely did not. There’s a flash of red hair as she hops up, and then she’s gone, the sound of dresser drawers being yanked open and shut echoing down the hall. 

You start rolling up the cuffs, and Billy reaches for the collar, adjusting it for you. You’re focused on getting your hands free when you feel Billy’s finger lifting your chin up. He brings his lips to yours, kissing you once. He pulls away and you move back in, wanting one more. He obliges, albeit grinning at your eagerness. When you’ve gotten your fill, you kiss his cheek, and that’s the one that makes him blush. 

He moves away from you, pulling on his own jacket. “I’m gonna go start the car, okay?”

“M’kay.”

Max let it slip once that Billy always went out to warm up the car before taking them to school. She wouldn’t have assumed it was for her right off the bat, but when she realized he didn’t do that when it was just him in the car, she figured out it was him being nice. Now he just does it for the both of you. You won’t ever say anything about it. 

You look at yourself in Billy’s mirror, listening to his footsteps down the hall and out into the living room. You put your hands in the pockets of his jacket, and to your surprise you feel something. It’s not spare change, or a lighter–anything you would’ve expected to find. 

It’s a sheet of paper. You pull it out, thinking it might be homework he tucked away or a receipt or something. It’s not, though. It’s notebook paper, and it’s been neatly folded like it was done with purpose. 

You sit on the edge of Billy’s bed, and unfold it. To your surprise, it’s a page covered in his handwriting, that pretty, sometimes faintly cursive scrawl. There are some lines scratched out because he used a pen and couldn’t erase. But the thing that catches your eye is the very first line. It’s just your name. It’s a letter. A letter for you. 

Your heart starts to race and you find yourself beginning to read, sinking further into his mattress. 

There’s something I’ve been wanting to talk to you about, it reads. 

Feelings. Jesus. The truth is, for so long I’d forgotten what those were. I’ve been stuck in one place. In a cave, you might say. A deep, dark cave. And then I sat with you at lunch, and bought you a book, and suddenly you were part of my life. For the first time in a long time, I started to feel things again. I started to feel happy. 

But, tonight I’ve been feeling distant from you. Like I’m pulling away from you or something. I’m sitting here and I’m thinking about the way you looked at me that first night at the record store. The way you held on to me when I slept over for the first time. I’m not even sure if you remember it, but every time I tried to move throughout the night you whined like you were afraid I was going to leave you. Like you needed me. 

But you didn’t know about my dad or that I was falling in love with you then. And I can’t stop thinking about how I raised my voice at you when I came over today.

You pause, realizing when it was that he wrote this. The day he fought back. 

And I’ve been afraid for so long that I might turn out like him. That I might be just the same. And I’ve been scared that you might realize that too and leave me behind. But I didn’t feel that way today when you spoke to me like a human being and you wanted to work things out. I’m changing. You’re changing me. We’re changing. And I guess, if I’m being really honest, that’s what scares me. I don’t want things to change. Because there’s a part of me that worries you might still change your mind. The rest of me knows you won’t. 

So I think maybe what I’m saying is that when you didn’t know about how I felt or who I really am on the inside that it didn’t feel like I’d lose you. But now I’ve let you in and you can see all of me. And now that you’ve said you love me I really don’t want things to change. I don’t want to lose you or want you to go. 

But I know that’s naive. To think you’ll leave. That’s not who you are. I know you’d look at me and say that’s not how this is going to work. 

My whole life everyone has picked someone else over me. Left me behind. Left me on my own. And I know that’s how life works. It’s moving. Always moving and people change whether you like it or not. But you’ve taught me that change can be good. That it doesn’t always mean people changing their mind about me. About caring about me or that I’m good enough to keep around. 

And sometimes change is painful. Sometimes it’s sad and sometimes it’s surprising. 

Happy. 

So you know what? I don’t think change is bad anymore. I think I’m supposed to learn from it. I think that when life hurts, because I know parts of it are going to hurt and there will be things that always hurt, I should remember it. Because the hurt is good. It means I’m out of that cave. 

I just want you to hold my hand while I figure it all out. 

You finish reading and fold the letter back up, putting it back where you found it. You hadn’t realized you were crying, but you were, and you spend the next few minutes fixing yourself in Billy’s mirror. 

When he returns he thinks you’re the one primping. 

“Ready, baby?” he asks. “Max is in the car.”

You turn to him, and he smiles at you. That pretty, pretty smile. You kiss him on both cheeks and then shut off his bedroom light. 

“I’m ready.”

————

Billy pulls away from Hop’s cabin after dropping Max off, but he’s quick to stop the car again. 

You were quiet the whole way there. Sweet as always, no doubt, but it was clear something was bothering you. He doesn’t like it when things upset his girl. 

“What are you doing, Hargrove? We’re gonna miss the movie if you keep this up.”

He raises his eyebrows at you. “Well excuse the hell outta me, hon’.”

You slap your hands against your face, peeking through your fingers at him in hopes that he’ll go ahead and scold you.

“I want you to tell me what’s wrong, baby.” Billy doesn’t have to elaborate. You never seem to have to explain your feelings to him much anymore. It’s like he’s figuring you out, like he understands and knows when something’s bugging you or if you’re hurting. 

“It’s nothing bad, I promise,” you say.

“That doesn’t mean I don’t want to know.”

You nod, and reach into the pocket of the jacket, pulling free the paper. It’s seconds before Billy sees the striped sheet that he remembers what it is, what he’d left in there. 

It all comes back to him, his wrist hurting from pouring his heart out, the relief he felt at putting his feelings somewhere. 

You hand it to him. He unfolds it and scans it over. “You read it?” He knows you did.

“Yeah.” You smile shyly at him, and it’s the same smile you gave him that very first night that you came to check on him. Billy wants to kiss you, so he leans over the center console and does; he presses his mouth to your forehead, warm and sweet. His presence is all-encompassing: heady cologne, minty gum. So very Billy. So much like home. 

He hands the paper back to you. “Feelings, huh?” he says, his mouth pulling up at the corners. 

“Feelings.”

You sandwich your hands between your thighs, taking a deep breath. Your eyes start to water and you can’t help it.

“Billy, I would never leave you, okay?” You were hoping the tears wouldn’t spill over, but it doesn’t matter because your voice fails you. It wavers and you sound fragile, young. And then he’s taking your face in his hands, wiping under your eyes even though there isn’t anything to wipe yet, just soothing motions over the apples of your cheeks, calloused thumbs and warm skin.

He stares at you, his eye contact unbreaking. When he looks at you like that, blue eyes boring into yours, you can’t help but feel a little full. Because he’s looking at you like that. You. 

“I know that. I know.”

You nod, and he nods with you, so much that it looks silly, the both of you nodding, and you start to laugh. 

“I made you feel that way? Really?”

“Of course you did,” Billy says. “My whole life I’ve felt like I’m like a black hole or somethin’. You don’t make me feel that way.”

Your heart aches for him. For this boy who’s had no one tell him how good he is. Who’s finally let you in. Who’s finally realized he can have better, and that he deserves to. 

“I love you, Billy.”

He kisses you on each cheek, your face warm against his lips. He grins and you can feel it on your face. 

“I love you too.”

When you get to the movie theater, you do pay for popcorn, and you do hand him the snacks you kept in your bag after you take your seats. Your mother said movie candy was getting much too expensive. 

You pop a handful of Sno Caps in your mouth, and Billy opens his mouth. You sprinkle some in his, and then reach for his hand. 

He looks down at your clasped fingers while a kid almost faceplants with a bucket of popcorn on the way up the stairs. Thankfully their father caught them first. 

“You did say you wanted me to hold your hand.”

“I did,” Billy says.

—————

“Sit still, I’ll be right back, I swear.”

Billy crosses his arms, but it’s hard for him to look entirely brooding when he’s got plum shadow on his eyelids. You stand. “Here, Max, supervise.” You hand her the brush between your fingers, and she snorts at her brother from where she lays across your bed. 

You make for the living room, suppressing a grin at the sounds of laughter emanating from the area. Susan and Nicky sit on opposite sides of the couch, watching The Golden Girls and talking about whatever it is that mothers-of-dating-children talk about. 

“Mom,” you say, coming to a stop in front of her. 

“Hi, honeybee. What’s the matter?” 

“Can I use some of your makeup? There’s some things you’ve got that I haven’t and–”

She smiles at you, adjusting the well-loved pillow squished behind her back. “You know you can. Whatever you need.”

Her grin is contagious, and you find yourself smiling back just the same. “Thank you.”

She nods. “Playing dress up?” Your mother gives you a knowing look, thinking about the idea you’d had in mind ever since you watched Rocky Horror with Billy that first time. 

“You could say so,” you tell her, and then you’re off to raid her bathroom cabinet, pulling free the large and full bag of goodies. 

You start to rifle through the corduroy pouch, but decide it’d be easier to take the whole thing with you to your room, so that’s what you do.

When you return, you settle on your knees in front of your boyfriend, still finding it odd that you get to call him that now, even if that is exactly what he is to you. Your pretty, pretty boyfriend. Your boyfriend who’s letting you do his makeup. 

Max hands you your brush back, raising herself up on her elbows so that she can watch the show better.

“Hi,” you say to him, pressing a kiss on the tip of his nose. 

“Hi,” he responds, his voice showing all signs that he’s both enjoying this, yet also grumping about the fact that he let you do it in the first place. He settles back on his hands, legs spread so that you can sit in between them and reach him. You pull free both the pencil of thick liner you’d been looking for, and a pot of blush you know to be much pinker than the one you’ve got. Yours has also been broken on multiple occasions so that now it’s just little bits of pink powder sliding around in the pan. 

You uncap the liner first, a warm brown shade, clearly freshly sharpened by your mother. “Close your eyes, pretty please,” you tell him. He obliges, lids fluttering shut. 

You reach out, and starting to drag the tip of the pencil across his skin, you realize your hand isn’t as steady as you’d like, considering the fact that you’re also half-focused on not kneeing Billy in a place you’re quite sure he’d prefer to not be kneed. 

You let out a frustrated sigh, and Billy blinks up at you. “What’s wrong?”

“This isn’t working. Just–” You shove the eyeliner pencil into his hands, and then move from between his legs. You grip his calves and move his legs together, then crawl forwards a little and straddle his lap.

He grins up at you, a cocky and mischievous look. “Comfy?”

“Shut up and close your eyes again.”

“Well you don’t want much.” 

You pinch the squish of his side and he swats blindly at your arm. You take Billy’s face in your hand, resting the pinky of your dominant one against his cheekbone. This go around you’re able to drag the liner effectively across his eyelid. A tap at his face signals he needs to look up, and when he does, you do the same to his lower hip. Afterwards, you take a super small brush that Max found and use it to smudge the eyeliner out some, that way the lines aren’t so harsh.

You finish and take Billy’s face in your hands again, turning it to face Max. “Thoughts?”

She taps her chin, though smiling all the same. “Very nice.”

With a little more manhandling, you get some mascara on those lashes of his, though not without a little pleased squeaking in the process. It’s at the blush that you get excited enough to make him laugh. You swipe your brush heavily across his cheeks, and then the tip of his nose, where you’re probably much too generous. You don’t care. He looks so, so pretty, all blushy like this. 

“Part your lips.” You say, thumb tugging at his bottom one. You put a gloss on Billy’s lips and almost lose it for good. He’s so gorgeous. 

When you finish, you wipe your hands clean on a towel and back up a little ways from him to survey your work. 

You clap your hands. “Max, help me. Would you look at this?”

She does, laughing gleefully. “Oh my god, this is so good.”

You look Billy in the eyes, and Max hops up off of your bed to get a better look. “You look so gorgeous, my love.”

He’s thankful for the blush in that moment, because without it you’d see the effect your using that name had on him. 

“Thank you,” he says.

“Wanna see?” God, you look so happy.

“Do I have to?”

You bite your lip and Billy pulls it free, taking the little handheld mirror from you. 

And, honestly, he thinks he looks kinda hot. You picked a good eyeshadow color, one that makes his blue eyes stand out even more, and he just looks pretty. Just as you’d said. 

“Do you like it?”

“Yes. You did a very good job.”

He goes to kiss you, but you stop him. “Nope. You’ll mess up my work!”

Billy rolls his eyes and flips Max a bird when he sees her giggling at your enthusiasm and his compliance. 

“Can I take a picture?” you ask. 

Billy holds up his hands. “Oh hell no.”

“Billy, she needs to document her masterpiece,” Max says, though really she knows it’d make great blackmail. That and she loves how happy the both of you seem. She’d like to remember this too. 

“Please?” You give him your very best puppy dog eyes, making sure they’re watery and everything. You know he’ll give in. 

“Fine. But you show this to anyone, and you’re both dead.”

You laugh, grabbing for your Polaroid camera. “Who the fuck do you think I’m gonna show? Everyone I know is in this room.”

Billy’s smiles then, and you’re just quick enough to catch it. You get another after you kiss his sparkly forehead. And when you’ve finished, you stick them in the frame of your mirror so they’ll always be there. 

That night, after Max and Susan have gone home, you sit in the bathroom to help Billy wash the makeup off, but only when you’d let Nicky see, and she thought he looked stunning. Showstopping, she’d said. 

And it’s then, as you wipe the rosy tinge from his cheeks, revealing his freckles once again, that you realize months before this you’d been so alone. You’d ached for a moment like this. 

And here you were. So even if the journey to get here had hurt, even if it’d been hard and pushed you to your limits, it’s okay. Because that’s how life works. It hurts sometimes. And that’s okay. 

Because the hurt? The hurt is good.

————

please let me know if you liked this! feedback is always appreciated!! comments and reblogs mean more than you know. <33

#billy hargrove #billy hargrove x you #billy hargrove x reader #billy hargrove x fem!reader #billy hargrove x y/n #billy hargrove fic #billy hargrove fanfic #billy hargrove fanfiction #billy stranger things fic #billy stranger things #billy hargrove imagine #billy hargrove series #billy hargrove angst #billy hargrove comfort #billy hargrove fluff #jim hopper #max mayfield #billy hargrove x female reader #savannah’s fics

[eternally-smitten]

JanAUary - Fake Dating

pairing: Natalie x Roman Roy

summary: Natalie does Roman a huge favor by pretending to be his girlfriend for a party but it doesn't help her self esteem much

content warnings: suggestive language, angst

word count: ~1.5k

author's note: i think i went a little nuts on this one not gonna lie but hey baby's first fake dating fic LOL

“Ugh, you are such a dick.” Natalie sneered, cradling her drink in her hand, “Why did you even need me to play girlfriend for you? You could’ve gotten the same shit from a cheap hooker.”

Roman groaned and rolled his eyes, “You were free, that’s why.”

“You’re just proving my point.” She huffed and shifted uncomfortably.

“Why did you even agree to this if you’re going to complain the whole time?” He asked, his eyes scanning over the crowd to see if anyone noticed how she was acting.

Natalie shrugged, “I have low self esteem and I’m masochistic, I guess.”

Today was the day she did Roman one of the biggest and stupidest favors of all time: pretend to be his girlfriend for a party. It felt juvenile and truly, it was. This was the sort of thing that reminded her of high school. Natalie was shocked she even went through with it but in her defense, he was very insistent. He said something along the lines of how it was just for looks and how it would make the both of them appear good. He asked her, no, he begged her to play along just for the night. She was resistant at first but with his ceaseless pleading and puppy dog eyes, Natalie eventually caved. Not without a price, though. Before finally agreeing, she gave him a cold, hard look and spat out, “You owe me. Big time.”

Roman rubbed the back of his neck, suddenly realizing how much of a jerk he was being, “Can I, um, get you a drink? Or something?”

She glanced at the drink she had in her hand, “No, thanks. I’m good…” She watched a group of people pass them, “...Darling.”

“Do you have to say it with such contempt? Can’t you make it sort of believable?” His lip curled, “Jeez, I’m starting to regret asking you to do this.”

“What a coincidence! I’m starting to regret agreeing to it. So, at least you’re not alone.” Natalie sighed, “Whatever. We’re here now and you’re going to make it up to me later. Might as well make the best of it.”

“What on earth do you want me to do to pay you back, anyway? The suspense is killing me.” Roman said nervously, covering it up with a small laugh.

She shrugged, “I dunno yet. It’ll come to me, don’t worry. I’m not gonna forget.”

“Seriously? I ask you for one favor and suddenly, I owe you restitution?”

“Retribution.” Natalie corrected him.

“What?”

A small, frustarted sigh escaped her lips, “Nevermind.”

Roman gave her an annoyed glare, “Okay, little miss English major. My point is, are you seriously going to hold this over my head?”

“Yes, actually. Having me as your play pretend girlfriend for your stupid, fancy party is asshole behavior and I think I deserve a little prize for taking a blow to my self confidence.” She growled, not being able to hide her vitriol anymore.

He suddenly got quiet and softened his gaze, “...I just wanted to look good to Dad, I guess.”

She clicked her tongue, “Glad to know I was your perfect fake option.”

He wanted to reply to her and give her some sort of reassurance but a group of people, including his family, were heading over to where the fake couple stood. Roman cleared his throat and straightened his posture, beckoning Natalie to follow his lead. She groaned quietly before doing the same, jumping a little when he hesitantly put one of his hands on the small of her back.

“Hi, hello, hiya,” He greeted, “Nice get together, huh?”

“So, Rome,” Shiv ignored his question, “Who is this? Now, I know you of all people couldn’t land a girl for longer than three days without making her turn tail and run.”

He awkwardly laughed at her comment, “Uh, no, she’s stayed for four days so, take that.”

“I’m Natalie,” She introduced herself, extending her hand outward.

Shiv shook it, giving her a smirk, “Hmm, I feel like you’re too normal for him. Too pretty, too.”

“Now, don’t inflate my ego.” Natalie giggled, “I’ll let it get to my head much like the alcohol.”

“So, why Rome?” She asked genuinely with the rest of the group behind her agreeing.

Roman’s breath hitched. He hated these types of questions. Especially now, knowing exactly how Natalie felt about him in this particular moment. Not only that, but he was used to being the butt of every joke ever told in his family, so he expected her to be no different.

Instead, she laid her free hand on his chest and grinned, “What’s not to love? I mean, look at him! Taking me to such a fancy event to show me off! Isn’t that just sweet?”

Shiv snorted, “More like expected of us.”

“Well, still.” Natalie shook her head, “Not to embarrass him but gosh, I don’t think I’ve ever met a man as handsome as him before. I just love his eyes.”

Roman felt like he was glued to the floor. She was saying kind things? About him? After he was being so unkind about this whole situation? He couldn’t believe it. He was convinced her hand was burning a hole in his suit with the way his chest felt warm under her touch. It felt kind of…nice?

“I’m awfully lucky to have landed such a guy, you know?” She continued praising him, “He’s such a darling.”

Darling.

That word again.

Only this time, she didn’t say it with disgust in her voice. He knew she was pretending because that’s what he asked her to do but the way she said it so sweetly had him fooled for a minute. It actually felt like he was adored by her. His entire world stood still for a few moments while strange thoughts flooded his head. If this is how loving she was when she was acting, how far off would her genuine affection be?

“Earth to Roman?” Shiv snapped her fingers in his face, “I’ve been trying to talk to you.”

He shook his head, becoming embarrassed that he was obviously spacing out, “Sorry, you talk so much I almost fell asleep there. What were you saying? Something, something, politics, something, right?”

She laughed at him, “Well, what I was saying was that she seems good for you. You guys look nice together. I just hope you don’t find some way to self destruct and fuck it all up.”

“Too late.” He thought to himself but instead, said, “Yeah, yeah, as if I want marriage advice from someone who cucks her own husband.”

“Be nice!” Natalie playfully shoved him, “But I think I should get going. I’m getting a bit tired. I loved meeting you all!”

Everyone waved and said their goodbyes before heading their separate ways. Once his family was out of sight, they let go of each other and went back to an embarrassed silence.

“You’re welcome, by the way.” Natalie spoke first, having a hard time making direct eye contact with him.

“Yeah, uh, thanks.” Roman looked at his feet, “You did good.”

She scoffed, “Maybe I should’ve gone to school for acting instead of English, huh?”

He halfheartedly laughed at her joke, “You could’ve gotten an Emmy with that performance you did.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Hey, uh,” He started to ask as she started to put on her coat, “Did you mean all that stuff back there? Like, the nice stuff?”

She gave him a weird look, “I mean, I do think you have nice eyes if that’s what you mean.”

His cheeks felt a little warm at that, “That’s kinda what I mean. I’m talking about the other stuff, too.”

“Well, it’s not like we’re actually dating, so I kinda tacked on all that 'He's such a lovely boyfriend' crap.” She admitted, “Sorry if that was too much or anything. I figured you’d want that since you asked me to do this.”

“No, no, you did fine, trust me.” Roman waved those words away, “I guess I just want to know if you actually meant what you said. That I’m darling and stuff.”

Natalie paused, not quite sure how to answer. Truth be told, she thought he was an ass. But at the same time, he was awfully endearing. When he wanted to be, that is. She cleared her throat and put her coat on, “Yeah, I think you’re very darling. I think anyone that ended up with you would be very, very lucky. Have a good night, Rome. Remember that you owe me one.”

“Y-Yeah, you too. Don’t worry, I won’t.” He said as she walked out the door.

Roman stared at the door she walked out of, almost hoping she’d come back to talk to him some more. He knew better, though, and eventually returned to the event. Although, he wasn’t present for it mentally. Shiv’s words kept running through his mind. Maybe he did what he does best and hit self destruct on one of the truest friendships he’s ever had. Maybe he also destroyed whatever chances he had with her romantically now, too. Only he could decide if he wanted to fix that or not.

tag list: @blood-moon-ships @bobmckenzie @kylars-princess @gideongrovel @felixrichtershubby @fates-theysband @nonesenseships @bioexorcizm @weirdgirlgf please lmk if you want to be added/removed! :)

#my stuff ♡ #⸝⸝⊂➜ corporate flirt ⊃⸝⸝ #self ship fanfiction #janauary2024 #ok to rb!

[faeflowerz]

Happy Birthday, Leona Kingscholar 🦁

Alright. Let's do this. Imma snatch this man's wig. Drag him for filth. I've been waiting for this moment. 

It's only fair I get his out before I play catchup with everyone else. Im primed and pumped. Let's get these jokes off.

Leona bothers me. Its not just because hes a grown ass man trying to stay in school. It's because he does it on pawpouse. He's playing 4D chess with everyone and found a way to stay in school rather than do ANYTHING ELSE. Leona values his school life more than his future bc hes afraid of what comes next. 

Unlike Mal + Lilia who can pop back into school every half a century, Leona will have to go out into the world and stay there. He knows that whatever comes next, he's not ready for it. He's expressed his dislike for his home life and being a prince seems like it's more trouble than it's worth. Leona wants to be free to do as he pleases without someone breathing down his neck. I get that. Adulthood is scary as fuck and I don't blame him.

But what will happen when the people he's grown attached to moves on? He's got a revolving door of students in his dorm and even he will have to leave too. It's fragile just like the dust he makes. And that’s what I'm curious about. Is his family okay with this arrangement? Do they appreciate not having to deal with him? Because then this all makes even more sense. He justified that he has ppl to do shit for him at NRC, but whatever he wants can be done at home too. And since he's the second son, he could fuck off even more, right?

While he's not easily stressed, his emotions can get the better of him. His chapter is pretty mid, but Lilia’s taunts set him over the edge. He's most likely been ridiculed all his life as the second one. He doesn't have an identity back home. If someone taps into that nerve, it breaks him. Leona aint figured out who he is as an individual and as a prince he won't get it. His friends and "subordinates" treat him as Leona and not the prince of the sunset savana. But um, hes an asshole!

Yeah hes a gd asshole and I'm not letting it go. Leona is surrounded by people who love and support him and yet he brushes it off. He won't tell you how he feels and it is annoying. Like, bro, stop trying to prove a point and tell your friends that you give a shit about them. Especially Ruggie. You nearly killed him and yet he still helps you. Hes not even the vice dorm leader so he could just tell u to fuck off. Scar fell because he neglected the people he promised to support. He made false promises and didn't deliver on them when it came time to return the favor. And while Rome wasn't built in a day, his chapter didn't do any favors for him.

I said his chapter is mid because like Vil, the stakes were low and stayed low. Riddle's behavior affected the QOL of everyone in his dorm. Azul was damn near a slave owner. Jamil (while limited to just Kalim) could have gotten himself killed if word got back home. Vil and Leona didn't have high enough stakes until they inflicted their magic onto someone (which still bothers me that he went for Ruggie who hadn't provoked him). 

His plan of breaking everyone's legs was dangerous. I think that puts his story higher than Vil's (which had reasonable demands most of the time). But if they rearranged some shit so that Savanaclaw students just went "fuck off leona, we're tired of this shit" and ruggie is the final one to go "I'm tired of it too." Then he would snap and we would get it. He wants control over everything in his life and now that he's pushed too many buttons, he will value the people who love him a little bit more. 

To me, Leona first came off as a lazy son of a bitch who didn't want to get his hands dirty and blamed everything on everyone else. And while that may be true, I also think that his chapter should have made his charm more obvious. Or maybe that's the joke? All of his fans have no reason to like him! 

You wanna know his appeal? Hes tsundere. That's it. His lines about MC are the most obvious but the ones about his dorm mates solidify it. Everyone loves an ass who can't tell you how he feels up front. But also people want to fuck cats so it's that too. 

But I think Leona needs to ask himself: does he deserve it? Does he deserve to be a leader and does he deserve his position? I would venture to say he doesn't think so. He's not as self-deprecating as Idia, but his flaws can be pretty stifling for some. So to compensate, he asserts himself a little more while picking which fights he goes into. 

WHICH BRINGS ME TO HIS REASONING FOR POMEFIORE. okay look. I appreciate a good surprise but Leona has another thing coming if he's sure he could take Vil. Their relationship is already frustrating for Vil because Leona doesn't put forth his best efforts all the time. Leona wants to reap the benefits with no work. He's spoiled. And that pisses Vil off because Vil is always on his grind. Type A vs Type B. And I agree. Leona's passiveness is frustrating especially when he looks down on people who could reasonably beat his ass. In terms of winning over the students, it's a tie. They're both attractive, persuasive and…fuck theyre so hot. But who will keep everything stable? Vil. Leona's good in Savanaclaw bc they value "the fittest" and follow whoever wins. All dorms could reasonably work like that that, but I think the application of Vil's UM could fuck Leona over. If he tested Azul or Riddle, he could win because their UM is easier to deal with. Mal is up in the air and Idia…probably would put it in a stalemate (see their chess battle). Plus, Leona hates stuffy clothes and would probably get annoyed by Rook long before he could actually enjoy anything Pome has to offer.

I get why he wouldn't want Diasomnia. Mal has that shit on lock. Scarabia would probably be easier than he thinks. Kalim and Jamil work in tandem so if he just gently pushed them both out the way, it wouldn't be too hard. Plus, Kalim already seems to like Leona. Jamil doesn't vibe with him, but what's he gonna do about it?

He could have just said pome to balance out the choices everyone made. I think i saw a chart floating around with everyones dorm pick so they probably didn't have enough Pome. Oh well. 

Ok before I go, I wanna talk about his relationship with Ruggie. I said that Ruggie has no dimension to him because he's only got Poor and Leona as his defining traits. And I still believe that. Fun fact. At the time of writing this, Ruggie has about 7 lines that mention Leona. Leona has 5 mentions of Ruggie. Do with that what u will. For real tho, i like their relationship for some reason. Ruggie doesn't take shit from Leona and Leona just lets him say shit with thin threats. And Leona has a lot of faith in him too. Ruggie seems to underestimate his abilities sometimes which is why Leona pushes him. After all, what good is a servant that sucks at his job?

Going forward I think I want Leona to…not be an ass. Easier said than done lmaoooo. But for real hes definitely scared of adulthood because it means going back to a life where he is constantly shoved into a box and limited in his individuality. It's kind of the system that fucks him over the most. He's got his smarts but it kind of seems like mages are valued past just what you know. Soz, dude. Sucks to be you!

Happy Birthday Leona! 🦁😊

#leona kingscholar #twisted wonderland #faes character reflection #writing

[therk900]

✨July TC Challenge (Day 1 - 31)✨

1. Describe your tc’s physical appearance. S wears glasses like me, is very tall and skinny! He also has a moustache. B Is a bit taller than me and has a stubble beard. There is this blue jumper that he wears lots and that I love

2. What was the first thing you’ve ever said to your tc? I’m pretty sure it was “Hey”

3. Is your tc single or taken? or are you unsure? and are you single or taken? I’m completely unsure if they are single or taken, but I know that B and S aren’t married. I am single! I’ve never had a boyfriend 

4. Is your tc more of the athletic type, the nerdy type or the artsy type? They’re all quite the nerdy type tbh.

5. If you and your tc were in high school together, do you think you’d be friends? Maybe!

6. Name one song that reminds you of your tc and explain why that song reminds you of them. S: Forth of July - Sufjan Stevens  Reason: Reminds me on how I miss him when he isn’t around  B: Get into it (Yuh) - Doja Cat Reason: When I first listened to this song at the start of 2022, all I could think of was B

7. Is your tc fashionable or are they more of the simple type? What is one outfit you’d love to see them wear? They are simple but fashionable. I would love to see them in a full suit!

8. Would you be willing to become a teacher and teach your tc’s subject if it meant you two could be together? DEFINITELY! 

9. Does your tc drink or smoke? Not that I’m aware of.

10. Name one item that is always on your tc’s desk. For B, all different types of books and for S, a mini desk plant

11. Has your tc ever done anything that has either thrown you off, annoyed you, angered you or bothered you in any way? if so, what did they do? Not really

12. Does your tc have any past jobs that you know of, before becoming a teacher? I’m not sure about B, but S worked in retail before teaching at my school

13. Does your tc have kids or siblings? if so, how many? I think S has a brother. They both have no kids to my knowledge

14. Are you taking your tc’s class next year? There is a chance because they could teach my tutor class!

15. Has your tc ever met your parents? if you were there, what was the meeting like? They have. It was good! Nothing went wrong thankfully 

16. Has your tc ever given you detention? if so, what was it like? Nope! 

17. has your tc ever failed you? if so, how did you react? if not, how would you react? They have never failed me! If they did, I would be embarrassed and I would not go to school for the next week

18. what are your tc’s hobbies/interests? are they similar to yours? S likes to play netball and B likes to play games on the PS. They are similar to mine in a way

19. have you ever spoken on the phone with your tc? what did you talk about? Sadly no. My mum has B's number though from last year. I should try and get it from her

20. if you had your tc’s class during quarantine, what were your zoom calls like? if not, have you spoken to your tc since quarantine? We used Microsoft Teams during quarantine and I had S for one of those years. The classes were fun! B came last year and we weren’t in quarantine then. Obviously, I kept in contact with both of them.

21. if you had the chance to go anywhere in the world with your tc, where would you go? what would you do? With S, definitely Italy! Maybe go to Rome and check out all the history of the renaissance. With B, maybe France and/or London! I would like to go to the Eiffel tower with him and just go sightseeing!

22. does your tc have any nicknames for you? No. I have a nickname for S though.

23. have you ever cried in front of your tc? why? how did they react? I’ve cried in front of S once. It only happened at the end of last year. He was running some sort of event for out tutor group (even though he wasn’t out teacher) I was getting overstimulated by the noise to the point of having a panic attack. My friend saw and told him that I needed to leave the classroom. He let me and I couldn't stop apologising after.

24. have you ever walked/drove to/from school with your tc? I haven’t yet. It may seem weird

25. do you know which teachers your tc is friends with at school? if so, do you like those teachers? B is friends with a couple teachers who teach the same subject as him. I like SOME of the teachers. He is also friends with this other teacher and I’m not the biggest fan of her for some reason. S is friends with one of my old teachers who taught me the same subject as him. I like him a lot as well!

26. why does your tc’s voice sound like? B has a voice that is calming and reassuring. S has a voice that is very energetic

27. do you like your tc as a teacher? are they a good teacher? They are both amazing teachers!

28. does your tc prefer books, shows or movies? I think B prefers books and S prefers movies! I will definitely have to ask them!

29. is your tc stern or easy going, in class? Both very easy going

30. how would you describe you and your tc’s relationship? S and I are very close! We are closer than the regular student. B and I are also semi close!

31. do you address your tc by their first or last name? Last name. Well, i call them by nicknames everyone calls them, which is just shorter versions of their last name.

#male teacher x female student #male tc #tc #teacher crush community #teacher x student #male teacher crush #teacher #tc community #tc crush #july tc challenge #teacher crush #tcc #male teacher #tc confessions #tc dream #tc feelings #tc challenge #tc feels #tc male #tcc confessions #tcc feelings #tc vent #tcc thoughts #teacher and student #tc thoughts #teacher attachment #teacher crush feelings #teacher love #teacher crush blog #teacher crush confessions

[aibidil]

Ray Bradbury, “Dusk in the Robot Museums: The Rebirth of the Imagination,” 1980

For some ten years now, I have been writing a long narrative poem about a small boy in the near future who runs into an audio-animatronic museum, veers away from the right portico marked Rome, passes a door marked Alexandria, and enters across a sill where a sign lettered Greece points in across a meadow.

The boy runs over the artificial grass and comes upon Plato, Socrates and perhaps Euripides seated at high noon under an olive tree sipping wine and eating bread and honey and speaking truths.

The boy hesitates and then addresses Plato:

"How goes it with the Republic?"

"Sit down, boy," says Plato, "and I'll tell you."

The boy sits. Plato tells. Socrates steps in from time to time. Euripides does a scene from one of his plays.

Along the way, the boy might well ask a question which hovered in all of our minds the past few decades:

"How come the United States, the country of Ideas on the March, for so long neglected fantasy and science fiction? Why is it that only during the past thirty years attention is being paid?"

Another question from the boy might well be:

"Who is responsible for the change?

"Who has taught the teachers and the librarians to pull up their socks, sit straight, and take notice?

"Simultaneously, which group in our country has backed off from abstraction and moved art back in the direction of pure illustration?"

Since I am neither dead nor a robot, and Plato-as-audioanimatronic lecturer might not be programmed to respond, let me answer as best I can.

The answer is: the students. The young people. The children.

They have led the revolution in reading and painting.

For the first time in the history of art and teaching, the children have become the teachers. Before our time, knowledge came down from the top of the pyramid to the broad base where the students survived as best they could. The gods spoke and the children listened.

But, lo! gravity reverses itself. The massive pyramid turns like a melting iceberg, until the boys and girls are on top. The base of the pyramid now teaches.

How did it happen? After all, back in the twenties and thirties, there were no science-fiction books in the curricula of schools anywhere. There were few in the libraries. Only once or twice a year did a responsible publisher dare to publish one or two books which could be designated as speculative fiction.

If you went into the average library as you motored across America in 1932, 1945, or 1953 you would have found:

No Edgar Rice Burroughs.

No L. Frank Baum and no Oz.

In 1958 or 1962 you would have found no Asimov, no Heinlein, no Van Vogt, and, er, no Bradbury.

Here and there, perhaps one book or two by the above. For the rest: a desert.

What were the reasons for this?

Among librarians and teachers there was then, and there still somewhat dimly persists, an idea, a notion, a concept that only Fact should be eaten with your Wheaties. Fantasy? That's for the Fire Birds. Fantasy, even when it takes science-fictional forms, which it often does, is dangerous. It is escapist. It is daydreaming. It has nothing to do with the world and the world's problems.

So said the snobs who did not know themselves as snobs.

So the shelves lay empty, the books untouched in publishers' bins, the subject untaught.

Comes the Evolution. The survival of that species called Child. The children, dying of starvation, hungry for ideas which lay all about in this fabulous land, locked into machines and architecture, struck out on their own. What did they do?

They walked into classrooms in Waukesha and Peoria and Neepawa and Cheyenne and Moose Jaw and Redwood City and placed a gentle bomb on teacher's desk. Instead of an apple it was Asimov.

"What's that?" the teacher asked, suspiciously.

"Try it. It's good for you," said the students.

"No thanks."

"Try it," said the students. "Read the first page. If you don't like it, stop." And the clever students turned and went away.

The teachers (and the librarians, later) put off reading, kept the book around the house for a few weeks and then, late one night, tried the first paragraph.

And the bomb exploded.

They not only read the first but the second paragraph, the second and third pages, the fourth and fifth chapters.

"My God!" they cried, almost in unison, "these damned books are about something!"

"Good Lord!" they cried, reading a second book, "there are Ideas here!"

"Holy Smoke!" they babbled, on their way through Clarke, heading into Heinlein, emerging from Sturgeon, "these books are-ugly word-relevant!"

"Yes!" shouted the chorus of kids starving in the yard. "Oh, my, yes!"

And the teachers began to teach, and discovered an amazing thing: Students who had never wanted to read before suddenly were galvanized, pulled up their socks, and began to read and quote Ursula Le Guin. Kids who had never read so much as one pirate's obituary in their lives were suddenly turning pages with their tongues, ravening for more.

Librarians were stunned to find that science-fiction books were not only being borrowed in the tens of thousands, but stolen and never returned!

"Where have we been?" the librarians and the teachers asked each other, as the Prince kissed them awake. "What's in these books that makes them as irresistible as Cracker Jack?"

The History of Ideas.

The children wouldn't have said it in so many words. They only sensed it and read it and loved it. The kids sensed, if they could not speak it, that the first science-fiction writers were cavemen who were trying to figure out the first sciences-which were what? How to capture fire. What to do about that lout of a mammoth hanging around outside the cave. How to play dentist to the sabre-tooth tiger and turn him into a house-cat.

Pondering those problems and possible sciences, the first cavemen and women drew science-fiction dreams on the cave walls. Scribbles in soot blueprinting possible strategies. Illustrations of mammoths, tigers, fires: how to solve? How to turn sciencefiction (problem solving) into science-fact (problem solved).

Some few brave ones ran out of the cave to be stomped by the mammoth, toothed by the tiger, scorched by the bestial fire that lived on trees and devoured wood. Some few finally returned to draw on the walls the triumph of the mammoth knocked like a hairy cathedral to earth, the tiger toothless, and the fire tamed and brought within the cave to light their nightmares and warm their souls.

The children sensed, if they could not speak, that the entire history of mankind is problem solving, or science fiction swallowing ideas, digesting them, and excreting formulas for survival. You can't have one without the other. No fantasy, no reality. No studies concerning loss, no gain. No imagination, no will. No impossible dreams: No possible solutions.

The children sensed, if they could not say, that fantasy, and its robot child science fiction, is not escape at all. But a circling round of reality to enchant it and make it behave. What is an airplane, after all, but a circling of reality, an approach to gravity which says: Look, with my magic machine, I defy you. Gravity be gone. Distance, stand aside. Time, stand still, or reverse, as I finally outrace the sun around the world in, by God! look! plane/jet/rocket—80 minutes!

The children guessed, if they did not whisper it, that all science fiction is an attempt to solve problems by pretending to look the other way.

In another place I have described this literary process as Perseus confronted by Medusa. Gazing at Medusa's image in his bronze shield, pretending to look one way, Perseus reaches back over his shoulder and severs Medusa's head. So science fiction pretends at futures in order to cure sick dogs lying in today's road. Indirection is everything. Metaphor is the medicine.

Children love cataphracts, though do not name them thusly. A cataphract is only a special Persian on a specially bred horse, the combination of which threw back the Roman legions some long while ago. Problem solving. Problem: massive Roman armies on foot. Science fiction dreams: cataphract/man-on-horseback. Romans dispersed. Problem solved. Science fiction becomes scientific fact.

Problem: botulism. Science fiction dreams: to someday produce a container which would preserve food, prevent death. Science-fictional dreamers: Napoleon and his technicians. Dream become fact: the invention of the Tin Can. Outcome: millions alive today who would have otherwise writhed and died.

So, it seems, we are all science-fictional children dreaming ourselves into new ways of survival. We are the reliquaries of all time. Instead of putting saints' bones by in crystal and gold jars, to be touched by the faithful in the following centuries, we put by voices and faces, dreams and impossible dreams on tape, on records, in books, on tv, in films. Man the problem solver is that only because he is the Idea Keeper. Only by finding technological ways to save time, keep time, learn from time, and grow into solutions, have we survived into and through this age toward even better ones. Are we polluted? We can unpollute ourselves. Are we crowded? We can de-mob ourselves. Are we alone? Are we sick? The hospitals of the world are better places since TV came to visit, hold hands, take away half the curse of illness and isolation.

Do we want the stars? We can have them. Can we borrow cups of fire from the sun? We can and must and light the world.

Everywhere we look: problems. Everywhere we further deeply look: solutions. The children of men, the children of time, how can they not be fascinated with these challenges? Thus: science fiction and its recent history.

On top of which, as mentioned earlier on, the young people have tossed bombs into your nearest corner art gallery, your downtown art museum.

They have walked through the halls and dozed off at the modern scene as represented by sixty-odd years of abstraction super-abstracting itself until it vanished up its own backside. Empty canvases. Empty minds. No concepts. Sometimes no color. No ideas that would interest a performing flea at a dog circus.

"Enough!" cried the children. "Let there be fantasy. Let there be science-fiction light." Let illustration be reborn.

Let the Pre-Raphaelites re-clone themselves and proliferate!

And it was so.

And because the children of the Space Age, and the sons and daughters of Tolkien wanted their fictional dreams sketched and painted in illustrative terms, the ancient art of story-telling, as acted out by your caveman or your Fra Angelico or your Dante Gabriel Rossetti was reinvented as yet the second giant pyramid turned end for end, and education ran from the base into the apex, and the old order was reversed.

Hence your Double Revolution in reading, in teaching Literature and pictorial Art.

Hence, by osmosis, the Industrial Revolution and the Electronic and Space Ages have finally seeped into the blood, bone, marrow, heart, flesh and mind of the young, who as teachers teach us what we should have known all along.

That Truth again: the History of Ideas, which is all that science fiction ever has been. Ideas birthing themselves into fact, dying, only to reinvent new dreams and ideas to be reborn in yet more fascinating shapes and forms, some of them permanent, all of them promising Survival.

I hope we will not get too serious here, for seriousness is the Red Death if we let it move too freely amongst us. Its freedom is our prison and our defeat and death. A good idea should worry us like a dog. We should not, in turn, worry it into the grave, smother it with intellect, pontificate it into snoozing, kill it with the death of a thousand analytical slices.

Let us remain childlike and not childish in our 20-20 vision, borrowing such telescopes, rockets, or magic carpets as may be needed to hurry us along to miracles of physics as well as dream.

The Double Revolution continues. And there are more, invisible, revolutions to come. There will always be problems. Thank God for that. And solutions. Thank God for that. And tomorrow mornings in which to seek them. Praise Allah and fill the libraries and art galleries of the world with Martians, elves, goblins, astronauts, and librarians and teachers on Alpha Centauri who are busy telling the kids not to read science fiction or fantasy: "It'll turn your brains to mush!"

"Go, children. Run and read. Read and run. Show and tell. Spin another pyramid on its nose. Turn another world upsidedown. Knock the soot off my brain. Repaint the Sistine Chapel inside my skull. Laugh and think. Dream and learn and build."

"Run, boys! Run, girls! Run!"

And with such good advice, the kids will run.

And the Republic will be saved.

#ray bradbury #dusk in the robot museums #science fiction #genre vs literature #fantasy #sci fi #sci fi fantasy #essay

[thebuckblogimo]

Some things I've been thinking about: income inequality, respect for elders, the gerontocracy and more.

September 24, 2023

Sometimes I have points of view that I'd like to write about but don't, because I haven't fully thought them out. They often involve things that aren't entirely clear to me. Or concern subjects that I don't know much about. Also, there are topics that don't deserve an entire essay. With that in mind, I decided to simply write the "gist" of what I've been mulling of late. Here goes:

During the past year I have spent time in Port Charlotte, Florida; Rehoboth Beach, Delaware; Woodsfield, Ohio; Chicago; and Detroit. Practically everwhere I've gone I continue to notice what appears to be a yawning gap between the "haves and have nots." I wonder... What does this mean? Recently I came across a quote by a historian of Rome named Ramsay McMullen who was asked if he could sum up the history of Rome in a single sentence. He replied, without having to think, "Fewer have more," (in terms of money, power, freedom). Those three words pretty much sum up what I've been seeing during my travels.

I have a wonderful mother-in-law who I love. At age 94 her cognitive abilities are in decline. More than ever she repeats herself, states the obvious, asks the same questions, etc. Sometimes it gets to me and I walk away, pretending not to hear her. But doing so causes me to feel guilt. It's long been my understanding that the Asian culture puts us to shame in how they show respect for older people. However, I know little about how that respect manifests itself. I should look into it because when interacting with my mother-in-law I often find myself asking, "What would Asians do?"

Recent polls indicate that over 70 percent of the American voting public would prefer presidential candidates younger than Joe Biden (80) and Donald Trump (77). Count me in on that one. Generally speaking, I feel as though it's time for the baby boomers (and those even older) to step aside and let a new generation of leaders take over the reins of government. Here in Grand Haven (population 10,000), we have an upcoming mayoral election that will pit a highly experienced boomer, who clearly understands how the city works, versus an energetic, up-and-coming millennial who has some interesting new ideas, especially for affordable housing. I like both cadidates. Each have excellent qualities. It's practically a toss-up for me, but I'm leaning toward voting for the younger candidate right now because I feel that the baby boomers have had their day.

In the past year I have lost several dear old friends and former work colleagues. I feel honored whenever I'm asked to write an obituary about one of them or to "say something" at a memorial. When I leave the service or luncheon, I often drive in quiet, thinking about how that person affected my life. Sometimes I shed a few tears, but I always wind up concluding that because I possess good health, the best way I can honor them is to live life for all it's worth.

I've always been a big "looker-backer." And whenever l gaze into the rear view mirror and see friends I made in grade school, high school, college, at the various places I have worked, and in the neighborhoods I have lived, I smile and cherish my thoughts of them. I collected a huge pile of memorabilia during my younger years. Plus I also had a huge, eclectic collection of LPs and CDs, thousands of photos and dozens of family videos before they went up in smoke. And yet, as much as I cared about those "things" they never came close, in terms of what they meant to me, to the fabulous friends and marvelous memories I collected during my lifetime.

Perhaps you're aware of the brouhaha over recent statements, criticized as being racist and sexist, made by Jann Wenner, the co-founder of Rolling Stone magazine, in the New York Times. It reminded me of something I've been thinking about since the late '80s when I first became aware of radio shows devoted exclusively to "sports talk." Despite the preponderance of black athletes, especially in football and basketball, and a large number of black listeners, those stations invariably play rock music for their program lead-ins, commercial breaks and backgrounds. Rarely, if ever, any black music. No R&B. No soul. Not even much hip-hop. How come no one ever thought to include the music of Earth, Wind and Fire? Or the Spinners? Or Stevie Wonder? Today, I listen mostly to sports podcasts on the internet, and the music selected for lead-ins, breaks, etc. almost always features twangy guitars.

I've never been able to get a handle on why good chemistry develops between some people and not others. Why, for example, is it that you can just see it in certain college basketball teams, but not in others? Same for business associates, people in civic organizations, among neighbors, etc. I always advised my children, as well as the people who reported to me during my working years, not to make snap decisions about anyone. Allow them to prove themselves to you over time, I would say. But there have been situations where I've done just that, found little to criticize and yet was unable to establish good chemistry with them.

My brother-in-law, the late, great Charlie Skinner, used to say that if he could live during any other period of American history it would be the Roaring '20s. Charlie loved how the automobiles of that era looked like rolling pieces of art, and with his sartorial taste, he favored the look of men who wore fedoras, bowlers and flat caps. But whereas Charlie loved the style of the '20s, I think of it as the period when Detroit was one of the great America cities. At the turn of the century there were a few thousand cars on American roads. By the end of the '20s, that figure had risen to 30,000,000 vehicles. Detroit put the world on wheels. It was also the period during which some of the finest examples of art deco architecture were built, such as the Guardian, Penobscot and Fisher buildings in downtown Detroit. Then came the Great Crash of 1929.

More views as they occur to me...

[lux333]

untitled 1.1

intro to a thing i writing :P lmk what u think!

(pretext: after departing from their lover, narrator amir struggles to come to terms with themselves and their relationships and reflects through emails and a life-changing journey.)

4 January 2016

Stony Brook University, New York

I had class after you left. The walk back to campus was cold, colder than usual. It’s odd; the winter hasn’t been as cold as it usually is. I haven’t fallen on my ass from the ice that is—usually—accumulating on the sidewalks on the edge of the building. Dry air hindered my breathing as I completed the feat of climbing the stairs to the second floor, and I coughed. It was dry like our conversation last night when you were leaving my bed. Your words hissed around my neck, suffocating me like when I was walking the steep stairs to the second floor.

“I’ve never left the country,” I lied with enthusiasm. I know how you take pride in the things you do. Or, perhaps, how you take pride in you. I was born in Rome. My parents, laced entirely with lust and love, decided to sell everything, and move themselves to Europe when they got pregnant with me. My mother was nineteen and a Yale drop out, while my dad was pushing twenty-two and disillusioned from reality. He worked nights at a restaurant in Connecticut, despite having a trust fund from a dead relative that died when he was three. They had just reached Rome when I was born, prematurely. Prematurely, like the love and life they lived with each other. They didn’t know what to do, they thought it was a game. In shock, they decided to just start a life there.

I have little memory of actually living there. I remember that my mom and dad would fight but not a traumatizing kind of fight. It was a fight that ended, somehow, in kisses between hits of a cigarette. What I remember the most was the day’s my mom took me to the beach when my dad would be out working. That was where she told me all about herself. I was pretty young, but I could still feel, now, at least, that she was just really scared. What you told me about Germany reminded me of this. I, suddenly, felt the sand sticking to my body from swimming, and the heat from the afternoon sun. My mother had an estranged great-uncle that lived in Berlin. She didn’t know about him growing up, but she found, through snooping in decade-old diaries and photographs, that he was gay. He was pushed out of his family after he was found out to be in a relationship with another boy. The mystery man was an international student at his campus, and one thing led to another. It reminds me of us, except I’m staying in New York, and you are going to commit war crimes or something.

“It’s just Germany,” you looked behind your back, pulling socks over your feet. You talked with no emotion. It wasn’t like you. My stomach turned and I felt nauseous. Your slight sweet scent of soap and sweat turned sour.

“It’s cool, still.” I sat up and thought for a second. My mind hurt and my conscious felt heavy and foggy. I couldn’t tell if you were being belligerent. And you got up and left. I surrendered to you, though. I saw you, still, as you got in your truck. You, still, kissed me like you usually do. I got that same nauseous feeling I got in the bed, but this time you drove away, and I puked in the flowerpot.

I can’t stand your truck and I, with guilt, love you. At that point, I was hoping you were going to find a way to change or figure out yourself or something. Boys from Long Island don’t get out much. They let this dead-end consume them! Some after high school might move to Queens with their best friend if they were lucky. You are different though. I am, too. In the midst of your absence, I can’t help but let the thought of you, all the misery and all the pleasure, possess me endlessly.

I went out to the city. I’m writing now from outside of Penn Station. I just smoked a cigarette with a girl I met at the club, dressed in white and long braids. It was somewhat reminiscent of that distant memory I wrote about—of my parents after a fight. I kissed her, like them, with desire on my lips. I miss you.

Amir

#creative writing #writers stuff #poetry #fiction #novel #literature #short story

[johnhardinsawyer]

“Being it’s You and Being it’s Today”

John Sawyer

Bedford Presbyterian Church

5 / 28 / 23 – Pentecost Sunday[1]

Acts 2:1-13

1 Corinthians 12:1-11

“Being It’s You and Being It’s Today”[2]

(The Gift of the Holy Spirit)

A friend of mine tells a story about Eric, a friend of hers – who went out for a Sunday drive along some back roads in Northwest Georgia.  Eric and his girlfriend at the time parked, at one point along the way, at a muddy spot in the road and, wouldn’t you know it, they got stuck!  That Georgia red clay sure can be sticky.  Finding someone to come tow them out of the mud on a Sunday afternoon was a bit of a chore, but finally, a tow truck arrived.  “Well, well, well,” the tow truck driver said, when he saw who it was that was stuck in the mud, “ain’t you so-and-so’s son?”  “Um, yes, I am,” Eric said.  The tow truck driver, who, for the purposes of this story, we’ll call Rusty, looked Eric up and down, and said, “I knowed your daddy.”  Rusty then went on to tell several long stories about Eric’s daddy and then he peppered Eric with questions as to how it came to be that the car got stuck.  Eric and his girlfriend just had to sit there with mud drying on their shoes, listening to Rusty, until, finally, Rusty took a breath and Eric was able to ask, “Rusty, do you think that you’ll be able to pull us out of the mud?”  Rusty looked Eric up and down, again, and said, “Well, bein’ it’s you and bein’ it’s today, let’s just see what we can do about that.”[3]

There have been times in my own life – and probably in your life, too – when we have been like Eric:  stuck, and in need of help.  And there have been times in my own life – and probably your life, too – when we have been like Rusty:  the very person with the very gifts and skills required to help someone in need.  There are times when we are given the very gift that we need the most and there are times when we are able to offer the very gift that someone needs – that the world needs.

Both of today’s scripture passages point to this – both in the story of the arrival of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost and in a letter that Paul wrote to the church in Corinth.

I have always loved the story of the first Pentecost.  The remaining followers of Jesus are all together in a room with the windows and doors shut.  They have been afraid – in hiding – because they do not want what happened to Jesus, in his arrest and crucifixion, to happen to them.  As we heard last week, this faithful remnant of Jesus’ disciples has been praying, though – praying without ceasing for God’s help.  And, on the day of Pentecost, that help arrives.  As they are all together in one place, the Holy Spirit blows the windows out and the doors off.  The whole room is filled with the breath of God and tongues of fire rest on each of them, and then. . .  they are not afraid anymore.  The go out and speak to everyone they see and everyone hears the disciples speaking in a way that can be understood.  

I imagine God looking at the followers of Jesus and saying, “Well. . . being it’s you and being it’s today, here is my Spirit – it’s just what you need.”  And, I imagine the disciples of Jesus looking at the devout people who have gathered in Jerusalem:  

[the] Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabs (Acts 2:9-11), [and saying. . .]

“Well, being it’s you and being it’s today – no matter where you come from or whether I speak your language or not – let me say something to you of God’s mighty, powerful, and loving deeds.  And, amazingly enough, these people from all over the world heard this good news of God’s love – each in their own language.

As I said before, I love this story and you just might love it, too.  But, when was the last time you started speaking passionately and intelligibly in another language – without ever having studied it in high school?  I can’t say that I ever have If I were to rely on what little high school French I can remember, most people who know better would send me back to Madame Marxen’s 10th grade French class.  What I can say, and what the Apostle Paul writes in today’s reading from 1 Corinthians, is that not everybody has the same gifts, but everybody has gifts that they can give.  Not everybody can speak another language, but, maybe we don’t have to do that.  We can speak volumes without using words by how we act and how we treat one another.  Besides, maybe we have other gifts to give – gifts given to us by the Holy Spirit.

Both the Apostle Paul and our own Reformed Tradition place a high emphasis on the gifts and power of the Holy Spirit – starting with the gift of faith in God.  In his letter to the Corinthians, Paul writes – and I’m paraphrasing here:

I do not want you to be uninformed, sisters and brothers. . .  You need to understand that only the Spirit of God can guide our hearts, minds, speech, and souls. . . No one can even say “Jesus is Lord” except by the Holy Spirit.[4]

In other words, no one can even say they believe in Jesus unless the Spirit is part of it.  John Calvin, explained it in this way:  

We perceive how great our weakness is, as we cannot so much as move our tongue for the celebration of God’s praise, unless it be governed by the Spirit.  Of this the Scripture, also, frequently reminds us, and the saints everywhere acknowledge – that unless the Lord open their mouths, they are not fit to be the heralds of his praise.[5]

It is only God who grants us the ability to believe – the gift of faith – and only God who helps us express that belief truthfully.  We cannot do it on our own.  We can only do it if God helps us.  Eugene Peterson translates the next part of today’s passage in this way:

God’s various expressions of power are in action everywhere; but God. . . is behind it all.  Each person is given something to do that shows who God is:  Everyone gets in on it, everyone benefits.  All kinds of things are handed out by the Spirit, and to all kinds of people!  The variety is wonderful:  wise counsel, clear understanding, simple trust, healing the sick, miraculous acts, proclamation, distinguishing between spirits, tongues, interpretation of tongues.[6]

All of these gifts on this list come from God through the Holy Spirit and are given to us for the benefit of all – “for the common good,” Paul says.  (1 Corinthians 12:7). This means that you and I have been given gifts and skills and talents to use, when the opportunity arises, for good.  And when we use these gifts and skills and talents, it is not we who are doing the good, but God doing the good through us.  This is where we Presbyterians hang our theological hats – in a place where God is so powerful – so sovereign, if you will – that the things we do for good in the world aren’t really done by us.  They are done by God through us – whether we know it or not.

There are a variety of gifts that we have been given and there are a variety of opportunities to use these gifts.  The question is:  “Will we?”  Will we allow, will we trust, God to work through us?  And if God is working through us, will we see it and realize what’s happening at the time?

This is the way the Holy Spirit will often work:  there is a need in the world or in someone’s life.  It could be as big as raising the debt ceiling or the problem of discrimination, or it could be as small as a child who needs a hug.  And into that place and time of need, regular people like you and I come along and the Holy Spirit looks at the need and looks at us and says, “Hey, being it’s you and being it’s today, what are we going to do about this?”  Now, we might be reluctant, and say, “My time has not yet come,” or “I’m too busy,” or “I’ve served my time,” or something else like that, but the Spirit won’t take “no” for an answer:  “Come on!  Being it’s you, and being it’s today, let’s do something good in the world.”

On this Memorial Day weekend, we are reminded of those who have answered the call to serve others.  “Being it’s you and being it’s today,” they have said, “I will give my life for you.”    

Jesus calls us in multiple places in the gospels to give our lives and to live our lives for others, but this does not always mean that he calls us to die, physically.  The Holy Spirit is always equipping us, though, for giving and living our lives in surprising and wonderful ways for the sake of something higher and more holy than we can often imagine.  In our own congregation, we see this in the countless ways our people have said – and continue to say, “Well, being it’s you, God, calling us to do this new thing.  And being it’s today, when we can work together to meet this need – to use our gifts for collaboration, and love for our neighbor, and hope for the future of the church. . .”  In this way, the Holy Spirit feeds twenty-five families a week through the Bedford Community Food Pantry, a refugee family from Afghanistan is welcomed with open arms and cared for, daily, people from our community can gather together in a safe space to talk about mental health, children are baptized and lovingly taught about the love of God, those who are sick are held in prayer and supported in loving ways. . .  and I could go on and on.  The Spirit moves in powerful ways and you are witnessing it in your midst.  There is no other way for any of these things to work except for the Spirit – working through people to bring about something good that has changed, and is changing, and will change the lives of untold numbers of people.

“Being it’s you and being it’s today,” God says through the waters of baptism, “I love you and you are mine, I am working on your behalf, I am giving you gifts to help other people, I am giving you what you need to make a difference.”  “Being it’s you, and being it’s today,” God says, “I have called you to use the gifts I have given you – to work for the common good, for the good of the world, for the good of the church, for the good of all people, for the good of the kingdom of God.”  “Why have I done this?” God asks.  Why am I calling you in this way to use your gifts?             Because I saw that you were in need – in need of forgiveness, and healing, and abundant life, and I said, ‘Well, my children, being it’s you and being it’s today, I will give you my Son and give you my Spirit.’”

“Now, there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. . .”  (12:4-5). . . . in you. . . and in me.

Being it’s you and being it’s today, will you use your gifts – the gifts that God has given you, the gifts that the Holy Spirit inspires?  Being it’s you, and being it’s today. . .  Will you?

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

---------

[1] Also, the day when my son, Elliot James Sawyer, will be baptized.

[2] I preached a version of this same sermon in 2021 at a meeting of the Presbytery of Northern New England.

[3] Shawna Dooley, a master storyteller of true – or mostly true – stories about real people.

[4] Paraphrased – JHS.

[5] Calvin, John.  Calvin’s Commentaries – Volume XX (Grand Rapids:  Baker Books, 2009) 397.

[6] Eugene Peterson, The Message, 1578. 1 Corinthians 12:4-7.

[anitosoul]

tripreport.020: THE VAST

isolation in expanse 🧑‍🚀

Key Inspirations

Arca (Music artist)

Koreless (Music artist)

DJ Sabrina the Teenage DJ (Music artist)

Specifically the song “Being Alone” (Song)

Space visualizers (YouTube video)

The Met Surrealist exhibit (Art exhibit)

Jon Watts – Spider-Man: No Way Home (Film)

Christopher Nolan – Interstellar (Film)

Night on Earth – “Dark Seas” (TV Show)

Doss’s opening DJ set for Arca (DJ set)

100 Gecs (Music artist)

Playboi Carti (Music artist)

The weird purgatory between Christmas and New Years (Time)

THE VAST Tracklist Act I: entropy

The Hellp – 4up7up

100 Gecs – mememe

Trippie Redd, Playboi Carti – Miss the Rage

Headband Andy – I must apologize – Remix

Slikback, FlexFab – Raw

underscores – Where did you fall

Danny L Harle, DJ Mayhem – All Night

Anz – Unravel in the Designated Zone

Louke Man – Took a Turn

poolsideconvo – anybody else but u

DJ Sabrina the Teenage DJ – Being Alone

Carlos Niño – Esssssssence

Koreless – Joy Squad

Oli XL – Go Oli Go!

THE VAST Tracklist Act II: ether

Doss – Softpretty

AceMo – Through the Pressure

Jacques Greene – Serenity

Oli XL – Cartoon Smile

Loop 7 – The Theme – Lamento

CFCF – Marigold Mix

Jesper Ryom – Apolune

Maddy Maia, Tottie – Spirit

DJ Sabrina the Teenage DJ – We Go On

Magdalena Bay – You Lose!

Harvey Sutherland – Priestess

808 State – Pacific State

Koreless – Shellshock

asc – lose ya

THE VAST Tracklist Act III: abyss

DJ FLP – Close the Door

Erika de Casier – Drama

Arca – Luna Llena

Sega Bodega – Only Seeing God When I Come

DreamWeaver – Altered Reality

Yu Su – Klein

CFCF – Nostalgic Body

PHD & The Funky Technicians – Above & Beyond

Dirty Bird – Midnight

Winslow – Snooze Button Roller

No Rome – Secret Beach

SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE – RAPID & COMPLETE RECOVERY

Virgil Abloh, serpentwithfeet – Delicate Limbs

1995 epilepsy – get 2 kno

Returning to NYC after Thanksgiving was a weird experience. I had extended my time in Tulsa so I was gone for about three weeks, which was the longest I had been away from NYC since moving back in May. As my plane descended over Manhattan, it felt like flying into the city for the first time. Something just felt…different. Maybe it was because it was getting cold and the days were becoming shorter. I reminded myself that I had a lot to look forward to, though, like concerts and holidays. 

That first weekend back, I had tickets to see 100 gecs. I ended up going with the partner of one of my friends from high school who I met in November when they visited and came to the PQ party. The concert was amazing and the chaos of it brought back a taste of the boundless energy from earlier in the year. Afterwards, we ended up walking all the way from Terminal 5 down Manhattan back to my apartment, talking about life and witnessing the spectrum of human experience pass us by as we drifted through the varied vibes of each Manhattan neighborhood. Getting to connect with someone I didn’t know that well so easily was refreshing and made me excited for the future. Still, there was a feeling of surrealness to everything, like I had entered into some sort of alternate reality. I was working fully remotely at this point, so my office became the various cafes or hotel lobbies in a 1-mile vicinity of my apartment. The lack of familiarity in anything I was doing was bizarre, and I wasn’t sure what else to do besides go along with it.

A few days after that concert, Arca randomly had a DJ set at a small bar close to my apartment. I’ve been training for a marathon, so despite running 12 miles right before, I decided I didn’t want to miss it and checked it out with a friend. It was an interesting experience, given it was on a Monday, I was physically exhausted, and the music was less than accessible. Doss started off the night with a fun set, and afterwards Arca went b2b with Shayne Oliver, the founder of Hood By Air. They absolutely blasted their tracks, doubling the speed to 200+ bpm, setting extremely short loops, and blowing out the speakers, trading sound quality for sheer volume. It was a mix of Latin and hip-hop but didn’t have any sort of natural flow like most DJ sets. Sonically, something about the set deeply intrigued me, but it mostly just added to the surreality I found myself in.

My birthday was the weekend after and I was looking forward to celebrating. I didn’t realize, though, that most of my close friends were already going to be home for the holidays by that time. There were murmurs of the “Omicron variant,” which seemed to be spreading in NYC but the impact of its manifestation wasn’t fully clear yet. I had tickets to Playboi Carti the Friday before my birthday, but the friend I was going to go with didn’t want to risk getting COVID as they were flying home the next day, which I understood. I ended up going alone, and it was yet another surreal experience. I was surrounded by teenagers in the pit as they moshed to the songs played in the interim before Carti went on. I felt like I was one of the oldest people in the pit, and being there alone made it even weirder–not bad, just kind of absurd. When Carti went on, though, none of that mattered anymore. It was arguably one of the greatest concert experiences I’ve had in my life. It was definitely top 5, up there with Frank Ocean, Kanye, Dead & Company, and FKA twigs. 

The whole experience was articulated perfectly by this white dad who brought his pre-teen son to the show and called it an anti-concert.

Afterwards, I didn’t want to have my birthday hit while I was in an Uber or something, so I walked over to this bar literally called “That Bar” and had some questionable (creepy) locals try to involve me in their conversation about dating younger women with a 20 year age gap. I was turning 25, so I didn’t have much input to offer. Once again, surreal.

On my actual birthday, my mom was in the city. There were some factors that made this emotionally complicated for me, but I got brunch with her and the people she was visiting with and then decided I would spend the day to myself. I had tickets to see AceMoMA and other Nowadays DJs at a fundraiser for Good Room, but it got postponed due to the Omicron variant. It was cold and rainy that day even though the day before was weirdly sunny and in the 60s, so to make the most of the day I went to the Met, a place I knew I could spend hours inside. 

I walked through the cultural exhibits, listening to tracks off LTJ Bukem’s Earth collections of chill drum and bass. Eventually, I got to the surrealist exhibit. I listened to Agor by Koreless for the first time, and I was fully immersed. The music was extremely trippy and matched the visuals in the exhibit perfectly; it was an overwhelming sensory experience. Afterwards, I left the museum, appreciative of the day but ultimately still in a very weird headspace. I was reflecting on what it meant to be alone, especially in a world with the dual stressors of COVID and climate change–the fact that everything was getting canceled brought back difficult memories of March 2020, and the constant shifts in weather felt like a tangible impending crisis. As I did earlier in the month, I tried to just roll with it. 

I had tickets to see Spider-Man: No Way Home, so I attempted to get myself in a mindset for enjoying a fun movie. I don’t want to include any spoilers, but the movie ended up being pretty emotional and I was a wreck afterwards. The impressions I had back in July about nothing being promised were eating at me. I called my mom as I left the theater, realizing how foolish it would be for me to give up an opportunity to spend time with her. 

My mom came over to my apartment and for the first time I could see how she’s aged. I noticed the wrinkles forming on her face, the strands of her hair turning grey. As a kid, she would rub Vick’s vapor rub on my forehead when I didn’t feel well, and she did the same for me on my 25th birthday. The difference, though, was that it wasn’t in my childhood home, it was in my own apartment in downtown Manhattan. 

I recalled that my mom told me when I was a kid, I said I was going to be a doctor and live in NYC with a dog. While it hasn’t fully panned out that way (yet! I will have a dog at some point, doubtful about the doctor part), I couldn’t help but think about how surreal this was for her, too. She spent the night in my apartment, and I set her up in my bed and said goodnight as I went to go sleep on my couch. It was in that moment on my 25th birthday, tucking my mother into bed in my own apartment, that I felt I transitioned into adulthood.

The rest of the month wasn’t any less surreal. My sister and mom visited for the week of Christmas, and on the day my sister arrived I tested positive for COVID. We were left to quarantine in my small apartment, and somehow my mom and sister didn’t test positive afterwards. I spent a lot of time that week mixing with the music that I had been listening to. I was finally able to express the weirdness I had been feeling all month. 

The surreality culminated on a random night when I decided to go over to a friend’s apartment and play him the mixes. We listened to them alongside a spaceship visualizer, and it was awesome. That night I realized that December’s theme is THE VAST, split into a trilogy. All month I felt like Matthew McConaughey’s character in Interstellar or Sandra Bullock’s character in Gravity, floating aimlessly in space and left to reflect on the memories of life on earth. That same solitude in the vastness of space was related to the vastness of the ocean, floating at sea. 

There was one missing aspect, though, which is represented by the ?-side of the mix, entropy. It’s the chaos, the absurdity, the confusion–accepting that sometimes things don’t make sense, and laughing through it anyways.

Visuals to go with Act I: entropy

Visuals to go with Act II: ether

If you have Netflix, Act III: abyss we discovered that it syncs up perfectly with this episode of Night on Earth: “Dark Seas.”

I found that this month broadly wraps up all of the themes I’ve felt over the course of this year and serves as a worthy conclusion to this series. If you’ve read any of this, I hope you’ve found a part of it you’ve connected with, or at the very least found a song or two that you enjoy. 

Have a wonderful 2022. 

Peace, Michael

#trip report #music #music writing #lofi #reflects #the vast #SoundCloud #Youtube #dj #dj mix #mix

[silver-moon1]

Midnight in Paris

I think spiritual pilgrimages are entirely necessary especially at a young age. My mother made it a point to take me abroad to Italy after my high school graduation and I always appreciated the experiences that trip gave me. Italy has such rich culture and food, especially in Rome. I was amazed by all the monuments and left the experience feeling more knowledgeable of the history in Italy and arts.

After watching Midnight in Paris if I was going to pick some place new to travel I would absolutely go to Paris. After doing a little digging and research on travel to Paris, I would plan to go during the off season (since it won't be as busy with tourism), I would book a hotel in a central location, I would try to learn some basic French phrases before visiting, and I would make some dinner reservations in advance. Some sights I would definitely plan to go would have to be: the Eiffel tower, the louvre, the arc de triomphe, the notre dame cathedral, and the Luxembourg gardens. The easiest and most efficient way to go sight seeing (in my opinion) is to book a tour guide, so I would plan on booking those in advance too. I know this because when my mom and I went to Italy we were told not only is it safer to travel in a group, but it's a lot more convenient and time efficient.

I chose this location because I have never been to France, but I'm a big coffee girl and I really want to try their coffee and croissants. I also don't know too much about the culture or cousine, so I think it would be enlightening to explore those things. I have also always heard that the French are very rude to tourists, especially if you don't know their language, and I don't know why, but that is a theory I want to test. I am hopeful that it would be a pleasant experience, and even if the locals aren't so nice, I would completely imerse myself in the sights.

Based on my experience in Italy I think I would learn to be careful with my belongings. I was told there are a lot of pit pockets in Europe and to watch your purse/not keep anything valuable in back pockets. Also on the tours I would take I would hope to learn more about the history of the buildings, art, language, and cuisine. Something I have always wanted to do is take a french cooking class. I think this would be the perfect way to get to know locals and learn about their food. (I am a big foodie).

My ideal time to go here would probably be Christmas. When researching the off season, Paris is not as crowded during the months of November and December. I would rather be cold than in a crowded, busy, tourist environment. Plus Christmas in Paris can't be bad. My motivator to travel ultimately is my curiosity. Travel always takes me outside my comfort zone. It inspires me to see, try, and taste new things (it would be disrespectful to the culture not to). Plus I believe that it is necessary to make the absolute most out of every travel experience. I am a picky eater, but I hope that if I went to Paris that I would return having enjoyed a new food.

Relating to the movie I chose to watch for this week, Midnight in Paris, the big theme was that we often look into our past as better than the present. I think this was extremely enlightening. I never want to get to a place where I am so stuck in my past that I can't live in the present. There is so much to dream of and accomplish in life, travel especially. What the movie taught me was to live in the moment, explore passions and dreams, and that our celebrity idols/or people that we look up to might not be so glamorous as we imagined. I thought that the movie did a good job in that aspect. It made me realize that many of our idols or celebrities aren't perfect. The movie made me truly understand the meaning of "never meet your heros." When he went back into the past and met all the different celebrities of Paris, at that time, he learned a lot from them, but some didn't live up to the expectations he held in his mind. The movie is really about coming to terms with your life. It made me wonder if I would have any big realizations while traveling abroad. Makes me very eager to go out and see the world.

#midnights #parisfrance #france

[evilkritter]

Author Wars: Primordial Age

I’m running into the “ocean of backstory” problem here. I wanted to do a Timeline Summary in a single post but it became more of a complete Timeline Recap, and since the working-timeline I have for personal reference is ~15k that’s too long for what I want this to be. Lore isn’t immutable, the canon gets reshaped for the story, and there are a LOT of ideas I’m playing with that might get the axe within a few books. Especially when it comes to the Ages. Early, Middle, and Late is a common historical analytical lens, but for the Tumultuous Realm specifically it is a based on the Dominions 4x series. Those are the playable Ages, and there is a progression with Nations changing over time and the overall technological advancement of the world. But before any gods get established the world has to exist, and that’s when the Primordial Age comes in.

The Primordial Age, literally the first beginning Age (it’s such a good word) is where the really weird stuff happens. I’ll have to backfit so many things here when I come up with ideas. Myths and legends in more classical style happen here, and very literally. The World Flame Spell creates the Surface in very genesis-myth style. Took some inspiration from the Silmarillion, such as hundreds of years passing with only Fire Children and magic providing light, the Suns being created at the Surface Capital after a few hundred years. Still playing with details about who makes which Sun, there might just be two at first sitting stationary in the sky and dimming for night.

The Elemental Races are created as a result of the World Flame spell, but they are all sub-surface and don’t really reveal themselves until after founding the Elemental Courts. Fire, Earth, and Water each have their own court and make up the Three Elemental Magics. Having Air be a type of magic but not an element, because it doesn’t spawn elementals, is very funny to me and I have some ideas of how to play with an Avatar crossover homage. Fire Children being more aligned with Life magic than Fire, maybe even having no affinity for Fire, is also funny to me.

A lot of things counter intuitively don’t happen here also. The Surface Capital (later to be the Frozen Capital) is established when the Citadel lands. The Ark of Souls is reactivated and it begins collecting the Souls of anyone who dies, and it begins collecting the Souls of Fire Children, though the Humans of Before don’t notice that until later. The major human afterlives don’t get created until the Middle Age.

Large chunks of story happen pre City-State, and anarchy/nationless thinking survives to modern day because of how recent that was. 3k years as opposed to 100k of humans existing. Not gonna get into how it still exists for populations in the real world, that’s a rabbit hole.

The earliest nations have roots in the Primordial Age but aren’t recognized by most diegetic historians until the Early Age. Pythium is established, the Snake/Hydra-Themed Rome analogue that becomes a Oligarchic disaster in the Middle Age, and Undead Apocalypse Nightmare in the Late Age. The Avkari Empire which is monkey-people with Dominions-based Hindi inspiration heavily diluted by all the Furry Shit that I am pouring in.

I pushed a lot of major players up to be Late Age newcomers so there’s not as much here as there used to be. I think that having major players be super ancient/entrenched is a writing decision that a lot of writers (myself included) make without considering the implications. Which doesn’t tend to bite them in the ass until they start writing prequels and then it bites their entire ass off. It’s a big part of why I went with the “new world made of magic” approach way back in high school. Now the artificiality and malleability of the world are major influences on the themes and concepts I want to write about.

The youth of Mother Nilra is the biggest story thread in the Primordial Age. Might get a book at some point but probably set in the Late Age with a lot of looking back/reference rather than being about the Primordial Age. Spoiler, she comes from the future and gives birth to herself, Old Mother Nilra mentors Young Nilra and then dies. The Tumultuous Realm: Goddess post covers that. Then Nilra gives (virgin) birth to the first of the Nagaran race, and her brother Oriro is weird and jealous about her having her first kids without him. Mother Nilra gives birth to many races, most of which can interbreed, then she marries Oriro because mythological Goddesses are all about that incest. Also she thinks it will help him chill. It does not. A bunch of important goddesses are born (worth noting that the default term is goddess rather than god, in reference and reverance to Old Mother Nilra), not gonna list them here and also the list will probably grow over time.

The marriage isn’t really working out and Nilra sort of wanders around practicing philosophy and religion while Oriro tries to bully people into letting him rule the world. Lots of sacred texts and lost sacred texts from Nilra’s early writings and the works of his collaborators/peers, any disciples or apprentices tend to move on to their own works fairly quickly or become groupies too awed to really appreciate her work.

Primordial Age ends when Oriro escalates to declaring himself the goddess over all other goddesses and declares himself Pantakrator. The creation of the title inspires his opponents to contest it. The Early Age dawns.

#AWLore #AuthorWars

[wazzupmrstark]

instead of you [part fourteen]

pairing: [best friend’s brother] tom holland x college!reader

summary: you didn’t expect to spend your summer pretending to be your best friend’s girlfriend- then again, you didn’t expect to fall for your best friend’s brother, either.

warnings: swearing, alcohol consumption

word count: 2.6k

series masterlist

“Just that you’re not technically a chef yet,” Tom explained defensively. “You’re not certified.”

“A chef doesn’t need a piece of paper to call themselves a chef,” Leo countered. “Anyone can be a chef. But don’t tell the WAC I said that.”

“Yeah, Tom haven’t you ever seen Ratatouille?” you teased.

“Great movie,” Leo added. “Sam, great job on your dough,” he reiterated.

Sam stuck his tongue out at his brother across the table who rolled his eyes in response as Leo picked up his ball of dough and rolled it in his hands.

“Tom, yours is still a little tough. Keep working on it.”

He nodded and took his dough back to continue kneading it. You noticed his jaw clenched subtly in frustration, but he didn’t say anything else. You watched as he rolled the pasta dough with a little more force, maybe a little too much.

Leo checked yours next and gave you similar feedback to Tom’s, even though Sam had helped you with yours. You didn’t want to think about what kind of feedback you would have gotten on your own.

Your dough was still flaking apart when you went back to working on it, and you tried desperately to hold it together with little success. Sam had left your side to help his mom so you were on your own.

At least Tom was also struggling. You felt a little better knowing he was miserable too.

You were starting to sweat with effort, you were so out of shape that even cooking had you catching your breath. You had thought this was going to be fun, but instead you were having flashbacks to high school P.E. class.

Leo made his way down the rest of the table and checked everyone else’s dough before circling back to you and Tom. He took over for Tom and instructed Sam to finish kneading yours so that he could move on with the lesson. It was embarrassing to be singled out, but Sam assured you it wasn’t your fault. He wasn’t making much progress with yours either.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with yours,” Sam whispered to you.

“I probably did it wrong,” you hissed back.

“I watched you do it, you did it the same way as everyone else.”

“Then why is it being like this?”

“Sometimes food has a mind of its own,” Leo interjected, making you realize the entire class had been listening to you and Sam’s back and forth. “This is good enough, though. We can set it aside with the other balls of dough to let them rest while we make the fillings.”

You and Tom set your sad pasta balls on the counter with the others before moving to the sink to rinse your hands.

“I think they’ll still taste good,” Tom said thoughtfully as he offered the bottle of soap to you and pumped some into your hands.

“I hope so.”

“It’s pasta, it’s almost impossible to fuck it up.”

“Yet somehow we still managed to.”

“Some would say it’s talent,” he said and shrugged.

You bumped his shoulder with your own as you fought over the water stream. You managed to stick your hands in first and Tom put his above yours only for you to shove them away.

“Hey!”

“You’re completely ruining the purpose of washing my hands!”

“I have soap on my hands, you have soap on your hands, what's the issue?”

“And you’re washing off your germs and they’re going on my hands now!”

“Fine, fine, I’ll wait my turn,” he seceded and let you finish washing your hands before he rinsed off his own.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Making the fillings for the pasta was a much simpler process than making the dough. All you had to do was mix certain ingredients together. It didn’t matter what order you added them, if you whisked fast or slow, the only important thing was that everything made it into the bowl one way or another.

You worked in pairs for this step. Sam mixed together the pesto filling while you did the parmesan-truffle one.

“This is different than the pesto I make,” he said, looking at the mixture in his bowl.

You frowned. “But I like your pesto.”

“It’ll still be good, baby,” he assured you with a kiss to the forehead. “Don’t worry.”

When the fillings were done it was time to revisit the balls of dough and roll them into pasta. Sam explained it to you like rolling Play-Doh, but it was far more difficult in your opinion. Play-Doh was nowhere near as stubborn as this. The pasta dough somehow retained tension, and would bounce back every time you tried to stretch it.

Sam ended up having to help you and Tom because both of you were starting at a disadvantage with your fucked up dough.

“I never want to hear you say I have it easier than you ever again,” Sam warned as he folded your strands of dough into raviolis.

The class had moved on to the final step, shaping and filling the noodles, but you had already tapped out. Sam was done with his portion before you had even finished one so he had taken over for you.

“I’m sorry for saying that,” you said, remembering all the times you had teased him for stressing out over his ‘soufflé final’ or ‘crepe labs’. “I would much rather be writing a paper right now.”

He shrugged. “Everyone has their strengths.”

“I’m starting to think that Ratatouille movie was bullshit,” you groaned.

“How ironic,” Tom snorted across from you.

He was really starting to get on your nerves. But you let his comment go, not allowing your temper to get the better of you. He was still Sam’s family, even if they had a... complicated relationship.

When the class finally settled in the dining room of the restaurant to eat you were sweaty, sore, and exhausted. You could feel your skin sticking to the leather seat, and you felt severely underdressed. Back in the kitchen you hadn’t been so self-conscious. But now you couldn’t stop thinking about your appearance.

The atmosphere was much more sophisticated. The lights were dim, and soft music played in the background. All of the other guests were following an unspoken black-tie dress code while the fifteen of you were still wearing your disposable aprons, only now they were covered in flour and egg yolk.

And to make it worse-

“Smile!”

Nikki held up her phone and motioned for you and Sam to scoot your chairs closer together. You took a deep breath and complied, leaning your head against your fake boyfriend’s and managing a grin. You really didn’t want this moment to be immortalized, but you didn’t want to be difficult either.

The camera flashed once, then again. Sam wrapped a hand around your waist and pulled your body against his, pressing a kiss to your cheek for another picture. You scrunched up your face as the flash went off, the tickle of his breath against your skin and the feather-light touch of his lips making you squeeze your eyes shut.

“That’s a good one!” Nikki complimented, even though you were sure it wasn’t as flattering as she was making it out to be.

The pasta was served with a glass of red wine for everyone. Sam was right, the pesto was different from his, but it was still good. It was no match for his recipe, but the handmade pasta did give it a few bonus points. You were sure you hadn’t gotten any of the noodles you made because all of the ones on your plate were perfect. It didn’t feel fair that you got to enjoy somebody else’s hard work while they got your shitty excuse of a ravioli.

But as the wine dwindled from your glass the negative thoughts began to ebb away too. Your muscles, though still sore, relaxed slightly and you rested your head on Sam’s shoulder as everyone else finished their meals around you. The conversation carried on without your contribution. Your social battery had died hours ago, but you were content to listen to the Hollands chat with other students at the table.

You weren’t a huge fan of wine, but the one served with dinner was palatable, and to be honest you weren’t one to turn down complimentary alcohol anyway. It tasted more expensive than anything you had ever drank, like the equivalent of velvet on your tongue. You finished your glass and the rest of Harry’s.

-

The next few days in Florence passed in a similar fashion. You ate a lot of carbs, drank a lot of alcohol and let the business of the itinerary overwhelm you. It was getting tiring, living in an act. Trailing along behind the Hollands like a dog, worn on Sam’s arm like an accessory.

You had known what you were getting into, and you were trying your best to enjoy the experiences- because who the fuck knows when you’ll ever get to go on such a nice vacation again, but pretending to be in love with your best friend was a harder feat than you had thought.

It felt like being in a school play. Every move and phrase had to be intentional. You tread the lines of your relationship with rehearsed expertise. And you had to watch what you said, because everyone’s eyes were on you. At least that’s what it felt like.

Sam’s parents were easy. They fully bought into your lie, seeing what they wanted to. They usually left you to your own devices, too. His brothers were the ones who needed convincing. Not even Harry, though. Tom was the problem. Tom was always the problem.

You were in Rome now, walking back to the hotel from the Colosseum. Sam had his arm slung around your shoulders and was talking his twin brother’s ear off about the Gladiators and inaccuracies in films about Ancient Rome.

You didn’t think you’d seen him this excited the entire trip. It was cute, the way he talked with his hands and looked off into the distance whenever he was really engaged in something. Harry was also cute. He was trying his best to keep up with Sam, nodding his head at all the right points, asking questions when there was a pause in conversation.

“Yeah, gladiators fucking unionized,” Sam explained. “They put their lives on the line all the time, ya know? Might as well get benefits.”

“If I was a gladiator I’d join their union,” you said, adding to the conversation for the first time in a while.

“There were women gladiators too, babe! You totally could’ve been one.”

You laughed. “You remember my season on the intramural dodgeball team? I wouldn’t last a day. But I appreciate the thought, Sammy.”

You had dinner in the restaurant attached to the hotel lobby. Nikki passed around her Canon for everyone to look through the pictures from the day while a bottle of limoncello was passed around the table.

You’d scarfed down your pasta and passed on dessert in favor of another shot of limoncello. Rookie mistake.

In the past the sugary drink had always tasted like cough syrup to you, but this batch tasted like straight-up lemonade. You were tipsy, bordering on drunk, but nowhere near blacked. Nikki and Dom turned in around shot three, leaving the tab open for the four of you. Sam went upstairs next, having gone too hard too fast on the limoncello (he was on shot five when his parents went back to their room).

Then it was just You, Harry, and Tom. You told Sam you’d join him in a bit after the pianist played a couple more songs. In all honesty, the music reminded you of Sam. Back at school you could always find Sam in the music hall if he wasn’t in the culinary building. You’d always hear him playing as soon as you walked through the double doors. You could always tell it was him at the keys by the way the playing sounded. He was self-taught, but still a genius in your mind. He didn’t need any formal training to make beautiful music, and that’s what you loved about it.

When he moved out of the dorms and into an apartment he bought a keyboard, and you’d spend nights together in his room illegally pirating sheet music for him to learn new songs. He’d play whatever you requested, and if he didn’t know how to play it he’d teach himself.

The pianist in the restaurant played with a little more expertise. The notes sounded refined, perfected. Sam always told you that perfect music was restrained music, that real music had flaws, that a song should sound a little different every time it was played.

After an encore of Beethoven the man at the piano stood from his bench and took a bow, passing his hat around the room to collect tips. Tom dropped a bill into the hat and you did as well, handing it back to the man afterwards. He dumped the contents of the hat into a briefcase and closed the lid of the piano, thanking everyone in the audience for their donations.

“Well, I think I’m going to head up now,” Harry said, yawning for emphasis. “We still have to get up at the ass crack of dawn even though we’ll all probably be hungover.”

“Speak for yourself,” Tom said cockily, then turned to you. “One more shot?”

The bottle of limoncello was almost empty anyway. Might as well finish it off, it’d be a shame to let it go to waste, right?

“Hit me.”

“God, you’re both going to be so fucked tomorrow,” Harry groaned.

“We’ll be fine,” Tom insisted, rolling his eyes at his younger brother.

“Good night, Harry,” you sang, waving at him as he walked off.

“Yeah whatever.”

Tom wasted no time pouring you both a shot of what was left of the limoncello. The restaurant was beginning to clear out so he worked fast, filling the glasses up to the marked line. You both took one and clinked them together before throwing them back.

You winced at the burning sensation in the back of your throat and put the glass back on the table, searching for something to chase the shot with. Your eyes fell to Tom, lingering on his cheeks, his lips, both pink from the alcohol or something else. You flicked your gaze down to his neck, his collarbone that was peeking out from the neckline of his shirt. You thought about how it would feel to kiss him there, to run your tongue over a love bite you’d given him.

You forced your gaze back to his eyes, hoping he hadn’t caught you staring. You had to act uninterested, you couldn’t let on to- but he was staring back. His eyes were intense, and almost impossible to read in the darkness of the room. You knew you should look away, knew you had to keep up appearances, but you couldn’t.

Later you’d blame it on the alcohol, but in that moment you knew the limoncello wasn’t what was making your head spin, or your what was making your vision cloudy.

You were about to leave the table, about to rush to the elevator and back to Sam but then suddenly Tom was kissing you. He cradled your head in his hand and tilted your chin up to meet his lips. It wasn’t desperate or messy like most drunk kisses were. Instead, it was delicate. You swore you could feel every line of his lips against yours, feel his heartbeat through his hands on your cheek.

It was only for a second, not enough time for you to react or reciprocate and then he was pulling away, eyes wide with panic.

“Please don’t tell Sam.”

logging off before i get yelled at but lmk what you think i always appreciate feedback!!

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[wiypt-writes]

25 Days Of CHRIS-mas

Day 1: Suck Me Under The Mistletoe

Summary: You attend a Frat Christmas Party and attract the attention of a handsome jock…

Pairing: Jake Wyler (Not Another Teen Movie) x Reader

Warnings: Bad Language, Adult situations, Alcohol, Smut (NSFW, 18+)

W/C: 913

Disclaimer: This is a pure work of fiction, any likeness to any persons or events in real life are purely co-incidental. I do not own any characters contained herein bar the reader and/or any original characters. I do not give consent for my work to be copied and posted/translated onto any other sites. If you see this fiction anywhere other than Tumblr, it has been taken without permission.By reading beyond this point you understand and accept the terms of this disclaimer and ALL warnings posted here.

25 Days Of Chris-mas Masterlist / Main Masterlist

The techno Christmas tunes blared through the frat house as pledges swarmed with their chores, house bunnies in their little elf costumes looked like Hefner's rejects.

You still weren’t quite sure what you were doing here, it totally wasn’t your scene but, well, when in Rome and all that.

You'd been accepted into your sorority but you were not the typical college girl. It looked good on applications and med school letters of recommendation. Yet, here you were, dressed as an elf, like your sisters and earning the eye of a handful of the jocks that plagued the house.

You stood up, plastic red cup in your hand and headed towards the keg for a refill.

"Hi," the smug, tall, black hair and blue-eyed ugly sweater wearing frat boy said as he leaned on the wall by the keg.

“Hi.” You gave him a polite nod as you refilled your cup. “Nice…sweater.”

Your eyes roamed over the Joint Smoking Jesus sitting on Rudolph.

“My mom got it me,” the guy said and you blinked looking back at him.

“Seriously?”

"Yeah." He quirked a brow. "I'm Jake."

“Y/N,” you supplied, taking a sip from your now filled cup.

"Cool."

There was an awkward silence and you flicked your brows up. “Right, so I, errr, I should… go and sit back down… over there.” You turned on your heel to leave.

"Right," Jake nodded and watched you go.

But that wasn't the last you'd seen of Jake. His eyes had been on yours all night, watching you, and you liked it. As you kept thinking, 'when in Rome'.

So, by the end of the night when you were several beers and a fair few shots in, you didn’t even blink an eye when some douchebag decided it would be amusing to play spin the bottle.

"Fucking high school games!" You snorted as you plopped down on the carpet.

"With college rules," one of your sisters chimed.

“What’s… what’s college rules?” You hiccupped.

“So, like if the bottle lands on you, you gotta kiss the part of the body the person who was spinning specifies.” Jake chipped in, and your nerves tingled as your eyes met his and he arched a brow suggestively.

The game began, and two by two the party began pairing off, coming back with smirks on their faces. And then, Jake reached over for the empty vodka bottle, curling his hand round the middle.

“Let’s see who the lucky girl is gonna be!” He smirked and a few of the other females giggled as he gave a twist of his wrist, sending it spinning.

Your eyes transfixed on the object, dizzying you as it went and then, that neck stopped... right... in... front... of... you!

You’re eyes widened as your friend to your right nudged your harshly with her elbow.

Smirking smugly, Jake stood and extended his hand, "Y/N...."

You rose to your feet and slipped your hand in his, allowing him to lead you out of the common room.

You headed out of the common room and up to the rooms. All the while still being led by Jake with onlookers coming out of their rooms looking like they scored. Who would have thought? You inwardly rolled your eyes and now here you were just like the house bunnies glaring at you as you were no doubt about to score with their preferred bottle champion.

Jake stopped outside a door on the left and opened it, allowing you in first.

His room was typical, full size bed, surprisingly clean and bed made. You sat on the edge and sorta swung your feet anxiously.

“So, you know the rules?” Jake spoke, “I spun, so I get to choose where you gotta kiss me.”

"Yep. Seems like it. So...." you knew exactly where this was going. "Drop your pants, Jake."

With a smirk, his hands went to the button at the top of his flies. He worked the zip down, and in a quick shove pushed his boxers and his jeans down to his knees.

Already semi-hard, you got a good look at him. He was thick, long and...

"Are you serious?" You snorted.

Jake grinned as he glanced down, staring at the bunch of mistletoe that was tied around the base of his cock, the green leaves and white berries nestled into the nest curls of his pubes.

“Babe, I said I’d get you a Christmas surprise and here it is.”

"Jake!"

"What?!"

"What the fuck would you have done if you didn't land on me?!"

“Same as you would have done when it was your turn if you didn’t land on me!” He shot back.

"Which was what? I'd have passed, you dick. Or kissed them on the spot!"

“Exactly,” he groaned, “I wasn’t gonna drop my pants for anyone else, Y/N. You just got lucky, you get the kiss me under the mistletoe now instead of later! Or should that be suck me under the mistletoe?”

"You're lucky I like you enough to put up with your weird shit." You got on your knees and started stroking him until he was hard. Your free hand rolling his sack in your palm.

You kissed the tip of his cock and licked the underside of his shaft.

“You know, most boys get their girls perfume, or jewellery for Christmas.” You scoffed, blinking up at him as his hand settled in your hair.

“I can make it a pearl necklace if you want.”

🎄🎄🎄🎄

Day 2: Kyle (The Perfect Score)

#wiypt25daysofchrismas #Jake Wyler #Jake Wyler x reader #reader insert #chris evans character

[umbran6]

Hogwarts Houses for the Heroes of Olympus, Apollo, and Meg.

I’ve seen a lot of people do this, so I thought I should do this and explain as to why I wanted them there. Spoilers are abound through Heroes of Olympus and Trials of Apollo as I explain my reasoning. 

Percy Jackson: Hufflepuff. Look, I know a lot of people place him in Gryffindor. That’s a reasonable outcome one can reach, considering his feats could be considered immensely brave. However, Percy has often participated in his quests out of a sense of loyalty towards those he loves, whether it’s his mom (The Lightning Thief), Camp Half-Blood (The Sea of Monsters), Annabeth (Both The Titan’s Curse and Battle of The Labyrinth), and in The Last Olympian, all of them. What really pins him in place is when he willingly fallis to Tartarus alongside Annabeth by the ending of The Mark of Athena, which is a remarkable yet insane feat of both love and loyalty. He also has a work ethic, which is revealed during The Tower of Nero. Rather than just go straight to New Rome and live a happy life, he went to a hellish military school just so he could graduate from there with a high school diploma. If that’s not a work ethic, I don’t know what is. Loyalty and work ethic are key Hufflepuff traits, and Percy has shown all of them. 

Annabeth Chase: Slytherin. Annabeth has often shown a lot of intelligence, but also a lot of resourcefulness and cunning during her time in the series. She literally tricked both Arachne and Nyx in what were impossible situations, and her goals are extremely ambitious, with her wanting to become an architect so she could build something that could last a thousand years. She also has a lot of Ravenclaw traits, to the point she repeated Odysseus and listened to the Sirens so she could learn what she desired the most. However, that was only once, and most often she used the knowledge she was given in resourceful and cunning ways, such as during the Last Olympian where she used the statues from Daedalus as a way to defend Manhattan. Needless to say, in my opinion she is a Slytherin first and Ravenclaw second. 

Jason Grace: It’s quite tricky, considering we don’t get to see any key defining traits, but I have decided to put him in Gryffindor. Jason’s shown plenty of bravery, fighting Giants and Titans during his quest, but he also has honor and chivalry, which he shows during Blood of Olympus, and later on, The Burning Maze. Specifically, in the scene where he makes a deal with Kymopoleia, promising to make shrines not only to her, but to all of the hundreds of minor gods of Greek Mythology. As we later see during The Burning Maze, Jason was completely willing to honor such a deal, working on the shrines even while he was living the closest thing to a normal life one could achieve as a demigod. And of course, we can’t ignore the fact that he was brave to fight Caligula just so his friends could escape. 

Piper Mclean: Slytherin. This is because during most of the time we’ve seen her, Piper fights dirty. She doesn’t stab a monster in the dagger, but charmspeaks the monster and stabs him in the back while he’s distracted. When claiming the position as Cabin Counselor in the Aphrodite Cabin during The Lost Hero from Drew, Piper uses the rules against her to get the position, rather than straight-up fighting her at the very beginning. Furthermore, rather than fight Khione upfront during the House of Hades, she bides her time and stalls the goddess until she can find a way to win. Though she has some traits that could go along with the other Houses, Slytherin tends to stand out the best. The only way she isn’t Slytherin in terms of traits is that she lacks ambition — we never see her have a higher goal beyond the quest, or any plans for what she’s going to do after everything’s done. Overall, she’s Slytherin through her actions, not her words, ironically. 

Frank Zhang: Gryffindor. This is because Frank performs a lot of actions that are by any standard, brave, and often selfless and self-sacrificial. Specifically, a lot of the sacrifices he performs throughout the series. In Son of Neptune, he was willing to be the distraction against the Laestrygonians so that Percy and Hazel could start their escape plan. He was literally willing to burn his own life force (his stick) so that Thanatos could break free despite the very large risk it posed to him. He even stood in the way of a Giant, pushing him all the way to the Canadian border. And as we learn in The Tyrant’s Tomb, he was willing to repeat his sacrifice if it meant Caligula and Commodus were killed.  Frank is a Gryffindor through and through, though he does have some minor Ravenclaw traits such as his use of tactics against his opponents, way of making plans, or recalling ancient Roman history. 

Hazel Levesque: Once again, this was another difficult one. Mainly because Hazel is split right down to the middle between Hufflepuff and Gryffindor. On one hand, she was so loyal to her mother that despite the fact that the lady got them into this mess, Hazel willingly sacrificed Elysium so her mom wasn’t punished. On the other hand, she was also willing to sacrifice herself so Alcyoneus couldn’t rise again despite the fact that it would lead to her and her mom’s death. Finally, I decided she deserved to go to Gryffindor, because of the fact that she willingly went towards the quest to rescue Thanatos in The Son of Neptune despite the fact that it was very likely that the god of Death would take her back to the Underworld. That takes immense amounts of bravery, not only because it’s the right thing to do, but she’s also putting herself at immense risk of being dragged down to the Underworld. 

There are some Slytherin traits, such as when she made a plan to trick Sciron during the House of Hades, or the plan to trap Nike. However, Hazel’s a lot more defined by her bravery and empathy, which are more Gryffindor traits. If she had more ambition, a big goal after the quest it could be understood, but overall her Gryffindor traits are more prominent. For example, let’s compare how she got to Praetor and Octavian got to Praetor, and later on, Pontifex Maximus. Octavian often used a lot of word-twisting and dirty tactics to get his position, and only got there because Reyna left her post so she could help Jason. In comparison, the legion willingly raised her on a shield and collectively voted her into the position due to her bravery during the fight against Tarquin in The Tyrant’s Tomb. 

Leo Valdez: There have been arguments over where he should go. All of them want him in one house or the other, but the most convincing ones were either having him in Slytherin, or in Ravenclaw. And I can definitely agree with both — Leo has shown immense amounts of intelligence and cunning throughout the series.  He’s also intelligent in the sense that he created the Argo II, multiple weapons, the Holographic Scrolls, and even Buford. 

However, after looking through his actions, I found that he leans more towards Slytherin. Although his façade of cheerfulness and humor was used to disguise trauma, he also used said humor to make himself appealing towards bullies so they didn’t beat him up. He often used his cunning to morph himself to social situations such as his façade as a jokester to look less threatening in comparison to others. 

During the times we see him fight, he’s also the one to not only play it smart, but also using tactics and dirty tricks, rather than focusing on swordplay or his own fire powers. The only time we see him go ham with his pyrokinesis is when he’s fighting Khione during The Lost Hero. Furthermore, in The Mark of Athena, rather than straight-up fight the nymphs and Narcissus to get the celestial bronze he needed to make repairs, he uses himself as a distraction and has Hazel manipulate the bronze in a place where she can’t be seen, which is a plan that needs a lot of manipulation of the opposing parties.

What finally acted as the nail in the coffin for me was his plan to defeat Gaea during Blood of Olympus. It involved a lot of manipulation of both enemies and allies, and in the ended it succeeded so brilliantly that everybody got what they wanted, with none of them being aware of the plan until Frank and Hazel explained it, and they were the very few people in the know regarding Leo’s sacrifice. Developing such a plan takes immense amounts of cunning and ambition, which are both Slytherin traits. Although he may be chaotic, mischievous, and annoying, Leo is the guy you don’t realize is a Slytherin until it’s too late.

Nico di Angelo: The thing about a guy who was pretty much a loner throughout most of his time in the series is that it’s hard to tell what values he has. Ergo, we should look at his actions rather than his own words. Nico, although mainly dominated by his naïveté during his younger years, has shown himself to be extremely brave. For example, there was him openly defying his father by saving Percy from his imprisonment, and later actively convincing Hades to stop his vow of neutrality and fight alongside the Olympians in The Last Olympian. Finally, there’s his excursion to Tartarus and later his willingness to transport the Athena Parthenos during Blood of Olympus. Nico willingly went there to see if the Doors of Death were over there, and later transported the Athena Parthenos to Camp Half-Blood even if it meant he would fade into the shadows forever. All feats are insanely brave, and therefore I argue that he should go to Gryffindor. 

Reyna Avila Ramirez Arellano: Hufflepuff. Most of Reyna’s actions aren’t inspired by bravery, honor, or chivalry, though from a certain point of view they are brave. Reyna often performs most of her actions out of loyalty for those she cares about, almost in a Percy-ish kind of way. Her interrogation and cold nature towards Percy in Son of Neptune? Suspicion that he would be a threat to Camp Jupiter. She metaphorically fought against Octavian’s power advances because she knew his own ambitions wouldn’t help New Rome. Willingness to cooperate with the Greeks before the Eidolons screwed up everything? She believed that it was best for New Rome. Willingness to brave the Mare Nostrum all by herself? Both her loyalty to Jason and that she believed that waging war against Camp Half-Blood was not the best for the legion. Her loyalty and ethic just make her a shoe-in for Hufflepuff. 

Apollo/Lester Papadopoulos: Oh boy, he’s kind of at an in-between when it comes what house he should be in. If we were talking about him pre-Lesterfication, I would honestly say Hufflepuff, but he takes a good chunk of those traits and turned them into a darker way. He defeated Python because the snake monster had chased his mother off of Delphi. He alongside Artemis murdered Niobe’s kids because the goddess insulted Leto by saying she was better than her. When Asclepius is murdered by Zeus, he retaliates by murdering the Cyclopes who made the weapons. And finally, he punishes those who broke their vows He shows loyalty, but in a lot of darker ways that we don’t expect. He’s got Hufflepuff morals, but they’re in a darker, more warped way than we expect. 

If we’re looking at him post-Lesterfication, I would still say Hufflepuff, but now he does it in a brighter way and is also more Gryffindor. He was more willing to sacrifice himself if it meant saving those he cared about, such as when he willingly tried to kill himself during The Burning Maze if it meant Caligula would stop holding his friends hostage. He was also willing to commit more honorable gestures such as bringing Jason’s body to New Rome during The Tyrant’s Tomb. He was even willing to own up to his mistakes right in front of a god who had every right to hate him if it meant Meg and Reyna could be spared. He’s still a Hufflepuff, but he’s a more idealistic and less warped version of the values he had before he became Lester. 

Meg: In a way, she’s pretty much like Apollo. She’s a Hufflepuff, but in all the wrong ways at first. We see this in The Dark Prophecy when its clear that during that time, she was more loyal to Nero of all people rather than her fellow campers, to the point of accepting Nero’s gaslighting if it meant she could see the positive view of him. However, she’s also loyal to Apollo and her father, which we see in The Burning Maze because the main reason she guns for Caligula is because she often compares him to The Beast aspect of Nero, the person who killed her dad. She in the end is also willing to accept and finish her father’s legacy, planting the seeds that eventually become the Meliai. Tower of Nero is when she gains the will to stand up to Nero after support from Apollo and her friends, and is later on seen taking care of the other children Nero abused. In the end, she’s a Hufflepuff despite the fact that she may not look like it. 

Now, before you guys getting up in arms about there being no Ravenclaws, in my opinion the house is a lot more knowledge-focused, whether its discovering more knowledge, but also using it in a more academic and experimental way. Considering we don’t see this attitude or its corresponding values too much during the stories that we see since they’re more save-the-world mission focused. While Slytherin does have an intelligence-centric value such as cunning, its more focused on using such intelligence to manipulate and trick others, while Ravenclaw uses such intelligence in the discovery for knowledge. 

#Leo Valdez #percy jackson #hazel levesque #meg mccaffrey #lester papadopoulos #apollo #frank zhang #Hazel Levesque #jason grace #piper mclean #reyna avila ramirez arellano #nico di angelo #hogwarts houses #Gryffindor #Slytherin #Hufflepuff #Ravenclaw #Sorry Ravenclaws #Hogwarts Houses through Character Analysis #I'm sorry I made it an essay long #pjoverse #pjo series #Harry Potter series (in name only) #hoo

[that-sarcastic-writer]

Coach (1)

Fandom: Dylan O'Brien

Pairing: AU Dylan x Fem!Reader

Mini series summary: Being a newly single mom of two kids wasn't exactly easy. And love wasn't exactly part of your agenda. So, should you avoid lusting over your son's baseball coach? Absolutely. But with a man like Dylan, could you really resist? Probably not.

Warnings: nothing major yet, small sexual innuendo, mentions of cheating and divorce

WC: 1.9k

A/N: a yes, to those who have been following me for a while may recognize this title, it's my old Dylan AU fic. Yes I decided to continue it. Updates will come periodically, because I write spontaneously and I cant guarantee quick updates. But I do promise I wont wait a whole year to update. And since I did some slight updates in the first 2 parts I decided to archive the old ones and repost them again. So yeah, if you've read them before great, give it another read, my writing is much better now I promise and if you're new welcome, I hope you like this mini series.

(You are here, part 2, part 3)

Dylan stood by the side of the large field, near the home plate, occasionally yelling out suggestions and pointing out mistakes to the young boys. 

"Ezra! You have to watch the ball! C'mon! I know you can do better!" He called out to the blonde boy standing on the home plate with a bat in hand. Dylan then turned his attention to the dark haired boy with the baseball mitt and ball in hand.

"Roman! What's going on, buddy? You gotta focus, alright? You gotta work on that throw!" Dylan called out to the young boy, who half nodded and sighed heavily in response.

Not long after, Dylan signaled the young boys scattered throughout the large field to gather around. He spoke some encouraging words to the boys before allowing them to disperse and gather their equipment which meant practice was over.

Your son, however, stayed behind for a minute. There was an inaudible conversation happening between Dylan and your ten year-old, Roman. You watched from the bleachers as your son made some tired gestures at his coach followed by a small pat on the back from Dylan. You couldn't help but follow them with your eyes as they made their way to the bleachers, your eyes lingering a bit too long on the brown haired coach. An action that wasn't taken lightly by the female sitting beside you.

"You're staring at him again." Your best friend, Ezra's mother, Eliza -or just Liz, commented.

"I'm not." You muttered out quickly, tearing your eyes away from the handsome coach, your mouth hanging open for a couple of seconds. "I wasn't staring." You stated matter of factly and shrugged as you looked down at the small six year-old sitting on your lap, making sure she wasn't paying attention to the conversation.

"Really? The drool coming from your mouth says otherwise." Liz playfully ran her finger across your chin, pretending to wipe away at it. You slightly glared at her, an eye roll going her way.

"I'm not drooling. I wasn't even staring." You tried to defend yourself, making a small sassy gesture to her.

"Hey, I don't blame you. If I wasn't married," she took a pause as she eyed Dylan as he removed his baseball hat to run a hand through his messy chocolate locks, you couldn't help but stare as well. "I'd jump on his bones any day."

"Hey, there's young ears present." You said quietly to Liz as not to disturb the young girl in your arms.

Despite your attempt not to, you couldn't help but allow your eyes to fall once again on the field, following the handsome male that was the topic of your conversation. You had to hide the infatuated sigh that left your lips at the sight of your son's coach running around the field, talking to the kids and picking up equipment.

"Well he is handsome, I'll give him that.." You admitted quietly, "and he's really good with the kids."

Your friend smirked slightly at your words and wiggled her eyebrows at you.

"I bet that's not the only thing he's really good at." She eyed you suggestively and slightly nudged at you with her shoulder, "You should find out what other things he's good at."

Your mouth instantly fell open and your eyes widened at the insinuation.

"Eliza! Oh, my god. Don't say that." You slightly shook your head to brush off the embarrassment and hid your face on your hands to cover the crimson on your skin.

"Mommy you're warm!" Athena, your six year-old giggled as she grabbed your warm, sweaty hands. Even your daughter noticed the nervousness that crept up on you when it came to Dylan, even if it was just the topic of him. Truth was, you had been shamelessly crushing on your son's baseball coach ever since he joined the team a couple of months ago. 

Get it together, you should not be crushing on your son's baseball coach.

"I know baby, it's just hot out here." You tried to brush it off, but the knowing smirk on Liz's face wasn't exactly helping. "Thena, why don't you go get Roman and Ezra? They're over there." You pointed to the field where Roman and Ezra were talking —or more like just Ezra was, to the other kids on the team. She quickly nodded and bolted off the bleachers, somehow not tripping over the steps as she went down. You sighed heavily the moment the young girl was far enough and slightly turned your head in Liz's direction.

"You should totally ask him out." She said out of nowhere with a shrug and a smirk on her face. Your eyes widened for the hundredth time, and you instantly shook your head frantically, the idea alone giving you a headache.

"Ask Dylan out? No way. I.. No.. That's just.. No." Your cheeks slightly heat up at the preposition. But you quickly turned it down with a vigorous shake of your head, not even giving the idea a minute to sink into your brain. "No, he's Roman's coach. It's just wrong."

"Why? I mean, you're single, and as far as I know, he's very single. Soo," she dragged the 'o' as she wiggled her eyebrows and she nudged your shoulder, pushing you over a little in a high school girl manner, "Why not get ready to mingle with the hot coach?"

"First of all, I'm technically not single, not yet." You groaned with an eyeroll. As much as you and your husband —or ex-husband or whatever were no longer living together, the divorce process had been unnecessarily long and dreadful. So as much as you wanted to be legally single, you were still married to that piece of shit. 

"And second of all, if I were to date someone, which is a big if, I can't date Roman's coach out of all people. He already has enough as it is. It'll just confuse him and probably upset him more." You sighed heavily as you looked over to the side of the field, where all the boys were having a conversation about elementary boys' things. And there you saw your son, trying, and ultimately failing at joining said conversations. And with little Athena tugging at his side, all he got from the other kids was laughing and rejection.

Seeing your son's sad and hurt expression when the other boys laughed at him or even told him to go away broke your heart. You wanted him to be happy again. You wanted him to be the energetic and loving kid he was before your waste of a husband left. Ever since Ryan —your waste of a husband left, Roman hasn't been the same. 

For the past six or so months, he has been distant and seemingly unhappy. All he ever did was lock himself up in his room and play video games. He barely ever interacted with you and Athena anymore. He barely interacted with anyone, period. Once Ryan left, it was up to you to support your kids financially. Of course, their father still paid child support, but he sure as hell didn't pay your bills or everything you needed to spend on your children. Which meant you had to take him out of the fancy school he went to in order to still pay the monthly expenses of your home. And he just didn't quite fit in at school, especially now. 

So, you hoped that him joining the baseball team would change that, that it would help him open up again and that it would help him make new friends. But so far, it's worked just the opposite.

"So, I'm making dinner tonight. Do you want to come over with the kids and get drunk? Luke will watch over the kids." Liz spoke, interrupting your train of thought.

"That sounds a-mazing," you spoke in a song-like tune, a sigh of contentment leaving your lips. "But I can't. I told Roman I'd take him to that Italian place he likes."

"Tomorrow then. I'll have that Chardonnay you love so much waiting for you." She winked at you as you both stood up, ready to greet your children.

"Thank God for your alcohol stash." You joked, flinging your arms up in praise. 

You both laughed and smiled in your children's direction, but your smile dropped as your kids and Ezra approached you. Ezra was holding Athena's hand, while Roman walked behind them, with a certain heaviness on his step and an annoyed look on his face. And Athena had a small pout on her face.

"Hey, what's wrong?"

"Rome doesn't want to hold my hand!" Athena whined with a pout of her lower lip. She released Ezra's hand and exchanged it for your own. Ezra going to his own mom. While Roman simply stood there, with a hand stuffed into his pockets and the other messing with the strap of his bag, his gaze stuck on the ground.

"Roman, baby," you sighed softly, not wanting to give the poor kid a hard time. You understood he didn't exactly fit in, no matter how much he wanted to, and that upset him. You didn't want to add up to that. "Your sister just wanted you to hold her hand."

"She was embarrassing me.. I'm already the kid without a dad, I don't need to be the kid with an annoying  baby sister." He muttered, his gaze not once leaving the ground.

 His words were harsh, but lacked emotion. And it broke your heart. But as much as you wanted to tell him that it wasn't true, that he did have a dad, you'd be lying if you did. Ryan was already absent in your children's lives before the split, but at the same time he was there, and Roman felt as if he was. But now, his father really wasn't there, at all. And there was nothing you could do about it.

You sighed softly, gesturing your free hand out for him, "Roman, come here," a heavy sigh left the young boy's lips as he took a few steps closer, standing in front of you with his head hanging low and his eyes stuck to the ground. You used your hand to hold the side of his face, his eyes meeting with your own. "Baby, Thena just wanted to show you that she loves you. She didn't mean to embarrass you, right Thena?" You turned your attention to the small girl that hid behind your arm, her eyes glistening with tears.

The small girl sniffled and shook her head, "No.. I'm sorry Rome.. I won't do it ever again, I-I promise."

You exchanged looks between your children, your eyes finally landing on Roman as you waited for a response. You raised an eyebrow at him, your eyes speaking a silent 'and' to the boy. He eventually signed, almost too heavily, and nodded. 

"It's okay, I guess.. I don't really mind all that much." He half smiled, shrugging slightly.

Athena's expression quickly lightened, the small girl detached herself from your hand and hugged her older brother. And as much as he hated to admit it, he didn't mind the affection. He returned the hug and smiled, for a moment at least.

After a second or two, Roman slightly pushed Athena off him, signaling that that had been enough affection for a day. You breathed out softly, turning to look at Liz, who gave you a sympathetic smile in response. 

"Well my loves, off we go. Say goodbye to Auntie Liz and Ezra." Both your children did as you said. Athena hugging both of them, and Roman simply waving at them. Good enough.

And at last, you gave Liz a quick but tight hug, "I'll call you tomorrow." You said shortly before you grabbed a hold of your daughter's hand and your son's bag, and eventually parted ways.

Today was gonna be a long day.

《Here's an edited version of part 1. As always I hope y'all enjoyed it. I'm trying to get back into writing after a long year, hopefully this will help me get back on track. Let me know your thoughts. And let me know if you'd like to be added to my dylan/coach taglist which I do have》

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