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flashflashhundredyarddash · 3 years

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Shove You Out the Door

Jaime regretted not letting the Reach invasion happen.

The day started out fine. He spent two hours stressing over what to wear to the movies before he covered up his shirt with the same blue hoodie that he wore all the time anyways. When he showed up 20 minutes early for their noon showing Bart was already there, wearing shorts in deference to the early summer Texas heat, and Jaime had the very unchill thought of legs sjdjfnee and Khaji Da offered to eliminate The Impulse, even though Bart had been Kid Flash for two years already. Bart spotted him and quickly latched onto Jaime's arm, pulling him into the theater and chattering away about whatever sci-fi movie Bart had picked out.

They went to a diner afterwards, and when Jaime blew his straw wrapper at Bart he laughed in delight. When Bart got up to go collect 50 more straws and sat back down he slid into the booth next to Jaime, and Jaime panicked because oh god, are they on a date? Jaime meant for it to be a date and then had freaked and not actually said anything to confirm it was a date so technically they were just hanging out and Bart was fiddling with the woven bracelet that Milagro had made for him that he wore everywhere because actually Milagro was his best friend now, sorry Jaime-

Then Booster Gold sat in the booth across from them.

Jaime didn’t realize it was Booster Gold at first, so he cleared his throat and said, “This table is a little occupied,” and Bart blew a straw wrapper into the side of his face.

The man who had so rudely sat at their table and interrupted their maybe-date opened his mouth before Bart interrupted him. “Hi Booster Gold,” Bart said.

Booster Gold closed his mouth. “It’s just Michael right now, actually,” he said. His blond curly hair was dark at the roots and when he smiled Jaime felt awe at how white his teeth were.

“Can we… help you?” Jaime asked, because he wasn’t sure why a random member of the Justice League decided to look for one or both of them. He had the thought that maybe he was actually an alien or shape-shifter and was coming to kidnap them or kill them or something, but then dismissed that thought because that was stupid, and also why would an alien disguise itself as Booster Gold to come kill them?

“Actually, I was hoping I could help you,” Michael said with his perfect, shiny teeth. He spread his hands out and magnanimously stated, “I have decided to offer my esteemed superheroing services and mentor the new Blue Beetle.”

He glanced back and forth between Bart and Jaime.

“Which one of you is Blue Beetle?” he asked.

Jaime choked on his drink.

“Me,” Bart said, immediately, “I’m Blue Beetle and I definitely need your superheroing services.”

Jaime put his hand over Bart’s mouth and very pointedly did not react when Bart licked his palm. Bart could never understand the pains of being an older brother.

“I’m Blue Beetle,” Jaime said.

“You’re both Blue Beetle?” Michael asked.

“Yes!” Bart shrieked.

“No!” Jaime said.

“This mentoring thing is already so complicated,” Michael sighed.

“Look,” Jaime said, wiping his hand off on Bart’s shirt, “it’s not that I don’t appreciate the offer, but I’m a little confused. I don’t think our skill sets are really… compatible.”

“I get it,” Michael said. “You’re the Blue Beetle and I’m a time traveler from the future. On the surface we have nothing in common.”

“Wow,” Bart said, “You’re from the future? What’s that like? Has the world been invaded by crazy bug aliens?”

“What?”

“Ignore him. Like I said, I appreciate the offer, but I feel like I’ve got this handled. Besides…” Jaime couldn’t help the bit of hurt that bled into his voice, “why didn’t you ever show up when I first got the scarab? I could have used a mentor back then.”

Michael sighed again and rested his face on his hand. “I don’t know. When Ted died, I just… I just didn’t cope well, I guess. He’d been my best friend for so long and… yeah, you didn’t deserve to have to deal with that, kid.”

“Wait, you actually knew Ted Kord?” Jaime said, leaning forward.

“Yes?” Michael said. He reached for a chain around his neck and pulled at it to reveal the ring that had been tucked into his shirt.

“Oh shit,” Jaime said. “I’m sorry, man.”

Michael waved him off. “Yeah, yeah, grieving widow. But anyways, I’m cool now, I did the whole therapy thing, and since I was married to the last Blue Beetle, I figure that makes you my, like, step-protege or something.”

“I don’t think that’s how it works,” Jaime said.

“Oh man, if you had showed up last week we would’ve gotten you something for Father’s Day,” Bart said, “Like a custom shirt that says world’s #1 guy who was married to the guy who was actually supposed to be my boyfriend’s mentor. World’s #1 replacement mentor.”

Jaime abruptly turned to look at Bart. “Boyfriend?” Jaime squeaked.

Bart squinted his eyes at him. “Have we not been dating for two months?”

“Should I go?” Michael asked.

“I thought maybe we were dating but I wasn’t sure? I do want to date you but I wasn’t sure if you wanted to date me.”

Bart huffed out a laugh. “You are so dumb. I don’t share food with just anyone. Also I already have my prom dress picked out so you just need to get a red tie.”

“I have a red tie!” Michael shouted, making them both jump. “I have like five hundred ties. Boom! You’ve just been mentored.” He pointed at the basket of fries in front of Jaime. “Are you going to eat those?”

Jaime slid the fries over to Bart.

“Oh my god,” Bart said, sounding a little choked up, “I love you so much. I will even let you eat some of these.”

“Am I nailing this boyfriend thing so far?” Jaime asked.

“Oh, totally, babe.”

Jaime nodded to himself. He was totally nailing this boyfriend thing.

“Ah, young love,” Michael said, getting up. He patted his pockets for a minute and then stopped. “I was going to pay, because I’m a mentor now, but I don’t know where my wallet is.”

“Don’t you own a quarter of Kord Industries or something?” Bart said.

“So! I’ll see you around, Blue, Blue’s boyfriend. Maybe you could help me out on a patrol or something. That’s what Green Arrow does with his kids, I think.”

“Sure, man,” Jaime said, deciding to throw him a bone. “See you around.”

Michael smiled brightly and then scribbled his number onto a napkin before leaving the diner, the bell tinkling behind him.

“Oh my gosh, did you see-” Bart started.

“His teeth!” Jaime finished.

Bart nodded aggressively, his auburn hair flopping. “I have never seen a man with more beautiful teeth. Well, except maybe yours.”

“You’ve got a pretty nice smile, too.” Jaime said, and reminded himself Bart couldn’t hear the way his heart fell out of its rhythm for a second.

“Yeah,” Bart said, leaning in, “Maybe we should compare notes.”

#author's note: booster knew how to find them bcus anyone whos anyone in the super community knows blue beetle and kid flash hang out #all the time so he just asked barry lol #blue beetle #bluepulse #jaime reyes #bart allen #kid flash #impulse #michael carter #boostle #booster gold #dc #young justice #yj #the burd squawks #fanfics #the burd writes #also milagro thinks jaime is lame but thinks bart is SO COOL FOR SOME REASON

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couvers · 3 years

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i keep rereading all the dialogue prompt fics you’ve posted and i need.. more .... pls🥺

maybe number 6 for percabeth if you’re up for it?❤️

6. “Do you want to get out of here?”

It was getting late. Estelle had already been put to bed – read two stories each by Percy and Annabeth – and, after that little hellion had fallen asleep, Sally had suggested they watch a movie. The movie had been watched and enjoyed. Paul, having school to think of in the morning, had said his goodnights as soon as the credits started rolling. With class also ahead of them first thing in the morning, Percy had figured that was a good time for him and Annabeth to think about heading home themselves. His mother, however, had refilled mugs of tea and settled in to chat a little longer.

That had been an hour ago. Now, Sally was doing a little late night tidying up. Percy figured it was time for him and Annabeth to think about heading home, since they also had class to think about first thing in the morning, but it seemed like Annabeth had other plans. She had curled up against Percy’s side on the couch and showed no signs she intended to move any time soon. If Percy was a betting man, he would’ve said she was a good ten seconds away from beginning to snore.

(Annabeth denied, adamantly, that she snored, but Percy had witnessed it himself on countless occasions and knew the truth.)

Even though he didn’t want to disturb Annabeth when she seemed so at peace, and when they were so close to his mother being able to back him up about her snoring, Percy decided to five her a gentle nudge. “Hey, Beth? It’s getting late. Do you want to get out of here?”

“No,” Annabeth replied, only stirring enough to nuzzle a little closer to him. “Let’s stay a little bit longer.”

“You’re just going to fall asleep,” he argued, though it was hard to fight her when she was acting so cute about it. “It’s only going to be harder to leave if we wait.”

“But I like it here,” she said, practically whining. If she got any cuter, Percy was going to be entirely useless at denying her whatever she wanted.

He attempted to have a semblance of a backbone though, gently rubbing her arm in an attempt at coaxing her further awake. “You’ll like it better at home in your own bed.”

Unconvinced, she shook her head. “I like it here.”

“Why?” Percy asked, all curiosity and no annoyance. He had to admit, he enjoyed hearing that she liked being at his parents’ place. It made him feel good about the fact they’d made standing plans to spend every other Sunday afternoon there, plans that would cut into his and Annabeth’s already limited alone time. Apparently she didn’t mind sharing.

“It feels like you here,” Annabeth explained, the words slow, quiet and lazy, evidence of how tired she’d become. “Being here makes me happy. Must’ve been a nice place to grow up.”

Percy hadn’t really grown up in that apartment. He’d moved there in high school, after his mom and Paul had gotten engaged. In reality, Percy had grown up in a series of apartments, many of which had been little more than closets, and falling apart on top of that. He still understood what Annabeth meant. Even though he hadn’t lived in particularly nice apartments, they had still been pretty great places to grow up, in the grand scheme of things, if only because his mom had been there, making the best of their circumstances.

“It wasn’t too bad,” Percy agreed, turning his head to get a better look at the woman beside him now. “It’s still a pretty nice place to be, too, you’re right.”

“Let’s stay like ten more minutes,” Annabeth suggested, shifting slightly against him to get more comfortable.

Sally appeared from the kitchen, leaning against the wall and observing them with a tiny smile. It never failed to make Percy’s heart break into a sprint when his mom looked at Annabeth that way – like Annabeth had always been hers to shower with love, and she intended to make up for all the years she hadn’t been able to do it as quickly as possible. Annabeth looked at Sally in much the same way, if not with a few more, very understandable, reservations. All of it confirmed what Percy himself had felt from the very beginning of his relationship with Annabeth – they were meant for this, to be together, to share their lives and their families, and build a future of their own one little block at a time.

“Why don’t I just make up the couch for you two so you can spend the night?” Sally offered, that fond smile on her lips only growing. “It’s late and you both look like you’d be better off just getting to sleep now.”

Annabeth lifted her head, blinking sleepily at Percy. “Can we?”

So rarely did Annabeth defer to Percy’s judgment with such entirety, Percy almost didn’t know what to do with himself. It did make sense, though. This was his family, so it was his choice, not that he had much of one when his mother was so clearly happy to have them and the woman he loved so completely content to be there.

“Yeah, it sounds like a good idea,” Percy agreed, reaching over to tuck a rogue ringlet behind Annabeth’s ear. Her sleepy, responding smile only made him that much more confident in his decision.

They managed to get themselves up just long enough to clean up a little in the bathroom. Percy had his own toothbrush at his parents’ place, but that night Annabeth got one of her own, too. When they returned to the living room, Sally had finished dressing the couch with blankets and pillows. It didn’t pull out, but Percy had no doubts they would be comfortable enough. He and Annabeth were disgustingly cuddly sleepers, anyway.

Both Percy and Annabeth were given hugs and forehead kisses goodnight before Sally finally turned in. Percy didn’t miss the way Annabeth’s cheeks flooded with pink when she got hers. If he hadn’t valued his life so much, he might have grabbed his phone and snapped a picture of her that way. Since he wished to live past the night, he had to settle for the mental image.

It didn’t take them long to get settled on the couch after that. Annabeth’s body, half on top of him and half wedged between him and the couch, was a comfortable and welcome weight. His fingers instinctively found their way into her hair, twirling strands around them in what had become a soothing nightly habit. Percy didn’t think he’d ever loved anything quite the way he loved falling asleep each night with Annabeth.

“Thanks for letting us stay,” Annabeth mumbled into the stillness of the night.

Staying would mean an even more rushed than usual Monday morning, but Percy thought it was worth it. “I’m just glad you like here so much.”

“I really do,” she confirmed, the reverence in her voice making it sound a little like a confession.

“I like being here with you, too,” he told her, thinking it just as much as a confession. Percy always liked being with his family, of course, but being there with her was a different kind of special. It made him feel complete.

She hummed softly, tilting her head to press a kiss against his jaw. “I love you.”

“I love you,” he echoed.

Percy wasn’t sure exactly when that had become their nightly ritual, saying I love you instead of a standard goodnight, but it was always one of his favorite parts of the day. If the world ended while they slept, he would have no regrets about those being his last words. He never failed to sleep a little more soundly having said them.

Dialogue Prompts!

#apt 305 #ask #gray tag #dialogue prompts #this one takes place the same weekend as chapters 75 & 76 #amy writes #i swear i'm not playing favorites here an anon had asked for this one too #maybe a little tho #since tomorrow is gray's bday #👀

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dream-a-little-bigger-x · 4 years

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Chapter 13 -- Perfect Harmony | Charlie Gillespie

Summary: Emily Fox is a talented 17-year-old with a passion for all things music. Her dream is to become a successful singer-songwriter one day. But to achieve that dream, she needs to get into one of the most prestigious music schools in her district – it’s all been part of her plan since she was six. Sadly enough, those schools cost a ton of money that her parents don’t want to invest. They don’t even want her to pursue her dream. So, now Emily’s hustling, working at the music store to save up to get into college. That’s until she meets Charlie, an annoying seventeen-year-old boy with the same dream as her. The only difference is, he’s just doing it. He doesn’t need a fancy college to pursue his dream to become famous with his band. He just writes his songs and books small gigs here, there and everywhere. Will meeting Charlie defer her from her dream college, or will he actually help her achieve the dream?

Pairing: Charlie Gillespie x OC (Emily Fox)

Warnings: mentions of death, sexual assault

Important note: the characters of Charlie, Owen, Jeremy and Madison are based on the characters they play on the show and i do not own their names, only OC are mine. The songs aren’t mine either, they’re all from the show except for one.

Chapter thirteen

~|Emily Fox|~

“Good morning, party girl!” Uncle Mitch shouts a little too loudly on a Sunday morning. “You look rough.” I sit down at the kitchen table on the opposite of him. “Gee thanks,” I rub my face harshly, then rest my head on my hand with my eyes shut. “You got in late last night. Didn’t think you’d stick around at a Brianna Holly party for so long. It surprised me you went in the first place, but you know, you do you.” My eyes shoot open at the reminder of last night. Jake’s eyes. Jake’s hands. On me. Jake’s lips. On me. “I shouldn’t have gone,” I tell him honestly which only earns me a worried look. “I mean, it was fun teasing Brianna a little and standing up for myself and playing a song with the boys but then Jake…” I trail off, not wanting to talk about it but Mitch and I are all about the open-book-policy. Talk about anything and everything with each other even if it might worry the other. Better to share the load than take all of it on one’s shoulders. “What did he do?” Uncle Mitch’s voice sounds darker, heavier. Almost villainous. “He was talking about how great we used to be and that he wanted it back, I think? I don’t really remember what we’d talked about, all I know for sure is that he’d tried to kiss me. The boys had to literally tear him off me.” Mitch’s eyes are intense, but at least he’s not trying to go and murder Jake. “We left pretty much straight after that and the boys took me to the Music Store. We stayed there, talking, pretty much all night.” I smile at the memory because even though what preceded that beautiful moment was literally the worst thing, it’s still a moment to cherish forever. “I’m glad those boys were there to help you out. They sound like great friends.” I smile a little and nod determinedly. “Wish I could hear you guys play.” “We’re having band practice later tonight, if you want to come and li—” I can’t even finish my sentence, because Mitch has already gotten up excitedly, dancing around the kitchen – though I wouldn’t call that dancing – and running up to me to hug me tightly. “But first!” He lifts a finger in the air. “Let’s grab all the snacks and watch some movies!” I nod excitedly and get up to gather up some snacks. With hot cocoas and all the chocolate in the world, we settle onto the sofa with blankets wrapped around us and Disney+ open to pick a movie since today is Disney day. We alternate between Disney+ and Netflix, one week Disney, the other non-Disney. “Can we watch Aladdin?” I suggest, mainly because it reminds me of mine and Charlie’s moment on the balcony, unbeknownst to my uncle. It’s been a little while since we’d made out on the balcony. Might have to suggest it soon. Mama needs her sugar. “Your uncle Bobby loved that movie,” Mitch comments as he presses play, “Do you remember you two singing A Whole New World together when you were really young, and he gave you a bath?” I nod my head at the far, but beautiful, memory. “That first weekend I came to stay at this house?” Mitch nods his head, “Yeah, I used to make a Sultan out of Bobby with the bubbles.” Uncle Mitch laughs at the memory. “The bathroom was such a mess after that!” I can’t help but laugh at the desperation in Mitch’s voice. “But you two were the cutest duetters alive. I loved having you around when you were really young too, you know? Still so innocent, not knowing how big and bad the world was. It made me forget about the big, bad world too.” I smile at him and rest my head on his shoulder. I don’t know what I’d do without Uncle Mitch. Live on a street, I guess? Probably? He might not be family by blood, but he sure does feel like it. I never knew anyone being with Uncle Bobby than Mitch. They were my one true pairing. I wanted someone to love me the same way they loved – and still love – each other. Their bond is unbreakable.

“Ready to go, Mitchy?” I ask when we’re both changed out of our pajama’s after dinner, ready to head to Jeremy’s garage for band practice. It’s the first time we’ll be rehearsing in his garage, but I’m excited to find out where Sunset Curve previously used to rehearse. Pre me. “Yes! I am ready to partaaaay!” I roll my eyes at him, an amused smile on my face. “Behave though? Don’t go and embarrass me on the first day meeting them, okay?” “Yes, mom.” Mitch can be such a child, but I love that about him. “Boys?” I knock on the wooden door that’s ajar. There’s some rummaging inside, but nothing else. I push it open to find all three boys inside already. Charlie’s sorting through his loose songbook papers, Jeremy is tuning his bass, and Owen just sitting on the couch, playing around with his drumsticks. “Hey! I brought my uncle; I hope you don’t mind?” “Oh, not at all!” Jeremy says, and gets up from his spot on the armchair. “Hey, I’m Jeremy,” he introduces himself with a smile, reaching his hand for my uncle to shake, which he does. My uncle has this look on his face that I recognize as his gaydar. He literally scans people to find out their sexuality. His gaydar is very accurate. “Mitch, nice to meet you.” Owen gets up next, shaking my uncle’s hand too. “I’m Owen, the drummer,” he shows the sticks in his hand. “I see,” Mitch replies with a smile, and then comes Charlie. “Hey, I’m Charlie, I’m—” he points at me, and I know what he’s going to say, but I can’t have him tell my uncle about us yet. “The lead singer!” I chime in and give him a knowing look. “Right, yeah, the lead singer,” Charlie looks kind of hurt, and it breaks my heart in two as well. Just an us-thing, for now. Then it can be an everyone-thing. I hope he understands. “Nice to meet you, guys!” Mitch then leans closer to me, “And which one of the two cute semi-straight boys is the Cutie from the Music Store?” he whispers with Charlie just a few feet away. His head turns slightly and his mouth curls upwards. He heard Mitch. “Semi-straight?” I ask for an explanation. “Jeremy is questionable.” “Right…” I trail off, still whispering, “Let’s get to work, guys,” I speak up now, so the band knows I’m talking to them. Uncle Mitch looks a little hurt at me ignoring his question, though I’m pretty sure he knows it’s Charlie. “What song first?” Charlie queries while my uncle takes a seat on the couch and we get ready. “Why don’t we let the guest choose?” Jeremy suggests, pointing at my uncle. “Me?” I nod my head, encouraging him. I’d told them all the songs we’d made or already sang together. Which are three, four if you count This Band Is Back. “I really liked Perfect Harmony when Ems showed it to me the other day.” Charlie and I exchange a glance, a shy smile plastered on his face, and I’m pretty sure mine mirrors his. He goes to grab his acoustic guitar for this one. “Perfect Harmony it is, then!” Owen says and counts us in. Where Charlie and I imagined the soft beat and melody, that’s where Owen and Jeremy come in with the drums and bass. We’d only practiced this one a couple of times before. It still has the same, electric vibe it did when Charlie and I sang it alone. I still feel the same sparks, the same tingles rushing over my body. “I feel your rhythm in my heart, yeah,” I sing without taking my eyes off of him. “You are my brightest, burning star, woah-woah” “I never knew a love so real” “So real,” he echoes. “We're heaven on earth, melody and words When we are together we're In perfect harmony Woah, woah Perfect harmony Woah, woah Perfect harmony” I glance at Uncle Mitch. He’s staring at us with so much pride and intensity. When he catches my glance, he mouths “Cutie from the Music Store”, which makes me smile like an idiot. He knows. “We say we're friends We play pretend You're more to me We create a perfect harmony” Uncle Mitch gets up off his seat, clapping and whooping like an intense fan. “My favorite song ever! So beautiful!” he shouts in between cheers. We play Now or Never, and, upon Jeremy’s request, This Band is Back before calling in a break. “I need a wee,” I say and patter towards the bathroom in the back. When I’m about to head back inside, I hear the boys playing a song I haven’t heard before. Or at least I don’t think I have. It intrigues me even more when I hear Mitch’s voice through the microphone. “Let me introduce myself We got some time to kill Consider me the pearly gates to your new favorite thrills We could go make history or you could rest in peace But here there ain't no misery Cause on the other side we live like kings” I find the boys in their regular spots, Uncle Mitch probably having told them what chord to play in or something. Either that or they’re just playing around, and Mitch’s song just matches. “Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do? Let your body loose, let your body loose Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do? Show you a thing or two 'Cause you ain't seen nothing” That’s when I recognize the song. It’s the one Uncle Bobby wrote for a Halloween musical at his school once. It was the villain song of the whole story and stuck in all our heads for months. I still know the words, and thus decide to sing along with my uncle, much to the boys’ surprise. “Life is good on the other side of Hollywood Life is good on the other side of Hollywood So welcome to the brotherhood Where you won't be misunderstood Life is good on the other side of Hollywood” I get behind the keyboard and play a couple of notes, leaving the verse for my uncle. “Everything has got a price but happiness is free Just so happens, you're in luck We've got a vacancy We can set the night on fire and break out of the scene Your soul print on the walk of fame On the boulevard of your wildest dreams” I now grab a mic too, properly wanting to join in now. “Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do boys? Let your body loose, let your body loose Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do boys? It ain't bragging if it's true Now you ain't seen nothing” I walk up to Jeremy whilst I sing along to the chorus and Jeremy’s shredding the bass. “Life is good on the other side of Hollywood Life is good on the other side of Hollywood” I walk over to the drumkit and jam out for a moment with Owen. “So welcome to the brotherhood Where you won't be misunderstood Life is good on the other side of Hollywood” I then move to Charlie while my uncle gets to the bridge. The boys stop playing and clap along with me. “The rain don't blind the rising souls They got too much to see I got your glamour, got your gold Got all you'll ever need Let me hear you now!” The boys have somehow remembered the lyrics my uncle just sang, and sing them with me now. “The rain don't blind the rising souls They got too much to see” “Yeah,” Mitch goes for a high note, chilling my spine. “I got your glamour, got your gold Got all you'll ever need,” the four of us continue. “Yeah,” Another high note from Mitch. The boys now pick up their instruments again. “I said watch me make a move, watch me make a move boys” “Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do?” the boys and I echo. “I said watch me make a move, no, I don't disappoint” “Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do?” “Watch me make a move I'm ya number one choice” “Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do?” “Watch me make a move Come one and give me that noise” The boys take a break. “A tomb with a view Ain't it something?” And pick it back up with a bit of bass before all three of them join in again, and even join me into singing the backing vocals for my uncle. “Life is good on the other side of Hollywood Life is good on the other side of Hollywood So welcome to the brotherhood Where you won't be misunderstood Life is good on the other side of Hollywood So welcome to the brotherhood Where you won't be misunderstood Life is good on the other side of Hollywood” Charlie and Jeremy stop playing and leave Owen a little drum solo.

“Ain't it the best? Long live the dead!” Mitch shouts out dramatically, and then Owen goes off again on his drums. “I thought your Uncle Robert was the musically talented one?” Charlie asks with an impressed smile on his face. “How do you think we met? It was musical night in our favorite bar, and we sang a song together. That first scene in High School Musical?” The boys nod, knowing what he’s talking about, “It’s based on our story… Just straight.” The boys laugh light-heartedly at his story. “That’s not true,” I whisper, making them laugh even more. “That was a fun song though! How did you know it?” Jeremy asks me. “Uncle Bobby wrote it. He is – was – the music teacher at this high school and he wanted a cool villain song for the villain in his Halloween musical, so he wrote himself one. The song used to be stuck in our heads for months on end. It surprised me I still knew it.” “The boys were playing around with their instruments and it reminded me of Bobby’s song,” Mitch tells me, “I couldn’t help but chime in and start singing.” He wraps an arm around my shoulders, pulling me closer to him. “It’s such a tune,” I say with a smile, “I think Bobby would’ve liked us singing it together.” “I think so too,” says Mitch and he presses a kiss to my hair. “Let’s get home now, yeah? Give your boyfriend a kiss and we’re off.” Charlie and I freeze, neither of us expecting Uncle Mitch to know about this since I never told him. “Oh, come on. You could not sing Perfect Harmony without staring at each other like that heart eyes emoji-thingy. I don’t only have amazing gaydar, I also have amazing love-dar.” He winks at me as I shake my head in disbelieve, but I can’t help the smile either. My uncle knows me well. “See you tomorrow, guys,” I say with the most awkward wave. I mean, I’m not going to kiss Charlie in front of my uncle. Especially when he specifically told me to do so. That’s just weird. Uncle Mitch gives me a look, which I shoot back. He then rolls his eyes. “I’ll meet you outside. Say goodbye properly.” He leaves the garage, and then it’s the four of us. Neither Charlie nor I move, still unsure of the public displays of affection in front of the boys. “Seriously?” Jeremy groans before leaving the garage with Owen. They’ll be able to entertain my uncle for a while. I don’t even know why it’s so hard for me to show PDA. It never used to be this way with Jake. But maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe us taking it slowly and not showing us off too much is healthy for us. “I’ll see you at the store tomorrow?” I ask whilst the two of us slowly walk up to each other, inching closer and closer by the second. “Definitely,” he replies with a smile. Once we’re inches away, he grabs my hands in his. “Isn’t your uncle going to be annoyed you didn’t tell him sooner?” I shrug. “I don’t think so. He knows how private I am about relationships. And besides, you heard him, he’s got amazing love-dar.” Charlie’s laughter intertwines with mine. “I think he knew before today already too. He’s all-knowing.” “As long as he doesn’t know about our sneaky dates on your balcony, I think we might be fine.” I chuckle at that comment, and then both of us fall silent. “He probably knows this’ll happen though.” The words come out just above a whisper as he inches closer and dips down. His lips meet mine in a sweet, somewhat long-lasting kiss. “I’m pretty sure they’re eavesdropping, though,” I say when we pull away. “No, we’re not!” Jeremy shouts from the other side of the door. “Yeah, definitely,” says Charlie, and he lets go of one hand, intertwining the fingers of his other hand with the one he’s still holding. He leads me out the door and then lets go of that hand too. “She’s all yours, Mitch,” he tells my uncle, and reaches out the hand he’d just held mine with for a handshake. “Hey!” I shout, “I’m no property!” Both Charlie and Mitch raise their hands in defense. “Yes, girl! Tell ‘em!” Owen preaches, holding his hand up and I slap mine on it in a high five. “I’ll see you guys tomorrow.” I kiss Charlie’s cheek quickly and then leave the boys with Uncle Mitch. “They’re really nice boys, Muffin. I’m glad you’ve found them.” I smile at that. “Me too, Mitchy, me too.”

Taglist: @parkeret @lukeys-giggle @hannahhistorian92 @gingerxarmy @marinettepotterandplagg @lovesanimals @thequirkybookaholic @calamitykaty Lemme know if you want to be on my taglist for this story/any of my other works!

#julie and the phantoms #julie and the himbos #charlie gillespie #jeremy shada #owen joyner #madison reyes #charlie x oc #oc emily fox #luke patterson #reggie jatp #alex jatp #julie molina

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argylemnwrites · 4 years

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It Couldn’t Wait Another Moment - Epilogue

Pairing: Drake Walker x MC (Riley Liu)

Book: The Royal Romance (Canon Divergent from Book 2, Chapter 15)

Word Count: ~2200

Rating: PG-13 (language)

Summary: Moving forward, together.

Author’s Note: This series diverges from TRR canon, where instead of waiting to discuss his relationship with Riley until their last night in NYC, leaving her a note while Liam is proposing to her, Drake tackles this topic as soon as possible after Tariq makes his statement and Riley’s name is cleared. To catch up on this series, you can find the previous chapters in my masterlist (link is located in my bio).

“So, who owns this place again?”

“It’s Cam’s uncle’s girlfriend’s sister’s building.”

“And we trust her… why?”

“Because she is fine with Cam vouching for us, so no income minimum, no issue with your lack of credit history, and no broker’s fee.”

Drake nodded. It still felt kind of shady to him, going to check out random units they heard about from different people they were tangentially connected to, but he was deferring to Riley completely, seeing as he had never been responsible for finding his own housing in his life. And apartment hunting in New York, it turned out, was a complicated task.

Back in February, when they’d started trying to figure out what neighborhoods to consider, Riley had told him not to bother searching the units listed on basically any website.

“There’s gonna be massive broker’s fees, and they probably won’t take us since we won’t have a guarantor. There’s a lot of scams, too. Just talk to your coworkers, word of mouth is going to be the best way to do this,” she’d warned him.

Drake had done as she’d asked, but the units that his connections, the ones at the law firm he’d been sent to as coverage for one of the assistants who was out after surgery, recommended had not been a good fit. One didn’t allow dogs, one had been a definite bait and switch scam that looked nothing like the pictures he’d been shown, and the one they’d checked out last week was nice, but they would have needed a roommate to make it affordable, something they both weren’t really interested in doing.

But today they were checking out a one bedroom place in the Kensington neighborhood in Brooklyn that she’d heard about through one of her managers. They were supposed to meet with the building owner at 3 o’clock, so they had taken the F train over just after lunch so that Drake could get a better feel for the area.

Now that it was April, the weather was finally feeling like spring more consistently. It really couldn’t have been a nicer day for them to walk around the neighborhood. Drake was shocked at how close they were to a park. It was crowded as all get out, given that everyone and their mother seemed to want to take advantage of the pleasant day, but Prospect Park was large, had fishing spots, and most importantly, was some actual green space. While there were still numerous restaurants in the neighborhood, it felt so much more residential than their current apartment’s location. Drake could actually see why people would choose to live in a place like this.

The building owner, Kris, let them in and showed them up to the second floor walk-up she was looking to lease. It was in an older building, but everything looked well maintained at least. And it was big, probably twice as big as their current apartment. Drake was sure the fact that he’d been living in a 35 square meter studio for over four months was influencing him, but it just felt larger than his quarters at the palace had been, even though he was sure that wasn’t the case.

He wandered around, checking out the bedroom while Riley chatted specifics with Kris. After their first apartment tour a couple of weekends ago, they’d both quickly decided that was the best approach. Not only did Riley have more experience and knew the better questions to ask, but when left to her own devices, she was often able to charm landlords into throwing in some sort of perk, like waiving the pet fee or granting them some flexibility on move in dates. It was best to let her just do her thing.

As he checked out the closet space, it hit him how different his life was now than it was even six months ago. That Drake would have just been amazed that Riley would ever willingly choose to be with him over Liam. He could have never pictured himself choosing an apartment in New York with her. Sitting down and making plans for the future with her.

It was easy to look at her and say that the change was all about her. And to an extent, that was true. He probably wouldn’t have found the motivation to make any changes in his life if he hadn’t met her. But it really was about more than that. It was about stepping up, letting go of the past, and taking ownership of his own happiness. He remembered Riley yelling at him, telling him he was scared to make changes in his life because he might still end up miserable on the other side of them. Basically telling him he needed to stop making himself a victim by his own choosing. And she’d been right.

Sure, some things were still a work in progress. Their visit to Texas a handful of weeks ago had proven that his relationship with his mother was not going to be mended overnight, after all. But on the other hand, he was hard pressed to imagine the man he was six months ago willingly getting an office job and going out for drinks after work with colleagues. He probably also wouldn’t have gotten a more “professional” haircut at the advice of one of those coworkers in hopes of turning a temp job into a permanent one. He would have fought such advice tooth and nail, insisting that anyone who cared that much about something as dumb as a haircut was a stuck up asshole, not worth his time. And while part of him still felt that way, he now saw it was a small price to pay to try and gain a more stable income so that Riley could cut down to part time at the bar and go back to college in the fall and work on finishing those last two semesters. Plus, she seemed to like his cleaned up cut, which was an added bonus.

The only way her going back to school was even a possibility was actually because of Maxwell. When he had let them know he was coming to New York for a “business venture,” they had both been confused, to say the least. But, when they met up with him for dinner and drinks, he’d told them he had found a way to bring some much needed cash to the Beaumonts - he had sold the rights to a holiday movie to the Hallmark channel, and that the script was so well received that they wanted him to keep writing for them. This had meant nothing to Drake himself, but Riley had just laughed, explaining that it was a TV network that made dozens of cheesy romance movies each year, many of them centered around Christmas.

When pressed, Maxwell had informed them, rather reluctantly, that the plot of the movie centered around a New York City waitress who came to a European country as the date of a prince for some Christmas ball, but ended up falling in love with his best friend. Despite Maxwell’s assurances that he was barely inspired by them and that all the names and locations were changed and that Christmas had nothing to do with Riley’s time in Cordonia, Drake and Riley had called him out on profiting off their story. Eventually, they struck a deal - they got a percentage of his payout for the script, which was going to cover most of Riley’s first semester tuition, and Maxwell had to help them with their move. It still irritated Drake a bit that Maxwell had just decided to throw their story out there for the world, but Liam had told him he approved the script and said it really wasn’t identifying at all, so Drake just decided to be grateful that Maxwell had not only brought Riley into his life, but also was giving her a ticket towards a job that didn’t require her to work a shitton of nights and weekends.

Drake wandered back towards the living and kitchen area, passing Riley and Kris in the narrow hallway, looking at the bathroom. He squeezed her hand as he passed them, and she threw him a little wink. He took in the main space of the apartment. They would be able to get a couch and a TV in there with their table, maybe even a bookcase. The kitchen was actually pretty nice, too. It probably had three times as much counter space as their current place. Everything here felt like it could work.

He opened the cabinets absentmindedly, half checking out the storage space, half waiting to see what Riley had to say about the place. After a couple more minutes, Riley and Kris came back out.

“Alright, well I’ll give you two a minute to talk it over,” said Kris, heading to the door, “I’ll be back in a few and you can let me know if you want to go forward with a lease.”

“Sounds good. Thanks, Kris.” said Riley, leaning against the end of the counter.

As soon as the door latched, Riley looked up at Drake, “So what do you think?”

“I think it’s great. It feels too good, to be honest. How bad’s the rent?”

Riley paused for a couple seconds, “1850.”

“That can’t be right. That’s less than what we’re paying now, and it’s so much bigger.”

She chuckled a little bit, “Well, that’s the beauty of not living in a prime neighborhood.”

Drake just shook his head. He considered this location to be far more desirable than their current one, but he knew he was in the minority there. “What do you think about it?”

“I think this could be a really good fit for us.”

“You’re okay with his neighborhood?”

She nodded and gave him a smile, “This is a pretty diverse area of the city, so the restaurant options are good, and there’s decent access to the Q and F trains, so the commute shouldn’t be too bad.” She stood up and joined him further in the kitchen, placing her hands on his shoulders. “Let’s be real, Drake. I’m not going to be as hard to please with this as you are. So, you gotta be honest with me. Can you see yourself here?”

He nodded, “Yeah, Liu. I can. I love this place.”

“Really?”

“Really. Is she willing to lease to us?”

“It seems like it. It sounds like her last tenant moved out unexpectedly, and her late partner used to handle the financial side of things, so she just wants to rent it out as quickly as possible.”

“And she’s cool with Anderson?”

“She told me she’s fine with small breeds.”

“Great, let’s sign.”

“Woah there,” she said, laughing, “And they say I’m the impulsive one.”

“What’s to discuss, Liu? Do you think we’re gonna find a better place than this one?”

She just shook her head and shrugged a little.

“Okay, then I stand by my statement - we should sign the lease today. If she’s motivated to lease this unit quickly, don’t we need to jump on it?”

“I just want you to be sure, Drake,” Riley said, biting her lip slightly before she continued, “Last time you moved on a whim, things kind of… blew up for us for a while.”

Drake let out a little snort, “I think this is a little different, Liu.”

She raised an eyebrow at him, “That may be the case, but I want us to actually take a minute and think about this. Make sure we can see ourselves here, okay?” And with that she plopped down on the floor, laying back and closing her eyes.

“Uh, Liu… what the fuck are you doing?”

She opened one eye and squinted at him, “I’m just taking a moment to tune out everything else and think about this. You should try it,” she said, waving him down.

Drake rolled his eyes, but sat down on the kitchen floor and leaned back slowly in the opposite direction. This seemed dumb as hell, but if it’s what she needed from him to not feel like he was going to flake out on her, he would do it.

They laid like that for almost a minute, breathing slowly. No fears or concerns or worries crept into his mind, which he was pretty sure was the point of this exercise. He wasn’t sure how long they were supposed to do this, but then he heard her moving and felt her curl her body against his head, snaking her hand under his neck and resting her head on his chest.

“So, any reservations about his place?” she asked.

He opened his eyes and glanced down at her. Her eyes were staring back at him, wide and dark.

“None,” he said shaking his head slightly, “I think the fact that there’s enough floor space in the kitchen for us to do this has just convinced me even more.”

She chuckled softly, tracing soft circles along his neck with her fingers. “So, you want to sign the lease then?”

“Yeah, Liu,” he said, letting his eyes fall shut at her soothing touch, “This feels like home.”

Permatag: @speedyoperarascalparty @mfackenthal @lilyofchoices @thequeenofcronuts @jamesashtonisbae

The Royal Romance/The Royal Heir: @kingliam2019 @sirbeepsalot @texaskitten30 @princessleac1 @ladyangel70 @dcbbw @yaushie @octobereighth

Drake x MC only: @jovialyouthmusic @iplaydrake @gibbles82 @drakewalkerisreal @riley--walker @notoriouscs @butindeed @addictedtodrakefanfic

It Couldn’t Wait Another Moment: @wickedgypsymoon @thesumofmychoices @cosigottahavefaith @thequeenchoices @katedrakeohd @feartheendlesssummer @ao719 @ooo-barff-ooo @sunnyxdazed

#drake walker #drake x mc #trr fanfic #trr #choices trr #the royal romance #choices fanfiction #choices #playchoices #choices stories you play

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theastrophilearchitect · 3 years

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March TBR/W.

Every book, audiobook, tv show and movie I want to consume in March 2021.

-Hence ‘TBR/W’ - to-be-read/watched.

I’m not usually a fan of pre-planning my media for the month - I plan out all my media obsessively, but doing it by month seems a little too much like setting deadlines for my taste, and I’m sure I’ll somehow manage to turn watching tv into a chore. Regardless, it’s worth a shot, so this is going to be a rough guide - I’m going to pick four of each category, one per week, because I’d rather underestimate and surpass than overestimate and have to defer things to the next month. So let’s go.

Books

1. Skyward and 2. Starsight by Brandon Sanderson

Skyward is set in a future where the human race is on the verge of extinction, trapped on a planet constantly attacked by alien warriors. Spensa, a teenage girl stuck on the planet, wants to be a pilot, but it seems far-off. Then, she finds the wreckage of a ship that appears to have a soul, and she must figure out how to repair it, and persuade it to help her navigate flight school.

In truth, I mainly want to read this because of how highly it’s been praised by Hailey in Bookland on YouTube. I actually tried reading Sanderson’s Mistborn series a couple years ago, and just didn’t click with it. I love fantasy, but I can pretty confidently say epic fantasy just isn’t for me. However, Sanderson’s work is adored by many, and Skyward and its sequel Starsight appeal so much more to me, and I can’t wait to get to them.

3. House of Earth and Blood by Sarah J Maas

This is Maas’s first technically-adult book; Throne of Glass is young adult, ACOTAR being classed either as young or new adult. I’ve been a fan of Maas for a long time, and, though I enjoy her books less now than I have in the past due to how seriously they tend to take themselves, I’d still love to read this one. Where her previous series were both fantasies, this sits somewhere between that and a sci-fi, but I can’t say as-of-yet what I think, because I haven’t read it yet.

Bryce Quinlan finds herself investigating her friends’ deaths in an attempt to avenge them after they were taken from her by a demon. Hunt Athalar is a Fallen angel, enslaved by Archangels, forced to assassinate their enemies, when he’s offered a deal to assist Bryce in exchange for his freedom.

4. Scythe by Neal Shusterman

I listened to this as an audiobook in 2019 as part of BookTuber Book Roast’s Magical Readathon, and didn’t hugely get along with it in truth. The audiobook was excellent as an audiobook, but the story Ian’s I just didn’t really vibe. I think I just want to like this book, so I think it’s worth a reread to see if my opinion changes.

This follows Citra and Rowan, a reluctant pair of apprentice Scythes - in a utopian future where humanity has the means to live forever, it is the job of the Scythes to control the population by essentially reaping the souls of those they choose to die. Neither Citra or Rowan want it, but I don’t remember enough about this book to say any more.

Audiobooks

1. Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

This is the last book in the Hunger Games trilogy, and you either already know what this series is about, or you’ve been living under a rock for the last thirteen years. I read this book for the first time nearly seven years ago, and it’s stuck with me. It sent me into a phase of only reading dystopian books (The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken was part of this, and was the series that really got me into reading), but this was the main one that stuck with me.

It contains a powerful message about capitalism and discrimination, and this is the second time I’ve listened to the audiobooks, though the god-only-knows-what time I’ve read the series. I listened to The Hunger Games and Catching Fire in February, which automatically puts this on my to-listen for March.

2. Ghosts of the Shadow Market by Cassandra Clare, Sarah Rees Brennan, Maureen Johnson, Kelly Link and Robin Wasserman

This is a novella bind-up set in the Shadowhunters world, that I would imagine has quite a bit to do with the Shadow Market, an aspect of the Downworld introduced in The Dark Artifices, which I finished in January.

In truth, I’m mainly planning to listen to this audiobook because it’s the only Shadowhunters novella bind-up with an audiobook, and I’d just rather read additions to the main Shadowhunters series in this format rather than physically.

3. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins

This is a Hunger Games prequel that was released early last year, and I just wasn’t going to read it. I heard several reviews, the general consensus of which was basically that it’s not as good as the trilogy and is somewhat unnecessary, but, in truth, my curiosity’s got the better of me, especially since I started listening to the trilogy’s audiobooks again.

This prequel follows Coriolanus Snow as a mentor in the Games before he became President of Panem and the wonderful villain of the original trilogy.

4. Eliza and Her Monsters by Francesca Zappia

I mentioned this in my physical TBR post a couple weeks ago, but have decided to listen to the audiobook instead. A few weeks ago, I’d started to run out of audiobooks I wanted to listen to, and didn’t want to read anything on my regular TBR in this format, including this book. But, I went through a load of audiobook recommendations, and this was one of them, so it joined my to-listen.

I’m not hugely into contemporary books, but I’ve wanted to get more into the genre for a while, and this was the first one to join my TBR.

This novel follows Eliza Mirk, your typical high school outcast, who publishes a hugely popular web comic under the pseudonym LadyConstellation. Then Wallace Warland, the biggest fanfic writer of her comic transfers to her school and begins to draw her out of her shell.

TV Shows

Before I go into my list, I’d like to mention that I am currently watching WandaVision and am definitely planning to watch Falcon and the Winter Soldier on Disney+, but both come out on a weekly basis, so aren’t being included on this list. Also, I’ve been watching way too much YouTube recently, so I’m not sure I’ll get through all of these this month, especially since I’m watching the Arrowverse shows, which have such long seasons.

1. Love, Victor Season 1

This Love, Simon spin-off follows a character named Victor at Creekwood (I think that’s the name?) High School. I saw Love, Simon twice in cinemas when it was released, and, miraculously, it made me cry. I love that movie.

This series was released last year on Hulu, which is only available in the US, but as of February 23rd, it’s one of the shows that came to Disney+ as part of Star.

2. The Flash Season 1

As mentioned, I’ve started watching the DC Arrowverse shows. I watch tv shows through alternating seasons - as in, I watch season 1 of show A, then season 1 of show B, then 2 of A, etc., then when I finish one, I start watching show C - but I’m treating the Arrowverse as one show (even though it isn’t) so it’s not the only thing I’m watching. So this is technically Arrowverse S3, preceded by Arrow S1+2 (though I haven’t actually started S2 as of writing this because of how much YouTube I’ve been watching, so I’ll be finishing that first).

I genuinely don’t know that much about most DC superheroes, Flash included, but I’m going into this having been assured it takes itself less goddamn seriously than Arrow. It’s my sister’s favourite Arrowverse show, and I can’t wait.

3. Dare Me Season 1

I added this Netflix show to my watchlist when it came out, and my basic understanding is that it focuses on the cheerleaders at a high school, and begins when a new coach arrives. It focuses on the psychological damage behind competitive cheerleading, and I’m not convinced I’m going to love it, but I think it’s worth a shot.

4. Arrow Season 3

I’m so confused by this poster. This is specifically the season 3 poster, and I’m so confused, but I’m sure it’ll make more sense when I watch the season.

I explained the weird way I’m watching Arrowverse (named as such because Arrow was the first show in it) already, but Arrow follows Oliver Queen, the son of one of the billionaires of Starling City upon his return after being stuck for five years on an island when a cruise ship carrying him and his father sunk. His father left him with a list of names of the people ‘corrupting’ the city, and Oliver takes it upon himself to assume a vigilante identity and take them down.

Movies

I’m not a huge movie-watcher, but I end up compiling so many to watch that, to ensure I get round to them, I watch a movie every time I finish a tv show season. I’m also currently re-watching the MCU movies in chronological order.

1. Instant Family

This is just something that came onto Netflix recently and I thought might be entertaining, and so it joined my list.

This follows a couple who decide to adopt a teenager, only to find out she has two more siblings.

2. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

This is just a continuation of my MCU re-watch - I love this movie. I love Guardians of the Galaxy, full stop (on another note, I just generally don’t understand why British people call it a full stop and Americans call it a period. Neither name makes particular sense).

3. Avengers: Age of Ultron

And here we have another continuation of my MCU rewatch. I honestly think this is my favourite Avengers movie, because the whole teams actually together, and Wanda, Scarlet Witch, is introduced - I love her. I really didn’t like Vision until WandaVision came out, though.

4. Behind The Try: A Try Guys Documentary

Not technically a movie, but still. (Are documentaries movies? I tend to think of them as separate categories, but I guess they’re both movies. Hm.) I’ve been watching the Try Guys for years, which means I need to convince my sister to give me her Google password so I don’t have to pay for this.

I’m probably not going to stick to this list, and even if I do, I’m either going to also consume things not on it, or just not finish it. But, you’ll have to wait for my March wrap-up to find out.

#tbr #book #books #reading #reader #bookblr #marchtbr #tv shows #movies #review #films #movie #tv show #writerblr #march tbr

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charmingturkeysandwich · 5 years

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fireworks (that went off too soon)

Hey there! This is a CS one shot. An AU in which Killian is the lead singer and songwriter in a band that sounds suspiciously like Fall Out Boy...

Summary: Emma and Killian were friends in college, but haven’t spoken in 9 years. Killian’s band’s new single changes everything.

Words: 4400ish

Rating: Teen? (Swearing, References to Sex)

Also on AO3

Big thanks to @awkwardnessandbaseball for reading this over, correcting all my dumbass mistakes, and helping me polish this up pretty :) (The title comes from my favorite Fall Out Boy song, Fourth of July. It’s heavily featured in the story sung by Killian’s band.)

---

It was 3pm on Friday the 13th – also a Full Moon – when Emma Swan finally had the meltdown she’d pressed “pause” on about nine years earlier.

(Nine years, three months, more accurately, but who was counting?)

The work week was winding down. The get this done today or be fired tasks had been completed and all the emails had been answered and it was about time to start doing the bare minimum to run down the clock to 5:01 when she could, without regret, run screaming from the building and put her god forsaken job out of her mind for two days of rest, relaxation, and rum.

(Definitely the rum. Or maybe it had been upgraded to a tequila weekend.)

It was Pandora’s fault, really. (A fitting name for opening up an emotional box inside her soul that had been sealed for quite a long time and with very good fucking reason.)

Usually Emma listened to wordless music – movie scores, Vitamin String Quartet and the like – so as to keep the creative juices flowing without breaking her train of concentration. But having reached the procrastination part of the afternoon, she thought, what harm could there be in listening to a little regular music?

Emma had always had a soft spot for pop/punk/emo music. It brought her joy even when it wasn’t joyful, which is either a sentiment only shared by lonely foster girls or perhaps all emo kids, but did it matter? It was her kind of music. Long before she met Killian Jones.

But then she met him. He was an insufferable ass at least 2/3 of the time, but for the other third of his life, he was sweet, funny, and musically a goddamn genius. His voice was smooth and warm, he could play guitar like it was in his DNA, and his lyrics were both relatable and completely original. She was half in love from the start, so of course she pushed him as far away as possible.

(Love is patient; love is kind. Love is slowly losing my mind)

He was aloof. At best. They were college kids who shared a dorm building and not much else, not until their roommates fell in love with each other. That’s around the time they started spending an inordinate amount of time together. He was fucking anything with brown eyes and tits and she absolutely did not care and everything was fine. They were friends, kind of. She was a fan of his band, but not in the groupie way. She had no intention of being just a notch in his bedpost or a line in his song.

(As it turned out, she ended up becoming both. Eventually.)

When he wasn’t playing shows in dive bars (or fucking freshmen girls in a shower stall of their dorm hall’s shared bathroom), he spent a lot of time in Emma’s room. Mostly to avoid Mary Margaret and David in his room who were, as he called it, “the most sickly sweet love story this side of the Atlantic” and “a complete buzzkill to complex song-writing.” And she was OK with it. She loved when he would compose while she read. And they had the best conversations. They challenged each other on everything from politics to pie flavors and she’d never been so stimulated by someone of the opposite sex in her life.

Intellectually stimulated. In the brain.

By junior year, the two pairs of roommates had moved off-campus, opting to share a three bedroom house while they finished up school. Killian’s band was starting to actually make something of themselves, but he vowed to get his degree (this pretty face won’t last forever), and Emma played tutor for him when he skipped class for weeks on end so he could play some gigs on the west coast.

They were friends. They were equals. They meant so much more to each other than “just” friends or study buddies or housemates or anything, because the past three years had been the most stable years in either of their lives and it was all because of the support they received from each other in the darkest nights and the brightest days and seriously.

Fuck Pandora.

It had distracted her when she was in the middle of perfectly pleasant procrastinating. Now she was getting off track. Frazzled. Fucking pissed.

With her work mostly finished, she had decided to listen to Panic! At the Disco’s station. It was a safe zone – the best of two different genres: emo and pop. She bopped along to Blink 182 and “the Ballad of Mona Lisa.” She swayed and swooned a little when “Secrets” by One Republic played. And she got a good laugh at “I’m Not OK (I Promise),” remembering the days she’d scream “I’m not o-fucking kay! [trust me]” every time she got into a fight with the foster mother she now loved so very much.

But then there was a dramatic twist and a cinematic sweep and that voice and before she could switch the station, some warning popped up at her, removing all the buttons and controls and displaying the error message of SOMETHING WENT WRONG and all she could think was no shit, Sherlock.

Killian’s band got big when they were 21. And stayed big. The band broke up once, briefly, but they’d been dancing around the American Top 40 for at least 6 of the last 9 years and as much as it hurt her to hear his voice through a radio and not through a wall of their shared house, at least the lyrics of the songs never stung her before.

Because they’d never been about her before.

It was the summer before senior year, late that June, and Killian had just returned from a little pop-punk festival in Seattle. She’d picked him up at the airport in Portland (Maine) and had been chatting his ear off about how much better “our” Portland was from “theirs” (Oregon), but Killian had been largely silent.

Which was out of character to the extreme, his little creative writing/song composer mind always racing and his far too pleasing voice always spilling from his stupidly attractive lips.

“What is up with you, Jones? I just said that they have better lobster in Oregon and you didn’t even react.”

From the passenger seat, he played with the window controller, the air whooshing in and stopping to the rhythm of Seven Nation Army AKA the world’s most overplayed song that wasn’t sung by Ed Sheeran or Taylor Swift.

“Hmm? Oh, it’s nothing, Swan. A problem for a different day, to be sure.”

His voice had been quiet, unsure. That wasn’t him either. This was the asshole who could start a trend with a typo and who claimed to have made a girl come with nothing but his voice. His level of confidence was infuriating, but unshakeable.

(He made forgetting the words to his own songs look attractive. And that was an eventual Buzzfeed headline, not Emma’s own assessment. Obviously.)

“Killian, what’s up? Did the festival not go as well as you wanted? From what I saw on YouTube, it seemed awfully successful.”

“Aye, love.” He perked up just a bit, finally turning toward her and smiling. “It was grand.”

“And you’re brooding because, what, you’re worried that feeling happy for too long will sap you of your emo energy or something?”

Her attempt to lighten the mood didn’t seem to take, though, and Killian turned back out the window like he was practicing for his very own music video.

When they got back to their house, Emma grabbed his clothes and Killian lugged the musical equipment and neither of them said a word.

Fog had rolled in, or maybe it was on its way out, and if it weren’t for the green leaves, it might have felt like October. But there was something about his expression that was a hell of a lot more December. Something ending.

They were lingering almost awkwardly in their kitchen, Emma trying to casually wrack her brain for how to pull Killian out of his little funk, when he interrupted her with an overdramatic clearing of his throat.

“Ahem! Fancy a drink, Swan?” Killian extended a shot glass to her, a dark liquid inside that couldn’t be anything but spiced rum.

“What’s the occasion?” she asked hesitantly.

“Perhaps… perhaps it’s a celebration.”

“…of?”

“Your business sense, of course!” He lifted his glass toward hers for a clink and then downed the shot faster than she could even raise hers to her lips.

“What kind of business are we talking here? I’m not sure if this is the setup for an idiot joke or a reference to lyrics you swear you told me you wrote but never actually did.”

“Ah, love, no. Not that, this time anyway. Actually – actually, it’s about the band. And ‘Grand Theft Autumn.’ They loved it like you said they would.”

“They being?”

“The record company. They loved it. And they want it. And us.”

Holy shit! She knew it. They were going to be famous. Killian deserved it so much and they were going to be huge and everyone was going to love him just like she did and –

Wait.

“When you say they want you… do you mean, like, deferred acceptance so you can finish college or…”

“No, love. The boys and I … we’re packing up and moving to LA.”

She was dumbfounded.

“LA?”

“Aye.”

“When?”

“Monday.”

That’s right about the time her stomach dropped to her heels and the rum threatened its way back up her throat and perhaps onto Killian’s perfectly rumpled white shirt.

She just – wasn’t ready to let him go.

She could hear his honey-smooth voice drift through her head, his own lyrics seeming oddly relevant to this dramatic turn in her life.

Maybe he won’t find out what I know; you were the last good thing about this part of town.

So they drank. And drank. And drank some more. They were more honest with each other than they’d been in three years. She told him how much she hated that he thought setting his clocks early would keep him from being late. And he told her that he didn’t truly think that… it just had fit as a song lyrics and he felt like he needed to “make it authentic by living it.”

She called him pretentious and he called her painfully adorable and neither were true and yet somehow they felt like the perfect identifiers for the characters they were trying to be when they weren’t with each other.

So of course she fell into bed with him that night. Her bed. The twinkly lights hung around her ceiling were flickering as he kissed a trail down her neck and she tugged off his way-too-tight jeans and dear fucking lord if she thought the only thing he could do with his tongue was sing, she was officially wrong.

But come morning she was officially gone. As the sun rose on a rainy June Sunday morning, she slipped out of her bed, slid into whatever clothes she could reach without making noise, and jogged all the way to David’s brother’s frat house to hide until Monday came and went and when exactly did her life turn into an emo song?

When I wake up I’m willing to take my chances on the hope I forget

September. Friday the 13th. Pandora malfunction. Her brain was reeling and her heart was shattering all over again, because the song pumping through her pathetic tinny Dell speakers was, on first blush, just another of his melodramatic fictions, a series of sentiments that sounded good together but that he’d never actually experienced (he’d admitted the best songs were much like Hey There Delilah… a lovely story and 0% real). But she could hear something genuine in that still so attractive voice. And then… a few familiar thoughts.

I’ll be as honest as you let me

I miss your early morning company

If you get me

You are my favorite ‘what if’

You are my best ‘I’ll never know’

She’d turned off her phone the morning she’d left him in her bed. Kept it off until Tuesday. And blocked his number the minute she turned it back on.

Goodbyes were bad enough. To have been reduced to his very last college-one-night-stand? She couldn’t face it.

(Especially because she’d realized mid-fuck she’d kind of always wanted to be his forever, or whatever overly-romantic hyperbole he’d scoff at before writing it down in his notes.)

She hadn’t let herself think of him for longer than the span of one of his songs since that day. Even then, she’d usually change the channel. It was just too hard.

But could this one actually be about her? And if so, what the fuck was she supposed to do with that? Cry? Scream? Sue his sorry ass for slander?

(Not that one.)

She’d made a lot of mistakes in her life. He’d never been one of them, not until the end. Is it possible that didn’t need to be the end at all?

My 9 to 5 is cutting open old scars

Again and again til I’m stuck in your head

He’d probably had a lot of almosts. Maybe he’d just gotten better at faking genuine emotion in his songs. There’s no way he still thought about her. Even for lyrical dramatics.

I wish I’d known how much you loved me

I wish I’d cared enough to know

I’m sorry every song’s about you

The torture of small talk

With someone you used to love

Well there you had it. Small talk? They hadn’t talked in years. And she already knew every song was total bullshit, made up longing. Some of his best lovelorn pandering (that she admittedly loved) had been written when he claimed to be incapable of actual love. When he would only sleep with dark-haired, dark-eyed girls who didn’t want anything more than a good breakfast the next morning.

(I’m not looking for a soulmate, darling, just a beauty without a gag reflex, he’d repeated on many occasions. Sometimes literally to the women he was hitting on. And yes, they did usually blow him afterward and he would inexplicably tell her and she Did. Not. Care.)

(Until the day she realized she always had.)

A week after he’d moved to Los Angeles had been the 4th of July. It being summer and most of her friends working various jobs, she didn’t think there would be a huge party. James had insisted, though, that they needed to celebrate the fact that their friends were getting famous. David had pointed out the irony that the band – Killian, Will, Robin, and Graham – were all from outside of the USA. And yet they were being celebrated on America’s birthday.

“Stealing things from others is the American way. Now drink, little brother!” James had shouted just before his frat brothers lifted him into keg stand position and he chugged.

Emma wasn’t one for keg stands, so she’d opted for drinking straight liquor instead, and from what she could extrapolate from the massive headache the next morning (in addition to the vomit in her bedside garbage can), she had likely drank that bottle in its entirety.

After the opening of Pandora’s box that fateful Friday the 13th, Emma couldn’t think of much else but her almost-maybe-something Killian Jones. Suddenly his stupid band was everywhere and that stupid song was everywhere and she was feeling a deep longing to connect with that girl who had two whole albums by two different bands written about her to see how the fuck she coped with old wounds being opened every fucking visit to the grocery store.

(Then again, Brand New and Taking Back Sunday weren’t quite so mainstream. Maybe that’s how she survived.)

(Is that what you call a getaway? Tell me what you got away with, cause I’ve seen more spine in jellyfish; I’ve seen more guts in 11 year old kids.)

She’d taken to keeping the radio off at all times, and humming the Star Spangled Banner when she couldn’t escape Killian’s stupidly attractive and all-too-familiar voice gracing the airwaves.

Ruby asked her out for drinks, and alcohol was exactly the cure for her current tumult, so she agreed on the very specific request that they hit the country bar downtown instead of their usual Rabbit Hole escapades. Which worked out great for avoiding song-specific reminders, but sadly didn’t keep all Killian talk at bay.

“By the way, how have you been holding up?” Ruby asked, probably in response to Emma’s downing two shots – one of which that had been intended for Ruby – in the first minute or so at the table.

“What do you mean, holding up?” She wasn’t that transparent, right?

“Well the song… the one Killian wrote about you. It’s, like… huge. Weird how he waited this long. Did he warn you first or anything?”

… what? It wasn’t about her. Sure, it kind of, a little bit, had some moments that seemed like they could be inspired by her. But it had been nine fucking years and she hadn’t seen him since the morning she slinked away from their house and it’s not like he’d ever reached out or anything (or at least he didn’t try very hard, because blocking a cell phone number wasn’t like blocking a whole-ass person), hence her nine years of denial and shoving down her feelings like the very opposite of the emo kid she once was.

She probably looked like that stupid meme of the lady thinking about math and her heart was beating nearly out of her chest, but somehow the only sound that made it out of her mouth was, “huh?”

Ruby, bless her heart, was much better at dealing with, you know, life than Emma was. And sorting through feelings and coping with unprecedented situations that Emma had so far only seen odd iterations of in Hallmark movies or … emo music videos, probably.

“The song. Fourth of July. It’s been a while since he wrote a song about you and I mean usually they were about pining for you, which is a little more tolerable, probably. But this one… I don’t know. I just figured you probably didn’t appreciate it, and that’s why you were drinking my shots.”

Another lame, dumbfounded response: “What? Killian’s never written a song about me.”

Ruby’s eyebrow shot up to her hairline (the way Killian’s always had when she said something silly). “So all that shit in college was…?”

“Made up! Ruby, he was a creative writing major. He just made up characters and then wrote songs as if he were them. He never actually wanted to date anyone. Just fuck anything that resembled Megan Fox.”

Ruby didn’t say a word. She stood, walked to the bar, ordered two drinks, and sat back down with Emma a few minutes later.

“Sweetheart. You sure are dumb for a smart girl.”

And that’s how Emma’s Enlightenment began.

As it turns out, Killian’s creative writing skills were great, but not quite as great as his love for his best friend.

Yep, love. Apparently he’d loved her.

There was a reason he’d really only fucked girls that looked nothing like Emma.

There was a reason he had valued her input so much in his music.

There was a reason he’d hung out with her so often and it had nothing to do with Mary Margaret and David’s grossness.

Keep quiet; nothing comes as easy as you. Can I lay in your bed all day?

Fuck.

“Why didn’t he tell me?!”

Ruby laughed at her, which was totally uncalled for, but also kind of made a lot of sense if she had the ability to think of any of this objectively.

“Oh, honey. He told you every goddamn day in those songs. And how he acted. You’d have to be blind to not realize how much that boy loved you. So he assumed it was a ‘no’ from your side. And then after you slept with him and then he poured his heart out to you and still nothing? That was kinda it for him. But I mean, it’s been so long. I can’t believe he released a song about that now.”

At that, Emma’s jaw dropped. Hard. There was an audible pop and damnit, she was going to have to ice that later, probably.

“How do you know I slept with him?!”

“… because you had a fight about it literally in front of every person you knew?”

HUH?

The buzz of the alcohol was nothing compared to the stinging behind her eyes and the pain in her gut and seriously had the past decade actually been a very different reality from what she’d been living?

And how had Mary Margaret, AKA the Secret Spiller, never told her that A) Killian loved her or B) that Emma had apparently had a blacked-out fight with him in front of everyone?

Emma’s Enlightment continued.

Apparently no one spilled the secret because no one knew it was a secret to start. Much like Killian had, everyone thought that Emma knew his feelings, but that she just wanted to be friends.

And after the blow up on the Fourth of July, they just assumed she didn’t want to talk about it.

While David and James and a bunch of their friends were playing beer pong and Mary Margaret and Regina were trying to find another pair to play cornhole, Emma had been nursing a bottle of Jack Daniels from the roof of the frat house. She’d crawled out of Jefferson’s window, much to his annoyance (he worked in the morning and needed to sleep), and she just watched. Everyone was having a good time. The best days of their lives were now or even tomorrow.

But hers were yesterday.

So she drank and she drank and she drank until the boys were lighting off fireworks and Belle had started a chant of USA! USA! And out of nowhere she saw the floppy brown hair and scuffed-up leather jacket she’d been wishing for every minute of the last week.

“Swan! I need to speak with you!” he’d called up at her, perched on the Lion statue at the front entrance.

But, of course, he’d been pulled in a thousand different directions as soon as everyone else saw their about-to-be-famous friend. So Emma drank and drank and drank some more, not prepared to actually have to say goodbye this time.

Ruby wasn’t sure how long it took until Killian made it onto the roof with her. She did know they’d only been talking a few minutes when Emma started screaming at the top of her lungs about thanks for the memories, even though they weren’t so great. That seemed to have really upset him, because then he started screaming about why the bloody hell did you sleep with me then and Emma had cried but ultimately said she didn’t mean to and he needed to just leave because that’s what he was going to do anyway and there was no reason to feel sorry for her.

There had been more screaming that wasn’t quite intelligible (thank goodness), but when all was said and done, Killian had told Ruby that he laid it all down on the line, how much he loved her, how he wanted her to go with him to LA, how he really would burn down the whole city just to show her the light, but she’d said no. Emphatically.

Before crying so hard in Jefferson’s closet that he threatened to take her to the ER. When Emma passed out, Killian had carried her to his car (the only sober one) and carried her into her room when they got to his now-former house, leaving her with a kiss on the cheek and his later assurance to Ruby that at least he had tried.

And Emma didn’t remember.

“I think I’m going to be sick,” Emma muttered to Ruby.

Was there anything worse than finding out something that could have changed your life nine fucking years too late? She had never loved anyone like she’d loved Killian. It had been the easiest relationship of her existence. She’d never felt more safe, more valued, more… loved. But she’d thought it was friend-love.

(Even after the amazing sex.)

What a fucking dumbass she was.

Ruby left her to gather her thoughts/sulk in the corner for at least three line dances before she came back over to their table, bringing Emma a nice tall water as she cleared the un-drunk Long Island Iced Tea from next to Emma’s slumped head.

“I don’t think I can ever un-fuck this up,” Emma whined into her elbow before sitting up to chug the glass of water.

“I do have his number,” Ruby offered.

Hey um Ruby gave me your number and apparently I have a lot to apologize for

Congratulations on the fame also by the way I loved you every minute of every day

This is Emma, remember me? Apparently your song about me is doing really well

Hey Killian, I was wondering if you ever made it to this side of the country any more

I don’t know what to say except I’m sorry

After about 15 failed attempts to send him a message that would convey the depth of her regret, she nearly gave up. Hands shaking, legs bouncing, lunch threatening to make an encore appearance, she pulled up the lyrics to his new song, took a screenshot,

And all my thoughts of you

They could heat or cool the room

And now don’t tell me you’re fine

Oh, honey, you don’t have to lie

And added:

I’m not fine.

It was a very painful 26 hours before she received a response, a screenshot with an addition as well.

I said I’d never miss you, but I guess you’ll never know

Where the bridges I have burned never really led home

Can I come home?

They met outside the old frat house (now shut down) a week later, staying awake until sunrise just catching up on all that had happened since they last saw each other (and a little bit of what happened when they did). She brought sparklers and he brought nine years of unreleased song lyrics.

And when his band’s next single was called Opening Pandora’s Box on Friday the Thirteenth, well, everyone but Emma just thought they were being their usual melodramatic selves.

Yeah, songs about her weren’t all that awful after all.

#cs ff #cs au ff #cs au #keisha writes #things i love #captain swan #emo music #BAM I PUT THEM TOGETHER #if you like this let me know?#because I think we'd be friends

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thewritewolf · 4 years

Text

Eating Habits Chapter 4: The Calm

Adrien has relaxing morning before going out into town with an old friend. Marinette overworks herself.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 (Final)

Enjoy!

Read on Ao3. My ko-fi.

Adrien stretched out, the pleasantly warm beams of the morning sun bringing an unconscious smile to his face. While he’d always been a morning person, his childhood schedule often had him getting up well before the sun, never getting to enjoy the first rays of dawn. That wasn’t something he intended to take for granted any time soon.

The sunlight seeped into his bones and warmed his heart as he rolled out of bed, taking extra care to avoid disturbing Plagg as he lay sprawled on his back on Adrien’s pillow. He tucked his feet into a pair of cute black slippers Marinette had made. Their floppy cat ears and green googly eyes never failed to put him in a good mood. Or in this case, an even better mood.

His morning routine went by in a serene blur. He crooned love songs in the shower. Took a little extra time messing with his hair. Danced while he dug through his closet for an outfit to wear today. He gently picked up his still-sleeping kwami and tucked him into his shirt pocket. Today was going to be a great day, he already knew it. As he stepped into his kitchen, it felt like nothing could ruin his good mood.

Except perhaps for the appearance of an envelope on his countertop.

His smile quickly melted from his face as he recognized the familiar handwriting. He vaguely remembered bringing it in yesterday after a long shift at the bakery. Wednesdays were always pretty busy for some reason or another. His fingers traced the edge of the envelope. Deciding that he’d better get it over with, he carefully and methodically opened it and pulled out the letter.

Before he could subject himself to reading the thing, there was a loud knock at his door that nearly had him drop it in surprise. He cracked open the door, which was all the invitation Chloe needed to strut inside. She lowered her sunglasses as she peered around his apartment and sniffed dismissively.

“A little quaint, but better than that damn cavern you grew up in.”

“Good morning to you too, Chlo.” He shook his head.

“Oh, lighten up, Adrikins. It’s a lovely place. Maybe not the Grand Paris, but...” They exchanged cheek kisses. She raised an eyebrow at the letter he was holding, snatching it from his hand. There was a teasing lilt to her voice as she said, “Oh? What’s this? Love letters, maybe? You’re certainly enough of a romantic to insist on something as ancient as these.” Her eyes narrowed as she skimmed. “I see.” She crumpled it up and threw it into the garbage.

“Hey! I hadn’t-”

“Trust me. He didn’t have anything of value to say, the rotten bastard.” She clapped her hands together and gave him a gleaming smile. “Now! Are you ready to start our day out, Adrikins?”

Feeling a little miffed at her brashness, Adrien played dumb. “I’m sure I have no idea what you’re talking about. I’ve got a girlfriend, you know.”

Chloe rolled her eyes. “Yeah, and so do I.” She crossed her arms. “I’m here to hang out with my friend, you ridiculous boy. I’d hope you’d at least remember that much, since this was your plan.” She walked towards the door. “Let’s get moving, I’m not going to be in Paris forever.”

He chuckled as he followed her out. Adrien usually preferred taking the stairs, but unsurprisingly Chloe lead him into the elevator.

To fill the silence, Adrien asked, “Girlfriend, huh? So you and Kagami are back together again? Or is it someone I don’t know about?”

“Like anyone else could handle me, Adrikins.” She snorted, a faint smile on her lips. “You and Marinette becoming a thing turned out to be a blessing in disguise. If that hadn’t happened, I wouldn’t have found Kagami tearing up in the girls’ locker room.”

“Should I say it just like that when I give a speech at your inevitable wedding?”

“Maybe. Two girls brought together when their mutual beard got taken away from them. A classic love story.”

The two of them shared a laugh and just like that, it was like old times again. The conversation, mostly gentle barbs and jabs traded between them, carried on through their walk through several shops. Naturally, with Chloe present they had to stop at a few boutiques to update her wardrobe. Several years in New York with her mother had left her fashion decidedly American rather than French. After a few hours of shopping and a brief stop for lunch, they arrived at the main focus of their excursion.

Adrien’s cooking class. He’d made the arrangements to join the class after he had gotten back from Marinette’s earlier that week. It was just good fortune that placed Chloe in town just as he was about to go into his first class.

“So… why the sudden interest in cooking, Adrikins?” Chloe asked as she tied her apron strings behind her.

“...It’s a useful skill to have. I love cooking.”

“Ah, you’re being sneaky. Got it.”

They were quiet for a few minutes as they listened with the rest of the class to the instructor. With the wide smile the teacher wore as she looked into each of their faces, Adrien could already feel his nerves relaxing. This wasn’t like the instructors he’d been provided as a child, always seeking flaws and failings. He reassured himself that he was going to a good time.

While they were in the middle of preparing the sauce, Adrien asked, “So… New York. Missing it already?”

Chloe paused. She sighed. “Not as much as I was missing Paris.”

“Really?” Adrien frowned. “I guess it’s easier to meet up with Kagami if you don’t have to take a flight every time you want to date, but…”

“No, no, it’s not that.” Chloe waved her hand impatiently. “It’s just… it’s been hard, you know? Trying to be a better person. For you. For Kagami. For all my friends. And it hasn’t been any easier spending all that time with mom.”

Adrien winced. It wasn’t hard to believe - Audrey was about as awful as they came, outside of supervillain circles. “Does that have anything to do with this visit? And why you and Kagami just got back together?”

“...Yeah. I was thinking… maybe this didn’t just have to be a visit.”

“You want to move back to Paris?” Adrien failed to keep the shock out of his voice. “You were so excited for New York, though.”

“It’s alright, but it’s not home.” Chloe sighed. “You know?”

He thought about the bakery and all the happy memories he’d made there. All the patrols that had devolved into late night cuddles on the Eiffel Tower. Games of tag across the rooftops of Paris. Deep conversations held in the towers of Notre Dame. The city was his home; he couldn’t imagine what it would be like to be away from it for so long.

“Yeah,” he said, swallowing the lump in his throat. “I get what you mean completely.”

The conversation petered out as they turned their focus towards finishing the class. A few more details slipped past, though - while she would be living there for a while, she wouldn’t be moving back to the Grand Paris Hotel. She wouldn’t be moving in with Kagami either. After having her mother’s assistants breathing down her neck for a few years, some time to herself was just what she needed. Taking things slow never came easily to Chloe, but she was trying her best this time.

Once class finished, they said their goodbyes. Adrien headed back to his apartment having recaptured some of that positivity that he’d woken up with. It was still early in the afternoon by the time he’d gotten home, on a day he didn’t work, but his usual means of passing the time wouldn’t be getting out of class for a few more hours. As he puzzled out what he’d do until then, his stomach growled. That dish he’d made in class smelled wonderful…

A few plates of homemade lasagna and a few movies later, and the sun was beginning to set. He’d had a beautifully unproductive day, which was just what he needed.

“Well, look at you,” Plagg said with a grin, slowly eating through his own plate of lasagna. “Finally get some time off to yourself and what do you do with it?” He took a huge bite, devouring the last of his slice. “Absolutely nothing!” He sniffed, as if holding back tears. “I’m so proud!”

With a faint smile, Adrien replied, “Coming from anyone else, I’d think you were being sarcastic. But thanks, Plagg.” He set his plate on the table and Plagg pounced on it, devouring the remainder of it. “Its relaxing not to be led by the nose across Paris. Always glancing at my phone to make sure I’m on time. Always doing something, never a moment of downtime.”

Plagg’s ears twitched and he tilted his head at Adrien. “You’re stressing out, aren’t you?”

“Was it that obvious?” Adrien deflated a little. “It just… it feels wrong. Not doing anything for a whole day.”

“Get used to it, young man. We spent all that time getting your task masters to put down that whip, I’m not about to let you pick it up yourself.” He floated up to Adrien’s face. “But hey! Don’t worry, you’ve got the king of naps and relaxation here to teach you everything you need to know, kid!”

Adrien smiled and rolled his eyes. “Sure, Plagg. I’ll defer to your expertise in this.”

“I’m glad-”

“Your much greater, wider breadth of experience.”

“Yes, thank-”

“Your unbelievably vast knowledge of the lazy arts.”

“I prefer the ‘way of ultimate relaxing’.”

Adrien chuckled and scratched Plagg between the ears with one finger. “I’m sure you do, little guy. Although, now that you’ve mentioned taking it easy…” Adrien pulled out his phone and scrolled down to the contact, ‘Mari’, surrounded by cutesy emojis. The phone began to ring…

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

Marinette’s eyes were burning from how long she’d kept them open today. Little sleep last night and it was looking like little sleep again tonight. But she needed to get this dress ready in time for the critique next week. No matter what she did, though, she couldn’t enter the right state of mind to just zone out and let the art flow through her. It came as a welcome relief when her phone rang. She even let out an affectionate sigh when she saw who it was that was calling her.

“Hey, kitty. What’s up?” She stood up, taking this break as an excuse to stretch her legs a little.

“Nothing much. Spent the day hanging out with Chloe while she was in town.”

“Chloe, huh?” Marinette had mixed feelings about Chloe, but it had definitely improved after they all rallied together for Adrien’s sake. She’d been beyond helpful during that terrible month, but it was only one step toward making amends for the years and years of torment.

“I know, I know. But she’s been doing good. That time in America really helped her. Or, at least, it helped her decide what she didn’t want to be.”

Marinette raised an eyebrow. “You say that like she’s done living in the States.”

“From what she was saying, it sounds like she is. Don’t worry, I won’t try to get you two to get along. I’ve learned my lesson.”

“Glad to know I can still teach cats new tricks,” she said teasingly. “But if that’s the case, then you probably didn’t call me to chat about that. What’s on your mind, hot stuff?” She stretched out on the couch. “Knowing you, I’m sure it's something romantic or something ridiculous. Probably both.”

“You know me so well, bugaboo.” His laugh came through, clear as a summer sky. “Well, we’re getting pretty close to our six year anniversary…”

“Six years…” Marinette whispered in awe. “Doesn’t feel nearly that long, but at the same time feels like our entire lives.”

“I understand completely. Hard to imagine a time before we were together, love bug.”

“Still, we’re a little under three months away from it. What did you want to talk about?” There was a silence on the other end. “...Adrien. You weren’t thinking of making plans already were you?”

Silence. “...No.”

Marinette laughed. “Sunshine, you’re ridiculous.”

“Mhm. And, if I were planning our anniversary date, which classy restaurant would you like to go to?”

“Do we really need to go somewhere?” Marinette asked as she sat up on the couch, elbows on her knees. Tikki glanced over her cookie at Marinette, tilting her head in a silent question. “What about just staying home and cuddling? Movies and junk food and a big, warm blanket?”

“Hm…”

“What?”

“Just trying to decide if that is ‘Marinette the exhausted student’ or ‘Marinette who hates the cold’ talking here.”

“It’s ‘Marinette who just wants to spend quality time alone with her boyfriend’, actually.” Tikki snickered silently and returned to eating her cookie.

“ I love spending time with you, but you also refuse to let me spoil you except on special occasions. What’s more special than our anniversary?”

“I’m just saying, I’ll probably be exhausted with finals and want to just stay in by that point.”

“Speaking of which,” Adrien said as he blatantly changed the subject, “how have you been doing on sleep?”

Marinette bit her lower lip as she debated whether or not she should downplay just how little sleep she’d been getting. Before she could respond, she heard Adrien sigh.

“That bad, huh? Listen, can you do me a favor?”

Always willing to help out others, Marinette replied without thinking, “Of course!”

“Go to bed early tonight.”

“But-”

“I know you probably have things to do, and I know you think you absolutely have to get them done tonight. But I promise, you don’t. And we both know the quality will be better anyway if you can get in the zone and not fall asleep halfway through.”

She pouted in silence. There wasn’t anything she could really argue - he’d got her pegged there. A downside to him knowing her so well.

“Mari? I need you to promise me you’ll go to bed early tonight. Please?”

She finally broke down. “Okay, okay. I’ll try.”

“That’s all I’m asking.” Marinette stood up to run her hand over her latest piece while Adrien continued talking. “So how has this week been going? Anything new to tell?”

As Marinette began to fill him in on what she’d been going over in her classes, she resumed work on her dress. If she was going to live up to this promise, she’d need to get plenty of work done right now. No matter how exhausted she was.

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

It was a couple hours after Adrien had gotten off the phone with Marinette, getting close to midnight. Normally, he knew that Marinette was as good as her word. She’d bend over backwards if it meant fulfilling all her obligations to people.

Unfortunately, she often didn’t take herself into consideration there.

Adrien trusted Marinette. He’d trusted her with his life more times than he cared to remember. But even so, he didn’t hold out hope for how well his little loophole worked out. Getting her to take care of herself and painting it as a personal favor was a little sneaky of him, but if it worked then it would be worth it.

“Sorry, Plagg.”

His kwami looked up from where he was laying, caught in a kwami-sized food coma. “Wha-?”

“Claws out!”

A flash of green light later and he was crawling out his window. Soon enough his feet were on the rooftops, the crisp autumn air in his lungs as he ran across the city. Less than ten minutes later, he was crawling into another window. As his boots hit the ground, Marinette jolted from where she was standing over her project.

She whipped around, eyes wide. “Adrien!” She tried to put herself between her and the dress. Given how small the love of his life was, it didn’t do anything to conceal what she’d been up to just moments before. “I can explain, I promise!”

He crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow.

“Um…” She wrung her hands and visibly struggled to come up with anything before hunching over in defeat. “Okay, it’s exactly what it looks like. I just need to finish this piece before I go to bed.” She moved as if to turn around. A small smile tugged at his lips as he caught her wrist.

“Mari, it’s time for bed,” he said gently.

“I’m not tired,” she replied while trying to stifle a yawn.

“I’m sure you aren’t.” He pulled her towards himself and swept her off her feet.

She immediately melted into his arms, leaning her head against his chest as he carried her. Even so, she blearily looked up at him and pouted.

“Hey! I need to finish my…” She yawned again and made a motion with her hand as she tried to think of the right word, “...thing.”

“Your ‘thing’ will be waiting for you when you’re awake and perky tomorrow.” He entered her bedroom and set her down in her bed. He tucked her in and planted a kiss on her forehead. “Good night, lovebug.”

He tried to walk away, but she snatched his hand. “Stay with me? Until I fall asleep, at least.” She stretched as she got comfortable. “It’ll be a while though. Since I’m not tired.”

Fighting down a smile, he laid down on the sheets next to her. Immediately she draped an arm over him and rested her ear against his heart. She sighed in contentment as he began purring.

They chatted for a little while, but contrary to Marinette’s blatant lies, she was exhausted. Hardly a few minutes had passed before she was soundly asleep and he was able to slip away. As much as he’d love to spend the night here, her bed was too small for the both of them. Prying himself away, he rushed back home.

After he dropped his transformation and Plagg floated away grumbling, Adrien started getting ready for bed himself. He settled into his too large bed and opened his phone as he waited for exhaustion to hit. Which is when he noticed that Alya was active on discord. Remembering his brush with her in the halls of Marinette’s apartment a few days ago, he sent her a message.

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

Direct message from Adrien

Adrien: You awake?

Alya: The truth never sleeps, blondie

Alya: Although... The truth IS feeling a little tired though

Adrien: lol, that’s fine I was about to head to bed myself Sorry to bother you

Alya: Nah, that’s fine Get back here centerfold What’d you want to talk about?

Adrien: Well… Marinette

Alya: Our favorite topic, lol I take it this is about how she’s running herself ragged?

Adrien: Yeah We’ve seen it before A lot I’m just worried Like always

Alya: I hear you I’d love to say homegirl can handle herself but Shes great at taking care of everyone BUT herself Which is where we come in

Adrien: Glad we’re on the same page So what’s the plan?

Alya: Well You know how she gets If we don’t pay attention she’ll end up starving herself Too focused on what shes doing to care about How SHE is doing

Adrien: yeah I had to go over and put her to bed myself today

Alya: Lol sounds aobut right Between the two of us we can watch out for her She’ll need lots of extra tlc But I’m sure you don’t mind that, huh lover boy?

Adrien: You caught me I love my girlfriend to pieces And this is a good excuse to dote on her

Alya: Attaboy I’ll do my part too

Adrien: Thanks, Alya

Alya: Don’t sweat it, blondie Just do right by my girl and we’ll be square

#Miraculous Ladybug #Adrien Agreste #Marinette Dupain-Cheng #Adrienette #Marichat #Chloe Bourgeois #Chloegami #Tikki #Alya #ml fanfiction #my writing #Eating Habits #The Lucky One series

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duhragonball · 5 years

Text

Dragon Ball Z 230

Last time, Vegeta blasted big chunks out of the tournament stadium, killing hundreds in the process. Goku agreed to fight him, provided Babidi would teleport them to some place where no one would be in harm’s way.

Which leaves everyone at the stadium to wonder what the hell just happened. The World Tournament Announcer discusses the post-tournament ceremony with the winner, Mr. Satan. Under the circumstances, handing out the prize money doesn’t seem like a good idea, so it’s probably best if everyone just goes home. This scene seems very weird to me. I’m pretty sure it’s filler, but either way, this conversation seems a little too “funny-awkward” when it needs to be “hundreds-of-people-just-died-awkward.”

For example, if you look closely, you can see Android 18 and Marron standing in the background, between Satan and WTA. She’s been there since the last episode, before Vegeta showed up and killed all those people. The gag is that Mr. Satan can’t celebrate his victory too much because he keeps noticing 18 glaring at him, waiting for him to pay her the 20 million zeni he promised to her so she would throw the fight.

I think what’s happening here is that Toei decided to recycle the gag from the last episode, which is a common filler tactic on this show. Think of all the times we’ve seen Goku running down Snake Way, or training on his way to Namek, or suffering from the heart virus. But it really doesn’t work here because the atmosphere in the stadium has drastically shifted, or at least it should have. I know it’s a popular joke that death has no meaning in Dragon Ball because everyone can just be wished back to life, but most of the people here don’t know that. 18 does, but you’d think she’d be more disturbed by what Vegeta just did. She’s a cool customer, sure, but you’d think she’d want to get her daughter to safety at the very least.

At least Bulma seems to be on track with the story. “Vegeta... What’s Wrong With You?” could be the title of her autobiography though.

The answer, of course, is that he’s allowed himself to be mind-controlled by a space wizard so that he can finally fight Goku. No more teases, no more buildup, no more false starts. This fight is happening, and it’s going to keep happening for a few more episodes.

So this fight. What do I say about it? When I was a kid, I grew up with the lore established after Return of the Jedi came out. One way or another, I heard that the reason Darth Vader wears his life-supporting armor is because he once challenged Obi-Wan Kenobi to a duel, and suffered severe injuries from it. I don’t remember where I heard this, but the story was that it was right after he turned evil, and they fought over a live volcano, and he fell in some lava.

Of course, for younger readers, it’s all a matter of record. You can just watch “Revenge of the Sith” and see exactly what happened. But between 1983 and 2005, we only had this one-sentence legend. I might have come up with the volcano part myself, since I heard “molten lava” and figured there had to be a volcano involved. For my generation, “Revenge of the Sith” was the payoff to that decades-long speculation.

The problem with moments like that is that you have to compete with fans’ imagination. I remember after the movie came out, and I was at a comic book store and heard some guy complain that there should have been more lost-limbs in that battle. Anakin lost an arm and both legs at the end, but I guess this guy’s bloodlust wasn’t sated. Maybe he wanted Kenobi to lose limbs too? Except he won, so I guess his dream scenario was for both of them to chop each other’s hands off and continue fighting one-handed.

For my part, I was satisfied with what I got, although when you get down to it, it’s never going to hold up quite as well as I pictured it, because I had 22 years to picture it, and I could imagine it from every possible angle, with every possible scenario. And when you imagine something, you can mix your emotions into the visuals. Watching Darth Vader fighting Obi-Wan Kenobi on the screen, well, it looks a lot like all the other lightsaber battles in Star Wars, only it’s longer and more intense. The movie is depending on you to fill in the emotional gaps. The actors can act in between the swordfighting, but it’s up to you to remember those performances when the blades start swinging.

What I’m driving at here is that a lot of Goku-Vegeta II is a dead heat. In particular, you see scenes like this one where neither guy can overpower the other, and they’re stuck holding each other’s hands and blocking knee strikes with their thighs. It reminds me a lot of the gifs of the Anakin/Obi-Wan fight, which just show them swinging their sabers around. Stripped of context, it looks downright silly. DBZ is counting on you to remember this:

This is why they’re fighting. I don’t just mean the original Goku/Vegeta fight as a whole, or even the outcome of that battle. I’m talking about this specific part of the fight, Episode 31 of DBZ, where Goku reluctantly used the Kaio-ken X3 and overpowered Vegeta, however briefly. This was really where Vegeta started taking Goku personally. After this, he tried to destroy the entire Earth just to kill Goku, and Goku used Kaio-ken X4 to overpower him yet again. From that point on, Goku spent the rest of the battle on the defensive, relying on Gohan, Krillin, and Yajirobe to finish what he’d started.

I’m not going to sit here and tell you the rematch is better than the original. Goku-Vegeta I is one of the crown jewels of this whole franchise. I still think I like this one better, though, because of the anticipation I had for it. It fufills a long deferred dream that Goku, Vegeta, and the audience have shared since Episode 36. One day, they’ll fight again, and settle this.

So maybe this battle doesn’t have the same underdog factor going for it, and the psychology and choreography isn’t as intuitive. It’s not as self-contained as the original battle, becaue this one depends so heavily on the viewer being familiar with Goku and Vegeta’s history. But dammit, I am familiar with all of that, and that’s why I like it.

There’s not a lot of stalling or desperate tactics here. Both guys powered up to their maximum at the start. This is just two guys trying to beat the hell out of each other, but they’re so evenly matched that it’s easy to lose sight of how hard they’re hitting, or how much of themselves they’re putting into every blow. Like here, Vegeta just got slammed into a cliffside, and he’s disintegrating the rock instead of just moving slightly away from it. Remember, it’s all about this:

Each of these guys want to pulverize the other this way. Goku wants to do it to prove that he can sustain this level of offense instead of barely holding out for a minute. Vegeta wants to do it because he’s still sore that any Saiyan managed to do this to him and live to tell about it.

There’s also something deeply tragic about this fight, which appeals to me in a way the original can’t tough. Before, they were two Saiyans. The last two, perhaps, but Saiyans nonetheless. Now, they’re Super Saiyans. The legend said there was only one every thousand years, but now, in spite of everything, there’s two. They’ve even managed to surpass the Super Saiyan and become something greater, but instead of saving the universe like they might have done before, they’re just beating the shit out of each other while the world burns. Z stands for the end.

Because every time Goku takes a hit...

The energy lost from the damage he sustains is magically transferred to Majin Buu’s ball. When enough has been aborbed, the seal can be broken, and Majin Buu will be resurrected.

Meanwhile, Dabura and Gohan have moved deeper in to Babidi’s ship to try and stop him while the Goku/Vegeta fight is in progress. This is Stage 4 of his spaceship, and in theory it’s no different from Stages 1-3. Babidi would normally send a warrior to fight the intruders, and any damgage they take would feed Buu. Only Babidi’s fresh out of good fighters, so he just sends ten of his low-tier henchmen to hold the line instead.

For some reason, everyone on board Babidi’s ship looks like these guys, except for Puipui, Yakon, and Dabura. I never paid much attention to it before, but when you think about it, it’s kind of weird how Babidi only “recruits” the best evil warriors he can find, but his crew all look like they came from the same planet. I’m guessing these guys were some sort of pirate band or something, and Babidi forced them all to come work for him and run his ship for him, or maybe this ship used to be theirs before Babidi hijacked it.

Anyway, Gohan takes them all out with a simple ki attack, and they can proceed. Not sure why these guys had Roman numberals on their uniforms. It implied that they were somewhat important, but I guess not.

Anyway, back to this fight. So yeah, like I said, these two are just going all out.

They’re using big flashy moves that might be climactic finishers in past battles, but here it’s just standard issue.

Take this beam struggle, for example. This was the height of the first Goku/Vegeta battle, but it’s just an appetizer here.

Like, they can’t even just have a beam struggle, they have to charge towards each other while they do it. Are they going to punch each other with their free hands while they do this?

Meanwhile, Trunks and Goten take a piss break on their way to the action. Some pervy dinosaur peeks on them while they go.

Okay, so this is my favorite part. Right here. Somehow, Vegeta managed to get the better of Goku, so he hauls him up, and it looks like he’s got Goku at his mercy.

Then he slams him into a rock and fires ki blasts that basically at like big staples, to hold Goku in place by his wrists, ankles and neck.

Then he reminds Goku that he claimed that he would finish this “quickly”. I think Goku knows better now, but let’s face it, he took Vegeta too lightly. He was sure that he could turn Super Saiyan 2 and blow him out of the water without a whole lot of trouble, because he’s spent most of their rivalry in the lead.

Then he slaps him in the face, and Goku can’t do shit. This part right here is the receipt for all the times Goku looked past Vegeta or failed to take him seriously. You can argue that he spared Vegeta all those years ago as an act of compassion or sportsmanship, but another way to interpret it is as an insult. To put it another way, Goku let Vegeta live because he didn’t think he was dangerous enough to kill. I think that’s how Vegeta’s always seen it, and now he’s out to prove otherwise.

So he’s just teeing off on the guy now. The message here is: If Goku doesn’t like this sort of thing, he should have killed Vegeta when he had the chance, because he’ll never get it again.

Then Vegeta has an extended flashback. The dub has him narrate this, which is one of my favorite monologues in this series, but the Japanese version just plays the footage, letting it speak for itself. I guess there’s a case to be made for either approach, but Chris Sabat killed this scene.

The bottom line is that Goku humilitated him in their first encounter by standing up to him and beating him up, and then he saved his life. Vegeta plans to avenge himself by tearing him to pieces. He means to kill Goku, which I don’t really understand, seeing as he’s already dead.

And this is where I think Babidi’s mind control may be somewhat underrated in this battle. I think it’s pretty easy to assume that this is how Vegeta would normally behave, but is it, though? Was he planning to face Goku in the world tournament and chop off his arms while their families looked on in horror? I’m pretty sure he wasn’t this hardcore about it going in. Before, he had resigned himself to never seeing Goku again, and then he was coming back for the tournament, and Vegeta was excited to face him under any terms, even while governed by the tournament rules, and Gohan’s “no-transforming” request. He wanted to beat Goku clean, sure, but he wasn’t nearly this bitter about it.

Now, this fucker wants to vivisect Goku. I’m pretty sure that’s Babidi’s handiwork, amplifying old grievances that Vegeta had probably moved past a long time ago.

Except...

Goku’s not done yet.

Every time Majin Vegeta gets surprised, I get a little more excited. This was what you wanted, wasn’t it? You self-important prick. You killed all those people just to get this guy mad enough to fight you.

WELL GUESS WHAT, JACKASS?

YOU GOT HIM.

ALL OF HIM.

I get chills every time I watch this part. Majin Vegeta is played up to be this horrible thing. The awesome power of Vegeta with none of the restraint, and if Goku even tries to stop him, he’ll just be playng into Babidi’s hands. Critics can say that this is a no-win scenario, or that Goku’s holding back during this fight, or that he’s not as into this as Vegeta is.

But this sequence here tells the story. Goku doesn’t have a long flashback to explain his motivation here. We’ve already seen it. This blue-pajamas-wearing idiot came to his planet to start shit. Goku was fighting to protect his home and everything he holds dear, and he barely managed to save the day, and that makes him the bad guy here? Vegeta broke Goku’s legs in that battle, but for some reason Vegeta wants revenge for that day. Vegeta beat the shit out of Goku’s son. Several times. Then he let Cell become perfect, and Goku and Gohan had to clean up his mess. Goku’s dead because of Vegeta’s arrogance, but Vegeta wants revenge?

There’s a part here where Vegeta tries to full-nelson Goku and impale him on a stalactite, and Goku just powers out of it. Goku’s not saying a lot in this fight, but he’s pissed, make no mistake. He’s just focused enough and gentle enough not to say anything.

He’s not shooting a Kamehameha inside a cave because he’s detached.

Vegeta fires back and the whole thing explodes.

So let’s be clear about this. There’s a relentless, wild animal in this battle, who won’t stop fighting no matter what. Also, Vegeta is here, and he has a goofy tattoo on his forehead.

Meanwhile, Gohan and the Supreme Kai have arrived at the chamber where Buu’s ball is kept, and Babidi and Dabura are there to greet them. Babidi isn’t worried at all, since he figures Dabura will be enough to hold them off until Majin Buu is ready. On the other hand, the Kai thinks he can kill Babidi wile Gohan holds off Dabura, and that should put an end to all of this.

But he’d better act fast, because Buu’s ball is glowing hot pink, and getting hotter and pinker by the second.

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javis-beretta · 6 years

Text

Babygirl

i was craving albert fluff, so here is a fake dating modern au, with my baby boy. (have you figured out that it’s my favourite trope yet?) i also can’t stop thinking of albert calling me babygirl, so there’s that. this is supposed to be set in high school, but i’m getting definite summer after senior year vibes idk. enjoy!

((tw: attempted assault near the end, but it’s not detailed at all))

You didn’t usually spend your free time in bars. The sticky countertops and weird guys were not your speed, even when you were tipsy off of the shots that Race usually ordered. You hoped this bar would be different – if you were a bar kind of person, it was exactly the kind of place you’d pick. It was new, but looked old in that gentrified, hipster way, it was walking distance from your house, so you didn’t have to worry about how you’d get home, and they served actual food, so you wouldn’t have to drink on an empty stomach. It seemed like a pretty good deal, so you and Albert had decided to meet there for dinner to check it out, but he was running late.

You really should have expected it, given that you had known him for most of your life. You met him before you could remember it – your parents had been friends, you lived a few houses down from one another, and your birthdays were just a few weeks apart, so it was almost fate that you’d become best friends. He had been a constant in your life for as long as you could remember, so you really should have known better than to be exactly on time. Albert had many winning qualities – he was funny, cheerful, the only person who completely understood you and he didn’t hurt to look at – but punctual, he was not.

You had been sitting at an empty table, looking like a lonely alcoholic and picking at your fries, for fifteen minutes, when the bartender brought you a drink that you hadn’t ordered, and motioned to a man standing at the bar. He looked young-ish, and marginally attractive, but that didn’t change the fact that you didn’t want anything to do with him. He waved, and you gave him a strained smile, twirling the straw that was in the expensive-looking drink. He got up from his seat and you stifled a groan.

By the time he made his away across the room to your seat, your smile had slipped away, and you were in a comfortable resting bitch face.

“Hey, beautiful, is this seat taken?” he said, giving you a yellow-toothed grin.

“Actually, I’m waiting for my-“ he sat down before you had a chance to finish.

“I’m Morris, and you are?”

“I’m not interested, sorry,” you answered, flatly.

“Oh, c’mon,” he cajoled, “your drink was expensive, you know.”

“I didn’t ask for that.”

“Look, just let me sit here and talk to you. We can be friends, I promise I’m real friendly.”

You rolled your eyes and pulled out your phone to check the time. Albert was now twenty minutes late, and you were considering ditching the bar altogether, if only to escape the man at your table. Although, with a type like him, you weren’t sure if he’d follow you.

“Hey, doll,” his voice was sharp, now, “I’m sure you know how rude it is to ignore someone, especially by texting.”

His eyes looked a little more menacing now, and you would be lying if you said that you didn’t feel a little nervous. You looked desperately around the restaurant, to see if you could flag a waiter or bartender’s attention.

“I’m talkin’ to you, sweetheart,” the man – Morris – snarled.

“I,” you started, not sure about what was going to come out of your mouth – the last thing you needed to do was make a guy that was already as creepy as him, angry.

Before you had to speak, someone swooped into the seat next to you, resting an arm on your shoulders. You glanced up. Albert DaSilva, knight in shining armour. He pecked you on the cheek and gave the man one of his most intimidating looks.

“Hey, babygirl, sorry I’m late, I got caught up at work.”

“Don’t worry about it, love,” you answered, quickly catching on to what he was doing.

He gave you a dazzling grin, but the look in his eyes asked silently if you were okay. You reached over and patted his knee in an answer.

“So, who’s your friend?” Al addressed the question to you, but he was levelling the man with another one of his looks.

“I’m – uh – Morris, but I was just leaving, man.”

The chair screeched against the floor as Morris quickly got up.

“Don’t forget this!” you said, giving him the falsest grin that you could muster, holding out the drink that you hadn’t touched.

Morris muttered something under his breath and looked like he was about to reply, before he glanced at Albert again, and snatched the glass away so quickly that something fruity spilled out onto the table.

You let out a breath of relief when he finally left, but Al’s hand didn’t drop from your shoulder.

“You okay?” he mumbled in your ear, his face so close to yours that you could smell his minty breath and feel its warmth on your face.

“Yeah, now that he’s gone. Thanks.”

“Hey, I’m the one who was late – no need to thank me, it’s what any good friend would do.”

He dropped his arm. You looked at him properly, taking him in. He was dressed in a regular button-down shirt and jeans, with a brown, warm-looking jacket, and the red hair that he despised (and you not-so-secretly loved) was hidden under a baseball cap. The outfit would have been nice on anyone, but on Albert, it was alluring.

He glanced around the room, looking for a waiter. His eyes met Morris’, who was still staring at the two of you with a frown. He nudged you to look, and this time you didn’t stifle your groan. Men like Morris were the worst: he didn’t respect your right to deny him, unless there was a man whose authority he could defer to.

“We’ll probably have to keep up the boyfriend-girlfriend act for tonight,” you said, grimacing.

Albert shrugged and put his arm back around your shoulders.

“S’alright. Enough people assume we’re dating, anyway, I don’t think we’ll have a hard time convincing one creep.”

The food at the bar’s restaurant was actually pretty good and Albert was such good company that you soon forgot that you were pretending to be together. His arm around your shoulder was familiar, and, when that it wasn’t there, his hand was warm as it rested on your thigh. You had to remind yourself not to get too comfortable. Albert was just, like he said, a good friend. You were not allowed to think about what a good boyfriend he would be, or how much you wished he would kiss you somewhere other than your cheek. He was a friend, your best friend, and you were not allowed to feel those sorts of feelings.

Still, your body felt a little cold at the end of the evening, when the two of you stepped out to walk home and finally dropped the act. He must have seen you shivering because he rolled his eyes and shrugged off his jacket, holding it out to you.

“How is it, that in the eighteen years I’ve known you, you still haven’t learnt how to dress for the weather?” he asked.

You stuck your tongue at him, but gratefully accepted the jacket, and not just because you knew it would smell of his cologne. It was a chilly autumn evening, and, he was right, you didn’t know how to dress for the weather.

“That’s what I keep you around for, DaSilva. You’re my personal coat rack.”

He let out a bark of laughter and nudged you gently with his shoulder, as you crossed familiar streets to get home.

“You feel like having a movie night tonight? We should appreciate Dead Poet’s Society properly before they take it off Netflix,” he asked, when you were a few minutes from his place.

“You know I’m always down to have a good cry, Al,” you grinned at him.

You texted your mom that you’d be staying over at his, and you both yelled greetings at his dad as you climbed the stairs to Al’s room. You crashed down onto Albert’s bed as soon as you got there, and he gave you a look that you didn’t recognise, his pupils a little wide, before passing you a pair of shorts that you’d left there for nights like this and an old sweater of his. You went to the bathroom to change and tried your best to ignore the scent of his cologne that clung to the warm sweater.

When you got back he was in pyjamas too, but he still had on that ugly baseball cap.

“Seriously?”, you asked, hands akimbo.

“What?”

“You’re gonna wear a baseball cap when we’re watching a movie at your house?”

He scrunched up his face childishly.

“Shut up. My hair’s been annoying me.”

You rolled your eyes and walked over to where he was sitting on the edge of his bed, snatching the hat off his head.

“I’ll have you know that some of us like seein’ your hair, DaSilva.”

He tried to grab the cap from your hands, but you held it behind your back. He groaned and reached for it again, inadvertently pulling you closer, so that you were practically straddling him. You were about to go through your regular routine for moments like this: you’d clear your throat, move back and make a joke like nothing had happened, but he put his hands on your hips, and pulled you down onto his lap. You saw his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed. Your hands dropped the cap that had been behind your back and came to rest on his shoulders.

“Hi,” you breathed out.

“Hey,” he replied, his voice sounding scratchy and kind of… wrecked.

Almost unconsciously, you began to lean towards him. His eyes studied your face, like he was drinking in the moment. His warm breath wafted over your face and your lips almost brushed, when you heard the door swing open.

“Hey, Al, do you have my-“ you scrambled to get off Albert’s lap as his older brother Dan’s voiced boomed. “Oh shit, my bad! I’ll borrow Charlie’s charger, get back to it, kids!”

You had practically fallen off of Al’s lap and were now sitting unceremoniously on the floor. His face was almost as red as his hair, and he looked nervous, nothing like the cocky boy you knew. The silence hung in the air for a moment, with tension that could be cut with a knife, before a giggle slipped out from your lips. He stared at you, momentarily shocked, but was soon laughing too. After a while, when your laughter had finally died down, he got up and reached out a hand to pull you up. Your hand tingled where it touched his, and he held it for a moment too long, before clearing his throat and pulling away to grab his laptop off his desk. You were sure that you saw his hand clench into a fist and then stretch out just before he picked it up.

Before long, you were settled on his bed, laptop between the two of you, as you watched the boys in the cave. The moment between you was gone, but neither of you could forget it. What would have happened if Dan hadn’t walked in? As was the routine with this movie, when it came to an end, Al rubbed your shoulder while you cried and tried to stifle his own sniffles.

“God,” you said, slamming the laptop shut and sinking down onto his pillows, “why did we think it was a good idea to watch that, again?”

“We must be sadists,” Albert answered, solemnly.

The two of you drifted into a regular conversation about something stupid that Race had done at a party the weekend before, or a fact Davey had told you, or how ridiculous Katherine and Sarah were, both of you ignoring the tension that still hung in the air. You talked into the early hours of the morning, slipping under the covers at some point. Albert’s body was warm near yours, and you tried your best to resist the urge to cling to him like a koala. He was always warm, and you seemed to run cold most of the time, so cuddling with him always helped both of you reach the perfect temperature equilibrium.

The conversation lulled, and you replayed the night back in your head, as he typed something on his phone.

“Hey, Al?” you said softly, turning to look at him.

“Uh, yeah?” he answered, looking up from his phone.

“Thanks for, um, saving me from that guy, earlier.”

He locked his phone and put it aside, lying on his side to face you fully.

“Of course, Y/N. You know I’ve always got you. I hate creeps like that. If you hadn’t’ve been there to ground me, I’d probably have kicked his ass,” he said, huffing a little.

“Seriously, Al, if I had to pick a fake boyfriend, you’d be my first choice any day.”

He laughed, sounding a little rough.

“You ever think about that?” he asked in a low voice.

“Think about what?” you frowned, confused.

“Like, you and me. You know, how everyone thinks we’re dating, even when we aren’t specifically pretending to?”

You rolled onto your back, staring at the ceiling.

“I mean, yeah. I guess that’s what usually happens with boy-girl friendships. ‘Basic heteronormativity’, Davey’d call it.”

“It’s,” he searched for the right word, “weird, I guess.”

“Yeah,” you agreed, “weird.”

Albert never had trouble getting girls, or anyone, for that matter, to like him. He was cute, and funny and charming, in that confident jock-ish way. It was unbearable for you, but he usually basked in the attention. Usually, but not this time.

This time, his eyes looked a little panicky as he stood in line for the bathroom at the music festival that Race and JoJo had dragged the lot of you to. A girl, a little bit older than him, was in the line behind him. He laughed uncomfortably at something she said and flinched a little as she put an arm on his bicep. He looked around desperately and made eye contact with you, in the line for a different port-a-potty a little further away. Your feet carried you over to him, almost unconsciously.

You slipped your arm around his and squeezed in a kind of hug.

“Hey, babe,” you said, pulling the backwards cap off his head and unceremoniously plonking it on yours.

“Hi, babygirl, I wondered where you got to” he replied, with a smile that was a little more than relieved. Your heart stuttered a little at the nickname, and you made sure not to let your eyes linger too long on way he ran his hands through his hair.

You turned to the girl and flashed her a grin.

“Oh, hi, I don’t think I know you. I’m Y/N,” you said, putting out a hand to shake.

She took it reluctantly.

“Vanessa.”

“Nice to meet you,” replied, with a saccharine smile.

“Hey, babe, I think that guy you like is playing at the bottom stage soon,” you said to Al, with a grin that you hoped looked lovestruck.

He beamed at you.

“That guy I like? Awfully specific, babygirl,” he teased.

You hit him in the chest, hoping he didn’t notice the warmth creeping up your neck.

“Whatever! Just hurry up and use the bathroom, the line’s moving and I’ve been holding it for, like, an hour,” you replied, giggling and pushing him forward.

“You don’t mind if I gap into the line, do you?” you asked, turning to Vanessa.

“It’s fine. I actually have to, um, go,” she huffed, walking away, quickly.

You gave Al a discreet high five and pushed him towards the empty cubicle.

When he came out, flicking the water on his hands at you, he flashed you another thousand-watt grin.

“You know, you are an excellent fake girlfriend,” he drawled.

“Yeah, well, too bad no one wants me to be their real one,” you replied, moving towards the bathroom yourself.

You turned quickly and missed the way he seemed to deflate at the words, the smile dropping off his face, as he scuffed his Converse in the sand.

“You two make such a cute couple!”

The voice came from an old lady, standing behind a stall at the carnival you and Al were visiting. He was standing behind you, unzipping your backpack and to get a bottle of water out, and he froze at her words.

“Thank you!” you answered, hoping to end the conversation quickly.

“You remind me of my husband and I at your age, he looked at me with those dreamy eyes too,” she winked at you. “And, forty-one years later, that look hasn’t gone away! It’s how you know he’s a keeper.”

Albert was glad that you weren’t looking at him, because you wouldn’t have been able to miss the panic in his eyes.

“Well, I’ll be sure to hold onto him, then,” you replied, smiling sweetly, before giving her a wave and leading Albert away.

“She was sweet,” you remarked, arm in Albert’s, as you headed for a claw game, and that was all that either of you said about the incident.

You were not a fan of bars, but you were a big aficionado of house parties. Well, not all parties, but parties like this one, where you knew all but a few attendees. It was so much easier to let loose when you were surrounded by friends, at least for the most part.

You had stepped out onto the lawn for a breath of fresh air, when one of the only people at the party that you didn’t know, walked up to you.

“Hey,” he said, giving you a smile that looked genuine enough, “I saw you inside, but didn’t get the chance to introduce myself. I’m Hunter.”

You introduced yourself back and put out a hand to shake his. His grip was firm, but his hand was cold, and you pulled away quickly.

“I saw you dancing inside, and, you’ve got some moves on you, if I do say so myself,” he spoke again.

You almost laughed aloud. Was he serious? You had about as much rhythm as a dead fish, and you told him as much.

“It’s not about the rhythm, at all,” he laughed, although it didn’t sound very kind. “You’ve got moves,” as he said the last word, his eyes raked down your body and you felt suddenly uncomfortable.

You chuckled lightly, and muttered some excuse, turning to head inside.

“Wait,” he said, grabbing onto your wrist, with a hand that still felt like ice, “stay out here and talk to me for a moment, babygirl,” he rasped.

The pet name, which sounded like honey when it dripped from Al’s lips, sounded crass and demeaning when he said it.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” you replied, trying to pull you wrist away.

His grip was like steel, and it only tightened as you tried to pull away.

“C’mon, just stay here and talk to me, I’m real friendly,” he croaked, with a smile that was menacing.

“No,” you said, looking around desperately for anyone else, as he used his hand on your wrist to pull you into his chest. He reeked of alcohol and sweat and didn’t look friendly at all, from up close.

His grip was so tight that you were certain you would bruise, and suddenly, he was pulled away from you. You were confused for a second, and then you saw Albert on the ground, pummelling him.

“She said no, asshole!” he was shouting, acidly, along with more colourful language.

Race was pulling him off, the guy was stumbling away, and Albert was panting and cradling his hand, breathless. You barely processed what was going on – it had all happened so quickly. Even with his bloody knuckles, Albert raced to you.

“Are you okay?” he asked, lowly.

“Yeah, I-I’m fine, now,” you uttered. “Are you okay?”

He laughed, drily.

“I’ll survive.”

“I think we should get inside,” Race called, from the doorway – when had he moved to the doorway?

You followed Albert, who tried to hide the way he held his hand. Whether it was for his bravado, or your peace of mind, you didn’t know. You dragged him to a bathroom before he could protest, and sat him down on the closed toilet, rummaging around for a first aid kit.

“Are you sure that you’re okay?” he asked, quietly.

You turned back to him, a bottle of disinfectant in your hand.

“You’re worrying about me while you’re sitting there, bleeding all over the bathroom floor?”

“Well, yeah,” he started to stand up, and you gently pushed him back down by the shoulders. “You almost got assaulted by a random creep, I should have been there to protect you.”

You gently took his hand in one of yours and started to wipe at it with a ball of cotton wool dipped in disinfectant. He flinched a little and swore under his breath.

“You’re my best friend, Al, but you can’t look after me all the time.”

“I know,” he said, “but I just wish that I could. I wish guys like him didn’t exist.”

“Trust me, we all do.”

You finished cleaning the blood off one hand and moved on to the other, gently wiping at his knuckles, apologising softly when he flinched from the sting. You cradled his hands for a little after you had cleaned them, and they were still warm in yours.

“Looks like surface cuts, mostly, but I wouldn’t go around punching any other creeps any time soon,” you joked, still studying his hands.

He stood up, quickly, and his body was nearer to yours than you had expected. You were still holding his hands, carefully, and your eyes were trained on them.

He pulled one hand away and cradled your cheek. He moved it down to your chin and lifted your face to look at him.

“I’m okay, I promise,” he whispered.

“Okay,” was all you could say, “that’s good.”

“You know,” he continued, “when I came outside to look for you and saw that guy, holding you, and you looked so…” he trailed off. “I just saw red, I couldn’t deal with the thought of you getting hurt.”

“Well, I’m not hurt, Al, thanks to you.”

“You’re my best friend, I’d do it again in a heartbeat.”

You huffed, and dropped his hands, moving away.

“What’s wrong?” he faltered, momentarily confused.

“I just – is that all we are, Albert? Because I always feel like there’s this… something else between us, and I just need to know if I’m imagining it,” the words spilled out before you could stop them.

He moved towards you.

“Y-you’re not imagining it,” he mumbled, “I – it’s there for me, too.”

You grasped his hand again, and his thumbs brushed over your skin.

“Well, what do we do with it?” you asked, eyes studying his face.

“This,” he answered, and in an instant, he had dropped your hands and was gripping your face.

His lips moved against yours, and yours against his. Your hands moved up to his hair, grasping at the roots and tugging lightly. You smirked against his lips when he let out a little moan, and he pulled away a moment later, moving to your jaw, and kissing along it, leaving you gasping his name.

“Albert, wait,” you started, and he pulled away to look at you, pupils wide and lips pink.

“Yeah?”

“I – this isn’t just hooking up, right?”

He laughed, and your heart dropped for a moment, before he pulled you against him in a hug.

“I don’t think I’m capable of just hooking up with you, to be honest,” he said, against your ear.

You sank into the hug and let him hold you in his arms, carefully, like you were something precious.

“I think I love you,” you whispered into his ear, holding onto him for dear life.

He pulled away and held you at an arm’s length, studying your face as though he couldn’t believe you without seeing you. His knees felt a little weak, but he gave you a cocky smirk, and you wanted to kiss it off him and leave him breathless.

“Well, I know that I love you, babygirl.”

You beamed and pulled him back down to kiss you again. Babygirl. That nickname would be the death of you, but, as his lips moved down and kissed at your neck, you decided that it wouldn’t be a bad way to go.

TAGLIST: @bencookisagod @broadwayandbookblog @theygivesyawhateveryouwant @crazymecjc

#albert dasilva x reader #albert dasilva #newsies x reader #newsies fanfiction #newsies: the musical

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cookiedoughmeagain · 6 years

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Lloyd Segan, Executive Producer: I think one of the most important aspects of being an executive producer on a show such as Haven is the selection of the director. The director is really the person that, whether they are the visiting person for the very first time and has to get used to a whole new situation, or someone who’s a veteran director, it’s a very important choice; it’s a very difficult schedule and very few directors are qualified to do that. And so part of my responsibility is to help facilitate the selection. And we’ve been very very blessed with some extraordinarily talented directors.

Adam Fratto, Co-Executive Producer: We all look closely at the reels, at previous episodes of directors; we want to make sure they have the right approach for the material. And then we always call and check them out. We want to make sure that we’re working with people who are reliable, and decent, and fit the sort-of family atmosphere that we have going on in the crew.

Lloyd: A great example of a repeat director, someone who we’ve had the pleasure and privilege of working with now over quite a number of years is Lee Rose who is directing this episode, the finale. And we chose Lee for this episode specifically because of our history with her.

Lee Rose, Director: I’m fortunate enough that this will be my third episode directing Haven. So I know everyone and sort of know the trajectory of the show. My relationship with Lloyd and Shawn and all the guys is great. I’ve delivered for them so they trust me, they’re friends of mine, we have a shorthand with each other, there’s no power play; it’s just ‘we want the best show possible’. Which is really, essentially what it should always be and doesn’t always end up that way.

Shawn Piller, Executive Producer: I can defer to her on certain things. Certain things I definitely won’t; things I have responsibility for. You still need a producer to help, but with her, we have such a shorthand and we’ve worked together enough times that she can pick up some of the slack on her episodes. It just takes longer to build up that trust and that shorthand that Lee and I have. It’s a major advantage to me and to the show.

One of the most important pieces of production, from a creative standpoint as well as logistically, is cinematography. Eric Cayla is not only an artist but ends up becoming the core constant on the set. Directors come in, directors go. Writers come in, writers go. But every week, at the end of the day there’s the crew, led by the DP.

Eric Cayla, Cinematographer (aka Director of Photography): The main work of the cinematographer is the lighting, that’s why we say painting with light. So I do all of the colouring with lighting, the contrast with lighting, lighting interiors, exteriors; controlling the image. And I’m also working with the director on shots; how we’re going to move the cameras, the angles, the choice of lenses. And I also direct the crew, the grip, electrics and camera crews.

Shawn: I had the pleasure of working with Eric Cayla for the last season of the Dead Zone in Montreal and he just wowed me from our first meeting and he has this French, European, East Coast feel to him, which is perfect for Haven.

Lee: We sort of bounce off each other; I’ll tell him what my notion is and what I think the shot is for the scene, and he’ll say, ‘Well what about this’ or ‘We can’t do that because of this’. Eric and I became very close on the first episode. It really is a sort of symbiotic, siamese-twin kind of a relationship for me with DPs, if they’re good. So it’s a true partnership. On set it’s the biggest partnership for me.

Eric Cayla: Since I’m constantly on set, I can’t be there to scout the locations.

Shawn: He’s got a team of people that help us with our tech scout. And they represent his interests when he’s on set shooting and can’t come to the scout, they go and check our homework and say ‘oh yeah so we’re here in the morning, the crane’s gonna be here’.”

Eric Cayla: As much as we can, on this kind of show (which is very fast), we go through either pictures that they take and bring on set so I can look at them, or in meetings during lunch time, we work through all the locations of the next show to come. It’s fast-paced, you know.

Sam Ernst, Executive Producer: The actors are learning a lot in the finale. They’re learning where we’ve been going this whole time.

Emily Rose, “Audrey Parker”: I usually try to call up one of the show runners, as well as the writer on the episode, and say ‘OK, this is what I’m thinking regarding the episode, but before I do that, what’s important to you thematically? What is the thing you’re trying to stress?’ Nine times out of ten, I get something new, a fresh perspective on the story. Or, if they’re going in a direction that’s kind of opposite of where I feel Audrey is, it allows us to kind of connect.

Lucas Bryant, “Nathan Wournos”: Because we shoot out of sequence, you know like now we’re shooting the climax of the finale on the first day of shooting the finale. Ideally, I draw a little trajectory of what is going on, where I am over the course of the episode, you know: happy, sad, angry, in love, why, so that I can refer to that easily when I’m shooting scene 25 I can look at a note that says, ‘You just left the house, you were pulling your pants on, you were very upset because…’ so you know exactly where you are because as I said we’re shooting out of sequence and it can be ridiculously confusing. But to be honest a lot of it is seat of your pants, you know because we’re shooting so quickly and the turnarounds between scripts are so quick that often it takes everyone to remind us what the heck is going on, you know, ‘Where are we? Did I know that he was the bad guy?’.

Emily Rose: The luxury with film or theatre is you get a lot of time to rehearse and we do not. And it’s also getting changed frequently, or we’re changing things or we’re trying to make things fit and work. So we try to either run lines with each other, or step aside and talk about the scene and run it again, or really guard that time of just trying to run it as much as possible. We initially always go ‘OK so what happened right before this? Where am I emotionally with this? Is there anything subtextually we could put in to our relationship or where we are?’

Lee Rose: For an episodic television director, you are a guest artist. Yes, it’s your job to bring to screen what someone else has put in front of you. But it’s not your medium in the sense that it’s not your final say; it’s the showrunners, the executive producers.

Sam Ernst: In television, the director’s there to effect the vision of the writers. In movies they’re there to effect the vision of the directors, using the script as a springboard. And that’s a big distinction. And the reason being that we have lots of directors and there has to be one unified vision for the show.

Jim Dunn: There’s a whole week of prep before we begin shooting. There’s one key meeting that happens in that part of the process, which is the tone meeting with the director. The idea is to let the director understand what the intent of each scene is, what the characters are feeling and why. But if we can really connect with the director about it, so they understand, they can then answer questions that production has on set.

Lee Rose; On the day of shooting, every day you get out of the van and you go ‘how do I regroup now?’ because that’s essentially what it is; narrowing what you want, as opposed to what you get. I know because I love editing and I’m pretty good at it, I know what I need to cut and what I can get away with not having if we get into trouble, if we’re rained out, if something happens; you have to be prepared to punt at all times.

Eric Cayla: The greatest challenge and sometimes frustration, is the time. It’s so fast to do a 45 or 44 minute episode of that scope, of what has to be done and achieved in a 7 day shoot, and sometimes even 6. So you have to shoot fast, and well. And there’s always a compromise. We do as much as we can in 7 days and I must admit, it’s gruelling.

Emily Rose: The biggest challenge of being an actress on a TV series is just trying to maintain your stamina and your energy and your health and your mental wellbeing.

Lucas Bryant: Pacing. Longevity. Maintaining my greek-like physique. [laughs] Er; yes, yes, and no. It’s a marathon; knowing how much energy you can afford to use every day or every week to get through each episode. Because you finish one and it’s a big sigh of relief and maybe you finish it on a tuesday and wednesday morning you’re starting the next one.

Emily: The most rewarding part to me is hopping on twitter or hopping on any sort of review and seeing that the fans really connect with Audrey, you know. ‘Oh my gosh that scene was so great’ or ‘I wanna hang out with Audrey’. I feel like that’s a success because I feel like, ‘Good, I didn’t just look like I was memorising my lines and I didn’t know what that Trouble was about.’

Eric Balfour, “Duke Crocker”: The reward of being on a television show is hands down the camaraderie of it. It’s the family of it. Me, Lucas and Emily have I think (I hope they’ll agree!) have formed a really amazing bond together. And, we film in rough conditions here; it rains, it snows, it’s cold. And so this crew, they work their butts off. Everyone can see when someone’s having a hard day, or sick. There’s been days where everyone on the show’s had to work when they’re sick and not feeling with and everyone, you know ‘Hey, can we get you some tea? You wanna sit down? Hey let me get that for you.’ It’s a neat place that way.

Eric Cayla: The love of making shots, and the love of lighting. And since the locations are great; beautiful locations, so inspiring. And the camera crews, they’re fun to light. And then using the medium of film too, as a cinematographer it’s fascinating because you have to be much more instinctive since you don’t see the result on set. You have to rely on your instincts, and knowledge. It’s much more creatively challenging. And rewarding once you’ve got results that are really satisfying. That’s a fun way to work, I find.

Lee Rose: What I love most about directing is the challenges you face every day of having to creatively solve problems. And a lot of them. You have a hundred people coming up to you asking questions and you’d better have an answer. So I find that that puzzle making for me is interesting as a director. And I’m engaged by the creative process. So I’m engaged by crew members or DPs that have ideas, or are excited by my ideas, or actors who are there to just lay it all out on the floor when you’re there. So, that’s why I keep doing it, thirty-some odd years later.

#haven syfy #haven dvd extras #haven season two extras #directing cinematography acting

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amanda-teaches · 7 years

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Escaping the Island - Part 1

Series Summary: You’re in for the fight of your life, trapped on a deadly, ghost-filled island with no way out. The only way to survive is by unraveling a murderous plot. Can you figure out who brought you here and why before it’s too late? Or will you, Sam, and Dean all become their next victims?

Chapter Summary: You accompany your best friend to a mysterious dinner at a beautiful, island-based mansion. But, when you arrive, you find that there may be more to this dinner than you ever would have thought possible.

Characters/Pairing: Dean x Reader, Sam

Word Count: 3101

Warnings: an overaggressive, manhandling man who grabs the reader; sexy, protective Dean; not much so far

A/N: This is my first ever series! I’ve been planning this for awhile and I’m really excited about it. It was betaed by the fantastic @cyrilconnelly, who helps me so much. I also threw in the quote for @because-imma-lady-assface‘s 300 Follower/Birthday/Will and Grace revival/all around extravaganza celebration! My prompt was a Jack quote (my fav!): “Sarcasm noted and quickly forgotten,” and I thought it fit really well in here. I hope y’all enjoy the first part of this 10 part series! Feedback is much appreciated.

Escaping the Island MasterPost

“Come on, Y/N! You have to come with me,” your best friend, Annie Jackson, pleaded as she paced in continuous circles around the couch where you were sitting.

“No, thank you,” you replied, never taking your eyes off the magazine you held in your hands. As Annie continued her loop around the couch, you paid her little attention, only occasionally needing to move your feet off the coffee table to let her pass by. But, as soon as she was clear, your feet went right back to their previous position and your attention right back to your magazine.

Eventually, though, the pacing got to be too much. The sight of her in your peripheral vision was making you dizzy, and you were pretty sure she was going to wear a hole through the floor. You glanced up from your magazine and sighed heavily. “Annie, why don’t you sit? You’re not going to feel any better about this dinner if you exhaust yourself pacing.”

“Fine,” she groaned, flopping down dramatically on the couch next to you, “I’ll sit. BUT, that doesn’t mean you’re getting out of this, Y/N. I need you to come!”

“I can’t, Ann.”

“Give me one good reason why.”

You rolled your eyes. “Hmm, ok. Maybe because, I don’t want to? Besides,” you added before she could argue, “I wasn’t even invited.”

She waved her hand to dismiss that comment. “Oh, I’m sure they won’t mind another guest.”

“Annie…”

Suddenly, you were interrupted by Annie screaming your name so loud that you actually cringed at the high pitch. “Y/N, please,” she begged, looking at you with giant puppy dog eyes. “I can’t do this alone! Please, please, please! I’ll do anything!”

You studied her pleading face for a second before you gave in. “Fine,” you said with a laugh. “I’ll go. I’ll go.”

“Yes,” she muttered, sitting back with a triumphant smile.

You narrowed your eyes suspiciously. “You knew I’d give in, didn’t you?”

She shot you a look that had a certain gleam you knew all too well. “Well….we are best friends.”

“I knew it!” you cried, jumping up and pointing down at her. “I never should have fallen for the old puppy dog eyes trick.”

She threw her head back and laughed. “Well, it’s too late now. You’re going.”

“Fine, fine,” you muttered resignedly. You placed your hands on your hips and looked down at her. “But, if I’m going to this dinner party, I may as well know what it’s for. Who’s throwing it again?”

“I’m not sure,” Annie whispered. She picked the invitation up from the coffee table and glanced down at it. “It doesn’t say who’s throwing it. It just says I’m invited to a dinner to celebrate the memory of Jacob Dawson.”

“Your old boss? Didn’t he die like a year ago?”

“Yeah, but I guess they decided to finally have a memorial dinner. It’s going to be held at his old house, but it’ll probably just be friends and coworkers sitting around reminiscing about him. He didn’t have any family.”

“I have a question: why are they having a memorial dinner now instead of right after he died? It’s been a year.”

“Beats me,” she shrugged. “But, a free dinner’s a free dinner.”

“I guess,” you said, still a little unsure.

Annie stood up and grabbed your hands excitedly. “Oh come on, Y/N. Don’t look so nervous. It’s just dinner. How bad can it be?”

Five hours later, when you were standing on the edge of the dock freezing through the thin material of your evening dress, you were starting to think that “just dinner” could be pretty bad indeed. In fact, you were seriously starting to regret ever agreeing to come to this dinner with Annie in the first place.

“Uh, Annie,” you muttered, as you picked up the already wet hem of your dress from its place on the ground, “why didn’t you didn’t tell me this thing was on a freezing cold island in the middle of freaking nowhere?”

“You didn’t ask,” she said with nonchalant shrug before she took off down the path in front of you.

You quickly followed, glancing up at the imposing mansion that rested at the top of the steep, hilly path. You let out a low whistle. “Was I the only one who didn’t know that your boss was practically Bruce Wayne?”

“He wasn’t that rich,” she said, looking back over her shoulder with a smile. “At least I don’t think he was.”

You flashed her an expression that screamed of exasperation. “He owned his own island, Ann. His. Own. Island.”

She burst out laughing as the two of you came to a stop in front of the door. “Ok, fair point.” She turned to you and dropped her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Here, I’ll make you a deal. We go in now and you’ll be the first to know if I find any batmobiles.”

“Hahaha,” you muttered sarcastically before reaching out to ring the doorbell. But, before you could, the door clicked and slowly creaked open on its own. You looked inside to see who had opened it, but no one was there. “Yeah, that’s not creepy at all….”

“Oh, shush,” Annie said. She grabbed your arm and pulled you inside. “It’s probably just a motion sensor or something.”

“Yeah, sure,” you whispered. “Cause, that’s always what it is in horror movies.”

You walked cautiously into the house and, once you were inside, Annie dropped your arm. Seizing the opportunity, you took a quick look around the vast entryway you were standing in.

The sight momentarily stunned you. It looked like something straight out of a fairytale. Two giant double doors stood facing you, with ornate carvings adorning the edges. There was a grand, sweeping staircase that curved up one wall, around the room, and into the opposite wall, the balcony disappearing into an opening above you. The elegantly patterned tile floor underneath your feet practically gleamed, reflecting the gigantic, waterfall chandelier that hung from the ceiling.

“Wow….” you breathed out quietly. This was the kind of room that demanded a certain element of deference.

Annie, on the other hand, felt no need to be quiet. “Hello?” she shouted, her voice echoing throughout the foyer. “Is anyone here?”

The sound of her reverberating voice instantly brought your attention back to the situation at hand. “Oh, that’s a great idea, Annie. Let the creepy serial killer know we’re here.”

Annie continued to look around the foyer, not even bothering to look your way when she replied. “Sarcasm noted and quickly forgotten, Y/N.”

You sighed and rolled your eyes. “It doesn’t look like anyone’s here, Ann. Maybe we should just go. I don’t think….”

Before you could finish your thought, the massive double doors flew open and a well-dressed man came striding through. He was wearing a three pieced suit that reeked of wealth, his salt and pepper hair slicked back, framing an unpleasant face that was twisted with anger. He leveled a glare in your direction. “Well, it’s about time you showed up. We’ve been waiting here for over 20 minutes! You call that service?!”

“Excuse me?” You backed up slightly as he advanced, his anger startling you.

“When I accepted this ridiculous invitation, I expected a gathering worthy of Jacob’s memory, not this unmitigated disaster. Frankly, young lady, the help showing up late does not make a very good first impression.”

Annie hurried over to your side and held up her hands, stopping the man’s tirade. “No, no, no, Mr. Leder! Y/N’s not the help! She’s with me.”

Mr. Leder turned his glare on Annie. “Oh, Ms. Jackson. I should have known you’d be involved in this whole debacle. Just when I thought this night couldn’t get any worse.”

Annie closed her eyes and sighed heavily. “Nice to see you too, Mr. Leder.”

“Oh, I’m sure,” he sneered haughtily before turning on his heels and stalking back through the double doors. You stared after him in shock for a minute before turning to Annie.

“Well, he seems nice…”

Annie turned to you and scowled. “Haha, very funny.” Then, her face fell. “Man, if I had known he was going to be here, I never would have come.”

“Who was that guy anyway?”

“Harold P. Leder. He was Mr. Dawson’s old business partner and I was his secretary too. He didn’t, well, he didn’t exactly like me.”

“I gathered that much, Annie.”

“Yeah,” she muttered, although she seemed distracted, like her mind was somewhere else entirely. “Ugh! I can’t believe he’s here! He hated Mr. Dawson by the time he died. Why would he even come to this?”

“I don’t know, but we don’t have to stay here if you don’t want to. We can still leave.”

Annie smiled for a second, but then she heard Mr. Leder bellowing her name from the other room and her face fell all over again. “So much for that idea,” she muttered. “Let’s just get this over with.”

“Hey, now you sound like me,” you whispered playfully, drawing a small laugh out of your friend as you followed her over to the double doors leading to the room off of the foyer.

When you entered, you saw Mr. Leder right away. He was standing by the stately fireplace in the back of the room, with one hand on the mantle and the other hand waving around a tumbler full of scotch. He was talking, or rather yelling, at a beautiful, well-dressed woman standing next to him. She was middle-aged, although, she was the kind of woman that you could tell had been absolutely stunning in her prime.

You happily pulled your eyes away from the fighting pair and over to the couch in front of the fireplace, where another couple was sitting. They were younger, late 20s, maybe early 30s, and they definitely looked happier than Mr. Leder and his companion. The man had his arm around the woman and she was leaning into him familiarly as she chatted with another young woman, who was sitting across from her with her back to you.

Annie leaned over to whisper to you. “The man on the couch is Will McHale. He was Mr. Dawson’s attorney. I’m not sure about the woman next to him. But, I know the other woman. That’s Stacey Crane. She was Mr. Dawson’s girlfriend, if you could call it that. I like to think of her as the gold digger who just missed out on becoming a trophy wife.”

You laughed out loud, inadvertently alerting the people in the room to your presence. At once, they all turned to look you, making you feel instantly self-conscious. You cleared your throat and held up your hand. “Uh, sorry. Didn’t mean to interrupt your little Downton Abbey convention. As you were.”

You heard a deep laugh come from the other side of the room and instinctively turned to find the source, only to discover that it came from the most gorgeous man you had ever seen. He was leaning against the far wall, one ankle crossed over another, looking effortlessly sexy in his dark red flannel and faded jeans. When he saw you looking at him, he smiled and winked. You smiled back.

You glanced over at the taller man standing next to him, who was also intensely attractive in his own right. In fact, you were surprised it taken you this long to notice the two of them. They were both unbelievably sexy and irresistible. You shifted your gaze back to the first man just as the taller, longer-haired one leaned down to address him, making him pull his eyes away from yours, breaking your brief connection.

You were about to turn back to Annie and ask her who the men were when Mr. Leder distracted you by grabbing your arm.

“Ah, I see Ms. Jackson and her little friend have decided to stick around. Y/N, was it?”

“Yes,” you repeated fiercely, anger seething under the surface at the way he was treating you. Did this man have no manners? You tried to pull your arm out of his grip, but his grasp was iron-clad. “Is there a problem?”

“Well,” he whispered spitefully, leaning in close until he was just inches away from your face, “I don’t believe you were invited to this little gathering, Ms. Y/N, and I don’t take kindly to party crashers.”

“Get your hands off of her,” a deep voice boomed from behind you. You shifted your head slightly to see the man with green eyes stalking towards you at a fast speed. He looked downright murderous and you were relieved knowing that you weren’t the target of that anger: Mr. Leder was.

Mr. Leder quickly started backing away from the intensity rolling off of the stranger, but his hand remained on your arm. When the handsome man stopped beside you, he stared Mr. Leder down with a look of pure hatred. “I said, get your hands off of her.”

The woman Mr. Leder had been yelling at earlier rushed forward to diffuse the situation. “Oh, now, let’s not get carried away. There’s no need for fighting.” She turned to Mr. Leder. “Come now, Harold, stop scaring the girl.”

Mr. Leder wavered for just a second before he released your arm. The mystery man instantly relaxed, but he stayed right by your side with his fists gently clenched.

The woman who had calmed Mr. Leder down took the opportunity the silence presented to plaster on an insincere smile and hold out her hand to you. “I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced. I’m Gretta Leder. I would like to apologize for my husband’s behavior. He doesn’t always play well with others, but he means you no harm.”

You took a quick glance at the attractive man standing next to you, who was still poised for trouble, and decided to take the high road. “Um, it’s ok, I guess. No harm, no foul. I think we can all just move past it.”

“Sounds like a plan to me!” yelled the lawyer, Will McHale, as he stood up to join you. He excitedly clasped Mr. Leder on the shoulder. “All of you should just ignore little old Harold here. I know I always do,” he added with a laugh.

You caught the rage that flickered across Mr. Leder’s face as Will held out his hand to you. “I’m Will McHale, attorney at law. It’s nice to meet you, Y/N.” He gestured to the woman who he had left sitting on the couch. “That right there is my girlfriend, Abby Hallman, and that,” he said, pointing at the gold digger, “is Stacey Crane.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” you said politely. As he turned to talk to Annie, you twisted slightly to face your defender. “And how do you fit into this crowd?”

He looked down at you and laughed, the tension easing out of him as his eyes met yours. “I don’t. Actually,” he said, gesturing back at the tall man behind him, “my brother and I don’t even know any of these crazy people. We just met that Dawson guy right before he, um…Well, right before he died.”

“Oh,” you laughed. To tell the truth, you were relieved that he wasn’t associated with the other people in the room. They all seemed like stuck-up, rich snobs, and you couldn’t bear the thought that the man with the dazzling eyes and gorgeous smile was one of them.

His brother, who had curiously stayed out of the entire volatile incident, chose that moment to walk up and stand next to the two of you. “Hi, I’m Sam. Y/N, right?” You nodded and he gave you a warm, comforting smile. “It’s nice to meet you. I see you’ve already met my brother, Dean.”

“Yes.” Dean. His name was Dean. “Thanks for your help, by the way.”

“Not a problem. That guy had no business putting his hands on you.”

“Like hell I didn’t!” Mr. Leder bellowed, interrupting your conversation.

“Harold,” his wife warned, but he paid her no mind.

“I don’t care what any of these morons say. This woman has no business here. She didn’t even know Jacob.”

Dean started towards him. “You know what, you son of a…”

Before Dean could finish his threat, the lights started flickering, stopping him. In unison, everyone looked up and watched as every light in the room started flickering.

“Sammy,” Dean growled urgently as he moved back to stand protectively next to you. The flickering became more intense, and the room shook violently, compelling you to grab Dean’s arm to steady not only your balance but your rapidly beating heart. Suddenly, the lights gave out entirely, plunging the room into darkness. A shrill scream sounded out, echoing throughout the room, and you clutched Dean’s arm tighter.

Then, as quickly as it had started, it was over. The lights came back on revealing everyone in the room again. No one was missing.

“Alright,” Sam said. “Nobody panic. Everything’s going to be fine. Who screamed?”

Everyone shook their heads. Dean groaned angrily. “Well, somebody did. So, who was it?”

“I don’t care who it was,” Stacey cried, jumping up from her seat and pushing her way forward. “I, for one, am definitely not going to stick around to find out. This party is a disaster. I’m out of here.”

She stalked out the door and the group followed, Sam yelling after her as they did. “Ms. Crane, wait! This is serious. We need to stay together.”

“Not happening, handsome. I’m out of here.”

“I’m with her,” Harold Leder asserted, grabbing his wife’s hand. He followed Stacey out the door and into the foyer. Will and his girlfriend, Abby, followed.

Sam raced after them while you, Dean, and Annie entered the foyer at the back of the group. You watched closely as Sam tried in vain to stop the exodus. You started to lean over to ask Dean why his brother was so intent on stopping them from leaving, but you were interrupted by an ear piecing scream. You looked over to see Will’s girlfriend, Abby, frozen with fear. She was pointing just over your shoulder.

You spun around and what you saw in front of you stopped you cold. You heard Annie’s sharp intake of breath beside you, but you barely registered it. You were too focused on the apparition standing in front of you.

It was a honest-to-goodness ghost, and it was staring straight at you.

Keep Reading with Part 2

Forevers- @hamartiamacguffin @mrsdeanfuckingwinchester @katymacsupernatural @impandagrl @cyrilconnelly @damnandriel-in-hell @impala-dreamer @castielhasthetardis @jarpadandjensenaremyheroes @shotgunintheimpala @mysterious398

Dean Tags- @akshi8278

Pond tags (I’ll be using them for the first part only so that I don’t bother people who aren’t interested. If you would like to continue to be tagged in the series, please send an ask, and I’ll be happy to keep tagging you!)

@thing-you-do-with-that-thing @nichelle-my-belle @leatherwhiskeycoffeeplaid @notnaturalanahi @whispersandwhiskerburn @roxy-davenport @deathtonormalcy56 @samsgoddess @frenchybell @spn-fan-girl-173@deansleather @whywhydoyouwantmetosaymyname @waywardjoy@mrswhozeewhatsis @imadeangirl-butimsamcurious @kayteonline@supernatural-jackles @wevegotworktodo @quiddy-writes @babypieandwhiskey @wi-deangirl77 @deantbh @chaos-and-the-calm67 @memariana91 @plaidstiel-wormstache @chelsea-winchester @fandommaniacx @castieltrash1 @supernaturalyobessed @ruined-by-destiel @tasteofdean @winchester-writes @deals-with-demons @faith-in-dean @winchestersmolder @bennyyh @clueless-gold @melbelle45 @winchester-family-business

#ash's 300 w&g challenge #dean x reader #dean fanfic #dean fanfiction #supernatural fanfiction #dean x you #spn x you #spn x reader #dean winchester x reader #supernatural reader insert #dean series #escaping the island

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faithandfairies · 7 years

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Okay, so I finished The Legend of Korra and loved it.

Seasons 1 and 3 happen to be my favorite, although my favorite episode has to be the backstory of the avatars with the original avatar in season 2.

There is just something about the team (Avatar) dynamic in seasons 1 and 3 that I love. Not to mention the family dynamic of Tenzin and his family that are pretty much Korra’s extended family and the presence of Lin Beifong, who is often Korra’s personal protector and a force to be reckoned with.

I also adore the fast pace of season 1 especially, which is missing in the first few episodes of season 2 and kind of made them a bit hard to get into for me. Despite the subject matter being interesting.

I love all the characters, the animation is fantastic, the shots are great and remind me of a real movie with cameras and different characters being in focus and others being out of focus in the same shot depending on the story in the moment.

The story itself is great and the action is superb and the animation for that specifically is amazing. Not to mention the switch between scenes and things that are taking place at the same time in different places is seamless.

I love the voice acting as well.

It’s just high quality all around.

I’m glad Korra didn’t end up with Mako though. I mean, it would have been fine in the sense that it could have been chalked up to the Avatar’s bad decision making when it comes to their personal life, which would be believable since they made it clear that Aang himself wasn’t without faults hen it came to that. Them emphasizing that he wasn’t the best father in the world and all.

But, I’m glad they didn’t go that way.

Mako was really bad for Korra and I’m gad she definitively ended things herself way before moving on. I like Asami. They did make it clear that Asami was able to be for Korra what Mako wasn’t. Which was a sounding board.

When Korra second-guessed herself or tore herself down Asami was there to build her back up. Mako just helped her second-guess herself or doubted her whenever he saw fit. I think that the Avatar having someone that truly believes in them by their side is essential. I’m watching Avatar: The Last Airbender and that’s one of the first things that I’ve picked up on there via Aang and Katara. Katara has this unwaiverng faith in Aang, which I kind of love. Otherwis I’m having trouble getting into the show a bit. But we’ll see.

As for Korrasami, as they’re called,while they’re undoubtedly great together- Korra also being for Asami what she needs, being there for her when she lost her father permanently where Mako I think was sitting sleeping next to Asami while she was grieving after her father almost killed her- it still came out of left field near the end of season 2.

If you’d told me in season 1 and early season 2 that they would get together I would have said that you were crazy. And the craziest thing is I knew and I still didn’t believe it. Even though I saw Varrick and Zhu Li coming from a mile away. No matter what happened there before they finally happened. No woman takes that much crap from a man unless she either loves him (more than she loves herself) or thinks she’s completely worthless (possibly because he’s made her feel that way-I’m looking at you, Emma (OUAT)). And Zhu Li was clearly not the latter. But anyway.

As I was saying I knew Korrasami was going to happen as I hail from the Once Upon a Time Swan Queen fandom and the ending of The Legend of Korra has been compared to the ending of OUAT episode 6x10, which is coincidentally my favorite episode of that show.

As such The Legend of Korra has convinced me that there is no such thing as unintentional. That when writers across any show aren’t trying to make it look like two characters are into each other, guess what, it translates on screen as them not looking like they’re into each other. Ether there’s barely any interaction between said characters or when there is there’s very clearly no hidden meaning. Nothing is ambiguous. Which is basically the first 1 and 3/4th seasons of The Legend of Korra. Compared to the last 2 1/4ths.

It’s a clear contrast of how two characters who are not supposed to be seen as more than friends if friends at that interact vs. how two characters interact when there’s more and that more is deliberately left open to interpretation. What I’ve concluded is that if writers don’t want people to interpret things in other ways than they intended they don’t leave room for it in their writing, etc. It’s that simple. Claiming otherwise, as in that “people will interpret things how they want” is the equivalent of saying you’re not a skilled enough writer to tell the story you say you wish to tell. Or you’re trying to attract different audiences by lying in your writing and execution about the story your telling.There’s no in between.

Korra and Asami truly came out of left field. But the writers were clearly in control.

The first season and most of the second had them barely interacting. And when they did it was because Asami was helping Korra because she’s a good person and was basically an extension of Mako. There was also clear rivalry between Korra and Asami and vying for Mako’s attention. Outside of that Asami and Korra barely had a conversation. They couldn’t even really be friends since Mako couldn’t make up his mind on which girl he wanted to be with, they both let him play them initially and were pretty much waiting for him to decide and that automatically pitted them against each other.

It started for me when Korra saved Asami’s life, pulling her back from getting speared by one of Varrick’s arows I believe, without breaking a sweat or waiting for Asami to thank her or react in any way that the Korrasami ship took to the water. That was in late season 2 I believe. That moment also reminded me of another OUAT moment in 6x10, but oh, well.

Still, it wasn’t until Mako betrayed Asami a second time and Korra definitively ended things with Mako that Korra and Asami started bonding.Over their mutual experiences with Mako basically.

Asami proved to Korra that she was a better sounding board and suddenly they seemed connected at the hip. They were fighting side by side, going everywhere together. Korra often saying hello and goodbye to Asami first. They even had Asami sitting with Korra while meditating perfectly paralleling villain Zaheer’s girlfriend sittting with him while meditating.

They had Korra deferring to Asami for a lot of important tasks such as taking her wounded father home where before Korra barely spoke to her directly and never to give her a task that didn’t involve engineering I believe, let alone one that involved someone that Korra loved deeply. They also had Korra hurt and vulnerable with Asami in more ways than just the meditating. It’s no secret that you should only meditate with someone you trust completely next to you not just to protect you, but not to hurt you themselves, because your body is completely defenseless in that state. And let’s be honest, Asami may not be a bender but she is lethal if she wants to be. but aside from the meditating Asami was also the one to flee on Naga from the Red Lotus literally with Korra tucked against her chest. Granted, they got captured by the Earth Queen’s people but still. And Asami single-handedly ended up saving Korra from that fate on top of that. So the girl is something else.

Then there was the fact that apparently Asami dressed Korra for Jinora’s ceremony. Usually that sort of thing is implied, not shown completely. But it still a big deal. Being naked in front of someone even just because they’re helping you dress is another way of making yourself vulnerable. A state worsened for Korra because she also happened to be in a wheelchair. And for anyone doubting that Korra couldn’t dress herself while in a wheelchair they had her explicitly say that she couldn’t.

Not only that, Asami offered to come with Korra while she was recovering. Which would have meant being there for Korra in any way she needed. For emotional support, dealing with the worst parts of Korra when she got frustrated because she couldn’t get back on her feet fast enough. But also dealing with Korra’s physical limitations, helping her where she couldn’t help herself. I’m sure Asami knowingly did that.

Then there was the fact that Korra after having been close to both Mako and Bolin for a lot longer than she had been to Asami, only wrote to Asami. Something that can only be described as...gay. It simply meant that their connection went deeper or was different somehow. Usually being romantically interested in someone changes things, depending on the relationship often implies that you trust them with your truth and makes you go the extra mile when it involves them. I’d like to point out that this letter business too is something used in OUAT in 6x11.

There’s also the romantic hand-holding while Korra is in a wheelchair, not to mention the hugs that I believe were non-existent for the first few seasons. Only to have Korra and Asami hug each other before anyone else. There’s also Asami explicitly alluding to missing Korra and making it clear she was excited to see her again after three years. And let’s not even talk about their dialogue right when they do see each other again.

What else?

Oh yeah, the lover’s spat, which historically hasn’t only happened between lovers, but people who want to be lovers or consider themselves in love which makes them want to look out for the other person which sometimes inevitably leads to overstepping.

Half of TV show Castle’s Caskett’s fights in a nutshell. Beckett wants to go on a suicide mission. Castle wants to stop her from getting herself killed because he loves her and therefore doesn’t want to lose her and he oversteps. Fun fact: Caskett ended up married with three kids.

In Korrasami’s case Asami talks about visiting her dad, Korra remembers how Asam almost died last time she saw her father and would like it to not happen again. The logical thing would be to keep her away from her father. She tells Asami this, which is overstepping. Not even because of her opinion. But you know why?

Because she’s been away for three years. Therefore she doesn’t have a say in what happens in Asami’s life. Which implies that at some point she did. Have a say. In Asami’s life. You see? Also, typical (“It’s my life”) Caskett.

Oh, and the most telling.

Korra actually blushes as Asami compliments her haircut. To my knowledge animators don’t go out of their way to animate one girl blushing as a reaction to another girl complimenting her on her hair. Unless she’s shy or it’s homo intended, you know. And Korra is not shy.

Also, apparently the writers confirmed it. And apparently the comic, which I’m about to read, is hella gay.

What gets to me though is that while Korrasami has had some well-placed “Harold, they’re lesbians” moments, they have been nowhere near as plentiful or obvious as the Swan Queen ones on OUAT, except for Korra’s uncharacteristic blush. And yet Korrasami’s canon and Swan Queen is unintentional. Yeah, right.

#the legend of korra #korra #team avatar #korrasami #ouat #swan queen #castle #caskett

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rockrevoltmagazine · 5 years

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INTERVIEW: KELVIN SWABY OF THE HEAVY

Hailing from the Southwest town of Bath in England the Heavy have put out five albums since forming in 2007. Consisting of Kelvin Swaby (vocals), Daniel Taylor (guitar), Spencer Page (bass) and Chris Ellul (drums) they have been featured in countless movies, television shows and commercials highlighted by their ultra hit “How You Like Me Now?”. RockRevolt Magazine had the opportunity to speak with Swaby on the cusp of their latest release Sons .

Many people out there might not know who The Heavy are but there’s a good chance that they’ve heard your music. It’s been featured in quite a few movies such as The Hateful Eight and Dallas Buyers Club as well as many TV Shows including a couple of my favorites, Strike Back and Entourage and even Super bowl commercials. How is it that The Heavy ended up on so many soundtracks and is that by you guys being proactive or do they come to you? In the end, has it been profitable or more advertising for the band?

It’s definitely allowed us to — it’s given us the luxury of time a little to kind of concentrate on producing great sounding music you know. So I think that’s a luxury you know for any band. It’s like, you know how the music business is now. There’s so much illegal downloading going on so it’s really hard to change the industry somewhat. So for us to kind of be involved with TV and ADs and films is pretty cool for us. And how it happens is people seem to kind of gravitate towards our sounds. I hope it continues.

So it’s been more them coming to you.

Yeah absolutely. We just make the music that we make you know. I think right from the off, myself and Daniel when we kind of set up the band, we kind of started the band, we were so influenced by film soundtrack and our vision for the band. So it wasn’t just going to be about being just like music. Music say for just the songs. We always think about how — we always kind of have like a vision for an album. Like our album The Glorious Dead we kind of thought was like a voodoo zombie that was kind of set in the south. So we always kind of have a vision for our songs. So we try — we go all out and we try and make them cinematic. We don’t just kind of get our base guitar down, we kind of process this stuff a little further you know.

Well it’s certainly paid off. I don’t think I can recall a band that I talked to that has had so much of their music in so many different outlets. Obviously that formula seems to work really well for you.

Thank you.

Let’s go back in time and give us a brief overview of the band, how it came together and how you all arrived at this point.

Well myself and Daniel became really good friends when we were working for the Gap. He was in a band, I was pretty much just kind of writing the songs for the band and I was never kind of a — I wasn’t the frontman you know. I was always kind of in the back. I was writing the melodies and I was singing the guide lyrics so that the girls could sing the songs. Then he was in another band as well and just like the whole thing just started cooking up. I started chopping up like ol Bo Didley brakes and Chuck Berry and ol kind of Muddy Waters and I was just like oh, then I would go out to Daniel’s or Danny would come around to mine and bring his guitar. Then we’d kind of start to work on a track and it was like wow this music sounds pretty ridiculous and not like anything that’s out there at the moment so let’s see what we can do. So it just kind of started that way and then before we knew it, we were building some songs and then we started playing out just the two of us. We started playing out at open mic nights and we became pretty popular at the open mic night. So what we started doing then was started advertising that we were actually going to be playing at the mic nights. So then the open mic nights became crazy. It was just like the two of us. It was Daniel on his acoustic guitar. We had Yamaha, tiny little kind of sampler. So it was the sampler, acoustic guitar and both of us singing and yeah we seemed to kind of develop a following. As it was getting bigger and bigger, it was like we need a band. Spencer had met Daniel independently of me because I was DJing in the club and Spence used to be running the bar and we became really good friends. And I knew that he was in a band. And then Daniel met Spencer like independently and we both loved him and it was kind of like yo. And he was the star yeah, you know, he played on a few recordings and then we just kind of started taking it out. Trying to find a drummer at that time was absolutely crazy. Because if you hear our music, we keep it super simple. It’s not flamboyant. We don’t have fills all over the place. We don’t have tons and tons of guitar. So as much as there are few guitar solos on this last record, but we keep it pretty straight. That was always what we wanted to do is that we were going to take the 7 minute solos from our favorite bands that we love. We were just going to take those or concentrate on those four bars of groove and see what we could work with from there. When we actually got signed it was crazy. We kind of turned like a room of 20 people into like 500 people and it just so happens that Peter Quick was there from Ninja Tune and the rest is history pretty much because we absolutely killed it in London. We are from the South-west and we were like you know, London is kind of tempting and then people from the southwest are just like farmers you know. So when you got like three guys come into a room and absolutely smash it up in London, that definitely changed for us that night.

So we’ll fast forward to your fifth album that was just released – Sons. What are you most excited about with the new record and what can listeners expect from it?

You know just such songs. I believe as we kind of grow older and we become more socially aware and we become and we try to become better fathers. It’s like myself, Daniel and Chris, we have children and it’s kind of like a way that — Sons represents us becoming families. We got signed in 2007 and we have been on the road and the studio for these past 12 years. And the last record was about turning poison into medicine because we had all been kind of going through tough times. And this album was the acknowledgement that we are family. This beast called The Heavy has created these Sons you know that are always there for each other you know what I mean. So I think there’s a maturity in this where we’ve kind of just acknowledged where we’re at right now and its in a really good place. As tough as it gets, we’ve always got each other.

Is there a track or two for you that might stand out on the new record?

There are a few tracks that I absolutely love. Obviously I love — I kind of pen because I’m super proud of them. I love “Heavy For You,” I love “Better as One.” I love The Thief that Daniel pens and I think that’s a brilliant record of having your heart stolen and you don’t necessarily want it to be stolen. So I love “The Thief.” I love “Put the Hurt On Me.” I love “Simple Things” because I wrote that with my daughter which was so much fun kind of doing that. Where you kind of have your kids around you in the studio and you’re like (Kevlin humming). There are a few kind of high points. As a body of work, we’re super proud of it. We’re super proud of it. There are curve balls in there but nothing that kind of defers from the sound. I think if anything it’s gotten bigger and better.

Absolutely. Well that’s great. I mean that’s asking you questions like hey who’s your favorite child.

Yeah exactly.

I know it’s a tough one. But sometimes maybe something stands out. What are the plans for touring and what can fans expect from The Heavy’s live show?

We’re always known for having quite an energetic show. We’ve kind of just elevated it somewhat now. Because the new songs kind of seamlessly — we just played Europe and we did pretty well every single venue that we went to. And the crowds were just crazy. On tour we start in New York next week and then we go on to Vancouver, Seattle, San Francisco and then finish in LA and they’re all sold out. I think there’s a couple of tickets left for Vancouver so what they can expect is these new productions, they’re like family. They just like seamlessly work themselves into the set. I’m suggesting anybody that’s coming to see the show to take the next couple of days off work because you won’t be able to talk. Your voice is going to be gone. You’re going to be of no use to anybody so take a few days off work.

Some words of advice; take a few days off. That’s great. Well over the years, you guys have obviously played a number of festivals, is there a show that really kind of sticks out? Can you give me one that you like, it was just an amazing moment? I’m sure you have plenty of them but is there one that sticks out?

I mean we’ve played some incredible shows between America and Europe and Canada, they’ve been some insane festival shows. I’m going to take the show that really stands out for me was, I remember we had “Same Ol,” from the Glorious Dead. It was used for an ad in Japan and so when we were asked to play, it was our first time in Japan and we were playing at a festival at 1 O’clock in the afternoon. And generally that time, that’s like when people are still coming into the festival. You never know what’s going to happen. I don’t even know if people are actually going to like go for what we’re doing you know. And they were so energetic. They were so incredibly energetic and then we kind of realized that with our set, we always finish with “How You Like Me Now?” anyway. And we decided to put “Same Ol” for “How You Like Me?” Now on that particular show and by the time we got to “Same Ol,” it would have been probably like 11 songs in or something and everyone is super hyped. They were so responsive to what we were asking them to do. Then as soon as I started singing “Same Ol,” it was rapturous. It was 60,000 people singing “Same Ol” word for word. I was just like, what is going on you know. It was insane. So “How you Like Me Now?” was eclipsed that day by “Same Ol.” So when you have that many people singing word for word and it’s not their native tongue — it was pretty ridiculous.

That’s great. And I’m going to go the other direction here real quick. What’s the worst experience you had live? Ever had anything you just like oh man?

Man, I remember we were playing this show. It’s so funny, as you were kind of saying that, I was taken back to our early years, probably like about two or three years into touring. Where we would tour everywhere around France, everywhere around Germany, everywhere in England because you have to do this. In a tiny little van, you do it. And I remember we were playing in France. And we were kind of thinking, why are we playing in this tiny little place like a social club. There were tons of pretty old people that didn’t really kind of get what we were doing. So the thing is with The Heavy, regardless of whether they’re five people there or five thousand people there, we still kick it out. So we were kicking it out and you have to bear in mind, this stage could just about get us on. And this is before we were taking girls with us. It was a tiny stage. We all were on top of each other. And Spencer had eaten something. He’d eaten something that day and it was rotten. Like he let it go while we were playing and it was so bad I had to stop. And even Daniel stopped and Chris stopped because that smell was so bad. I would love to have had a photo of that. I’m sure someone must have taken a photo where you’ve got me Dan and Chris, we all ended up at one side of the stage until that smell was gone. And Spencer was on one side of the stage as if looking to say what. It’s like dude your ass-hole dude is out of order. You’re having that kind of gig and it’s like you can get away with doing that. You probably wouldn’t do that on Letterman or something.

I would say, that’s got to be the first time I’ve heard that.

Oh yeah literally, his fart stopped the show.

Oh that’s funny. Is there a musician around today that you would really love to meet and why?

Is there a musician around today? There are tons of great musicians around today. I got to meet Dan Auerbach actually and he was absolutely lovely. We’ve actually met Dan like two or three times but the one time that we played in Kamona and we were playing and his other band, The Arcs were playing. We kind of discussed how cool this could be at some point in the future to actually try and do something. So I don’t know, watch that space, that could be quite cool. I think Dan is a wicked dude. A super down to earth and yeah to kind of work with him at some point could be quite cool.

Excellent. Did you ever come across an experience where you met someone and kind of went jeez, I wish I didn’t meet that person. I love their music but the person themselves, not so much.

Not really. I remember we went on tour with some dude and it’s so funny when you’re playing all of the gigs that you can play because you want the exposure for the band because you want the work you know. I remember we played with Mayer Hawthorne. He turned out to be somebody that I really would not like to ever tour with again. You know when people kind of have egos for no reason. Kind of like we’re super humble in our band. You can have that where you kind of like I don’t know why you’re actually being this way. It’s like everyone is trying to get somewhere. So on one hand, you can have that and on the other hand, when we were playing with Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings, all of those guys were great. And even at one of the Sharon Jones shows, Tom Waits turned up with Cathleen and his son because his son was like a big fan of ours and I met Tom, a guy who should have an ego and didn’t at all. I was like Tom, dude, if it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing. And he just pointed at the stage, Sharon was playing at the time. He pointed at the stage and he just said you, you know, and I’m just like yeah dude I’ll take that. So it’s like dudes that should have egos and don’t have egos are incredible. Dudes that shouldn’t have egos but have them are like a 100 times bigger than you could ever imagine. I kind of don’t understand it.

Exactly. There’s no use for it either way right?

No exactly. Just get on and do what you’ve got to do.

Absolutely. Well I’ll try to fire off a couple of quick more questions, I’m sure you’ve got a busy day.

I’m just in my studio. We’re going to go to Secret Life of Pets with my little 2 year old later.

Oh fantastic, a little family time, that’s always nice.

Yeah a little family time.

If you could pick a song that you wish you wrote what would it be?

I wish I wrote “Simply Beautiful” by Al Green. Because it is simply beautiful, it is super simple and yeah I wish I’d written that because I sing it pretty well. Al if you could just you know, you want to give that to me?

Is there a song that you’ve put out during your career that you wish you didn’t?

That’s a fun one. I know that the guys, when we were doing “Just My Luck” and they were kind of like okay but we should go half speed. We’re going to drop from that speed to this speed. I was just like no dude it can’t be that. It has to be what feels right so let’s not be typical and go half speed. So for the recording, we managed to work it out but live, it was a nightmare trying to do it. It was always such a nightmare. In retrospect, I should have just listened to the rest of the guys and gone half speed.

Sounds like a tough one live. Do you happen to have — I don’t know if you can fire off your top five records?

Ann Peebles – I Can’t Stand The Rain album. I absolutely love that and pretty much base all of our records on how that record feels you know because it’s short, it’s concise, it’s 10 tracks, you get to the end of the record and you just want to play it again. So I love Ann Peebles I Can’t Stand The Rain. I also love I’m Still in Love With You by Al Green. I was playing that the other day. That’s a fucking ridiculous record. Boom by the Sonics because my son absolutely loves that song as well. We have like a little record player and we have like a stack of 45s and he just loves to kind of go through and just play and he always plays “Shot Down” by the Sonics. Gimme Shelter – Rolling Stones. If I have to put one more in, I would put 36 Chambers – Wu-Tang Clan as well. That’s what I’d put.

That’s a nice little mix you got going there I like it.

Cool dude.

Tell you what, let me finish up real quick here and I’m going to kind of go off topic here a little bit but it seems to be a very big topic nowadays. Of course you’re over in the UK. Any feelings on the whole Brexit thing?

I mean I live in the States now. I live in Florida. I go back to England like every four to six weeks and we all kind of get together and do — but my thoughts towards it is the country is super divided at the moment. But the majority of the country obviously don’t want to go through with the Brexit thing because they would have had it sorted by now. So I don’t think it’s going to change everything too much. They just need to work out a deal that kind of works and how the visas are going to work. But nothing actually seems to be set in stone at the moment. At the moment, it kind of seems that everything is up in the air and you’re depended on this government who are idiots at the moment and you’re depended on them to get a job done. For the sake of the country, they need to get it done, be concise and work it out and make it so it’s like seamless change basically.

I guess you’re here in the United States where everything political is just kind of nice and smooth right.

Yeah everything is super smooth here isn’t it.

Oh that could take us another hour to discuss. I won’t even go there.

Yeah let’s not go there. Not right now please.

We’ll revisit it sometime in the future.

I am with you.

I appreciate the time Kelvin and any final words for the fans or anything?

Kelvin: The bystands enjoy Sons part of the family.

Well best of the luck with the new record, the tour and hopefully you’ll get back in the States and maybe get a little closer to where I’m at in the Boston area, I’d love to see you guys.

Well hopefully. I’ve seen dates kind of penciled in for early fall. So let’s hope that we can get that soon.

Fantastic. I’ll keep an eye out and we’ll get to catch you on the road. Good luck with everything Kelvin, pleasure talking to you. Enjoy the movie today.

Yeah that’s been a lot of fun. Thank you for that interview, it’s amazing.

Absolutely, thank you.

Connect with The Heavy(click icons):

INTERVIEW: KELVIN SWABY OF THE HEAVY was originally published on RockRevolt Mag

#Chris Ellul #Daniel Taylor #How You Like Me Know #Kevin Swaby #RockRevolt Magazine #Sons #Spencer Page #The Heavy

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disneybeautyandthebeast · 7 years

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How many people, animals and props were involved in making the opening musical number, “Belle?”

According to Disney, there were more than 150 cast members and extras involved, along with 28 wagons and carts, hundreds of live animals (horses, cows, mules, ducks, geese and hens) and countless props and set decorations. The set itself was also the production’s largest, measuring 28,787 square feet.

Bonus fact: The town is named Villeneuve, a fictional French village that was built on the backlot at Shepperton Studios outside London. The town’s name is an homage to Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve, the author of the original Beauty and the Beast story.

How many horses played Belle and Maurice (Kevin Kline)’s trusty steed, Philippe?

Three.

“Belle and Maurice’s horse Philippe was played by three different horses, two of which had to be painted on a daily basis,” says a rep for the studio.

How did they pull off the waltz scene between Belle (Emma Watson) and the Beast?

Carefully! Watson and Stevens first had to learn the choreography, and then Stevens had to master it on stilts. The British star tells PEOPLE practice makes perfect when it came time to learn how to walk and dance in the steel contraptions.

“You’ve just got to get in ’em, start moving around!” Stevens says with a laugh. “Fortunately we had about three months of pre-production for rehearsals, learning the songs, the dances. Initially with the waltz I learned the steps on the ground and graduated to the stilts, which was slightly terrifying for me but probably more for Emma. I think she was very worried that I was going to tread on her toes in steel stilts, which could’ve ruined the movie, but I didn’t, so I’m very proud of that.”

Is that Dan Stevens’ real singing voice?

Yes! And it was a welcome challenge for the actor.

“Singing was a relatively new thing to me,” Stevens, 34, says of re-training his singing voice. “I’d sung at school and when I was younger, but in my 20s I [hadn’t] sung as extensively so reengaging my voice, retraining the voice was a big challenge.”

Did they use Dan Stevens’ actual face for the Beast?

Yes, although the finished product is a computer-animated and significantly hairier version.

Stevens wore a 40-lb. “muscle suit” and performed the role on stilts — first so that the size and movements of the character were captured on set during filming, and then again for the visual-effects teams so that his face was captured and later computer-animated with the Beast’s hair and fangs.

“Every couple of weeks I would go into a special booth and my face would be sprayed with about 10,000 UV dots and I would sit in what I used to call the Tron cage,” Stevens says. “Anything I’d been doing in the previous two weeks in the scenes, whether it was eating, sleeping, roaring, waltzing, I did it again with my face, with Emma [Watson] sitting on the other side of the cage, and we would capture the Beast’s face.”

What’s with Dan Stevens’ hair in that Prince reveal?

It’s a wig. A stringy, scraggly one.

“The hair at the end, was it extensions? I think it was a wig,” Stevens says, trying hard to remember the hair accessory he wore two years ago during filming. “It was quite awhile ago. Yeah, I’m pretty sure that was a wig,” he adds with a smile. “And what a wig!”

Which costume was the most challenging to create?

Belle’s red “montage” outfit, aka the one she wears outdoors for her snowball fight with Beast. Why? Because costume designer Jacqueline Durran used all eco-friendly materials in its design.

“Because Emma is so interested in sustainability and fair trade, eco fabrics and eco fashion, we applied those criteria to making a costume from head to toe,” Durran tells PEOPLE. “That [red] costume was made entirely from sustainable fabrics. We dyed it in vegetable dyes in our workroom, we had shoes made with eco leather, and we did the whole thing from top to bottom to be as thorough as we could. People learned different skills in the work rooms to be able to do it, so the dyers learned to dye with strange vegetable dye. Sometimes it took two weeks to dye something because you’d have to leave it in there for that long to get a rich color. It really was a learning curve for all of us, I’d certainly never done that before.”

How did the filmmakers decide on which songs to feature from the animated film and Broadway musical?

The answer is by hiring and deferring to the animated film’s composer, Alan Menken, who also co-wrote the music for the new film.

“It was challenging,” Menken told EW. “[The] Broadway show had songs that I would have loved to use for the movie, but the form for a film and the form for a Broadway show are different, so the song we wrote for the Broadway show was not going to work. Consequently, we wrote a brand-new song. The challenge is just to maintain the balance of what we originally had for the score and what we had for the show, and at the same time allow this film to have its own character.”

How many new songs are in the film?

Three.

Menken and lyricist Tim Rice (The Lion King) wrote three new ballads for the film. They are: “How Does a Moment Last Forever,” performed by Belle and her father (and sung by Celine Dion over the end credits), “Evermore,” which Beast sings for Belle when he releases her (and is sung by Josh Groban over the end credits), and “Days in the Sun,” which is sung by the objects in the castle and Belle when they are going to sleep.

What was left on the cutting room floor?

A lot — including a clever Frozen reference. Please allow LeFou (Josh Gad) and Gaston (Luke Evans) to explain:

“I mean, Gaston dies. Is that a spoiler?” Gad says with a laugh, when PEOPLE asked him and Evans during a recent sit-down if there are any Easter eggs fans should look out for. “The Easter egg I fought for [director] Bill Condon to put in but we never did, there’s a moment in the original where a bunch of snow falls on LeFou and he becomes a snowman and I thought, this could kill. It’s a little meta but it could be great [For those who may have forgotten, Gad played Olaf, the snowman in Frozen].”

Evans says his favorite scene that didn’t make the movie is one filmed during the castle battle, in which Gad’s LeFou has a fight with a bathroom appliance.

“What I miss, which we shot and is not in the film, is you having a fight with the toilet,” Evans says to Gad.

Adds Gad: “Played by Stephen Merchant (from Hello Ladies and the original Office)!”

“Yeah, it didn’t make the final cut,” Evans says with mock sadness.

Both actors joke that they have no idea what might end up on the DVD/Blu-ray because no one tells them anything.

“Nobody guarantees us anything,” says Gad. “We’re not even guaranteed that we’re going to be in the movie. It’s all based on our interview performances.

Adds Evans: “Which so far have been terrible.”

#beauty and the beast #batb #live action beauty and the beast #disney beauty and the beast #beauty and the beast 2017

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modelronpagame · 5 years

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The Big Shrek Finish || Kagemori, Kei, and Preston || GFS 4

Another day, another fashion show - and another motive to come after, surely. Kei couldn’t say that the latter part didn’t make her nervous, and the atmosphere around the agency wasn’t really any good for fashion shows, what with all the dead people.

But, the show must go on, as they say. Especially when there was punishment involved for those who didn’t comply, punishment Kei would rather avoid. So she joined up with two of her fellow Cool Team members and made her way to the stage - she was pretty excited for the whole “working in teams” thing… it felt just like one of her plays! Or… not really… but as close as she’d get around the murder agency, probably!

The theme, admittedly, was also pretty exciting, Kei was always fond of those “fairytale” types of stories. Fancy, that was something she could do with ease, and she had just the item to use - the pink kimono and all the accessories to come with it weren’t the sort of thing Kei usually wore, on stage much less off of it, but hey, perhaps it could be a show of versatility, or something like that. It was cute too, which was good, because she couldn’t imagine showing up in the Chiitan costume would work a second time. (And it wasn’t exactly very fancy, either…)

All dressed up and ready to go, she and her little cool team are off! As the gang got to the village part of the stage, Kei made her way to the other side of Shrek, getting down on one knee and throwing her arms outward all dramatic like, flashing the judges a smile. The duality of cool team. She’s having fun, at least.

Kei joined the squad next in... carrying the Shrek cutout, like a coffin. He’s dead. Rip in pieces. As Kagemori and Preston fight the dragon in… their various ways, Kei gets in front of Shrek, arms spread out like she's trying to block him off from this dragon... all defensive like. It's almost a t-pose... she's halfway there. Legs weren’t quite there, but it’s the thought that counts… probably?

Shrek is the star… it’s him!! Once they’d reached the end, Kei once again got down on one knee, arms off to the side of her, one higher than the other, in a sort of... presenting motion. Yes. She’s presenting the lovely couple… ta-daaaaa.

Dressed up like an incredibly fancy (and cute?) doctor, Kagemori was here to be the cure for fashionless runways! At least, they would try. Their luck hadn’t been great the past few shows, but they would still give it all they had! Three members of the Cool Team dreamed up a sickening runway collab, after all, so there was no way they’d choke here. With Kagemori's legs, Preston's glare, and Kei's smile, this would be radical!

Clicking down the runway in tall cage heels, white coat swaying in the artificial wind, Kagemori walks through the prop village with Kei and Preston. They spot a cutout of a familiar green-skinned lad with antenna-like ears clad in a leather vest. Aah! An ogre!! But, maybe, is this…? They swoon over Shrek, using overdramatic body language to convey this love at first sight. Amore. Momotori, play “I’m a Believer.”

Then, the gang carry Shrek much like a coffin down the runway. But, oh no, there’s a dragon! It wants to separate their forbidden love! Kagemori fights the dragon with their sword, hoping to spook it off with their (limp) prop sword. However… Kagemori trips and somehow drops their sword when trying to swing at the dragon. It’s now on the ground by their feet. Kagemori then flees from the dragon, Shrek cutout in tow. They…. they meant to do that! The dragon was simply too strong, so running was the best move!!

At the end of the runway, Kagemori appears before the castle. Swept up in the rush of this fairy tale’s happy ending, Kagemori dips Shrek in front of the castle. For once, it goes over really well!! Kagemori pulls some sly moves on Shrek and it’s highly romantic! Even some little light drones float up and create fake fireworks for the lovely couple! With Kei and Preston down here too, it all seemed like a movie. Huh.

After a long, meaningful look between the knight in shining cage heels and their green damsel in distress, Kagemori bows then saunters back up the runway. Still… taking the Shrek cutout with them. This was the Cool Team’s swamp now.

As they're heading up to the village part of the stage, Preston poses boringly next to Shrek, looking like he doesn't want to be here, only just close enough to Shrek to look like he's part of the group effort.

They carry Shrek down the stage, supporting him on their shoulders as if carrying a coffin at a funeral. They put him down in the middle of the stage for their second pose. Preston flips his middle finger at the dragon.

They carry Shrek again to the end of the stage in a similar fashion to before. Preston can't really think of what to do this time, so he... bows down, in deference to Shrek, who is clearly the star of this show. It's not a pitiful bow, just a show of respect.

#chapter four #modelronpa #chrono #kagemori #kei #preston #group fashion show #submission

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