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#This is probably the first thing I've actually posted in like three years
batsplat · 1 day
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hi batsplat this is marquezian.. as our resident casey scholar i was wondering if you have casey race recs !!
boy do I ever have recs! here's a (hopefully) fairly comprehensive list, drawing from more or less all the stages of his grand prix career and featuring races notable for a bunch of different reasons
casey is quite defensive of the 'boring' racing of the alien era (in particular the 2010-12 years)... but it is a shame his time in motogp overlapped so heavily with the 800cc era, which did lead to some tough watches for fans of 'overtakes' and 'close racing' and 'unpredictability'. so a lot of these race picks aren't necessarily reflective of how casey racked up the majority of his wins, plus presumably don't always match up with what his own picks would be. but well, whatever! I threw in a few of the ones I know casey likes
warning: the race descriptions generally spoil the results of the races. since this list is pretty long, I've put an asterisk next to the races I'd particularly recommend, and double asterisk next to my personal faves
my tldr spoiler-free top five faves list is catalunya 2007, donington park 2007, laguna seca 2008, sachsenring 2010, and laguna seca 2011. my five next-off most notable/fun races are assen 2004, turkey 2006, qatar 2007, phillip island 2009 and silverstone 2011
and here's the actual list, in chronological order:
sachsenring 2003: first podium in grand prix racing! big disclaimer: the recordings of the 2003 125cc races you can find on the videopass are poor quality and don't feature any commentary, so not the easiest to watch. this race is also not great to follow on the colour front: the three main protagonists are *squints at notes* casey (yellow bike, number 27), perugini (mostly black and white but with a few greenish highlights, 7) and de angelis (mostly green, 15). but well it's a really tight fight that goes until the last corner, good fun... casey's talked about how nervous the track made him so he wasn't racing his opponents hard enough at the end. which is kinda sweet and revealing
brazil 2003: another tight battle, this time with jorge (green/red, 48) and de angelis, another time he doesn't QUITE make it. jorge's first ever victory! y'know the one where he overtakes everyone on the outside and starts the whole x-fuera thing
valencia 2003: first win! 125cc/moto3 racing being reliably good fun is a time-honoured tradition and it can even make that middling karting track exciting to watch. it's a good fight - quite helpfully, casey's nicely visible yellow bike contrasts well with the blue bike (hector barbera, number 80) and the red bike (sic, 58) (at some point steve jenker, 17, shows up on a black and white bike). that being said... the bloody video on the motogp website cuts off around two and a half laps to the end, which is a shame because those laps were (apparently) filled with drama. very close finish, not helped by the spark plug of casey's bike breaking RIGHT before the end, which is a very casey thing to happen to him. he thought he was screwed but ended up being saved by barbera running wide trying to overtake him in the last corner. here's a cute lil feature with casey discussing the race that you can probably just watch instead of the race. also ofc him saying how good it felt to beat the spanish at their home circuit (clip here), king of spite
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^look at him in evil gross luminous yellow
**assen 2004: I'll admit, this race is one of my faves in large part because of the terrorism jorge does on casey on the last lap, which casey was NOT happy about. (in a funny coincidence, the same event features jorge's future teammate doing some last lap terrorism on gibernau that gibernau is also decidedly not thrilled about.) featured in the autobiography - he really wasn't a fan of jorge at the time - and when he's being sulky in the interview they have in the post-race broadcast. but another great fight and, with my apologies to casey, the last lap is fantastic. excitingly includes commentary!!
jerez 2006: casey's first motogp race! you don't reallyyyy see enough of him on the broadcast for it to be completely worth it, but it's still a proper good ride. he starts in fifteenth, makes a great start and then gets a lil lucky at the first corner when toni elias attempts to murder barrels into valentino and opens up a gap for casey. gets all the way up to fourth and finishes sixth!! also ofc a starring performance by dani at the front of the race
qatar 2006: second race of the season. after the first race, casey had been ill with a bad fever, plus there'd been a fuck up with the flights that meant he only got to the lusail circuit ten minutes before the first session. he topped the first practise session and qualified on pole, even though he was still recovering from illness and was massively sleep-deprived. his first battle with valentino, eventually drops a few places but still <3 also features some fun vale/nicky hayden battles
*turkey 2006: the third race of the season (look he front-loaded his good races that year) and my girl's first premier class podium!! but... bit of a heartbreaker as he did come VERY very very close to winning. also he said apparently he was pleased with his podium but when he got to parc fermé his team was acting disappointed he didn't win :( still a fantastic race, the highlight of casey's troubled rookie campaign. (casey was fast from the get-go in the premier class, but was dealing with major tyre issues that the team around him didn't do a good job at helping him with. by the end of the season, he ended up acquiring a somewhat unfair reputation for being a crasher, with the lovely nickname 'rolling stoner'. still, for young talent it's generally the peaks that matter most and you could really see his ability shine through here)
*qatar 2007: obviously of Great Narrative Significance, casey's first race with ducati and when he announced his arrival at the top of the sport by getting his first premier class win. good solid fun casey/vale fight, though it does feature the classic 'ducati blasts past everyone down that very long lusail straight' syndrome. people were kinda mean about that - which in turn made casey very irritable, arguing that if your bike is a nightmare to ride everywhere else then it's an accomplishment to be close enough to blast past down the straight. unfortunately I do agree a lil bit with the naysayers in terms of the actual racing, but still a pretty good fight
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^the last year it was a day race
**catalunya 2007: probably my personal favourite? (of the ones casey won, anyway.) just something about a great battle at that track - obviously valentino had about a million, but this was really the only race-long one that he lost. important in the context of the 2007 title campaign - even though it was only a ten-point swing - because it showed casey wasn't just about horsepower dominance. fantastic riding from both of them
**donington park 2007: my fave of his wet weather performances because he actually has to work his way through the field. he started fifth but was outside of the top ten early on after an uncharacteristically poor start. fun race with plenty of good shake-ups of the order
(he sealed the title in motegi and won his home race for the first time that year, but since he finished sixth in the former and won the latter by a few lightyears, they don't make the cut)
*qatar 2008: more fun than qatar 2007!! imo!! obviously it's also jorge's first race and he's on pole and dani's a bit injured and those two have their whole thing™️ going on... and vale has just switched tyre suppliers and is trying to prove he's not washed and casey is starting his title defence... so a big significant race for all four of them, and unlike many races in that era has a fair few twists and turns and almost all of them actually get to fight each other a bit. okay eventually it settles down and gets dull but until then it's fun (and there's also some very late excitement involving dovi/vale)
**laguna seca 2008: I feel a wee bit bad for including this one and casey would throw something at me, but well it obviously belongs on here. ignoring casey's complaints for a minute about vale's aggression, it really is a fantastic battle - and vale only goes as far as he does because casey's so good! (also unsure whether casey would appreciate this line of reasoning.) probably the one everyone's most likely to have already watched, and for good reason since it slaps. sorry casey
estoril 2009: only for sentimental reasons, after the first few laps it gets boring fast. still, it's casey's first race back after the mystery illness-induced break, he immediately has a cute lil battle with vale (which he wins, slay) and... okay then it's basically a procession but it's also nice and sweet when it's over and he's on the podium and he's shown everyone he's still got it. maybe skip like. 20 laps
**phillip island 2009: casey's first win in only his second race back!!! warning that it's a little light on actual overtaking but it's still tense and close most of the way through and casey's so great to watch on this circuit. (he's literally too good at it for most of his races there to be all that interesting, this is probably the best one.) plus it's another one included partly for sentimental reasons. here's my pitch:
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sepang 2009: so he's been slandered for months, he's been written off, ducati have been fucking him over, he comes back and immediately gets a podium finish and wins the next race... what does he do after that? win again obviously! another neat little wet performance (partly helped by vale having a bit of a shocker off the line lmao, though he seals the title that day with a p3 finish)
valencia 2009: if you want to see the pole sitter crash on the warm up lap and dani almost miss the start in confusion
**sachsenring 2010: vale's first race back after the broken leg. usually that's the time when everyone would pretend to be nice to each other... but all three of vale, jorge and casey had gone to efforts during vale's absence to make things worse <3 anyway cracking race including a good fun spite-fuelled battle between casey and vale for the last podium spot, one of their better scraps with a dramatic ending - after which both of them are charmingly bitchy about each other to the media (see below). shame it was basically their last notable battle in the dry (I didn't include either jerez 2011 or le mans 2012 on this list because I wouldn't really recommend them as good casey races, but they do more or less conclude casey and vale's on-track story. and the latter is also the last podium they share, plus it's the race right after casey announced his retirement. fave presser moment)
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^😭😭😭😭😭 you guys are AWFUL oh my god. people always talk about laguna 2008 but the vibes got way more rancid post-2009 when their actual on-track rivalry was basically over
motegi 2010: this one's kinda marginal on whether it qualifies for this list. casey was really proud of this win and felt his 2010 wins were particularly impressive given how much he had to override a bike that was objectively shit by this point.... BUT in practise once he shakes off dovi, it's quite a dominant win and the real fun is watching valentino experiment with whether he can make jorge lorenzo the first person ever to die of rage alone while riding a motorcycle
*silverstone 2011: one of the truly great wet weather performances. this is a personal taste thing - I don't mind dominance as much in the wet because it's just cool sometimes seeing somebody drop a masterclass on the field in those conditions. but obviously not necessarily the most exciting victory fight once he hits the front after like. a lap. still, good battles going on behind him
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^a fan of british tracks, not a fan of the british
*sachsenring 2011: great three-way battle with jorge and dani, with the lead exchanged several times - also plenty of other good battles down the order. not one casey emerges victorious from, but definitely one of the best races that season
**laguna seca 2011: okay look corkscrew this corkscrew that but there's an argument to be made that casey makes a pass in this that's better than anything marc and vale can DREAM of. well no I won't go that far - but it's still an incredible overtake, insane thing to do at a blind corner, and casey just looks fantastic riding on that circuit. in his autobiography he says something along the lines of 'oh it looked scary on tv but I knew I'd make it'. which. okay casey!! not gonna say more than that, one of those where you'll know it when you see it. one of the best races of his career and also a key race in that year's title fight
phillip island 2011: marginal inclusion, but it's sweet he sealed the title on his 26th birthday by winning his home race (even though he mainly sealed it there because jorge lost half a finger and couldn't start the race). conditions got treacherous when the rain showed up but well casey stayed on the bike, just about
*jerez 2012: casey's first and last win at jerez! this is the one that casey called his greatest career win at the time and... sure, fair enough, especially given he had a weirdly bad record at the track. he didn't enjoy the experience much because of his arm pump issues, which makes the performance all the more impressive. fun first few laps in particular, after that it's maybe a bit more tension than actual action. still a proper good race
estoril 2012: another win he's very proud of... another one that's maybe even more skewed towards tension than actual action, but still an unmistakably impressive performance given jorge's strong record there and casey's physical issues. that and jerez completed his set as they'd been the races he hadn't won yet, which made him feel more certain of his choice to retire
phillip island 2012: listen it's his last win and it sealed the title (for jorge), so was at least somewhat exciting. but also according to his autobiography, casey deliberately rode slower for a bit before expanding the gap again just to keep his focus up, which I think gives you a sense of how easy he found winning there
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^his penultimate race and sixth consecutive victory at phillip island. he also finished on the podium in his last ever race at valencia
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bookwyrmpendragon · 7 months
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Ignore how bad this picture is, but I met one of my favorite authors today! I told her she was one of the main reasons I wanted to be a writer, and her immediate reaction was to say "I'm so sorry..."
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moongothic · 4 months
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Crocodad AU where immidiately after having left Dragon and his baby boy Crocodile finds an 11 year old Robin. And while he's 100% only recruiting her so they can make a beeline for the Poneglyph and Pluton in Alabasta by the two of them... Crocodile accidentally sorta kinda adopts Robin.
At this point Robin's been running for her life from the Government for three years so her deep trust issues and fear of betrayal are starting to take root in her little heart. Like perhaps they haven't taken fully over yet, and being still a child I'm sure Robin might've still had that genuine hope that she could find a safe place to stay in. But I'm sure the though of "what'll he'll do with me once he gets what he wants?" would be nagging at her at the back of her mind. Meanwhile Crocodile's struggling between the pain and hurt he's already gone through and given him his trademark trust issues, as well as the aftermath of The Dragodile Divorce. But he also has his Fresh Paternal Instincts and probably misses his baby. So when given a small, scared child who is running for her life, being chased by the very same Government that'll want his son dead if they ever find out about him... Yeah that might fuck with your brain a little
You know this post was supposed to be just that first paragraph and just a few footnotes from the following two paragraphs. And then I kept on Having Thoughts. And I kept on writing them down. And oh no what happened when did this post get so long (Look I was going to either kept on writing my Additional Thoughts in the tags or I just put them in the actual fucking post)
Like considder this: based on this one SBS, we can kinda tell that if Crocodile was given a chance to raise a child, that child would be a spoiled little shit, right
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So in this scenario, where Crocodile's looking after lil Robin, would he be kind of torn? Unsure how to feel about her?
Because on one hand, this strange child would have the potential to not only ruin his plans, strip him of his Shichibukai Privileges by outing him and his plans to the World Government, but also put his son in grave danger by extension (if she found out about him having been involved with the Revolutionaries and/or having a child). But on the other hand, his paternal instincts could make him want to spoil this poor little girl rotten. But only because he needs to (perhaps literally) buy her trust so she'll behave. No other reason, he doesn't feel sorry for her one bit, no sirree. (But maybe he did feel sorry for her, since his son could very well end up exactly like her. Poor little thing) (Which is why he needs to nuke Marijoa out of orbit as soon as possible, no matter the cost, and this child can't get in the way of Crocodile protecting his son) (But also this is a child. Like how bad could she be. Besides all he really needs to do to win her trust is be nice and make her feel safe, right?)
Of course, while I'm suggesting Crocodile could have some parental instincts, realistically, he hasn't actually spent any time being, you know, a father to a child (looking after his newborn for an unknown though short amount of time aside), so it's possible he wouldn't even know how to parent Robin even if he wanted to, would he? (Like taking care of a newborn and an 11 year old kid aren't the same either) So if he was kind of just emotionally flipflopping between No Trusting Ever and It's Just A Kid for God's Sake, Crocodile trying to be nice to Robin to make her feel safe and then telling himself to stop being so soft and vunerable... Yeah that would make for an absolute mess of a relationship. (Not to mention, let's be real, dude's a scary motherfucker too, and a bloody giant compared to itty bitty baby Robin. He could keep on accidentally scaring the shit out of Robin (who would be On Fucking Edge To Begin With) by just Being Himself. Like for example, can you fucking imagine if he caught Robin trying to cheer herself up with a little "dereshishishi" only to tell her to stop because "it was stupid"? 'Cause I can imagine him doing that, and boy howdy would that make Robin feel bad)
Or who knows, maybe Crocodile was just Born To Be A Dad, maybe he just Fucking Gets It. Like Crocodile is canonically pretty good at manipulating people to do what he wants them to do (see: how he played Vivi like a fiddle), so knowing Robin's position and understanding how she feels, maybe he COULD completely nail how she needed to be treated. Not being too familiar but still making her feel safe and happy, knowing exactly when to be stern and when to spoil her, etc. Dude just goes off and wins the Dad of the Year Award while being a deadbeat dad himself. The only thing Crocodile would have to worry about then would be making sure HE doesn't get too fond of her. And certainly that could never happen, he's so in-touch with his own feelings and so grounded, he's not a softie, get outta here. Or maybe he does but never realizes until it's too late and good luck backpedalling on those emotions now dumbass
Alright so, the reason I went on that whole rmble is just that like. I'm so interested in the relationship Robin and Crocodile already have in canon. I'm so facinated and curious about how the two feel about each other, considdering they did spend 4 whole years of their lives together as criminal business partners, though neither ever trusted the other. A partnership that was only ended because Robin betrayed Crocodile, out of her own trauma. (God, I want to see these two "reunite" so bad, I want to know how they feel about each other now after the timeskip and Robin joining the idiot in flipflops who foiled Croc's plans)
My question here is just that... if they had met 13 years earlier, would things have been different? Especially if Crocodad Real? Because as I mentioned in the begining, Robin would've been on the run for only 3 years by this point, as opposed to 16 years before running into Crocodile. Simultaneously, this would be before Crocodile went onto spend an entire decade all alone, slowly losing his marbles in his emotional solitude. They'd both be emotionally traumatized, yes, but would it have been as bad in this scenario? Like I did start this post kind of joking about Crocodile adopting Robin, and for clarity's sake I don't think they'd have like a father-daughter relationship nececarily. But it would be a strange relationship still, because we'd have two broken people, both struggling to trust anyone. One who had lost her mother and her only friends, leaving her all alone and afraid while running for her life. The other a father who had just given up his son whom he probably missed dearly. Both having these holes in their hearts from loss of family, holes that could not be filled with replacements. But could they find comfort in each other anyway, because they still as people occupy similar roles to their respective loved ones? If they both could just get over those trust issues?
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Okay I've been going off on the Emotional Side Of Things for this AU Concept, THERE'S PLOT TOO
So if Crocodile did pick Robin up like 19 years ago, that should be before he set up base in Alabasta, long before he had built is homebase and financial empire etc.
Now the thing is, while we don't know when, where and how Crocodile learned about the Ancient Weapons, Pluton specifically and how the lead on it would be in Alabasta... Considdering Crocodile did once upon a time aim to become Pirate King, it would make perfect sense if he had learned about Poneglyphs during his past adventures, as he would have needed to get the Road Poneglyphs to find One Piece. And while the World Government did bury the truth about why Ohara had been burned down and why Robin had been given her bounty (remember, the WG claimed it was because she had sunken a fleet of battleships, which she had not, it was because she could read the Poneglyphs), considdering this is a Crocodad AU specifically, you could totally make an argument Crocodile could've learned about what actually happened to Ohara from Dragon and co. So, just to make this AU work, you could just assume Crocodile learned about the concept of the Ancient Weapons from Dragon. And who knows, maybe he overheard the truth about why Robin had been given her bounty from Dragon too (maybe Dragon was able to get intel from Garp in secret) or while going to Marijoa himself to attend a Shichibukai meeting or something IDK.
Maybe he learned about Pluton being in Alabasta before finding Robin by accident, and maybe they made a beeline for Alabasta the second Croc recruited Robin. Travelling takes time and the guy would've most likely had to find an Eternal Pose to Alabasta just to get there (also canonically Robin didn't enter the Grand Line until her 20s so they should've met in West Blue probably, since that's where Ohara was) Or maybe Crocodile had to haul Robin around for a few months while looking for That Missing Piece of Information that would lead him to Alabasta. (Imagine the two travelling from like island to island, library to library, Crocodile trying to find that leads while Robin's just so excited about ALL THESE BOOKS (she's helping too with the research) (but to her, research is playtime, so she's just having the time of her life) (Also, notice how Crocodile's Theoretical Child is a fucking loser ass nerd? Yeah Crocodile would encourage Robin reading and studying, surely. And that would be fucking cute))
But like, once they set sail to Alabasta...
Sure, Crocodile could try to do it The Slow Way that we know he tried in canon, building trust and creating his little empire etc. But also, in canon, Crocodile couldn't have jumped into action head first because without Robin, even if he had found the Poneglyph he couldn't have read it and found the location of Pluton. Crocodile choosing to do it the slow way may have been partially because he didn't have much of a choise and it could've felt like the smarter move long-term.
But in this scenario, he already has Robin. Yes, he could do it the slow, secure way.
But what'd be there stopping him from infiltrating Cobra's palace and kidnapping him (in the night, when nobody suspects a thing), demanding Cobra to spill the beans lest Crocodile kills him and/or his pregnant wife* (*Vivi was born 10 months after Luffy so depending on how long it's been between Crocodad leaving Luffy behind and this scenario... Yeah either the wife is there, still pregnant, or there's a newborn Baby Vivi)
Like it'd be a risky move but depending on how ballsy Croc's feeling and how confident he feels in being able to kidnap the king without being noticed... Yeah he could probably do it. And I'm sure he'd have no problem killing Cobra either, if anything it'd be required if he didn't want the Government to find out he was out to find Pluton, and god knows Cobra would tell on Crocodile if left alive. I could see Crocodad being maybe a little iffy about killing Baby Vivi though (it's not like the newborn baby could report him to the WG anyways), but if nothing else, he just needs to be able to pull off the bluff of his life to convince Cobra to do as he's told. And we all know Crocodile's good at convincing people.
The only question is, how would Robin take that?
Watching Crocodile go into Full Murder Mode, hearing him say he'd kill a pregnant woman/a newborn baby if he didn't get what he wanted? Like yeah, I'm sure 11 year old Robin would be fine with that, that wouldn't make any alarm bells go off in her head at all, it'd be fiiiine. IT WOULD NOT BE FINE, SHE'D BE SCARED SHITLESS. That fear of "what will he do with me when he gets what he wants"? Well, Robin may not have found the answer to that question in particular, but she certainly found the answer to the opposite question, and it's not good
So say Cobra, kidnapped (perhaps with Baby Vivi) by Crocodile in the night, guides the two to the Poneglyph under the tombs. Crocodile puts Cobra out of his misery because he's not needed anymore. And he asks Robin to read the Poneglyph for him.
Robin, who has spent the last little while, be it weeks or months with Crocodile, him having become her "guardian", the thing keeping her safe. Crocodile, who has now shown how cold blooded and cruel he can be. Robin, who might be scared out of her mind. Of him.
And the Poneglyph says Pluton, the thing Crocodile wants, isn't there. It's in Wano.
What's she going to do?
EDIT: I wrote a sequel post, enjoy
#Moon posting#OP Meta#Sir Crocodile#Crocodad#Nico Robin#THIS POST WAS AN ACCIDENT. I DON'T KNOW HOW THIS HAPPENED. WHY DID I WRITE THIS. WHAT DEMON POSSESSED ME#I'm sure someone's written this already right#Right#Surely this fanfic already exists#Please tell me it exists#I dunno what to tell you I am not immune to a Juicy AU#Anyway on a more wholesome side of things: Robin accidentally calling Crocodile ''dad'' and he just inhales and swallows his whole cigar#Nearly chockes to death. Gets burns on his throat.#Robin feeling less alienated because of her DF ability because Croc has seen weirder AND is made of sand himself#If anything if they're literally by themselves then Robin being able to literally lend a hand to Croc at any time could be extremely useful#Like. In regular life situations. 'Cause Croc only has one hand. And Robin as many as she wants. Perfect duo.#(Also if they were travelling on like a small ship then it'd probably be built for a Tall Motherfucker like Croc right)#(Robin's ability would just make the ship more accessible to her and Croc would find that independence good)#Robin still gets a codename because Croc can't have anyone realize who she is. Maybe she even wears like a mask or summin' in public#If Crocodile's openly trans and the news of him transitioning recently broke out. Like. No avoiding that convo eh#Baby Robin's like ''...I read in a book once that some reptiles can change sex but I didn't know crocodiles could do it too''#''💦.../Humans/ can't do that normally either''#''Hmmmm. Weird. I don't think being a girl would suit you though'' // ''...I'll take that as a compliment''#I just. I think they could have really cute interactions if they warmed up to each other after a little while#And I'm Extremely Normal about that
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seungkw1 · 25 days
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better late than never — kmg
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♡ pairing: kim mingyu x afab!reader ♡ theme: smut [18+ mdni], best friends to lovers, non-idol au ♡ wc: 2.7k ♡ warnings: size kink, oral (f. receiving), fingering (f. receiving), riding, unprotected piv sex (stay safe y’all), creampie, mingyu is a boob guy, praise kink if u squint ♡ a/n: written for my bestie <3 and posting just in time for his birthday - happy mingyu day!!
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knock-knock-knock-knock
“come on! let me in!!” 
you approach your front door, but you don’t unlock it yet. 
“what happened to the copy of my key i gave you?” you inquire to the voice on the other side. 
“i forgot it!” 
you turn the deadbolt, opening the door to reveal the man standing outside - the look on his face is sheepish as he stands there, arms full of grocery bags. 
“kim mingyu i asked you to get me three things, not the entire store,” you say incredulously. 
“i saw your fridge the other day. you literally only had cheese, beer, and a jar of pickles in there,” he retorts, shooting you a judgemental look. 
“the three main food groups.”
mingyu rolls his eyes as he enters your apartment. “whatever, i'm cooking you dinner. a real dinner.”
“aye aye captain,” you say as you jokingly salute him. 
you met mingyu freshman year of college, when he burst through the door of your dorm room - thinking it was his own (he was on the wrong floor). his eyes turned wide as saucers as he realized his mistake. 
“SORRY,” he blurted out before fleeing out of the room. he was gone before you had even processed what happened. 
the next day he returned - this time knocking first. you opened the door to see the tall man, holding two packs of ramen. 
“sorry about yesterday,” he apologized, still a bit embarrassed. “i'm an idiot and thought i was on the sixth floor.”
“you're not an idiot, mistakes happen. it's okay,” you assured him amiably. 
“thanks, i’m glad you’re not mad at me or anything,” he replied with a smile. he extended the ramen to you. “it’s not much but i just… felt like i should bring a gift for some reason?” he told you, looking like he was second guessing himself as the words came out of his mouth. 
“ooo it’s the good kind too,” you replied eagerly as you took the ramen from him. “you wanna have one right now?”
he looked surprised, but delighted at your suggestion. 
“actually that would be awesome, those were my last two,” he admits with a laugh. you grin back at him. 
“well, come on in. again.”
and so mingyu inadvertently became your best friend. if not for the dorm incident, you probably never would have even crossed paths with him - he was your typical business bro, while you were majoring in psychology and literature. but, something just clicked between you two. 
a handful of years later now, he’s still your closest friend. and here he is, in your kitchen, grabbing the appropriate pots, pans, and utensils to get started on his spaghetti carbonara. as independent of a person as you are, you're not particularly the best chef - so you're grateful for his culinary expertise and willingness to make food for you. 
over dinner, mingyu is his usual chatty self. he tells you about his day, about how his neighbor has picked up the irritating hobby of learning to play the trumpet, about the dog he met yesterday while at the park, about his new coworker who seems to like him a little too much. 
“well, is she cute?” you ask nonchalantly, swirling the wine in your glass.  
“huh?” your question seems to catch him off guard. “i don't know. i mean, i've never thought about it.”
“bullshit,” you tell him, taking a big sip. 
“it's true!”
“right. well think about it, is she?”
“she's conventionally attractive i guess. i don't know why it matters though,” he says sincerely. 
“well if she likes you and she’s cute, you should ask her out.”
“that would be extremely unprofessional,” he scoffs, appalled at your suggestion. “besides, she's not my type.”
“what, is she weird or something?”
“no. and besides, i like weird. but i definitely don't see her like that.”
“what do you mean, you like weird?” you ask, raising your eyebrow. 
“i mean, you’re weird. and i like you.” he says it matter-of-factly, as if he was telling you the grass is green. 
“okay well obviously you don't want to date me,” you reply, rolling your eyes. “but come on, you haven't dated anyone in years. i'm trying to help to you here.”
the expression on his face changes, but you can't quite decipher what he’s thinking. 
“i don't need help.”
you give him a weird look. 
“not like that!” he quickly insists. “i just mean, don't worry about me, i’m fine.”
“ooookay, whatever you say gyu.”
his face remains calm, but you notice the corners of his mouth twitch upward slightly. normally, he’s not a fan of the nickname, but you know you're the only one who's allowed to call him that. he’s told you before. 
“well, what about you?” he asks suddenly. 
you look at him while chewing a big bite of pasta, confused. “what about me what?”
“are you, like… seeing anybody these days?” 
he speaks timidly, as if treading on eggshells. 
“why? are you asking me out?”
“ha ha, very funny,” he says sarcastically. he then shrugs. “i was just curious.”
“i actually did go on a date last week,” you admit. he looks up, surprised. 
“really? how'd it go?”
“surprisingly, really good,” you tell him.
“that's good. you have a long history of terrible first dates.”
“it was a second date, actually.”
mingyu pauses. “and you didn't tell me about the first one? fake as hell.”
“oh shut the fuck up,” you tease back, grinning at him. 
he picks up the bottle of wine sitting on the table. “should we finish this?” he asks. 
“duh.”
he removes the cork, pouring you another glass before refilling his own. 
after the delicious meal, you begin to clean up the kitchen, but mingyu quickly gets up and takes the dishes from your hands. 
“i got it.”
“you did all the cooking, let me do it,” you tell him. 
“nope,” he insists, already scrubbing plates. 
you help anyway, but mingyu is fast. the kitchen is sparkling within ten minutes. 
“damn, this looks better that it did before you got here,” you remark as you start the dishwasher. 
“don't go on a third date.”
you freeze. you look back at mingyu - he's reclining against the kitchen counter. his face, sincere. 
“what?” you ask hesitantly. 
“i said, don't go on a third date.”
he rises, walking toward you. he stops inches away from you, extending his arms, leaning his palms on the counter on either side of you. his face hovers above yours, his warm eyes locked onto yours. 
“gyu, are you drunk?” you ask, knowing full well he's not. your heart is suddenly pounding. 
“i'm not.” he brings his hand up to your chin, tilting your face upwards. “can i kiss you?”
you’re stunned, standing motionless, breathing deeply as he strokes your jawline softly with his thumb. sure, you’d thought about the possibility of dating mingyu before. more than once, even. and you figured he’d probably thought about dating you before. but truly, you never thought he had serious feelings for you. 
but here you are, pinned against your kitchen counter by your best friend. your best friend, who happens to be incredibly attractive. and the way your heart is racing - you really do want to kiss him right now. 
you try to think logically, rationalizing whether this is a good decision, but the emotional part of your brain takes control. you kiss him. you kiss him - and he kisses you, and you stand there, in your best friend’s arms, kissing each other, as if you'd both been waiting for this moment for years. and deep down, you know you have been. 
mingyu grabs hold of you, pulling you up onto the counter. you wrap your arms around his waist, running your hands slowly up and down his torso, feeling his toned body through his soft shirt. he caresses you gently, kissing you still - you're suspended in time, just the two of you, bodies connected like never before. you suddenly cannot believe you've spent years with this man and never once made out with him - but better late than never. 
he softly brings his hands to your sides. your lips finally part - you instantly miss the sensation. he slides his hands under your shirt, pausing right before he reaches your breasts.  
“can i touch them?” he asks, his voice breathy. you nod fervously. he caresses your over your bra, kissing you again as he squeezes your tits in his large hands. you inadvertently let out a soft moan. mingyu grabs the hem of your shirt and pulls it off of you. he looks at you in awe. 
“you're so perfect.” 
he is utterly gushing and swooning over you right now. you feel your heart skip a beat. 
you slip your hands under his shirt, running your hands over his abs and chest. he pulls his shirt off too, standing there before you. you've seen mingyu shirtless before, but not like this. his muscles are striking, perfectly sculpted - his golden, sunkissed skin glows beautifully. you feel a sudden, strong carnal urge to lick him, kiss him, bite him all over. 
you look up at him - the look in his eyes reciprocating your desire. you hop off the counter, taking his hands in yours. you pull his arms, tugging him in the direction of your room. his cheeks turns flush as he realizes your intent - a roguish grin spreads across his face, revealing his pointy canines you’ve always loved.
mingyu wastes no time taking your pants off as you throw yourself onto the bed, reclining against the soft pillows. he gazes at you lustfully as you lay there in your lingerie, unzipping his pants and pulling them off as fast as humanly possible. you feel throbbing in your core at the sight of him standing there - his light gray underwear doing absolutely nothing to disguise the prominent erection underneath. 
he crawls into bed, his body hovering above yours. you wrap your arms around his broad torso, pulling his large frame into yours as you begin to move your hips, grinding against his cock - the wet spot on your panties grows as you rub your cunt against him. it was clear from the moment he took his pants off that he is big, but feeling its length, its thickness, against your clothed pussy is making you clench around nothing - making you wish you were clenching around him instead. 
mingyu gently grabs your arms, pinning them next to your head as he interlocks his fingers with yours. his lips lightly graze against yours. 
“are you sure you want to do this?” he asks softly. you nod immediately. 
“yeah.”
he buries his head into the crook of your neck, kissing you repeatedly. he gradually makes his way down your body, his hands moving to take your bra off, but he pauses.
“can i-”
“you can do whatever you want to me,” you interject.
you feel his cock twitch. “oh god, don't tell me that.”
he unclasps the hook, letting out a moan at the sight of your bare tits. immediately he takes your nipple in his mouth, swirling his tongue around the hardened bud before taking it between his lips. he sucks on your tit like his life depends on it - his hand squeezing and pinching the other as his cock grinds against your core. you're gone already - a moaning mess, putty in his hands. he eventually switches sides, cool air hitting the wetness remaining on your nipple. you get the feeling mingyu could suck your tits forever. 
he eventually moves on, planting kisses down your stomach as he situates himself between your legs. he kisses your inner thighs - slowly approaching your core, but not touching you just yet. you whimper as he finally touches his lips to your clit over your thoroughly wet underwear. he licks you slowly, his tongue running over the thin fabric several times before he slips his finger underneath, pulling your underwear aside, exposing your soaked core. he groans at the sight of it. 
“fuck, just as pretty as i imagined.”
you part your lips to say something, but your words become lost - instantly replaced with cries of pleasure as he begins eating you out. you run your fingers through his hair, grasping onto it as he sucks repeatedly on your clit. he places a large hand on your belly, applying pressure, as he takes two fingers to your pussy, slipping them in with ease. you moan as he begins to fuck you, your hips beginning to buck. 
“more,” you beg. 
you cry out as he adds a third finger - your cunt has never felt so full, but you know this is nothing compared to how his cock would feel in you. he continues sucking your clit, heat rising in your lower stomach as you feel yourself nearing orgasm. you writhe in pleasure, screaming mingyu’s name as he makes you cum - and he makes you cum hard. 
your head spins as you come down from your powerful high. as you catch your breath mingyu crawls back up, laying against you, his radiant body heat making your skin turn hot. he strokes your cheek, pressing his lips hungrily against yours once more. 
“can you… will you ride me?”
your pussy throbs at the mere thought. wordlessly you nod. mingyu reaches down, sliding your panties off before discarding his own underwear. you gasp softly as his cock springs free. you reach down, taking hold of it - its size making your hand appear tiny in comparison. he leans his head back, sighing as you stroke his length, your palm becoming wet with his precum.
you give him a push, rolling over on top of him. his tip grazes your wet cunt as you straddle him, his eyes locked onto yours intensely. you sit up, taking his cock in your hand, rubbing it against your folds a few times, before finally slipping it inside. you slowly lower yourself onto it, whining softly as its thickness stretches you. mingyu groans as you bottom out, sitting entirely on his cock. you haven’t even moved yet, but his breathing is heavy, inhaling deeply as he reaches up to grab onto your breasts. you begin to ride him, slowly moving your hips up and down, his cock filling you up beyond anything you could’ve imagined. you gradually increase your pace, both of you moaning at the overwhelming sensation, until you are fully bouncing on his cock, your palms resting against his muscular chest to steady yourself as you unravel over him. 
mingyu begins to whimper. “you’re so fucking hot,” he utters between heavy breaths. “you’re gonna make me cum.” 
you ride him relentlessly, crying out at how good he feels inside you. his eyes close as he releases, thrusting his hips powerfully as he cums in your pussy - the warmth of his cum filling you up. your pace slows, riding him gently as he finishes, his moans tapering off as he begins to come down. you settle onto his cock, laying on him as you kiss him. he kisses you back lovingly, one hand running through your hair, the other caressing the small of your back. you lay there for a while, his chest rising up and down as he breathes deeply. your heartbeat slows, pounding heavily in your chest as you recover.
slowly, he finally pulls out. you roll to his side, wrapping your arms around him in a warm embrace, squeezing him with all your might. he giggles. 
“mingyu?” you ask softly after several moments of silence.
“hm?”
“you should’ve told me sooner.”
he sighs. “i wanted to - many times. but i didn’t want to risk our friendship. i didn’t think you felt the same way.”
“i think… i think i’ve always loved you. i just never realized it.”
mingyu smiles. he gives you a kiss on the forehead.
“so… what does this mean? for us,” he asks you.
you look up - his warm eyes are fixated on you, optimistic, awaiting your answer.
“well, i really don’t think anything is going to change.” a nervous look washes over his face - you quickly add, “except that we fuck now and also i want you to be my boyfriend.”
he closes his eyes, letting out a laugh. he pulls you closer into his embrace.
“i like the sound of that.”
692 notes · View notes
erwinsvow · 6 months
Text
𝐜𝐨𝐟𝐟𝐞𝐞, 𝐛𝐥𝐚𝐜𝐤, 𝐭𝐰𝐨 𝐬𝐮𝐠𝐚𝐫𝐬
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summary: aaron hotchner is a lot of things. in love with you is one that you never saw coming.
word count: 7.1k
author's note: bau!reader + hotch is my favorite combo ever. i haven't written and posted in, like, two years so please be nice :) i've written so many other versions of hotch but this one just wrote itself. inspired by the amazing @luveline and so many breathtaking hotch stories and isabel (alisdas on ao3, not on here anymore i think :( ) who wrote of terrible coffee and late-night rides which i think started all of this and my immense aaron brain rot when i read that fic, like, three years ago. enjoy!
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This was wrong, Aaron thought to himself. He seldom committed acts that others might say were wrong, or argue they could potentially be wrong, but this was different. Aaron felt wrong, a feeling he was not used to.
“I’m worried about you, that’s all,” you had said quietly on the jet early one morning. You two were sitting across from each other on the flight back from the team’s latest solved case, an excruciating long ride home from the coast of Oregon.
Your book laid open on your lap, unread and a bookmark tucked between the earlier pages. The spine was cracked, like you’d read it a hundred times before. He knew that wasn’t true though, it was just a used novel probably from the thrift store around the corner of your apartment.
You had told him once, back when you first started—back when he was still married and you were less affected by this job—that you liked finding used (pre-loved, you call it) books and picking the most worn out ones to take home. You said it means that someone used to love this book.
It felt wrong because you were too young for him, and too innocent to be mixed up in his life. What could you know about his thoughts? About the love of his life that divorced him and his son he only sees once in a while.
The rest of the team makes jokes with you, in particular JJ and Penelope. He’s even heard Emily pitch in, about your not-so-secret fondness for your boss. For him. 
Back when you had first started, it was nothing. Passing glances, working extra hard to please him and earn his praise—which was never given out generously. He hadn’t even taken the time to notice, never paid more attention than any other member of the team. What he did notice was your work ethic.
Being among the youngest of the team had instilled a drive in you to prove your worth. You always stayed an hour extra, came early, and spent  nights working the case even when you were yawning every few minutes. The most attention he’d given you back then was commenting that you’d had a good insight into the unsub, commending you on well-written reports and briefs, and offering you a cup of coffee when it was just you and him left in the sheriff’s office. He’d be rereading seemingly endless pages of the case reports and you’d be diving headfirst into the victim’s lives.
Your specialty was always understanding why the victims did what they did, figuring out their routines and ascertaining important details from their personal belongings. He was used to you flicking through diaries and boxes of mementos that were once treasured by another young girl, not so much older than yourself. 
He’d be lying if he hadn’t thought it was impacting you—reading through the journals of dead women who had been very similar to yourself, with similar hopes and dreams. It was depressing, he knew, and yet if you were bothered by it, you didn’t show it in the slightest. At least not to him. 
And back then, he’d never notice the sweet smile that always graced your face when he was asking you if you’d like coffee. You’d shake your head no, and take sips of water between your yawns. You didn’t even tell him that you don’t drink coffee until a few months later, after he asked if you’d ever like a cup when he offered. He can remember it clearly even now.
“Actually, Hotch, I don’t drink coffee.” Your cheeks were tinged with color like you were embarrassed to even be admitting this to him.
“Why didn’t you say anything sooner? I would have stopped asking three months ago.” If he sounded stern, he didn't mean to. The burning on your face deepened.
“I didn’t want to be rude. I drink tea though, but I didn’t think to mention it. It’s not as easy to make.”
“Well, let me know if you need a cup of hot water then.”
You had smiled at that, and he had turned around to take another picture on the bulletin board. He smiled a little too.
“You don’t need to worry about me,” he said, maybe a little too gruffly. He didn’t mean it, again, but it just came out that way. He thinks some part of him is trying to warn you to stay away before you get too close.
“We’re all worried. You went through something really big and didn’t tell any of us and even if you don’t care about us like that, I care about you. I just want to make sure you’re okay.” 
Aaron’s gaze casts around the rest of the jet.  Derek has his headphones in, staring out the window and trying to resist sleep. JJ and Emily are playing cards—they should be sleeping, but they had a little too much espresso a few hours before. They’re too far away to hear you and Aaron speaking, but he notices JJ’s eyes darting over every once in a while. Spence is asleep, and he realizes that’s why it’s so quiet. Dave is reading a book, too, but he’ll stop and interject into JJ and Emily’s conversation.
He looks back at you, sleepy-eyed and wrapped in a warm, boxy pullover from your alma mater. He thinks a little bit too much about you these days, and he can’t get it to stop. He shouldn’t profile anyone on the team, they have a strict moratorium on that, but especially not you.
You, who never fails to try to make anyone feel better when they’re down. You, who doesn’t make it seem like you’re analyzing their behavior, but rather observing and offering comfort in hard times. You remember everything the team tells you about their likes and dislikes, never forgetting a birthday or special occasion. He can distinctly recall fresh chocolate chip cookies on Derek’s birthday, carrot cake from the Italian bakery Rossi loves to celebrate when his latest book became a bestseller, and a new knick knack for Penelope’s office after a particularly brutal case.
You say it’s all in passing, but he knows it’s not. You’re trying your hardest to keep the team together in the little ways, strengthening bonds that extend beyond coworkers. You want to fit in and be accepted, and you worry so much that you won’t. This is your way of trying to show that you’re a part of this team too, not just the new girl and one of the young ones. 
Aaron blinks twice. You’re looking at him expectantly, and he wishes you wouldn’t. All he’ll do is disappoint you. 
“You don’t need to worry,” he repeats. “I’ll be fine.” 
“I wish you wouldn’t say that. Why is it so bad for us to worry about you?” You look like you’re starting to get upset—it hurts Aaron more than he realized it would. It’s not bad for the others to worry, it’s bad for you. If you get attached, if he lets this get unprofessional, he doesn’t think he’ll ever forgive himself. Hurting himself is one thing; hurting you is another entirely.
“Let it go, Agent. Try to get some rest.” He looks out the window. He can see the sun coming up, and realizes he hasn’t slept since the night before last. He still needs to drive home—not really home, he remembers sadly, his empty apartment— and work on reports before he can even see Jack. He doesn’t think resting now is a good idea, and yet his body is so tired.
When he looks back, you’re reading your book again but your eyes are really paying attention to the words on the page. You’re just skimming, and blinking rapidly, and he realizes then he’s made you tear up.
His phone goes off—Haley, and he feels guilt building up in his chest, almost overwhelming him. He steps away to answer and talks quietly. He doesn’t want you to overhear and worry even more. When he comes back to his seat, you’ve fallen asleep. He takes the book from your hands gently and puts the bookmark in, closing it and resting it on the seat beside you. He watches you sleep and wonders if he’s making a mistake trying to hide from you. He thinks, and not for the first time, that you see right through him.
The plane lands an hour and a half later, and everyone is beyond exhausted. Even Spencer, who normally doesn’t need much energy or caffeine to start talking fast about something interesting he noticed about this case and this unsub, is unusually quiet. They’re all running on fumes, staying up two nights in a row profiling and then catching the unsub with the latest victim at one in the morning, and then boarding the jet soon after.
Aaron makes a decision, everyone can work on their notes from home and the report is due no later than day after next. Derek pats him on the shoulder and says no one is to call him for the next twenty-four hours. JJ and Emily exchange a laugh. Y
ou, he notices, though he wishes he wouldn’t, go up to Spencer and talk with him quietly. When you’re done, he beams at you and you at him. He wonders what you two talked about when they’re all heading out, listening to Spencer ramble about how the unsub’s use of his childhood spots as disposal sites offers insight into the abuse of his youth. Prentiss tells him to save it for the report. 
He and Rossi are walking back to their cars when Dave speaks up for the first time.
“You’re wondering what she said to him, aren’t you?”
Aaron stops for a moment. 
“You should know better than to profile me.”
“Oh, I’m not profiling. This is just me being observant. You should stop fiddling with your ring finger when you talk to her. It’s a dead giveaway.”
“Dave, I don’t need to tell you that this conversation—“
“I know, I know. I won’t mention it again if you don’t want me to.”
“Thank you. I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”
“See you tomorrow, Aaron. And by the way, she offered to write his notes for him if he wanted. He said it’s hard for him to write about unsubs with schizophrenic tendencies and she said she can try to help, if he wants. That’s all. Let me know when you’re ready to talk about this.”
Aaron gets in his car and doesn’t stop thinking about you the entire ride home.
-
You wish you could make it stop. The way you feel about your boss. It started so long ago, it’s almost a part of you now. Aaron is stern and his disposition is frightening, to the say the least. But only at first, you’ve realized, after so many late evenings spent discussing the case with him, breaking down the tiniest details, and him paying attention to your every word when you discuss the victim’s demeanor and behavior to try to figure out what had really happened.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this, you thought. You had gone to the overpopulated state school with the hopes of entering the medical field. You were a true empath, and there was no one’s suffering you couldn’t relate to, no one that you wouldn’t try to make feel better. All your life, people cried on your shoulder while you offered up words of comfort. And because of this, everyone thought you were a shoo-in for nursing or medical school, where you could help people through the worst days of their life.
All it took was a few days at the hospital where you had been working, a string of murder victims being wheeled in one after another, for you to reconsider your life’s work. None had survived the incident, but the killer let them live just long enough to be seen by the doctor, who then had to declare them legally dead.
Something about the victims seemed familiar to you, how they’d all come from wealthy families and were sliced up in their expensive clothing, expensive jewelry and watches smashed to bits instead of being stolen. You mentioned it to one of the officiers, who told someone else, and somewhere in that chain of events, your insight helped them catch the killer.
It was then, you thought, that maybe you should be working on the other side of these situations. Stopping the killer before it ever got to this. 
Then you’d done a one-hundred and eighty degree spin on your career, electing to pursue becoming an agent. You had been young, and motivated, and you chose to overlook when everyone told you this job might become your whole life, leaving no time for a husband and kids and a family.
You had ignored it all, working your way up from the local field office to child crimes in just a year and a half. The transition out of sex crimes to homicide was disturbingly hard, because at least before you’d had a victim to interview. You were no expert, not yet, but a unique asset altogether, combining a true mission to uncover the best in each victim, and figuring out their behavior patterns from bedrooms and diaries.
It was a unique skill-set, acquired mostly because a lot of traumatized children didn’t offer much to go off of. You had to turn to their childhood homes, toys, and scribbles to figure out what had been going on in the first place.
You reflect often on why you decided to leave child homicide when news spread that the BAU had an opening for one more agent. Truthfully, you hadn’t considered it at all, since you were more than happy with your current position and coworkers. You were solving cases, delivering justice, and bringing whatever comfort you could bring to grieving families.
In fact, you had been requested specifically. You, out of a hundred or more well-established, intelligent agents that could be a huge asset to the team. You were never special, and you didn’t like to think of yourself in that way either, but you couldn’t deny how good it felt to hear that the team wanted you. 
And when you transferred over, everyone was so nice. The team was inviting, they respected your opinion, and especially in cases with younger victims, they revered your knowledge. You felt included, and invaluable, and as hard as you worked, you wanted to work even harder. 
Your boss was a brilliant agent and profiler, and so hardworking that you wanted to do anything you could to make his workload a little easier. You wrote the most detailed reports, so he would have to edit them as much.. You offered to pick up extra briefs, so he took home a couple less papers. And no matter what you did, acknowledged or not, you knew you were making the kind of difference you’d always dreamed you would. 
Aaron—he was only ever Aaron in your head, and Hotch the rest of the  time—liked you as an agent, and it made you happy. A little happier than you should be, considering he was happily married with a toddler and a perfect life outside of work. It was almost wrong, but it didn’t stop you from trying to impress him with your work ethic.
You always put aside your other feelings and focused on the team, and somehow in all of that, you felt like you were finally making your difference. You were close with the team and close enough with Aaron, that you hadn’t been worried to start that conversation on the jet now that all these circumstances were changing. Haley had asked for a divorce and he hadn’t muttered a word of it to anyone.
He’s so tired, you can see. You wonder if everyone else notices it too, or if it’s just you observing so closely. He has dark circles now, because he never sleeps, always working, and the furrows on his forehead are seemingly etched in and permanent. He misses his wife and his son, and you know it, and maybe it’s wrong to care about your boss so much that your heart hurts when you see him glancing at the framed photos of his family on his desk, or the tiny polaroids in his wallet, but you do. You think you’re in love with Aaron Hotchner, and you don’t know how to make it stop. 
You’re gonna get hurt, you remind yourself every now and then. 
Aaron and Spence have just come back from the prison, where they had an encounter with Chester Hardwick that they won’t really talk about. You’d been with the rest of the team in Indiana, and then two days later in Oregon. 
Aaron and Haley were divorcing, and it hurt him so much, you knew, because it wasn't for a lack of love. It was a lack of time, a shortness of hours in the day. He couldn’t be the husband Haley wanted and the father he thought Jack needed while being an agent for eighteen hours a day. It hurt you too, seeing him like this. You wish he felt better. 
The days and weeks seemed to blend into months. Somewhere in between Hotch’s divorce and JJ’s pregnancy, you had become complacent with your relationship with Aaron. Walking in together from the parking lot, leaving together at the end of a long day—usually alone and sometimes joined by Emily or David. Sometimes you’d have a frothy drink from a nearby coffee shop in your hand—to which you always hear, “My coffee’s not better than that stuff?”
“It’s not coffee, remember-”
“I know, you don’t drink coffee. That stuff is full of sugar. I don’t need you bouncing off the walls like Reid and Garcia too.”
You laugh, and then you wonder if it’s because he really cares or if it was just a passing comment. You share a lot of little moments like that. 
When his eardrum was nearly blown out after New York, you almost offered to drive back with him from Ohio to Virginia. It was instinct, because you just didn’t want him to be alone. You had exchanged a glance when he handed you the plate of brownies from the victim’s mother, and you knew he had read your mind. But he didn’t say anything, and you left it at that. You’re not nearly stupid enough to think that your boss reciprocates your feelings for him. Hell, most days you don’t even know what feelings you have for him.
Your seats on the jet are almost permanently fixed; near the coffee machine towards the cockpit. You sit across from each other, and sometimes you don’t even speak. He’ll bring you a cup of hot water, and he doesn’t ask if you need a tea bag from the make-shift coffee station, because knows they’re in your go-bag. 
When it’s his weekend with Jack after two weeks of back-to-back cases, Aaron is always working on the reports on the jet. It’s because he’s trying to reduce how much work he has to do at home, and even when everyone’s fallen asleep and your eyes are close to shutting, you get up and make him a cup of coffee. He’s never once told you how he takes it, and he doesn’t know if you’ve seen him make it either, but somehow you know, and it’s always right. When you offer him the steaming paper cup, he looks up at you with an entirely new look—something you’ve never seen before. You two don’t exchange so many words.
He says it all with his eyes, sometimes, even when you’re not looking. It’s gratitude. (When you get off the jet a few hours later, you tease Morgan about his snoring. Derek asks you where his cup of coffee is, and you shove his arm so hard he almost drops his bag.
In the end, it was you who had figured out there was something wrong with the Reaper’s last few victims. 
“Why would a nineteen year old girl date her teaching assistant?” You had questioned, looking through a file that everyone’s eyes had already seen. “An honors student, a freshman, I mean, none of this points to an illicit affair with faculty. She knew it was against the rules and her roommates said she’s never so much as skipped class.”
“That could have been because she wants to see him,” Derek interjects. “If they were truly in love like Foyet said, she’d take every opportunity to be with him.”
“But in an environment where no one can know you two are together? I mean, if she was in love and close to getting engaged, wouldn’t she tell her best friends? Her parents? How many teenage girls keep something like that just to themselves?”
The pieces of the puzzle that had once fit together so nicely were coming undone. It felt like the blink of an eye, from catching Foyet to him escaping. Everyone was on edge, no one more than Aaron, and your empathy still knew no bounds. Where you had once been able to focus on work and dedicate all your thoughts to the cases, you now were distracted and distant. Every other thought was about Aaron, as wrong as that might be. 
Canada had been something else entirely. It was difficult for the entire team to fathom, but nearly impossible for you. You had lost your temper twice—something you’d never done before— and thrown up when the team discovered all the shoes. JJ had run after you but in the end, Aaron was the one who found you outside.
“I’m sorry, JJ, I’ll be fine—I-I just need a minute,” you breath out, chest heaving and tears brimming. 
“It’s okay,” Aaron says, “take your time.” 
You turn around so fast, your breath catching, and you hate this situation. You could never hate Aaron but you hate this, you hate that he followed you and that he’s seeing you like this. You look weak, after two and a half years of trying to prove to him that you’re strong—strong enough to handle this job, do what needs to be done, and not cry at a crime scene.
“I-I’m sorry, I-” 
“Why are you apologizing?” He doesn’t sound mad, or like he’s belittling you, and you don’t know why that’s what you expected. This is Aaron, your Aaron, and even though he’s not really yours it doesn't seem to matter much right now.
“I’m making a scene. I-I shouldn’t be throwing up on the job or screaming at those unsubs or anything else-”
“It’s okay. It happens.” Aaron says it so concisely, you almost feel better for a second. Isn’t this what it’s always come down to? You need Aaron like air, and somehow he always knows what you need to hear. He doesn’t treat you any differently compared to the others but it feels different today. You can’t describe it in words. If JJ or Morgan had followed you out here, you would have said the same things, but you wouldn’t have felt this way. Like if you crumble here today, Aaron will be there to pick you up.
“Take your time, please,” he repeats. “I know you think you have something to prove to me, but you don’t. You’ve proven it already, to all of us. Admitting that all of this gets to you isn’t a bad thing. That’s what separates us from them.”
At that moment, a dam bursts. Tears flow down your face like they haven’t in so long, as long as you can remember. You think you should feel embarrassed, crying in front of your boss, but Aaron takes you into his arms and you can’t remember the last time you felt this safe. Cheesy, you think, but this is everything I thought it would be and more.
You’re not sure how long he holds you there, but eventually once the front of his shirt is covered in your tears and he offers you a tissue (Does he just carry this around waiting for one of us to cry?) and you head back together. This is the embarrassing part, you think, bracing yourself and biting your inner cheek. But if the team is judging you at this moment, they certainly don’t show it.
You join JJ and Emily inside the house, who ask you if you’re okay when you sniffle for the last time. Spencer asks you later, on the way home. Derek tells you to call him if you need anything. Dave tells you, “You’ll be okay, kid,” and somehow, you believe him. Penelope texts you once on your phone, checking in and promising a distracting, gossip filled girl’s night out soon.
Aaron walks you to your car, and says goodnight. You’re delusional, you think, once you're back at home. You’ve taken the longest, hottest shower imaginable and your record player is emitting the scratchy sound of your favorite Beatles album. You’re in a big shirt that’s getting wet while you brush your freshly cleaned hair and all you can think about is how it felt to be wrapped in Aaron’s arms a couple hours ago. 
You are delusional, you remind yourself. You’re checking your phone every couple minutes like a love-sick teenager. You think Aaron’s going to call you to check in, you almost feel it in your bones. You leave the ringer on incase he calls later—maybe he showered and sat down to work on some reports before sleeping. You fall asleep thirty minutes later, exhausted down to your bones, and wake up startled by your phone going off. In your sleepy delirium, you answer without looking who it is—assuming it’s Aaron.
“Hotch?” 
“Hey, sorry it’s JJ. We have another case, I’m sorry.”
“Oh, JJ, um, okay, I-I’ll be there in ten. Text the address, okay?” Your cheeks burn at the slip.
“I sent it just now. Listen, I’m sorry, but can you try Hotch’s cell? I called and texted and he’s not answering.” You feel your stomach turn, first because Aaron isn’t answering and he always answers, and second because JJ thinks he’ll answer if you call.
“I’ll try him now. I’ll call you back.”
You try him twice while changing and another time in the car. Your only explanation is that maybe he went to see Jack and put his phone away, but even that doesn’t check out. 
When you get to the scene, you inform the others about Aaron not answering.
“Alright, let’s split up for now and I’ll keep trying Hotch,” Derek says. They don’t seem that worried, and maybe that lulls you into not worrying either. After all, they’ve known him a lot longer than you have.
You end up with Spencer and Emily at the doctor’s house, combing through patient files Garcia sent over. There’s tens of dozens, and even though you want to go with Emily to Aaron’s place to get him, you know your experience with kids and in the hospital is vital. You and Spencer start working, but something feels off. You just can’t place it. 
In the end, you attribute it to your nerves from the last case. Your fear of embarrassing yourself carried into today, and even though you know no one judged you for losing it in Canada, the feeling lingers. Spencer answers the phone from Emily and says that Hotch was busy with something at the bureau that now requires Emily too. In the end, you and Spence figure it out just in time. Your body is so tired, it hurts, and then on top of that, Spencer gets hurt. You can barely process what’s happening, and you don’t feel better until the doctor says it’s through-and-through.
“God, Spencer, never do that again,” you say, your hands wet with the blood from his wound. You wipe it on your clothes, thinking you’ll change soon. 
“Guys, guys listen to me, something’s happened to Hotch.” The blood drains from your face and your breath stops in your throat. 
“What?” 
“Emily told me not to say anything until we got the unsub, but he’s in the hospital.”
The next hour is a blur. You all show up to the hospital, and Emily is talking to a bunch of agents. Their faces are blurred because you can hardly think straight. 
“Em? Is he okay?” your words must be coming out frantically because everyone’s looking at you like you’re about to crumble. 
“I’m sorry, I couldn’t say anything because I knew we wouldn’t be able to think straight about the case, I know it’s wrong but-”
“Is he okay?” You didn’t mean to cut her off, it just happened like that. Your mind is so clouded right now with a petrifying vision of Aaron dying alone on the floor of his new apartment that he hates so much, while you were waiting for a call for him.
“He-he hasn’t woken up yet.” 
You sit on a chair by Aaron’s bed. He looks like he’s sleeping, and a part of you had always wanted to see him like this. It would be comforting, if he actually was sleeping. You’d imagined it a little differently—you thought for sure he snores and sleeps on his side. You always notice sleep lines only on one arm when you guys have just woken up and continue working on the case. You stare extra hard when he rolls up the sleeves of his dress shirt on particularly hot days. Everyone would moan and groan about another case in the heat of Texas or Arizona, but not you.
It seems like those memories were a million years ago. 
When he wakes up, everyone pours in and it distracts you for a few heartbeats. When they realize what Foyet is actually after, the terror is apparent on everyone's faces. You realize how long it’s been since you last saw Haley and Jack when they finally step into the room. You and Emily leave to give them privacy. 
Later that night, you’re back in that chair. Aaron wakes up for a few minutes at a time, and when he finally stays awake, he notices you.
“How long have I been out?” 
“Thirty minutes. Give or take.”
“Is there water?”
“Yeah, yeah.” You scramble up to get the pitcher and pour him a glass. There’s a straw too, which you put in the cup and hold still for a second so he can drink.
“Thanks.”
“Yeah.” He can see all your emotions on your face. It doesn’t take him long at all, not anymore. You’ve been crying and your clothes have blood on them. He’s alarmed again.
“Is that your blood?” he asks, swallowing hard.
“No, no, Hotch. We had a case, the-the unsub shot Spence. He’s okay though, it just got on me and I haven’t been back home to change yet.”
“Why don’t you? Go home?”
“I didn’t want to leave you.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“I let you go home alone yesterday and look what happened.” You smile meekly at your own joke, hoping he appreciates it. He lies still though, not smiling. 
“I think you should go home. Get some rest after everything.”
“You know, Hotch, only you would tell me to go home and rest up when you’re the one who’s currently in the hospital.” 
“I just think-”
“Do you want me to leave? If you do, I will. I swear.” There’s silence between you two for a moment.
“No.” 
“Good, because I wasn’t going to.” The corners of his mouth turn up a little. You barely even notice it. “I can’t leave now. I don’t want you to sit alone here.” You should stop talking, you think to yourself. But you don’t. “You know yesterday, I got home and the whole time I sat there wondering if you were gonna call my cell. I even turned the ringer up all the way so I didn’t miss it. And I know that’s stupid because why would you call me? But I had this feeling. And now all I can think is why didn’t I call you?”
“Don’t think like-”
“Don’t think like that? Yeah, I knew you would say that. But if I had called you like I wanted to, and asked you to come over like I wanted to, maybe this wouldn’t have happened. But I didn’t because I was scared and I don’t want to be scared anymore. And I know this is the last thing you need to hear right now, but I guess I can’t hold it in any longer.” 
You want to clamp your hand over your mouth. Your favorite cheesy rom-coms have infiltrated your brain, and you can’t fathom how stupid you must sound right now to Aaron. He’s just almost died and the kid who was the last to join his team is declaring love for him on his hospital bed. But it won’t stop coming out.
“Can I tell you something Aaron? I mean, more than I already have? Emily said she didn’t tell me you were hurt because she knew I wouldn’t be able to think straight about the case anymore. About anything, anymore, if I knew you were missing or that you were hurt or dead. And I’ve been trying to hide it for so long, because I know you don’t need any more complications in your life right now, but, I think I have feelings for you, Aaron.” Hot tears stream down your face. You try to stop them but you can’t. They’ve been building up for two years.
“Please don’t cry. I don’t have a tissue for you this time.” You smile through your tears, but your entire body is still tense. It’s because you’re still expecting bad news, still waiting for the other shoe to drop. 
“Do you want me to leave? I can call Emily, she’ll sit with you if you don’t want to be alone.”
“I don’t want you to leave. And you don’t have to tell me these things, I already knew them.” Another few tears drip down your face. Aaron’s chest hurts more than it has ever before. He thinks back to your conversation on the jet that day, when you told him you cared about him and he hadn’t said much of anything at all. “I hope you know that I have feelings for you, too.” 
“You mean you care about me and the team?” you question half-heartedly. You think you’ve already gotten your answer. “I mean I care about the team a lot. And I care about you more than I should, more than what’s right. More than a superior should care about one of their agents. And I think if this hadn’t happened, I would have called you last night. Not because of the case, because of you. Because I need to make sure you’re okay.”
Your heart thumps uncomfortably in your chest. Aaron reaches out his hand a little, and you take it into yours. You sit like that for a long time, and you know there’s so much else going on, but a small part of you sighs in relief. Aaron is okay, and he feels about you how you do about him, and maybe everything will be okay in the end. 
The months after Haley’s funeral are tough for everyone. It’s weird going to work and not seeing Aaron. Sometimes you inadvertently make a cup of coffee how he likes it and have no one to give it to. You started drinking some, even though it tastes bitter and terrible, it makes you feel close to him.
How stupid is that, you wonder one day, sipping the coffee and looking over files with JJ. If the rest of the team thinks you're stupid, they haven’t shown any signs of it yet. You’re sure they mostly feel bad for you and your pathetic behavior. You’ve gotten sloppy because you can’t stop thinking about how Aaron is doing. 
You and the team will go visit him and Jack at his new place. You make cookies, snickerdoodle for Aaron and oatmeal raisin for Jack.
“What kind of a kid are you?” you questioned, helping Jack scribble in his Captain America coloring book. He’s munching on a cookie while you try to figure out what part of the shield is blue and what part is red. “I mean, who likes oatmeal raisin cookies at the tender age of 5?” 
“I did,” Spencer says, taking another one out of the tin. 
“You don’t count, genius,” Morgan says, and then directs his gaze at you. “And I mean come on, no chocolate chip for me? None at all? That hurts.”
“I made you some like two weeks ago! I have a job, you know,” you fire back. Aaron laughs, eating the snickerdoodle after dipping it in milk. It’s so domestic, you feel yourself staring. You only turn away when he catches you looking. 
When he comes back, you wonder if it’ll ever feel normal again. That silly routine you two had, the chairs on the jet near the coffee machine that you still sit in, walks to your car. 
At first, it just feels strange. So much has changed yet the team’s dynamic remains the same. You get through cases with the same ferocity you had when you first started, eager to prove your worth again. Your reports detail every detail and then some, and you stay even later than Aaron some nights. You need something to focus on, and your cases seem like the best option. The other option is to have another conversation with Aaron about your feelings and you think you might die if that happens.
When it finally does happen, it’s plenty embarrassing. You were so sure about your theory about this unsub, so sure that he would confess if he was confronted about his crimes and reminded of the humanity of his victims—three little kids, all under ten. Maybe that’s why it bothered you so much, and that’s why you stormed into the residence even though the rest of the team was screaming at you not to. In the end, you talk him down, but Aaron runs in behind you anyways and nearly spooks the unsub into suicide.
“You do not have the authorization to make calls like that,” Aaron yells at you, and though you had once thought you would die if he yelled at you, it’s all too easy to yell back. 
In that moment, when you had known what would happen, dealing with your area of expertise, he stormed in and questioned you and your abilities as an agent and as a profiler.
“I don’t need authorization, I knew what would happen, and I knew how to talk him down without this ending in gunfire—”
“I don’t care what you think you knew. This is a team, and we don’t make decisions that jeopardize a case without agreeing on it!” “You mean you have to agree with every decision I make? I had it handled, Hotch, you almost blew that whole thing up because you didn’t believe in me!”
“That’s not what this is about,” he fires back, and it feels strange to be yelling at you. He can’t recall the last time he’s ever done this. The rest of the team is just packing up in the police station, trying not to overhear but not really having any choice in the matter.
“Yes it is! You don’t trust me! Not to make decisions for this team and for our cases, or for anything. You just proved that back there. You don’t trust me.” It’s happening again. Tears brew in your eyes. They spill down before you can stop it. Aaron softens before your very eyes at the sight of them. “Stop! Stop feeling bad just because now I’m crying, they’re not tears for you, they’re angry tears and I can’t control it-”
“Of course, I trust you.” His voice has dropped from a yell to just above a whisper. “How could you think that I don’t?”
“I’m not stupid, Aaron. I know what I’m doing. My plan was going to work and you shot me down in front of everyone because you didn’t believe in me,” you say between tears. “Nothing’s changed.”
“And what do you think would happen if you stormed in there and I lost you too?” His voice is gentle. You hadn’t noticed that he was so close to you now. You can see the eyelash on his cheek and feel the heat radiating from his body. 
“That’s not what this is about.”
“That is exactly what this is about. You think I don’t trust you, so I won’t let you walk into a confrontation alone? That I think you don’t know how to profile, how to handle these unsubs, so I get into a screaming match outside a crime scene? Tell me, does that check with any of my behavior in the years I’ve known you?”
“I don’t know, Hotch, I don’t profile you.”
“You call me Hotch in front of everyone, and especially when you’re upset with me. When it’s just us you use Aaron. You know how I take my coffee even though I’ve never told you, because you pay attention even when no one else is looking. Cases with children affect you the most, especially when it takes us longer to work them, because you think you should be quicker and figure out the unsub faster since you worked with kids before joining the team. You remember the little things everyone says because you don’t want them to think you’re not paying attention to them. You cry about cases when you feel like there’s something more you should have done, even though there’s nothing else any of us can do. And you cry about me the most of all, that time on the jet, in the hospital, and just now because you think I don’t share your feelings. You think I know all this because I’m profiling you, but it’s not. It’s because I pay attention to those whom I love.” 
Shell shocked. You are shell shocked at Aaron’s speech, eyes wide and mouth open. You’re sure the rest of the team, hidden behind a bulletin board and the conference table is much the same. 
“I’m going to kiss you now. And that’s the end of the conversation about me not trusting you, okay?” You nod dumbly. Aaron’s lips are sweet and taste like his coffee—black, with two sugars. You feel another tear falling but it’s only because you hadn’t expected any of that. 
“That took long enough,” David says from behind the partition. 
and voila <3
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talkdutchtome · 5 months
Text
Bad Idea Right? - Daniel Ricciardo
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pairing . . . daniel ricciado x reader )
genre . . . smut )
summary . . .it had been three months seen you had seen your ex boyfriend, you had done everything in your power to get over him, so why does it only take daniel to look your way before you’re putty in his hands once again )
song . . . bad idea right? - olivia rodrigo )
warning . . . smut, 18+ MINORS DNI, choking, rough sex, spitting in mouth, use of the words slut and whore, degradation, face slapping, dacryphilia, fingering, oral (f receiving), p in v, unprotected sex, creampie, use of petnames, not proofread )
word count . . . 3200 words )
a/n . . .i'm still pretty new to writing smut so this probably isn't fantastic but i've had it sitting in my drafts half done since guts first came out so i just wanted to get it done )
Haven't heard from you in a couple of months  But I'm out right now and I'm all fucked up  And you're callin' my phone and you're all alone  And I'm sensing some undertone 
The second you saw him across the crowded club, you knew the months of progress and moving on would be for nothing. He looked better than ever, the tight white shirt he wore complemented his tan skin and made you press your thighs together. Daniel Ricciardo ended things with you 3 months ago because your relationship, though full of love, became extremely toxic; with the two of you constantly going through the vicious circle of arguing and then fucking to make up. It hurt to be without him as you truly believed the two of you were meant to be together but after months without him, you had finally started to believe that you could live without him; that was until you walked into a nightclub and found the Australian sat in the VIP section with two absolutely beautiful women sat either side of him.  
Suddenly you were the 22-year-old girl that met Daniel three years ago, immediately transfixed by him and willing to do anything for his attention. You knew he knew you were there, when Max saw you, he waved and called you over, but you just waved and gestured to the bar, telling him that you were getting a drink. Still living in a post-breakup world, you had gotten especially dressed up for tonight; hoping to find someone who would help you forget about the Formula 1 driver who still had a hold on your heart. You wore a lilac lace minidress that hugged your curves tightly, it was brought for you by Daniel, but you didn’t see the need to throw out a perfectly good dress just because of whose money purchased it. Point was, you looked hot as hell and you knew it too, so you didn’t mind going over to the table your ex sat at, only to talk to Max though of course.  
When he saw you walking over, he felt his mouth get dry and annoyingly, his trousers get tight. He had always loved you in that dress and now that he knew he couldn’t have you, you looked even better. He watched you talk to Max, laughing at all his jokes and batting your pretty little eyes at the Dutchman just like you used to at him. He also watched Max’s eyes watching you, he watched his friend practically eye-fuck his ex-girlfriend whilst he sat across from them. The girls sat next to him were now completely forgotten, all Daniel could focus on was you. When Max went up to the bar to get the next round, Daniel knew this was his chance; he scooted around the table until he was sat next to you and began to whisper in your ear.  
“He wants you, you know”  
You scoffed at your ex-boyfriend's words, you and Max may be flirting a little bit, but that’s all it was, not to mention that it was none of his business who wanted you anymore 
“Well maybe I want him to” You whispered back at him with a smirk, expecting that to knock him down a peg or two but instead you saw him smile back at you before taking a piece of paper out of his pocket and starting to write something down. 
“Yeah sure thing, but if you decide that you want to be fucked by someone who will actually make you cum tonight, heres my new address. I'll be waiting.” He told you before putting the piece of paper in your hands before getting up and walking away from you.  
And I pull up to your place on the second floor  And you're standing, smiling at the door  And I'm sure I've seen much hotter men  But I really can't remember when   
You held the piece of paper containing Daniel’s address in your palms as you paced back and forth outside the door to his apartment. You knew this was a bad idea, but you craved him so badly. You had slept with other people since your relationship ended but none of them compared to the way Daniel made you feel, and you didn’t realize just how badly touch starved you were until Daniel whispered those dirty words in your ear and you felt throbbing coming from between your legs. “Fuck it, it’s fine” You spoke aloud before finally knocking on the door. 
Daniel opened the door with a smirk painted on his face, he knew you would cave and follow him home. Seeing his face almost mocking you made you half want to turn around and walk home but half jump on him and let him fuck you senseless. Deciding on the latter, you walked past him into his home. Before you had a chance to say anything you were pressed up against the now closed front door with Daniel’s hand around your neck. 
“What a silly little whore you are, trying to fuck my best friend right in front of me, and in my favorite dress too” He tutted at you, smirking more when you kept quiet, unsure what to respond to the words he had spoken. 
“Do you really think he could fuck you like I can? Like anyone can fuck you like I can?” he asked you again, now starting to apply pressure to your throat with his fingers, you stayed quiet still saying nothing to the man in front of you. Suddenly you felt a sharp pain on your cheek, Daniel had slapped your face. 
“Answer me pretty girl” 
You could have cum right then and there; the issue with all of the sex you had been having post Daniel is that none of them knew how rough you liked it, and to finally have that feeling of a man stood in front of you getting ready to fuck you silly made your pussy quiver with anticipation. 
“No Danny, nobody can fuck me like you can” you responded, looking up to him through your long lashes, giving him the doe eyes that you know he was never able to resist.  
“You look so pretty babygirl” he spoke, bringing his hand away from your neck to your lips. He used his thumb to push your mouth open slightly, you opened it wider, knowing what he wanted. He spat in your mouth before using his hands to close your lips together again 
“Swallow” he ordered and you did without a second thought. You felt his hands move down your body, coming from your mouth, stopping briefly at your tits before they travelled down even further, eventually ending up between your legs. He pushed up your dress to your waist and sunk down to his knees.  
“Oh new panties sweetheart? Did one of your new fucktoys get you these?” 
“Maybe” you retorted at him, but before you could finish the word Daniel had ripped them off, literally 
ripped them off. He smirked at the sight of your glistening pussy, knowing that he had gotten you to the point of dripping without even touching you. He pushed his fingers through your folds, running his fingertips harshly across your clit before sinking two fingers straight into your core without giving you a second's warning. The involuntary squeal that left your lips only boosted Daniel’s ego, his smirk growing wider than you thought possible. The pleasure that you felt in the first ten seconds of him thrusting his tattooed fingers inside of you was greater than anything you had felt since the pair of you had broken up. Though just as quickly as he had started touching you, he stopped, leaving you a whimpering mess.  
“Such a slut aren’t you, so desperate for my dick” he taunted you, a low chuckle leaving his lips before he picked you up and threw you across his shoulders. 
“Ahh Danny what the fuck?” you asked, genuinely startled as he began to carry you to his bedroom, before throwing you down onto the bed.  
“Dress off” Daniel said, stood in front of where you laid, his eyes dark and focused on you. You thought about fighting him, to at least make it look like you’re not willing to give in to him too easily, to keep some pride; but the look he gave you sent shivers down your spine, you could feel the slickness building up between your thighs, you needed him, pride be damned. And if you thought Daniels eyes where dark and hungry before, it was nothing compared to the way he looked at you he towered over you on his bed. He looked like a man possessed when you slid off your dress, leaving you covered only by a black lace bralette that was swiftly removed by Daniel anyway. You opened your mouth to beg for him to touch you again, but you were swiftly cut off when his mouth crashed against yours, enveloping you in a earth-shatteringly good kiss that sent your mind swirling. The feeling of his lips against yours was one you would never grow tired of. The way his hands laced into your hair and his knee nudged your legs open made it hard for you to understand why you would ever willingly let this go.  
It was only when you started to grind yourself against his knee that he pulled his lips off of you. The way that he looked down at you as you cried out for him was sinful. His messy chocolate brown hair, his swollen lips turned up in smirk, his eyes usually so bright and happy now dark and stormy, full of lust. Every part of him turned you on more than any guy you had ever known. 
“Please Danny” your voice was horse; you were becoming desperate. 
“Please what Babygirl?” he spoke with a chuckle, he loved having you like this, like putty in his hands.  
“Make me feel good” You gave him your best puppy dog eyes, not above trying any trick that would get too closer to cumming. 
Daniel didn’t say anything to your request though, instead he just began pressing kisses on your lips, before slowly bringing his kisses down past your neck and chest, getting closer and closer to the place where you ached for him the most. This process lasted only a few moments, but those teasing moments felt like hours and when his tongue finally found your pussy you honestly felt like you had died and gone to heaven. He licked strips up your slit, savoring the taste of you, the taste that he had missed so much. Your hands found his hair as his lips attached themselves to your clit, the curls wrapping around your fingers as they had done so many times before. The way he sucked at and nibbled your clit made you see stars and you soon felt your first orgasm start to build up, that familiar feeling in your stomach making itself known.  
“Ahh Danny I’m going to cum, please let me cum” you begged him, although if he said no, you weren’t sure you would be able to avoid it anyway.  
“Sure, Babygirl you can cum all over my tongue, do you think Max could make you cum this hard” His words annoyed you, bringing up Max at this point was not necessary but before you could complain to him, he picked up the pace of his tongue and you quickly found yourself reaching climax, a string of profanity falling from your lips as you did so. The sounds you were making were music to Daniel’s ears, sounds that he wished he could hear for the rest of his life. If Daniel’s ego wasn’t big enough already, the way he had you falling apart in just a few minutes made his pride swell. You could walk away from him, pretend that you’d moved on and don’t want him anymore; but it’s him who knows your body better than you do, it’s him who knows exactly how to give you what you need to make your knees weak.  
Once he had made you feel good, he turned his attention to himself. The way you tasted, the way you sounded; you were his kryptonite, and he was becoming so hard that it had started to become painful. His rock-hard dick straining against his jeans made your mouth water, it had been far too long since you had felt the sting of him splitting you in half, and you didn’t want to wait any longer; so, when you saw him reach for his belt you felt your pussy quiver with anticipation. 
“Are you going to let me fuck you baby?” he asked as he began to pull his jeans down, revealing his grey boxers, damp from the way his cock had been seeping with precum. His underwear didn’t last long as they were the next thing to be removed, his length red and angry with how hard it was, how desperate for your touch it was. It had only been three months since you had last had him, but in that time, you had somehow forgotten just how big he was; it made you nervous, but it also made you that much more desperate to have him inside of you.  
“Yes, Danny please fuck me” At your words of conformation, he roughly manhandles you to flip you onto your stomach. You prop yourself up on your hands and knees immediately on instinct; you knew how he liked to fuck you, and you also knew that if you did what he wants than you’re more likely to be allowed to cum around his dick.  
“You’re such a good girl aren’t you baby; you know just how I want you don’t you” His hands fall to your ass, groping it and massaging it; savoring every moment of having you spread out in front of you, for all he knew this could be the last time that he has you like this so he was damn well going take his time.  
“What’s the safe word sweet girl?” he asked you as he runs his hands across your body, wanting to feel all of you.  
“Mclaren, please Danny, just fuck me I need you so bad” 
Without warning he plunges two of his fingers deep inside of you, sending shockwaves of pleasure ringing throughout your body. He pumped them inside of you roughly and without care, the sting from just his fingers stretching your cunt out making your eyes water and you felt that oh so familiar feeling of another orgasm creeping up on you embarrassingly fast, however that was all taken away when Daniel abruptly pulls his fingers out of you, making you whine; feeling empty from the loss of contact. That emptiness didn’t last for long though, because just as soon as he took his fingers out of you, he slammed his cock into you.  
Your cries filled the air and tears began to fall from your eyes as Daniel picked up his pace, still slamming himself inside of you despite your discomfort. His hand reaches around to grab your neck, pulling you up flush against his chest so he can see your face as he continues to wreck you. 
“You look so pretty when you cry you know that, such a pretty little slut” as he speaks his hand finds your clit, rubbing it harshly. The pain starts to subside as you get used to having him inside of you again and it is quickly replaced by insane pleasure. The groans falling from the Australians lips sounds heavenly and you can feel your second orgasm quickly approaching.  
“Don’t you dare cum, not until I say you can” Danny tells you, letting go of your neck and gently pushing your head down to the pillow. He’s fucked you countless times, so he knows your body, he knows the way that your pussy starts to clench when you’re close, he knows that you’ll purposely not say anything to try and get away with cumming even when he’s told you not to. He is an expert in the subject of you, and that’s information that he’ll always keep, regardless of how long the two of you spend apart. He knows you more than anyone ever has, and anyone ever will.  
“Oh, fuck fucking fuck you feel so good babygirl, you’re so tight for me” he said through gritted teeth, still slamming into you with all of his might, drunk on the feeling of you clenching around him, your moans and cries spurring something on in him. He didn’t want to admit it even to himself, but he had missed you more than anything, he had missed the way you feel, the way you taste, the way you sound. Everything about you was perfect and, in that moment, he decided that he would never let you go again. The thought of another man getting to have you like this made him sick to his stomach, the thought of someone like Max getting to hear the whimpers you make when you’re being fucked, it was unbearable. 
It was getting harder and harder for you to hold off your orgasm, Daniel was fucking you like a man possessed and sooner or later you were going to cum whether you were allowed or not, and he knew that, of course he did.  
“I’m so so close Danny, please please let me cum” You were begging, shame and pride had gone out the window when you turned up at his door after three months. 
“Okay baby, cum. I’m close too, I’m going to fill you up, okay? This is my pussy, and mine only” Daniel just about spoke through gritted teeth. The second those words left his mouth though; you were over the edge. The feeling was overwhelming, you couldn’t remember the last time you came so hard. Tears spilt from your eyes as fireworks went off in your lower stomach and your legs began to tremble. 
The combination of the sound of your cries and the feeling of your pussy contract around him had Daniel not far behind you. His hands gripped your hair in a makeshift ponytail as he picked up the pace one last time, fucking you so hard that you genuinely thought he was going to split you in half; his groans getting louder and his breaths getting deeper and more sparce until he spilled out into you.  
~~~~ 
  The morning sun filters through the blinds, casting a warm glow on the tangled sheets, Memories of the night before float hazily in your mind and you catch sight of Daniel sleeping soundly next to you. Truth be told you don’t even remember falling asleep, you must have just crashed after such an intense orgasm. Reaching over to check your phone, you notice multiple messages from your best friend asking where the hell you got to last night. You quickly send a message saying that you were so tired you just went home to sleep, before putting your phone back onto the nightstand and cuddling back up to the man beside you.  
But you never said where or in whose sheets 
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ineffable-suffering · 7 months
Text
Why Aziraphale is an unreliable narrator
Part 1: The Story of Job
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I'm absolutely not the first one to talk about this on here and I probably shan't be the last either. Alas, here's my take on why all of the minisodes in Season 2 should be enjoyed with great care – and taken with a grain of angelic salt.
I'm gonna split this into 3 parts, aka the three minisodes we are shown, since I tend to get a bit waffley in my posts and want to still be able to include all the little details. Once I've written them, I'll link Part 2 & Part 3 here as well!
Alright, let's get into it under the cut of doom.
Episode 2 opens with the Story of Job. Right off the bat, I noticed that it sort of looks like an old film playing. At first I didn't read that much into it, but once we see the cut-away to Aziraphale at the bookshop, currently reading that part of the Bible (presumably), I immediately thought: "Oh! It's because it's his memory. He's remembering how it went down and therefore it plays like a figurative film in his head."
This, I then came to realize, is a very crucial difference to all the flashbacks of S1, which were exclusively told and narrated by God. May her intensions be as ineffable as they are: She did tell us all of these stories from an objective outsider's point of view. Now, however, it's Aziraphale who's re-telling those stories to us from memory.
And if there's one thing that's for certain, it's that a memory is something entirely different to an objective narration of a story. Just think about how you yourself remember things. Especially things that happened years, maybe even decades (or, in an angel's case, millenia) ago. What is it, that you really remember? Can you know for sure, that a conversation was held with those exact words? Are you 100% certain that the clothes someone wore weren't different? Had it really been snowing or would that make very little sense given what you're remembering happened in May? And did it even happen in May? Or does that just happen to be your favourite month, the current weather, your preferred style of clothing and what it was that you would imagine someone would have said to you?
What I'm trying to say is: The further away it is that something happened, the more your brain has to fill in the gaps. This is why, for example, your parents will remember the family summer holiday entirely different when you ask them about it 20 years later.
"No, it was Sarah who puked on the car ride home!" "Nonsense, Sarah never puked as a child. Bobby had that gone-off pizza, he's the one that was sick the whole ride long!"
We've all been there. Bobby made it out alive. Don't buy gas station pizza.
Alright, back to the plot: Naturally, Aziraphale is not actually human, so it is a pure assumption on my part that the way his memory works is similar to ours. However, the whole topic of "memory" is actually quite a recurring one on Good Omens.
Crowley seems to have lost his in the Fall, yet somehow managed to get most of it back. Not all of it, though, he clearly has some major gaps ("You used to jump on me back, little monkey in the waistcoat!"). Beelzebub helps Gabriel store all his memories in their little fly container before they get wiped entirely too, by the Metatron and/or Saraqael. Crowley and Aziraphale (and possibly Jimbriel) perform a miracle together that makes everyone in Heaven and Hell forget who Garbiel is or what he looks like. And we know that the Book of Life apparently has the ability to completely erase someone from existence – ergo also erasing them from everyone's memory and making it is as though the person had never been in them at all.
So, clearly, angels and demons being able to remember, forget, reconstruct and, if you're the Metadork, wipe memories, is very much canon. Apart from that very last one, it does make them quite human-like in a way. We too can forget or (wrongfully and incompletely) reconstruct memories, due to things like trauma, illness or simply a lot of time having passed.
So, just like Crowley remembers going into battle but doesn't remember Furfur being there, or just like Jimbriel has entierly forgotten who he is but still remembers the tune and lyrics to Buddy Holly's song Everyday, and just like archangel Michael was miraculously made to forget Gabriel and yet says "Don't I know you?" when seeing him again – just like that, Aziraphale's memories of the story of Job, the story of wee Morag and the story of the magic show in 1941, might not actually be the whole truth.
So, time to look at where the furniture isn't.
Now, it could very well be that the costume designers of S2 thought: "Fuck it, let's go crazy" – but given that this show has a track record of meticulously making sure to stick to accurate and cohesive character design, doesn't it strike you as odd that Crowley would go from this look at the Flood in Mesopotamia, 3004 BC:
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... to the (very iconic, don't get me wrong) Bildad the Shuhuite drip in 2500 BC:
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... back to this at the crucifixion of Jesus Christ in 33 AD:
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I mean ... I mean– come on, that seems like a bit of a far stretch, even for someone as enthusiastically experimental with fashion as Crowley.
And it's not just that: Where did the sunglasses come from, all of a sudden? And why do they look like some sort of obscure, ancient optometrist's device? It's a known historical fact that the Romans were the ones to have invented sunglasses, somewhere around 50-ish AD. Which actually matches perfectly with when Crowley and Aziraphale meet again in Rome 8 years after the crucifixion (51 AD).
So, where do the weird spectacles come from, over 2000 years too early? Maybe from Aziraphale's brain filling in some gaps? Hasn't Crowley always worn those ridiculous sunglasses? Was it Rome? Or Golgotha? Wessex? Oh, blimey, what does it matter!
And it's not just Crowley: Aziraphale's own clothes, as well as the other angels', seem to be very different from the rather plain linen we see him wear before and after the story of Job.
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They're laced with golden embroidery along the neckline and sleeves. The remind almost of the clothes angels are depicted wearing in biblical and historical drawings. Ornate and decadent. Not at all like we see Aziraphale in the other flashbacks of S1.
Even Bildad the Shuhite's hair within the minisode keeps changing, going from all pouffy and voluminous to rather deflated and straight-looking:
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The costume department either had to fix up two seperate wigs or manually straighten out the volume of the one again to give it a more sleek look. I'm not a professional in this field, but if there's anything I've learned from watching hours of behind-the-scenes material of movies and shows, it's that very little about costume, character, prop and set design is purely coincidental.
You know what it could be, though? An accurate representation of how memories aren't linear, historically correct and objective representations of a certain event, but rather an ever-changing, jumbled mess of impressions, emotions and exaggerations.
More specifically: Aziraphale's impression, emotions and exaggerations.
Like "remembering" Crowley with sunglasses because he's been wearing them for so long.
Like "remembering" himself wearing more luxurious, angelic clothes because that's how he thinks of the difference between Heaven and Hell.
Like "remembering" the permit as a ridiculously long scroll that folded out over an entire valley.
Like "remembering" Job's children to be weirdly sassy in an almost Aziraphale-esque way (Enon: "Don't be silly!") for the fact that Job would have probably taught them to be more humble and obedient in the presence of a literal angel.
Like "remembering" eating an entire fucking Ox after having just one bite of it while Crowley watched him lustfully, sipping on his wine.
Like "remembering" Crowley calling him 'angel', despite them having barely known each other back then.
There's a reason why the flashbacks in S2 seem so much more alive, quirky and, at many points, confusing and all over the place. Because they're not objective stories being told by a third party. They're Aziraphale's. So much of his own thoughts and feelings at the time get projected onto them because that's simply how memory works!
It's subjective. It's unrealiable.
It's not that I'm calling Aziraphale a liar. He's no more a liar than your parents are, mixing up Sarah and Bobby. Or you, remembering snow instead of sunshine. Memories aren't lies. They can simply be faulty, focus on things that you thought were more important and leaving out or changing things that weren't, to you.
The real challenge in all of this, is trying to filter through Aziraphale's stories to see what it actually is they're telling us. Where it is that the furniture isn't. And I think in this case, that's 6 main things (eff you, God, I know you like sevens, but I don't care):
God and Satan (still) talk to each other We see that Aziraphale is quite surprised when Muriel mentions that the whole Job thing is God's bet with Satan. But clearly, despite having made him and the rest fall, God still converses with Her number one traitor about whether or not the humans simply love Her because she gives them nice things or because they truly believe in Her.
God and Satan (and Heaven and Hell) can and do collaborate with each other when they feel like it So much for choosing sides, huh? Truthfully, this is not the first time this is shown to us, but still. It's another piece of evidence on the growing pile.
Aziraphale understands the World and humans way better than any of the other angels "Well, you see ... Citis is 58 ..."
Aziraphale, despite having troubles voicing it, absolutely disagrees and even condemns God's plan of destroying Job's children (and goats and camels and––)
Aziraphale is willing to lie and thwart the will of God Also not the first time we're being shown this but again, piiiile of evidence.
Angels don't automatically Fall simply by doing the above To me, this is one of the most important take aways. It's already hinted in S1 as well that 'Falling' seems to have been a one time even back when the first war broke out in Heaven. And I actually believe that ever since then, no other angels have Fallen again. Aziraphale is the best example for this. He has gone against God's plan numerous times and even lied to her very face (voice?) about it. And yet, nothing ever happened to him. Why exactly that is the case remains a topic for another meta (that I might or might not be working on already, teehee).
Alright, that concludes this first look at the Job minisode! If there's anything I missed, feel free to share it with me. I'll try and add Part 2 (the story of wee Morag) and Part 3 (the magic show of 1941) soon.
Update: Part 2 and Part 3 have officially been written, you can find it them right here:
Part 2: The Story of wee Morag
Part 3: The Story of the Magic Show in 1941
Hugs and kisses, (God)!
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thankskenpenders · 4 months
Text
Happy new year, everyone! Welcome to 2024, the year that will mark the 10th anniversary of Thanks Ken Penders. I'd like to go over my plans for the blog for this year.
First of all: in the very near future, I'll have a post with my thoughts on Sonic Dream Team, and I'm sure I'll write one last Sonic Prime review once the final episodes drop on the 11th. I've also been sitting on an unfinished piece about the Sonic LEGO sets. I wanted this to be longer and more detailed piece that not only reviewed the sets but also went into the weird disconnect between homogenized image of Sonic the Brand and the actual fiction it's based off of, but it'll probably end up getting cut down a lot just so I can put something out. Let's just say I did a fun little thing with one of the sets.
Second: yes, I would like to return to regular TKP updates this year. As I've said many times, I wanted to do this in 2023, but I've been suffering from creative burnout after finishing SLARPG and have generally been unable to focus on any of my creative goals this past year. I'm hoping that this year will be better and I'll be able to get back into the swing of covering Archie Sonic issues. Even doing one issue every week or so would be vastly preferable to continuing the hiatus. I'm still only halfway done!! But aside from burnout, my other main hurdle is that I need to reread my own archive to refresh myself on all these things after nearly three years away. This will take some time.
The thing is, though, this year I'll have an extra incentive to go back through my previous writing and brush up on all things Archie Sonic. Because you see...
I've decided that I want to make a video essay about Penders. The comics, the copyright battle, The Lara-Su Chronicles, everything.
The why
I've thought about doing this before, but I never committed to the idea. I was too busy with gamedev, or I thought it'd end up being too long, or I figured that there were already enough videos on the subject, or I just lacked confidence in my ability to put together a video essay. So I told myself it wasn't meant to be, and let the multiple YouTubers who have cited me as a source on their own Penders videos fill that void.
Recently, though, a few things have happened that have convinced me it might be time. For one, YouTube video essays/media retrospectives/etc. are just getting longer and longer. When Quinton Reviews is out here doing 21 hours of videos on Sam & Cat, a subpar Nick sitcom that only lasted one season, I don't feel so crazy for wanting to make a video about several hundred comic books and two lawsuits that'd be at least an hour or two long lmao. Admittedly, I've also been self-conscious about doing a long video essay like this as a trans woman who has yet to do any vocal training. But these days I feel like I see a lot more transfem YouTubers who have done little to no vocal training, and that's given me more confidence on that front.
But the big one was Hbomberguy's recent plagiarism video. As I sat there watching it, I kept thinking about the time I found a CBR article that was just a crude 800 word summary of my two previous articles on Penders, published by a CBR writer who's put out over 4000 articles since 2019. If I've already been plagiarized before, and my writing is so frequently passed around as a go-to source on Archie Sonic drama, then I wouldn't be shocked if there were YouTubers out there straight up just plagiarizing me. I don't watch other peoples' videos on Archie Sonic, so I'd never know! So if people are just gonna paraphrase me when covering these topics anyway, why not take matters into my own hands and make what I would consider to be the definitive video on the subject? If hacks like James Somerton and iilluminaughtii can churn out these shitty video essays and people will still watch them, surely it can't be that impossible to make my own, right? (And also, uh, Hbomb literally told me I should make the video lol. If you're reading this, thanks for the encouragement.)
The what, how, and when
So here's the plan.
Part of this video essay will be an adaptation of my Medium article on the recurring themes of Ken's Archie Sonic run, with its content touched up and expanded upon. There were a few things I skimmed over in the article because I didn't want it to get too long, but again, people are out here watching ten hour videos about bad Nickelodeon sitcoms now. I can get away with elaborating a little more. I can add a few paragraphs talking about the Chaos Knuckles arc, or throw in a little more historical context I've discovered in the years since.
After covering the comics, the back half(-ish?) of the video will be dedicated to the copyright battles and their ensuing controversies, trying to give an accurate picture of what actually went down, the sheer scale of how bad Archie fucked up, and what our takeaways should be. This will have some similarities to my New York Magazine article on the subject, but I'll be rewriting it from scratch. I REALLY had to keep things short for that article because I was already way over the expected word count, and my tone was a little more straight-laced than normal because I was trying to keep things Professional. I can riff more and insert more of my own opinions this time, like I normally would.
I'll inevitably have to touch on some of Ken's Bad Tweets when discussing things that have happened after the lawsuits, but I don't want the video to just devolve into a list of times people got mad at him on Twitter, so I'm gonna try to keep that to a minimum in favor of focusing on his actual work. Things like the Scourge the Speed Demon incident and his continued statements on certain characters' copyright statuses probably warrant mentioning, though. And finally, assuming that the book really does come out this summer, I would like the grand finale of the video to be about those first couple chapters of The Lara-Su Chronicles.
I don't currently know when this video will get done, but it'll probably be in the back half of the year, especially with me waiting for the book to either drop or get delayed yet again. But I've actually already started writing a bit of the script, and will keep chipping away at it for a while.
So, uh, yeah, look forward to that? Wish me luck?
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hellenhighwater · 7 months
Note
Hey Hell! Can you please explain how the cats that you talk about relate back to you cause at some point I was certain that you hasd at least five ?
Yeah, I forget how many of you are new here and this is probably confusing.
I have two cats. Their names are Malice and Vice; they're three years old, and they're not related. I adopted both of them when they were kittens, after the passing of the best cat I will ever own (Nimitz, the Terror of the Underbrush, in May of 2020). They are my permanent cats; I will have them until either I die or they do. Vice is a grey longhair male; Malice is a black longhair female. Both of them are mutts, but Vice looks like a Nebelung and Malice could pass for Chantilly-Tiffany, if you squint.
I occasionally post my mom's Himalayan/Ragdoll cross, Eleanor, who comes from purebred lineages. She's terribly fancy and I love her a lot. She lives with my parents, but my mom sends me pictures frequently and I often petsit.
I am also currently fostering! Right now I'm down to my final three foster babies (Blouse/Queen Skrungle, Maladict, and Jade) but I've actually had more-or-less three batches of fosters since I started in May. I may have a couple more foster kittens this year, but I'm likely to pause on fostering when the winter holidays make it too complicated for me to be able to provide reliable care. With the foster kittens, I keep them until they get big enough to be spayed or neutered, with is generally at the 3 lb mark. The current babies are ready for that, and I'm having a hard time letting them go! I really want these three to find good homes, they're such fantastic cats. If you're in MI, hit me up!
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Honorable mention goes to my pet doves, Arson and Larceny. I don't post as much of them because 1. they live outside when the weather is nice, and will only be back in my house after first frost, when the outdoor aviary is no longer an option and 2. I really just let them do their own thing. They're a mated pair and they don't want anything from me aside from basic needs.
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moghedien · 3 months
Text
So someone is in your inbox asking for money
I'm not going to say that every single instance of this happening is a scam, but in my experience, random people following you and then sending you an ask to ask you to reblog a post or donate, they are almost always a scam.
You may feel bad about ignoring them or deleting the ask, but doing so is probably going to be the best course of action. Not only so that YOU don't lose money but so that you don't give the scammer access to you followers.
But how could you know that the person is a scam and not the one instance where someone really needs help? Let's go over some ways to check for signs of a scammer.
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this is the post I got in my inbox today. I've personally never dealt with this particular version, so I didn't immediately delete. I probably wouldn't have reblogged anyway, but I wanted to look into this specifically.
The first thing to do is go on their blog. In this instance, the post they want me to reblog is pinned, and it also has a donation link. I'm NOT going to click on the link because there is no indication at all to what this might lead to and I'm going to instead hover over link and see what url pops up
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in this instance, the url shows me that I'm going to be redirected to paypal. IMMEDIATELY a sign that this is a scam. people can still scam with gofundme and other sites like that, sure, but at least with those sites, there is some accountability in that you can see if the donation goal is being met or not. with paypal, you're just blindly donating, assuming that this donation amounts are what the person says they're at.
And also this is not to say that honest people can't use paypal for donations, sometimes that's the only option. But if you're going to donate to someone via paypal, you should at the very least be personally aware of who you're donating to and that they are an actual person.
But let's look deeper just in case. The next thing to do is look for other sketchy signs on the blog. So I scrolled through to see what they were blogging about otherwise, and there were red flags here.
Just glancing through the blog, I could see that they almost exclusively posted about Taylor Swift and the Mandalorian. They posted A LOT within the past day (this is why you should have times enabled btw) and exclusively from the same four or fives blogs.
But maybe they just post a lot. You can actually very easily see their posting habits by looking at their archive.
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We're going to go to the three dots and click "view archive"
You can also just type in "[username].tumblr.com/archive" for any blog and access anyone's archive as long as they have a public account. But what's the point of doing that. Well, in the archive, we can get a very quick overview of someone's posting habits.
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And here I've circled in red the first and last thing this blog has posted in the month of February 2024 (the month I'm writing this). You can see that both of those posts were posted on the same day. Meaning all of their posts in the entire month of February happened on the same day.
But what about posts outside of February 2024?
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Well there are none
You can sort posts by month and year and doing so for this blog shows that they ONLY posted in February 2024 and ONLY one day in February and it happened to be the day before I got an ask in my inbox asking for donations.
These are the most obvious tells, but there are other signs you can look out for.
For instance, all of their posts are without any sort of tags. They never comment on anything and their only original post was their one asking for donations. If you click on the search function in their blog, nothing comes up
There's also the fact that the blog is clearly targeting at making the people who WOULD care about someone needing insulin sympathetic. The fact that they use BLM, identify as a black man, have pronouns in their bio all are on purpose to make people who might care feel like this is a person who deserves help. the scammer is using your empathy against you. DON'T LET THEM. Be smart and always always think before you act, even if that action is just posting. You can help people in need without feeding the vultures that want to take advantage and want to use YOU to steal from your community
But let's just be REALLY REALLY sure this is a scam.
On whim, I copied the text straight from the ask in my inbox and put into google and then added "tumblr' at the end. You'll be shocked to know there were immediate results and not from this blog
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First one was a reblog from over a year ago. the exact same wording minus the cost of the insulin and the call to action at the end
I clicked on the original poster for this and the blog was cleared out!
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Minus them using the exact same photograph in their header as the blog that sent me an ask today, of course.
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The second instance I found was slightly different wording, but using similar enough wording that it can be assumed came from the same scammer. This came from another ask in an inbox, but the receiver rightly called them out as a scam. The post is from two months ago and the blog that asked it as been deleted outright
All of this to say, there are always scammers on tumblr, but there have been a lot recently. This one happened to not be posing as Palestinians in need, but a lot are (in that instance, Palestinian bloggers have been vetting who is and isn't real so you can always check to see if they're getting support or getting called out from actual Palestinians). They won't always use these methods and won't always been this obvious, so even if you don't donate to someone yourself ALWAYS be thorough in your checking before you reblog a donation post. Make sure the charity its collecting for is REAL and if its a person asking for money, make sure that person is real as well.
You can help people without getting scammed or giving scammers access to your followers, and not reblogging every donation post doesn't make you a bad person or mean you don't care. Its important to be careful, and not being careful can do more harm than good. it makes actual people in need look sketchy and takes away resources that could have been given to them. So if you aren't sure if something is real DO NOT REBLOG IT
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slowestlap · 3 months
Text
Bradley Scanes, Max's trainer during 2020-2023 seasons, did an interview with The Red Flags Podcast (22 Jan 2024)
I took one for the team and transcribed the bits I found interesting enough to share:
[12:40] Talking about the first times Brad met Max and how important it is that you click together well:
I think it's the most important. We had a good conversation in that time, I think the decision probably set on the fact that, for half of the time I was there, he was out driving the car. But I was there, talking to his dad, talking to his family. And really got on with Red Bull and really kinda fit into that mold and did for my whole 4 years with him and it was so nice. And I appreciate Max for this, his dad for this and the rest of the family because I felt part of the family the entire time which was really really nice and you know, we'll stay friends.
[24:00] From what I saw, I saw a guy that was elite. He knew where he wanted to go. You could see the drive, you could see the work ethic. The work ethic was tremendous. And for me it was just, I've gotta create the optimal space for him to be him and him to do him.
[27:30] Talking about flexibility and adaptability being the traits that separates greats from the rest:
He's on the grid being interviewed by two or three different tv stations, or something's happening with the car, he gets in the car and drives exactly the same no matter what's going on. And that's for me what I've seen from the kinda good to great.
[28:25] Was it hard to train him this year when he was so far ahead?
No, no. If anything he was more motivated this year than any year before.
[34:55] I feel like you have to be elite at falling asleep. Is Max like "allright time to go to bed" and he's like "okay [snores]"? Can kinda turn on turn off?
Yeah, he's really good at that.
[48:50] On staying motivated to win:
The mindset to keep winning is there. We love winning and it's what we get out of bed for, it's what we do our work for. We want to win no matter what it is. We going to Monza, going to Belgium, we wanna win that race. We want to win every single race and if the championship comes in the end the championship comes in the end. That's the mentality he has. […] The first one was motivated by winning the first championship, the second one was motivated by seeing off Ferrari and making sure we got the second (wdc) and that we're here to stay. And then the third one we were motivated by winning every single race and setting every single record that we could.
[1:14:55] Talking about other drivers posting tough work out videos while Max posted a lighter work out:
That's the thing actually, it's a conversation we've had before because we have the markers where we need to get to. How you get there doesn't really matter. We managed to do it in the most time efficient way, in the most enjoyable way for Max and how it doesn't impact on the other stuff as much. […] He doesn't like working out, everybody knows that. But when he's in the session he gets after it. It's just shifting that mindset, he might not want to do it ever again but there's not too much encouragement needed actually in session which is always nice. It's nice to work that way.
[1:16:10] If Max pisses you off what exercise are you doing to punish him? What's his least favorite?
Single-leg squats or planks.
[1:17:35] How long can Max plank for?
Decent amount of time. I don't actually remember but we must have hit like 4-5 minutes in pre-season test and a bit longer come summer break.
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Note
AITA for calling the cops (twice, kind of) on someone in a car who swerved at me on the side of the road?
(Disclaimer: I hate cops. But I felt extremely threatened and wasn't going to let this go without something happening.)
I am a high school student and have not yet gotten my license, and therefore cannot drive alone. To get to school I ride an electric scooter, it looks a bit stupid as a high schooler but it is the only way possible for me to get to school on time. (I have a class before school in the morning, and both parents have work.) I've been doing this for over three years and have had no problems until recently.
Two or three weeks ago, I was on my way home from school. I noticed a car approaching from behind, and moved to the very edge of the road as I would normally. I was literally in the gutter on the side of the road, nowhere near where cars would be. This car, however, then sped up rapidly and swerved within 2-3 feet of hitting me. Probably not trying to actually hit me, but clearly trying to scare me or something of the sort. The person in the passenger seat was screaming the whole time.
The car sped off (I should mention that the speed limit on this road is 25 mph, and the car was going at least 50-60 mph) and after standing in shock for a moment I followed them home since they apparently lived in my neighborhood. I caught two teenage boys leaving the car, and asked if they had been in that car and had swerved at me on the road. They denied everything and went inside the house.
I went home and after a short while, came back with my father to back me up. Asshole move from me, I know, but he insisted on going in case the boys decided to get violent. I made him wait a short distance back, then rang the doorbell. Waited for a while, no answer. They were clearly still inside; the car was still parked on the road nearby and I hadn't been gone for long.
When they didn't answer, I then went home and called the police. I gave them the license plate number and the guy's address, and they said there had been reports of him speeding and being reckless before. The cops went to the house and yelled at them, and I thought it was over then. I most certainly did not want to press the issue any further, the shock and adrenaline was wearing off at this point and I just wanted to be done.
But several days later, I was sent screenshots of the driver of that car spreading hate about me on Snapchat for getting him in trouble. Now this is kind of difficult to explain, but I am unfortunately somewhat well known for riding an electric scooter to school. But up until this point, people just were aware of my existence. After the Snapchat posts and messages about me were spread, all of that turned into pure hate. Every time I was seen with that stupid scooter, people would scream that they wished I would fall and stuff like that. None of this had happened before, and I was (and am) miserable and scared. I don't feel safe anywhere around school because this is still ongoing.
I also tried to contact him via Instagram messages, to which he did not respond. That was three times that I attempted to contact him: first by following him as he was getting out of the car, second by ringing the doorbell, and third by messaging him.
Two days ago, I got my mom to pull me out of school early because I was feeling like crap after some particularly bad harassment in the morning. In the office as I was asking to sign out, I started crying in front of the school police officer, and she asked for the full story. I told her about the online posts and the catcalling and harassment I dealt with every day, and she took it very seriously. I didn't want her to do anything really, but she did anyway (I'm not upset about this honestly, it was probably a good thing). She said that the patrol officers usually didn't do much about stuff like this, but she could and would do a lot more.
She pulled the guy out of his class after I had left to go home, and in her words "put the fear of God in that kid"; telling him he should have lost his license and that since he was 18 he could face real consequences and go to jail for stuff like this. He has been told that he has to stay at least three feet away from me at all times.
Since then, he hasn't said anything to me in person, and hasn't posted anything publicly online. I still don't feel safe at school or anywhere in the area, but I've been taking an alternate route to try to avoid being seen and yelled at as much.
Am I the asshole? I honestly think we both might be, but I do feel somewhat justified by the fact that he at least got some sort of consequence for threatening my life like that and causing that level of problem.
What are these acronyms?
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goodluckclove · 18 days
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I've been meaning to say something. (100 follower hot take)
Hey! Thanks for stopping by. I hope you've had a nice day. Why don't you rest with me for a while? I made some chocolate chip cookies - with shortening instead of butter, so they're very soft and very chocolatey. I made way too many and they aren't my wife's favorite, so I could use some help in eating them.
You're probably a writer, right? Or maybe you think about how you could be. Browse the tags here, or on other social media platforms. Maybe you used to write stories as a kid. I bet those were fun. Teachers might've thought they were impressive, or they dissected them line by line until the words didn't make sense in your head anymore. Either way, if you're here you're probably here for a reason.
(rant alert)
I dipped a toe in online writing communities on and off. My last attempt was forty-five minutes scrolling through the writing hashtag on Youtube Shorts (so TikTok, I guess? I don't know). I didn't like it. I really didn't. The thing that sticks out the strongest in my mind is one particular video where a woman claims that every story needs a second act plot twist.
Huh? Every story? All of them? Why? Since when? Who are you? What qualifications do you have to make a statement like that?
That's the common thread that makes a lot of writing spaces very uncomfortable for me. Successful writers are really only successful in their genre and for the given moment, so they don't have that much objective authority in the craft. And yet I see a lot of people deciding the things that you can't do in writing. Or the things you have to do, and how you have to do them. It was so much of Writeblr at first glance that I almost dipped out once again. I didn't, though, and I'm glad I didn't because now I get to watch some of the next great storytellers from across the world grow and examine and forge their way forward.
No one can teach you how to write. No, that's not true. Teachers teach literacy. Handwriting. Typing maybe - do schools still teach typing? Let me try saying it in a different way - no one, not one single person on this goddamned planet, has the right to tell you how to make a story.
I was supposed to get my MFA in creative writing before my first breakdown. My uncle stayed in the program I was meant to be in, and a few years after I dropped out he graduated. Recently I had the thought to look up his thesis novella, and as I searched I found myself regretting my decision to leave school. If I stayed and got to develop my writing in an actual class, with other writers and a knowledgeable professor, how much further along would I be than where I am right now?
It was bad. His novella was terrible. It was so bad I had a small existential crisis for, like, three days. He spent so much money on years and years of professional education and came out with a truly soulless story that read as if you prompted an AI to write the next Great American Novel. So if you think you need a writing degree to be a legitimate author, it could help connections-wise, but it ultimately won't be the thing that does the work for you.
Not all advice I see online on writing is bad. I find the people who are able to capture the "I" statements of therapy and phrase advice as things that have worked for them, or things that they personally enjoy, to be fine. Some writing advice can spark inspiration.
But if someone is the type of person to boil every story down to troupes and cliches, and then immediately say that every story that uses the trait they don't like is automatically bad for everyone? I'm dropping the kindness for a second - that's trash. That's a trash take and I see far too many writers use it as a reason to stop before they begin.
I don't like whump. I say my reasons in previous posts if you go back through my blog. But you will never hear me say that any story with whump in it is bad, because I don't know that. You might prove me wrong. I am an adult human being and I have the humility to admit that I can like something I didn't expect to. I genuinely enjoy the direction of The Human Centipede (only the first one) and if you cringed just now that probably means you haven't seen it.
There are so many types of books and movies and plays and comics out there. To enjoy a specific genre is fine, to ignore the existence of everything else is a really, really, really odd thing to do. Maybe someone will hate your story because they think everything should be Neil Gaiman, and therefore have no way to understand your epistolary high-Western. You are not the wrong end of that situation just for existing.
And at there is a definite threshold on how many writing tips you can gather before they stop being useful. If you find them interesting, that's one thing. That's fine. But if the culture of creativity online has made you feel like you need to educate yourself on every possible angle before you can write a story, you are actively harming yourself.
Imagine taking the level of structure you put on yourself in that way and putting it on children playing pretend in the backyard. Oh, Susie, don't you know that it's overdone for your Kitsune have dead parents? Xyler, shouldn't you ask someone else before you decide how Spiderman would react to this? It would make no sense and they do not need it. Kids will make a whole world out of nothing and it's the most fucked thing in my heart that at some point they get access to Reddit and dipshits start insisting that's wrong.
They aren't wrong and you aren't either. Your favorite creative influencer can't tell you your story, strangers on the internet can't tell you your story, your teachers and loved ones can't tell you your story. They can influence it, but they can't write it honestly the way you can.
You do that. That's the thing you do.
Man that makes me upset. I can't tell you how to make a story, either. If anyone sends me asks for writing advice the most I'll do is say what I've done before hopping into your DMs and starting a direct conversation. it's so personal to each individual artist, and I'd like to think that the people selling these classes and software and promoting these platforms haven't thought about that before. Otherwise it does feel manipulative. If you have a willingness to practice and imagine and really experiment with the possibilities, you are ready to write your story.
And if it doesn't work? Try again. That's what you do.
Stephen King has written roughly a thousand books and maybe five of them have decent endings. He is unimaginably successful.
I'm rambling now. I think I got that out of my system. I was really worried to say this out of fear of being too weird or somehow reverse-gatekeeping so hard that it circles back into also being a bad thing. I've just spoken to a lot of people who I still think of throughout my day, and I truly ache for them to get past the fear of creation. Because it's worth it. It's worth it and it's fun, even when it's messy and you're tired.
Let it Be just came on. Beatles. I haven't listened to The Beatles in a long time. Feels a little apropos.
I love you, reader. Reader, Writer, Colleague. Take care of yourself. Especially the little you, still sitting there in the backyard of your soul, bathing in the sun with their bare feet in the damp earth.
Consider joining them, maybe.
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janeyseymour · 5 months
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At Arm's Length pt 3
Another little addition to this story I've somehow managed to start. It would probably be best to read the first 2 parts, but it should be able to stand on its own.
Summary: You overhear a few things Melissa says to your coworkers. It leaves you less than pleased.
Part 1. Part 2
WC: ~4k
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As you pull up to Melissa’s house, the same type of wine before in hand, you realize the
severity of the situation you’re in. You were going to have dinner with the redhead again- but this time not as a friendly dinner. No. This time... it was a date. Your first date in years.
Suddenly hyper aware of the fact that you are still dressed in your teaching outfit, your hair is in the rattiest bun, and you have no makeup on. 
You take a few minutes to primp yourself in your car, thanking God you always keep an eyeliner and mascara in your purse for if you ever decide to go out on a whim. With one final fluffing to your hair and making sure you look presentable, you sigh and exit your car. 
Dinner is perfect. She makes you the pasta she promised, you two share another bottle of wine, and then she asks if you’d like to stay for a little longer. Of course you accept the invitation. Your head is swirling, and you aren’t sure if you’re just the slightest bit tipsy or completely intoxicated with being in such close proximity to the woman across the table from you.
“So,” you sigh in content as you settle onto her couch, a glass of wine in hand. “Is this for real?”
“I think so, hon,” Melissa smiles at you as a hand rests on your knee. “If you want it to be.”
Your cheeks heat up again, and you don’t know if it’s from the wine or from her gentle touch. It’s much more gentle than you expected it to be, considering her brash and abrasive personality she usually likes to show. You smile shyly.
“R-really?” you ask hesitantly. “I mean... I- you hated me a week ago.”
“I told you,” the redhead fights the urge to roll her eyes. “I never hated you. I could never. I just had to pretend, so I wouldn’t act like a lovesick puppy around you.”
“But just last week, you were ragging on me for my bulletin boards, and you were laughing at the fact that I was trying to learn to juggle for the kids, and I- I haven't contributed anything to the school. I barely know what I’m doing... I actually don’t know what I’m doing in the slightest. I’m kind of a hot mess. Actually, I’m probably the hottest mess I know.”
Melissa frowns, and you know she’s over you. That didn’t take much convincing at all. She’s looking at you with concern, and her hand moves from its place. She’s clearly thinking. Deciding to cut her off, you make to stand.
“Hey, hey,” she says gently. “C’mon.”
“I know when I’m not welcome anymore,” you whisper as you go to grab your bag. Your heart almost breaks in your chest as you go to leave her warm house.
Her hand wraps around your wrist, and she pulls you back onto the couch. You just barely manage to not spill any wine. “Y/N, do you think I was being for real when I said all that stuff? It was all an act so I wouldn’t grab you and make a move on you at school.”
You shrug.
“I was jealous of your bulletin boards. And yeah, learning to juggle is ridiculous, but that just goes to show how dedicated you are to the kids. You learned to juggle in three days because one of them took up an interest in it. I’m sure you’ll learn more ridiculous skills as you-”
“I’m already learning how to make balloon animals for Jessie,” you admit quietly.
“-And you have contributed to the school.”
You roll your eyes. “Melissa,” you sigh. “It’s fine. You don’t have to-”
“I don’t have to do anything,” she cuts you off. “But you deserve to know how lucky Abbott is to have you, hon. You’ve made such a big difference with these kids already. I overheard some of your post-observation meeting with Ava, and she had nothing but good things to say- it even sounded like she was pretty locked into the lesson herself. And you go the extra mile for Zion- paying for his lunch everyday and making sure you’re stocked up on snacks for the kids who forget or can’t afford to bring their own.”
“I-” you bite the corner of your cheek. You really don’t know what to say. “I’m a hot mess everywhere else though.”
“I doubt it,” she says honestly, and she’s back to squeezing your knee gently. “C’mon, hon. You’re just hot, if anything.”
“More like a dumpster caught on fire,” you mumble, looking away from her.
“Hey now,” she clicks her tongue. Then she makes a joke. “I’ve smelled enough dumpster fires started by us Schemmentis to know, you are not a dumpster caught on fire.”
That just barely gets you to smile, and she squeezes your knee again. 
“Now, I want this to be something,” she tells you seriously. “But do you?”
You nod, and you look at her. You see nothing but adoration in her eyes for you, and you notice how they sparkle in a way you’ve never seen someone’s eyes sparkle before. 
“Words, hon,” she prompts.
“I- I want to see where this could go,” you whisper as you start to lean in. You feel her hand cup your cheek and, this time, Mr. Johnson isn’t there to stop what almost happened in the hallway a few hours ago.
It’s soft, it’s sweet, it’s short. It’s perfect. 
---
That was almost two months ago. Since then, you and the fiery redheaded teacher have been seeing each other in secret. Nobody at work knows- not even Barb. It shocks you that your girlfriend hasn’t told her best friend- you thought that at least by now she would know.
You’re fairly certain Barbara is onto the two of you; actually, you know this. She could spot it from the first week you two had started seeing each other. But you nor Melissa had ever confirmed it for her. So for now, she just gives you two a knowing glance and a smile whenever she sees you together.
This morning was perfect. You had woken up in her arms, and the two of you got ready for work in a sleepy haze, but you were together. While she’s upstairs finishing getting ready, you head down the steps and into the kitchen. 
Only recently had she let you even think about touching anything in her kitchen, but you were going to take full advantage of the fact that you weren’t as exhausted as usual and were ready before she was.
Just as you’re plating the omelets you made for the two of you, you feel two arms snake around your waist, and she settles her chin on your shoulder. You lean back into her embrace for a few seconds, reveling in her warmth before pulling away just slightly.
“I made breakfast,” you say softly. “I can’t cook much else, but I make a mean omelet.”
She presses a kiss to your cheek and unwinds her arms to take the plates over to the table. You immediately miss the fact that you’re almost an arm’s length away from her. You sit down next to her, grinning as she rolls her eyes and pulls you into her lap.
As she takes her first bite, you glance at her. You hope she likes it. You know you’ll never be nearly the cook that she is, but-
“Holy shit, babe,” she exhales. “This is delicious. Beats my Aunt Rita’s- but don’t ever tell her I said that.”
You grin before digging into your own breakfast.
The two of you drive separately to school, not wanting to give away the fact that you spent the night together. The crew didn’t even know you were dating, so how would they react if Melissa pulled into the parking lot with you in the passenger seat?
You circle the block a few times, just enough to give off the effect that you hadn’t arrived at the same time before pulling in next to her car. You glance over, but she’s already inside. She’s probably pouring you a cup of coffee as you speak.
You’re about to enter the breakroom to put away your usual lunch when you hear your girlfriend’s loud voice. You turn just out of sight you can listen in.
“Oh come on,” the woman groans loudly. 
“All we’re saying, Melissa,” you hear Barb tell the woman. “Is that I see the eyes you give her. I haven’t seen those eyes since you went out with Joe, and the two of you ended up married.”
“Yeah,” you hear Melissa huff. “And then we got divorced.”
“I think you guys would be cute together!” Janine gives her thoughts. “You already do coupley things together anyway.”
“Like what?” you hear your girlfriend challenge.
“Well,” Janine drawls out. “You make her coffee in the morning.”
“I always have a little leftover anyway.”
“She practically grabbed your hand that one day when the fire alarm went off and none of us knew it was a drill.”
“And I grabbed Barb’s as a natural reaction.”
“You two stay late to decorate bulletin boards together even though we all know she does all of the-”
“Safety in numbers.”
“You give her the eyes Gregory and Janine would give each other before they got their heads out of their asses and finally started dating,” Jacob cuts in. The two mentioned feel their cheeks heat up, but they both agree.
“You’re outta your damn minds if youse think I would ever go out with Y/N. She’s a kid who barely knows what she’s doing in life. Now turn on the damned news.”
Your heart drops. It falls out of your chest and onto the floor. It shatters into a million pieces. Sure, you had used those words to describe yourself before, but hearing them from her mouth... that kills you.
You don't enter the break room that morning. Instead, you head straight for your classroom. You guess you’ll have to get used to wilted spinach again, and you’ll have to go without your morning coffee today. You plop down at your desk and put your head in your hands. And after last night and this morning, it just hurts even more. 
You feel like an idiot. An absolute idiot. No wonder she didn’t want anyone to know- because she isn’t falling for you the way that you already fell for her. She knows this isn’t going to be a lasting thing- you should’ve known too. You’re just beginning to berate yourself when you hear her footsteps growing louder. You know what that means- the kids are due to come in at any moment.
But the sound of her boots don’t go past your room. They stop right outside your door.
“Hey, hon,” she says as she knocks on your doorframe. “You ‘kay? You didn’t come in like I thought you would.”
You look up, and there she is standing with two mugs in her hands. You look at the clock. It’s fifteen minutes before your students will start to file in. Jim Gardner should still be on in the staff room. You set your hands back into your head.
“Fine,” you say as evenly as you can. “Just- responding to an email I got from Anaya’s mom.”
She looks at you curiously. You don’t even have your laptop out yet. She steps into your room and makes her way over to your desk, where she sets the coffee you would usually lunge for. 
“How’re you replying to an email when you don’t even have your laptop out?”
“Replying in my head,” you mumble as you glance at the coffee mug. You want to reach for it so badly, but you won’t.
“Can I help y’out in any way?” she asks, completely unaware of the fact that you had heard her earlier.
You shake your head.
“Can I at least take your lunch to put in the fridge for you?” she asks gently.
You shrug.
“What’d the email say that has you so worked up?” she prods. “You were fine this mornin’.”
“I’m fine,” you lie. “Just have a headache.”
“Did you take Advil?” you nod. “Okay, hon. Try to feel better, yeah?”
You continue to stare at your desk, not wanting to look at her. You know how she feels, so why is she pretending like she still cares?
“Okay, babe,” she leans down to press a gentle kiss to your temple. “I’ll leave you with some peace and quiet before the little monsters come in, but I hope you start to perk up again.”
You don’t miss the fact that she snags your lunch from your bag before leaving you with the cup of coffee she made for you.
As the kids make their way in, you aren’t there to greet them at the door with a smile like you usually are. You stay planted at your desk because you don’t want to have to look down the hall and see your girlfriend- probably you’re soon to be ex-girlfriend.
“I thought there was going to be a sub!” Jada announces as she walks in. She runs up to your desk and gives you a hug. “I’m so happy you’re here today, Ms. Y/N! I don’t like when we have subs.”
You can’t help the small smile that appears on your face as you embrace your student. “I’m glad I’m here too,” you tell her gently. You do mean that, because had you been home, you would already be half a wine bottle deep wallowing in your self pity, and it was barely 8 am. 
Standing outside of her classroom, Melissa can’t help but notice that you aren’t standing at the door like you usually do in the mornings. Watching you greet your kids always brings a smile to her face, and that smile is missing right now. She figures your head must really be hurting if you can’t even do that.
She makes her way down the hall to your door where she sees a few of her former students.
“Ms. Schemmenti!” one of them grins.
“Hey ya little eagle,” she chuckles as the girl practically bear-hugs her.
“Is Ms. Y/N here today?”
“She is,” you hear the second grade teacher say before seriously telling the little group now huddled around her, “But she isn’t feelin’ too great today, so I need youse all to be extra good for her today. Can you do that for me?”
They all nod eagerly.
Even with your students being on their best behavior thanks to a talk from Melissa, you can’t seem to pull yourself out of your funk today. You’re usually so good at compartmentalizing your home life from your school life- but now those two worlds have collided, and here you are.
The morning drags on much slower than it usually does, even as the students do everything they can to make today easier on you. And you may have lied to the redhead about having a headache earlier, but now your head is pounding- caffeine withdrawal.
You walk the kids down to their lunch period like you usually do, and you almost head into the break room to grab your lunch and make a coffee, but you don’t even want to look at your girlfriend right now; not after the way she acted with her friends this morning. Deciding you’ll just have to make do with a poptart from the kiddos’ snack stash, you head back into your classroom. Your headache won’t go away, but at least the growling of your stomach will.
As you settle at your desk, your eyes wander to the now cold cup of coffee on the corner of your table. You want it so badly, but you also don’t want it. You don’t want to give Melissa the satisfaction of-
“Hon,” the woman practically storms into your classroom, your tupperware container and fork in hand. In her other hand is a new coffee. She sets it in front of you. “Eat.”
“‘M not hungry,” you mumble and push it away. “Not for that anyway.”
“You hungry for somethin’ else?” she asks teasingly, a smirk written on her face. 
“Melissa, we are at school. No.”
“Hey,” she says quietly as she sits on the corner of your desk. “I was just makin’ a joke. I didn’t really-” her eyes wander to the untouched coffee. “You didn’t drink your coffee from this morning.”
“I didn’t want it.”
“I think if you drink it, it might help your headache.” Her brows are knit in concern for you.
“Please just go,” you sigh as you bite into your poptart. “I just need some alone time.”
Melissa’s hand finds its way to your shoulder, and she immediately realizes how tense you are. “Sweetheart, are you that st-”
“Just. Go,” you practically hiss.
“O-okay, hon,” she whispers. “‘M sorry.” She gives your shoulder a little squeeze and leans down to kiss your cheek before leaving.
Come the end of the day, as soon as your last student is out, you’re out. You leave your salad on your desk, you leave the two untouched mugs of coffee on your desk, and you sneak out before anybody else can see you leave. 
Melissa saunters to your room, hoping that you’ve perked up and are willing to come over again for dinner tonight when she notices that your lights are off and the door is shut.
“Y/N?” she opens the door. She walks over to your desk, a deep frown forming on her face as she sees your untouched food and drink. Your bags aren’t there. You left, and she knows it.
With a sigh, she closes your door and heads down towards Barbara’s room. The kindergarten teacher is just locking her door as you make your way over to her. 
“Hi there, Melissa,” she smiles. “No Y/N today?”
“She was here,” the redhead tells her. “She’s already gone though.”
“I know she was here, dear,” Barbara glances over. “I saw her this morning when she was on her way to take her kids to music. Poor girl looked miserable. Looked like someone kicked her puppy.”
“I know,” the second grade teacher groans. “I tried cheerin’ ‘er up, but it didn’t-”
“We know,” the older teacher tells Melissa. “We saw the way you came back to the staff room after you gave her your lunch. Ooh, girl, if looks could kill.”
Mr. Johnson’s walking down the hall, his garbage bin rolling in front of him. “Maybe you shouldn’t have said what y’did this morning,” he mumbles, mostly to himself, although the pair hears him.
“What was that?” Melissa whips around and glares at him.
The janitor shrugs. “Maybe you shouldn’t have said what y’did this morning,” he repeats again bravely.
“And what the hell is that supposed to mean?” the redhead raises a brow in shock.
“It means you’re the one who made her look like someone kicked her puppy,” the custodian tells her, and in that moment, Melissa knows what he means.
“She- she heard,” the redhead’s mouth falls open.
“Yeah, she did,” Mr. Johnson drawls out. “You shoulda seen the look on that poor girl’s face. Thank God hearts don’t really shatter, otherwise I’d still be there cleaning up the mess.”
“I- I gotta go,” Melissa pats her friend’s arm as she frantically runs out of the building.
“Go!” Mr. Johnson cheers. “Get your girl back!”
Barbara looks to him, clearly surprised. “So they are together?”
“We better hope they still are tomorrow morning,” the janitor quips. “Otherwise, I’m gonna have to do more than pick up Y/N’s broken heart. We all know Melissa can destroy.”
The second grade teacher probably breaks every possible driving law in order to get to your apartment. She’s barely put her car in park before she’s stumbling into your building and knocking on your door rather aggressively.
You’re laying on your couch face down when you hear what is obviously Melissa. She’s coming over to break up with you- you just know it. 
“Y/N!” Melissa yells. “I know you’re home! Your car is in your spot!”
“Go away!” You call back. “I don’t feel-”
You're interrupted by a key being put into the lock. You hadn’t give her a key? And she didn’t know where your spare was hidden? Nevertheless, your front door swings open as she throws a bobby pin back into her hair. 
“What the- dammit, now I have to get a new lock,” you grumble into the cushion of your couch.
“Hon, I’m so-”
“So what, Melissa? Ready to break up with me because you would never go out with me?” you finally bite out now that you aren’t at school.
“Babe,” she whispers as she makes her way over to you.
“I heard what you said this morning,” you spit out. “So just break up with me and be done with it.”
“I don’t want that,” she tells you as she wraps your arms around you. For the first time, you don’t lean into her. 
“Then what the hell do you want?” you wrestle free of her hold on you. “Since you clearly don't care about me enough to tell them we’re together. You wouldn’t have said what you did if you didn’t mean it, even slightly- dismissing everything they were saying.”
“Babe, it isn’t like that and you-”
“I don’t get you!” you finally break. “You tell me I’m your sun at home, and then you say all that shit at school! You won’t even tell your best friend because you’re so ashamed to be with-”
“I’ll tell Barb officially,” she states quickly. “I’ll tell Abbott. I’ll tell the whole fuckin’ world. I’m not ashamed at all.i I want you, and only you.”
“You say that now, but you haven’t even told Barb. You dismiss every comment she makes about the two of us,” you mumble. “Is it because you don’t really-”
“Barb knows,” Melissa tells you. “So does Mr. Johnson.”
At that you look at her, dumbfounded. 
“I don’t know how he knows, but he does,” she shrugs. She wraps her arm around you again. “And hon, I’m so sorry you heard those things I said.”
“It doesn’t take back the fact that you said it,” you grumble.
“You have to know I didn’t mean any of it,” she whispers as she kisses your temple.
“I- I know,” you admit. “But it still hurt that you could say all of that without any hesitation.”
“Because us Schemmentis are damn good liars, and we know how to- that’s besides the point. Y/N, I am so sorry. So sorry.”
You shrug again, but you don’t pull away from her.
“How can I make it up to you?” she whispers as she pulls you closer.
In lieu of an answer, your stomach growls.
“Why don’t you come back to my place with me, and I’ll make you a nice meal?” she suggests.
“That’s a start,” you say with a small, nervous smile.
“And then tomorrow, I’ll drive us to work, and we can tell everyone,” she suggests.
“Mel,” you sigh.
“I’m serious. I’ll tell them- I’m ready. I never wasn’t ready,” she promises. “I was trying to respect your boundaries, and you hadn’t said anything to anyone at school, so I didn’t wanna out you.”
You lean into her. “‘M sorry I was a bitch.”
“You had every right to be,” your girlfriend assures you. “I probably would’ve committed a crime if I were in your shoes. C’mon, hon. Let’s get going if we want to eat at a decent time tonight.”
“Just let me pack a bag, and then...?” you look at her, waiting for her nod of approval. She kisses you gently with a nod. “I’ll be waiting.”
As you leave your apartment hand in hand, her carrying your overnight and school bags, you know the two of you will be okay. 
Next
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dduane · 29 days
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I just saw from your comment on the shrinkflation post that you’re also lactose intolerant with IBS. So listen. This weekend I made Nutella-stuffed chocolate chip cookies, and in doing so realised Nutella is a HUGE trigger for me. It’s been years since I ate it so it came as a total surprise. And the cookies were Amazing, so this is just crushing.
Anyway I see your post and I think, you’ve probably been doing this a while, I’ve seen on other posts that you like chocolate, perhaps you have also encountered this issue and have found a Nutella replacement that’s actually good?
Help me Obi Wan.
I wish I could be sure to be of some genuine help here, as IBS seems to be one of those Every Person Their Own Test Tube things. I may get good mileage out of a strategy, but yours may seriously vary.
Re: chocolate: I don't seem to be bothered by it as such. It's the associated milk content that seems to cause me the most problems, so I watch the package labeling closely for that—and fortunately EU package labeling as regards allergens and triggers is, by and large, very good.
I've been using the Monash University FODMAP method of helping to control IBS, but am surprised to find that its associated app doesn't seem to say anything about Nutella. (Which strikes me as a bit weird, but I may be searching incorrectly.) ...Casa de Sante (which is a third-party site that sells "gut supplements") suggests that Nutella is low-FODMAP due to containing fairly low amounts of known triggers. So, all right, that's nice.... but I'll still take that assessment with a grain of salt, as these are people who want to sell you IBS-adjacent supplements.
Here's where things get complicated, though. I do occasionally have a little Nutella (or the non-branded version of it that we get from our local supplier of baking goods, Kells Wholemeal.) And because I carefully restrain myself, I haven't as yet had any problems, because I always take a lactase supplement—a.k.a. Lactaid or similar—along with them. Because lactase is (relatively) cheap, and spending two or three days swollen up and in pain from having gotten careless with myself is not.
As regards the branded stuff, though, there's a problem. European Nutella and US Nutella are not the same animal... and the US version of Nutella is apparently disquietingly cagey about its labeling. It's apparently difficult to tell whether the portion size of the Nutella you're ingesting has enough skimmed milk powder and/or whey in it to set your lactose intolerance off.
My advice to you would be this (and as usual, you know what advice that costs you nothing tends to be worth... But anyway): don't eat Nutella without taking a Lactaid or similar first. Two reasons: (a) To cover your butt. (b) To help act in establishing a basis for any further diagnostics you need to do. If you have some Nutella after having taken lactase, and still have internal trouble afterwards, then it's a fair bet something else in the stuff is triggering the IBS side rather than the lactose-intolerance side of the equation. That soy-based lecithin, for example. I'd be a bit suspicious about that. (Soy, unfortunately, is one of my own triggers. I can still have tofu, but only so, so carefully.)
...And then, after that, act accordingly to what you've discovered. One thing about my intolerance that I do know: it's come and gone without warning* over many years—sometimes receding into the background completely, suddenly getting much worse without apparent rhyme or reason. So an amount of lactose that once wouldn't have troubled you very much might now be one that you have to watch out for. Or else you simply exceeded what is now a wise portion-control amount for you when you got into those cookies.
(sigh) It's the imponderables associated with handling this problem from day to day that are the most annoying aspect of it. I'm not wild about the wariness with which I have to approach a lot of foods these days—not least because this is Ireland, and in this historically heavily-dairy-based culture, food processors will sneak milk into any damn thing without warning. :) But you do what you've gotta do to get by... which means that, outside of the house, I don't put anything in my mouth without having the lactase pills nearby.
Anyway: hope this helps!
*It also doesn't help that my earliest attacks happened before lactose intolerance was widely recognized as being a problem for a significant portion of the planet's population.
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zinya · 1 month
Text
OBEY ME INCORRECT QUOTES #2
Hey, is your day going well? I had a question before starting: which OM character do you like the least?
This time there is no mention of blood or injury so you can read in peace
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Mc- "I love you."
Lucifer-"Please don't."
Solomon who wanted to surprise MC by cooking a new recipe and ended up burning whatever this thing he calls "dish"
Solomon-"Look, I can explain... "
MC- "At this point I don't think I want you to."
Diavolo: "That's suspicious..."
Lucifer who watched MC and his family "What is?"
Diavolo:"This is the first time youve smiled in fourteen years."
Mc and Asmo who bet on who will have the most likes on devilgram
Mc-"How did you defeat me...?"
Asmo-"Because I have something you don't..."
Mc-"Superpowers?"
Asmo- "Well, I was going to say friends.. but yeah, that too."
Diavolo-"I've decided to run off and become a pirate. "
Barbatos-"But your highness, you have a kingdom to run...
Diavolo-"Not anymore!"
Mc- "Violence isn't always the answer."
Satan-"True, but it is an answer."
Mammon-"You can tell me to do whatever you want-"
Mc- "Good, because need一"
Mammon-"But that doesn't mean that I'll listen."
Mc who enters Levi's room and sees him with his sewing machine
Mc-"What are you making?"
Levi-“Bad decisions.”
Lucifer- "I have a secret."
Mc-"Then keep it to yourself. Knowing you, it's probably something that would get me killed again."
Levi- "I'm going to need a week to recover from this..."
Mammon-"We've only been outside for three minutes."
Lucifer-"And this, is exactly what happens when you don't follow instructions."
Mc- "Last time I checked, life doesn't just hand you a book of instructions when you're born."
Mammon- "Even if life did, who would actually follow them?"
Mc-"You look extremely sad."
Asmo-"Thank you."
Mc-"Well, are you alright?"
Asmo-"Yes, I'm fine."
Mc-"You have tears streaming down your face...'
Asmo- "I'm auditioning for a movie, and I have
to be able to cry on command."
Lucifer- "What is that?"
Mammon"Nothing!"
Lucifer"Well, 'nothing' looks a lot like my wallet. How did you get that?"
Mc-"NO."
Mammon-"I didn't even say anything."
Mc- "You didn't have to. That smirk said it for you."
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Here are the ideas coming from: ~ThirzahWriteg~ and @Bookingitonthedaily ( Instagram)
I don't know if you like this kind of format, in any case I have a lot of fun making them, and of course sorry for any spelling mistakes you might see in the posts.
On that note have a good day, believe in yourself and do everything you can yesterday doesn't matter anymore but today does.💙
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