#JUST DO THE STAINED GLASS ART YOU DUMB FUCK

[nerves-nebula]

Zag on them bitches, never let them know your next move- TIME TO WRITE TRAUMA AGAIN

——

It was Donnie’s turn to do dishes. Raph had cooked them some really nice veggies with some weird sauce Casey had brought them that had been absolutely delicious. The texture was a little weird, so smooth versus the crunchiness of the vegetables, but the taste had been great. Even Splinter hadn’t found anything to gripe about when he grabbed his helping.

However, now that the food was eaten and in his stomach, his tongue was making its dislike of the texture known. He hated that he was so picky about food, he wished he could just subsist on liquids. A nice flavorless juice full of all the calories and vitamins he needed without any of the horrible feelings that came with things touching his tongue.

“Dumbass, you’ve been scrubbing the same dish for five minutes.” Leo’s snarky voice didn’t even manage to cut through the cloud of discomfort, only amplifying it.

“There was a stain.” He lied.

“Sure there was. Can you fuckin’ stay on Earth for long enough to talk?”

He frowned, looking Leo’s way. He took in his body language, the cock of his hip and the way he crossed his arms right over his chest.

Leo was in a bad mood.

“C-can’t you bother s-someone else?” Donnie huffed, setting aside the washed dish to grab another, “I’m busy.”

“Busy doing what? Coming up with a new way to disappoint your family?” Leo laughed, incredulous and mean, “Thinking of some new dumb robot that’ll inevitably go haywire and explode in your face? Making a new plan to get yourself kidnapped again?”

Donnie didn’t answer, just set another cleaned plate aside to dry.

“Don’t give me that look, you know I’m right.” Leo leaned in closer, “I should start up a bingo sheet of ways you manage to fuck up. See if I can manage to fill the whole board before a month is up. Free space would obviously just be ‘Sucks at Ninjutsu’.”

His tongue felt like it wanted to crawl out of his mouth. He could still feel the bristles of broccoli in his throat, trying to gag him. Carrots that were just too over cooked, feeling almost slimy in the new sauce.

“What other spaces could there be?” Leo mused, “Blowing up another dumb invention.” He counted on his fingers, “Refusing to eat. Never fucking talking. Getting kidnapped, of course. Screwing with mystic shit you were told to leave alone.”

His mouth was simultaneously too wet and too dry. He set the last plate aside and started the quick task of cleaning their utensils. These were easy. He could get this done and just leave.

“Saying something is bad when there’s literally nothing wrong with it.” Leo was still. Fucking. Going. “Getting sick again. Breaking your dumb glasses. I’d say disappointing Dad, but there’s so many ways you manage to do that that I’d have to split it into multiple spots!”

Spoons were easy. A quick scrub with a rag and they could be set aside.

His throat caught and he had to pause to stop himself from gagging.

“Oh, how about managing to ruin some of Mikey’s art with your dumb experiments and pissing him off? That’s a good one! Not common, it’ll be hard to tick that box off, but man when you piss off Mikey you really make sure to go all out!”

Forks. Finish the forks. Get the gunk out from between the tines and set them aside.

Fuck, he got wet food on his fingers and now he could feel the slimy texture over his palms, mixing with the soapy water in a textural nightmare.

“I could make two separate boxes for you breaking our plumbing and our entertainment systems with your idiotic upgrades and repairs.”

Why wouldn’t Leo ever just shut up? His stupid tongue always flapping away like he was paid per word that fell from his stupid lips. It wasn’t good enough for him to embarrass them constantly in front of Splinter, he had to come and individually harass them?

Forks were done. Last thing was the veggie knife.

He could take it and use it to cut out Leo’s tongue.

His eyes went wide as he stared at his hands. He could so easily envision it, grasping the knife and just quickly shoving it into his brother’s mouth. He didn’t need to be stronger than Leo, just had to surprise him. He would never expect it, he was vulnerable. Just wait until he opened his mouth to laugh at his own cruel jokes and slam the blade into his open maw. If he was lucky, the damage would be bad enough that he’d completely lose the ability to speak.

He quickly tossed the knife onto the drying rack and drained the sink.

“Man you’re such a space case.” Leo rolled his eyes again, pushing off the counter to start walking out of the kitchen, “Maybe I’ll go borrow some art supplies from Mikey to make my bingo cards.”

With that, he was gone, leaving Donnie with the vision of him laying on the ground, mouth bloodied and fear in his eyes.

The bad texture in his mouth was gone.

——

Tee hee

-Monster Anon

Where did you find this scene of my brother harassing me- the way I’ve imagined putting knives in his suitcase so he’d stab himself when he goes to unpack it. The way I’ve imagined bashing his head in while he’s talking to me <3

I’ve never experienced this kind of ghost-texture issues. Once it’s down that’s usually it for me. Though the lingering tastes can be excruciating.

Anyway I loved reading this and I’m going to eat it <<33

#nnstuff #ask #abuse tw #fanfic #teenage mutant neglected turtles #tmnt leo #tmnt Donnie #neglected fic

[13meigo]

A snake’s plaything | Fifth year || Sebastian Sallow

🐍🌿 Chapter 10 | Possession

NSFW - Oral pleasuring M / F | Unprotected Sex

The snowstorm outside howled against the stained glass windows of Hogwarts. No one would be so dumb to be out in this weather right now, right?

Well, here she was running together with the boy of her dreams across the icy cold viaduct courtyard. The cold winds whipped into their faces.

The hate that they felt for this poltergeist Peeve was unimaginable.

'This prick!' Sallow cursed while holding his coat closed. 'And you can't even kill him!'

'I swear they should just kick him out of Hogwarts and make him never come back!' Violetta hissed and tried to cover her face. Peeves was a particularly nasty ghost and only the bloody baron from Slytherin could control him. Peeves got to the brilliant idea to block them the way to the stone bridge by the potions classrooms and the suspension bridge by the defense against the dark arts classrooms. This clown caused first flooding and then a fire!

Violetta and Sebastian saw the door to the entrance hall. They put all their last efforts in this way to not immediately freeze to death. Unbeknownst to them there was a cover of black ice under the thick layer of snow on the stones to the door.

Violetta stepped on the snow and felt her food lose its balance. Her knee twisted and with a shriek, she fell hard onto the icy ground. Sebastian tried to catch her but to no avail. He also slipped and with a short yell, he landed also in the cold snow.

With huffing and puffing, they both got up. A rage-filled noise escaped Violetta's mouth when she saw her hands and knees. Her stockings were ripped and her hands scraped bloody. She was just so cold. Sebastian came to her and saw her. He grabbed her by the shoulder.

'Come on, let's get you fixed up!' He said and led her to the entrance. The warm air hit their faces and the door closed behind them. Violetta turned to Sebastian. She just felt so angry at everything.

'It is the first fucking day of the Christmas holidays and you get to the brilliant idea to search in the restricted section of the damn library for curses? It's the first day! Just relax or something but no! Mister Sallow needs to go exploring and pull me into this!' Violetta said angrily while wringing out her cloak aggressively. Sebastian looked at her darkly.

'I mean you wouldn't even need to come with me! But you decided to do so!' He was as angry as her by everything that happened. 'I couldn't know that this asshead Peeves was then on the loose.'

'If I wouldn't have come with you, no one would!' Violetta replied bitterly.

'Oh, I would bet that some other people would have liked to come with me!' Sebastian said taking off his cloak.

'Like who? You don't even have the guts to ask other people besides Ominis and me!' Violetta hit right in the black with that sentence. It was true. Since they had this intimate encounter they were always together. Sebastian just looked furiously at her until a dripping noise caught their attention. Blood was dripping down from Violetta's hands onto the stone floor.

'Here.' Sebastian grabbed her hands and pointed his wand at them. 'Episkey!'

The small cuts disappeared from her palms and fingers. Violetta looked up at him. A bit of her anger was released.

'Thank you.' She said and he released her hand. Still, that spell didn't do anything about her soaked clothes and wet hair. Sebastian looked at her and thought for a moment.

'I know a place. Come with me.' He grabbed her hand and lead her through the castle until they reached the faculty tower near the hospital wing. They both left footprints. Sebastian's curly hair was stuck against his forehead and ears. His white shirt was so wet that you could see the freckles on his body through it. Violetta's soaked tights stuck to her legs like leeches and her hair became stringy and cold. Violetta saw her bra through her shirt.

Sebastian and Violetta came to a halt before a beautifully designed door. Violetta recognized the door. It was the bathroom for the students who has become perfect. She looked at Sebastian.

'Wait what?' She said. 'You want to go inside there? There could be students in there! If they catch us we could get into trouble!'

'Calm down.' He laughed and pointed to the door. 'No perfect are in and at this time no one will be here too. The perfects have a schedule for when to use it.' Violetta was still suspicious. Sebastian laughed and pulled her inside.

More warm air hit her face and she slowly stopped shivering. Sebastian locked the door. Violetta has never seen such a beautiful bathroom before. In the middle of the room was a big pool filled with steaming water in a light red color. Ornamented faucets were on every side. On the left wall was a giant moving picture of a mermaid holding a pearl. To the left and right of the door were toilets.

Suddenly Sebastian started to undress. Violetta looked at him with confusion.

'Wait, wait, wait! You want to take a bath here?!' She said and Sebastian put his cloak to the side and got out of his shoes.

'Do you have a better idea?' He asked while he began unbuttoning his shirt. Violetta blushed as she saw his chest expose. Actually, he was quite right. She didn't have any better ideas.

Sebastian dropped the shirt onto his cloak and turned to the still fully-clothed Violetta. He laughed at her flustered expression.

'I guess you like what you see!' He chuckled and Violetta turned her face away. She began to realize again how uncomfortable her cold wet clothes were. So she began to undress too. First her cloak and shoes, then she unbuttoned her shirt. She saw Sebastian glancing over at her. Violetta put her wet clothes on top of his ones. Violetta pulled the zipper of her skirt down and it dropped to her feet. She kicked it to the other. Then she tried to pull her wet tights down. Oh, this would be a fight.

Sebastian watched her struggle against the soaked material. He laughed at her helpless tries.

'Come here, darling. Let me help you.' He said and he guided Violetta to a chest. She sat on it and he kneeled down in front of her. His fingers locked into the waistband of her pantyhose which was already over her behind. Slowly but strong he pulled down her tights exposing her bare legs. He pulled it further down her knees and over her feet until she was free. Sebastian laid it with the rest of their clothes. He stood up and Violetta watched him open his pants. It dropped to the floor and he stepped out of it. Her eyes were glued to his underwear that fitted him so nicely.

Suddenly Sebastian kneeled down again and touched her thighs softly. This sent shivers down her spine even tho the air was hot and steamy.

His hands traveled up until they reached her hips, then her waist. He carefully slid them behind her back and opened her bra.

Violetta's heart was racing at the thought of what would happen next. She helped him remove her bra and he looked down at her breasts. Her nipples peeked straight at him. Embarrassment flushed her face. She knew that her body doing this only meant two things; either she was cold or she was aroused. Well, it was definitely the second option.

Sebastian felt her embarrassment and softly touched her face. He looked at her and his lips closed the distance between them. Such a sweet and gentle kiss gave her so many butterflies. Violetta wrapped her arms around his neck and she felt his fingers locked into the waistband of her underwear. Her head was racing.

She remembered the embarrassment she felt when all the female students from her year had a 'sexual education class' with professor Weasley. Well, there would be better teachers for a class like this. At least Violetta knew what was about to happen.

Sebastian pulled down her underwear until he slid it over her legs and she was completely exposed. Her dark hair was sticking to her back and face. Sebastian released the kiss and looked down at her body. She could see the excitement in his eyes and in his member. Violetta saw him slowly stretching against the fabric of his underwear.

Sebastian's heavy breathing echoed in the room and he grabbed her thighs, suddenly pulling her a bit forward. He spread her legs a bit and looked into Violetta's face.

'May I?' He asked so softly that her heart melted. Violetta pushed a strand of her from his forehead.

'Do as you desire.' She answered. Sebastian held eye contact while he took her left leg and kissed her knee. Then he put it over his shoulder. He began kissing his way up her thigh and sometimes she could feel him nibble on her sensitive skin. Small moans escaped her lips while she ran her hand through his hair. With his free hand, Sebastian moved on her other thigh up. Until he reached her core. His kisses made her slowly get wet.

Sebastian placed a kiss on her pubic one. With his hands, he lifted the skin up that was hiding her oh-so-sensitive clit. He placed a kiss on it and her moan echoed through the bath. The way he did it really aroused her. Sebastian kissed that sensitive nub again and carefully played his tongue on it. Well, she didn't expect that, and as a response, she pushed his head closer. She could feel him smile and Violette covered her mouth with her free hand. Sebastian swirled his tongue around it and licked it more and more. The heat rushed to her face and to her pussy. Her legs began trembling from being in this position. The more she suppressed her moans, the faster he got. She bet that he wanted to her hear make some noise for him.

Sebastian started sucking her clit and her eyes rolled into the back of her head. How could he make her feel this good?

Without noticing Violetta spread her legs further to give him better access. Her nails dug into his scalp and he hissed. This heat in her belly appeared and she desperately wanted to release it, so Violetta began moving her hips into his mouth. Her moans and whimpers got higher and higher. This fuzzy sensation spread over her entire body. Her breathing hitched and the coil in her was ready to... Nothing.

Sebastian stopped and pulled away from her pussy. In a short moment of frustration, Violetta grabbed his hair and yanked it to the side. Suddenly Sebastian grabbed her hand, which made her release his hair. He pulled her forward and his free hand grabbed her throat.

'Do that again and I will destroy you.' He whispered dangerously quietly. Violetta looked at him horrified. His hand released her throat.

'I am sorry.' She said and kneeled in front of him.

'I know how you can make it up to me again.' Sebastian stood up and pulled down his underwear. He sat down on the chest and looked at Violetta. Right now she had a waterfall between her legs and it didn't really help that Sebastian just sat there so damn handsome. His body did things to her that she never imagined. Sebastian wrapped his hand around his hardened dick and started stroking it. His whole body structure was very athletic and he was showered in freckles. Violetta scooted closer to him and there was this darkness in his eyes again. This hunger made her feel like a mouse ready to be devoured by a snake.

Violetta wrapped her fingers around his member and stroked it at the pace he did. Sebastian let go and his head fell back onto the wall. Violetta got closer to his dick with her face and closed her eyes. Her lips connected to his tip and she pressed a soft kiss onto it. A sallow breath released from his mouth and Violetta kissed his tip again while stroking at a steady pace. She felt his body heat up. Slowly she opened her mouth and took the head in. Her tongue swirled around it and he bucked his hips forward. More of his cock entered her mouth. His hand grabbed her hair and he started to guide her in how he wanted her to pleasure him.

Violetta took with each head move more of his inches into her mouth. Violetta rested her hands on his thighs. His dick hit the back of her throat but the noises he made got louder and deeper.

Then he grabbed her hair in a fist and he pushed her head faster and harder. Violetta's nails dug into his thighs and her eyes started to water. She could feel his hot thick dick twitching inside her mouth.

Suddenly he pulled her forcefully away from his dick. Strings of saliva connected from his cock to her mouth. She gasped for air. Sebastian looked at her and released her hair. He grabbed her arms and pulled her on top of him. She hovered over him and looked into his eyes. The hunger in his eyes was unbearable. Sebastian grabbed her waist and guided her down. His dick was already standing so hard that it didn't need a hand. Violetta felt its hot tip at her entrance. She rested her head on his.

'Fuck, you are so hot.' Sebastian said while their foreheads were connected. 'I can't control myself anymore.' With a force, she never felt, he pushed her down onto his dick. Her tight walls stretched so quickly at once that a sharp pain ran through her belly.

Well, he was her first and very goodly equipped.

A short pained noise escaped her mouth and she scratched his back hard that she was sure he was bleeding. She tried to push her hips up again but Sebastian held her tight and began slamming her at a merciless pace onto him. Quickly her pain was replaced by pleasure. Violetta moaned into his shoulder and he in her ear. His dick was so hot and ruff for her that the coil in her belly reappeared again. Violetta got closer and closer to her release and Sebastian felt that too. Violetta lifted her head from his shoulder and rest her hands on his shoulders. Her boobs bounced up and down.

The coils felt so close to snapping. Her walls clenched down and she felt her release rushing in. Her head fell forward and Sebastian's slamming became eradicated until he put all his strength into this last slam before his eyes rolled back into his head. His fingers dug into her soft skin and a loud growl escaped his lips while he released his thick sticky juice into her.

Breathing heavily they stayed connected. This moment made them feel whole and connected, so close to being one.

Violetta lifted her head from his shoulder and looked at him. Sebastian brushed her hair out of her face. He pulled her into a deep kiss.

She could taste herself on his tongue.

If you enjoy the content please leave a heart and follow to not miss any updates! xx Meigo

#sebastian sallow x mc #sebastian sallow #sebastian sallow smut #sebastian sallow x reader #sebastian sallow fanfiction #ominis gaunt #hogwarts legacy #hogwarts oc #hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry

[juspeczyk]

answering art questions for my beloved @belzebub430

1. Art programs you have but don't use

procreate T-T i don’t draw often enough anymore to keep my ipad reliably charged, and it takes so long to charge up when i DO want to draw, it’s a whole thing. also gimp because it looks like the version of photoshop i’m used to except everything is two inches to the left and i don’t have the patience to learn it properly

2. Is it easier to draw someone facing left or right (or forward even)

you expect me to think about what direction my blorbo is facing? you expect me to think and not just vibe with what looks good at the moment?

3. What ideas come from when you were little

my comic/novel princess huntress and by extension my d&d homebrew world! always loved princesses, always loved fantasies, was a tiny lesbian who thought the beast was way cooler than the prince and belle was dumb for de-beasting him

4. Fav character/subject that's a bitch to draw

plants and buildings :(

5. Estimate of how much of your art you post online vs. the art you keep for yourself

if it’s drawn, i usually post it somewhere; if it’s a collage, i usually keep it to myself. probably 5% of my collages are shared in the group chat or in person

6. Anything that might inspire you subconsciously (i.e. this horse wasn't supposed to look like the Last Unicorn but I see it)

i was a tim burton child and a my chemical romance teen so now i lovingly craft deep, dark undereye bags and shadows on to 90% of the people i draw regardless of how much sleep they get

7. A medium of art you don't work in but appreciate

oil painting!!! i dabble in acrylics and watercolors, but i LOVE the texture and color blending abilities of oil, and it’s so so so so so so gorgeous and if it wasn’t so expensive i would dabble in it too. also clay. also stained glass. also prop foam. i did set design in high school and got to make an entire brick building facade for the glass menagerie out of foam and heat tools it was SO FUN

8. What's an old project idea that you've lost interest in

markers :/ like they’re great and i still use them but they’re just for fun now, not something i really invest practice in

9. What are your file name conventions

usually [character name/s] [situation/theme depicted] .png

10. Favorite piece of clothing to draw

veils, jewelry, plate armor

11. Do you listen to anything while drawing? If so, what

whatever playlist relates to what i’m drawing

12. Easiest part of body to draw

hands cause they can be a little funky or a little simplistic and it still looks fine cause hands are just Like That

13. A creator who you admire but whose work isn't your thing

every glassblower ever

14. Any favorite motifs

heresy and sacrilege >:3c

15. *Where* do you draw (don't drop your ip address this just means do you doodle at a park or smth)

my bedroom mostly, i do love drawing outside but i usually get too distracted by the world

16. Something you are good at but don't really have fun doing

inking... i’m not BAD at it but it can smell my fear

17. Do you eat/drink when drawing? if so, what

never eat (food on paper!!! bad!!! no!!!), sometimes fix a cup of coffee or tea, set it aside to cool, and then forget about it forever

18. An estimate of how much art supplies you've broken

Y’ALL ARE BREAKING YOUR SUPPLIES??????

19. Favorite inanimate objects to draw (food, nature, etc.)

plants, kitchenware

20. Something everyone else finds hard to draw but you enjoy

noses and hands uwu

21. Art styles nothing like your own but you like anyways

hyper-realistic painting!! oil, acrylic, digital, it’s all fucking gorgeous and jaw-dropping

22. What physical exercises do you do before drawing, if any

none. don’t be like me

23. Do you use different layer modes

if i color it yes, if i’m just sketching i usually only change the opacity

24. Do your references include stock images

how do you use references WITHOUT stock images

25. Something your art has been compared to that you were NOT inspired by

no clue

26. What's a piece that got a wildly different interpretation from what you intended

little mini comic of the joker and harley quinn from like 2016 that everyone on tumblr thought was the lead singer of a boy band

27. Do you warm up before getting to the good stuff? If so, what is it you draw to warm up with

i start with rough sketches and get more detailed as i go, but i usually just work on one piece at a time, no separate warm-ups or anything

28. Any art events you have participated in the past (like zines)

i’ve submitted stuff to the county fair (and won honorable mentions!), library competitions, and some of my comic pages from college were displayed there for multiple years!

29. Media you love, but doesn't inspire you artistically

whatever tv shows i’m into at the moment

30. What piece of yours do you think is underrated

all of them. everyone should be praising me and giving me money at all times forever.

#piri.txt

[song-for-the-seasons]

OCPD diagnosis ramblings under the cut

Got dx’d with OCPD this week which is like, the way it was explained to me was like,

with OCD the people that have it KNOW they’re having intrusive thoughts that aren’t logical, but feel compelled to do them anyways. It’s ego-dystonic, meaning it goes against what you know to be ordered thinking.

I have OCPD which means I don’t know when the intrusive thoughts are happening because my brain accepts them as reality. It’s ego-syntonic , meaning these intrusive thoughts align with my belief system. Like, perfectionism is a good thing! Being detail oriented is a good thing! Being motivated and dedicated and a self starter is a good thing! Being an advocate for other people is a good thing! But now it’s going full tilt into “if everything isn’t perfect, if something goes AWOL I lose my SHIT”. It’s genetic and gets worse with age, which explains why I’ve gradually gotten more and more type A in the last 9 years. It centers around perfectionism and fairness and balance. like if I buy someone coffee, they have to buy me coffee next time or the balance isn’t right and I could be in danger. Or vice versa, if someone else was slighted in some way, I have to make it up to them to make everything fair or else I’m horrible and deserve to die. It’s even gotten to the point that I have a knee jerk reaction that if someone hurts me, I need to hurt them back to create *BALANCE*. I’m at least self aware enough that I can realize that’s dumb as hell and not something I would DO, but the thought has begun creeping in. If one of my clients doesn’t like their order, then I wasn’t perfect and I have a breakdown so hard I’m hospitalized. I have to get a 100% score on everything- conversations, being a good friend, art, chores, therapy, driving or I dissociate for DAYS. I graduated suma cum laude for fucks sake because I felt like I’d stupid if I didn’t. To be clear, no one else has to meet these standards because they have inherent worth as a human. Because I lack inherent worth, I have to play this game of perfection and balance in order to make sure I deserve to be alive.

like the whole thing feeds into itself because I AM good at things because I feel like I HAVE to be or I’ll DIE. I excel at almost everything I touch because I HAVE to. But when I don’t, when something isn’t in my control, I fall apart. I wasn’t INSTANTLY perfect at stained glass last week and I had to pointedly calm myself because it wasn’t PERFECT. I completed nanowrimo but because I have been bludgeoning myself over the head with my *first draft not being perfect* I can’t enjoy the fact I wrote 50k words in a month! At least I know *that’s* illogical but it doesn’t stop the berating.

for a really long time my doctors and therapists just thought it was PTSD and anxiety creating a monster but once this piece was brought up it finally clicked. The other side of it though is there’s not a TON of research on it and idk how much hope there is of getting better. The most positive I can find is the *progression* can be halted. so like, rn I’m dx’d with PTSD, CPTSD, anxiety, depression, and OCPD. I’m a fucking cocktail that cancels each other but on the outside look like a go getter, perky, friendly individual and then on the inside I’m just constantly screaming AHHHHHHHHHHH

being aware it’s happening is step one. Maybe it’s the perfectionism speaking, but I WILL get better. I have a lot of hope. For a really long time I’ve been working on myself, and I think it really slowed the progression of this disease. I felt like I was making big strides with myself, but there was something huge missing that we weren’t understanding and this is it.

knowledge is power etc etc I WILL gain control of my brain again, I WILL be better than I was yesterday. But hoo boy I got my work cut out for me

[letitrainathousandflames]

Some artist: *makes art with a widely known element that isn’t anyone’s trademark and can therefore be explored by anyone, i.e. stained glass, halo/religious motifs, monochrome w/ one single pop of color, etc.*

Me: ah fuck, they did it first. If I do it now I’ll be copying off them and therefore Plagiarizing And Being A Bad Lazy Artist

#callout post @ myself #JUST DO THE STAINED GLASS ART YOU DUMB FUCK

[eddie-doesart]

If you're doing fic requests, could you write a fic of Hank being amazed at Tricky's paws n finding out he's ticklish? I hope you have an awesome day!

Yes You May. :)

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Paws

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Fandom: Madness Combat 

Characters: Hank And Tricky

Romantic Or Platonic?: Platonic Hank & Tricky Friendship

Summary: Hank Tends To Tricky's Injuries On His Paws, Finding Something Surprising When He Starts Cleaning The Excess Dirt Off.

Requested By: Anonymous

Warnings: Injuries, Blood, Murder Mention, Cursing

Notes: I'm So Sorry This Took So Long And Sorry It's Short. I Kept Getting Distracted. I Also Hope You Don't Mind That I Drew Art For This Fic.

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Hank Was Fixing Adjusting His Goggles As He Heard Some Agents Scream In Horror Followed By The Sound Of Tricky Laughing Maniacally. He Headed To The Closest Window And Saw Blood Splattered Everywhere. He Had Concluded That Tricky Murdered At Least 5-6 People.

As Soon As Hank Was About To Head To The Blender, He Jumped At The Sudden Bang On The Window. He Turned To See Who Or What Hit The Glass, And Was Greeted By Tricky Staring At Him With His Hands Making Grabbing Motions. And….Goddamnit He Cut His Hands On That Dumb Stop Sign Again.

Hank Made His Way Outside To Receive The Clown, Grabbing A Weapon Just In Case Someone Tried To Attack Him On The Way. Once He Opened The Door And Took One Step On The Dirt (Or Sand?), Tricky Jumped In His Arms.

Tricky: "HEHE, HI HANK!"

Hank: "Jebus Tricky, You Really Fucked Those Agents Up….And Your Hands."

Tricky: "INCORRECT. CLOWN WAS CAREFUL WITH STOP SIGN. HANK WORRIES TO MUCH."

Hank: "....Whatever. I'm Wrapping Your Hands Anyway So They Don't Get Infected Like Last Time."

Hank Carried Tricky Towards His Bedroom, Setting Him Down On The Bed. He Left For 1 Second To Get The Medical Kit, And Came Back To See Tricky Jumping On The Bed And Causing Havoc. Wimbleton Had To Forcefully Set Tricky Down So He Could Remove The Clown's Gloves, He Was Surprised To What He Saw.

Hank: "You Have...Paws?"

Tricky: "HANK DIDN'T KNOW?"

Hank: "Well No Tricky, You're Always Wearing Gloves!"

The Man In The Goggles Started To Clean The Wounds On Tricky's Paws And Bandage Them. He Inspected Both Paws To Make Sure He Cleaned Them Spotless. Of Course There Had To Be A Dry Blood Stain On One Of The Paw Beans. As Hank Started Scraping The Blood Off With His Nail.

A Giggle Escaped The Clown's Mouth As He Quickly Pulled His Hand Back, Making Hank Annoyed. They Both Struggled Keeping The Hand In One Place, Until Hank Firmly Grabbed Tricky's Paw And Held It In Front Of Him As Still As He Could. He Then Stared At Tricky With An Annoyed Glare And Watched The Clown Giggle With Anticipation.

Hank: "What Is Your Deal?!"

Tricky: "HEHE, T-TICKLES!"

Hank: "Oh, Boo-Hoo. Deal With It."

Hank Went Back To Getting The Dry Blood Of Tricky's Paw, As The Clown Continued To Giggle From The Action. After A While, Hank Started Chuckling At Tricky's Reactions. The Blood Was Finally Picked Off, Cleaned And Bandaged (Just In Case It Was An Injury.)

Hank: "Better Now?"

Tricky, Still Giggling: "YES, CLOWN BETTER NOW. NOW HANK PLAY?"

Hank: "...You Set This Up On Purpose?" *He Watched As Tricky Nodded Enthusiastically, Getting Angry But In A Playful Way.* "You- COME HERE YOU LITTLE SHIT!!"

The Rest Of The Day Consisted Of Hank And Tricky Chasing Each Other, Both Laughing The Whole Time.

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

I Hope That You Enjoyed The Fic. And Sorry Again That This Is Late.

#madness combat #madness combat fanart #madness combat tricky #madness combat hank #mc fanart #mc tricky #mc hank #tricky the clown #tricky #hank j. wimbleton #hank #art #my art #fanfic #my fanfic #requested fic #ask #anonymous

[oh-boy-me]

Demon Outfits Discussed

The wait is over :) thank you for your patience and all the lovely comments on the casual discussion!!

I feel like it got longer this time, so I hope it’s all an enjoyable read!  Also, I apologize for the ugly pictures--it was the easiest and fastest way to both have all the design in one image and also prevent it from stretching so far.

Like last time, please don’t take this too seriously; we love these boys and Justin doesn’t know them but has no grudges against them.  We’re just harping on their fashion sense.  Absolutely no hate is intended towards the boys or the design team!

Participants in the discussion were

Jo ( @jodaneko ), our art major with storyboarding/character design experience, who finds they have more in common with Satan each passing day.

Justin ( @justinlester0629 ), our fashion expert, who dressed up and filled a wine glass with water for the occasion.

Noodle (Me), our untrained eye who owns the Barbie as the Island Princess video game on three different platforms.  It’s not even that good.

Featuring emergency guest star Megan ( @maggo77​ ), my sister who is physically near me as we look at the backs of their designs for the first time.

Edit: Distracted by the pretty jacket, we made a mistake when putting in Levi’s silhouette rating.  It’s the worst.  2/10, not 6.

Lucifer:

“Boy looks like he’s about to swing open the doors of an expensive mansion during a debutante party and give some SCATHING NEWS.” —Justin

“Short shoulder cape and a long split butt cape lol” —Jo

Jo has realized that based on both outfits, Lucifer doesn’t want people looking at his butt.  Possible reasons are: he doesn’t have one, or Diavolo someone was getting distracted.

His shoes match his outfit.  After last time that’s all I care about.

A triple popped color, and how many layers is the middle one?  Is that a book?  Dude has like 27 collars.

The forehead diamond is very important and it’s great that there are diamond buttons to match it.  But uh.  How about those red diamonds on his sleeves.  They.  They sure are there.  (I actually like the red accents and that they match his gloves; I just can’t take the diamonds seriously.)

  Lucifer 🤝 Some Horses Diamond on the Forehead

The peacock motif is HERE and we’re all living for it.  HOWEVER, the feathers on the cape and coattails should have matched, OR there should have been more lime green because there’s so little of that color.

The pants have a pleat in the front, which Justin says means he responsibly irons his clothes, and Jo says only heightens the fact that under the capes this is a marching uniform.

Can he fly?  Jo says these are baby wings that can’t support his weight, and his cape has a hole for the top pair but blocks the bottom pair?  Can’t believe Lucifer handicapped himself for the sake of fashion.

The red makes it regal and the wide flowy design makes it imposing.  Good job, Lucifer!  I might actually be intimidated if I saw you.

Definitely the classiest outfit.  You can tell they put care into it.

Mammon:

“BITCH MY BODY CANNOT TAKE THIS KIND OF SEXY, I THINK I AM OVERHEATING!  NO MORE FURTHER COMMENTS, YOUR HONOR.  HAUTE AND HOT.” —Justin

The whole thing does amazing with only three colors.  We’ve noticed the trend of black and white + one color, but I mean hey.  It’s working so far.

Damn those pants sit low.  No wonder literally all of you wear belts.

The leather jacket?  The studs and harness?  Bless.  Justin calls it “the perfect blend of stylish and ‘I’ll see you tonight *wink*’”.

Kind of don’t like how the belts connect to the pants, though.  It looks better in the back.

“He found a really cool jacket, but it didn’t pair with anything so he just didn’t wear anything.” —Jo

Honestly though?  We’ve all made fun of Mammon for having big hoe energy in his outfits, but like, he knew he had wings and planned his outfit to accommodate for that.  He’s the only one who didn’t cut holes in his outfit.  Maybe Mammon was the smallest hoe after all.

Also if there’s a motif it repeats elsewhere, like the studs and diamonds on his jacket and pants.  Did he and Lucifer have a “tastefully putting diamonds on my outfit” battle?  Because Mammon definitely won.

One of the charms broke off the belt loop and he never bothered to replace it, and honestly thank god there isn’t two of those anymore.

Torn between wishing the boots were tighter to match the rest of the outfit and saying “yoooo they’re open in the back!!!”

Ok so so far we’ve said generally only good things, but there is one major issue with the design: Its gravity.  Everything points down, his tattoos, the diamonds, even his wings.  The center of gravity in the image is his shoes.  Bitch loved his shoes so much he made his whole outfit point to them.

Either way this was universally considered the best and I mourn Justin who doesn’t know how far Mammon’s standards are gonna fall from here.

Leviathan:

Diagonal zipper

“Levi what the fuck.” —Megan

He looks like an e-boy.

Honestly it looks like he borrowed something from Justin’s wardrobe for Pride but he didn’t know how to put it on.

APPARENTLY the biggest hoe.  Abs that he shouldn’t have coming through a mesh t-shirt.  I thought Mammon’s pants were low, but Levi’s whole-ass ass is out.  Ok Levi, I see you.

The shirt pattern is good but he probably leaves it partially unzipped because it’d look really dumb fully closed.

Justin loves the funky pants pattern and Jo likes the pants but not with the outfit.  It’s because the devs were too coward to give him a thick tail base so his pants had to fill that role by sharing the pattern.

The shoes are good, and not just because they incited Justin’s deep-set hatred for Christian Louboutin and his uncomfortable red-bottom shoes.

Justin is offended that he’s hiding his suspenders; either show them completely or not at all, no in between.  Jo’s not fully convinced it isn’t just one suspender.  What are his suspenders doing?  What are they attached to?  Are they holding anything up?  Apparently not.

Jo pointed out that if you squint the belt on his waist looks like fangs and the orange dots on his sleeves looks like eyes so it’s like theres a snake head on his outfit.  Cute!

The gloves are throwing us off though.  Why is Levi of all other brothers need gloves?  I bet he has sweaty hands.

Ok really, does his sweater unzip all the way into two pieces?  Or does it hang by that tiny thread underneath the tail hole?  There’s even a button, just in case.

Can’t believe this antler-sporting, suspender-wasting nerd went diagonal zipper on us because we beat him at a trivia game.  Should have just zipped his hood.

Satan:

HONEY.

“I hate everything about this.” —Megan

First of all, he’s straight up wearing Lucifer’s casual shirt.  Does it only button down the back?  Can he take it off?

Then he spilled bleach on his pants.  Like I get what they were going for but with the white on black that is literally just bleach stains.

Incredibly differing opinions on the belt.  He got it in the cowboy department.  Justin adores it.  Jo despises it.

And are those… athletic slip ons?

And now the elephant in the room.  The ribcage made of ribbons.  The ribboncage.  The idea is great!  I love that they gave him a skeletal theme without throwing him into a Hot Topic.

But if you take the ribboncage and feather boa off he’s literally just wearing a dress shirt and some nice jeans.  And that’s the problem with Satan’s demon form.  Not that it looks goofy.  It’s that they took risks but then hid all the risks behind business casual.

Also Megan said that the back of the ribbons look like a rock climbing harness.  Someone (probably Justin) said the front reminds them of the underbelly of a green cockroach.  Ew.

The feather boa would look better if it was over something you wouldn’t literally wear at the office.  (And also didn’t look so much like worm on a string.)

“He is going to Dragcon 2020 and is definitely going to take a picture and ask to lip sync, but accidentally start beef with Acid Betty.” —Justin

On a good note, loving how the tail fades to highly radioactive green.  Feels dangerous.  Megan pointed out that it’s a pretty wimpy tail, though.  Jo enjoys the self-conscious posture it expresses.

That’s basically the only good thing we have to say, though.

I just????

Merry Christmas.

Asmodeus:

The kanji on the picture is just saying that the coattail is the same on both sides.

Ok now with that out of the way, HONEY.

I’m sure he says that to others but I hope he says it to himself too when he looks in the mirror.

Starting with the good.  The wings?  Adorable.  The heart-shaped hole to accommodate them?  Adorable.  One of the only good adjustments.

And I love that the tips of his horns look venomous, like a scorpion tail!

We love a good floral design and a good twin tailcoat.

But once again, the shirt just has too much going on.  The flowers.  The buttons.  The brick-pattern stitching.  The brooch.  The long collar.  The fact that if he closed the last button it’d end in a diamond covering his crotch.  Sometimes less is more, Asmo.

That scorpion brooch is the best thing to ever grace my computer screen and it shouldn’t have to share the spotlight with the rest of his shirt.  It should have wrapped around his arm and been paired with some more jewelry.  Then he could have ditched those giant cuffs.

The bleeding heart tattoos are a really good idea!  But they should have been angled better and not like someone else put them on at the roller rink.  And maybe they shouldn’t have been outlined in pink.  Those aren’t tattoos, those are gaping holes in his arm.  Is he ok.

I’ve been avoiding the pants, but.  The pants.

“Oh dear god. Oh no that’s… I thought you were a designer…” —Jo

One side is buckled the ENTIRE way down, and then the other side is COMPLETELY plain.  It’s too extreme on both ends.  It should have been only half a leg of buckles.  Not whatever this is.  I still don’t think he can bend that leg.

The shoes are ok but they COULD have been a stiletto so.

Jo is DONE with these demons’ inability to wear socks.

We expected better from you, Asmo.  I hope you have to fasten all those buckles every morning as retribution.

Beelzebub:

He said “how many belts can I wear on one outfit.”

Justin said it’s like Barry B. Benson and Post Malone had a beautiful baby boy, and Obey Me! is cancelled for creating a sequence of events that could lead to me hearing that with my own two ears.

The jacket?  Stunning.  “It’s steampunk mixed with Jack Sparrow, mixed with Billie Joe Armstrong,” says Justin.  It’s got puffy sleeves!  And there’s objectively too much going on with the jacket, but since it’s a leather jacket I can forgive it.  Justin and Jo can’t.

I’m not sure why they keep giving him weird jacket collars but I prefer belt number 9 to fur.

“Why is it bucked in the back?  Couldn’t it have just been a jacket?” —Megan

Good that the black tank isn’t only black, but he has so little color on his outfit that it would have been nice for it and the matching pattern on his boots to have been a color besides gray.

I don’t mind the belts down the leg because they’re not too in your face.  Jo wants the white belt to be thinner.  Justin wants him to just pick one and go with it.

Poor Beel, he can’t do his lil thigh pat pose without his right hand being assaulted by studs and that bear trap-shaped buckle.

Justin feels like the cowboy boots are too wide up top and it’s probably because they’re FAKE cowboy boots.  I don’t know why he didn’t just get cowboy boots instead of putting fake coverings over his dress shoes.

Can’t fault the twin belt, though.  And the wing hole isn’t terrible.

Idk I guess.  They knew what they wanted to do at least.  

That seems to be the pattern with Beel: they know what they want to do, but something weird happens in the middle of it.

Belphegor:

“I don’t know which Teletubby let their son go through the it’s just a phase mom phase, but they should be ashamed.” —Justin

A toddler who just learned how to cut holes in paper got a hold of his hoodie.

Is it a hoodie?  A jacket?  A poncho?  The cow print actually isn’t terrible.  At least it had the decency to be unique in its spotting.  And the actual presence of blue is very appreciated.

On the topic of colors, Jo is calling the devs out on their apparent fear of color.  “Put the pink elsewhere, cowards,” they say.

We actually don’t hate the horseshoe, and using it for the belt buckles is actually really clever.  Even if 75% of them are doing literally nothing.  Feel like he didn’t need that many.  Could do without the bottom one, maybe even bottom two.

There’s a teeeeny tiny cowbell on the back?  Megan apparently finds that VERY important.  Why do they go to such great lengths to remind us that Belphie’s a cow?  Beel doesn’t rub his hands together 24/7.  Mammon doesn’t even get bird wings.

Just like Satan spilled bleach, Belphie has tar pants.

It’s nice to see a change in pant style, but.  Am I biased because I hate harem pants?  Maybe.  Are these harem pants too short on him?  Yes.  Maybe they were supposed to be parachute capris?  But it just looks he outgrew them too fast and Lucifer won’t buy him new pants yet.  At least they look comfy.

If he puts his keys in those pockets will his pants fall down?  Probably.  That’s a problem considering his are the only pants that look like they could hold any keys.

The shoes are fine.  I can enjoy a high topped sneaker.  …Is that a security tag?  Did he steal his shoes.  Belphie stole his shoes.

On the tiny tail hole, I appreciate that Belphie went for modesty.  But I hope it’s impossible to wear these outfits outside of demon form because I don’t want him walking around with a tiny hole right above his ass.

Honestly he doesn’t even look like a demon?  He just looks like… a cow.

There’s one more aspect of their demon forms that I didn’t feel comfortable forcing into a smaller space than it deserved: Silhouettes.  Jo puts a lot of weight on silhouettes and their role in character design.  Is it dynamic?  Is it recognizable?  Jo ranked them as such:

1. Lucifer: 9/10.  Care and effort were put into this design and it shows. 2. Mammon: 7/10.  Points deducted for most of it being form fitting but otherwise still manages to get a passing grade. 3 (tied). Beelzebub: 5/10.  His wings have actual mass but his horns being mostly hidden by his head reduce his score. 3 (tied). Belphegor: 5/10.  Evens out since his clothes aren’t as form fitting as the others but they also kind of turn him into a blob. 5. Asmodeus: 4/10, and only because he’s got multiple wings and that his tailcoat breaks up the bottom half. 6. Satan: 3/10, for the fact HIS BOA carries most of the work in altering his silhouette. 7. Leviathan: 2/10.  The tail and horns prevent this from being a total flop.

Our (surprisingly unanimous!) ranking of their outfits (not counting Megan her opinions deviated) were:

Mammon

Lucifer

Leviathan

Belphegor

Beelzebub

Asmodeus

Satan

In conclusion, any M-rated fic that doesn’t have it take demon Satan 20 minutes to take off his shirt is too unrealistic.

#got it out on time for demon day yaaaay #half of it got deleted because i'm a DUMB BUTT who hit the power button #so I had to redo a lot but I think it's all there #none of our notes got lost luckily just how I worded them #obey me #obey me one master to rule them all #obey me shall we date #obey me swd #swd obey me #shall we date obey me #obey me! #obey me lucifer #obey me mammon #obey me leviathan #obey me satan #obey me asmodeus #obey me beelzebub #obey me belphegor #obey me outfit analysis #image

[scary-lasagna]

ThanksKilling [Pt. IIII]

___ The creeps finally have a nice meal together ___

An hour later, and the dining hall was filled with scents of pumpkin, turkey, ham, roasted chicken, and lively lighting from the warm chandelier, it gave a sense of security to those peacefully chattering over their feast. A miracle was deemed that no one has killed each other yet, and everyone seemed to decently be getting along. Conversations overlapped each other, and there wasn't a singular conversation through the 30+ dining seats; Everyone seemed to be in their own ombre groups, talking over the table and calling down the lines of seats to their friends. 

"I still can't believe that Slender and Zalgo had a baby."

"We didn't conceive a child, Ben. Rake was made with pure magic and wishful thinking." Slender spoke over the chatter of the dining hall, and has been popping in and out of guest's conversations regularly. The being in question was weaving in and out of chairs, picking up table scrapes and nearly nicking fingers who dared to share their food despite the specially ordered cherries they beloved.

Words faded in and out as creeps exchanged bonds, well-wishes, and fond inside jokes everyone seemed to know of.

"Aw!~ Cmon, Jackie, no one's gonna judge you! Everyone eats rare steak now and then." Nina cooed with an encouraging shoulder pat, and the poor eyeless demon responded with a sigh and a poke at the raw meat on his blood-stained plate with upturned brows. Nina was encouraging, but maybe...he'll just save it for later. 

"And then he said 'I'm pickle rick'...funniest shit I ever saw." Silver merely stared politely at the blue jester, and wished BEN would drag him out of the god-forsaken conversation.

In the seats across from Silver and Candypop, BEN has reached his own dilemma, "Jeff, my hand's stuck in the turkey."

"You're a ghost, bro."

"Oh, yeah, haha." Ben popped his wrist-deep hand out of the turkey, offering a handful of stuffing to Jeff's plate.

"So," Kagekao hummed, smirking under his mask, "Who wants to talk about politics?"

A chorus of no's and 'fuck off's' erupted, excluding the agreement from Zalgo and Laughing Jack, who purely came to stir chaos among the creeps.

"You know Slender, I have to admit I extremely underestimated how this night would go." Zalgo set his utensil down, and wiped the blood off of his lips with a neatly folded napkin.

"Well, just let this be a lesson when trying to-"

"Please do me a favor and never invite me over again, this is incredibly boring and I have not seen a single death tonight."

"Would you like to experience one? Because I'll kick this turkey leg so far up your-"

"Mother! Oh, have I ever told you how much I love you?!" Splendor chimed in at the perfect time, and pressed a cheek to his mother's temple.

"Yeah, keep kissing ass for Christmas, Splen." Offender took a seat next to Jane, "Hello my favorite lesbian!"

"Don't ever refer to me like that again."

"What's wrong with lesbians?!" Jeff exclaimed, "They just like other girls, there's nothing wrong with that." The raven-haired man shrugged with sass, and took a bite of marshmallow-topped yam. It caught some attention, and even a disinterested Helen looked up from his chived-mashed potatoes.

"Jeffery, you dumb soulless bitch, I'm a lesbian." Jane placed a manicured hand over her heart.

"Well, congratulations, Jane, you're not as much of an asshole as I thought you were."

Jane paused for a moment and finally exhaled, dropping the conversation to return to her knife talk with Tim. 

"TiiiIIMM!! Can I have the 'tates please?" Toby reached across the table, teetering one of the candle holders in the process.

"Yeah, just don't set the table runner on fire." The brunette grumbled and handed over the glass bull of onion and chive flavored mash potatoes. The table runner would be better set on fire. It was far from returning to a smooth velvet, and the messy housemates have all left their lasting decorations on the poor piece of fabric. 

After the feast, the creeps retreated to their own circles to rest and digest the wide arrange of food that was presented to them. Some slept on each other, and some we're forced onto the floor by their friends after some calming gaming, art, or whatever those silly creeps like to do in their downtime.

Zalgo and Slender departed with a not-so-friendly handshake, although the king was extremely appreciative of the invite, even if he expressed mixed signals.

Toby had a peaceful sleep, wrapped up in a pile of jackets and blankets to ward away any brewing nightmares. And Jane decided to be kind enough and return Jeff's broken dog tag that fell off in a fit of laughter.

The Rake? Well, they snuggled close to Clockwork that night.

What matters is that they spent their well-meant time together, and no one had to do the dishes that night.

#god sorry i wrote this after eating and my brain ceased function #so i took a break #and whoops its 11pm #ITS A LIL LATE BUT ILL BE DAMNED ILL GO TO SLEEP BEFORE ITS POSTED #Im very tired haha #thankskilling #thanksgiving #creepypasta #creepypasta imagines #short story #jeff #jane #tim #zalgo #slender #holiday

[iron--spider]

you’re as good as it gets

“Whoever would have thought Peter would replace me?” Tony asks, peering over at Pepper as they set the table. “I guess I should have. I guess I should have seen it coming. I’m not as cool as I once was.”

 “I am going to record you,” Pepper says, glancing up as she sets the silverware down. “And then I am going to send the videos to Peter, whenever you do this.”

 “Good,” Tony says. “Then maybe he’ll see how much he’s hurting his old man—” Pepper starts coming at him with the dish towel, and Tony laughs, holding his hands up in surrender. “I’m kidding, I’m kidding. Sort of.”

 “This is what you wanted him to do, right?” she asks, bracing her hand on the chair and looking at him. “This Octavius guy, doing this with him gets Peter college credit?”

 “The class does,” Tony says, chewing on a toothpick. “The working with him thing is a whole different...thing.”

 “He’s just living his life,” Pepper says, and she’s looking at him sadly now, like she might get it. “Getting better after everything he’s gone through. You know he’s not actually replacing you, he’s just—”

 “No, I know,” Tony says, laughing a little bit. “I know. I’m just being dramatic. To irritate you.”

 “Mhm. Easily done.”

 Tony doesn’t know much about Otto Octavius. Well, he knows everything he learned after he heavily, heavily researched him when Peter started working with him in his lab on the weekends. But, he doesn’t know Octavius as a person, and he doesn’t hardly trust anybody with Peter, even people he trusts. Logically, this is a good thing. Peter’s preparing for college. He’s getting back into the groove of things after...all the bullshit. He was having a hard time with it, for a while. Being gone for five years. His life upended. Tony nearly dying in front of him and losing an arm as a result of the near death. So Tony knows this is good. The kid’s moving on.

 He’s moving on?

He’s moving...on. 

 Tony’s had a lot of people move on from him. He expects it. He expects every day for Pepper to up and leave, for Morgan to pack up her little pink Hello Kitty suitcase and disappear in the wind. Rhodey never picking up his calls again. Happy slamming the door in his face. All of them would probably beat the shit out of him if they knew he still thought that way, but it’s so ingrained in him that it’s hard to push it back.

 He knows it would piss Peter off too. So Tony never says anything to him about his own dumb shit or his worries or his occasional loneliness, despite his firecracker of a daughter who’s been dressing up in Spider-Man costumes lately. But Tony misses Peter. And feels a dumb tinge of jealousy knowing he’s learning and growing with some other asshole scientist mentor guy. Tony is supposed to be the only asshole scientist mentor guy in his life.

 His phone buzzes in his pocket.

 “Speak of the devil,” Tony says, opening up Peter’s message. 

 “See, there you go,” Pepper says, laying out napkins. “He wouldn’t be messaging you if he’d replaced you. He’s too polite for that.”

 The message is a photo—a billboard of Tony himself, the kind of shit that started cropping up everywhere after everyone found out what he did. Suited up, sans helmet, staring upwards with a look of determination and grit on his face, like some kind of stained glass church art. Peter is in the foreground, both eyebrows raised, and it’s captioned “TONY ARE YOU STALKING ME?”

 “What a nerd,” Tony says, full of fondness. 

 “Make sure he knows he’s coming for movie night tomorrow or Morgan will never forgive him,” Pepper says. 

 “Noted,” Tony says, crafting a reply.

 ~

 A couple days later Tony is falling asleep sitting up in the workshop, still analyzing the layout for the new bot he’s creating to accompany DUM-E and U. He’s seen Peter a couple times in the past week, but the kid looks more worn out than normal with every new day that passes. Tony had texted a bit with May, trying not to worry, but that’s practically his every day state of mind, especially when it comes to his kids. 

 His kids. Plural. Two. How long has he been thinking about Peter like that? One of his own. Since before the end of the world? During, while he was gone, when there were things Tony couldn’t change, when the world was so heavy that he had to remove himself from it? When his failure loomed in front of him like a crumbling shadow, the darkness drawing all the light away from him?

 Was it then? Or was it when he saw the kid on their newfound battlefield, like a memory of a lifetime past, an impossible miracle? Talking and talking and talking like he used to?

 Tony leans forward and braces his elbows on the table, digging his thumbs into his eyes, nearly poking his own fucking eye out with his new titanium alloy thumb. It’s been a while and he’s still not used to the new arm. How it looks, how it feels, what other people think. An eternal reminder, just like the arc reactor was. Once again, he’s marked.

 He’s about to call it a night when his phone starts ringing.

 Peter.

 It’s after midnight, and yeah, he’s gotten calls from Peter at all hours of the night, but usually, it’s when he’s in trouble. 

 Tony answers fast. “Hey buddy,” he says. “You okay?”

 Peter’s breath is coming fast, and he doesn’t say anything for a moment. 

 Tony sits up straighter, eyes intent. “Peter, what’s going on?” he asks. “Talk to me.”

 “I—I, I—I made a bad decision. I didn’t know. I didn’t—I didn’t know. Help me.”

 Tony nearly leaps to his feet. Help me. Not I need help. Just help me. “Where are you?” he asks. “What happened? Who did this, what’s going on?”

 “I’m in—I’m in the suit,” Peter says, and Tony doesn’t know if he’s ever heard him sound like this. Only in the moment he knew he was dying. Or when he thought Tony was.

 “I’ll track you, are you safe?” Tony asks, getting up and sweeping towards the exit, a tension headache spreading across his forehead. “Can you stay where you are?”

 “I’ll—I’ll stay close to where I am, it should be—should be okay, but I don’t know, I don’t know.” His voice breaks and he sucks in a few gasping breaths. “I can’t think. I can’t—help me, please, I messed up, I don’t know what to do.”

 “I’m coming, I’m on my way,” Tony says, trembling now, himself, trying to summon the kind of strength that whatever this is needs. “Stay on the line with me, Pete. I’ve got you, just stay there.” He grabs his earpiece on the way out, activating it.

 “Friday, track Peter and give me the fastest possible routes to get to him,” Tony says, starting up the stairs. 

 He hasn’t had a suit on in almost a year. He hasn’t felt strong enough, safe enough, and the others have been covering it. It, the royal It, everything that needed to be done. Tony did what he could and it wound up well, and after that, nobody’s needed Iron Man. 

 But Peter needs him now.

 ~

 Tony can barely get him to talk while he’s on his way over, and that terrifies Tony even more—just short, clipped answers, wavering breathing, and it sounds like a panic attack. But Peter doesn’t seem to hear him, when Tony tries to talk him through it. He’s faraway in his head, too. 

 Tony finally finds him in an unused tunnel in Harlem, and getting over there without drawing a crowd is more difficult than Tony would have liked. But Friday finds him the way in that Peter must have found, and it’s like dropping directly into a horror movie. Quiet, echoes, dripping. 

 Peter crying.

 He’s sitting there, against the wall, his mask balled up beside him. This place is dirty and abandoned, and he looks too bright and vibrant to be here. Even in the state he’s in.

 Tony lets the nanos crawl back into the housing unit and he rushes over to him, kneeling by his side. He glances up, briefly, to make sure no one is keeping him here, that this isn’t a trap, but he doesn’t see anything anywhere. He hopes Friday would alert him to anything like that.

 “Hey, hey, okay,” Tony says, one hand on Peter’s shoulder, the other tipping his chin up. “Here I am, okay? What happened? What’d you do? I’m sure whatever it is, not your fault, we can fix it. We can fix it, together, no problem, kid. You know how much shit I’ve messed up and thought was beyond repair? Plenty. I always fix it, and we’re gonna fix this too.”

 Peter’s eyes finally focus on him, red-rimmed, and he shakes his head. He shudders to his feet, bracing his hand on the wall behind him, and he nearly falls before Tony grabs him and steadies him.

 “Otto,” Peter says, sniffling. “Doctor Octavius. He, he, he—he’s a bad guy, Tony, he’s—I’ve been helping him invent things and working on his specs and I’ve been helping him with all this stuff for months and months and he’s using it to hurt people, to commit crimes. He’s got—an entire team of guys, and I didn’t even mean to find them but I found them, tonight, they’re all these costumed villains, they were—they were working with the Rhino, that big guy I put away last month—”

 “Yeah, I remember,” Tony says, still holding onto him.

 “The police thought he had people behind him, more—more powerful people, but tonight I went after these guys that had robbed a bank on 4th street and I webbed up one of them but the other got away and I followed him—but I realized he was leading me somewhere bigger, and there were—Tony, he was there, Otto, he was in charge—he’s using these—these arms, they look like octopus arms, and I, I—I’m the one that helped—I helped him, I helped him with those—with those specs—”

 He covers his mouth, shaking his head, and before Tony can think about hugging him he steps forward and buries his face in Tony’s shoulder. 

 Peter keeps talking, muffled. “He’s responsible—his group, these people, they’re responsible for so, so much—shit—countless robberies, kidnappings, that—that explosion, at that office building, that happened—that happened in July, that was them, Tony, and people died, and I—and I’ve been—working with him since June—”

 “Stop, stop, stop,” Tony whispers, holding onto him.

 Peter gasps, sounds like he’s gonna start choking, and he claws at Tony’s shoulders. “I should have—realized, I should have known, some—somehow, figured it out, realized, but he—he acted so, so normal, with me, and I thought he was—I thought he was doing something—good, but he’s—he’s not—”

 “And you’re sure—”

 “I’m sure,” Peter whispers, wounded. “Positive. And I—they were picking up and moving their—base and I was—freaking out too much to even—follow—keep track—”

 “Shh, relax,” Tony whispers, ruffling Peter’s hair. “Relax, breathe.”

 Peter stops talking, but his breathing is labored, and he’s holding on tight.

 “The guy that got away, that led you to all this, did he know you were following him? Did he know what you saw?”

 “Don’t think so,” Peter says. He shakes his head. “I should never have—even taken that course, with Otto, let alone started—working with him. I made a bad decision, a—a stupid decision. May is gonna be so disappointed in me. And I know...I know you don’t like him.”

 Tony scoffs, still rocking them back and forth, gently. “I didn’t not—listen, one, May can never be disappointed in you. Please. And me, I’m just—I’m just jealous. I wanna work with you, I wanna hoard you, and that’s selfish of me, whatever. That’s all. But fuck that guy, now I have a reason to hate him. We’re gonna take him down, yeah?” He pulls back, holding Peter by the shoulders. “Yeah?”

 Peter looks positively fucking miserable, but thankfully, uninjured. “I’ve been helping him, Tony,” he says, dejected. “With...God knows what. The arms, they’re—they were supposed to be for limb replacement, but he’s altered them, and they’re—they look dangerous. He was in charge, he was—with all these criminals, some I’ve seen before, some that have gotten away from me and he was—he was in charge.”

 “Listen,” Tony says, stepping a little closer. “I’ve been betrayed before. More than one time. Used for what I know, what I can do. That’s what happened here. Nothing else. You have not and will not ever hurt anybody or anything. You’re a fucking angel, kid, and this does not change that. We’re gonna take care of this. You could do it without me, because you can do anything, but I’m gonna help you every step of the way.”

 Peter heaves a sigh, the kind of motion that shows he’s still horrified and put-upon by all this, but relieved that he’s not handling it alone. Tony knows how that is. It’s always easier to have backup, especially when things are personal. They both take things to heart.

 Peter moves in and hugs him again. “I’m sorry,” he whispers. 

 “Nope,” Tony says, automatically, hugging him back. “No reason to be sorry. My least favorite phrase from you.”

 “I’m just sorry for everything,” Peter says, voice breaking again. There’s a lot more behind that one, and Tony sighs, rubbing his back.

 “Don’t be,” he says. “You’re doing everything right. The world just sucks and good people get taken advantage of. And you’re as good as it gets.”

 “But we’re gonna fix it,” Peter says, tentatively, like he’s hoping to believe it.

 “Yes,” Tony says, firmly. “We’re gonna fix it.”

#tony stark #peter parker #iron dad #iron man #spider-man #my fics #a little more drama for your mama

[mor-beck-more-problems]

Road to Hell || Morgan & Miriam

TIMING: Current

PARTIES: @meflemming & @mor-beck-more-problems

SUMMARY: Morgan interrupts one hunt; Miriam proposes another

CONTAINS: discussions of violence

The woman babbling on about something to Miriam as the two of them sat at their little corner table was a witch. Miriam had known that the second the girl had walked into her store a few nights ago, just before closing. It was that time of year when she could actually go out into the main area of the store without worrying about sunlight and burning flesh, and she’d struck up a conversation with the woman, particularly about the runic tattoos along the girl’s skin. Miriam wasn’t daft; she knew that these sorts of designs were in with all sorts of people, not just practitioners of the magic arts. But the young woman had actually admitted to Miriam what she was. Spellcasters these days. They had no sense of self-preservation. So, Miriam had invited her out to dinner, a nice dinner for the young woman and a nicer dinner for Miriam afterwards. It wouldn’t be anything to be savored; Miriam refused to bring people home, not with Evelyn in her house. Still, it would suffice. Really, she was doing the girl a favor. Anyone stupid enough to out themselves to a mere stranger should be put out of their misery. She tried not to think about that too hard, about how that was technically how she’d met Morgan, and, if she’d truly managed to kill Morgan that night, she’d be down one… acquaintance. They likely weren’t friends. It wasn’t like they could be, not with the way that Morgan saw her.

“Is it not good?” The woman, Leigh, asked, looking at Miriam’s plate curiously.

Miriam forced a charming grin on her face. “Oh, it’s lovely, sweetness. I’m just a bit distracted. Would you like some more wine?” As long as she could keep the girl unaware, this would be easy. She could do this and be done with it for a few days, maybe even a week. Maybe the next one she wouldn’t kill, either, but just find them in the night, get her fill, and wipe their mind of the experience, leaving behind only the pain. Maybe so. But she’d committed to this form of hunting for the night. She took a bit of her steak, too done to provide her with any sort of nourishment, and poured both herself and Leigh a bit more wine. She wished she could feel its effects the way the younger woman did as she giggled and talked about her job, her family, her friends. Miriam would kill to be so innocent. Miriam would kill.

Morgan had plenty of experience balancing the cognitive dissonance of making holiday merry with normies while her world was falling apart. Thirty nine (almost forty, now) years with the curse had been good for that much. But this was the first year she’d had to do it without being able to get drunk. The UMWC English Department Christmas after party had enough tipsy middle aged women to get the dance floor at the bar moving, but no matter how hard or how long she danced, the world was still in pieces and she still, still soaked with blood and hurt, and she still needed a human sacrifice to accomplish the one single thing she actually had a clue about accomplishing. Morgan told her coworkers she’d get them vodka shots, teasing, “Maybe if we’re lucky, we’ll get as shitfaced as our students after finals,” as an excuse to separate from the pack.

But Morgan never made it to the counter, because she saw Miriam first. Even worse, she saw Miriam’s date. Those runic tattoos couldn’t have been and accident, and the alchemic circle on the top of her hand sure as hell wasn’t either. She was hanging on Miriam’s every look, oblivious and engaged in all the wrong ways. Morgan didn’t have long to think. What did she do? She didn’t have anyone to make a distraction for her while she ushered the would-be witch-feast out the bar. How was she supposed to do this by herself? There wasn’t time to panic, she needed to stay in control and do something now. What would Deirdre do if she had to make a distraction for this?

“HEY, BABY!” Morgan cried the words loudly, enough to make at least one person check over their shoulder.  She gave Miriam a big wave and ran over to their both, sliding in beside the vampire. “You should’ve said you were coming to meet me early, I would’ve had a round of your favorite waiting!” She planted a big, awful kiss on Miriam’s cheek and squeezed her hand, bringing it up on the table. “And, and, and!” She squealed excitedly. “I went to the jeweler and picked out your ring! It’s gonna be a surprise, obviously, but I think you’ll like it a lot.” She looked over at the girl sitting opposite, flashing a thin smile that she hoped said, get lost. “And who are you? No offense, but I was kind of hoping to have a more private meeting with my Mimsy,” she said.

The shrill sound of a familiar voice caused Miriam to tense up. No. No. No. She wished she’d gone to a more private place, perhaps a classier establishment, to do her hunting as she watched the zombie coming in hot towards them. “Morgan?” Leigh looked at Miriam with confusion, and Miriam gritted her teeth as Morgan slid in next to her. Of course, of course. “Darling, you shouldn’t have.” She really shouldn’t have. There was no way to save this, was there, Miriam wondered as she looked dejectedly at Leigh, who had shifted from confused to pissed off in a matter of moments.

“I’m no one,” Leigh muttered, grabbing her bag and shoving her belongings inside. “It was--” she looked at Miriam, and, if a voice that the vampire would not have heard had she been human, muttered, “Course she’s-- Fuck me, I guess.” Then, louder, to Morgan, “Sorry, I’ll let-- I’m just gonna go.” Leigh hurried out the door, leaving her food half-finished, before Miriam could so much as even try to explain her way out of this. Lovely. Miriam was so glad that she’d get to pay for not one but two uneaten meals. She shoved her plate away and downed her glass, the alcohol not doing shit when there wasn’t blood mixed in.

“What the fuck, Morgan?” Miriam snarled, pushing the zombie away and rubbing at her eyes. They were probably turning red, the anger and frustration and hunger causing the color to change from their normal shade of green. She couldn’t even muster up the energy to be mad for too long, though. She just felt tired. All she had wanted was a meal and then to simply go home, crawl in bed and close her eyes for a few hours. Maybe chat with Evelyn for a bit about nothing serious. “Do you think you were loud enough? I don’t think the other side of town heard you. Speak up a bit next time.” She almost poured herself another glass of wine, but instead she just grabbed Leigh’s. She could, at the very least, assure that it wasn’t wasted.

“What? I can speak up if you’re having trouble hearing me.” Morgan said playing dumb with a dry smirk. But she had succeeded in chasing the girl away and turning her off from further contact with Miriam. She didn’t have to make any more public fuss. “You know, maybe I just missed you. Maybe I was jealous! We have some seriously problematic differences, but you are nothing if not clear and consistent. Not everyone’s like that.” Deirdre, for example, came to mind. She played with the flatware and the napkins, rolling them back and forth with her palm against the table for the novelty of the sensation. “Maybe I just didn’t want some sweet idiot girl like I used to be get carried off to your secret lair.” She shrugged, grinning sidelong at Miriam. “It’s the department holiday party, over there--” she gestured to the dancing middle aged women. “You just caught me at the right time. I’m not trying to...I want better for you, but I’m not a stalker. We can take a twirl if it’ll save your night. Some of the ladies over there hate their lives and marriages enough to probably make a good snack.” She delivered all of this in a dry, even tone, unphased, even a little amused. “I mean, we could talk about murder and torture, but I’m trying to do a little better by you than that.”

“My hearing is just fine, sweetness, but thank you,” Miriam said with a smile that was more of a bearing of teeth. “You missed me? Aw, I’m touched, truly. Maybe give me a ring, though, next time? We can go out for drinks instead of you dropping in on my meal.” She sighed, though, and shot Morgan a sympathetic look. “Glad my consistencies can be counted on.” Really, Morgan was quite consistent as well, in her stubbornness that bordered on pigheadedness when it came to Miriam’s dietary habits. “I wasn’t going to carry her back to my ‘secret lair.’” She did air quotes with one hand. “Just to the woods. I don’t bring people home with me anymore. I have someone staying over.” Besides, her “secret lair” was her wine cellar, and there were only so many ways that blood stains could be explained away before it became far too suspicious. She glanced over at the gathering of people near the bar, frowning. She should feed, she should, but she was turned off from it, at this point. The mood was killed, and she had no desire to feed in front of Morgan, no desire to see the woman think even less of her. “I’ve lost my appetite, I’m afraid, but I do appreciate the offer.”

Morgan hummed, smiling, to hear Miriam’s nickname. Her expression was too sour and vacant for it to count as delight, but maybe someone might have made that mistake at a quick glance when she laughed. “Sometimes it takes your evil friend getting tortured and burned to ash for you to appreciate the important things in life. Or to decide, fuck it, I don’t care about anyone or anything so let’s just disappear and burn it to the ground. Or to finally get on that bucket list! Granted, I’m not usually into--” she screwed up her face, pretending to be scandalized, “Blood sacrifice, but the magic wants what the magic wants. Screw anything being easy for once, right?” She gave Miriam a wide, thin smile. “Come on! The night doesn’t have to be super ruined, right? I don’t  actually want you to starve or feel like I don’t care, you know? I might be a little...whatever, but if there’s a way that makes up your night that doesn’t involve witch torture, I’m at least interested.” Her smile twisted into a grin, conspiratorial. “Are you gonna tell me about this friend staying over? Is the same lady friend you were staying with before?”

For a moment, all Miriam could do was stare at Morgan in shock and blink. Then, she said, “I thought I was your evil friend.” She gave Morgan a smirk, one of the one’s she’d adopted in high school that said I’m Better, before she let it drop. “That’s quite a lot to unpack, Morgan. Really, more than a lot.” Blood sacrifices, really? See, this was what Miriam always thought of when she described bad magics, improper magics. Though, all magics were improper in the hands of human beings, but Miriam didn’t think she needed to try and drive that point home. Not while Morgan was like this. “Perhaps things should be easy, sometimes,” she said, slowly, putting down the glass without finishing it so that she could give Morgan most of her attention. She scanned Morgan’s face, checked her over for any signs of outer distress before she realized that, as one of the undead, Morgan wasn’t going to show scrapes or bruises. “Let’s make this easy, shall we? I’m really quite alright,” she could always feed later, “and I’m a bit more worried about you. I’m aware you don’t want me to starve, darling.” She knew that. Morgan just wanted her to find a better source of food. Miriam rolled her eyes. “It is the same person, yes. She needed me to check on her while she was sleepwalking, and now she’s staying with me amidst some repairs to her home. Nothing serious. I’m just helping her out.” And that was all there was to it. At least, that was all she would admit.

“You’re at least a little honest with yourself.” Morgan said, smiling fondly. “You wouldn’t hurt so much if you really thought what you were doing was the natural order of the world or some bullshit. And you know the people you hunt are people, and you don’t keep them in a five star containment cell for a few years. Maybe you’re a misguided torturer, but it’s coming from a real place. It’s not...banal. You’re better than that, Mim.” Morgan pursed her lips in a pout, teasing in sing-song, “Although, she did give really nice gifts. You’ve never gotten me anything pretty before, so maybe the jury’s out after all.”

She turned her face away as Miriam started giving her a once over. Her face, usually amused and unflappable, was wrinkling with concern. Morgan wasn’t sure she could bear someone with as few reasons to care right now as Miriam being concerned. “Thank you,” she said, her voice low and sincere. “For knowing that. My friend didn’t and I uh...I know we’re not about to suddenly become different people, but it’s important to me that you know I care. It’s the fucking worst, feeling like you’ve lost someone they’re judging you for how you are. I think you’re wrong and I think you know it too, but I still care even if I fuck it up every time we hang out. I want good things for you.” She swallowed thickly. “Don’t worry about me, I’m just uh...casually falling apart a little bit. I’ll figure it out. Although if you do have any tips for picking out a target who won’t be missed, I’m all ears.” She tried to smile sincerely, pull herself up by those proverbial bootstraps and keep trucking. “Tell me more about this friend. It sounds like y’all are getting pretty used to each other’s company. Maybe getting domestic, even?”

“Am I?” Miriam asked, a bit bemused. “I suppose I try to be, but I would have thought we wouldn’t agree, on that front.” She tried to tell herself, at least before, that this was her purpose. Witches must be dealt with. Now, she just told herself this was the only way to live. She’d love it if every witch on the goddamn planet stopped practicing magic at her behest, but she didn’t see it happening. So she’d just keep hunting. “Years? No, that’s far too long to keep someone about. Too much responsibility. Do I look like the kind of woman that has that much time?” She kept people for a few days, at most, and that was only if she was feeling extra malevolent. She was wracking her brain, though, trying to figure out exactly what was going on through Morgan’s head. She didn’t particularly like the path they were going down. “Well, damn. I suppose I’ll just scrap the jacket I’ve been working on then.”

Miriam couldn’t help the concern that she felt, the worry. She wasn’t used to it, either, which added to the discomfort of the situation. “Of course I know that, darling. You’ve made it clear. Every damn time you scold me, you try to find different options, which, though increasingly annoying,” and Miriam kept her tone light, teasing, “is considerate, so thank you.” She wrinkled up her nose. Morgan did have a habit of getting preachy and nosy when they hung out, and it almost always ended with one of them storming off the premises, but that was just who Morgan was. “I’m aware of all of that, truly. You don’t fuck it up. I suppose that the day you’re alright with my serial killer tendencies is the day I should really worry.” Though, she was really worrying now. Miriam… didn’t know how to be a friend, though, properly. It had been too long. “Casually falling apart is still falling apart, Morgan. Don’t fall apart if you don’t have the wherewithal to do it gracefully instead of casually.” What could she do to help with this? Could she do anything to help with this. Miriam had no experience with helping ex-witches through emotional crises. Nosy ex-witches were much easier to handle, and she rolled her eyes at Morgan’s words. “I don’t think I will tell you about this friend. I’m simply providing her with a place to stay for the time being while her… windows get repaired.” Though, really, Miriam was sure Evelyn’s windows had already been repaired. They just weren’t talking about her going home. “I wouldn’t say domestic. I don’t do domestic.”

“You could stand to be more honest, but you’re not full on, ‘humans are cattle, darling, this is putting them to good use,’” Morgan tried to mimic Lydia’s sophisticated cadence mockingly, but she could still hear in her memory just how poor a job when she was doing and felt miserable by the failed effort. “You know what you’re doing, you just don’t know you can be--more--” Morgan grimaced at herself, shaking her head. Aaaaand here I go again… “Thank you, for indulging me at least.”

At the mention of a jacket, Morgan whined, pouting. “There was a jacket? Don’t scrap the jacket. I want a pretty jacket!” Beneath her teasing, she was surprised that Miriam would go to such thoughtful lengths for her. Granted, she was a workaholic with nothing to do during the day and leatherwork was the only skillset Morgan was aware of her having that didn’t involve violence, so maybe it wasn’t so special after all. But Morgan couldn’t fully rationalize the thought away, that Miriam cared enough to try, and might be convinced to turn that care inward some day.

“Gracefully?” Morgan snorted. “Yeah, I don’t think that’s been applied to me in my life, sorry. And uh, no worries about those tendencies. I appreciate your expertise, and I’m only half kidding about needing pointers for scrounging up the right human to sacrifice, but I’m not going to give you another reason to think that killing is all there is for you by asking you to do my dirty work with me.” She flashed a smile, offering to let that part of the conversation go. “Getting windows repaired, huh? Is that a euphemism from your day? I think the kids are calling it something else now. But if your gal pal won’t be sad, can I interest you in a dance?”

“Well, seeing as how I was human not too long ago, I’d be a bit hypocritical to perceive them as cattle,” Miriam said wryly, wondering just what kind of peoples it was that Morgan associated herself with, presently or in the past, that would think such things, especially when she felt so strongly about everything that Miriam did. “I do know what I’m doing, and I live with it. It’s simply the way things are, Morgan.” Miriam sighed, though, grateful that Morgan didn’t go further. “Of course, darling. I don’t mind.” Too much.

“Was. Past tense.” Miriam adopted a pout of her own, mocking Morgan’s. “So sorry, darling, it’s officially been scrapped, not even a thought in my mind, anymore.” Really, though, the jacket was done save for a bit of stitching, something that she’d planned on giving Morgan during the holidays, probably at the start of Yule. She still would, most likely, all kidding aside. It had been fun to make, something other than some of the orders she’d taken on recently, and she was proud of it. Though, Miriam was good at her work; most of the things she made were worthy of pride.

“Come now, Morgan. I’m sure you’ve done something gracefully. Your tenacity is breathtaking, truly.” Perhaps more annoying than graceful, but still. It was something. She frowned, still concerned for her… friend. They were friends. She thought of Morgan as a friend. She wanted to continue this, wanted to point out that her expertise wasn’t in human sacrifice at all, and that, if that was what Morgan was looking into, perhaps she should find a spellcaster who practiced something as nefarious as blood magic or necromancy or something. Those tended to be the experts in blood magic, not charming but occasionally homicidal vampires. But she let it end there. “Getting her windows repaired means that all of her windows shattered, darling, and she had to get them fixed.” She rolled her eyes, but stood up and motioned for Morgan to do the same. “I don’t think my friend will mind, no. I’m more worried about you, darling. Won’t your girlfriend get jealous?”

Morgan pouted back, harder, if that was possible. “But-- even just a cropped jacket? Do you want my measurements?” She had a sense that if this jacket already existed, Miriam would give it to her no matter what, and if it didn’t, it was just a whim that wasn’t necessarily worth pushing just now. Morgan’s lips quirked up with hope all the same.

She couldn’t help but notice how Miriam refused to take the bait when it came to discussing the practical points of violence. But then, Morgan was being coy as well, almost embarrassed about the severity of her need and her total lack of knowledge. Why couldn’t she just come out with it? Was it really just because she felt guilty that there was no one else left to ask? That she couldn’t keep her intentions straight with her between trying to find something better than her alleged purpose and leaning on her expertise? Morgan let it rest for now, grinning with a bitter edge at the mention of her ‘tenacity.’ That was about all she had going for her these days. Tenacity.

Morgan took Miriam’s offered hand and followed her to the dance floor. “My girlfriend isn't here and I don’t really care how she’d feel about me dancing with a friend right now. Besides, I’ll be good.” She teased a coy smile and locked their fingers together as the song changed to an upbeat remix of another Christmas song. When she danced, Morgan’s body almost remembered itself. Hair swinging, feet pounding, she buzzed with the tingle of her body vibrating against the world, pulsing I am here, I am here, I am here, damnit. I deserve to be here more than you, Constance. She stayed close to Miriam, gauging how she took to the music with interest, and flashing the occasional grin. The song changed to something slower, and Morgan leaned against the vampire for the sake of appearances. If she were alive, her body would be exhausted after how desperately she’d pushed it into motion. “Can I ask you how you do it?” She asked, half into her shoulder. “How you make it so you’re never caught or interrupted?”

“Not a chance,” Miriam said, her grin only mostly bite. She rolled her eyes at Morgan’s questions about measurements. As if she didn’t already have them. As if she hadn’t been doing this kind of thing long enough to be able to get Morgan’s measurements in the plenty of times they’d been around each other. “Sorry, darling. Opportunity's gone, now. You should have been nicer to me, you know. Maybe then you’d still get it.” As they walked out to the dancefloor, she stuck her tongue out childishly.

“Well, if you’ll be good, then I suppose we can dance.” Again, another thing that she should be worried about. Not being worried about her girlfriend was very much not a Morgan Beck kind of thing. Then again, they were only friends. Morgan seemed more concerned about Miriam’s love life or lack thereof than anything. So she resigned herself to dancing, and she was pleasantly surprised to see that they were both damn good at it. Morgan was right; graceful wasn’t a word that could be used to describe her movements, but they were wild and fun and on beat, and Miriam found herself getting lost in the music for however long she could. Miriam had taken dancing lessons as a child, but she’d learned to actually enjoy dancing in college. This reminded her of that.

As the song changed, she pretended to be a little out of breath for the sake of the people around them. She was surprised, though, at Morgan's questions, and she glanced down at the other woman. She wasn’t going to drop this, was she? Miriam swallowed. “You make them trust you,” she said, lowly, swaying them along with the song. “You smile, and you compliment them, and you let them compliment you. We’re at an advantage, darling, with our gender, our appearance. They rarely suspect danger lurking under pretty facades.” She moved them away from the crowd. “Then, you take them somewhere secluded, somewhere safe. And you do what you must. Then you get rid of them. Or you don’t, depending on what you want people to know.” Sometimes, you left them out where they’d be seen in broad daylight because you were young and dramatic, and you just wanted to be seen. A cry for help, Miriam’s mother had said hysterically, though she’d cleaned the blood from Miriam’s hands with a calmness that Miriam had never seen in the woman before. For all her parent’s faults (or maybe in addition to them), they had never abandoned their daughter, even when they probably should have.

Morgan shuffled in step with Miriam as some girl on a piano turned ‘All I Want For Christmas’ into a crying balad. She listened, keeping the rhythm to distract herself from the ghost chills crawling down her back. “That sounds cruel,” she mumbled. “Trust is…” Fragile. Precious. There had to be some people Morgan could stomach luring and betraying over the course of an hour or two, but even thinking about playing with them on purpose… Morgan watched Miriam as she led her away, looking as lovely as she had the night she’d tried to kill her. Morgan had imagined herself after the fact as some kind of exception. And maybe in the course of playing that kind of game, she had become one by accident. But the dance had still been choreographed from the start, no matter what they became later. “And that’s it?” She asked. “No one goes looking into their whereabouts and asks, hey, who was that femme fatale they were last seen with? Maybe she knows something?” Morgan shook her head, not nearly as surprised as she would have been in any other place. “This fucking town…” But apathy and idiocy wasn’t Miriam’s fault, just like it wouldn’t be Morgan’s. And she, at least, would be able to bundle up the body and haul it to the shed to be disposed of after she’d harvested her blood. “Thank you, for being honest with me,” she mumbled.

“Life is cruel, Morgan,” Miriam murmured softly. “Besides, there isn’t a spellcaster in this town that should trust me or anyone matching my description. You know this, darling.” Miriam Flemming was a terror, just as much as she had been more than twenty-five years ago. It wasn’t her fault that her prey made it so damn easy. She leaned down and whispered in Morgan’s ear, “That’s it. What did you expect? Drugging? Threatening? I’ll admit that I compel the ones I let live, though that’s quite rare, but murder is a far easier endeavor than they want you to believe.” The first few times had been difficult, but she’d rarely tried to hide what she was doing, in the beginning. She had been nothing but newfound rage and vengeance and a desire to make everyone else hurt as she’d been, worse, even. “The apathy in this town will blow your mind, sometimes, the way some people seem to not care. But, and it will do you well to remember this, pride is the real killer here.” Miriam laughed, low in the back of her throat, and shook her head. “Like I said, they know about me. They’ve been warned. Hell, Morgan, you warned quite a few of them. But they see me, and some of them are blinded by thoughts of ‘Surely not her’ or ‘I’ll be different.’” She shook her head. “Or they underestimate me. You would think, over the years, that that wouldn’t be the case anymore, but here we are.” She had made orphans, widows, and widowers, yet still she was underestimated. But she was still a boogieman, a monster under the bed. Likely, there was more spellcaster deaths credited to her name than there was actual blood on her hands. She didn’t mind that. “You’re welcome, darling, though I’m… Perhaps you should let me do whatever it is you plan on doing. I’d hate for you to get caught due to bad advice.”

“Not always,” Morgan said feebly. She remembered believing this with a lot more umph when she was alive, even as recently as three or four months ago. It sounded like a line she didn’t quite believe now. So much of her good, her hope, had been pulled from her fingers. Would there even be much of a new life for her on the other side of this? Finishing the ritual was her anchor now, but what would it leave her with? Morgan tried to recapture the image she’d had when she started this all. How strong, how powerful, how very close to peace. The closest she would ever get to have, living as what she was now. That much would still be true, wouldn’t it? Even if everything else in her world crumbled, she would still be the woman who had ended the curse, who had taken her power back from that cruel, evil little bitch.

Miriam’s points were comforting only in their practicality. At barely over five feet, Morgan had the unassuming thing down pat. She could rely on her brute strength to subdue some random asshole, whoever she picked out. It just felt so….deceitful. And were it not for the obvious, that this person would run and tell whatever authority they believed in about what had happened, they didn’t have to die. They just had to suffer. There were memory charms, but how was she gonna find someone to do that to cover up a casual maiming? Morgan hissed through her teeth. “I need to do this myself,” she said, slumping against Miriam’s side. “This is my magic family bullshit, and I don’t think you’d enjoy avenging a line of cursed witches.” Another breath, just try and make the tension release from her chest.. “I just need blood wrought from pain. And because it’s magic, of course it can’t be my own. It doesn’t count unless it’s live.” Her voice turned bitter. She couldn’t even fully save herself. She couldn’t even lend energy to the exorcist that was due to make contact in, what, a little more than a week? “But I meant it, when I said you’re more than a killer. I don’t want to treat you like one, Mim. You should do something better with your time.”

“Most always,” Miriam bit back, but there wasn’t much bite to it, not when Morgan didn’t seem to be fighting much to begin with. She sighed, rubbed at the lines forming between her eyes. Eyes that flashed red briefly before she blinked the color and the feeling that came with it away. Miriam frowned, unused to the feeling, but shook it away. “I know that it sucks, but that doesn’t make it any less true. I apologize for the pessimism, but…” There was no but. She apologized. That was it. That was enough. She disliked that it upset Morgan, but there was no taking the words back, and there was no getting rid of their honesty. “I apologize.” She hoped Morgan understood how rarely she offered those up.

“Do you need to do this yourself, or is it a pride thing?” Miriam deadpanned. This, a blood sacrifice, something that she wouldn’t have suffered through were Morgan still a living, breathing witch, wasn’t a task that had to be conducted alone. Miriam hunted alone because she had to cause the pain, the misery, the anguish. She had to feed off of it. It wasn’t the same. “I’m offering my assistance to you, not your family, dearest, and if you find me a witch worthy of such a task, I really don’t give a shit, as long as you let me have a meal, afterwards.” She clicked her fingernails together, thinking. “It’s very easy to get blood wrought from pain. Killing isn’t even necessary. I would know, you know. I don’t always kill.” She grinned, though, just for Morgan, and her fangs slipped out easier than normal. Her voice is low and muffled by them when she speaks. “I know I’m more than a killer, but, damn, I’m just so good at it.” Then, more seriously, “Morgan, I’m offering. I know you think I’m more than a killer. I’m just offering to help. I’d hate to see you get arrested.”

“You don’t have to be sorry,” Morgan mumbled, barely audible. She reached for Miriam’s hand and squeezed it carefully to show she meant it. There were more than enough reasons to believe the way she did, and as the days dragged on and the world shrank and shriveled up with winter, Morgan found she thought of it that way sometimes too. How much power could you exert by yourself in a world like this? What was the point when you couldn’t count on anything, anyone, to stay with you?

“If you mean ‘am I bitter that I have to face this death and magic problem as a neutered witch’ then yes, it’s a pride thing,” she said. “I don’t like having people do my dirty work for me. I’ve been on my own so many times, and when it comes to my deep, dangerous bullshit I feel better being the one to take care of it. And I...don’t really have much else going on for me. Definitely nothing else grounding me right now.” Morgan set her jaw, trying to to keep the prickle of tears at bay. It sounded awful out loud, but how else was she supposed to get this done except by giving this her heart and energy? How else was she supposed to come out of this free and cleansed (if that was even possib--no) if she didn’t put herself all the way in? “Does it have to be a spellcaster?” She knew that there were at least a few that made themselves into a menace. Jo the Alchemist was simply one she’d been able to find because her carnage crossed her path. She could find another, if she really tried, or maybe the fairest thing would be to pick someone at random, and hope they weren’t so traumatized from the experience they couldn’t have nice things after. It wasn’t the worst sort of deal. The pain caused by the bloodletting would at least go to Miriam’s survival, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. They both needed just enough to get by. And she couldn’t argue that she would probably make a shit torturer and cover up criminal.

Morgan looked up at Miriam, sniffling and blinking back tears. “You don’t scare me with those,” she said, hovering her finger over her fangs. She poked the corner of her mouth gently, teasing, and gave a sad smile.“You’re not a thing, you that too, right? When I say you’re more, I don’t mean you’re a swiss army knife. You deserve to have good things, better things, and I don’t want to use you.” But she needed this. Stars above, she needed this to go right. “So are you sure? Really, really sure?”

“Yes, well, I rarely am.” Miriam Flemming didn’t apologize. She just didn’t. She wasn’t raised to apologize, not properly, not well. She wasn’t sorry that she was wrong. She was sorry that she was right, and sorry that her words came out cruel because of it. Miriam owned up to her cruelty, but that didn’t mean she had to enjoy them. “But I’m apologizing for saying it, all the same.” She frowned a bit, looking Morgan over. “Then, perhaps, stop trying to solve problems as a neutered witch and start trying to solve them as a zombie. This isn’t me asking to do your dirty work. It’s just me offering assistance.” She swallowed. “And I don’t know what to tell you about grounding yourself. I’m not the one to offer that sort of advice, but.” She looked away. She wasn’t the kind to offer this sort of advice, not with her pastimes, not with her own marrow-deep need for revenge against a man that has long since been dead and buried.

“It doesn’t have to be a spellcaster,” Miriam said with gritted teeth. “But I would prefer it. For my own morality’s sake.” Though, maybe, her morals were skewed. But, if Morgan could find a shitty spellcaster, both of their needs were met. Morgan could get her blood, Miriam could get her blood, and they could both go about their merry way. This had worked fine with the Jo situation, Miriam had fed well for days off of that one. She sneered a bit as Morgan poked her fangs, but there wasn’t any meanness to it. She was more concerned with not making Morgan cry. She didn’t react well to tears. “Morgan, I’m quite aware that I’m a damn person. Granted, I can’t see myself in the mirror, so sometimes I wonder, but I know I’m not a thing.” She was more than a killer. She was just damn good at killing. “You’re not using me, I’m offering. And, yes, damn, I’m sure. I’m surer than sure.”

Morgan waited for whatever came after the ‘but’ of Miriam’s sentence but there was only silence. She didn’t know any better than Morgan. They were both just muddling along, trying their best, struggling against all of this muck, this pain, these ghosts tearing at their souls. She felt Miriam bristle, and shied away from her grasp reluctantly, an apology on her lips. Morgan swallowed it back and sniffled again, staring out into the night. This was the best plan she was ever going to get. There was no one else she could ask. There was no course in abduction and bloodletting she could cram for. She only had so many days before the exorcist she’d hired turned up ready to do the damage she’d asked for. Morgan couldn’t stomach having to fess up to needing more time, or to being gouged and mocked for needing that woman to do her work for her after the way they’d talked in the hotel. Playing the engagement in her head, the way the exorcist would laugh and sneer at once, Morgan cringed with humiliation. This had to be it; however heavy and cold it felt, this was her way out. “I don’t mean to upset,” she said. “I just needed to be sure. It’s important to me to be as fair with you as I can be.” She’d been enough of a magnet for collateral damage when she was alive. She didn’t want to hurt more people or bring whole classrooms and city blocks to their knees that cruel, evil little bitch. She couldn’t. But if this wasn’t going to give Miriam some kind of complex, then… “Okay. I’ll take a few days to pick someone out, spell caster or not, get in touch, and we’ll come up with a plan that minimizes risk to everyone. And when we’re done, I’ll end this.”

#wr miriam #wr chatzy #wr miriam chatzy #road to hell #wickedswriting

[hananario-oh]

My Dearest.

The snow was cold. Well, obviously. It was snow. This snow however, was biting. Most of her legs were numb. The few bits that weren't, prickled with sharp tingles that probably weren't good.

Twelve hours. Twelve long, hard, cold hours. Were they even coming back? Was it worth leaving? The tent wasn't enough to keep her warm and the fire, though probably the only reason she was still alive, wasn't enough. The storm was slowly picking up again. The wind would soon blow out the pathetic flames of the little fire, if it could last much longer on the last of the firewood left. More embers now than wood.

Had they left her? The thought again crossed her mind. As sharp as the pain in her cheeks, as scary as the idea of the storm hitting full force. No. They wouldn't, couldn't have left her. It was a death sentence to be left out here, miles away from town. Up in the high woods, secluded. Granted, those people seemed... Foolish. Immature even but surely they knew if they left someome up here in the snow with a storm brewing with nothing but a tent and a dwindling fire that they would die?

Or maybe, she was the fool. For trusting people she'd met not even two days ago. For agreeing to go camping without even checking to see the weather. For not seeing anything wrong with them leaving to fetch alcohol. For waiting so damn long before questioning why they had not returned. By car, after all, it was half hour on a straight path.

They should have returned. But they weren't going to, were they...

At that thought, the fire caved in on itself. The bits of wood charred and broken, unable to burn any longer, gave way. The smoldering bits left offered no heat, simply smoke and little crackling noises that proved it was over.

That was it.

Standing from the entrance of the tent, a last glance around to see if anyone had returned. If anyone had left anything to come back for. If anyone was... If anyone was here to save her. But no.

Alone.

Abandoned.

And the storm was going to hit soon. By foot, an hour would easily pass before the walls of town would come to view from the tree line.

Leaving camp would be a risky game, but staying would be loosing without even trying.

It only took a few minutes before the tent was out of site. Before the trees got thicker, providing some shelter. Luckily the path was clear enough. Thick enough. If luck was on her side...

Not that it was though.

No more than ten minutes in something was wrong. Something felt wrong. Dangerous even. Why were things so quiet? A stupid question to ask in the woods but it felt wrong. There was a lack of noise, the wildlife was silent. Because of the storm perhaps? Maybe even the animals weren't dumb enough to be out in this. Maybe it was just her.

Lost in thought, it was a shock to suddenly see the car they had all travelled in ahead. The relief was unbelievable. Like a rock had been lifted from her chest and dark clouds from her mind. Smiling, she couldn't help herself as she started to run towards it.

Of course they hadn't left her! They were on their way back! They were- stopping, something was still wrong. Relief suddenly became awareness and confusion.

The car. The car was facing away from her. Towards town. Not coming back. And the doors, two were open. A quick glance around and there was more wrong with the picture. Off to the side, a boot led alone and covered with a thing layer of snow.

No. That wasn't... This wasn't right. What was going on here? Slowly, approaching the car, fear was starting to crash down inside her chest. The anxiety building like a knot in her stomach. The cold all but forgotten. The doors in the front were open and the windows in the back were smashed. The engine still turning over, as if it had been left in a hurry. Around the car were footprints but the other marks, like drag marks, seemed so prominent. Claw marks away from the car into the bushes.

Backing away, the feeling of a panic attack was rising. What the hell had happened? Were they attacked? By what? They weren't that far away from camp and in a car. What thing would be able to stop the car and drag them off like that?

Were there bears here? Wouldn't they be hibernating? Or was it too early or late? Hell, how would a bear even stop a car?

This couldn't be happening. Shaking her head, the feeling of the blood draining from her face swept over. This was some kind of prank, surely. The process of thought kick started. There had to be a reason. A set up or something. It was strange enough that a random group of college students took a liking to her, the lone one who liked classical music and art, let alone invite her to go camping.

No, this was... This had to be some TV show or youtube prank or blog prank or something.

Turning around, she looked into the trees.

"Guys," her voice travelled, bouncing in the empty trees, "guys come on. Zeke? Marie? Uh, you there?" God, what were the other two names? The tall guys name slipped her mind, and the other girl, Beth?

Suddenly it dawned how little she'd knew about the stangers she'd gone off with. The stupid thing was that it had felt natural almost to give in to the urge to be with the popular type kids and go with the flow. Yet all she knew was that it had gone wrong and now there was no name to a face she had trusted, just the knowledge that she'd fucked up and something was terribly wrong. Why had she even done this? What was wrong with books and music and movies and just being her secluded self?

Lost in thought, it was the ice cold chill that run down her spine that spun her, attention now on the tree line to her side, where the drag marks led to.

Oh god. What had she done? If something had dragged them off, she had called out and led it back to her!

Fuck!

Frantically looking about, there was no where to hide. The car, while some protection normally, clearly didn't stop it. Still, alone in the woods there were few options.

Something was there, she felt it. Climbing into the car, over the glass on the back seat, it was all she had in her to hide in the leg space. Heart pounding, the drum noise echod inside her own head. This nightmare, this disaster, was it real? In the quiet, footsteps fell. Gentle but firm, crunching. In the haze of doubt in her brain that this was even real, all focus numbed, her eyes staring unknowingly at the stain on the car seat. Dark and splattered, the finger marks clear. Dragged away out the window. Blood, drying and frozen at the same time. Beating faster, her heartbeat louder and louder, head swimming in numbess and fear. Unknowingly tears slowly fell.

The cold, back again, felt heavy. The energy to move left her, leaving it easy to stay tucked away. Ignoring the cramps of hiding in such a small space. Eyes still locked on the dark red patch, heart pounding. The air so cold in her lungs. The footsteps, so much closer. Gently, her eyes closed. The red stain still there, hauntingly bright behind her lids.

Glass, gently grunched under foot. Holding her breath, mind suddenly clear, she felt the soft touch of a hand on her cheek, gliding under her chin, pulling her head back. Marble. Soft yet hard, smooth and cool. A touch like no other.

Eyes flying upen, the light of the sun behind them blinded her, only to fade away and leave shadows again. The mist of her breath floated up towards him, almost shrouding his face, only to fade to nothing before it reached him.

Red orbs, glinting brightly despite the cover of the car he leaned into, red and stunning. Dangerous though alluring. Blurry with tears, she saw them. She saw him. Stunning and real, a devil on earth who stole the form of man. A beauty to behold, handsome and beautiful. Enough to lure.

He leaned forwards, his eyes never leaving hers, his lips parted slightly, a distraction she never tried to fight.

"To my suprise I lose a meal. Yet gain something far more valuable. My dearest, don't cry."

His hand moved, leaving her face to gently wipe a tear, then reaching down to her hand, pulling her up. Without a struggle, he pulled her out. Neither he nor herself came into contact with glass, one swift move with strength beyond expected. Stunned and confused, she couldn't look away. He moved a lock of hair away, tucking behind her ear. A deep breathe and he smiled. Fear was gripping her insides, yet she stood, enveloped in this mans existence like he was the air she needed. Another stranger, dangerous and something else. This time though, it was no choice. Deep inside stirred, an instinct and she knew, he was something for her. Good or bad, he was for her.

"I returned for desert, yet found blood that sings to me. How precious you became so quickly. Forgive me please, for your friends and the life that is about to befall you, forgive me..."

Shaking her head, the fact he implied he did something passed in her head, the notion of things to come held attention.

"They... They weren't my... I hardly knew them. Befall me?" Her voice quivered. Something of fear and unknown, yet excited and stunned. The feel of his hands on her back, the cold, different to the coldness of the snow, brought life to the skin beneath her clothes. It was like a spell had been cast. Why wasn't she afraid like before, why wasn't she trying to run?

He smiled, something that caught her by suprise. Her heart lurched at the sight. Had she made him smile?

He looked off to the forest, looking off far as if he could see through the darkness.

"Then I suppose you'll bear no grudge for what we did. Now, come. They wait for me, for us. My name is Demetri. This will not be easy for you my love, but it must happen now. My dearest."

And like that, the car was gone, he held her as he ran through the trees, blurs of greens and whites, ground and trees. This was dangerous, but better than being alone. All she could do was grip him and hide. What was to come?

Demetri...

Demetri...

Oh lord.

#demetri volturi #twilight #vampires

[justformyself2]

P.S. I Love You. (p1)

Hello guys, it’s been a while, but i finally gathered my emotions together and put to use on this amazing challenge.I hope it can be of good  entertainment for you guys in this terrible times. Stay safe, keep your loves ones safe, and for those who are ill, or have loved ones ill i’m keeping you in my prayers, and i hope for your recovery.

The Rom-Com Writing Challenge is brought to you by my dear creative friend @lullabieswrappedinlies​. As the title says, this is inspired by - the great at making me cry hard movie- ‘P.S. I Love You.’ if you haven’t seen it, go see it before you read this.

BEFORE YOU JUMP IN BE ADVISED:

.This series contains spoilers from the movie P.S. I LOVE YOU.

. Pairing: Reader x John Krasinski.

. (Y/M/N) stands for ‘your mother’s name’. Letters in italic means memories.

.It contains strong language.

.It contains angst and grieve.

. IF you want you can read this along with the amazing soundtrack from the movie CLICK HERE

WANT TO KEEP UPDATED ON THIS STORY? CLICK HERE

.gif found by google search.

                                                                                          JOHN’S POV.

“After you’re done with this, can you close the blinds for me?”

Says (Y/M/N) behind my back, toneless, going away with more empty glasses banging against each other.

I drop the green sponge next to the faucet, drying my wet and soapy hands on the back of the jeans, remaining into my slob habits who refuses to use the dishrag. 

The tintinnabulation continues. On the east side of the bar, more hugs, more people, and more loud conversation. I start to pull strings when 'Can’t Get Out of This Mood' softly playing on the background was completely turned off and the doorbell ranged one last time, making the room quieter, leaving the cue that it could only mean one thing, but I still had more strings to pull before looking back. 

The claustrophobic feeling the room induced had to be shaken off. People were embracing her with arms, and ‘I’m sorry’s as she sits on one of the bar stools, strategically put in a circular form where they all could be closer to Gerry’s black quadrangular urn and his picture. I close the door, pulling the closed sign-on, the Priest takes his place, rearranging the clerical collar before standing next to the remains of Gerry.

“Did you closed the door?” (Y/M/N) questioned, and I affirm. She nods. “Good, now go take a seat, (Y/N) arrived.”

She goes back to the counter in a hurry. 

I don’t try to blend amid the crowd wearing black since I was still wearing a green polo shirt with jeans, and hadn’t time to change earlier when my hands were full of all the thanksgiving decorations that had to be taken down, at least it was a darker shade of the color.

I carry myself next to the wall, getting an angular vision of her eyes starting to get red, Denise pats her back, and someone pats mine.

“Hey, John, how are you doing, bud?”

Mark smiles and puts a pack of cigarettes on the inside of his suit.

“I’m fine, and you? still smoking that shit.”

He sighs, scratching the oily forehead.

“I’m allowing myself today. Otherwise, I will bang my head against the wall till unconsciousness. I can’t fucking believe he-.”

Mark chokes, the corners of his mouth trembling. It is my time to fill the 'guy’s code’ and pat his back.

“I know, bud, at least you got to say a proper goodbye.”

He nods, looking down at his shoes.

“Well, as Gerry would say, let’s get this party started." 

The Priest started, making the murmurs stop.

 "Gerry Kennedy did not want a lot of words. He preferred music. He was a unique young man. As you can see by the urn he had designed by the love of his life…His wife, (Y/N). His life may be over for now, but we can still hear it. He lives in us forever in our hearts, like his favorite song.”

Close to the urn, a small, old stereo box I found in the basement was placed. The Priest hits play and the melody of 'Fairytale of New York’ stars. I spot her giggling.

“Have you finished the job? Did you get what I sent you?”

Mark turns to me, desperately grabbing my shoulder. He was still nervous or too emotional, and I can’t blame him, but this was neither the time or place.

“Can we not talk about this, right now? Later ok? Let’s focus on celebrating Gerry’s life, as he wanted… Look, the shots are ready.”

On top of the urn, small shots of tequila were placed. I see (y/n) getting closer to it slowly, almost as she wanted a turn to another direction, but she takes one of them.

                                                                     A COUPLE OF MONTHS LATER.

(Y/N) walks fast in front of me, holding that letter as if it was a map leading her to a scavenger hunt. Her hair was bouncing against her back.

“Come on.” She grabs me by the hand, and I have to match her pace. 

“Come on, are you denying a dying man his last wish?”

We stop by the fountain, in front of the enormous arch adorned with sculptures, at the northern entrance of Prospect Park. On the top, a woman on a chariot carried by four horses, two angels were blowing trumpets besides her dominance.

“This is 'The Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Arch,’ and that on the top is the goddess Columbia, with wings, ready to battle." 

(Y/N) smiles at me, pointing at the piece briefly with the enthusiasm of a toddler. I nod, genuinely impressed by how amazed she looked at the Arch, how enthusiastic, art in any form, made her feel. We just left the Brooklyn Museum, and that smile hasn’t faded away. I hate Gerry less at this moment.

"I always adored this place. It was the first place I visited when I moved.”

I let it slip, getting inebriated by the overwhelming nostalgia that also included her.

“I like it too. I used to spend the Saturdays walking around with my sketchbook in hands, this big jean bag full of art supplies, and my whole afternoon would be drawing random strangers.”

She giggles for a moment and goes back to serious on the other, the circle repeats. I already know why, but waiting to go away was not my thing. 

“Oh, so that is what was inside that bag.” I reminisced and laugh.

“You remember?” She smiles, and of course, I did.

“Of course I do, but you never showed me any of you work. It would be nice to see it.”

I make the suggestion that makes her eyes gain a little more shine again, and she was back for now.

“I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”

“Show you what?” I play dumb and receive a slap in the arm.

“Come on, English major in Brown. The hell, of course, you got stuff.”

My mouth drops.

“How do you even remembered that?”

“Because I remembered that after I interviewed you and saw your resume, I couldn’t believe you would just be a barman, and I don’t mean to offend, I just think you are capable of much more.”

I was still stuck on the realization of my thought to even understand how to be offended. She still remembered the infamous day of my interview, made by her, years ago, before she traveled to Ireland, before Gerry.

(Y/N) rolls her eyes and laughs. My blood rushes to my ears; I can feel the tingling.

“Well, that and that big stain on your purple shirt, my eyes still burns even if the memory of it, also your heavy Bostonian accent.”

“Wow, I sound the worst.”

She laughs again, and I’m glad because I felt paralyzed, surprised that I can continue talking.

“You know you were not.”

Her expression changes like she just caught herself saying what she wasn’t supposed to. from paralyzed I get unquiet as she moves along.

“Well, it was a long time ago.”

#RomComWC #RCWC #fanfiction #story #p.s. i love you #movie #john krasinski #writing challenge #john krasinski imagine #john krasinskixreader

[harryandmolly]

Change of Pace - 6 (Summer 2019)

cowritten by @achinglyshawn

summary: Shawn and Maya meet again 10 years after life got in the way of love

warnings: language, NSFW

wc: 10k

---------

Previously:

Shawn starts to lead her back down the boardwalk to the party. Suddenly, her body makes up her mind and plants itself firmly like a child about to have a fit at the mall. She locks her knees and stands firm.

“I’m -- wait. I think instead,” she pants gently, “I think you should… god. Fuck it. Come home with me, Shawn.”

++++

Of course, Shawn says yes. He doesn’t even hesitate, doesn’t bother to weigh the pros and cons of following her home like a lost puppy. It’s all pros, as far as he’s concerned. 

He can worry about his heart at the end of the summer. Right now, he just wants to be with Maya as much as possible. It’s a chance he never thought he’d get again. 

Her place is scantily decorated, which he guesses makes sense since it’s not a forever home, or whatever. She’ll probably end up renting it out to surfers or college kids once she leaves. Shawn sniffs around as she clangs about in the kitchen, getting wine and glasses. There’s not much to see, but he likes looking for the small bits of her life she’s left out, like her sketchbooks on the coffee table, or her laundry piled on the armchair in the corner.

There are built-in bookshelves along one wall, and Shawn finds she’s organized her books both by genre and alphabetically. She’s got classics first; Jane Eyre, Rebecca, Wuthering Heights. Then comes fantasy, which is full of titles Shawn doesn’t recognize except for Harry Potter. Finally, there’s a cluster of books at the end that seem to be like, female empowerment books or something. Women in the Male-Dominated Workplace is one title; The Female Chauvinist Pig is another. 

He goes back to Harry Potter and tugs on Prisoner of Azkaban, because it’s his favorite and he also needs something to do besides twiddle his thumbs. 

Shawn doesn’t make Maya twist his arm, he agrees instantly, practically before she could finish her sentence. He wants to come home with her. He wants to spend the night with her. Maya’s practically floating down the boardwalk with him in tow.

She crash lands a little at her house. He hasn’t been in her house. Actually, no one’s been in her house but her since she bought it. It’s been her little safe haven where she doesn’t have to pretend she has her shit together, doesn’t have to lie about this not being her permanent home. This is where she hides. And now she’s letting him in.

Just maybe not… all the way in.

She’s eager to have a distraction so she darts off when he accepts her offer of a glass of wine. When she comes back with two long-stemmed glasses of a very nice bottle of red, she finds him standing by her bookshelf hunched over one of his favorites.

“I think that’s the copy that has the chocolate stains in it,” she murmurs, lifting an eyebrow teasingly, referring to the time he was sick in bed and she brought him snacks and books and cuddled with him until he could breathe through his nose again.

He blushes, accepting the wine glass from her as he closes the book and slides it back onto the shelf. He’s not very good at not being like, totally messy and pathetic when he’s sick. Maya was always so eager to take care of him, though, that he didn’t need to be anything else. 

“Sorry, Lu,” he says with a sheepish smile, “I can get you another copy if you want. But I bet that one has like, tons of sentimental value. It’s priceless now, you know, because of those chocolate stains.” 

Maya’s nose twitches. She’d never dream of getting rid of that book. She doesn’t indulge his dumb, nervous-talking joke, but she knows it is worth more to her.

He’s rambling because he’s totally nervous and not at all under the influence of alcohol, the rum having worn off back at the tattoo parlor. He takes a sip of his wine to shut himself up, but it’s so good, his favorite, that he has to let out a soft moan as he swallows. 

“Is this the Flowers Pinot Noir?” he says, and it feels weird, not knowing what wine she keeps around anymore. It tastes like what they used to drink when they decided not to be so cheap, but she’s a New Yorker with money now, so it’s probably not anything they used to drink at all. Still, a part of him likes to hope that maybe she held on to a few of their co-habits, even without him around. 

She ignores the shiver that rolls violently up her spine at his visceral reaction to the wine. She hasn’t heard him make that sound in a very long time. It sets her mouth watering. She takes a sip from her glass and nods.

“Of course it is,” she teases, “It’s your favorite.”

Maya’s jaw clenches. She averts her eyes. She meant it more like, of course she opened this particular bottle because she remembered how much he loves it. But it sounds more like she bought this bottle and hoped he’d be around to drink it with her.

Which isn’t… untrue.

Maya takes another sip.

Goosebumps prick the back of his neck. She says it like she always drinks this because it was his favorite. Because she wanted to hold on to a little piece of him, even though she’d decided he didn’t fit into her life anymore. 

Maybe it’s the thimble on his back or the wine in his system, but the thought makes him more hopeful than anything. 

The rational part of his brain knows it’s probably one of many bottles she had and she just happened to remember he liked it. But he’s pretty sick of listening to rationality. 

He wants to fucking feel something again. 

“So do you also have my favorite cookies on hand or are you just trying to get me drunk?” He asks with a careful smirk as he makes his way to the couch to sit with his wine. 

Maya ducks her head and laughs as she heads to the couch with her own glass. She sits beside him with her legs crossed toward him, her foot brushing against his leg. 

“I’m a high powered executive, Shawn. Of course I have mint Milanos in my house at all times for emergencies.”

She’s gazing at him, a little amazed at seeing him here sitting in her house amidst all her stuff in her dim lamplight glowing from the inside out like she remembers he always has. It takes her a beat to long to realize --

“Oh, did you want some?” She starts up off the couch.

He goes to reach for her foot, to ask her what else high powered executives keep on hand, but she’s up before he gets the chance. 

He laughs, takes her hand to tug her back down. 

“I was just giving you shit, Lu. Sit with me.” 

He doesn’t let himself think that maybe she’s looking for excuses not to sit still next to him. Or that maybe tonight at the parlor was enough and she’s just now realizing it.

He ignores the paranoia. Pushes through. 

Shawn chuckles at her awkwardness and brings her back down to earth. She sits a little closer to him this time and decides not to let go of his hand yet. She loves his hands. She loves holding them, loves feeling them reach out for her, cherish her. Even just the weight of his hand in hers brings that back. 

He drapes his arm along the back of the couch, just behind her shoulders. He takes a sip of his wine, swallows, then licks a stray drop from the corner of his lips. 

When he lays his arm around the back of her couch, she sighs and tilts her head back to rest against it, watching him sip his wine. She’s only had one sip from her own glass, but she feels warm and content anyway, so she leaves it where it is on the coffee table, instead studying the way the curls around his ear brush his skin. 

“Have you been to Emilia’s since you’ve been back?”

He asks both because he’s bad at small talk and because he wants to know how much of a trip down memory lane she’s taken. He’s not sure why it matters, but he thinks if she wants to take one, he’d like to go with her.

Maya raises her eyebrows. She’d never dream of stepping foot inside Emilia’s without Shawn. She’s sure she’d be immediately haunted by everything they were then, everything they had. She frowns and shakes her head.

“No, I-- no. I mean, I don’t… I don’t know how I’d feel about going without you. I think it would be weird,” she confesses.

He doesn’t want to admit that’s the answer he was looking for. To her or to himself. He likes to think he’s better than that, wants to be objective when it comes to Maya and the things she chooses for herself. But he’s never really been able to do that, even if he’s great at faking it. He’s selfish when it comes to her, and so even though he wants her to be happy, he’s also an asshole who doesn’t want to be alone in missing what they once had. 

He goes to Emilia’s only rarely. Either to play piano during dinner when their regular guy is out, or when he’s feeling nostalgic and tough enough to wallow in it. Either way, it’s not often. 

He wants to go with her. 

“We should go, then. They’ve redecorated a little and it looks pretty good. Plus the chocolate cake is still, like, insane. And they— well, Em’ll still do the coffee shake if you know how to ask.” 

Maya’s nose twitches over a gentle smile. “Wonder what she’ll say when she sees us walking back in there together after a decade.”

Emilia became very fond of Shawn and Maya. She had seen her fair share of summer fling couples on Avila Beach over the years. She’s always had her favorites. Shawn and Maya were among them. She finds herself drawn to the big dreamers -- Shawn and his music, Maya and her art. She was rooting for them.

Maya hasn’t seen Emilia since she left Shawn. She wonders if she’d be a disappointment to her now. She reaches for her wineglass again to urge the thought away. She doesn’t want to be anyone’s disappointment anymore.

“Maybe we’ll go,” she answers noncommittally. She looks up at Shawn, at the way his amber eyes glitter at her like she’s never disappointed him in his life. She swallows. She hopes just being with him, like this, simple and present, is enough for him for now. Because she thinks it’s all she can manage. 

She sounds like she’s trying to say no in the nicest way possible. He’s heard it from her before. His stomach sinks and he has to look away. 

He drinks his wine. 

Idiot is not a strong enough word to describe him right now. Hopeless, perhaps, is more apt. He’s like a dog with a bone, except Maya isn’t a bone and she doesn’t owe him jack shit. 

The most hopeless part is, he’s still hoping she kisses him again. 

“Em would love to see you,” he murmurs, but doesn’t look at her. He focuses on the weight of her head against his arm and lets it ground him. He convinces himself she won’t disappear if he blinks. 

She knows him well enough to see the way his whole demeanor sinks when she begs off the idea of Emilia’s. She has the strongest urge to jump in after him and swim hard against the current to drag him back out, promise him no, it’s ok, she’ll go with him, they can make it exactly like it was.

But she knows it’s all different now. Pretending will get them nowhere. She continues watching him even though he’s looking anywhere else. When he eventually glances back at her, her heart gives a smashing thud in her chest.

Finally, he looks over, barely a ghost of a smile pulling at his lips. 

“Everyone just…” he takes a breath, exhales through his nose. “We really missed you, Maya.” 

He looks away. Sips his wine. He won’t press more than that. 

Maya sets her glass down. She draws her hand up his neck to turn him gently to face her. She cocks her head.

“I didn’t miss them,” she confesses, feeling the bubble of honesty pop in her throat, “I only missed you.”

With the tips of her fingers, she smoothes the curls on the side of his neck, begging him silently to be okay with her here, now.

The question, ‘then why did you leave me’ burns his throat, just like her fingers on his neck burn his skin. He doesn’t say it. He knows it’s not fair. He could’ve figured out a way to find her back then, if he hadn’t been so busy licking his wounds and pretending he didn’t care she was gone by marrying someone else. 

He finally lifts his gaze to hers and lets the warmth of the way she looks at him overwhelm his senses. He nods, lifts his hand to her wrist and curls fingers around her. 

“Can I kiss you again, then?” 

He’s pretty sure the answer is going to be yes, but you know what they say about assumptions. 

Shawn’s been made an ass before. He doesn’t want to go there again. 

Shawn looks at her so tenderly, touches her like she might slip out and run away if he says the wrong thing. She knows she put that insecurity there. She knows he wasn’t always afraid of her, or afraid of putting his heart out for someone to hold. 

But she gave it back to him, battered and bruised. She can’t blame him for being unsure now. 

He’s reaching out tentatively. So what can she do?

She can be the brave one tonight. 

Maya stands. She takes his hand and starts to guide him off the couch. 

“You can kiss me in my bedroom, if you’d like.”

He tries not to literally jump off the couch as she urges him up. Instead, he nods and grips the cushions to push himself up. 

“Yeah,” he says with a careful smile, “I would like that. So much, Lu.” 

He’s always been eager for her and he’s always wanted her to know that. He’s always wanted her to know how much she’s loved. He’s gotta pull back, now, though. They’re not in love anymore. At least, she isn’t with him. He doesn’t want to turn her off by acting like a lovesick puppy. 

Even if he totally fucking is one. 

She guides Shawn up the stairs, their fingers loosely linked. The floorboards creak beneath them, Maya feels sand on the hardwood under her toes. 

He follows to her bedroom and for a moment wants to give himself a tour, but he realizes there are more important things to do right now. 

Her bedroom is still a bit spartan. There’s a bed and a dresser and a desk in the corner with nothing on it. But, shit, the view is good. She’s about to start nervously small talking about the view from the bay window when Shawn appears above her.

He pulls her into his chest before they reach the bed. He cups her face and tilts her head back, wants to take his time studying her but knows it's probably not the best move. 

Instead, he kisses her, a delicate press of his lips to hers as his fingers lightly stroke her hair.  

He kisses her tenderly, like it’s the first time all over again. She remembers their first kiss fondly, after that art show her junior year. It gets her heart racing under her blouse.

Maya steps closer, coming up on her toes a little to split their height difference and kiss him back more firmly. She swipes her tongue against his lower lip, dragging her hands up his back to hold on.

She doesn’t complain when he kisses her. Quite the opposite. She licks his lip lick she always used to, pops onto her toes and presses into his chest, her hands on his back like all those times before. He groans, bends down to curl his arms firmly around her waist, lifting her up so she can wrap her legs around him. 

It’s just as easy as it always was. 

He turns, lifts a knee on to her bed, then pulls back from her lips to nip at her jaw, nibbling his way to her ear. 

Maya sucks in a rattling breath when he lifts her. Her muscle memory has her wrapping her legs around him, clinging to him like a tree as he lowers her carefully onto the bed. She lowers her legs but only enough to keep them clenched around his hips as he hovers over her. 

“Gotta be careful with the tattoos, sugar,” he murmurs, a gentle reminder before sucking at her earlobe.

Shawn sucks at her skin and she murmurs her agreement and moves her hands down his back. She lifts her hips to his automatically because she hasn’t been this close to him in so long and her body misses him just as much as her heart has.

She swallows shakily and pulls him back from her ear to look at him. His cheeks are ruddy and his eyes are a little dazed. She whimpers his name weakly and drags him back into her lips, holding his head between her hands like he’s precious, because he is.

It’s so hard to ignore when it’s like this, when they’re so close again. She can’t pretend she doesn’t feel how good and right this is for her, how there’s nothing unfamiliar about him, about his body, about the way he treats her. It’s just as magical as it always was, like they haven’t missed a beat.

He collapses a little when she kisses him, her familiar lips pulling familiar sounds from his throat. They’re well practiced, but it still feels brand new, somehow. Maybe because, for the first time in a long time, it’s not just a dream. 

She bites down roughly on his lower lip to keep herself from spilling the words I love you into his sweet, warm mouth.

He growls at her bite, rock his hips down against hers, pressing himself against her abdomen. He’s half hard for her already, and quickly on his way to completely fucked. 

He tips his hips away from her, still clinging to enough sanity to know he can’t get carried away. Carefully, he winds an arm around her waist and slides her up the bed, crawling up after her until her head reaches the pillows. 

He drops kisses along her exposed collarbone, hums into her skin until he reaches his favorite cluster of dark brown freckles that look like a birthmark from far away. He tongues the spot at the base of her throat while a moan rumbles in his chest. It’s something about her that he’s always loved, always paid attention to, but one of the first things he’d started to forget as the years went by. 

Maya presses her nose into his neck as he shifts her up the bed, largely, she knows, to make her more comfortable. She smiles at the thought and closes her eyes, letting his lips take her away. He busies himself with the skin of her neck and she blinks hard, remembering all of a sudden that he used to love kissing her there.

They’d lie on the couch watching movies when it was snowing and Shawn would get bored eventually and start sucking at this spot on her neck until she was mewling and whispering his name, pushing her hands under the waistband of his sweatpants.

Her breath quickens, she bites her lip. Shawn is back where he belongs, if just for a night.

“Your lips feel so good,” she confesses, widening the spread of her thighs. She smoothes her hands up under his shirt to explore the peaks and valleys of his firm lower back, hoping he’ll take the hint and shed it for her carefully to avoid his fresh tattoo.

He fucking throbbing for her. It starts in his cock but it radiates through his entire body. He feels it in his heart, too, pulsing with a throb of its own that has him yearning to tell her how much he loves her. 

He doesn’t. 

Instead he rolls his hips against her spread thighs, thickening cock hard against her clothed heat. He distracts his mouth with a trip to her ear, sucking just beneath it until his brain can come up with something else to say. 

“Do you want me to make you come, Lulu?” he purrs slowly, pushing back a little to carefully tug his shirt off, as per her insistent hands’ request. He drops the shirt on the ground and looks down at her. His heart pounds erratically against his ribcage, drowning out the rest of the world, except for Maya. 

Maya watches her hands rise to trail over Shawn’s bared chest and stomach. He still looks like he’s sculpted from marble, but the dusting of chest hair he had in his early 20s has spread a little. She blinks and lifts her head to nod eagerly.

“Please,” she whimpers, “I… yes. Please. Make me come.”

He drags his hands down her thighs, to her hips, then her waist, fingers slipping under the hem of her shirt until he can trace her ribcage. He glides his calloused fingers along her ribs until he reaches the undersides of her breasts. He wets his lips, then sinks his teeth in as he cups her tits, bringing his thumbs to her overly sensitive nipples. 

He ducks his head, bites at the fabric of her shirt and tugs at it until he can see his hands on her, can watch his thumbs slowly circle her nipples. He has to focus on anything but her face, or he won’t be able to bite his tongue much longer. 

His tongue darts out, and he wets one of her nipples before blowing on it, like she always used to like.

“Still good, sugar?”

Shawn remembers everything. He remembers the way she squirms in his arms when he traces her ribs with his fingers. He remembers how sensitive her nipples are and avoids any stimulation that could be too harsh. He remembers that he used to call her ‘sugar’ and it always got her wet for him.

Maya whimpers and pulls her own shirt over her head so she can see how delicate he is with her, watch as he reverently sucks a nipple into his mouth and blows on it with cool air.

Maya tucks a hand into his hair and whines, low and soft.

“Still so good, sweetheart. You’re so good to me. Know exactly what I like,” she praises, remembering the way that always perked him up. 

He wants to say, I know everything about you, but it’s not exactly true anymore. Just feels like it is, especially when she moans in all the same ways as he touches all the same places. He feels like he’s stepped into a time capsule. The best fucking time capsule he could’ve ask for. 

He groans as he kisses his way between her tits until he reaches her neglected nipple. He sucks the little nub between his lips, tonguing lightly at it until it puckers. He lets her go with a pop, then blows a focused stream of air against her. 

Maya could melt into the mattress with how loose and warm and good she feels beneath him right now. Does she even need anything else? She’s not convinced she’d even need an orgasm from him at this point. How could it possibly feel better than she already does?

He nips at her sternum, glancing up at her. 

“How do you want it, Maya?” he says with a lick to her skin. “Wanna give you whatever you want.” 

Don’t wanna chase you away again, he thinks.

Maya whimpers, remembering how good he used to make her come. And since he’s offering… From between her breasts, he offers her the world. She tilts her head back and exhales slowly, trying to calm herself enough to make some kind of choice. She swallows roughly.

He presses his lips to the underside of her breast, thumbing at her nipple while he grips her ass and lifts her hips off the bed. He grinds his hips into hers, sliding his cock along the length of her heated slit. 

They’ve always been teenagers that way, loved their fair share of grinding and humping before even taking their clothes off sometimes. It makes the actual sex that much more satisfying— when you don’t let yourself have it at first. 

Before Maya can answer him, he’s pressing against her, lifting her into his grip, desperate to feel her heat against his. She gasps, ass clenching in his hands, feeling her pussy soak her little denim shorts.

She wets her lips. “I… your mouth, Shawn, baby, I want to feel your tongue on me again. Always so good to me. Made me come so hard for you every time.”

Her desperate babbling would be embarrassing with anyone else. But she’s not actually sure of the last time she had oral sex. And he was always so fucking good at it.

Goosebumps prick in waves across his skin when she calls him baby and begs for his mouth. He’s missed tasting her so badly. 

She doesn’t have to ask twice. 

He swallows her pleas with a devastating kiss, then licks and sucks his way down her body, between the valley of her breasts and over her belly button, until he reaches her little jean shorts. He nips at the denim before bringing deft fingers to the snap. He gets them open, tugs down the zipper then hooks his fingers through the belt loops to slide them down her hips.

Shawn doesn’t make her wait. He kisses her fervently and wastes no time crawling down her body, tasting her skin as he goes. Her breath hitches when she hears the button and zipper of her shorts come open. He shuffles them down her legs. Maya thinks about snapping her thighs shut to rub them together for relief but he’s between them already, ready to take care of her.

His hands slide along her legs on his way back up, fingers stopping to curl under the edges of her silky panties. He presses a kiss to the little bow at just above her pussy, then looks up at her, gaze hot from beneath his lashes. 

Eyes on hers, he lowers his mouth to her cloth-covered clit. He flattens his broad, wet tongue against her, giving her sensitive slit the lightest bit of friction. 

He’s looking up at her like it’s all he wants. He just wants to take care of her. Maya exhales a sobbing breath. He’s going to give her what she wants, but he’s going to do it his way. He doesn’t even have her panties off. He couldn’t wait. He needs her immediately. She knows the feeling. 

He likes tasting her like this, tasting her through her panties, giving her what she wants without really, fully giving it to her. Not yet. He drags the tip of his tongue along her slit, from her entrance to her pulsing clit that sits hot and needy beneath the damp silk. He flicks his tongue quickly, back and forth across her. 

Maya starts to shiver. His mouth is perfect — it’s actually better than she remembers. It occurs to her in a flash of a foggy moment that he’s probably had some practice in her absence. She flicks away the thought as fast as it arrives. 

His tongue is lighting her up from the inside out. She tenses, shoving a hand into the sheets and twisting as he focuses sustained pressure on her clit through the satin of her panties. She refuses to lose it now, though. Not when he’s just gotten his mouth on her.

Shit. She tastes so fucking good, soaking through her panties to get his tongue wet. He bites at the fabric, tugs it from her cunt then releases so it snaps against her. He tongues her panties again, wiggles between her swollen lips, up and down over and over, giving her clit a little more pressure with each pass. 

She almost kicks him when he pinches the fabric of her panties between his teeth and snaps it back against her sensitive folds. She scrunches her nose and giggles. He’s teasing her. She loves it. 

He pulls his fingers from her hips and grips her thighs instead, moving away from her heat to look up at her pretty, flushed face. 

“Will you take off your panties for me, Lu? Show me your pretty pussy?” 

Before Shawn can get the words out, Maya’s practically ripping her panties off to toss them away. She gets self conscious suddenly, the comfort of the moment before gone in a flash. She starts to close her thighs and breathe harder. 

It takes very little urging for Maya to kick her panties away, but then something changes. She was protected before, but now she’s vulnerable. He doesn’t want her afraid of being vulnerable around him. 

He catches her thigh with his hand, pressing her leg down gently, as he clicks his tongue. 

“Maya,” he murmurs, hooking his other arm around her thigh, just above the crook of her knee. “Let me see you, okay? It’s just— it’s me.” 

He feels vulnerable saying the words, but he’s used to being vulnerable around her, maybe even when he shouldn’t be. He really can’t help it now, as she tries to hide from him. 

Shawn’s hand is big and warm and soothing as he keeps her from snapping her knees all the way shut like a fly trap. She lets her head fall back and takes a moment to breathe, nodding when he says her name to recenter her.

He kisses the inside of her knee instead of doing something completely stupid like saying I love you. Instead, he trails slow, open-mouthed kisses down the inside of her thigh, pausing when he reaches her pussy.

Maya slides her hand down her side until she can find his on her leg. She rests it there, her fingers curling over his pulse, letting the quick, steady beat calm her. She takes a deep breath, releases it. 

Her thighs relax. She lets him in. Her eyes close. She feels his lips, soft and already a little swollen, move down the inside of her thigh.

He glances up at her. “Do you still want me to make you feel good?”

She opens her eyes, swallows and bobs her head.

“I just… sorry. I… haven’t really been with anyone in a while. I guess I’m rusty,” she chuckles, but it’s a little hollow.

“Take me out of my head, Shawn,” she begs, squeezing her eyes shut, shaking her head as she lets her thighs fall open completely.

She feels better once she says it. She doesn’t know what he thought she’s been up to since they’ve been apart, but if he imagined her living some sexy, glamorous life where she was going to fancy dinners with fancy men and having fancy sex afterwards, he’s mostly wrong.

She’s been lonely. She doesn’t want to feel that anymore.

The stupid, ape-brain part of him feels a little giddy that he’s the first one to get to do this for her in awhile. Maybe since they broke up. Which. Would be pushing it maybe, considering he had a whole fucking marriage, but still. It’s kind of a nice thought. Not that it matters. She could be with anyone she wanted, and he would still want this with her right now. 

Her voice is needy in that way he’s always loved and he groans, drops his forehead to her abdomen and gently kisses her clit where it peeks out from between her slick folds. 

“Anything, sugar,” he murmurs, glancing up at her one last time before he wraps his lips around her and gives her a slow suck, pressing the tip of his tongue to the hard little bundle of nerves. 

Shawn seeks out her clit with his perfect lips and sucks it into his mouth, lavishing it with his tongue. Maya moans, loud and unashamed. She sinks her fingers into his hair and lifts a leg over his shoulder, leaning into this feeling he gives her. He makes her feel sexy and desired.

He makes her feel loved.

“Your tongue is fucking magic, Jesus Christ,” she croaks through a chuckle.

Maya watches him work on her, feeling her stomach quiver with every harsh, rattling breath in her chest. She smoothes her fingers through his curls for something to do with her hands because she can’t stop moving, he’s driving her totally insane. 

He hums against her wetness, the tip of his tongue vibrating on her clit as he does so. He nips at her, tugs her little peak with his teeth while he lets his hands wander across her skin. His fingers tease her ribcage before walking their way back to her tits. 

He flicks at her nipples just as his tongue flicks her clit. He gives her a moment of intense stimulation, flicking and grinding at her swollen nub with the stiff tip of his tongue. But then he stops, pulls back just as he feels her soaking his chin. He glances up at her, grins a little as he slowly scraps his nails over her tight, brown nipples. 

Shawn goes off on her clit at the same time that he gently stimulates her nipples. Maya growls, feels her eyes roll back and mutters a series of swears under her breath. She squirms, she squeals, she thrashes, completely out of control. 

His tongue curls out and he licks along the length of her slit, getting her all that much wetter before he blows on her cunt, starting with her dripping entrance then moving to her twitching clit. 

“I think,” he hums, nipping at her clit, “Your pussy is magic.” 

He doesn’t let her answer before pressing a hot, open-mouthed kiss to her wetness, tongue sliding into her tight channel. 

He slows down. She can breathe again, enough to focus and look down at him. His nails drags across her nipples, leaving her gasping and digging her fingers into his hair further. His cool breath is tantalizing. She’s seeing stars now. She barely registers his comment, whimpering his name just as he dives back in full force, fucking her with his tongue. 

Maya cries out, scrapes her nails against his scalp. She lifts a hand away from his hair to clasp over her wild mouth because she can’t keep quiet at all and it’s a lot. Between his hands and his perfect tongue, she’ll never recover from this. 

“Shawn, I,” she pauses, realizes she’s talking into her hand, “Baby, I can’t last, I’m gonna fucking come.”

It’s a such a sweet sound. He loves the way she whines for him, how she whimpers when warns him of her impending orgasm. He looks up at her, sees her hand covering her mouth and reaches for her elbow, tugging her arm gently. 

“Wanna hear everything, Lu,” he growls against her cunt before suckling her needy clit. 

Maya rises off the bed. She nods mindlessly, dropping her hand to support her on the mattress as she rolls her hips at him. She pushes a hand through his hair again, hoping the rhythm will keep her even enough not to actually faint when he makes her come. Because she’s a little worried it’ll be too much for her.

He brings his hand to her entrance, prods at her before sliding one thick finger deep inside of her. He pulls back from her clit so he can get his fingers on that, as well. Slowly, he rubs the tight peak as his middle finger massages the sensitive spot inside of her he knows so well. 

Her eyelids flutter when he slides his finger inside her. She clenches around it, like she’s trying to drag him further in, gushing around his digit as he presses it into her g-spot. Her head falls back, she moans his name. 

His fingers pull away and he spanks her clit instead, groaning at the filthy noise of her wet skin against his. 

“Come for me, sugar.” His tone is insistent as he tucks a second finger inside of her and stretches her pussy, giving her clit another sharp spank, before leaning down to soothe it with his tongue. 

“Come all over me,” he growls, pushing one wet hand into his swim shorts and wrapping it around his aching cock. “Gonna fuck you so good when you do.” 

When he slaps at her clit, Maya cries out again and slides back off her hand, landing against the mattress with a bouncing thud. She plants her feet under her and thrusts into his face when her orgasm takes over. She rasps his name over and over until she’s out of breath, begging this feeling not to leave her, she needs it, she needs him. 

As he drags the remnants of her orgasm out of her, she looks up and realizes she’s nearly got him in a headlock with her leg. She releases him, dropping back weakly, panting as she watches him fist a hand around his dick in his bathing suit.

It’s one of the most beautiful orgasms he’s witnessed. It quakes her entire body, has her spasming and thrusting and gripping his fingers like she’s never experienced such overwhelming pleasure in her entire life. His heart pounds in his chest as he fucks her through it, the sound of his name in her throat making the tips of his ears burn and his cock twitch in his hand. 

Finally, she collapses into the bed, leg falling from his shoulder. He pulls his fingers from her cunt and laps at them, cleans himself quickly before cupping her pussy again and pushing his trunks down around his thighs. 

He massages her twitching, sensitive cunt as he kicks off his shorts and knee walks up the bed. He presses his bare thighs into hers, keeping her legs spread as he slowly strokes his cock. 

Maya hasn’t had an orgasm like this in a very long time. Recovering from it is disorienting. She’s staring up at the ceiling and vaguely recognizes the sound of him sucking on his fingers, which makes her shiver hard against the mattress. She groans gently when he gets his hand back on her, reaching down to grip his wrist because feeling him feels good.

“Can you do that again for me, sugar?” he murmurs, leaning down to suck a kiss to the angle of her jaw, nosing lovingly at her temple. His hand moves from her pussy, just enough for him to nudge the head of his cock against her clit, slowly grinding into her. He slips, presses against her entrance before dragging his length back up to her swollen nerves. 

She gathers herself enough to look up. He pushes his shorts down and crawls up the bed to continue massaging her. She sort of forgot how ambitious he gets, how he’d love to make her come as many times as she’d let him. She whines, nodding even though she’s not sure she can come again, but if anyone could make it happen, it’s him.

It’s always been him.

Maya turns her head so his nose slips from her temple to rest next to hers. With every pass over her clit with the thick, pink head of his cock, Maya twitches, feels her toes curl, feels her fingers wrap around his arms and grip hard for control, but she doesn’t need it. Not with him.

Maya’s lips graze Shawn’s. She tilts her head and takes his lower lip between her teeth to nip sharply.

“I’ll give you whatever you want,” she swears.

The words are too heavy with promise. His heart lurches into his throat and he almost chokes, almost says, Want you to marry me, or, Please don’t leave again, but can’t, knows he can’t and not only because it would ruin the mood. 

Instead, he kisses her. Where she nipped before, he sips, slow and deep as he presses the head of his cock firmly against her clit for one last moment before he glides down to her tight, dripping heat. He slides shallowly into her pussy, her folds blossoming around him. He brings his thumb to her clit and gives it a little flick. 

He kisses her until he trusts his big fat mouth, then finally pulls back and looks down to where their bodies are joined. He growls, drops his head to her collarbone and watches his thumb glide back and forth across her nub. 

Shawn uses his kiss to silence them both and she thinks it’s a good idea -- she doesn’t really trust either of them not to be flaming morons right now when they’re this close, this vulnerable, feeling this good. 

And it’s a hell of a kiss. It’s slow and wet and hot and she just came so hard but he’s getting her there again, she swears he is. She’s dazed, letting her body’s needs control her in a way she hasn’t in too long. When he pushes just the head of his dick inside her, she croaks a breath. Her eyes open when he pulls his lips away.

Maya angles her hips up, knowing she’s wet enough to get him to slide in more if she just gets the right angle. She’s not above a cheap trick to get him to give her what she wants, if he’s easy enough to fall for it.

“Maya,” he rasps, kissing one of her nipples. He looks up at her, eyes glassy. “You want my cock? You come again, I’ll give it to you.”

His lips are soft against her sharp, taut nipples. His words make her gasp. 

“Please,” she whines, not even recognizing her own voice, “Shawn, I want you inside of me. All of you. Make me come.”

“Like this, want you to come like this,” he moans, mouthing at her throat as he focuses on working her clit with his thumb. 

He’s got years to make up for. Years without giving her orgasms. Years of not feeling her fall apart beneath him. Years that he’s, quite frankly, ready to forget.

He pulls his cock from her before pushing back in, angled up towards her g-spot. He nudges her there while his thumb moves in tight circles on her clit. 

“C’mon, baby, you’re so good for me,” he purrs against her jaw, kissing her until he reaches her chin. He presses their foreheads together, nudging his nose with hers. 

He chokes on the I love you and sucks at her lower lip instead. 

He’s got her on the ropes. Maya’s fingers go loose around where she grips his arms. With as hard as her desperate pussy clenches his cock, her body can’t bear to hold on to anything else. 

Maya nods, swallowing roughly, feeling her body start to shake again. His thumb is relentless, swiping against her clit as her second orgasm builds hot and hard in her abdomen. She rocks her hips, letting the stiff tip of his cock pound hard into her g-spot with each of their corresponding movements. 

With a loud gasping hiss, Maya arches hard off the bed, planting her feet and fucking up harder onto his cock, as much of him as he’ll give her. 

She’s sure she’s a thousand degrees under her skin. How can he even stand to touch her? She’s molten for him. Her body fades out of her orgasm, soft and pliant. She makes a soft, desperate noise from the back of her throat and flutters her eyes. 

Shawn’s still there. 

Even after all these years, her body still responds so fucking well to his. She fucks herself against his cock, works her hips back and forth until she’s coming again. He moans against her mouth as her cunt soaks him, has to bury his face in her neck and grip her thigh so he doesn’t come himself. 

“Shit, Maya, Jesus Christ,” he rasps into her skin, mouthing hopelessly at her as her orgasm rolls through her. 

“That’s so good, fuck, you’re so fucking good for me.”

Shawn’s in awe of her as she comes hard again for him. His praise is sweet, drugging her as she relaxes into the mattress and presses light, gentle kisses all over his face. It’s probably too intimate for where they’re supposed to be with each other right now but Maya’s too overwhelmed to care. She kisses him anyway. 

He moans about her being good for him. She smiles, a little sleepy, a little smug. Just as she’s about to make a snarky, sexy comment, Shawn lifts away from her enough to make her worry he’ll leave her. Her legs tense like she’s preparing to wrap around him like a vine on a tree and keep him here with her. 

He keeps his cock nuzzled against her pussy as she comes down. He takes his time to sit back on his knees, hands wandering across her body until they settle on her waist. 

Shawn watches her chest heave as his fingertips press into her flushed skin. 

“Still want me, sugar?” he murmurs, tilting his head as he slowly rolls his hips forward, sinking his cock deeper into the tight clench of her pussy. 

And then Shawn cants his hips to bury his thick cock inside her and she’s dumbfounded. 

“Holy shit, Shawn,” she breathes, staring up at him wide eyed as he fills her. He’s better, bigger, thicker than she remembers. She’s tender enough from the first two orgasms that she could easily let herself cry over how good he feels, but she holds back enough to growl deep in her chest and tilt her hips up further, taking him in as far as he’ll go. She gasps and lets her head fall back. 

It takes all of his willpower and then some not to scoop her up into his arms and smother her with praises and coos of love. She’s never felt this good, never been so desperately overwhelmed for him like he’s the best thing since legalized weed. 

He digs his fingers into her skin and holds her still on his cock as he throbs inside of her velvet heat.

“Lu,” he moans when she growls for him, the sound vibrating through her entire body. His hips snap once, tight and quick, before he stills again, trying to calm down. He hasn’t been this close to blowing his orgasm too soon since they first started fooling around. 

Shawn is holding on by a thread, she can feel it all over him by the way he loses his control and fucks hard into her, just one tight stroke, before he gets his feet back under him. His muscles are tensed, his brow is furrowed. She thinks if she gave him just the right grind of her hips, the right pulse of her hot wet walls, she’d have him coming hard and deep inside her in seconds. She locks her jaw against another whining moan at her beloved nickname and keeps still, trying to hold on longer.

“Talk to me, sugar, please,” he groans as he hunches forward, reaching down to cup her throat, his thumb sliding along her jaw. His fingers tangle in her wild hair and it grounds him, keeps him a little steadier as he slowly starts to rock his dick inside of her. 

If he wants to hear her, he’ll fucking hear her. He won’t be able to shut her up once she opens her big stupid mouth. All she can do is hope she doesn’t say something she doesn’t mean to -- I’m staying in Avila, love me forever, tell me everything that you did and you were in the last 10 years so I can love all of you all over again.

Maya’s gaze goes so hot that it’s probably better he’s not actually looking at her. She inhales sharply at the slow rocking of his hips. She plants her feet and gives it back, smooth and gentle. With a low, steady breath, she curls a hand into his hair as his head rests against hers. She closes her eyes and opens her mouth.

“Baby,” she purrs, and her voice is so breathy and fucked-out she barely recognizes it, “Honey, your cock feels so good. So thick and perfect inside of me, fills me up so good, better than anyone ever has. Did you miss this? Miss fucking me like this? Did you miss how fucking tight and wet I get, just for you?”

She is, one thousand percent, trying to kill him.

She knows just how to arch her back and roll her hips to get him more worked up than he swears he’s ever been. His hips stutter for a moment, his cock twitching inside of her. Her pussy absolutely soaks him, soaks them both, and drips onto the sheets beneath them. 

His needy mouth presses against the corner of her lips as she coos in his ear, tells him dirty things he never thought he’d hear again from her. He whines a little, then nips at her skin to shut himself up as he fucks her harder, digs his knees into the bed and shifts his hips until the head of his cock strokes steadily over her g-spot. 

Whatever it is she babbles desperately into his cheek, because she’s not even sure she could repeat it back if you asked her to, it works for Shawn. He goes breathy and whiney and bucks hard into her soaked pussy. It’s all Maya can do to keep up with his fervent strokes, choking on air when the angle of his cock has him coming right up against her g-spot.

He growls. “Fuck, Maya, you-- missed you so fucking much, you fucking-- you know, you know I did, sugar, missed your pussy so much, shit--” he rasps a heavy breath against her lips, “Always get so wet for me, so fucking good on my cock, baby. Fuck. It’s perfect, you’re so-- always been so goddamn perfect.” 

I love you.

He drops his head to her shoulder, can’t let himself keep talking and instead bites at her shoulder to shut himself up as he tries to bring her towards her third orgasm. There’s just so much dirty babbling he can do before he professes his true feelings, and he can’t fucking do that. They’re too far gone. 

She hangs on his every word. She can see now if her stream of consciousness was anything like his, how it got him so completely crazy. Hearing him say these things, things he hasn’t told her, things she hasn’t felt about herself since she was last with him, it’s almost surreal.

Maya pins her arms against Shawn’s as they rock hard against each other. She grabs his shoulders and winces, pulling away when her tattoo stings. The idea of not being as close as possible to him right now is sickening, though, especially because she knows how incredibly close she is to coming and then it’ll be over.

Can she make this last longer? Is there anything she can do to hold on to this?

Before she can push it away, just as the words “so goddamn perfect” roll off his lips, Maya’s orgasm takes her. She goes totally silent, mouth dropping open but releasing no sound as her orgasm swallows her. Her body continues rocking even as she feels like she’s left it altogether. She’s just… gone. Maybe if she’s lucky, he’ll come with her. She wants him with her everywhere. 

Maya can’t breathe, but she needs him. As she reaches the peak of her orgasm, she lurches up into him, wrapping her untattooed arm around his neck as she dives into his mouth.

She drags him down for a kiss that nearly swallows him whole. 

Her orgasm rolled through her body silently, but she rocked through it, worked her hips to chase every bit of release his cock could offer. Now she’s trying to eat him alive by sucking at his lips and licking into his mouth while he whines desperately. His hips snap harder, encouraged by the tight clench of her spasming pussy. 

“Lu-- Lulu,” he growls into her mouth before his head falls, and his body follows. His hips stutter, cock throbbing deep inside of her as his balls tighten. He barely manages to choke, “I’m gonna fucking--” before he spills inside of her. 

He twitches through it, hips flicking of their own accord as he falls, and falls, and falls. She’s hot and wet and tight and he remembers he used to last longer with her, that they both used to last so much longer but this -- it’s different now. 

After a moment groaning and twitching, he manages enough coordination to properly kiss her as his orgasm quells. His hips slow and his body relaxes, but he doesn’t collapse on top of her like he might’ve, years ago. He holds himself up and focuses on kissing her, on distracting himself from doing anything that might ruin the afterglow of the phenomenal sex they probably shouldn’t have had. 

He’s dying to do it again.

Maya doesn’t even for a moment consider asking him not to come inside her. She hasn’t let anyone come inside her since… him. She realizes she’s fixating on all the things Shawn’s giving her now that she hasn’t had in a decade and change. She decides it’s another matter for another time.

He comes hard, his body going rigid as he spills hot and heavy in her aching pussy. She groans gently, so satisfied by feeling filled by him. His hips rock to a stop as he kisses her -- it goes from sloppy and frantic, teeth and tongues clashing to slow, deep, warm, wonderful kisses that have Maya’s head absolutely swimming. She murmurs happily into his mouth. She missed this most of all.

She missed the way he kisses her. He kisses her like he doesn’t ever want to be anywhere else with anyone else. He kisses her like his lips on hers will stop time and drop the whole world in her back pocket just for them. It’s perfect, the way he kisses her.

She starts to pull away, but only for air. With one limp hand, she traces his spine, blinking slowly and plodding kisses along his jaw.

“Stay with me here for a minute. Please?”

She doesn’t want him to pull out yet. She just wants a minute or two, just like this, like it’s forever for them all over again.

Shawn can’t deny her anything. He can’t speak for a moment as her lips wander along his jaw. He nods, knees slipping until he’s collapsed on top of her, his cock still nestled inside of her. 

He doesn’t think he would’ve moved even she hadn’t asked him to stay. He feels stuck, like they’ve fused together and it would take a painful amount of effort to separate. Maybe that’s his heart, though, slipping rose-colored glasses onto his face while he’s weak from coming. 

Maya shifts around him to accommodate him dropping between her thighs and staying pressed up against her warm, orgasm-weakened body. 

He feels so good. She loves that he’s still inside her, but it’s more than that. She loves him lying against her without a breath of air between them, lifting her even closer, feeling like he needs her again. 

He buries his face into her throat, reaching down to curl one arm around her waist, pulling her tighter against him. It’s like, even when they’re connected so intimately, it’s not enough. He can never get enough of her. 

His hazy, orgasm-fucked brain tells him to ask her to stay in Avila with him. He sinks his teeth into his lip to stop himself until he can think of something else to break the silence. 

He’s quiet and contemplative. She knows better than to reach inside his brain before he’s ready so she instead cradles the back of his neck and lifts a leg over his, rubbing her foot along his calf soothingly as he thinks. 

After a moment of abuse, he releases his lip and kisses his way up her throat to her jaw. He noses at her cheek, humming softly. 

“You remember the first time we fooled around?”

His voice is rough but gentle. She smiles, turning her head to offer him more of her. 

“I do. It was right after my winter art show. You took me to Sammy’s and didn’t get scared of my burger order. I slept in your Bill and Ted t-shirt, do you still have that? And… you made me come harder than I ever had for anyone.”

She remembers how he felt like nothing she had ever experienced. He was tender and sweet and attentive and so fucking sexy. She didn’t want to leave the next morning. She didn’t want to wait to text him. Maya started to fall in love with him that night. 

He slips out of her, settling only half on top of her once she starts speaking, murmuring gently in his ear like she always used to after they made love. Not that they just made love, but. She sounds the same. He finds a warm comfort in it. 

Shawn presses his cheek against her collarbone and smiles into her throat, one hand wandering along the curve of her hip, up to her ribcage then back down again until he reaches her thigh. 

“I guess I was pretty clever with my fingers, even back then,” he says with a smirk, nipping gently at the patch of freckles on her neck. “And I definitely still have that shirt. It’s still the softest t-shirt I own.” 

Maya holds him like he’s hers to hold. As he rasps into her throat and rests his heavy head by her shoulder, she scoops him into her arms and relishes in the feel of his solid weight against her. 

The nip on her throat makes her giggle and scrunch her fingers in his hair, squirming beneath him playfully. She falls silent again when his fingers explore her warm, soft skin, re-familiarizing, indexing differences, of which there are few. 

His head falls from her chest onto the pillow so he can look at her face instead of her throat. His fingers walk across her hip to the soft curve of her stomach, then up between the valley of her breasts, along her sternum. Slowly, he teases the little notch between her collarbones with the tips of his fingers, before he reaches to cup her jaw, turning her face towards his. 

He gets bold. 

“Are you gonna kick me out, Lu? Or can I crash here? I’ll make you breakfast.” 

The few seconds they spend watching each other breathe are heavy. The bed feels sodden with soft, wet words they haven’t been able to say yet. Maya almost, really nearly almost, buries her face in his neck and cries out everything. 

Instead, he steps in first. 

Maya closes her eyes and turns into him so her nose brushes the hair on his chest and she can wrap an arm around his wide back. 

“You should stay. But I’ll cook. Can’t have you burning my new house down.”

They’re asleep in record time. Maya is heavy, dreamless. She barely moves beside him the whole night. 

----------

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[ashes-and-ashes]

1) More wolfstar angst-ish: Sirius, Remus, and James all sneak out one night to the Three Broomsticks. They drink and have fun, but Sirius appears to be downing Hog’s Tea and Butterbeer, etc(idk I’m a dumb). Eventually Sirius is considerably way more hammered than the other two boys. And like the good friends they are, Moony & Prongs help Sirius get back to their dorms. Once there, Sirius is starts ranting and soon gets into emotions. He rambles on about how the one he likes will never like him-

Combined them!! Had a lot of fun writing this...the first time. My WiFi was crappy tonight, and I posted it, but it didn’t go through! Had to rewrite everything lol. Hopefully it is okay - I was kinda done halfway through.

tw for drunk!sirius and alcohol and drug mentions

Me Too

~

Even from outside, they can hear the commotion.

It was some seedy little bar, tucked into one of the back alleys in Hogsmede. There was no display, nothing but a flimsy metal door barring the way, as James and Remus approach.

They’re hooded, dark shadows hiding their faces, as Remus glances nervously around the alley. It was almost 2 in the morning, the air reeking of alcohol and smoke, light filtering in from the crack under the door.

”10 galleons says Pads is in there,” James murmurs, his voice low as he fiddled with the lock on the door.

“It’s a sleazy, sketchy bar,” Remus hisses. “What do you expect? Of course he’s in here, seeing as he got kicked out of the other eight.”

He didn’t know what was happening with Sirius. Every night he was gone, slipping out to dark bars and clubs, coming back smelling of weed and firewhisky and God knows what else, red eyes and pale skin.

He tried not to care. He really tried. It was over between them, had been over for a long time, destroyed when Sirius had brought Severus into those tunnels under a full moon. You are selfish, he had screamed, heartbroken and bitter and so, so angry, the type of screaming when you lost something so precious. You are a selfish, arrogant prick, who doesn’t give a shit about what we were together!

Sirius had looked up at him, with those forlorn, hopeless eyes, and whispered, I’m so, so sorry, Re.

The nickname had burned, slicing him up inside, and Remus didn’t even bother to raise his voice as he said, We’re done. It’s over.

But he still noticed the cuts on Sirius’ face, the stiffness at which he moved. He didn’t know what was happening, but Remus couldn’t let him suffer.

So they casted a tracking spell on him, following the trail every night, Peter covering for them back in the castle. They followed him, because no matter how heartbroken Remus was, he still loved him, deep down.

The lock gives away under James’ wand, the door opening with a grating sound as James pushes it open. He gives a mock bow, sounds of fighting and laughing echoing from down below. “After you, darling.”

Remus flips him off, an overwhelming stench of pot filling his nose as he walks down the stairs. The carpet is sticky, pulling at his shoes, and James winces. “God, this place is a dump. We should take Marlene.”

”Perfect for Sirius, then,” Remus says, pushing past several beaded curtains, entering the bar.It’s dirty, concrete floors and open drains, wooden tables scratched and stained. The air is thick, sweat and smoke and alcohol, strobe lights flashing as a a flickering sign advertised 1 glass for every 3 bought - FREE.

Remus winces, James a comforting presence at his side. For a moment, he reaches out, seeking another set of fingers, before he snatches his hand back. He makes no attempt to disguise the movement, just pushes his way deeper into the throng.

There’s some fight going down in the center, men laughing on the outside, as Remus shoulders his way through, two men punching and kicking each other as the crowd cheers. He pushes past two drunk men, almost shoving them into the pit, as there is a collective roar. He looks down, one of the men having bashed the other unconscious, and Remus swears.

He’s about to turn away when the winner looks up, his face full of triumph.

It’s Sirius, dark hair knotted into a messy bun. His lip is split, blood trickling down his chin as gives a mocking salute. He spits, the sawdust red as he stalks out of the pit, snatching up a bag of gold and heading over to the bar.

It’s as if the breath has been knocked out of Remus. He curses, turning around, heading over to the bar where Sirius is sipping from a bottle. “What the fuck are you doing here?”

Sirius glances up, his eyes hooded. “Why, hello Remus. Come to bother me?”

He was very clearly drunk, his eyes bright and cheeks flushed. There was something beautiful about him, though, when all the ice and marble was gone, when the walls were taken down. He could see the emotion simmering through Sirius’ eyes, the anger and the loathing and the pain, the desperation that could only be numbed by spirits. “Stop, Sirius. You’re going to kill yourself.”

Sirius just laughs, the sound deep and rich as he retorts, “I’m already dead.”

With a lazy movement, he stands, chucking the empty bottle against the wall. It shatters, a shard slicing into Sirius’ hand, but he just shrugs as he stretches. “You should go back, Re. You hate places like this.”

He makes his choice in a second. When Sirius turns his back, Remus points his wand at him. “Stupefy!” The jey hits Sirius straight in the back, Sirius pitching forwards as the spell knocks him out. He grabs Sirius’ hand, meeting James’ eyes from across the room, before apperating away with a bang.

~

They land in the Shrieking Shack, the first place that came to Remus’ mind. Sirius groans, pushing himself off the ground, his lip bleeding over his chin. “What the hell, mate. Mother hen much?”

”Shut up.” Remus stalks to the window, yanking the dusty blinds closed before pointing his wand at the hearth. “Incendio.” Flames shoot up, illuminating the room, the growing puddle of blood under Sirius. He scowls, rummaging inside an old cupboard, tossing a towel at him. Pomfrey used to give him some potions, to help with the pain of transforming, and he grabs a small green bottle before dropping in front of Sirius. “Drink this.”

Sirius raises an eyebrow. “Is it poison?”Remus glares at him. “Pain killer. Either drink it or don’t. I don’t really fucking care.”

Sober Sirius would have nodded, drunk the medicine, quiet and remorseful, that icy wall between them. Drunk Sirius just smirks. “Bullshit. You care. That’s why you came to save me.” He swigs, swallowing the potion, before smiling. “Not that I needed it.”

Remus ignores him, vanishing the puddle of blood underneath him. He’s about to go when Sirius calls out. “Wait.”

”Wait for what, Pads?” Remus whirls around, gripping his wand. Anger flares in his chest, making everything go red for a moment. “Wait for you to apologize again? To say sorry? For betraying my secret?”

Sirius just shrugs. “You called me Pads.”

“Fuck. Off.”

He turns away, about to leave when Sirius speaks. “You’re right, you know.” He’s leaning against the wall, legs stretched out in front of him, shirt half opened and sleeves rolled up. His hair was a tangle, dark against his scars, eyes closed as he laughs.

“What did I expect? That we were going to last?” He laughs again, twirling his fingers. “It’s funny. I’m a Black. I’m a prince of evil, a master of the dark arts. I’m beaten and tortured and hurt, but I suppose I’m lucky, because I’m royalty.”

”We should get you drunk more often,” Remus mutters, rubbing his hands through his hair. “Maybe you’ll spew enough bullshit to get you through Divination.”

Sirius shrugs, stretching out in front of him. “It’s like...that quote. From Paradise Lost? ‘Abashed the devil stood / And felt how awful goodness is.’” He laughs. “Guess I’m the devil. Fallen and evil.”

“You’re not evil, Pads.” Remus’ voice is thin, fraying as he sighs. “It’s...complicated.”

“Evil?” Sirius scoffs. “I never told you, why I waited so long to run. My mother used to get drunk, you know, drunk on god knows what. She’d come home, reeking of alcohol and she would want to hurt something.” He shrugs. “It always was be. Better me then Reg, anyways. Who’s covering him now?”

Remus shakes his head. “Sirius, stop. There’s nothing you can do about it. You were getting hurt.”

“I should have stayed,” Sirius breathes. “I should have stayed.” He looks up. “For what it’s worth, Re. I’m so sorry.”

It’s as if a fire was lit under Remus’ skin. Everything burned, his shoulder where Sirius leans against it, his eyes where they stares into nothingness, his legs where they are pressed right against Sirius’. The words are quiet, barely whispers. “Do you still love me?”

Sirius glances up, his expression shocked. “You wouldn’t believe me. I’m drunk.”

Remus stares into his eyes, the dark grey that he’s looked into so many times before. “Do you?”

There’s a silence, thin and fraying, the only sound their mingled breathing. “Do I love you, Re?” He laughs. “God. You’re the first thing I think of, when I wake up, the last thing when I sleep. When I think of my happiest moments, you’re always there, and you’re there in my saddest moments, because you were always with me. My heart still stops whenever I see you, even after all this time, and every time we touch, it’s like someone’s lit fireworks under my skin. And I know. I know I’m not good enough, that I will never be good enough. You deserve so much more, Re. You deserve the world.” He smiles, the sort of desperate smile that one makes when saying goodbye. “But do I still love you? Always. I’ve never really had a choice.”

Remus stands, the words burning. He walks over to the door, the hallway opening in front, ready to walk always from Sirius like he’s always done.

He glances back, Sirius a spill of dark ink against the white wall. There’s something inside of him, where it had all been dark, as Remus says, “Pads?”

He meets Sirius’ eyes, the dark grey, the same eyes that had carried him through transformations and exams and kissing and life, because he still loved Sirius, still loved him so damn much, despite how he tried to hide it.

He smiles. “Me too.”

-

#wolfstar #wolfstar fanfic #wolfstar fanfiction #wolfstar angst #em’s ideas #sirius black #remus lupin #sirius x remus #sirius black angst #remus lupin angst #angst #harry potter #hp #marauders era #the marauders #james potter #wizarding worlds #the first wizarding war #the prank

[stanlevuris]

i was tagged by @billdenbrough, my #1

rules: answer 17 questions & tag 17 people you want to know better

nickname: mar is technically a nickname. a friend of mine has taken to calling me miss mandarin, people call me mandarijn (dutch for mandarin) a lot. margerine, marzipan, marijnuana, marine ... there’ve been a bunch of nicknames, most of them bc people dont know how to pronounce marijn lmao

zodiac sign: leo!!! 

height: 5′8/173 cm

hogwarts house: gryffindor first, hufflepuff second

last thing i googled: "slaapbed in het engels” i had to translate something to english lmao

song stuck in my head: well i’m listening to music rn so the song i’m listening atm is stuck in my head, and that’s all the wine by the national!

following: 133, which is a pretty low amount for me so i’m constantly trying to find more peeps to follow

followers: yeehaw i have 51 followers which isn’t a lot but it is if you consider that ive had this blog for a month, have less than 200 posts and haven’t created anything yet so my blog is just reblogs & a random textpost here and there. i don’t have anything to offer and yet! there’s 50 of you! lmao

amount of sleep i get: 7-8? i finally have healthy sleeping habits

lucky numbers: 7 / 17 / 56

dream job: i want so much ... i’d really love to be my own boss --- be a freelance journalist and write the stories that drive me and bring me passion and sell them to magazines/online platforms i love. or i’d like to work for a magazine in general! besides that i’d love to write creatively and make art, and in a perfect world i’d be able to combine my love for creating journalistic pieces, for creative writing and for making art into one big career.  

wearing: my low ankle docs, striped socks, levi’s, a turtleneck w skandinavian print

favorite songs: these are on my favourites playlist on spotify: baba o’riley -- the who, beautiful people beautiful problems -- lana del rey and stevie nicks, tusk -- fleetwood mac, under pressure -- queen and david bowie, tears dry on their own -- amy winehouse, landfill -- daughter, bird song -- florence and the machine, street spirit (fade out) -- radiohead, teenage riot -- sonic youth, porcelain -- red hot chili peppers, don’t stop (the dance live version) -- fleetwood mac, rhiannon (the dance live version) -- fleetwood mac, i know it’s over -- the smiths, the wind -- pj harvey, lise -- eefje de visser, paper thin hotel -- leonard cohen 

instruments: i own a guitar, a baritone ukulele and a concert ukulele. i’m mostly self taught (my mother taught me some guitar basics though) and am ... definitely amateur but i can pick a few songs and strum and i know chords and all that !!! i do play a lot and jam with friends and i like to sing. 

random fact: the other day i saw a dog ‘walking themselves’ by holding their leash with their mouth and i burst out in tears on my bike. it was so fucking cute. i just --

aesthetics: funky socks, red lipstick, raindrops on glasses, wine stained teeth, holding up a finger while reading a book to quiet someone, beaten up doc martens, dancing while crying and listening to britney spears, chipped nailpolish, petting all cats on the street (and having favourites), dumb but funny remarks in class, pink eyeshadow, listening to your dad’s old records

tagging: if you see this and want to do this you have BEEN TAGGED

#tagged #thank u jane this was so much fun!!!!

[shhhnottom]

I Got Bored. Here's A Book

Just a quick warning before we actually start this mass roller coaster of bullshit. If you are easily offended, feel free to stop and reverse your hand to the home page.

Also, this is not a story of any kind. It's just a random bunch of subjects that mean something to me and I ramble on about. I drank quite a lot whilst typing 90% of this and watched a fair amount of Netflix

Just take a look at these chapters. I think you could see where this is going to go:

Depression

Anxiety

Television

Self Harm

Procrastination

One Word Chapter

Didn't See That Coming?

Swearing

Panic Attacks

The End?

Just another warning, there will be a fair amount of swearing in this so if you want to censorit out, feck off. It's safer, trust me.

Depression

Yeah, lets start off dark. That seems like it's going to be a great plan. Let's face it, everyone has their bad days. Try to lie, I dare you. I have mine and they get me to a point where I just want to throw myself into a keg of ale and a couple bottles of whiskey. Has to be the good stuff, otherwise my sadness is made more sad. I mean, who wants to depressed and drink a bottle of Tesco value blended shite when there is a long list that will make you feel slightly better, like Jameson's, Tullamore Dew and Paddy's. Yeah, I went straight for the Irish whiskeys, sue me.

Anyway, after my lengthy dabble with the art of drinking myself into a coma every night, waking up for work in the morning, finishing work and continue to drink, I decided that I need to ruin all of the relationships I have built over the years with a combination of heartfelt insults and trying to throw myself into traffic when they are looking. I'm a lovely person, aren't I?

What I decided to do after several attempts on my own life, well two attempts anyway, is to take the fucking hint and realise I'm not supposed to die. Did you know, that therapy is actually effective and gets you to the place where you feel a lot better and not suicidal any more. You see, it's almost as if the doctors who say you are depressed and need therapy are speaking the truth. Who knew? You know what I found doesn't really help. If you decide that you don't need therapy and that finding pictures of celebrities who have decided to end their own lives and post that shit to Facebook, saying that “Even The Happiest People Are Sad”. Its almost like they decide, before they leave the house, that they don't want people on the outside who have cameras and social media accounts to take pictures of them whilst they are having a bad day, and post it all over the fucking place. Fucking hell, I went to therapy for a year before realising that I'm just a massive idiot and if I thought a little bit differently, I could get over all of that nonsense that was going on inside my head. I, now, look at my depression like its one big fucking meme and take the piss out of myself because that's how I can deal with it. I mean, I don't read books and here I am fucking writing one.

The main reason why I look so differently at depression now is because of the millennials who think because something hasn't gone their way, they have to post shit over social media complaining about how hard life is. You haven't even hit 20 yet, you pricks. Wait until you get to 25 or 30 and come to realise “I'm in a dead end job, going nowhere and I have no money”. Oh Jaysus, wait until that comes along. You will think that not getting laid in that shitty club is a holiday.

I mean, there are some great positives to come out of having depression, going to therapy and getting to a point where you are comfortable with living the life you have been given. I, myself have reconnected with people who I thought I had lost, through my incessant need to push them away. I have a better relationship with my parents, now that we have started communicating properly again. I am a lot less selfish, and have developed  a form of empathy I had no idea I had inside. I've even tried to help some people in their times of need, when they were feeling at their worst. I once wrote a letter to someone to try to make them stop going down the same road I went down:

“I have this incessant need to do stupid things to hurt myself

I have broken my hand multiple times to avoid mental harm but have inflicted physical harm on myself

I have destroyed possible relationships in the desire to remain alone, to stop myself inflicting my mental harm upon others

I have kept myself busy in order to stop myself from pursuing a premature non existence”

Told you before that I was a lovely person.

It turns out that maybe, my experiences, aren't as bad as other peoples. It might also turn out that your experiences aren't as bad as mine but I'm not going to presume. Hopefully, you've enjoyed the first chapter, I have no idea what's going to happen in the next few chapters, mainly because I haven't written them yet.

Anxiety

Disclaimer,

I was fucking hammered and heavily depressed writing this chapter and tried to write it completely in the 3rd person. Enjoy.

Have you ever noticed when people get really offended they decide to inhale very dramatically and hold their chest as if they have been hurt so badly that their heart has been hurt? Imagine if those people develop a heart condition. You'll never be able to tell if they eventually do have a heart attack or if you've just told a really funny joke.

Just to reiterate, “this book” is just my thoughts written down whilst I have a couple of drinks and watch Netflix.

Someone once told me that a persons feelings are subject to the person they are. I know people that are massively bitter and their stomachs always hurt. All they do is moan about what other people do or think and then constantly moan that they are ill.

Here Tom, isn't this chapter about anxiety? I'm fucking getting to it. Chill the fuck out.

Getting back to what I was saying before I was rudely interrupted. This person also told me that they get a sore throat every time they want to say something but they force themselves not to. Can you imagine what that's like? To not say what it is you want to say, just to not offend people.

I get super anxious around people who are better than me. I know someone who is literally the most caring person I have ever met. They care more about other people and how they feel than they do about how their life is going. Another thing I get anxious about is when I  think that I've not accomplished what I thought I would have done by this point. I mean, I could claim that I was from a broken home, had to move from my home country to another and had to start my life from square one but I, then, realise that there are so many more people that go through that and I'm not special.

I've just poured another glass of whiskey. Its just about a half a glass. This shit is difficult to write about, can you tell?

If you haven't noticed yet, I like to make stupid jokes just to pass off that I'm OK in the head. “shakes head dramatically”. I put that in because you cant physically see me and I'm shit at drawing my head shaking.

I know a lot of people who smoke an arse tonne of weed just to get over their anxieties. Have you ever smoked weed? That shit is scary. I remember one time, New Year I think, I was working. Showed up at 10am, was supposed to be on until 6pm but it was so quiet that I got sent home after 2 hours. I went to the nearest town and drank like half a bottle of whiskey, well Jack Daniels. Does that count as whiskey? Its basically sugar with some ethanol. Along with several pints of beer and a shit burger from a Wetherspoons. Anyway, after drinking myself into a stupid comatose state where I was still somewhat functioning, myself and one of my friends went back to his house and he broke out the weeds, the green, the marry Joanna. After quite a lot of smoking and a bit more drinking I decided I needed to rest my eyes for a moment, just a single moment. Suddenly, I felt slightly ill in the stomach. I remember saying to him, “If you don't get a bucket, I'll throw up all over your floor”. However the video suggests something different. Yeah, there's a video. It goes something like this: “mmmmmmmmmmm mumuumumumu bucket muumuu floor”. The point is, there was a massive stain on his bedroom carpet for 6 months after. He didn't let it go. At all. The bastard.

That whole story doesn't explain how weed doesn't help my anxiety but I ran out of shit to say and I thought that would break some tension. Hopefully.

I'm currently listening to a song that tells you how to kill yourself. Yeah, this got dark really quick. Although, it has a great message. Don't rely on pop stars to write a song that will resonate with your feelings. Lady Gaga doesn't care if someone found her lyrics about the paparazzi inspirational enough to make them not kill themselves. (There are many pop stars out there who do the same thing, Lady Gaga was just the first person who came to mind). They've made their money, after that they just carry on making new “inspirational songs” and go on a new tour, make more money and the cycle continue. I listen to Twenty One Pilots' album Vessel when I feel really anxious. Seriously, those guys write about what they feel instead of what some songwriter thinks what other people feel.

Hey Tom, how are you going to bring this chapter out of the hole its in? You expect me to be funny and make a point? Nah,Nah,Nah,Nah,Nah,Nah,Nah,Nah,Nah,Nah,Nah....Hey Jude.

I've been at this chapter for too long now. I'm fucking done. Good luck understanding this mess I've just read this back. I mean, seriously, if you've got through this well done.

Television

Ah now for fucks sake. Who's idea was it to put in Television as a chapter? Mine? Nah, doesn't sound right. I'm not that fucked up to put this in here. I mean I'd put in music or video games. I'm more interested in those than I am in TV. Fine, Fucking, Fine. I'll talk about this stupid subject. I mean, fuck me. Dumb ass.

At this current moment in time I am watching the second season of Jack Ryan and I can conclusively say that I am not disappointed. Two episodes in and it has been a massive thrill ride. I mean, to go into Venezuela at the current moment is brave just to film a TV show. They must have spent more money picking the safest place to film there than it cost to pay the actors. I could imagine that John Krasinski isn't that cheap to hire after the first series and after the US Office. Not including his directorial debut in the Quiet Place. Magnificent.

I've also watched the Netflix series Daybreak about a dirty bomb going off in L.A and only people under the age of 18 surviving. Very clever concept for a show, and the fact that they managed to film in parts of L.A is even more impressive for a small time TV show.

3 paragraphs I managed to get through before getting to a point. I decided to throw on the last thing I was watching on Netflix to emphasise said point. Yeah, I'm watching the last series of How I Met Your Mother. DONT START. Seriously, I know. Up until the last 2 episodes it was OK. It was a great story overdone by bad direction.

4 paragraphs, look at me.

OK, by this time, I'm sure you're getting it. TV is a great way to distract yourself from the real world. A great way to distract from your problems in the world. I mean, you've got to find the right show for you but there are so many out there at the moment and so many ways to watch them. There will always be people who say that you shouldn't waste your time sat and watching TV, go do something with yourself. Just imagine what those people do when they get in from their days at work. They come home, sit in an empty chair and look at their walls. I mean, they could be reading a book. Preferably, this one. Or maybe not, but my point is still valid. You could read your books and force your brain to imagine the world that the book is coming to or you could spend the time to celebrate the people that have done that before you and decided to 'Do something with themselves' and make their favourite book into a magnificent visual performance. I mean, at this point, I have switched to the modern Sherlock Holmes series, which as everybody knows is brought to life from the many stories written by Arthur Conan Doyle. This TV show is 90 minutes long per episode and is very entertaining, so you never seem to notice that the time goes by. This means that if you are feeling a certain way at the start of the show, there is a 90 minute period where your feelings could change, your opinion of the world could change.

OK, I have nothing left to rant about here. If I were to speak about another music or video games I would have been here for another 6 pages but I figured your time would be spent better here.

I mean I wrote the names of the chapters before I wrote the actual chapters themselves so you're as stuck as I am with what gets written. I could change this but where's the fun in that.

Good luck reading the next chapter. I promise, I will be completely hammered writing it because I'm going to continue writing after this chapter. I am currently on the verge of tears now so, I guess good luck to me too. Thank you for reading up to this point if you have. I've tried to keep it fun but now I'm into serious mode.

Self Harm

Hey people, lets enter dark mode. I mean every other company on the planet has already done it. I mean, apart from Facebook but those bastards let political propaganda through, so I guess that counts.

I mean, that's the shortest joke I've told so far so, for the people that know me, know that this will be a bastard of a chapter. And also ,for people that know me will also be looking at this chapter going, 'He's not seriously going to talk about this, is he?' Yeah, that's exactly what I'm going to do.

Over the last five years, there have been several moments I am ashamed of. All of which are my own fault. I once launched an egg at someone because the oil that I was supposed to put it in splashed at me.

Did you know that even talking about a certain subject can sometimes bring up feelings you hate? Coming to realise that.

I fell for a woman. Gorgeous, smart, beautiful. We had a lot in common. She was my perfect equal apart from she was caring and humble about it. I'm an arrogant bastard. She was single at the time and I thought I had some form of chance to win her over not knowing everything about her. At this time, I was a very possessive person. I would have done anything to be with her. I let this attribution take control of me at the worst time. I wanted to play the long game, get to know her and eventually ask her out. I went out for drinks with a friend one night. Got absolutely rat arsed. I found out, that night, that she had been asked out by somebody else and she had accepted. I didn't know her very well by this point but because of my possessive compulsion, I took this very personally. It was neither of their fault, just myself.

Some time had passed and I was trying to prove my self worth to this woman. She was still with the same man and I was still jealous. Another night, another time these people were around me, another time that I tried to make it about me.

9 shots of tequila later. 9 exactly. Someone kept count by keeping a tally on my arm. In marker, before you get to excited. I'm not sure of how many other drinks on top but it was 9 tequilas. Anyway, I'd had some minor thoughts in the past of how my life should end but that night my head went into overload. You know, that summer was so bad for me I don't even know if this was the same night. Anyway, after some time and a lot of drinks later, I figured that this was the end of the night for me. Well, end of something for me. I had decided that this was the last straw for my bad luck in this world.

There is a point where half the people I know think a certain habit started but in actual fact this story is where my habit actually began. Everyone has their own stories, where they cut their wrists to fill some form of void, to feel. There are some people who look for it sexually, unfortunately I'm not the lucky. I decided this night out of pure frustration to pull said woman aside, point at a wall and told her that was how I felt when I was around her at that point. I was a brick wall. I wanted noting else at the time to kill that brick wall. So, what I did next is, by far the thing I regret the most. Out of everything I've ever done and believe me, I've done some bad shit. Over and over again, I punched that wall until I could no longer feel my hand and then, I carried on until I broke my hand and then, I carried on until somebody pulled me away from the wall. By this time, I had broken my hand in 2 places, I was bleeding all over the place and I had broken every friendship I had built and every relationship I had hoped to build. I think the most embarrassing thing for me was, the person who bandaged me up was the person who had the balls to ask the woman I had fallen for. Could you imagine? This was the person I had blamed for driving me to the place I was. He helped bandage me up and the woman who I had fallen for was consoling me and trying to help me get through what was in my head. I could not take this. In my head, I would never be able to recover from this. I continued for another 18 months to cut myself, punch walls, headbutt walls, kick and break my hand and other bones in my body. I was always in a mental state where I never thought that I was good enough until I decided that enough was enough.

Surprisingly, when people say that therapy works, they are telling the truth. Big wow. I think its safe to say I am definitely stupid enough to continue writing this nonsense. Well there's a few more chapter so lets see where we end up.

Procrastination

OK so its been a solid 2 months since I wrote the last chapter, which is long enough by anyone's standards, but for me, being the stubborn prick that I am, is no time at all. I mean, I can not do something for an extended period of time. It took me a year to launch a business I could have launched in 6 months only because I changed my mind on whether or not I wanted to start the bastard thing in the first place. It took me spending a grand on my first design to actually say, “Yeah, I'm in too fucking deep here to pull out”.

I've gone through 90% of my life not doing things when they needed to be done in favour of doing them the very last second, mostly because I was scared that they would never work out in the way that I wanted them to and that I would constantly be they failure I feared I always would be. I never believed that anything I was doing was worth the time or effort to do. I decided at the very end of college that I wanted to go to university but by the time I had decided this, it was too late to take seriously and I missed out. I did 3 years in college whilst everybody around me only did 2 because of this. Still, I never went to university so I guess that third year was pointless but the point was that I spent so much time on the internet playing online games instead of revising for exams and concentrating on my coursework.

This got very serious when it got suggested to me that I might need to go to therapy to sort out what was going on inside my head. I kept telling people that I would go eventually because I never though that I was “that” bad but going by what you have read in the previous chapters proves that I made the mistake of putting it off. Big woop. I did go in the end but it took some serious relationship breakdowns, quite a few broken bones and the attraction to my inevitable early grave to accomplish.

I think the message here is to not be afraid of what you thin will fail. Give what you want a try and if it fails, get back up and try it again in a different way. Never give up on something if you really want it to happen and listen to the people who you care about, who also care about you. Especially when they are telling you something is wrong and they are concerned.

One Word Chapter

Vukei

Didn't See That Coming?

Yeah, you probably should have seen that one coming. Its literally called a one word chapter.

It took me two minutes to choose the word. I had an unlimited choice to go with across multiple languages, so me being me went for the most obscure language of Fijian. What does the word mean? Do I look like Google?

There is no moral to this chapter. I just needed to fill in a gap to make this “book” look more full than it actually is. I mean, the moral could be that I've got to a point where I am comfortable enough to actually start doing what I say I am going to and then do it. I still get people telling me to do the most ridiculous things and saying that I will never do them because of the person I used to be. Imagine the look on their faces when I actually come through with the goods. I started a joke with a friend where , when we worked together, we would always listen to Party in the USA by Miley Cyrus whilst we worked and when we stopped working together, whenever the song came, we would SnapChat the other whilst the song was on. We said that this wouldn't last long so I personally made sure that the joke carried on. At the time of this being written we haven't worked together for over a year and the joke is still going.

Swearing

Welcome to this shit storm of a chapter. Do you ever notice that when you hurt yourself in a bad way you cant help but swear. That's because it releases a small amount of dopamine into your brain to help ease the situation you are in and stops some pain in the process. Weird, right? I'm in the strange occupation of chef where I am constantly getting burnt, cut and verbally abused in different languages, so swearing is one of those things that helps with the day to day survival of working in kitchens. I could fall into one of the other 5 habits that a chef develops as a result of the stupid work that we have to do. Those habits being:

Drug Abuse

Alcohol Abuse

Gambling Addiction

Caffeine Addiction

Smoking

I do suffer from 2 of these. Not saying which ones but I do have people around me that think I'm on at least 4 of them so that's nice but in every profession there is the secret, hidden thing that helps them through the day and that's the swearing aspect. I don't think, in the last 3 years, I have gone a day without telling someone that they should fuck themselves or that they are a cunt with them being aware that I am just taking the piss out of them an I don't mean half the shit I say. It just becomes habit to tell people to fuck off or suggest that they shove a large object up their rectums.

I used to knock the shite out of walls to relieve stress but I would always swear like a cunt after I would do it thinking to myself “You are a stupid prick and I hate you”. I would then look at my hand, laugh and say out loud “Ha you are a cunt”. The thought was always I would get over some of the pain if I constantly just swore to myself and carried on as if nothing had happened. Of course, my hand would always hurt for days afterwards and I would be swearing until it healed only to find another wall to knock shite out of and the process would start all over again.

Panic Attacks

A friend once said to me, “Bring A Harmonica Everywhere You Go, So If You Have A Panic Attack You Can At Least Make Some Music”. I never bought the harmonica but it is a very good way to portray what its like to have regular panic attacks. Could you imagine just busking in town, guitar in hand trying to be the next Ed Sheeran and then suddenly, your heart starts to blast out of chest, you feel light headed and you start to hyperventilate. That would be the best time ever to pull out your harmonica. You'll be on the floor with tears rolling down your face but you'll be smashing that cover of You Don't Know How It Feels by Tom Petty.

I starting writing this back when I was having regular panic/anxiety attacks, every 2-3 days in fact, but getting to this point its a bit more every month so, yay progress but I wrote the chapters out months before and I said I would follow through with it so here I am.

Funny story, I once had a panic attack in a nightclub whilst sat on a replica of The Iron Throne from Game of Thrones, whilst my friend was out on the pull. That's the whole story, seriously, but could you imagine having a great time up until the point when you realise you are surrounded by 250+ people you don't know, with a severe case of crowd anxiety and your friend abandons you for the prospect of sex. My head exploded and there was a very attractive looking wall outside that I felt needed a makeover. Never got the makeover, the lucky bastard.

I used to make the biggest mistake for myself whenever I felt anxious, panicky or depressed because when my depression was really bad, my drinking made it so much worse because I lost the control that I had over myself. My mistake in recent times is that, when I started to feel like my old self, I would have a drink to try to combat it. That is the mistake I would make. Try to stay away from my old self by doing what my old self would do.

Its got to a point now where, even where I am reading this back, and nothing in my body reacts. No anxiety, no panic and no depression. Well, saying that, I still have those feelings but they are not nearly as hurt filled as they were in the past. My secret, apart from therapy, on how I deal with life and why I am the way I am now is.

The End?

I mean, is there really an end to a story, an idea? I do have secrets, everyone does. My biggest is that I made a character in myself to try to avoid loving myself and anyone else. I acted as if I didn't care about other people to make it easier on myself if it came to a point where they let me down or, in the more realistic circumstance, where I let them down. I always tell people that I'm not a nice person to put them off this fact so that they see me as the character I made up. I make certain jokes to people to put them off and I say things to them to give them the idea that they need to avoid any form of relationship with me so that they don't get hurt in the crossfire of what I am.

In the 2 years since I have made this character, only 3 people have seen through it and seen me underneath, no matter how much I have tried to put them off. One of which is my mother, another being the woman mentioned in the Self Harm chapter and one more person who I fell for but not in the way I have before. Only because I am afraid of what would happen to me if I had made the same mistakes from before. Its really irritating trying to get people to keep the secret that I am a horrible bastard so I can stay in my own little bubble.

At the time in which I am typing this, I have not been to therapy for 2 months. In this time, I have learnt that:

Not everyone is out to get me

Not every decision I make will fail

I have the self control to not hurt myself physically or mentally

My emotions are not here to hurt me

I am capable of loving myself along with someone else

I am a nice person and I don't need to hide behind my old self

Swearing actually does help, I don't have any regrets there

Bring a harmonica to a panic attack if I want to be the next Tom Petty

Don't throw away the opportunity to love if given it. It will bite you in the arse if you do

Safe to say, even though I have my bad days, I have, recently, barely gone a day without having a smile on my face. For those who know me will know that this is a rare occurrence.

I don't think there will be a day where I don't think about the person I used to be. I'm sure I will use this as a defence mechanism in the future but I know that I will eventually get over it. If you ever see me later, if I ever just clench my fist. Just know that I am trying to counter act my old self. Not very helpful but still.

I want to thank every person who has helped me become who I am now because who I was previous was, to put it lightly, a total cunt. I have become a functioning person, with some glitches, only a couple though. I decided to thank everyone who helped me in person months ago but it needs to be said again to solidify my authenticity.

If you have read it to this far, you are one of the people who have helped me, inadvertently, but still thank you.

Tom