#They hang out until his shift is over and smooch him lots and Drive him home and make him dinner

[katrinawritesthings]

onjongtae; he's tired; pg

@taemsjjong asked: Please i require onjongtae crumbs im running out 🙏 maybe like jinki works at a generic fast food place and the other two bozos pull up to make his life better cuz work is boring- recently i just like to imagine jinki trying to be a functioning adult and jongtae go "no <3" but jinki rlly doesnt care cuz hes soft for his boys uwu

my dude. You are so right about everything

Jonghyun has the card because Taemin once again forgot his wallet before they left for the movies. Still grinning, grabs his wallet from his pocket and hands Jinki the card. He holds onto it for just long enough for Jinki to bring his hand all the way to his mouth and smile against knuckles.

Jinki looks like he craves death behind the cash register.

Better than usual. Normally he already looks like a zombie in his little burger joint uniform. He even perks up a little when Jonghyun and Taemin walk up, arm-in-arm, smiling at their babe. 

"Hi Jinki honey,” Jonghyun chirps, and, "hey Jinx," Taemin says. They stop in front of his register, leaning on the counter together. They don't worry about holding up the line; it's after the lunch rush and the place is practically empty. Jinki smiles sleepily between the pair of them.

"Hey you two," he yawns. "How was the movie?"

“Uhhhhh,” Taemin says, and then he grins, covering it with the back of his hand. "Well," he says.

"We didn't really watch a lot of it,” Jonghyun says, trying to go for guilty but landing, he thinks, more on mischievous. To be fair, though, what he saw between sloppy makeouts was pretty boring. Jinki doesn't seem to mind the lack of review. He just shakes his head fondly, rolling his eyes. Jonghyun leans closer, enamored just by Jinki existing, and plays with his bangs, pushing them out of his eyes. "What's the most bullshit thing that's happened to you today?" He asks. 

“Fucking--” Jinki slams his hands on the countertop, his eyes and wide with more intensity and fire than Jonghyun has ever seen within the walls of this establishment. Quickly, his shoulders hunch and he glances around, making sure no one else on the skeleton crew in the kitchen heard him cursing or having a negative emotion in front of customers. 

Then, quieter, but still full of barely contained rage, he says, "this group of five jackasses comes in, right. And they order and everything, whatever. And I see all five of them each get three little cup things of ketchup. But I'm just like, whatever, they like ketchup, who cares. But then." His little hands clench into fists, his chest rises and falls in a steadying breath that doesn't seem to steady him at all. "I'm cleaning the counters before all of the high school kids come in for lunch. And my manager comes up to me and he's like, ‘hey, go clean up table twelve real quick,’ so I'm like, fuck, I guess someone spilled a drink or something. But then I get there. And every single fucking one of those little ketchup cups. All fifteen of them. Are upside down? They just put them upside down? Still full of ketchup? And left them there? So I had to pick them up and let the ketchup splort everywhere before I could even start cleaning. And it's like? What is the fucking point? What is the reason? What is the motivation? It's not fucking funny, Taem.” 

Belatedly, Jonghyun realizes that Taemin is shaking, hand clamped over his mouth, eyes little crescents, doing his very very best to not laugh out loud. “It's not,” he says, voice trembling. "It's not, it's not funny. I know it's not. I'm not – I'm not laughing because. It sucks, Jinx, I know, it's – hey, can we get some nuggies?"

And now it's Jonghyun's turn to burst into laughter. Taemin forced so much casualness into that and the way he’s smiling so plainly like he didn't just completely change the subject is too much. Jonghyun turns into his shoulder, laughing into his hoodie even though it barely does anything to muffle him. He only extracts himself and tries to calm his breathing when he hears Jinki ask, weary and resigned with just a touch of softness reserved only for the pair of them, "which one of you has the card?"

It's him. He has the card because Taemin once again forgot his wallet before they left for the movies. Still grinning, grabs his wallet from his pocket and hands Jinki the card. He holds onto it for just long enough for Jinki to bring his hand all the way to his mouth and smile against knuckles.

Glancing at the register screen while Jinki scans the card, Jonghyun wiggles happily. He's gotten their regular order perfect, as well as an extra big oatmeal cookie for Jonghyun and choccy milk for Taemin. 

“Oh, you have – Onew,” in a heartbeat, Taemin switches to Japanese. He leans forward, grinning eagerly, and says, "can you sneak me a dinosaur toy? The purple one? Onew? Please?” 

"My new weekend manager knows Japanese," Jinki replies, also switching languages without missing a beat. "So careful if you come over here on Sundays." He gives Jonghyun back the card and the receipt while Taemin mumbles, "homophobic." 

Another customer is walking up to the register, so Jonghyun and Taemin retreat to one of the tables where they can still see Jinki. Suddenly he's smiling bright and cheery, but it's not a smile that Jonghyun has ever seen outside of this burger joint. Actually, that's not true. Jinki puts that smile on whenever he has to make a phone call for insurance or bills or anything else that he hates that he has to be doing but he still has to be pleasant during it. 

Jinki catches Jonghyun looking over the customer’s shoulder; Jonghyun waves eagerly, excited to have his attention even if it's just for a glance. For a split-second, Jinki's smile twitches before he focuses back on this job.

"It's sooooooo fucked up how we live in a society and he has to work,” Taemin sighs. 

“It really is," Jonghyun agrees, pouting. Taemin is folded dramatically over their little table, cheek smushed against the tacky surface and arms stretched out so his hands dangle off of the edge. Jonghyun rests his head on his shoulderblade and plays with his blond hair. He thinks about how fucked up it is all the time.

Technically Taemin has a well-paying job, but as a backup dancer he’s relegated to the concert tour schedules of the celebrities that he works for and is always at the mercy of auditions so it's not exactly consistent. And Jonghyun flat-out can't work for a living without it severely damaging his mental health. Not being able to work also does that to him, but in a different way for different reasons that are much more manageable. So it's Jinki that's gotten stuck with holding down a regular hourly job to keep their income stable. And that is so fucked up. If anyone was put on this earth to just be straight fucking chilling, it would be Jinki. 

Jonghyun stops playing with Taemin's soft hair for a moment in favor of pushing his head closer so he can sniff it. It's his favorite smell in the world, cozy and comfortable and familiar and inviting, and he gets his whole face in there, and nuzzling in happily. "Were you hanging out with Choi earlier?” He asks, curious. Something about his scent is the tiniest bit off.

“Wuh?” Taemin asks. He's playing a game on his phone, but he glances back over his shoulder. "Yeah," he says. "Viddy game," he adds. Jonghyun snorts. Like the two of them ever do anything else together. But he’s glad Taemin had fun. "Hey, I'm about to get a new puppy," Taemin says. He shimmies his shoulders to make sure Jonghyun is paying attention. 

Jonghyun is of course paying attention to Taemin's game and he tenses all up in his excitement, crawling even further on top of Taemin so he can hook his chin over his shoulder. It's just one of those idle clicker games that he has no patience for but Taemin is obsessed with, but this one has something that the others don't: puppies. Every however many bajillion clicks Taemin unlocks a new one and his most current one is – 

“That is the cutest fucking thing I’ve ever seen in my entire fucking life,” Jonghyun announces loudly. Involuntarily, almost, because as soon as Taemin tapped to reveal the soft brown dachshund Jonghyun could physically feel his serotonin shoot through the roof. He grabs for Taemin's phone as Taemin bursts into laughter underneath him. Gosh this dog is so fucking cute. She has little dark and white spots. 

Quickly, Taemin starts grabbing for his phone back. He starts making half-baked shushing noises in between his laughter, too, and when Jonghyun glances around, he finds out why. What few people are in this restaurant are staring at them. 

Jonghyun tries to be quiet, he really does, but he catches the quickest look at Jinki rubbing his fingers into his eyes behind the counter and he starts laughing as well. 

He does, though, at least manage to get off of Taemin and sit in his own seat and put his face into his hands to muffle it a little bit. Which is good enough. Probably. And a few minutes later, he’s put himself back together enough to cuddle up against Taemin and watch the video he's trying to show him on his phone. 

It's a music video for a band that Jonghyun doesn't know but immediately likes. They enjoy it together and when it's over they pick another music video from the recommendations, and then another. They're jamming at such a politely quiet level that Jonghyun is honestly proud of himself. It's hard for him to be quiet when he's listening to music that he likes but he is doing such a good job. He bets Jinki is so proud of – 

“Jonghyun.” Jinki's voice cuts through Jonghyun's hearing, stern and sharp. He jumps, looking up with wide eyes. Jinki is at the counter, looking directly at him, full tray of food in his hands.

“Oh, fuck, were we number 19?” Taemin drops his phone and scrambles for their receipt.

"Was he calling our number? Fuck." Jonghyun didn't even notice. Quickly he gets up and walks to the counter, trying his very hardest to look guilty but landing again, he thinks, on just amused. "Sorry, Jinki honey," he says, flashing Jinki his prettiest smile. He grabs their food tray, heartened by the way he can tell that Jinki isn't really mad. He's just fed up with everything else and low on his usual endless supply of patience. 

And actually maybe not even that, because now that Jonghyun has had a minute to process it, something about his expression was very familiar to him. "You know," he says, smirking and leaning closer. "The way you were looking at me, kind of looked like, you know,” he wiggles his eyebrows, “when you're getting ready to punish m–"

He's cut off by the sudden sound of a bunch of little objects falling and scattering all over the floor; looking around, he finds Taemin at the ketchup station fumbling the last of the tiny cups out of his grip. He stands there for a moment, frozen, and then starts scrambling around to pick them all up. "I got it!" He calls out. "Don't worry about it, I'll fix it!" 

"He's so cute," Jonghyun says, shaking his head fondly. He's their little gremlin and he's doing his best. Jonghyun turns back to Jinki to look for a reply.

Jinki has his face in his hands. 

#jongtae #jongyu #ontae #jonghyun #jinki #taemin #onew #pg #fluff #oneshot #Jinx is so tired and he puts up with so much but what he's mostly grumpy about is that he can't be laughing with them #Of course he snuck Taemin the dinosaur toy and Jonghyun a little plushie guy #They hang out until his shift is over and smooch him lots and Drive him home and make him dinner #and he goes : )

[lollytea]

mmm okay opinion (☕ emoji I guess if this counts for that game) on huntlow and pda/physical displays of affection. Are they big on it? Do they not like to do it in front of people? My personal hc is hunters too flustered to do anything other than a hand-hold/pinky-link in public but when it's just him and willow he's touch starved and even a bit clingy. But I want to hear your thoughts boy 👁️👁️

YEAH YEAH YEAH This is also my hc about it!! And it's not even just Hunter who has reservations about being overly affectionate in front of people, but Willow too. It's the vibe I'm getting from little details like her waiting until everybody else leaves the room to flirt with him in TTT or not initiating the finger link in FTF until everybody was distracted by Stringbean. Like. She is shy. She feels weird about being so open about it when people are watching.

But I also feel like, though they aren't sickeningly sentimental in front of others, they are usually touching in some capacity. So yeah. Linked fingers. Or holding hands. Willow idly resting her weight against Hunter. Subtle stuff like that. And if they're not touching, they're likely standing very close together.

I dont think they're completely devoid of PDA. Like I definitely think they do shit like this while they're out walking.

Willow likes to have his arm. She is a gentleman. 😊

OH and while they don't dare kiss as shamelessly as Luz and Amity do...Hunter occasionally gives Willow goodbye smooches. Even if they're hanging out with the others. It be like this

It's always her forehead he kisses cuz her forehead so perfectly aligns with where his mouth is. She is the ideal height for it. And this is calculated too. He'd be embarrassed to do this and stick around for the others to make fun of him so it's always right before he has to leave. He plants that smooch and immediately teleports off the scene. He refuses to face the repercussions of being mushy with his girlfriend!!!! It drives Willow insane because hello??? She doesn't get to leave just yet. She has to just stand here with the others and be blushy and giggly about it. Do you even care, Hunter??? Do you even care about your girlfriend??? And she hates it cuz she likes it and no matter how embarrassing it is, she doesn't not want goodbye smooches, so she just has to put up with it. Fuck this guy!!!

But yeah!!! YEAH!!! If nobody else is around, Hunter is actually really touchy. He was very hesitant at first during intimate moments and Willow had to manually guide his hands to her face, her waist, wherever she wanted his hands to be. But as he got more comfortable with the fact that he was given permission to touch her, he gradually shifted into this fervent eagerness whenever they're alone. It kinda flusters Willow actually. She wasn't entirely prepared for it. Even after she gets used to it, he still has the ability to mentally trip her up.

Like he'll usually show up at her place after a long, soul draining kind of day. And they'll barely get their "hellos" in before he's suddenly bundled her up in his arms, squeezing her tight against his chest (Willow's like "Okay...okay...this is happening...be cool, this is happening....") and pressing a light kiss against her lips. It's a nonverbal question. Like "I feel like doing a lot of kissing? Can we do that right now??" And Willow rarely says no. She can't always manage a yes either. Just a little nod because WOW!!! OKAY!!! YOURE JUST GONNA BARGE INTO HER ROOM AND SWEEP HER OFF HER FEET???? NO CONSIDERATION FOR THE FACT THAT SHE WAS DOING HER HOMEWORK AND NOW SHE CAN'T FOCUS ON ANYTHING ELSE BUT YOUR STUPID MOUTH!!!! DO YOU EVEN CARE?????

Anyway, yeah. Very subtle acts of PDA. But Hunter is an absolute menace once he gets the hang of this whole "having a girlfriend" thing. Hands all over her. He has the audacity to make her feel loved to the point of idiocy. Disgusting.

#(i was planning a little fic that might include these elements so i didnt want to go too into detail about hcs) #(but i hope this suffices) #huntlow

[ecoamerica]

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[y0itsbri]

hii bri, how are you? 🥰

how do you think ian and mickey spent their weekend? ☀️

hello twisha my beloved 💞 i am well thank you ☺️

(thank you for the ask, this got kinda long oops)

ian started out saturday morning with a quick jog around the neighborhood. he easily could have spent the weekend morning sleeping in late and snuggling with mick, but they had plans for the day so ian wanted to start off the day with his normal routine.

he picked up smoothies on his way back from his run, a 'berry good' workout smoothie with added kale and protein for himself and a peanut butter banana chocolate smoothie for mickey.

mickey was already awake when ian got back. well 'awake' was a strong word, given that he was wearing his blanket like a cape while waiting for the coffee to brew with half closed eyes. he perked up a little bit as the door locked close behind ian. ian set the smoothies on the counter and gave mickey a lingering hug and forehead smooch because he's too irresistibly cute in the mornings.

they have a chill morning sitting out on their balcony until debbie comes over to drop off franny around noon. over the past few months, franny had gotten really interested in her uncle ian's gardening and he promised to take her somewhere real cool this weekend.

debbie and ian chatted by the doors while franny enthusiastically showed uncle mickey a super cool rock she found yesterday and mickey told her about how he knows this 'dinosaur guy' who has some super cool rocks that they keep in a museum. franny asks if the dinosaur guy wants her rock for the museum and he tells her he'll ask him next time he sees him.

they pack some snacks in a backpack and head off to garfield park conservatory. they were a little out of their element but they got their tickets for all the exhibits. ian's expression matched franny's in its awestruck wonder as they took in the sights. mickey and ian took turns taking pictures of each other and the flowers in a very 'tourist mom' fashion. franny insisted taking a picture of them together and directed them exactly where to stand. mickey stuck his tongue out in the photo and got reprimanded by franny who insisted they smile, almost a mirror image of her mother's attitude. mickey smiled in the next photo, but ian leaned over to kiss mickeys cheek. franny threw her arms up in frustration and they finally complied. ian lifted franny on his shoulders for the rest of their time at the conservatory.

franny fell asleep eating goldfish crackers on the drive back to their apartment. mickey gently picked her up and carried her inside, setting her on their bed to nap while he and ian started making dinner: french fries, chicken strips, and apple slices. they cracked jokes with each other and one of ian's belly laughs woke up franny who ran into the kitchen, crashing into his legs and hugging him. he told fran to pick out a movie to watch while they ate dinner.

franny is well equipped with using disney plus, so she put on 'luca.' they all settle into the couch and eventually settle into each other once they had finished eating, franny making her way onto uncle mickey's lap with ian's arm around mick as well. one of mickey's fingers traced ian's wrist before linking along with his fingers. ian spent half the time watching the movie and half the time staring at his enchanted husband.

after the movie finished, fran turned around to look at them and asks uncle mickey if he had been crying. he denied it but ian and franny shared a knowing look. ian affectionately squeezes his shoulder while franny gets herself some oreos from the kitchen while they wait for debbie to come pick her up.

ian and mickey spend the rest of their night drinking some new beer ian had picked up at the liquor store and watching sitcoms to relax and relieve the big emotions that came from the kid's movie.

sunday morning was spent in mickey's favorite way, sleeping in late with his husband. the soft warmness of each other and the blankets covering them being pure bliss.

mickey popped some frozen waffles in the toaster for breakfast while ian turned on the tv to catch some of the morning news. it's kind of a gloomy day outside, but that's okay because it's their cleaning and grocery shopping day anyways. ian had followed in fiona's footsteps by making sundays chore days... whenever he felt like it at least.

mickey swept the floors and did laundry while ian wiped down the countertops and made sure the dishwasher was loaded. mickey bitched about one of their neighbors from down the hall, but then revealed that said neighbor had invited them to their barbeque down by the pool next weekend. mick had said he would have to make sure ian didn't have any plans. even though he was content with the friends he had, ian was proud that mickey had become more amenable to the idea of hanging out with new people sometimes.

now that they regularly shop at a nicer grocery store, ian had been determined that they eat better. but somehow, every time they go shopping, they end up with half a cart of frozen meals and snack foods. there's not much complaining because that shit is good. it is what it is.

the other week, ian had picked up a guitar on sale from the music shop next to his yoga studio. both ian and mickey had been fucking around with it in their free time. this evening, mickey tried teaching ian what he knows about guitars, but it went a lot like how it went in friends when phoebe tried to teach joey guitar.

eventually, mickey ended up on the balcony for a smoke while he scrolled through instagram, seeing a new post of mandy in some fancy sunglasses and palm trees in the background. he double taps and comments some dumb shit knowing mandy is probably rolling her eyes at him from a thousand miles away.

ian was just getting off facetime with lip and freddie when mickey comes back inside. ian tells him about all the cute shit that freddie has been up to lately and lip's success at his new part time job where he mentors kids interested in robotics and coding. ian also mentions that carl is stopping by after his late shift so he can bring them takeout for dinner from their favorite asian restaurant on the south side.

they ate their stir fry, spring rolls, and crab rangoons with the house's specialty sauce as carl complained about his new partner and mickey muttered an 'acab' under his breath before ian kicked him in the shin.

after carl left, the boys headed to the bathroom for a rather spicy shower and then laid in bed watching tiktoks with ian's head resting on mickey's chest as they fell asleep. 🖤

#i just realized i kinda skipped lunch for both days but like imagine it's there lol #grumpymickmilk #ask #my posts #shameless #gallavich #ian gallagher #mickey milkovich #franny gallagher #carl gallagher #lip gallagher #freddie gallagher #ian x mickey #debbie gallagher

[peralta-guaranteed]

Mac and Jake reading and talking about their day in a hammock (at the cabin without the Santiago’s except their favourite one) Amy coming to see them hc 

It's been a day. That's the best thing Amy can say about it all as she steps out of the shower, finally having washed off all the grime and sweat that had accumulated on every inch of her during the course of said day.

It had started out with a very simple plan. Victor had texted them on wednesday to inform them that the Santiago cabin was actually free this weekend (a rare occurrence, considering all 8 siblings were constantly fighting over getting it for a weekend trip) so they should lay claim to it if they could make the time - and a quick chat with Holt made sure they could. So, by friday evening, their bags were perfectly packed and waiting in the car, ready to drive over to Karen to pick up Mac and head straight up to the cabin.

Then that big break-through in one of Jake's cases had happened, and he didn't make it home until 11pm, tired and weary and with a big bruise on his hip that he said was fine, but made him whince when he picked Mac up. Holt had relented and offered them the monday off as an apology to save their weekend getaway, but they still didn't get on the road until almost 11am on saturday because Mac had had a massive blowout right around the time they were dressing him to leave.

And then the thing with the tire happened halfway through. Amy changed it like a pro - you never unlearn that, obviously - and waved a mental goodbye to her summer dress, now covered in grease and dirt. Mac had gotten a little overheated during the change, and ended up fussy and whiny for the rest of the drive. And whatever they'd picked for lunch at that truck stop had given her the worst stomach cramps she could remember having - and she'd given birth, after all - so Jake took fussy Mac to the passenger seat to let her lie down in the backrow, constantly worrying about how having a baby in the front seat was a major safety violation, even as Jake kept to the right and drove as slow as the honking and raging cars around them allowed.

And then they'd arrived at the cabin only to discover that Julian and his friends, who'd had it last weekend, had left it in such a state of disarray that Amy genuinely considered whether he had any Santiago genes in him at all. (It wasn't really that much of a mess - she was certain Jake wouldn't have minded at all, but she still spent a good hour cleaning up and sorting everything through while Jake put away their own things and food supplies and changed fussy Mac into a more airy outfit to crawl through the now clean place.)

After all that, Jake had only given her kiss and a knowing look. "Go take a shower", he'd said, knowing it was half for her to feel clean again, and half to get her head set back straight to relax, "as long as you need. I'll entertain Mac outside."

And that's where she finds them when she steps onto the porch with a new, clean, bright yellow summer dress. She can see the hammock that has been hanging at the edge of the woods for decades now swinging softly, Jake's flipflops and a bottle of water and a fruit pouch underneath it. And she can hear his voice, soft and a little bit deeper than usual, a tone reserved for story time and lullabies.

"So the No-nicorn, for the last time, took a deep, deep breath and said: NO!" He finishes as she carefully stalks closer, not wanting to interrupt. "Man, your Mama's not gonna be too happy if that ends up being your first word by accident. Maybe the book's not such a good idea, hm? Need to step up the cariño game some more to make it stick." He continues while the book closes with a soft thud.

Mac lets out a little gurgle.

"I know, but it would be a sweet surprise, you have to agree." Jake continues as if the baby on his chest has said something wortwhile, and Amy stops on her way to them. Mac is a little babbler, even though he's far from forming proper words, yet Jake has taken to replying to him as if he were, and she's only ever caught the end tail of their 'conversations'.

"What a day we had, huh, buddy? Mama had to do a lot today. And she was supposed to relax..."

Mac seems to shift as he answers with a few noises.

"Yeah, she's a superhero, you're right." Amy fights a smile as Mac squeals.

"You think so? I dunno. I think more Captain Marvel."

Another gurgle.

"Mac, just because you're obsessed with Gal Gadot doesn't mean Wonder Woman is the only super heroine in the world."

Mac's reply sounds almost indignant.

"Okay okay, you're right. Anyway. We gotta make it up to her somehow. What do you think about getting a head start on dinner?"

A definitely delighted squeal - they've been giving him more and more 'adult' food to chew on, which he loves.

"No, you can't keep asking for chicken nuggets. They're like 99% fat. At least ask for tater tots, those are vegetables in a way."

"They are not." Amy interrupts the little scene as she steps up to the hammock, finally getting a proper look at her two boys in summer shorts and tank tops, Mac resting on his back against Jake's chest, chewing on the edge of the soft cover book they've just read. "You know we got him a broccoli and carrot mix for tonight."

"Ames, you can't give him broccoli after I promised him tater tots."

"Well then you shouldn't have promised him tater tots."

Jake sighs, but grabs her hand to pull her a bit closer and press a kiss on it, the only part of her he can reach without moving too much in the hammock and subsequently falling out of it. "Feel better after the shower?"

"Definitely. But I think dinner can wait a little bit. I need quality time with my babies first. Think you can make some space in that little cocoon you two built?"

"Normally I'd give a strong yes to that, but I'm not sure if the hammock can hold us all." He shifts anway, holding Mac tight against him as the whole construction sways a bit less softly as it did before.

"Well it can hold two 19 year olds during a make-out session, from what I remember, so I'd say it's pretty sturdy." She grins while she slips into it, laying down carefully against Jake's side as his arm wraps around her.

"Santiago!" He gasps. "I don't know whether I should be proud, turned on, or a bit grossed out by that. Didn't know I was bringing our son into a place of teenage debauchery where his Mama was smooching some other guy years ago."

"It's okay." Amy continues to grin as Mac tries to crawl over to her, stroking her fingers over his smiling, chubby cheeks. "I can fix it by smooching his Dada in it later when he's asleep."

Jake tilts her head up by a soft pull on her hair for that, and presses a kiss right onto her still smiling lips. And even though the weekend has started with more chaos and troubles and worries than they probably would've ever expected, she's sure it's going to be a great one despite it all.

#b99 #brooklyn 99 #jake peralta #amy santiago #mac peralta #peraltiago #ficlet #my writing #my fic

[classic80sand90smovieloves2]

Meeting and Dating Randy

(Not my gif)(requested by @westanimagines )

(I tried my best with the few scenes we had of him <3)

- You meet Randy when you get a job at the grocery store. You get introduced to the butcher and pretty much everyone else during your first break with your new coworkers. From the moment you laid eyes on him there seemed to be something about him that pulled you in.

- Sadly, the two of you don’t see very much of each other considering he’s usually behind the scenes and you’re more on the floor. But every now and again you’ll have to go and get something from the back and you’ll bump into each other.

- Whenever everyone is on break together, he’ll shoot you glances from across the table. He’ll look over at you when he or someone makes a joke, finding your laugh adorable and smiling along with you. You tend to not notice it but every now and again you’ll catch his eye.

- You kind of feel bad that he’s stuck down there with no one but maybe Produce Joe to interact with so whenever things are slow you poke your head in and say hi. You start a sort of friendship with him and wind up getting pretty close, closer with him than any of your other coworkers at least.

- He never minds the company, in fact he looks forward to it. A pretty girl coming to pay him attention; what more could he ask for in this line of work? A raise maybe, but this was good enough for him.

- During one of your breaks, one of the other girls had asked if you had a boyfriend since they’d been telling you about a problem they’d been having with theirs. You chuckled and told her “it was kinda difficult to meet guys on a vampires schedule”. Randy just so happened to hear and was pleasantly surprised.

- For someone who spends a lot of time alone in a dimly lit meat locker he sure is good at flirting. You’re surprised when your usual banter turns into something more suggestive and complimentary but you certainly don’t mind.

- Not too long after your conversations started to take a turn, he invited you out for drinks at a bar down the road from the store. Even though you’d usually be too tired to do anything after your shift you happily accepted.

- You left work together and soon after you found yourself laughing with him as the two of you sat in a booth, sipping your drinks. He recounted stories that your bosses and coworkers had yet to tell you and had you in stitches with his own tales from behind the shelves.

- You really seemed to click as the night went on so you were excited when he said he’d like to “do this again sometime” as you walked out to your cars. He opened your car door for you, gave you a warm smile and headed over to his own vehicle. You were grinning the whole ride home even though you were starting to feel the effects of staying up later than you should’ve.

- Jennifer and Linda wanted all of the details when you went into work the next day. They could hardly act natural as Randy passed your little group as they attempted to bombard you with questions. You could see him give a knowing grin as he walked towards his station, leaving you flustered and your friends ecstatic.

- You ended up going out together again later that week, and then again a day or so after that. You were really smitten with each other.

- The two of you had your first kiss while you were at work waiting for your shifts to be over so you could go on your fourth date.

- You’d been moving some boxes into the back of the store when you’d heard a noise coming from the far end of the room you were supposed to be in. Obviously the sudden interruption scared you, especially when it came from somewhere you knew no one else was.

- You’d accidentally dropped a box when you’d gotten spooked which is what prompted Randy to come out and check on you. You assured him you were alright but mentioned the noise, still slightly (yet admittedly irrationally) shaken. He checked around for you, coming up with nothing once he was finished.

- It helped but you still weren’t completely comfortable. He teased you a little, gave you a hug and before you knew it his lips were on yours. It was definitely a nice way to be calmed down.

- Perhaps it’s not the best for people to date their coworkers but let’s just say you’re very happy you gave it a try.

- The extent of his pda is a quick kiss and hand on the small of your back or shoulder when you’re standing together. He’s not a huge fan of smooching you in the public eye.

- You drive to work together, usually in his car.

- You’re called either pumpkin, babe or sweetie, and of course sometimes just an abbreviation of your name.

- You usually wind up eating all your meals together. He’s pretty fond of Italian.

- He sneaks little bits of food whenever you’re cooking. He is a nuisance in the kitchen.

- He has his own place; albeit small, so you tend to hang out there, cuddling on the couch, watching a movie/tv show and drinking a beer.

- He doesn’t make a lot of money so you rarely have expensive dates. Not that either of you mind, just being together is good enough for you.

- He has a habit of coming in at bad times which is something you’ll just have to get used to. I mean it doesn’t happen all the time but make sure to lock the door if you’re dealing with something you don’t want him to walk into.

- Hands. Just hands. Butchers need to be steady and calculated yet I can see him having a slightly rough touch at the same time. ...Yum.

- Randy just looks tired so you tend to take naps together after work. Or he’ll occasionally fall asleep on you while you run your fingers through his hair.

- The two of you usually wind up with his feet on the coffee table and yours in his lap whenever you’re on the couch together. Either that or you’re pretty much laying on top of him.

- Even though he acts like a smartass he actually does like hearing about your day and the different stories that you have.

- He’s pretty fond of teasing you; doesn’t matter what it’s about he just loves doing it.

- He likes to mouth things at you when someone’s back is turned, trying to make you laugh while they’re distracted.

- He loves seeing you having a good time. He’s a pretty funny guy so it isn’t hard for him to make you laugh. Plus, his smartass behavior usually ends up doing the trick if his jokes don’t.

- You play pranks and attempt to spook each other.

- He’s a fan of horror in general so the two of you watch a lot of scary movies together.

- Baking cookies together.

- Stealing his flannels.

- He tends to misplace his belongings so you often know where he puts things more than he does.

- Mistreats appliances and tools; sometimes you feel the need to apologize to the things in his home. Poor half broken washing machine.

- He can be a baby when he gets hurt, he’ll keep fussing over his injuries until you help him or kiss them better.

- He has to lift heavy carcasses all day so he’s pretty strong. You need help lifting something or want to be lifted yourself than he’s your guy.

- He’s used to seeing a little blood and other gross things so theres not much that disturbs him. He’s perfectly fine in a lot of situations whether it be when you mention your period or want him to get rid of a dead animal in your yard.

- He thinks it’s cute if you don’t like being around the meat or thinking about him butchering. He always smiles when you give him a grimace as he talks about his work or whenever you see the hanging bodies.

- Sometimes you’ll catch him murmuring songs while he works; you think it’s cute. If you ask him sweetly enough he may just sing to you.

- Your mom probably loves getting the best of the best whenever she shops at the store or when you take home groceries.

- Your parents probably love him unless they’re super vegan and despise the meat industry. Your dad is especially a fan of his since he can make a conversation out of nothing and make the older man laugh like it’s no ones business.

- He offers to warm you up whenever you visit him in the meat locker and absentmindedly mention how cold it is.

- On that note~ He is basically a human heater; you sort of have to be to handle being in the cold nearly all day.

- Bar dates. He greatly enjoys teaching you how to play pool if you don’t know how.

- Having barbecues together.

- Sitting on the sink or bathtub ledge as he shaves in the morning.

- Showering together.

- He’s not a very jealous guy but he will tell someone to to fuck off if he finds them flirting with you, mostly because it’s obvious you’re uncomfortable.

- He’s pretty protective of you; and has a bit of a temper, so he’s prone to starting arguments or yelling at people in your honor.

- Making out in the back of the store and having quickies in the bathroom.

- Getting each other for lunch. You usually sit next to him with his arm wrapped around the back of your chair.

- He taste tests things for you. If something looks a little weird he’ll take a bite before you do to make sure it’s safe.

- Occasionally chatting with Produce Joe when you’re waiting for Randy to be finished with something. You’re like the only person in the store who really talks to him besides Randy. You get a taste of the freshest of fruits in return for your kindness.

- Comforting and ranting to each other when you’re told the news about the store. He’s definitely a little more upset than you are, considering he was cheated out of a whole two week paid vacation.

- Trying to help each other find new jobs when you’re laid off.

- He tells you he loves you quite a bit. It’s not hard for him in the slightest, he knows that he does and has no intentions of letting you go anytime soon.

- You picked a keeper; even your parents agree with you on that. You have to bribe your mom during the holidays to not bring up marriage. Not that it takes very long for him to propose to you ;)

#intruder 1989 #intruder imagine #intruder headcanons #intruder headcanon #intruder 1989 headcanons #intruder 1989 headcanon #intruder 1989 imagine #randy intruder 1989 #randy intruder #80s movie imagine #80s imagine #80s movie headcanons #80s movie headcanon #80s movies #80s imagines #80s movie #80s movie imagines #sam raimi #sam raimi imagine

[yodawgiherd]

First kiss pt.2

Rating: T

>>>Read on AO3<<<

Eren's experience.

All things considered, the dance was rather easy to execute in the end. Making sure that Carla saw as much of him as possible, Eren followed the instructions that he had memorized to perfection, putting on a happy face for his mother. After all, she was the reason why he even bothered going to the prom in the first place. Personally, he didn’t see the appeal of the event, the dance that would in the later hours spiral into a party full of drinking, smoking, and other activities which he fell no need to partake in. He was single-minded, focused, and his goal was becoming a doctor, anything else was an unnecessary distraction. But when his mother said that it would make her happy if Eren attended this thing, it was more than enough to make him go. He did love his mother dearly, although he sometimes had trouble expressing it.

Now the dancing part was done, most of the adults left, leaving the kids to enjoy the company of their friends before they leave for all the different colleges they’ve been accepted to, perhaps never seeing each other again. It should feel nostalgic, in a certain way, but not for Eren. Armin was the only one who he would miss from his class, and he was accepted to the same school Eren was, meaning that they would not be separated. Hell, they even had a dorm together, so it was more likely that he would get sick of his blonde friend before missing him. And of course, the only other person he might miss, Jean, was also accepted to the same college as the two of them, so Eren wouldn’t even get rid of that horse face. A tragedy.

He certainly did miss Armin right now, however, as Eren was standing outside, breathing the chilly night air, with the party going strong inside. Without his presence, he was slowly but surely getting sick of it and contemplated going home, knowing that Carla would be happy that he attended the prom to its fullest, which in turn made Eren happy. It was understandable that Armin ditched him, as his grandfather was sick and the blonde had to take care of him, so it was not like Eren blamed his friend. If his mother needed anything, he would stay home for her in a heartbeat. To summarize, Eren did what he came here to do, did his best to appear happy during the afterparty, said all the completely insincere goodbyes, and was more than ready to call it a night and dip. That was, until he heard a voice, saying his name.

“Eren? What are you doing out in the cold?”

Turning his head slightly to the left, he saw a shadow approaching, that soon formed into the shape of the girl he danced with, the one with the interesting name.

“The party is inside,”, Hitch continued, stopping next to him, “and people are still not that drunk, so you can actually talk to them.”

“I know, I just…”, he gestured towards the moon, “wanted to get some fresh air. A lot of smoke inside.”

It was, of course, forbidden to smoke inside the school building, but not like anyone ever bothered with taking their habits outside. Especially when it was so cold.

“Not a fan of smoke, huh. I get it, I don’t really like it either.”, hugging herself against the cold, the girl stomped her feet, getting the blood flowing, “But it’s really freezing out here.”

“Maybe you should head back in?”, Eren offered, only realizing how rude that sentence was when it left his mouth. But Hitch didn’t seem too bothered by that, shaking her head.

“I will, soon, but I want to talk to you first, and this place is as good as any.”

Eren didn’t mind talking, or Hitch’s company, she was a sweet enough girl, so he nodded, waiting for her to begin.

“The dance was fun, wasn’t it?”

“It was fine, hope I didn’t hold you back too much.”

Hitch grinned.

“No, you helped me quite a bit actually. And you managed to lead without stepping on my toes, I was impressed.”

Eren’s eyebrow rose.

“Impressed that I didn’t stomp your feet?”

She shrugged.

“Just didn’t take you for a dancer, that’s all.”

“I’m not,”, he admitted,” just memorized the steps.”

“Memorized?”

He nodded.

“Oh.”, Hitch did look a bit taken aback by that, “I thought you practiced.”

“With who? Mom?”

Eren did contemplate asking his mother for help, but in the end, he decided against it. He preferred doing things on his own anyway and learning a few steps to perfection was much easier than studying in preparation for the medical college, albeit he enjoyed the latter much more. Hitch shook her head, looking down at the ground, her cheeks beginning to slightly blush for a reason Eren couldn’t decipher.

“I didn’t mean your mother, I meant like.. you know… your girl?”

“Girl? I don’t have any.”

“Oh…”

Hitch looked back up, something of a new hope lighting up behind her eyes as she suddenly changed the topic, spiraling Eren even deeper into the confusion hole.

“So, leaving for college soon, huh? Gonna miss anyone from here?”

Albeit courtesy probably required him to say otherwise, Eren decided to just say the truth. Lying to Hitch didn’t feel right for some reason.

“Nope, not really. I’d miss Armin, but he’s coming with me, so I’m good in that department.”

Hitch signed, sounding really exasperated for some reason. Hm.

“Really, no one?”, she tried again, “Not a single person?”

While having the general idea that he’s missing some point she was making, hand to heart, Eren couldn’t crack it. Deciding that sticking with the truth is his best option, he just shook his head.

“Nope.”

“Right. Well, glad to hear that you have it all figured out. I just thought… I thought…”

Hitch trailed off, running out of ways to send signals Eren’s way. He was just so hopeless.

With the silence that followed her words, he looked to the right, to see what she was doing, and was confronted with her staring at his face, jaw working over some unsaid words, a sort of inner conflict going on in her head. It was like she wanted to do something, but not really, and wasn’t sure if doing it will help anything in the long run.

“Ah fuck it., she murmured.

Reaching out, Hitch took hold of Eren’s completely motionless face, and pulled him down to her height, pressing her lips against his. It was nothing serious, just a quick kiss, more like a peck, which ended as fast as it began, with her pulling back, the blush on her cheeks going strong. The innocent smooch left him completely stunned, however, as Eren had completely no idea how to respond to this, what to do or say, so he just stared at her, mouth still hanging slightly open. And that was when Hitch decided that she did everything in her power, and there was nothing else left to try.

“I hope that you’ll like it at your college.”, she whispered, turning on her heel and making a swift exit, leaving only a whiff of her perfume behind. And Eren was left to stare after her, the gears in his head slowly turning.

What the hell just happened?

“Wow.”

“What?”

“I mean, I know that you can be dense, but this?”, Mikasa shrugged, “This is something else. Poor girl.”

“Oh, so it’s my fault now?”

“It’s not anyone’s fault, it’ just..”, reaching over the table, she took Eren’s hand into hers, “you are so… you, it’s adorable.”

Eren couldn’t help but grin.

“I’m me, huh? Well that’s reassuring.”, looking up, he could see that their table was being approached by the same waiter who brought the wine, so he winked at the girl who was still coming to terms with the thick-skull of her boyfriend.

“Food’s here.”

Technically Erwin was right, the food was good, great even, the people at the kitchen certainly knew what they were doing. The taste was not the problem. But looking over the table, Eren could see that the hunger written in Mikasa’s face was still going strong, even after finishing. Not that he was surprised anyway, because the portions were, for a lack of a better word, tiny.

“That’s it?”, she whispered under her breath to him, as if expecting the waiters to come again and bring real food this time, after this joke one.

“I think it’s stylish right now, to eat little.”, he whispered back, “Look around, everyone has similar quantities to what we got.”

“Baby, I had training with Levi today. I don’t care what’s stylish, I need my energy back or I’m going to die.”, she did her best pleading expression, the one that Eren could never say no to, no matter how hard he tried, “Can we get out of here and get some real food, please?”

Declining was not an option.

“Let’s go.”

The guy who worked the night shift at the fast-food drive-through window didn’t even look surprised when they pulled up, dressed for a gala or a similar thing, as he’s seen much worse cases daily. Deciding that home was too far, they just parked themselves at the lot, sat on the hood, and Mikasa could finally satisfy her eternal hunger, at least for a time. And while she was finally getting her fill of energy, Eren, not that starved, twirled a fry in his fingers, watching her.

“You know, this reminds me of our time in college. We used to go out to eat all the time.”

“That’s true.”, she murmured around the food, eyes slowly but surely inching towards his uneaten stuff, “You didn’t cook that much back then.”

Surrendering his fries, as Eren expected was bound to happen, he leaned back, watching the moon overhead.

“I had other things on my mind.”

Next to him, Mikasa audibly chuckled.

“That’s one way to put it.”

Returning her grin, Eren put an arm around his fiancé with a sigh.

“It was fun though.”

Sure was, remembering everything they did back then, it moved them towards what they are today. And what was it? Well, among other things…

#fanfic #eremika #snk #aot #hitch dreyse #;)

[ecoamerica]

Watch the 2024 American Climate Leadership Awards for High School Students now: https://youtu.be/5C-bb9PoRLc

The recording is now available on ecoAmerica's YouTube channel for viewers to be inspired by student climate leaders! Join Aishah-Nyeta Brown & Jerome Foster II and be inspired by student climate leaders as we recognize the High School Student finalists. Watch now to find out which student received the $25,000 grand prize and top recognition!

#ACLA24 #ACLA24HighSchoolStudents #youtube #youtube video #climate leaders #climate solutions #climate action #climate and environment #climate #climate change #climate and health #climate blog #climate justice #climate news #weather and climate #environmental news #environment #environmental awareness #environment and health #environmental #environmental issues #environmental education #environmental justice #environmental protection #environmental health #high school students #high school #youth #youth of america #school

[viraljournalist]

Ten NBA things I like and don't like, including the Luka Doncic-Dwight Powell dance

New Post has been published on https://viraljournalist.com/ten-nba-things-i-like-and-dont-like-including-the-luka-doncic-dwight-powell-dance/

Ten NBA things I like and don't like, including the Luka Doncic-Dwight Powell dance

How about a fresh serving of 10 NBA things:

1. The tricks of Ja Morant

Morant’s athleticism and fearlessness strike you first. He is so fast. He wants to dunk on everyone — to humiliate victims, the bigger the better.

All that is cool. But what is most impressive about Morant — the runaway Rookie of the Year — is his veteran craft. He already knows how to start and stop with a live dribble, and keep defenses guessing until the best option reveals itself. He sees every pass. He imagines passes no one else sees, and conjures them with dribble moves designed to shift the defense in some specific way.

You just don’t see rookies doing stuff like this:

That fake spin — the Smitty — dusts damn near the entire LA Clippers team. The one-handed lefty gather into a reverse layup is borderline pornographic. That insta-gather is already a Morant trademark — useful in tight spaces.

He has a mean pass fake:

He busts it out on the perimeter to freeze help defenders:

A lot of ball handlers turn statuesque when someone else takes the controls. Not Morant. He weaponizes his speed as an off-ball cutter.

Morant isn’t the only reason the Memphis Grizzlies — 13-6 since early December — have improbably surged into the Western Conference’s No. 8 spot. Their three core big men — Jonas Valanciunas, Jaren Jackson Jr. and Brandon Clarke — are balling, and their bizarro bench is obliterating opponents.

But Morant is driving it. He is real. He is a superstar in the making playing winning basketball. He belongs at the edges of the All-Star conversation right now.

2. Drivin’ De’Aaron Fox

After two months of injuries and uneven play, Fox is back on his ascent toward becoming the Sacramento Kings’ franchise point guard. In seven January games, Fox is averaging 24 points and 8.5 assists on 50% shooting. He is driving more often, with more guile and ferocity.

Fox is earning seven free throws per 36 minutes — easily a career high. He is piling up almost 29 drives per 100 possessions, second among rotation players — and up from 15 and 18 in his prior two seasons, per Second Spectrum data. He has drawn fouls on 13% of those drives, 16th highest among 173 guys who have recorded at least 100 drives.

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Fox is still searching for the right pass-or-score balance, and the Kings under Luke Walton haven’t landed on a coherent identity. (Injuries to Fox and Marvin Bagley III have stalled progress there.) They are playing at one of the league’s slowest paces, though they amp it up some with Fox on the floor.

The next step for Fox is dialing in on defense, where he has disappointed this season. The Kings won’t go anywhere too serious until the Fox/Buddy Hield backcourt proves it can survive on that end.

3. Forfeiting mismatches

A pet peeve:

This isn’t about the Orlando Magic. Every team does this now and then: Spot a juicy mismatch, and default into a pick-and-roll that allows the defense to switch that mismatch away.

The Utah Jazz are stuck with Emmanuel Mudiay on Aaron Gordon. If you want to post Gordon up, do it when he can mash a smaller dude. Instead, D.J. Augustin and Gordon gift the Jazz a switch.

Come on. Disengage autopilot and read the game. The right kind of post-up can still be an effective scoring option. They also are fun to watch. The league needs stylistic diversity.

You know who rarely bungles this? The Indiana Pacers with Domantas Sabonis. Their old-school mentality serves them well when they earn a switch, or when the opposing power forward is stuck defending Sabonis. The Pacers in those scenarios are ruthless. They are surgical. They abort whatever plan they had and hunt that mismatch.

4. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, off the glass

The notorious S.G.A. is already one of the league’s shiftiest ball handlers — a long-limbed, change-of-pace phantom who seems to move at two or three different speeds at once. Guarding him is like trying to catch a fish with your bare hands.

He also is a premier bank shot artist, smooching from unconventional angles:

That is a little close to the baseline for most players to go glass. Gilgeous-Alexander has the touch to pull it off. That one hits pretty low on the backboard, but Gilgeous-Alexander will kiss the ball off the tippy-top if need be.

The straight-on banker is underused — a tricky work of depth perception that can increase your margin for error on harried floaters. Gilgeous-Alexander has it in his bag:

Only 10 players have attempted more glassers than Gilgeous-Alexander, per Second Spectrum. (Russell Westbrook has tried by far the most — almost double the No. 2 guy.) Coming off a ridiculous 20-20-10 game, Gilgeous-Alexander has a fringe All-Star case: 20 points, six rebounds and three assists per game, decent shooting, solid defense.

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It is a hard case to parse. Each member of Oklahoma City’s three-headed point guard monster has sacrificed something. Gilgeous-Alexander has stepped back into a secondary ballhandling role behind Chris Paul (probably a better All-Star candidate) and Dennis Schroder (in the running for Sixth Man of the Year). Gilgeous-Alexander has logged only 40 minutes as solo floor general — without either Schroder or Paul.

I recently debated with a few non-Thunder executives whether Gilgeous-Alexander would grow into an All-NBA player. That they framed the question in those terms — and not around whether Gilgeous-Alexander will make All-Star teams — is indicative of how good he has been.

5. Still waiting on Aaron Gordon

Boy, did Gordon need this recent mini-hot streak: 60 points on 23-of-39 shooting over Orlando’s last three outings, and a last-second game-winner Monday in Sacramento. It has otherwise been a stilted, disappointing season for Gordon.

I thought this was the year it might finally happen for him. I predicted Gordon would make the All-Star Game.

Instead, Gordon’s production on offense has dipped across the board, though he remains engaged on the other end. There are three theoretical Gordons: the player Gordon wants to be; the player Orlando wants him to be; and the player Orlando needs him to be because of their roster construction. The actual Gordon is paralyzed in some sort of existential tension between all three.

The first player — Gordon’s dream for himself — is a ball-dominant scorer. Orlando indulges that Gordon by calling occasional post-ups for him and giving him some freedom to go rogue. Gordon can make hay against smaller players. He has done well on scripted duck-ins. But too many of his forays into would-be stardom end with bricked fadeaways:

A player this powerful should not spend so much time spinning away from the hoop. He rarely draws fouls. The Magic have scored 0.826 points per possession anytime Gordon shoots out of a post-up or passes to a teammate who fires right away — 74th among 96 players who have recorded at least 25 post-ups, per Second Spectrum data. He is not much of an inside-out playmaker. A full 77% of those post-ups have ended with Gordon shooting — the second highest such rate in that sample.

The best version of Gordon on a good team is something like his take on Draymond Green: screening and rolling as a power forward, spraying passes (Gordon is an underrated playmaker), defending like all hell across every position. The Magic have never put Gordon in optimal position to find that role. They shoehorned him onto the wing next to Serge Ibaka and now Jonathan Isaac.

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That is not on its face unworkable. Some of those ultra-big Magic lineups have performed well — including last season. Talented frontcourt partners render positional designations irrelevant. What position would Gordon play next to, say, Kevin Durant and a traditional center in Brooklyn? Isaac has some blossoming all-around skill on offense.

But Isaac also is very young. Before Isaac’s injury, it felt — from the outside — Orlando was reaching the point at which it would have to make a final call on Gordon. There are teams who would give a lot for Gordon. Isaac’s knee injury may have put off those decisions. The Magic don’t have to rush. Gordon is still just 24.

But stasis often becomes untenable.

6. The Bucks, going under

Almost every team scurries under picks against bad shooters, but Milwaukee does it more dramatically and against many more players. The Bucks treat every so-so shooter like Ben Simmons. Present Milwaukee with Kris Dunn or RJ Barrett (two recent examples) and its on-ball defenders hang almost in the paint — a step or two further back than most teams prefer. They form a shell that is really hard to puncture.

They don’t deviate if some Dunn type hits a couple of long 2s. The Bucks understand math. They know their scheme plays mind games with opposing shooters — even non-terrible ones. They’re going so far under. This is embarrassing. Am I really supposed to keep shooting? Boom — the shot clock is down to 8, and you’ve accomplished nothing.

This is such low-hanging fruit. Every team should imitate Mike Budenholzer’s exaggerated “go under” ethos.

Of course, later playoff rounds offer very few awful shooters — and almost none beyond Simmons who handle the ball. It would be interesting to see Milwaukee’s approach in a series against the Miami Heat and Jimmy Butler — shooting just 27% from deep this season and 36% for his career on long 2s.

7. When young guys forget who is guarding them, Part I

Oh, Jordan Poole.

That’s Kawhi Leonard. At his apex, the mere act of possessing the ball within a 15-foot radius of Leonard was dangerous for anyone outside the league’s most deft point guards. Forget dribbling. Poor saps held the ball close to their chest — terror sweat pouring from their brow, eyes darting in search of some passing target — until Leonard would simply reach out and take it. It was cruel. It was bullying.

Leonard isn’t the same impenetrable wall today, and he saves his best stuff for high-leverage playoff moments. But you can’t be Jordan freaking Poole and dangle the ball in front of him. This is like living next door to Thomas Crown, buying a masterwork, and leaving your front door wide open all night. What do you think is going to happen?

There has been much fretting of late about the Clippers’ underwhelming performances against the dregs of the league. Meh. One of Leonard and Paul George has missed most of those games. Wake me up when the real Clippers struggle.

The Clippers also seem like a mortal lock to make a win-now trade. They have use-it-or-kinda-lose-it assets ticking toward evaporation. They can trade their 2020 first-round pick, but that is the last one they can move (as things stand now) before their 2028 selection. They have Maurice Harkless’ $11 million expiring contract, and a few semi-expendable midsized salaries.

The Clippers would rather add talent (via in-season free agency) without trading anything. Harkless is solid — a starter most of the season. That 2020 pick represents one of LA’s only means of acquiring a young player who might help Leonard and George as they age.

But the Clippers are all-in. George and Leonard can hit free agency in 18 months. They should prioritize this year over everything.

Part II of young guys failing to respect their elders is coming next week.

8. Respect the Mavs’ other big men

I never got the mostly quashed rumblings Dallas might be interested in Andre Drummond. Kristaps Porzingis should eventually play more as the Mavs’ lone big man, and in the meantime, Maxi Kleber and Dwight Powell are doing just fine alongside him.

Skeptics in the preseason perceived the Mavs roster as top heavy: two stars and a motley crew of bench guys. It’s true (it’s damn true!) Dallas does not have anyone like a third member of past championship Big 3s. But they do have (by my count) seven guys you might describe as quality fifth starters — seven fifth-best players, all but one (Tim Hardaway Jr.) on value contracts. There is power in giving zero minutes to below-average players.

Powell has always been a dangerous rim-runner, but he has exploded as Luka Doncic’s go-to pick-and-roll dance partner. Only three player pairs have teamed up on that play more often. (For trivia purposes, the top three in volume: Spencer Dinwiddie/Jarrett Allen, Damian Lillard/Hassan Whiteside, and the Lou Williams/Montrezl Harrell symphony.)

The Mavs average a ginormous 1.18 points per possession anytime Doncic or Powell shoots out of the pick-and-roll, or passes to a teammate who launches — ninth-best among 226 duos who have run at least 100 such plays, per Second Spectrum.

Powell has improved as a passer on the move — crucial when teams trap Doncic:

Kleber does a little of everything. He’s a serviceable screen-and-dive guy. He is hitting 41% from deep on a career-high attempt rate, and he makes canny plays off the bounce when defenses rush at him:

Kleber is a sturdy, smart defender across multiple positions. Rick Carlisle has trusted him to guard extra-large ball-handlers, including LeBron, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Simmons. He’s a solid rim protector with some hops.

Dallas is starting Kleber and Powell in the absence of Porzingis, and the Mavs have outscored opponents by 13 points per 100 possessions with both on the floor.

Kleber and Powell earn $18 million combined this season — $9 million less than Drummond. Drummond holds a much-discussed player option for 2020-21. Kleber and Powell are under contract through 2023. Leaving aside money and whatever assets Detroit might demand, it’s unclear whether giving Kleber/Powell minutes to Drummond would even make Dallas any better.

9. Miami is one player away, but who?

This is a minor quibble considering the Heat are 28-12 and a robust 10-6 against teams at .500 or better. Maybe the “one player” is Justise Winslow, who is still out with a back injury after returning for a single game last week.

Winslow is (in theory) the well-rounded small-ball power forward to unlock lineups featuring Bam Adebayo at center. Meyers Leonard is shooting 45% from deep as Miami’s nominal starting center, but there are lots of games in which he never sees the floor after his first stint in each half. Kelly Olynyk is barely playing.

Follow Zion, Ja, RJ, De’Andre, Coby and more top rooks as they balance basketball and life during an exciting NBA season. Watch on ESPN+

Right now, Derrick Jones Jr. and James Johnson are holding down that Winslow slot. Johnson looks feisty after a long stint in Heat purgatory. He’s 10-of-20 on 3s. But his jumper is unreliable, and he is regaining the team’s trust.

Jones has taken the lion’s share of these minutes over the last month. His arms are everywhere. He is the keystone of Miami’s zone defense. Lineups with Jones and Adebayo at power forward and center have done well.

But are you trusting Jones to close playoff games? He’s shooting 23% from deep. Defenses ignore him on the perimeter to muck up Miami’s spacing.

Miami has tried to solve the equation at times by going super-small, with Jimmy Butler at power forward. That is a little too small. Adebayo is so strong and athletic, you forget he’s only 6-9. Miami has been a middle-of-the-pack defensive team after a stingy start. They have to be careful.

They are one player away from being really dangerous. They know. They are looking, sources say. A lot of speculation about the Heat — and other teams — has centered around Jrue Holiday. He’s good. The Pelicans may opt to keep him and push for the No. 8 seed. (This is what suitors expect as of now — which could of course change.)

But I wonder if Miami has a more pressing need for a stretch power forward with some defensive chops to fill that Winslow/Jones/Johnson slot. (Winslow returning to form could render this moot.) Danilo Gallinari would be a worthy rental, but the Thunder might be too good to trade him. It’s also unclear whether Miami has any appetite for surrendering any players who are or could be (i.e., Winslow) key parts of their current rotation.

Regardless, keep an eye on Miami.

10. Marcus Smart is coming at you

What in the hell is this?

I’ve seen defenders close out low to distract shooters, but they usually resemble football tacklers. They aim for the stomach. I’m not sure I’ve seen anyone crouch toward the shooter’s foot. Smart looks like he’s trying to pick something up off the floor.

I honestly don’t know how anyone shoots 3s against Boston without worrying what kind of goofy closeout awaits. Jaylen Brown jumps straight up and down with all his might, and reaches both arms as high as he can — a technique Al Horford mastered, and something the Celtics teach. Brace for that, and Smart comes nipping at your ankles.

What’s next? Jayson Tatum running at shooters, screaming gibberish and waving his arms? Kemba Walker experimenting with some kind of drop-and-roll technique?

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[sarsaparillia]

title: into the endless night summary: Alex and Jonas, stumbling through the aftermath. --- Alex/Jonas.

rating: t-ish word count: 6500+ genre: roadtrip fic! + smooching and ghosts notes: hey look, it’s the sequel to once more with feeling

AO3 | FFN 

—

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Evening is pale lilac.

It's one of those nights where nothing feels real, where everything is just the right side of off-kilter to set her teeth on edge. Golden light spills out of the windows like expensive champagne and Alex draws her nails along the skin of her wrist. Ren's babble winds through Clarissa's snarking beneath Michael's alcohol-smooth laugh, the clash and clang sharp as a looped feedback squeal. All the stars have gone out and it's too loud inside, too warm, too close, so she sits outside on the front stoop with her knees up to her chest and her face to her thighs while she tries to figure out how to breathe again.

(It's not a haunted house, but some days it feels like it.)

You should be used to this by now, something in the back of her head says.

And yeah, maybe she should be. Maybe she should be used to feeling like darkness coats her skin, maybe she should be used to feeling like she's outside of reality, maybe she should be used to not being okay. The ghosts used to sit on her shoulders and whisper soft sweet nothings to her, dripping venom and vitriol into her system, a slow-acting poison, and even though they're gone now they're not really gone, because—

She is sitting out here alone.

Ghosts, one. Alex, zero.

It's always like that, though. You win once, and then you're playing Hangman on a chalkboard without chalk, running blind through the rain. There's no winning that game, and Alex should really have learned her lesson by now.

But she hasn't, not really, so instead she sits out on the porch alone while her friends laugh from inside. And it's good, it's okay, Alex is only a line of noise out of static, anyway. She can count on one hand the number of times she hasn't disappeared from a party in the last six months. People would worry, if they knew there was anything to worry about.

Jonas usually finds her before she gets into any trouble. It's not a terrible thing.

The porch creaks beneath her, splintery old wood just in the beginning stages of rotting away groaning beneath the weight of a second person. For a minute the noise roars, sound pouring out of the open door. Alex gets halfway through a flinch, and then it stops. Quiet, again.

"I figured you'd be out here," comes Jonas's voice. "You want company?"

Alex shrugs.

She hasn't decided, yet.

Jonas waits by the door, doesn't move at all. He's always been good about that, about waiting for verbal confirmation of whether she wants something to happen or not. Sometimes, Alex thinks she might like it if he sat down beside her without asking, but the fact that he always makes a point to ask makes him one of the most stable people she knows.

And making out on the dock under the sun and the mist is one thing, but things change after the sun goes down. Right now, Alex isn't the same person she was yesterday morning, and she's not sure if she wants to inflict herself on people right now, even if those people are just Jonas in ratty jeans.

She weighs it for a while.

And all that while, Jonas waits.

A breeze shivers its way down her collar. For a summer night, it's pretty cold; gooseflesh breaks out all over her arms. Alex tips her head and like, that's as good as it's gonna get.

The porch creaks beneath his weight, because yeah, he gets it.

He stays standing, though. Alex thinks that sometimes, Jonas knows her better than she knows herself.

"Let's go somewhere," he says.

"What?" Alex squints up at him. He's in silhouette, standing in the warped backglow of the glass doorway with his hands stuffed in his jacket pockets. His face is swallowed in shadow, only shifting lights for eyes. That's not ominous or anything. "Go where?"

"I dunno. Somewhere," he shrugs, jerks his head at his truck, parked on the side of the road. The headlights flick on and off, the quiet click of locks unlocking made visual.

"Why?"

"I don't wanna be here right now."

He doesn't say you look like you're about to tear your skin off to get away from yourself, but that's what he means. Alex can hear it in the hanging in the air around his shoulders, in the space between seconds. There and not. Ghosts of themselves. Always ghosts.

Aw, crap.

Alex unfolds from the porch, all of her bones creaking. She feels so old. This place is in her bones, sunk inside of her. She carries it like she carries the empty plot of land where Michael's grave used to be, and not even a hundred parties can take that away. She carries it like she carries Edwards Islands, like she carries Maggie and Anna, like she carries the blank space between resets. She carries it like she carries the ghosts.

"What if I don't want to come back?" she asks him. The night colours up around them black and rotted, and it's not the only one. She hasn't slept in days. Steady, Alex, steady. "What if I want to keep going?"

"Okay," Jonas says. "We keep going. You're gonna have to learn to drive, though, I've gotta sleep sometimes."

"I know how to drive," Alex says, which is a lie, she is a lying liar who lies, she has no idea how to drive whatsoever. It's not that she's scared of flying metallic vehicular death, but yeah, okay, she's sort of scared of flying metallic vehicular death. She's been close to the end enough times to not want to go there.

(Four people drowned at Cape Meares. The red pulsing light from the headlamps in a locked car. And Jason sounds a lot like Jonas. Jason sounds way too much like Jonas. God, there's just no leaving the ghosts behind, is there.)

"Stick," clarifies Jonas, grinning. He's not privy to the wheels Alex's mind are turning. "You have to learn to drive stick."

"You're the worst," Alex manages, and she's unsteady as she stands but she's always unsteady, so what the fuck ever, right. The night slips further into itself, turned the colour of a bruise blooming violet-dark above them and Alex wraps her arms around herself like a shield. "I mean—yeah, okay. I can drive stick. I can totally drive stick!"

"Yeah, you can," Jonas says. He drapes an arm over her shoulders, and Alex goes kind of grudging until the seams of their jeans brush. Gathered close like this, it only takes a minute for all of her muscles to begin to unknot. His thumb draws a line along her collarbone.

Alex doesn't have the heart to push him away. He's warm. "I'm not twenty yet."

"Yeah," Jonas says. "But I am."

She squints up at him again. "I will push you off the dock, do not test me."

"Already tried that, Als, it didn't go over awesome," and they both remember the weathered-silver wood, the sun-shot fading mist, the island in the distance lurking like a hungry thing. A distant chill runs over them, a ripple of time and loss and forgiveness. It's so quiet these days.

"Yeah, well," Alex says. The crook of his body is an okay place to be, and yeah, things are still—they're still delicate, sometimes, still difficult and too big and she should be over it! She knows she should be over it, okay, she knows. But that's not the way things work, that's not the way Alex works, that's not the way the ghosts work. Worked. Past-tense. They don't work at all, anymore, do they.

Alex takes a shuddery breath in. Alex lets a shuddery breath out.

"You gonna be okay?" Jonas asks the top of her head.

"I dunno. You really wanna run away with me?" Alex shoots right back at him.

"Yeah," Jonas says, like it's easy. For him, maybe it is. All of his muscles go lax, this weird little smile crooking up the corner of his mouth. "So. Wanna go?"

"God," Alex sighs. "More than anything."

And so they do.

They go.

— — — — —

Jonas drives too fast, flying down the highway towards the state line like the ghosts have come back grasping from the gates of hell (but they don't and they haven't, please god say they haven't), until there's nothing but the motion-blur outside the window, the summer-new leaves reduced to dark impressions along the side of the road. Alex dozes with her head against the window.

Michael's jacket is a shitty pillow but Alex couldn't bear to leave home without it. The radio is left untouched in the back of her underwear drawer wrapped in Maggie's stories and Anna's letters, and she very carefully didn't look at them before they booked it out of town. Her parents had been watching TV. They didn't hear her leave.

(There are some things that she can't let go of, and maybe that's okay. Healthy? That's a different question, but no one's here here to tell her that her coping methods are going to get her killed, so whatever. She's only running away for a little while. It'll be fine. It always is.)

The highways are deserted, this late at night. The occasional passing vehicle's headlamps are the only light, washing passively over their faces, bright then not. They're far enough away from the city already that the light pollution's faded, and the galaxy sprawls out above them, a diamond-covered blanket soaked in ink.

Inside, the truck is very quiet.

Alex doesn't sing anymore, but that's alright. No one else does, either.

And she doesn't reach for the knob of the radio, because that's still impossible. It feels like it's always going to be impossible, because sound is waves and waves are drowning and drowning is the ghosts underneath a hundred million tonnes of water.

It's dumb, Alex knows that.

But associations are hard to shake off, especially when you've played the game so many times that you don't freak at the jumpscares anymore. She doesn't have enough fingers to count out all the ways that's fucked up.

So instead she draws on the window and thinks about Jonas, about the toothpaste cowlick on the back of his head, the weird difficult way he looks at the world with his jaw up and out like he's daring it to come at him. They're all problem kids, really, but Jonas is quiet about it; it's the cigarette and the leather and the beanie, the wide shoulders and the habitual background lurking thing he does.

It's like this: Ren has his drugs and Clarissa has venom glands and Nona visits the graveyard like she can't stop. Michael dreams about running after Clarissa, and Alex dreams about running until she can't run anymore. Jonas stands in the background, a break in the river, a stone in the storm, ready to go whichever direction Alex picks.

That's pretty fucked up, too, now that she thinks about it.

"I'm sorry," Alex says.

"What? Why?"

"I just am," she tells him. A car goes whooshing by, and his face is lit up for a split-second. His eyes are very green. Alex's stomach twists, pain or pleasure or both or maybe neither, maybe something else entirely like want or regret or self-loathing. It's a lot of things, maybe. Emotions are like that. Sometimes, they're too big for names.

"Don't be," Jonas says. The road curves, a ribbon of grey silk disappearing into the gloom, and the steering wheel curves with it. "Nothing to be sorry for."

There is, though.

There are always things to be sorry for. Alex turns back to the window, and wonders if she'll ever be able to listen to the radio ever again.

Lonely hours slip by in the silence, and they drive and drive and drive. They drive and Alex counts the lines in the corduroy, the dust motes in the passenger cup holder, the cigarette butts in the ash tray. They drive until Alex is nearly asleep, or maybe is asleep, until—

it's raining. your hair sticks to your face, to your lips tinged blue. there's water dripping down your neck, down his neck, your starboy laughing into the force of the storm with his jacket up against the wind to try to keep you dry. edwards island's main street is drowning, rain a whole symphony in the gutters, and you duck down between two close-spaced buildings with your palms wound into his shirt to drag him somewhere a little more dry. alex he says, alex we're already soaked what are you doing, and you turn and his collarbone is right there. against his skin you say shhh don't make a sound and it's so close, so warm, he's laughing again and

—moonlight limes the horizon, and then Jonas flicks his blinker on.

"I'm hungry," he says into the silence between them. Alex blinks into wakefulness. Weird dreams. There's salt on her lips.

She doesn't question it.

But she does question his choice in rest stops.

"Are you serious right now," Alex says when they pull off onto the tarmac of a little roadside turnout diner, and it's not a question. The Last Dance proclaims itself in bright neon red-violet, bulbous incandescents flickering sepia gold, a cheerful pink sign in the window glowing OPEN. It's one of those disappearing heart-of-the-Americana-drain places, liminal simply because it's already halfway gone. Everything smells like just-baked apple pie and that peculiar not-quite-smell-not-quite-taste of diesel and dreams that infuses all roadside diners. The lights are on inside.

But the shadows stretch long, and Alex thinks that if she had her radio, it would be singing all kinds of death songs.

Wet pavement shines, but it hasn't rained in days except inside of Alex's head. Come play with us, soldier, she hears, all soup-can jingles on the breeze. There are ghostlights blinking in the distance. If there was a piano, it would be playing itself.

Holy man, this place is haunted as shit.

"Coffee," says Jonas. The smeary lines beneath his eyes are enough to have her reaching across the console for the keys. He can't drive like that, it's not safe, and she doesn't want to die tonight.

"Why didn't you say anything?" Alex asks over the clink of metal, even though it's a stupid question. She knows why, and when he looks at her in the dark with eyes like holes in the world, she wishes she'd never asked. It's easy to ignore the puddles in the cracks in the ashphalt. "You're exhausted, Jonas, jesus."

"You wanted to go," he tells her.

And that's just—that's just Jonas, isn't it. Of course, he hadn't stopped because he thought she wouldn't want to; she'd said as much before they left, hadn't she? Alex hates herself. She runs a hand through her hair, catching on tangles in straw.

(She still needs a dye job. She always needs a dye job.)

"Yeah," Alex says. It punches out of her, such a hurting thing. "I guess I did."

"So," Jonas says, like he doesn't blame her for it, like he could never blame her for it. It twists all of her insides into knots. "Coffee?"

"Coffee," she says, because, man, why not?

Fifteen minutes later, Alex is rethinking that assessment. Jonas orders pancakes, and when the waitress brings them over, he pushes them right across the linoleum table without a word. A white plate, the pancakes are golden and beautiful, soaked in whipped cream, dripping buttery syrup. There is a strawberry.

"Are you serious right now," she says again.

"Eat your pancakes," Jonas advises, slouching back against the booth's wall-corner, eyes closed. Leather squeaks against leather as he shifts. The mug of coffee sitting between them steams thinly, little pale tendril like ghost hands reaching up towards the ceiling. Alex watches it for a minute without saying anything, chewing on broken glass words, shatter-shard and metal red in her mouth. She can still hear the Morse beeping through the static: still here, cannot move, very cold, love—.

"We are going to get murdered," she mutters at last, which, probably. Across the diner, the tired-eyed waitress raises an eyebrow like she heard it, which, also probably. It's not a big place, this diner, and the shadows are very hungry.

"Pancakes," Jonas says again. His eyes are still closed, the jerk. Who even looks like that after a night of driving? Who sits like the whole universe is an opportunity? It's not fair, and even more so because of the perspiration running down the side of Alex's glass. Rain, salt, oceans. Grief in all its forms. "Eat them."

"Death first," Alex stabs viciously at her plate.

"Been there, done that," Jonas kind of grins out of the corner of his mouth. It makes his lip pull up right where he normally sticks his cigarette, and the worst thing is that he's not wrong. It would be so much easier if he was. It would be so much easier if she had no idea what he looks like when he laughs.

Because dying isn't permanent when time is just a construct.

Alex eats the pancakes.

(The dream lingers for a long time. Hours later, she can still taste the rain.)

— — — — — 

"So is this Tour de Haunted America, or are you punking me?" Alex asks, after Jonas has paid and they're strapped back into the truck. The tips of her fingers feel like ice; it's not a nice feeling, all the worse for being one that she knows. The Kanaloa ghosts were always cold, too—every time they gave Jonas or Clarissa or anyone else back, the body would spend fifteen minutes shivering the frost in their souls away—so it stands to reason that every other ghost would be, too.

"What makes you think it was haunted?" Jonas asks levelly. The truck hums beneath them, roadsong murmuring up through the faded corduroy seats and into Alex's bones. It's a warming thing. She tucks her freezing fingers underneath her thighs.

"Really?" Alex raises a skeptical brow. God, he's the worst, she can't believe she likes him. If he was wearing his beanie, she would pull it down over his eyes. Then they'd crash and die and become ghosts themselves, so maybe not. "We're gonna go there right now?"

"We're always going there, Als," says Jonas.

Well, they're always going somewhere.

Alex turns her face back to the window, inhales deeply and holds the air in her lungs until the beat of her heart slows to something a little more manageable. Her reflection looks back, all big dark eyes, brown skin, bleached-out bangs.

She's had other reflections, but this is the one that she knows the best.

Ang god knows, she owes him this much.

"I could feel it," Alex says, low. "It was like, shadows? I dunno, I can't even explain it."

"Try," says Jonas.

Alex sighs. Her breath fogs the window, and yeah, it was kind of like that, kind of not. All she has is impressions: merry red lanterns to lead the way, devoured suns inside the great gaping maw of the universe, the sharp jut of a collarbone in the rain, Clarissa's red curl of a smirk falling backwards out of a window. Hauntings feel like that, she thinks, that same edge of unreality.

Like peeling back flesh from bones.

"Do you remember when Clarissa died?" she asks the dashboard.

"Which time?" he asks, so casual.

Well, that's dark. "All of them."

"Yeah, I remember."

"It's like that," Alex says, takes a breath. This is still difficult to talk about, but at least he sort of gets it. At least he won't look at her like she's something unfixable. "Like—layers. We watched her fall, what? A hundred times? A thousand times? It always turned out the same, and then they stacked—"

"Memories on top of memories," Jonas nods. "Déjà vu."

"That's French for already seen, you know that, right?"

"Alex," Jonas stresses her name. He doesn't really need to say anything else.

"Okay, okay, be grumpy," she says airily, and when Jonas's mouth twitches like he's going to protest, Alex reaches over to poke him in the side just to watch him squirm. That it keeps him from interrupting her is secondary, but also appreciated. "Anyway, it's that. Feels kinda… heavy. Like there's too many people, but not enough space."

Jonas catches her wrist. With his thumb against her pulse, for a minute they both just sit there and count the beating of her heart. One-two, one-two. He tethers her to the real world, does Jonas, anchors Alex back in her body when she can't figure out how to do it for herself. His hands are just on the other side of too-warm, callused all over and nearly uncomfortably rough. His dad had him mowing lawns all summer, and the mower is an old one, made of splintery wood. She doesn't know why she thinks of it, because it's something so mundane.

But for the first time in a long time, Alex doesn't feel like she wants to climb outside of her skin, so she just goes with it.

"Jesus, you're freezing," Jonas says, shaking his head. "Put your jacket on."

Michael's jacket, she wants to say. Michael's jacket.

But there's no way to say that without making it weird, even though Jonas probably won't be too judgy about it. It's not like he's the pinnacle of stable mental health, either; his mom's still dead.

(Sometimes Alex wonders if he begrudges her this: she brought Michael back because she couldn't stand not to bring him back, because broken dishes and broken hearts aren't the same thing, because she had the opportunity to erase the cataclysm that destroyed her whole life and he didn't. Sometimes she wonders if Jonas would do the same, if he had the choice. Sometimes she wonders why he didn't get the chance, but that never gets very far because it always ends up making her grit her teeth. God, she wishes so many things.)

Alex puts the jacket on.

Jonas turns the key in the ignition.

Into the endless night, they go.

— — — — —

They're four hours outside Camena's limits, far past where the city meets the sea, on a long empty stretch of stretch of road that hasn't seen another soul in probably a hundred years. It's a forgotten space, time-out-of-time, and that's exactly what Alex wants. There are some things that shouldn't be said in daylight places.

(Or when operating flying vehicular death traps, but that is another story entirely.)

"Hey," Alex says, "can we stop here?"

Jonas looks at her out of the corner of his eye like he's been doing all night, half measure and half respect and all exasperated, cracked-out affection. But it's not even a question. She can feel his foot heavy on the brake as the truck shudders, slows. Stops.

The night air is cold and wet with saltspray, the crash of the ocean against the rocks. But it's quiet, it's so quiet, there might be no one alive for a hundred miles. Civilization could end and neither of them would ever know, and it wouldn't be a terrible thing.

Alex climbs out of the truck without a word.

(Jonas follows her because Jonas always follows her. What else is there?)

After the island, they'd done this a lot—snuck out during one of Michael's parties to go driving out into the middle of nowhere, where no one knew their names. Not this far away from home, but something like it. In the back of the truck bed there are blankets in a box, half a bed already made just waiting to be laid out.

"Naptime?" Jonas blinks at her. "Seriously?"

"Naptime is great, don't front," Alex says. She yanks the blankets out of their coffin, thick handspun wool that she'd stolen out of her parents' house six months ago and hadn't ever given back. Her mom had looked at her, once, with ancient eyes.

But she hadn't asked about it, and Alex had no answers for her. Has no answers, for anyone.

Alex looks over her shoulder, out through the tangle of her hair around her face. "Are you coming?"

"Yeah, okay," says Jonas.

The truckbed dips beneath his weight, and they arrange themselves in the messy nest that she'd made. It's not elegant. It's not pretty. It's two kids trying to figure to figure out who they are, even though they have no idea who they are, not really. A boy and a girl. A girl and a ghost. A ghost and a shadow. the aftermath of a supernova, like nothing left. Like rain on lips from forgotten dreams, or forgotten lives. Alex feels scraped raw, but Jonas is a garbage snowman and she's a hole in the universe, and it's—it's okay. Maybe. A little bit.

Because then they're just laying there, and it's quiet, and it's good. Comfortable. Warm. And safe, and maybe that's the most important part. There's a screaming two inches of space between his shoulders and hers, and it's still too much.

Alex can feel the words welling up in her throat, tight and hot and laden with heartache.

"I can't swim," she whispers into the empty black dome of the sky.

"…Huh?" says Jonas.

"It's why—I mean, Michael wanted to teach me, you know? The lake, that's why we were—" and she stops, breaks, washes ashore. It heaves in her chest, wretched, such a howling grief. She can still see his hand reaching for her through the water, shimmering sun-speckled blue-gold. It's been a hundred days, or maybe a hundred years, and it still gives her nightmares. "That's why. The whole thing. 'Cause I can't freakin' swim."

"Huh," he says again. "Hey, move your head."

"What?"

"Just do it," Jonas says.

Alex moves her head.

When they settle again, he's somehow managed to get his bicep beneath her neck, arranged her close enough that they're touching from hip to shoulder. Alex blinks upwards, thinks about putting her cheek against his arm where his shirt's ridden up, skin to skin. His body is right here, and she could. She could.

"Shouldn't you be mad or something?" Alex asks the sky, instead.

"Shit happens," Jonas says. His muscles ripple like he wants to shrug but he also doesn't want to dislodge her head from his arm, so there's that.

"Okay, I'm sorry, but that's like, the worst excuse ever, man. And that's including the ghosts' whole let us have your bodies so we can pretend to be alive again thing," Alex says. "Shit happens. Seriously?"

"Shit does happen," Jonas says mildly, but she can hear the grin in his voice.

"Even when your brother drowns and it's your fault?"

"It wasn't your fault," he tells her, painfully gentle. "You came down after me, remember? If it was anyone's fuck-up, it was mine."

"You didn't fuck up," Alex murmurs, shaking her head back and forth like a crazy person. There's winding panic in her throat like there always is when she thinks of the lake; lake, water, rain in the gutters, drowned and drowning, a collarbone and a kiss. "If Mike hadn't—if I hadn't—if he'd just listened—"

"Woulda, coulda, shoulda," Jonas says into her hair. He's kind of mashed his face against her skull, speaking low and soft to calm them both down. "Als, breathe."

Right, breathing. That's like, a thing.

Alex gulps down air, gulps air, gulps.

"In to the count of seven, out to the count of eleven," Jonas says placidly. "C'mon, breathe with me."

It starts in the fingers, the uncontrollable tremble. Then it's the shrinking of the world, the black around the edges of the vision, the sudden saltwater sloshing behind the eyes, the breathe alex breathe breathe breathe you gotta breathe shit will you please breathe—

(She never used to be like this.)

"Crap," Alex says, a long time later. She sounds like she's been gargling soda and salt. "Sorry."

"Not something to apologize about," Jonas says, and his eyes go hard when Alex opens her mouth to protest. There's a line of pale pink on the horizon; it's an hour to sunrise, maybe two, and it's getting easier to see. "Als, don't apologize. Not for this. Not ever."

"I got snot on your shirt."

"Yeah well," he shrugs. "I've had worse things than snot on my shirt."

"Like what."

"Ghost goop?"

And it's that phrase, ghost goop, that breaks whatever was left of Alex's composure. She's exhausted, anxiety draining away, and Jonas is a dumb idiot who says things like ghost goop. Who even says that?

Alex hides her face in his side, and she laughs until she can't breathe. It's catching, too, because then Jonas is laughing, and then they're both laughing, like a pair of power-mad maniac supervillans. Two kids here at the end of the world before it's eaten into the sea, laughing and laughing and laughing.

"God," Alex says, the last bubbles of mirth easing the words. "Ghost goop."

"Ghost goop," Jonas grins. "Feeling better?"

"A little," slips out of her, not quite a murmur but close. The exhaustion leaks out of her, a loose-faucet of tiredness. "Let's never do that again, okay, that sucked."

"You wanna sleep? We can," he tells her.

The truck-bed blanket nest is perfect for curling up and sleeping off an anxiety attack, but Alex mostly just wants to stay where she is. If she sleeps, she'll dream. There's no telling where that will go, especially not after the night they've had. Edwards Island plus a panic attack plus a haunted diner multiplied by the heady attraction of Jonas' skin equals nightmares, probably. "The sun's almost up. Is there even, like, a point?"

"There's always a point to sleep, Als."

"Pfft, whatever man, says you."

"Says every bad decision I haven't made, because I get enough sleep, unlike some people," Jonas says, and actually has the gall to stick his nose in the air like he's not also rocking the insomniac eye-luggage.

"Oh my god, there is not one single bad decision you haven't made," she says.

"Is, too!"

"Name it," Alex grins at him with all her teeth. She has the emotional range of a teaspoon. "I dare you."

"Well, I mean. There's this," he says, waves a hand to indicate the… everything around them. The night sky turning light along the edges of the world, the moon's pale face a luminous disc beginning to wither in the coming dawn; this dark and quiet place they've found themselves in, safe and warm, is far away from the ghosts they carry.

"Okay, no, this was a terrible decision, Jonas. Like, no thought went into this decision. I said I wanted to run away, and you just, like, went with it so don't even front," says Alex, but then she's kind of smiling, so soft it's almost not there. "Thanks, though."

"For what?"

"Getting me outta there," she murmurs, turns her face into the crook of his shoulder. Something hot and tight had throbbed in Alex's chest all day, an ugly red beat that abated only with miles passing beneath them. Trapped in her parents' house, trapped in her own head, Alex hadn't been able to escape the cyclical nature of the thought patterns but, well—

Jonas gets it, which doesn't surprise Alex at all.

I'd do it again, he doesn't say, just shifts enough that he can press his chin to the top her head, and they stay like that for a long time because it's easy, it's so easy to just lay here and breathe together. There are no obligations, just silence and stardust the glow of far-off silvershot nebulae.

"What's a bad decision, then?" Alex asks, very quietly, what feels like an aeon later.

For a whole endless breath, Jonas is perfectly still.

It's a blur of movement, shadow-dark skittering smearing into her head going thud against the truck bed, into knees and elbows digging in, into the rush of blood beneath skin and heat and then—

Jonas hovers above her, looking down.

"What are you doing," Alex says, the echoes of a long-dead conversation soft like new leaves in her mouth. His chest is solid beneath her hands, beneath his shirt, the bones of him all elegant lines straining around her. He keeps her safe like that, legs tangled, arms a cage. She could leave if she wanted to but she doesn't want to. Alex wants—she just wants.

"Making a bad decision," Jonas says. He brushes her washed-out hair out of her face, and she catches a flash of his white fingers. Alex tilts her chin just enough that his knuckles graze her cheekbone. "Hey, we're not dead yet."

"I know we're not," she says. "How is this a bad decision?"

"You just had a freak out, Als, I wouldn't say it's great."

"I dunno, it could be worse. We could totally be possessed," she pauses to stare him up and down. There's a challenge hidden in the corner of Jonas' mouth like a drift of cigarette smoke on a cloudy day, and she raises her eyebrows at him. He doesn't get to be the only one that dares the world to come at him, does he; Alex is just as bad. "Are you going to kiss me, or what?"

(They're both going to eat it someday. Probably they already have.)

"If you want me to," Jonas says.

"I do," Alex says, raw and honest with it. Sink-spill, ghost-riders, starboys with their empty eyes and their canvas skin, she wants. She just wants. "I do."

"Cool," he says, voice hoarse, and he's close enough now to count the flecks of hazel-grey in his eyes, close enough now that their noses bump. There's nothing sexy about it. She doesn't know why it's endearing. "Cool."

When Jonas kisses her, Alex keeps her eyes open.

They both deserve to remember this, after all.

— — — — —

"D'you think Maggie and Anna are… you know, together?"

"They're okay, Als."

"Okay isn't the same as together," Alex murmurs. They've migrated inside, the chill of the pre-dawn air sending them skittering back into the truck. She pulls her knees up to her chest, Michael's jacket tucked between her shoulder and the window. It's a bright spot of colour in the grey morning light, a bloom of crimson, satin-soft.

"Better than not okay, though," Jonas yawns. There are little purple violets of exhaustion pressed underneath his eyes, blossoming night flowers that can't be smeared away, no matter how much Alex would like to.

They're going to crash, pretty soon, the both of them.

"Mm, I guess," she says, dropping her head back against the window. "But I mean—they're dead."

(Dead like his mom, dead like her brother, dead like the ghosts.)

Jonas looks at her. His eyes are soft. "I know what you mean, Als."

And Alex thinks about Michael and Clarissa, and the future, about time's strange and arbitrary rules on how she lives through it. She thinks about Ren and Nona, off-again this month, and about school and leaving and all the things that come after graduation. College, or travel, or… whatever the heck it is that teenagers do to become adults, whatever a person does to figure themselves out.

She thinks about the fact that in graveyards, she can feel the press of the dead like butterfly wings, whispering softly in her ears. She thinks about the fact that she knows what a final goodbye sounds like, that she knows the taste of time, that she knows the feel of sand slipping through fingers. People look at her like she's crazy, sometimes. Even Michael does it, and that hurts the worst.

Alex thinks about the fact that she still keeps that stupid radio.

"I don't think I'm ever gonna be normal," she says. Her hair falls into her eyes, and she shrinks behind it 'til all she sees is teal-turning-blonde, nothing but a sunlit sea. Alex thinks of rainwater down a window, streams converging, one thing becoming another becoming another becoming another, and doesn't know how to explain.

"The hell is normal, anyway," Jonas says. He rolls down the window and there's a spark, a tiny flame alive then dead; he exhales opaque smoke.

"That's going to kill you," Alex says, but this is an old argument, and nearly fond for it.

"Everything's killing me. Might as well enjoy it," Jonas grins at her around the cigarette, startlingly white, startlingly charming. He turns sober and quiet when he looks at her, though, eyes going soft. "Normal's overrated, Als."

"No, I mean—" and Alex breaks off, chewing on the words, trying to pick the right ones for what she feels. "It's like, Clarissa's going to Boston, right? And Nona got that scholarship to Juilliard, and Ren's aiming for UCLA, and it's like, it's like everyone's doing the whole real life thing. But I can hardly sleep, because I can still—"

"Still what?"

"I can still hear them. Not the Kanaloa them, they're gone, that's why I asked, but like… dead things in general. Graveyards suck for real, man."

"Is that how…?"

"The diner?" Alex thinks about it. There were other things, too, of course—the conspicuous lack of other patrons with solid food, for one, and the way that even the waitress was a paper-thin imitation—but mostly it was that cold trickle down her spine. "Yeah, that's how."

"…Why didn't you tell me?" Jonas asks. Exhales smoke, again, and drops the cigarette into the ash tray. It's the only one there.

"I did tell you, like, six hours ago."

"Why didn't you tell me before this?"

"What would I have said? Hey, by the way, I see dead people? Yeah, no thanks," Alex shakes her head. As it is, her parents have been quietly taking her aside and asking if things are alright—she doesn't need them worrying that their daughter's gone off the deep end and sending her to some correctional facility up in Alaska, which is totally not nightmare fuel or anything. As though she doesn't have enough nightmare fuel as it is. Jesus.

"I mean, you could've."

"Oh, shut up," Alex says, lips twitching as she reaches over to shove him.

Jonas catches her hands. He's always doing that. It would be annoying if Alex didn't know that he has a thing about touch: who's allowed to touch him, who he's allowed to touch. "I'm gonna have bruises, stop your violence."

"You like my violence!"

Jonas doesn't deny that, which, um, okay. He looks at her and says, "I like you."

Alex turns red to the tips of her ears.

"Are you blushing?" Jonas stares at her. "Christ, you're blushing, that's adorable—"

"Shush, I'm tryna be serious here! We made a deal, okay," Alex blows all the breath out of her lungs, forcing the flush away. Now is not really the time to turn into some eighteenth-century maid, swooning over a compliment from a stableboy. That's ridiculous. Alex is an adult or something. "Me and the ghosts. I promised that I wouldn't forget, no matter what. I can't—it's not a promise I can break."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I dunno," she shrugs. "Maybe I'll go chase ghost stories. Maybe they'll think it's funny."

"I thought we established that annoying dead people is a quick way to get killed," Jonas says flatly.

"Yeah, well," Alex says. A slow, creeping smile splits her face, bloodied in the wash of the rising sun. "We also established that I don't get on super-awesome with staying dead, right? I'm basically the perfect person that way."

"You're going to die," he says, dropping his head back against the headrest to stare at the ceiling, wonder-eyed and dazed like he can't believe the words coming out of his mouth. "I'm coming with you, or you're going to die."

"I'm not going to die. You don't have to come."

"Kinda do, though."

"No, you actually don't—"

"Alex," Jonas says. Her name passes his lips simple and low and honest. It sends a shiver down her spine. "I want to."

"Oh," she says. "Really?"

"I'm here right now," Jonas says, staring straight ahead. He puts the keys in the ignition, and the truck thrums to life. "Aren't I?"

Alex looks at his profile for a long, long time. The broken ridge of his nose, the dark bruises beneath his eyes, the line of his jaw. She knows his face, and she knows when it's lying.

It's not lying, right now.

"Yeah," she says. "I guess you are."

Along the edge of the universe, the sun is coming up gold, glinting diamonds across the ocean. There's an island out there, dotted with the leftover remains from a different ghost camp, a different girl who broke the world, different travelers, different stories. Jonas lets the truck sit idle beneath them, palm loose around the gear shift. His knuckles are a curvature, bone and tissue, marrow and blood.

Alex links their fingers like a prayer.

In the sunrise over the water, she can see for miles, miles, miles.

—

.

.

.

.

.

fin.

#oxenfree #oxenfree fanfiction #alex x jonas #i'm a garbage trashcan on fire whaddup #sara makes shit

[deadsy-doodle-blog]

PUNK ROCK RUINED MY LIFE

SECTION THIRTEEN

       Grim’s alarm went off early in the morning, he pulled himself out of bed and pulled the nearest pair of pants on and the least smelly shirt he could find. Today was the last day of the first week of is full time summer job. The June morning air was crisp in his grandmother’s house as he quietly went down the stairs to make some coffee and eat breakfast. He shoveled cereal into his mouth as the coffee maker gurgled.

       His ear flicked around to his grandmother softly shuffling her slippers across the wood floor.

       “Good morning.” She said scuffing her way to the fresh coffee. She poured herself a cup and one for her grandson. She softly sipped from her mug, watching him pour some cereal milk from his bowl into the coffee and stir it around, spooning out a soggy flake. “It’s Friday mijo.” She smiled, looking at the bags under his eyes as he let a heavy sigh out.

       “almost there, one more day.” He said in a slight smirk.

       “Going to see your girlfriend after work?” she asked.

       “Yeah, it’s been a few days.”

       “Good, that will make you feel better. What time are you getting home tonight?” she asked.

       “I’ll try to be back by midnight.” He said slurping his coffee and leftover milk, he put his dishes in the sink and poured the remaining coffee in the pot into his thermos for work. He pulled his leather jacket off the back of the chair and pushed his arms through it. He grabbed his thermos and motorcycle keys and headed out the door for work.

       He swung his leg over his motorcycle and revved it, the sun was starting to peak over the mountains and shine into his eyes, he pulled his sunglasses out of his jacket and slid them up the bridge of his nose. He tucked his thermos into the saddle bag of his motorcycle and pushed his bike out of the driveway. He ripped his bike forward down the road and drove to work. He clocked in and pulled his long snarled mane back. He went to his station and began his day’s work. His eyes repetitively glanced at the clock watching the hours tick by. He counted the minutes down until he was able to go see his girl.

       After eight grueling hours he ambled to the time clock and punched out, immediately releasing his mane from the ponytail and shaking it out, greasy and sweaty from the warm building. He grabbed his jacket on the way out and tugged it on as he briskly walked out the door. He revved up his bike and sped to Oasis’s parent’s house. It was about 5:30 by the time he got there, he knocked on the door timidly and waited for an answer. Her mother answered with a welcoming warm smile.

       “Grim! Come in, we were just having dinner, come join us if you’d like to.” She said leading back to the dining room and rushing to get him his own plate. He sat his plate down next to Oasis and hugged his arm around her. She smiled and smooched him sweetly.

       “How was work?” she asked as he reached to slap some food onto his place.

      “It was a fucking drag.” He said cramming food into his mouth. Her father cleared his throat and glanced his way. Grim didn’t acknowledge his glare and kept gulping food.

      “You must have been hungry!” Aqua giggled as he cleared his plate in record time and leaned back in the chair, patting his belly.

      “I was starving. Didn’t have time for lunch today.” He said in a smirk to her. Oasis giggled at him and shook her head. After the dinner was cleaned up Oasis’s family scattered around to their various activities. Shoal was going to his art class in a little while and was preparing to go. Cache and Splash watched the football game on TV, calling out as team scored. Oasis’s mother was busy cleaning and talking to the couple as she went. 

      “Do you wanna go do something?” Oasis asked Grim feeling bored.

      “Yeah, we can go hang out somewhere.” He said gently stroking her hair with dazed eyes.

      “Going out?” Aqua asked pleasantly.

      “I think so.” Oasis said in a smile.

      “Have fun, be back before ten, okay?” she smiled. Grim took his girlfriend’s hand as they walked to the door.

      “Oasis, are you going out?” Shoal asked gathering his art stuff.

      “Yeah, why?” she asked with her brow cocking down.

      “Can you drop me off to Ozzie’s?” he asked. Grim looked to Oasis.

      “Yeah, is it okay if we take my car instead of your bike, Grimmy?” she asked. Grim nodded his head.  Shoal smiled and gathered his art supplies and followed them to Oasis’s bug. He crawled into the back seat and waited as Oasis started the car. Grim pulled the seat handle and pushed his seat back into Shoal’s long legs and laughed.

     “God, Grim!” he laughed. Oasis smacked his chest playfully and he pulled his seat forward again. Grim chuckled to himself and turned on his music as she pulled out of the driveway. Once down the road a few miles Grim rested his hand on Oasis’s leg and they talked about their day and what they wanted to do.

     “Is dad going to pick you up?” Oasis asked looking in the mirror at her little brother.

     “Yeah.” Shoal said in monotone.

      “Okay, good.” Grim smiled looking back at him. He scooted closer and whispered in Oasis’s ear his idea.

      Oasis pulled up to the blue house and waited as Grim got out and pushed the seat up so her little brother could climb out of the seat and head inside. Grim sat back down and looked at his girlfriend for a while.

      “His art is pretty good huh?” he asked. She nodded her head. “Is his art teacher like some crusty old lady with a shit load of cats?” he chuckled.

       “No, actually, he’s covered in tattoos and listens to metal.” Oasis laughed.

       “Fuck, maybe he’ll rub off on your brother…that didn’t sound right…” he laughed.

      “Oh my god!” Oasis laughed.

     “So what did you think of my idea?” he smiled, watching the road go by in front of them.

      “I know just the place, it’s a little bit of a drive but it’s perfect.” She grinned. Grim smiled at her.

       “Oh, I’m excited.” He said in a chuckle.

      After several miles and a few songs later they were very far from the city. She pulled up next to a little meadow on a dirt road. She took her keys from the car and followed slowly to an old willow tree as Grim looked around silently, fireflies glimmered through the air and over water of a pond. He slipped his leather jacket off and tossed it into the grass near the dock, followed by his shirt. His pants dropped and he gently flung his briefs to the dock. He took a running jump and plunged into the cold water. It was a refreshing feeling, washing the days stress and sweat from his body. He emerged from the water and spat a bit from his mouth, straightening his soaked hair out of his eyes. He looked up to the dock to see Oasis on the last part of her undressing. He waved her on.

       “Come on, it feels so good!” he smiled, looking up to her dainty body bathed in moonlight. She gracefully submerged her naked body into the water and swam toward Grim. “Hi.” He said as the water rippled from her body to his.

      “Hi.” She laughed. Blushing a little and keeping her eyes glued to his. He smiled and kissed her sweetly. His hands threaded through the water to her hip as they swam in place. He gently rubbed her hip through the water and glanced down with a smile, the water a little dark and murky to see much. She blushed and laughed.

      “Sorry.” He said in a sigh, looking back to her face. “You’re too perfect.” He said caressing her face with his dripping fingers. She smirked at him and laced her fingers around his neck. She pulled herself closer to him and kissed him warmly. He caressed his hand to her tail and kept them afloat.

      “We didn’t bring towels.” Oasis giggled, trying to keep talking to avoid awkward silence among the sound of treading water and crickets.

       “We can drip dry.” Grim shrugged a little. “I don’t mind if you’re a little wet.” He said softly before his soft smile cracked and he immediately started laughing. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it to sound like that.” He said in embarrassment.

      “I don’t get it.” She said looking at him confused. “what did I miss?” Grim laughed harder.

       “Shit, you have a lot to learn.” He giggled kissing her softly.

      “What? Was that like a sex joke?” she asked with her brows scrunching.

     “Yeah, it’s okay. I’m a pervert sometimes. I really didn’t mean for that to be dirty.” He apologized.

      “It’s fine. Have you done it before, Grim?” she asked starting to drift away a little bit.

      “Yeah, I’ve done it a few times. We don’t have to talk about this if you’re not comfortable.” He started to feel an awkward tension building.

      “I mean, we’re butt naked, might as well address the elephant in the room.” She said in a smile. “How many girls have you been with?” she asked hesitantly.

      “Three.” He said calmly looking her in the eye, her eyes fell a little bit. “I know I got started a little early.” He said shifting his green eyes from her face. He started tearing  himself apart in thought, how his mother probably doomed him to turn out this way.

       “I just feel embarrassed, I’m not experienced and I’m scared I’m not enough.” She said bringing her eyes up. “I want you to be happy being with me.”

      “Oasis, I am happy with you. You’re like the only thing that makes me happy. Don’t feel bad for being naïve, or innocent, please.” He grabbed her hands in the water. “I can be patient, I have no problem waiting until you’re ready and we can take it slow, okay?” he asked softly as the moonlight illuminated the bright green sincerity of his gaze.

      “Okay.” She said in a sigh, treading water to hug onto his body. His hands rested on her hip as hers wrapped around his shoulders. She started to blush a little and pushed herself back starting to giggle.

      “What?” Grim smiled at her.

      “Its…smaller than I thought it would be.” She said giggling.

      “Hey! The water’s cold, don’t be mean!” he chuckled and splashing some water at her. She laughed and pushed water back at him. He took a deep breath and dipped below the surface, disappearing in the murky pond water. Oasis looked around, waiting for the cold shock of a splash. She felt him tug at her foot before popping up behind her, she screamed and swam away as he tried to splash her.

      After a while they were both getting tired. Grim clutched onto the dock and pulled himself up out of the water. His back arched with the cold air and he wrung the water out of the hair of his tail and shook his mane. Oasis struggled hanging onto the dock to pull herself up. Grim’s hands met hers and he pulled her up. Her eyes quickly skipped from their feet up to Grim’s face, blushing.

      “uh, here.” He said reaching for his shirt and handing it to her to dry off with. He tugged his briefs on followed by his pants. They clung to his damp legs as he put his leather jacket on his bare shoulders and flipped his hair over it. She was already dressed and running her fingers through her hair when he glanced back. They wandered over by the willow tree and laid in the cool grass, watching stars and fireflies. “This place is really pretty.” He said glancing over to her.

       “This is where my mom and dad grew up” Oasis said in a smile.

      “Oh really?” Grim’s brows raised in surprised. She turned her head back a little and pointed to the tree trunk that had some initials carved into it. She smiled. “They probably fucked under this tree.” Grim smirked, digging for a reaction from her.

      “Oh my god!” Oasis belted out in laughter. “Don’t make me think about that!” she punched his arm. Still sitting up she pointed across the field. “See those lights? That’s my grandparent’s house.” She giggled.

      “Jesus, you’re a little ballsy, aren’t you?”

       “They couldn’t tell if it was us from that far away.” She smiled. “My other grandparent’s live just down the road the other way too.” Grim laughed.

       “You’re a fucking psycho.” He laughed.

       “It’s pretty though, huh?” she added looking around the meadow and the dotted fireflies and wildflowers.

       “Yeah.” Grim said looking at her as she sat taking in the environment. Grim grabbed her hand sweetly and kissed her fingers a few times before massaging them in his callused hands. He looked down at her dainty left hand, stroking at her ring finger gently for a moment. Her right hand butted in and he massaged that one gently. After a few minutes he stretched her hand around to his neck and she was pulled in closer to his chest.

       “Hi.” He beamed up at her. She smiled and moved her damp hair out of her way.

       “Hi.” She smiled down, biting her lip slightly.

       “God, you’re fucking pretty.” He said in a short sigh, caressing her cheek softly. She leaned down to him and kissed him softly, his hands lazed up to her waist, holding onto her as she smooched him lightly. She shifted a bit in the grass and flung her leg over him His fingers curled to her pockets as she kissed him a little more passionately. His tongue slithered to her lips as they let go of his bottom lip. She pulled back starting to laugh.

      “You taste like pond water.” She giggled. He chuckled and sat up to her, kissing her gently once more. “What time is it?” she asked.

     “Fuck if I know.” Grim smirked. Oasis stood back from him and found her car keys in the grass. He got up and followed as she walked to her car. She started it and checked the time.

      “Shit, I need to be home in twenty minutes.” She said to him.

      “Oh fuck, do you have everything?” he asked getting in the car.

       “Yeah, I think so.” She said getting into her driver’s seat and handing his shirt back to him. She pulled her car out of the meadow and headed back down the old corroded road. Grim lit a cigarette and rolled the window down.

       “Can I have one?” Oasis asked, glancing at him, obviously stressed. Grim nodded his head and handed his to her and dug another out. She puffed on it shakily and let a cough out with the first inhale. The smoke whipped out the window as they sped through the night toward the highway. “That was fun.” Oasis said between a puff.

       “Yeah?” Grim chuckled.

       “So you really meant that, that you’ll wait for me?” she said starting to get a little more quiet. Grim turned the radio down.

       “Yeah, I have no problem at all. You just take your time, alright?” Grim said before taking a long drag.

       “I just feel bad.” She said before puffing on her slow burning cigarette.

       “Don’t. I don’t want to pressure you into doing stuff if you’re not ready or scared. I’m fine with where we are for a while.” He said shaking his head.

       “I want to try, I’m just scared I guess.”

       “We can work up to it. There’s other stuff we can do. Just don’t worry about it for right now, okay?”

       “Thanks, Grim.” She said turning her eyes to him briefly.

       “I love you.” He blurted out. He watched her ears perk and a smile cross her lips. His ears and cheeks burned, his heart pounding in his chest. Did he really just say that out loud?

      “I love you too.” She said in a smile before tossing her cigarette butt out the window. His heart jumped to his throat and he couldn’t wipe the smile off his lips.