#also purchasing my friend gifts for her birth so like

[diegowife]

“Two Of Us”

A Mini Of Denji X Reader

Reader uses She/Her pronouns :)

Might be include manga spoilers, read at your own risk!

Makima revealed that Y/n possesses a unique gift since birth - the ability to manipulate Hell-Fire. She is capable of generating and controlling flames, despite not being a devil herself, which sets her apart with this incredible power.

Y/n, who is not only my close friend but also my first love, captured my heart from the moment Makima introduced us. She possesses an exquisite, refined, charming, and courteous demeanor that surpasses even Makima.

Her prowess in eliminating devils, coupled with her captivating actions, sends shivers down my spine. I find myself unable to divert my gaze from her. Unlike Power, Y/n does not possess a childish disposition nor is she easily frightened. In times of danger, I feel assured that Y/n would come to my aid, steadfastly standing by my side.

I often contemplate confessing my feelings to her, but the thought of doing so is daunting. The fear of potential rejection and ensuing embarrassment renders the endeavor an arduous one.

Nevertheless, today is the day I gather the courage to ask her out. I cannot continue to suppress these emotions indefinitely. Nervously, I knock on her apartment door, eagerly awaiting a response. As the door creaks open slowly, my heart skips a beat.

To my surprise, Y/n is already dressed impeccably. Why is she adorned as if attending a wedding? I stand poised like a gentleman and clear my throat,

“Ahem, Y/n, will you go out with me today? You know, just in case the two of us want to spend time together? Since there are not so many devils and Makima hasn't informed us of any mission yet...”, It can prove quite a challenge to convey my thoughts to her on occasion. Undoubtedly, I can be quite bothersome.

“Oh? I was planning to go out to buy something. I guess going out with you is fine too..” In a manner that exuded shyness, she gently rubbed her neck as she spoke.

While holding my hand, she stepped out of the door, “Well, where should we go?”. The suddenness of her actions caused my face to blush as red as Makima's hair. Why would she hold my hand? Is this all just a dream? Or could it be that my dream has finally come true? If this is indeed a dream, I wish to share it with Pochita. He expressed his desire to know and understand the contents of my dreams. Hang on a little longer, Pochita; we are almost there.

Walking hand in hand with Y/n now felt like a taste of heavenly bliss. Although I've never experienced heaven firsthand, I assume this is what it must feel like. Earlier, I had to lock Power in the apartment to ensure she wouldn't disrupt our date. That girl truly knows how to cause trouble.

~TIMESKIP~

Presently, we find ourselves in Y/n's apartment once again. The burden of carrying her shopping bag is quite noticeable, indicating her fondness for shopping. Assisting her, I collect her belongings and arrange them within her humble abode. After completing the task, "Denji..." She appears discontented. Did I do something wrong?

“Denji, I extend my gratitude to you for everything that you have done. The time we spent together was truly delightful and it brought a smile to my face”, This made me chuckle. Oh yes, the plan that we executed has been successfully achieved. “No worries, I had intended for this to happen all along.”

It pleases me to see that she appreciates it. Our moments spent together were enjoyable, but the highlight for me was the opportunity to hold her hand..

Despite all that we did, it still doesn't feel satisfactory to me. We engaged in various activities together, such as going to the shopping mall, purchasing ice cream, having dinner, and strolling around the park. However, even with all of these things, it still doesn't meet my expectations. I can't help but wonder what else is lacking. Ugh, what is it that you desire, Denji? Come on, tell me.

As she prepared to close the door, I intervened, realizing that I needed to speak up once again. “Um, excuse me, but I have something else to say,” I blurted out. In that moment, I questioned my actions, thinking to myself, 'Oh no, what am I doing?' It felt as if my hand had a mind of its own. She furrowed her brow and asked, “Yes? What is it that you want, Denji?” Contemplating whether or not to reveal my thoughts, I considered that perhaps she wouldn't welcome them. Today was an exhausting day, after all.

“If you would be interested, I could propose the idea of accompanying me to the beach tonight, around the hour of 2 am. However, if this time is not suitable, I am willing to change the tim-”, before I could finish my sentence, she ecstatically grasped both of my wrists.

Without hesitation, she replied, “Absolutely, Denji, I would be delighted to join you!” Her laughter filled the air, causing my eyes to widen with admiration. She truly is a treasure. Alas, if only my wealth allowed me the privilege of showering her with delightful gifts. We solidified our plans and rendezvoused at the beach later on.

~TIMESKIP~

At the seaside, I found myself by 2 am. It has been a while, yet she has not shown up. What could be causing her delay in arriving here? Perhaps she is still asleep? No, that cannot be, as she never fails to keep our promises.

Not too distant from this location lies her apartment. Engaged in playing with the sand, I suddenly felt the touch of someone closing my eyes. I couldn't help but smile, playfully remarking, “You won't fool me, Y/n.”

In a state of amazement, she burst into laughter and released her grip, “Impressive how quickly you can guess!” Her face radiated joy as she flung sand towards me, yet I managed to evade it. “To me, it seems evident that we are the only one here,” I commented. Indeed, there is no chance that anyone else is present at this hour, considering it is late morning. Nevertheless, there was a peculiar sensation, as if someone was observing our every move, perhaps a homeless individual seeking solace by the ocean's embrace. I could simply overlook it all and fully embrace this moment.

In addition to that, a solid button-front blouse and trousers were worn by her; in contrast, I am only donning shorts and find myself half-naked. As she took a seat beside me, I crouched down. “I apologize for my tardiness, as I had to carefully select a suitable outfit, and may I mention, I also prepared a bento for the both of us!” she exclaimed, proudly displaying her portion of appetizing food.

Without warning, she forcefully pulled me into the ocean. I have never been a proficient swimmer, especially after the incident involving Reze. Although the trauma continues to linger in my thoughts, I must brush it aside. Y/n is all that matters to me now. “Can't swim, huh?” she scoffed, taunting me. Irritated, I retaliated by splashing water in her direction, provoking her laughter as she reciprocated the action.

Observing her silhouette, her laughter, and her facial expressions brings me great pleasure. Following a blissful period relishing in our youthful moments, we situated ourselves upon the sandy terrain and savored the bento she had prepared.

“Denji, why did you choose this particular location out of all the options available?” she inquired quizzically. Pausing to meet her gaze directly, I responded, “Well, it's quite challenging to put into words, but what I desire above all else is merely the presence of the two of us, without any disturbances or interruptions.”

Momentarily pausing to collect my thoughts, I continued, “All I yearn for is to sit in tranquil silence by the shore, admiring the rhythmic waves, listening to the harmonious melody of the surf, and experiencing the soothing pulse of the earth.” Yes, I suppose that phrase will suffice. While I cannot offer a concrete explanation, I did my best. At that moment, I felt her hugging me. Indeed, she enveloped me with her affection. Well done, Denji.

A rush of warmth envelops me as I sense her skin, the pulsating rhythm of her heart, and her embrace encircling my neck. Regrettably, the embrace is destined to be short-lived. She disengages from the hug and gently places her palm on each of my cheeks, hesitantly questioning, “Denji, do you believe this to be a date?”. Mirroring her actions, I also rest my palm on her cheeks and confirm, “Yes, Y/n, all along, this has been a date.”

A mixture of nervousness and anticipation tinges my smile as I gradually close the distance between our faces, and she reciprocates with equal measure. My throat tightens with anxiety. Despite not being my first kiss, I hope that I am deemed a proficient kisser. Our lips finally unite, and I relish the sensation of her soft lips pressed against mine. It is comforting warmth, and I find myself enjoying it immensely. In that fleeting moment, just as I am beginning to savor the experience, that moment until I hear...

“ BANG !”

Rather than realizing the events that had unfolded, I continued to relish in the sensation of our genuine kisses. My gaze shifted towards her, and the sight before me was utterly unforeseen. The tender caress of her cheeks and the touch of her hand upon mine were no more. Her body lay before me, disintegrated into countless fragments, not a single bone remaining intact. The crimson blood splattered across my visage and drenched my entire being. The chilling tableau left me breathless and shaken.

As I stared at the bloodstained hands, my eyes widened in disbelief. I cast a glance over my shoulder, and to my astonishment, it was Makima. I attempted to utter a response, yet my voice failed to escape my lips. “Denji, creatures like you, devils, should devote their attention to destruction rather than surrendering to love,” she proclaimed.

“Denji, it is obvious that you have developed a sentiment for her from the very beginning. Why did you decide to switch your affections towards her? You have kissed both Himeno and Reze, and now you attempted to kiss her?” She approached me and lifted my chin, saying, “Denji...from this point forward, you are under my complete control.” With a smug expression, she departed, completely disappeared in the shadow.

I find myself completely immobilized. Has the circulation of blood in my body ceased, or am I simply paralyzed with fear? I have lost Y/n. Why am I unable to experience any emotions? Why can't I shed any tears? I had just experienced my first genuine kiss, only to witness her obliteration right before my eyes. It is at this moment that I comprehend the following truth:

“In a world consumed by devils and misery, no feelings of love can endure.”.

I'm sorry if there are any grammar problems. English is not my first language :)

Thank you so much for reading <3 I hope the ending satisfies you. If you have A03, please look up my account PortgasDqish. I usually post my fanfic there ♡

#denji x reader #denji chainsaw man #chainsaw man denji #POV male character #romantic friendship #friends to lovers #fluff and angst #falling in love #love confessions #idiots in love #surprise kiss #reader insert #denji is a simp #makima #chainsaw man #anime #manga #chainsawman anime #chainsawman manga

[whumped-by-glitter]

Meet My OC's

CW: Institutionalized Slavery

this list is and evolving work in progress, hopefully I'll have pictures and additional bios soon.

The Characters:

Princess Annika Lynn Baltair (17): she is princess and hair to the throne of Tallis. Her mother was the youngest princess of Cadmus, as a result, her skin is darker than most Tallisians, closer to Dasa’s tone, she is about 5’4” tall. She does still have the same bluish undertone as well as their white hair and icy blue eyes. She also has wings like all Tallisians, white with hints of blue and silver. Like many 17-year-olds, she can be self-centered at times and a bit naive. She has a good heart, it just takes a bit to find it under the teenage attitude. It also does not help that her father spoiled her to a disgusting degree.She is initially very pro slavery, but eventually softens as she gets to know Dasa and gets to see what he goes through in his day-to-day life. She loves animals and is actually just a lonely, scared girl who doesn’t want the burden she was born into.

Jarek Torbin (27): he is assigned as the princess’s bodyguard. He is tall at about 6’3” and built like a bear, with brown hair and lightly tanned skin due to drilling outside so often. He was in a special unit before being assigned to the princess. He joined the military underage, lying about his birth date, to get away from his drunk father and to attempt to restore his family’s honor. His father was the general of the king’s guard when Annika’s grandfather was king and was blamed and disgraced for the king’s poisoning by his oldest son. Because of that incident being indirectly caused by a Drar, Jarek absolutely hates Drar and believes they deserve to be slaves at first. He eventually becomes very protective of Dasa, even then he doesn’t necessarily flinch away from Dasa being hurt if it can’t be avoided since Jarek is very duty bound. He is also constantly having to patch up Dasa after his self-destructive escapades, so that kind of lowers his sympathy for Dasa at times as well. None the less, Jarek and Dasa do become best friends over time (and maybe more). Due to his time training, unlike most of his race Jarek has developed the ability to use two elements at once, his favorite being coating his fist with bits of metal and charging it with lightning.

Dasa (22): Dasa is a quiet, very obedient Drar slave. He has shaggy black hair, and dark tan skin which his amber eyes almost glowed against. He stands about 5’8”, a little smaller than an average Drar male. This is due to the poison he is always taking, which also negates the quick healing Drar are usually blessed with as well. He was purchased at around the age of 2 when his master, Corvius, found out his childhood friend was trying for a child. He made Dasa consume small amounts of poison with every meal, working up a resistance to it, then as Dasa aged, he was taught to identify and neutralize them. Until he was given to Annika as a gift for her coming of age, he was actually never given a name, not even a temporary one like the other slaves Corvius trains. Instead Dasa was only called Dog or Mutt, or the like. Dasa is fiercely loyal and protective, due to a trauma he absolutely cannot tolerate seeing others hurt, which often causes him to take it on himself. Corvius was exceptionally hard on him and Dasa’s treatment growing up was definitely far worse than average, even at the hands of a noble, who are known among slaves for being particularly cruel. Dasa’s senses were developed more than most as a result of his training though, which makes him and amazing tracker, and although he is not as strong or tall as an average Drar, he is faster. He does have a few screws loose and a probably unhealthy fixation with broken bits of glass.

Corvius Atheris (47): Dasa’s first master. He was King Henrick’s childhood friend. He is about 5’6” tall, a tad shorter than Dasa, and often makes him crawl or kneel when the slave is near him due to the height difference and the amount of time Dasa is around him compared to the other slaves. he has silver-grey hair and piercing blue eyes, and the usual Tallisian subtle blue skin. He became distraught witnessing what happened to Henrick’s family, which is what caused him to start experimenting with poison. He killed 2 slaves by accident before successfully working up Dasa’s resistance. It was difficult because the Drar are so sensitive to toxins and magic, which Corvius theorized was why they evolved such keen senses in the first place. He is cruel and strict but not necessarily sadistic, his goal is to train functional slaves after all. His son, Balor, fiancée to Annika, however is sadistic and twisted, and Corvius often gives him too much freedom with Dasa.  

Masterlist

Taglist: @whumperofworlds, @wounds-seen-and-unseen

#whump #whump writing #fantasy whump #masterlist #original character

[dearchifuyu]

REO MIKAGE HEADCANONS !!

character : reo mikage

contents : character headcanons, friendship headcanons, fluff, nagi and chigiri cameos, not proof read

note : these are some random hcs i had in my notes about reo and i decided to post them here because why not. enjoy!

afab (assigned female at birth) but identifies as nonbinary & transmasc now. his sexuality is currently unlableled but he knows he has a male preference.

he's autistic with (undiagnosed) bpd. his special interests are sports, photography, & astronomy and his favorite person is nagi.

some of reo's favorite artists are takayan, the neighborhood, chase atlantic, & conan gray. he also listens to twice but doesn't openly tell people because he's embarrassed.

always buying nagi new video games if he so much as even mentions ONCE that he wants to play them. reo also does research on the game after the purchase so he can get a grasp on the concept of it for nagi.

reo also likes to watch nagi play games (especially if they are ones he bought for him) because he likes to see nagi's reactions while he plays. he also likes to listen whenever nagi rambles about something he liked or disliked about the game. reo finds it endearing.

cat and dog person, he doesn't like to choose because he finds both pets equally adorable. reo was the kid that would always beg his parents for a pet but they always refused him.

reo would always show his parents those videos of families gifting their children a kitten or puppy in a box (with holes) for christmas or their birthday as a way to convince them but it never worked.

lucky for reo though, nagi has a cat! ever since he learned about this information, whenever reo comes over he immediately showers the kitten with love by playing and cuddling with her during his stays. reo also likes to purchase cat toys and essentials for her even though nagi gripes at him to stop overpurchasing for a cat that isn't even his.

nagi is convinced his own cat loves his best friend more than him. (she does.)

reo's a light sleeper, even the slightest noise will have him up immediately. it annoys the shit out of him and he even had his parents buy him noise cancelling headphones to help but they ended up being too uncomfortable to sleep in so he just gave up.

reo can never fall asleep if nagi is staying over (or vise-versa) because of how loud the mashing of his keyboard is at two in fucking the morning. so, he has to wait for nagi to finally doze off before he can himself.

when staying at chigiri's house however, reo always gets the best sleep. chigiri is an early sleeper and his mom and sister are very quiet. he constantly jokes about living at the hyoma's forever which just gets him a side eye from chigiri whenever his mom and sister immediately agree.

reo is a gossip girl at heart, even though he despises having other people in his business he is always up in everyone elses like a hypocrite. need or want to know something about someone? just ask reo. he refuses to spread around or participate in anything remotely harmful though.

whenever he gets into a fight with his dad he basically moves in with the seishiro's until it all blows over and he comes back home. nagi and his family always welcome reo with open arms anytime he needs.

even though he doesn't play on a team anymore and he's more focused on soccer, reo still plays basketball from time to time.

he's not good at understanding his own feelings so he struggles with deciphering if he feels romantic or platonic attraction for someone which gets him mixed up in all sorts of stressful situationships.

despite his complicated love life, reo's love languages are gift giving and quality time.

he actually had a crush on nagi for awhile but his best friend never requited his feelings. it was painful at first but reo got over nagi eventually, but he hasn't had a genuine crush on anyone else since then.

also reo and chigiri have kissed once... or twice, and they refuse to talk about it. he also flirts with chigiri's older sister frequently just to piss him off.

reo adores playing with his friend's hair (heavy on chigiri.) if he just so happens to be sitting behind any of his friends his hands will always find their way into that persons hair.

sometimes he'll just brush his fingers through it or he'll style it, either way he enjoys playing hair salon when he's bored.

chigiri's hair is reo's favorite to play with obviously because of how long and soft it is. he constantly has his hands in his hair and chigiri has admitted he really enjoys it and it calms him down which motivates reo to do it more often.

reo doesn't play with nagi's hair as much. one, because it's not as long and two, because he gets lazily griped at by nagi for distracting him while gaming. whenever he isn't gaming though and they are laying down to rest, reo's hands in his hair actually help him fall asleep a whole lot faster.

made by @dearchifuyu do not repost. reblogs appreciated!

#reo mikage #mikage reo #blue lock #blue lock headcanons #reo mikage headcanons #mikage reo headcanons #reonagi #reogiri #nagi seishiro #seishiro nagi #chigiri hyoma #hyoma chigiri #bllk headcanons #blue lock fluff #blue lock scenarios #bllk reo #reo bllk #reo blue lock #blue lock reo #blue lock drabbles

[ssreeder]

I will now share about my Christmas. I got many gifts, practical gifts as one gets older...sadly (the getting older part). We got knives, money, mini notebooks, a mechanical pencil (I haven't used those since high school...actually lie I used one this past semester on my chem exam), Washi tape, red velvet album, RAE DUNN (I love rae Dunn, please do yourself a favor and get into rae Dunn), and another squishmellow because you cannot have too much or a finite amount. I will say you know you're getting old when you actually want to save money or use it for practical things instead of immediately purchasing to your hearts desire. I want to use this as an excuse to finally buy platform converses because I want to see the world from the perspective of a 5'4 person jfc. what else. what else. the actual Christmas Day sent me to the great beyond because why do I live in florida yet felt like I was going to die from hypothermia. is now a great time to mention that I kinda want to move north? like winter wear is such an aesthetic but that cold took me to the great beyond. I made my bfffff a crochet beanie with her first initial embroidered and then we both got sad because she has the audacity to live in California instead like what is in California???? I also remembered the taste of boba. tiramisu boba like wow. what flavor. what decadence. I am also turning into my mom because I also got a purse for Christmas and I'm not mad about it cause now I can start a purse brigade for different occasions. I have a purse that smells like Marseille France, a sticky coach purse from a consignment store that I was pretty sure was fake but it actually isn't (funny story, made up a story about my grandmother leaving this purse in a closet because I was too embarrassed to admit that I went to a thrift store and bought it cause like what if it was fake? I would combust right there and then in the store. but it wasn't fake and they engraved my nick name on the bag tag so for a second there I felt like a rich person but then I started going back to work and school and that fantasy diminished). what am I looking forward to now? my day of birth which is in two days. what am I doing you ask? invading my friend's house so I can cuddle her dogs and cats for Free. why a cat cafe when I get sniff cats for Free. I kinda want to splurge the more I think about it. I need to grow my collection of sneakers, bags, sweaters, and squishmellows. also vests. I love me a good sweater vest shirt vest thingy. have like 6 of them. that was my Christmas. if I had to rate it overall 7.5/10 is it the lack of nostalgia that brought the rating down? is it because next year will be even better?

Ahhhh this sounds like a fun Christmas!!

First of all: the older you get the less nostalgic holidays feel, but what’s cool is you make new fun traditions and memories so it works out.

Second: I think we’ve all lied to some stranger when we were embarrassed about something. Haha I’m so glad it worked out so well for you!!

Third: HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!

Fourth; thanks for coming to share this with me I feel included & that’s awesome you’re amazing

#happy happy birthday #I’m telling you now because I’ll forget #I’m bad at birthdays #& other things #it sounds like you had fun #I’m happy you had fun #it’s amazing #gabbitril #ask

[itsyourchoicedevotionals]

Costing Something Significant

“…Behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, saying, “Where is He who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw His star when it rose and have come to worship Him, …And going into the house, they saw the Child with Mary His mother, and they fell down and worshiped Him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered Him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh.” Matthew 2:1-2, 11ESV

Watching people hustle, bustle, push, shove, grabbing things to obtain their desired gifts isn’t a pretty sight. Few people are like a certain friend I once had, who began shopping the week after Christmas each year. Her list was thorough, estimating sizes for the year to come. By July, 90% of all shopping was finished, with toys being the only needed items, those were purchased in October. She always reminded me of the Proverbs 31 woman, V27BSB “She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness.”

No one knows exactly where the Magi originated from, the ‘east,’ being the most precise location. Disputes arise, as to whether there were only three Magi, where they really came from, even their names. Were there only wise men, as in those with knowledge about stars or were they also kings? How many people accompanied them for protection? An army? Definitely, the entourage’ was more than the three puny characters of my nativity set.

Through knowledge of the stars, Magi learned the Savior of all mankind, God was being born on planet earth. Knowing about this glorious event they prepared for a major trip, with protection, gifts worthy of the King— treasure chests of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, not so extensive they couldn’t be handled by Joseph, Mary and a donkey. Yet, treasures large enough to finance Jesus’ family’s stay in Egyptian stay for minimally two years.

Wise men followed His star beginning moving westward. Did they have maps to follow— roads, something showing the lay of the land where they would travel?

Mom always said, ‘Wise men and women still follow Jesus,’ so true. Wise people prepare their hearts to know Him, not only as Father-God-Jesus in reverential fear, but also know Him as “Abba” intimately ‘Daddy—Papa.”

The Wise Men brought Him gifts costing something significant. We still give Him gifts— the most precious costing us everything— our wills, hearts, and faith. “Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.” John 12:25ESV.

As we approach the normally accepted time for celebrating the birth of Jesus, follow the attitude of Jesus’ earthly brother James 4:7-8NIV “Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and He will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will lift you up.” He’s excitedly awaiting spending time with you. Give the gift of you to Almighty God for your special present this holiday season. It’s your choice. You choose.

LET’S PRAY: Holy Father instead of running around telling the world this is the season to celebrate Jesus’ birth, please help us prepare a special altar in our hearts to sacrifice every part of us to You, in the name of Jesus Christ I pray.

by Debbie Veilleux Copyright 2023 You have my permission to reblog this devotional for others. Please keep my name with this devotional, as author. Thank you.

#Jesus Christ #lord of lords #word of god #God #holy spirit #costing #significant #humble #wise #planning #gold #map #prepared #love #hope #devotional #it's your choice #faith

[sparkcolor27]

Funeral Planning Checklist

funeral booklet funeral site online funeral programs funeral pamphlets

One of the biggest motivating factors for people in their 50's and 60's is leaving a long-lasting legacy. Dependant on Carl Jung, at midlife we move from cataloging achievements to discovering meaning. We begin to accomplish that working life is limited - and despite the fact that many men and women think of this mid-fifties or early sixties as midlife, we will also aware that i probably will not live turn out to be 0ne hundred twenty. Several thoughts occurred opinion as I considered this assignment. The first one was: "How must i want regarding remembered?" Second, I wondered who would write my story, and what they would say. My final thought, which really frightened me more in comparison with thought of writing individual obituary, was: "Will my obituary bring tears to my readers' eyes?" Not from memories of my wonderful life; but from boredom brought on by reading a snoozer of obituary. As much as we can't dwell on his or her past, we all do need to shell out a few minutes doing an autopsy located on the lost sale and gaining knowledge from it. Once we don't study each sale we fail to close, then we're committing ourselves using a pattern of losing more sales. Different flowers mean different things in different cultures. Simply make want things the mistake of gifting flowers that carry unfavorable meaning or carry some type of superstition to someone in a period of time of pain and losses. Even in the United States, flowers have different meanings diverse cultures and peoples. Along with a friend of the same background and inquire them if there are any associated with flowers really should not have access to at funerals. This means that everyone should create a funeral design. We are all going to die someday. Simply like you would plan any important event, a funeral requires the identical way type of planning. You can funeral planer from any funeral home purchase so desire or you may also have it pre-arranged. It is even easy to pay for it ahead of their time. It is a good approach to saving some profits.

Now write 2 or 3 paragraphs tracing your childhood and early adulthood, starting from birth. What were the main events and also the did they influence your later task? If you're stuck to the previous professional highlights section, reflecting on early influences can be very interesting. What did you on-line massage therapy schools these that you just could provide for your hard work? Family members should work together to specific each part of the service is taken good care of. Delegating during this time is crucial as it is extremely difficult 1 person to take on all in the details by themselves. Planning a funeral has never been a happy event, but with some cooperation, help and practical advice, you can certainly create lasting and memorable final goodbye.

#funeral program

[changbin-froggy-jimin]

I have absolutely no idea what proper manners are for buying photo cards off of Etsy, but like I’ll buy 5-15 in a single purchase and idk if that’s a bad thing??????

Like I don’t want to stress anybody out but like I’m paying them a bit more I think??? So I hope that if there’s stress it’s not to bad because hey that’s good right?? I hope??? I’m sorry if it’s bad I don’t know any better????

It’s my first time ever really doing something like this so... Idk how to do it right ahhhhhhhh

#yes I do literally feel bad for supporting small businesses and creators because what if I’m stressing them out or requesting to much #is this that ‘I’m trying to get a good grade at Etsy which is something that is achievable and normal’ type thing?? #annabwbwksmkznsbakalqm #I’m stressed #but I will hopefully get cute fake cards so like... happy about that #also purchasing my friend gifts for her birth so like??? #oh goodness I feel kinda bad #they can also cancel the orders right??? #I hope they can if it’s to much #all the pictures only have people purchasing like 1-2 cars and I’m over here purchasing 12 #am I a bad person? I don’t know 😔 #can somebody tell me if this is bad behavior? #thanks I would appreciate it #froggy writes

[lady-knight-]

St Jude

Warning, I relay  a personal story. If you're annoyed or triggered by personal sob stories, not a believer, and not a catholic, you can stop here as you won't  necessarily like it. But if you do: keep on reading, this is important.

  Six months ago, I spotted in the drawer of my night table at my parents’s a letter I kept for reasons I don't even remembered and from years ago. It was a donation ask in favor of Mother's Theresa charity foundation. What caught my attention was the text of a prayer to saint Jude. He was presented as the patron saint of desperate causes and the prayer translated like this:

  "Oh glorious apostle St. Jude, faithful servant and friend of Jesus, the name of the traitor who delivered thy beloved Master into the hands of His enemies has caused thee to be forgotten by many, but the Church honors and invokes thee universally as the patron of hopeless cases--of things despaired of. Pray for me who am so miserable; make use, I implore thee, of that particular privilege accorded thee of bringing visible and speedy help where help is almost despaired of. Come to my assistance in this great need, that I may receive the consolations and succor of heaven in all my necessities, tribulations and sufferings, particularly (mention your request), and that I may bless God with thee and all the elect throughout eternity. I promise thee, O blessed St. Jude, to be ever mindful of this great favor, and I will never cease to honor thee as my special and powerful patron, and to do all in my power to encourage devotion to thee. Amen"

I was surprised, to me, the patron saint of desperate causes was Saint Rita. But prior to her  birth, Jude used to be this.  Killed with a club, he was one of the Christ’s cousins. I've then learned he was a victim of his name, too close of "Judas", and fell in obscurity. That's why he's named Thaddeus instead, sometimes.

  Being in dire straits for two years now, the novena caught my attention, and I have started to experience attraction law since three years. So I did not believed it was a coincidence and stated the novena in in October. My present problems come from the fact I don't have any money and it would solve most of them, so I asked for it. In November, I've also learned that Thérèse of Lisieux's relic would come temporary in local churches. I loved to read her story as a kid, and from time to time since she popped up in sometimes surprising circumstances. 

Like this small scapular I received with her photo on, or, when I went on World youth day in Roma. Back from it, my bus meet another bus burnt carcass in a parking. 

It carried others french pilgrims, it caught fire at night, and luckily nobody was hurt. But their stuff burnt to ashes, except perhaps... Someone found a carton folder remains in the fragments, and between two blacken hymn sheets..."Hey look, little Thérèse did not burn!" , showing us her not even blackened  photo.

But it was only at the beginning of last year, caught in a hypochondriac panic (not easy, the pandemic) that I thought back she would give "roses" (gifts) to the living ones. Signs started to pop up. I asked her too better financial days, and since, she pop up constantly, people brought her spontaneously in conversations, I notice her biography or poster in the shop of the abbey where we hear mass with my family, or...On Christmas day, I've noticed in said shop key chains I never saw before. It represented roses and I supposed there was a Virgin Mary engraving or something behind it but no, just roses.

 It was then two months and a half since my novena. To me "visible and speedy help" shall happen within three months. On Christmas day, my parents told us about a sold in their real estate society, and I knew that. What I did not suspect was the my sisters and me would be granted a part of the prize.

  It's roughly the same than my three years savings I've lost in my moving out and fuel oil purchase. And a third of what I wrote on my Secret check from Universe. In addition, my disabled allowance was just renewed for five years instead of just two.  So it works, and now Jude deserve recognition (and Thérèse if you never heard of her). If you are desperate, try the novena, and, to encourage devotion,  explain everyone the difference between Judas and Jude-Thaddeus. Thanks and blessings!

#jude #saint jude #novena #therese of lisieux #catholic #prayer

[thecarnivorousmuffinmeta]

This is a weird question, but what would happen if Edward slept with or raped Bella in Twilight and got her pregnant with Renesmee? I know that this is even more unlikely than her getting pregnant in NW, but well we're in the land of answers to unlikely questions on this blog

Well anon, I guess we're going here.

Specifically anon is referencing this post.

My Usual Up Front Note

Yes, I know, we all know this is outlandish but I have to do this. Otherwise this blog descends into me writing fanfiction, and I have an AO3 and FFNet account for that.

Edward is many things and it's no great secret that I think he... makes very questionable decisions all the time and should not be romantically entangled with anybody.

However, Edward is not a rapist.

In the original post I go over my thoughts on this but essentially the crux of it is that Edward does have his moral standards. He will not have sex with a woman without a) being married to her first and b) without her explicit consent. Which, Bella does give against his advice in New Moon, fully aware of all the consequences that Edward himself is aware of (neither knew Renesmee was on the table then).

I do not think, at least without a lot of terrible things and huge catalysts happening first, that Edward would rape Bella.

I certainly don't think they'd be having sex as early as Twilight. Bella's not yet eighteen, Edward has no immediate plans to leave her (likely telling himself he'll leave after graduation when the separation is more natural), and he has no plans to marry her.

Sex isn't even on the table in Twilight.

Come on, Muffin, Try

But, per the ask, Edward and Bella do have sex in Twilight.

I have no idea how this would occur without a substantial amount of sex pollen. So, sex pollen it is.

Edward and Bella are in the meadow, it's the happiest day of Edward's life as Bella now fully understands what he is and doesn't run in terror. It's the happiest day of Bella's life as beautiful Edward has just shown her his innermost vulnerable self.

The stupid lamb is in love with the stupid lion. Huzzah.

Just then, wafting through the sky, is a blossoming alien plant life that for some unknown reason is also an intense aphrodisiac. This likely affects the entire town of Forks, but never mind them, we're focusing on Bella and Edward.

Bella looks at Edward, Edward looks at Bella, chemicals in their brain are churning. And as many a fanfiction protagonist has found out: resistance is futile. Edward and Bella succumb to the sex pollen in short order.

Edward probably crushes Bella in the act of sex and ends up sucking her blood out of the grass like a vacuum cleaner while naked. When he comes to, there's bits of Bella's pancreas on his face. He sobs in despair, for he is the world's greatest monster who has raped the love of his life to death and then devoured her corpse.

He goes to Volterra to kill himself. Aro's not sure what to say to any of this, Caius judges Carlisle by association.

However, we're not in that timeline per the ask.

Instead, somehow, despite both parties being not at home, Edward does not crush Bella in the midst of intercourse. Instead, as the sex pollen fades, they get to stare at each other in the aftermath.

They're in a meadow, naked, their clothes are torn into pieces, neither Bella nor Edward is a virgin and both of them can barely remember having sex.

Edward likely flees with suicide on his mind.

He may not have crushed Bella and devoured her corpse but he did just rape her. His inner demon took over and tarnished the most wonderful thing in all the world: he is no better than the monsters he once devoured.

He's likely planning his flight to Volterra before he even gets to the house. All he needs is a change of clothes and a credit card.

And luckily for him, since the entire town just succumbed to sex pollen (including the Cullens), Alice is probably in too much of a daze to see what's about to happen. Edward is able to find some pants, purchase a flight, and runs.

Bella is left naked and alone in the meadow. And very, very, sore.

Eventually, she has to hobble back to the street. She probably gets lost, as she did in canon. Eventually, a search party is probably sent out for Bella. One of the Cullens probably finds her first and... holy god she's looking full on rape victim.

No clothes, shivering naked and dangerously cold, covered in bruises.

Carlisle has not seen Edward all day, sex pollen descended on the town, this is painting a very bad picture of what just happened to Edward and Bella.

Bella tries to insist she's fine. She's not. She's taken to the hospital. And then the bomb drops. Bella easily confesses to Carlisle that she and Edward had sex. Bella has had sex with no one else. She's given a pregnancy test, it comes back positive.

Bella is pregnant with Edward's vampire child.

Carlisle... does not know how to tell Bella. Bella takes it very well surprisingly. By which she doesn't at all.

She does not want to be a teenage mother, that girl in that small town, at all. (She also would be devastated to be thought of as Edward Cullen's rape victim, but Bella's oblivious to that whole part of this)

She also has her whole life ahead of her and never wanted kids or to get married. She's seen how that shit turns out.

On the other hand, this is Edward's child, how can Bella take something so beautiful out of this world? Also, Renesmee's probably working overtime.

Bella tells Carlisle, right there in the hospital, that she's keeping the baby. Yes, she knows that she will have to fake her death, that she'll never see her family again. Yes, she's carrying a child that Carlisle's never seen before, he's not an OBGYN, and there's no telling what will happen. Yes, she's aware she could die. She's doing this.

Well. Carlisle's life just got ten times harder.

He fakes her death in the hospital somehow. Bella Swan dies of internal bleeding from the rape and is carted out of the hospital. Charlie, naturally, comes to arrest Edward Cullen (despite the entire town being affected by sex pollen all at once) but Carlisle truthfully notes that Edward isn't there. He hasn't seen Edward since the day before.

Charlie is also probably working overtime as the whole damn town was raped and does not have much time to look into this. Though Bella will be top priority case.

Charlie leaves (likely to go get a search warrant) and Carlisle gets to breathe a temporary sigh of relief. That sigh of relief is very temporary. Alice comes in in a flurry: Edward has fled to Volterra to kill himself.

Bella, who comes out of the cupboard she was hiding in during Charlie's visit, asks, "What's a Volterra?"

Carlisle calls Aro, tells him to stall Edward until Carlisle can come and also, Bella's pregnant with Edward's child.

Aro has no idea how to take that, and confesses what Carlisle guessed: no, he's never heard of such a thing before. Well, Aro will ask around and try to see if this (or sex pollen) have ever happened before and why doesn't Carlisle bring Bella with him when he comes to pick up Edward.

(Remember, this is before Eclipse, and as such all the shady nonsense has yet to go down.)

The whole family vamooses in the middle of the investigation, Dr. Carlisle Cullen won't be allowed t exist for a while. They head to Volterra, where Edward, indeed, has been stalled and he and Bella reunite.

Though, when I say "they", it's probably the Cullens sans Alice and Jasper. Alice wouldn't want to tempt Aro too much and, since Bella's carrying Renesmee, her visions are pretty much useless anyway. She'll see them later.

Edward is not nearly as thrilled as Bella that she is carrying his demon rape child. However, no one's listening to him and Bella insists she's not aborting the baby. Instead, Bella is heartbroken and tries to assure Edward that he's worthy of her and that it wasn't rape (it was) she had a great time! And she wants his demon baby!

Caius can't believe this soap opera is in his house.

Well, Edward probably won't try to kill himself before killing Renesmee, but then Renesmee's gift works overtime and he's convinced vampires have souls and is somehow able to forgive himself all this madness.

Edward marries Bella after she turns and gives birth, everyone loves Renesmee and they decide she's not a demon and is worthy of life, and they eventually leave Volterra great friends with the Volturi.

Sort of.

Weirdest decades of Caius' life.

#twilight #twilight meta #twilight headcanon #twilight renaissance #edward cullen #bella swan #anti edward cullen #edward/bella #anti edward/bella #renesmee cullen #carlisle cullen #the cullens #aro #caius #the volturi #meta #headcanon #opinion

[ray-ray-writings]

Oh Boy!-BadBoyHalo

One of you lovelies requested a part two to Oh Baby! So here you go! I hope I do it justice and that you enjoy! 

This is a BadBoyHalo x gn!reader. Again this is pretty heavily fem but I know there are people that do get pregnant that do not identify as a woman, and for that reason this is gender neutral. Also, COVID-19? We don’t know her in this fic. 

How Darryl and Y/N tell their families, friends, and fans that they’re expecting. 

Y/N’s POV

After Darryl and I celebrated our good news, we decided it would be best to make a doctor’s appointment to check how far along I was and make sure everything was alright in my uterus. The doctor determined I was 6-7 weeks along and everything was going fine. Darryl and I once again celebrated by ordering food from one of our favorite places. 

“When do you think we can tell  people?” Darryl asked excitedly, picking at his food. I chuckled as I swallowed the food in my mouth before answering, “Well I definitely want to make sure that I get out of the first trimester before we tell anyone. I just want to be extra careful incase things go wrong,” I explained softly, a hand falling to rest on my stomach. Darryl nodded understandingly, “That makes total sense and I agree.” “Maybe when I hit 14 weeks we can tell our parents. And then maybe you could even invite the boys down at around 16 weeks and we can tell them in person,” I stated, shoving another forkful of food in my mouth. 

Darryl let out a small gasp, “You’d let the boys come over and stay with us?” I giggled and nodded, “Of course! They’re some of your best friends and the most important people in your life. You know, we could even have our gender reveal party while they’re here! We could record some of it and upload it somewhere and announce it to your fans, if that’s something you want to do!” I stated excitedly, my mind already racing with ideas. A soft smile fell on Darryl’s lips. He quickly leaned forward and pressed a small kiss to my lips. “That sounds perfect baby. I’ll talk to them about it tomorrow!” He exclaimed giddily. “Sounds good!” 

*Time skip. Many weeks later*

Keeping the secret was really hard for the two of us. But somehow Darryl and I managed. We did have a few close calls. A few slips of the tongue that caused raised eyebrows and hushed whispers, but we always managed to recover from the small mistakes. 

I was so excited to finally be out of the first trimester. Darryl and I planned a dinner for both of our parents. We invited them over under the pretense that we simply wanted to see them and catch up. The four didn’t seem to bat an eye. They came over and enjoyed a really nice meal with a very sweet dessert. After we finished our plates, I offered to brew some coffee for our parents. When everyone agreed, I immediately made my way into the kitchen, Darryl following close behind me. We had to keep our giggles quiet as we poured coffee into the four new mugs we had purchased. 

Yesterday, Darryl and I went out and bought four new mugs. But not just any four mugs. On each of the four mugs, the phrase, “Grandparent. Established: 2021” was written. Bad and I thought this was the best and funniest way to announce it to them, as well as giving each a cute little gift. 

Darryl and I quickly carried the mugs back into the dining room, making sure to cover the labels of the mugs so no one would see before they all were revealed. The mugs were removed from our hands and the four began sipping on their hot drinks. Darryl and I watched with glee as their eyes got wide as they caught sight of the writing on the mugs. All heads snapped to us as we began to giggle at their reaction. “Are you serious?” Darryl’s mom squealed. I simply turned to the side to show off my small baby bump causing the four to gasp in surprise. “Surprise!” The two of us exclaimed together. The four parents stood up and rushed over, wrapping their arms around us in a tight hug. Happy tears fell from everyone’s eyes as we basked in the announcement. The rest of the night was spent sitting around the table talking and laughing. It was an amazing night for everyone. 

*Time skip. Two weeks later*

Today was the day! The boys would be here any moment! Darryl had left early in the morning to pick the boys, Dream, Sapnap, and George, up from the airport. I would have gone with him, but I felt a little too ill. The morning sickness had died down a bit ever since I left the first trimester, but there were definitely days I still felt sick to my stomach. That being said, it did give me enough time to cook up a big breakfast for everyone to enjoy. They had said in the group chat that no one really had time to eat. 

It was perfect timing because as I finished the last pancake, the door swung open. “Honey! We’re home!” Four voices teasingly called from the front door. I quickly turned off the stove and rushed to the door. “BOYS!” I exclaimed in excitement, wrapping my arms around all three in a big hug. “Y/N!” They cheered back, immediately returning the hug. “You’re just in time! I just finished breakfast, come, come!” I babbled, grabbing someone’s hand and pulling them with me. 

The four boys followed me into the kitchen and quickly gaped at the sight. “You didn’t have to do all of this” Darryl whispered, moving forward and pressing a kiss to my cheek. I smiled and shrugged, “I wanted to.” Clay, Nick, and George quickly grabbed plates and piled theirs high of the breakfast foods. “Plus, it makes our announcement a little smoother” I murmured to Darryl as the two of us followed behind the three. 

Once all plates were piled, we moved to the dining room and began eating. We talked and laughed as we caught up with one another, discussing how their flights and things like that. Our discussion was interrupted by a loud beeping from the oven, causing us to jump. 

“Oh gosh! I have a bun in the oven!” I exclaimed standing up and rushing to the kitchen to turn off the stove timer. As I approached the dining room once more, I could hear the boys laughing and when I appeared, they began teasing me. “You’re so forgetful Y/N,” Clay teased, taking a bite of pancake. “Yeah how could you forget your oven’s on?” George also poked, taking a sip of his juice. “Hey, don’t be mean to Y/N! I’ve left buns in the oven before.” Darryl defended, giving me a slight wink. “Oh I remember that!” I exclaimed, “We’re still dealing with that today… And then for the rest of our lives as well.” The three boys fell silent at my statement. Confusion fell onto each of their faces, “What? What does that mean?” Nick questioned. I couldn’t help the grin that covered my face as I rested my hand on my stomach and turned sideways. 

An audible gasp left the three boy’s lips. “No way!” Clay uttered, “No way!” “Way!” I responded, turning to face forward and walk to my chair. “We’re going to be uncles?” Nick questioned softly. Tears pricked in my eyes at the question, but I nodded excitedly. “Yeah, you’re going to be uncles.” The sound of chairs scraping against the floor greeted me before three bodies slammed into me, hugging me tightly. I giggled as I attempted to wrap my arms around everyone to hug them back. Darryl’s chair scraped against the floor and soon his arms wrapped around us as well. 

We stood there for a while, just hugging. Our food was getting cold, but none of us cared. “Do you know the gender?” George asked, pulling his head back a bit. I smiled making eye contact. “I don’t, but our mommas do. They’re in charge of the gender reveal, which is this Saturday. We planned it so that you three could be here for it.” I answered with a grin. The boys seemed to be touched at what I had to say. “You didn’t have to plan your baby’s reveal around us,” Clay uttered softly. I simply scoffed and shook my head, “Of course I did. You’re a part of our family. You’re way too important not to include in this type of stuff,” I answered honestly. Tears seemed to form in everyone’s eyes at my response. “You’re our family too, Bad, Y/N. We love you” “We love you too.” 

*Time skip to Saturday*

Today was the day. We find out what gender our baby is today. I couldn’t help but grin as I watched everyone interact at the party. Darryl and I decided to combine the baby shower with the gender reveal so everyone could get together for one big party. It was also so that the Dream Team could be here for both without having to go home and then turn back around to come for a different party. Besides, they would already be coming back down a month or two after I gave birth so they could actually meet their niece or nephew. 

Darryl’s arms wrapping around me, startled me out of my slight daze. “We’re ready to cut the cake whenever you are,” He murmured, pressing a kiss into the side of my head. I hummed in response and turned to him, “I’m ready”. He ushered me to the table where the cake that our mothers had made. Our moms made a cute cake that was white on the outside with pink and blue decorations on the outside, with “Boy or girl?” Written on the top. “Gather round for the cake cutting!” Darryl called out. 

“Do you really have no preference?” Darryl questioned as everyone made their way over to the front of the table. I smiled and shook my head no, “I honestly don’t care, as long as our baby remains healthy, I’m okay with whatever they turn out to be.” Darryl hummed, kissing the side of my head once more, “I completely agree baby.” Once we made sure that everyone was ready, the two of us picked up the knife together. Darryl’s hands rested over mine as our hands hovered over the cake. The knife cut into the cake easily, a piece was quickly cut. I took a deep breath as we let go of the knife. Darryl reached over and grabbed a spatula to move the cake piece. 

“Ready?” He exclaimed to the crowd. Shouts of affirmation resonated back. Darryl slowly moved the piece out of the way causing blue M&M’s to fall from the center of the cake. Everyone that had gathered around burst into cheers at the reveal. I wrapped my arms around Darryl’s neck after he set the cake down on a plate. His arms came to rest around my waist. “It’s a boy!” I whispered, “It’s a boy Darryl. We’re going to have a baby boy.” “That we are, sweetheart.” 

The two of us let go of our hug and turned back to the crowd. “Well come get some cake!” I exclaimed, motioning for everyone to come forward. Nick, Clay, and George were the first to charge forward. Excited babbles fell from their mouths about having another boys join them. They chattered about how they were going to teach them everything there was to know about Minecraft, not that they couldn’t do that with a girl, but they couldn’t help but be so excited about a boy. A grin fell on my lips and my hand fell to my tummy as I listened to the four babble about everything they were going to do with our baby. Only one thought came to my mind as their words rang in my ears… Oh boy! 

*Bonus*

The day after the gender reveal, Darryl posted a photo of the two of us hugging after we cut the cake. It was a picture that I didn’t know existed, but was so glad it did. The response was overwhelming. The fans exploded at the announcement. Many comments and tweets were so supportive of the two of us having a baby together, claiming it would be the best and cutest kid ever, which I couldn’t help but agree with. Fans being excited about the baby just made me even more excited, I couldn’t wait to hold my baby boy in my arms.

 There you go! I really hope you enjoyed, if so please be sure to leave a like!!

#mcyt #mcyt imagine #mcyt x reader #mcyt one shot #mcyt drabble #bad #badboyhalo #badboyhalo imagine #badboyhalo x reader #badboyhalo one shot #dream #dreamsmp #dream smp #imagine #oh boy! #oh boy #oh baby part two #oh baby #ray writings #ray-ray-writings #ray ray writings #requested

[cassandraclare]

Cassandra Jean’s illustration for this month’s Chain of Gold flash fiction — this one’s about Will and Gideon, and features James, Thomas and Jesse as little kids. It’s a two-parter, so here’s part one!

LONDON, 1889

Will Herondale was full of Christmas spirit, and Gideon Lightwood found it very annoying.

It wasn’t just Will, actually; he and his wife Tessa had both been raised in mundane circumstances until they were nearly adults, and so their memories of Christmas were of fond family memories and childhood delights. They came alive with it when the city of London did, as it did every year.

Gideon’s memories of Christmas were mostly about overcrowded streets, overrich food, and over-inebriated mundane carolers who needed to be saved from London’s more dangerous elements as they caroused all night, believing all trouble and wickedness was gone from the world right up until they were eaten by Kapre demons disguised as Christmas trees. Just for example.

Born and raised a Shadowhunter, Gideon, of course, did not celebrate Christmas, and had always borne London’s obsession with the holiday with bemused indifference. He had resided in Idris for most of his adult life, where the winter had a kind of Alpine profundity, and there was nary a Christmas wreath or cracker to be found. Winter in Idris felt more solemn than Christmas, so much older than Christmas. It was a strange facet of Idris: where most Shadowhunters ended up celebrating the holidays of their local mundanes, at least the ones that spilled out into street decorations and public festivals, Idris had no holidays at all. Gideon never wondered about this; it seemed obvious to him that Shadowhunters didn’t take days off. It was the blessing and the curse of being one, after all. You were a Shadowhunter all the time.

No wonder some couldn’t bear it, and left for a mundane life. Like Will Herondale’s father Edmund, in fact.

Perhaps that was why Will’s Christmas spirit annoyed him so. He’d come to like Will Herondale, and consider him a good friend. He hoped that when their children were older they too would become friends, if Thomas was all right by then. And he knew Will deliberately presented himself as silly and rather daft, but that he was a sharp and observant Institute head, and a more-than-capable fighter of demons.

But when Will insisted on taking them all to see the window displays at Selfridge’s, he could not help but worry that perhaps Will had a fundamentally unserious mind after all.

“Oxford Street? Days before Christmas? Are you mad?”

“It will be a lark!” Will said, with the slight lilt into his Welsh accent that meant he was a little too excited for his own good. “I’ll take James, you take Thomas, we’ll have a stroll. Have a drink at the Devil on the way back, what?” He clapped Gideon on the back.

It had been a long time since Gideon was last in England. As one of the Consul’s most trusted advisors, Gideon not only lived in Idris but rarely found opportunity to leave. He also remained so that his son Thomas could breathe the healthy air of Brocelind Forest, and not the air of this filthy, foggy city.

This filthy, foggy city, his father’s voice echoed in his mind, and Gideon was too weary to silence his father’s voice as he usually did whenever Benedict crept in. More than ten years dead, yet he had not shut up.

His brother Gabriel lived in Idris, too, and for less obvious reasons. Perhaps it was not only the bad air; perhaps they both were happier with a good distance between them and Benedict Lightwood’s house. And the knowledge that its current resident would barely speak with either of them.

But now Gideon had come to London, with Thomas, just the two of them, leaving Sophie and the girls behind. He needed advice about Thomas, people with whom he could discuss the problem discreetly. He needed to talk to Will and Tessa Herondale, and he needed to talk to a very specific Silent Brother who was often found in their vicinity.

Just now he was wondering if that had been a good idea. “A good bracing walk” was exactly the kind of English nonsense he’d half-expected Will to suggest for Thomas, but “a good bracing walk down the most crowded shopping street in London three days before Christmas” was a level of nonsense he had not been prepared for. “I can’t take Thomas through that crowd,” he said to Will. “He’ll get knocked around.”

“He isn’t going to get knocked around,” said Will scornfully. “He’ll be fine.”

“Besides,” said Gideon, “we’ll get looks. Mundane fathers don’t usually walk their babies in prams, you know.”

“I shall carry my son upon my shoulders,” said Will, “and you carry yours on yours, and Angel protect anyone who complains about it. Fresh London air would do all of us some good. And the windows are meant to be a spectacle, this year.”

“Fresh London air,” said Gideon dryly, “is thick as molasses and the color of pea soup.” But he acquiesced.

He had left Thomas in the nursery, where Tessa kept a watch over him and James. A full year older than James, Thomas wasn’t always good at understanding what James could and couldn’t do or understand. Tessa had been concerned that James would end up hurt. Gideon, though, was more concerned about Thomas, who was still smaller than James, despite the difference in their ages. He was paler than James, too, and less sturdy. He had only recently recovered from the latest of his terrible fevers, which had brought a Silent Brother, unfamiliar to them, to their house in Alicante to examine him. After a time the Silent Brother declared that Thomas would recover, and left without any further conversation.

But Gideon wanted answers. As he picked up Thomas now, he couldn’t help but think about how the boy was hardly any weight at all. He was the smallest of all “the boys,” as Gideon thought of them – of James, and his brother’s son Christopher, and Charlotte’s son Matthew. He had been born early, and small. They had been terrified the first time he caught fever, convinced it was the end.

Thomas hadn’t died, but he hadn’t fully recovered either. He remained delicate, weak of constitution, quick to illness. Sophie had fought harder than anyone to drink from the Mortal Cup and become a Shadowhunter, but now she was forced to fight a far worse battle against death by their son’s bedside. Over and over again.

Sighing, he took his son to fetch their coats for their bracing Christmas walk.

#

As expected, Oxford Street was a madhouse of pedestrian shoppers, carriages, gawkers, and menacing groups of roaming carolers. Gideon would just as soon have glamoured them all invisible from mundane eyes (although one of the groups of carolers were obviously werewolves, who had exchanged Acknowledging Looks with Gideon), but Will of course wished to bask in the experience.

James also seemed mostly intrigued by the noise and lights, giggling and yelping at the merry scene around them. A London boy from birth, thought Gideon, and then thought, well, but I was a London boy from birth, and this is too much commotion for my liking. For his own part, Thomas was quiet, watching with wide eyes, clutching onto his father’s shoulders. Gideon wasn’t sure how weakened Thomas still was from the last fever and how much he was overwhelmed by the crowds. In some ways, when he wasn’t sick, Thomas could be guilt-inducingly easy to care of; he rarely made a fuss, just looked out into the world with those large hazel eyes, as if aware of his own helplessness and hoping not to be noticed.

Will waited until after they had already joined the crowds at the windows of Selfridge’s and Will had made a number of nonsensical exclamations of delight of the “By Jove!” variety. He had held James right up to the glass to examine the scenes in detail, which seemed to revolve around some blond children ice skating on a river. Gideon had pointed things out to Thomas, who had smiled.

Only once they had stopped to purchase some hot cider from a man hawking it down a side street did Will say, “I heard about Tatiana’s son Jesse. Dreadful business. Have you spoken to her?”

Gideon shook his head. “I haven’t spoken to Tatiana in nearly ten years, or been back to the house.”

Will made a sympathetic noise.

“I don’t think it’s a coincidence,” said Gideon.

“What?” Will said.

“A coincidence,” said Gideon. “That both her and I have children who are—sickly.”

“Gideon,” said Will reasonably, “forgive me for saying so, but that is a load of codswallop.” Gideon blinked at him. “For one thing, you have your beautiful daughters, neither of whom were more than usually ill when they were babies. For another, all of what happened to your father was his own doing, and happened long after you were born, and neither you or Gabriel were sickly.”

Gideon shook his head. Will was so kind, so eager to spare him the consequences of his family’s sins. “You don’t know the extent of it,” he said. “The extent of Benedict’s experiments with dark magic.  They were ongoing, from as long as I can remember. The demon pox just sticks in the memory, because it is rather lurid.”

“And also we were there,” said Will, “when he turned into a giant worm.”

“Also that,” said Gideon grimly. “But two sickly sons, small and frail—I cannot say with certainty that it is a coincidence, that it has nothing to do with the depredations of my father. I cannot risk the possibility.” He looked at Will imploringly. “It took Jesse years to become ill,” he said, “and Thomas has been ill so much already.”

There was a profound silence. Quietly, Will said, “You sound as if you mean to do something.”

“I do,” said Gideon with a sigh. “I must look at my father’s papers, his records of what he called his “work”. They are at Chiswick, and I must go and ask Tatiana for them.”

“Will she see you?” said Will.

Gideon shook his head again. “I don’t know. I hoped her anger would cool, over time, and her resentment. I hoped the fact that the Clave gifted her with all my father’s wealth and possessions would help her find peace.”

“Well,” said Will, “if you go, you absolutely must leave Thomas with us.”

“You wouldn’t want him to meet his aunt?” Gideon said innocently.

Will looked at him seriously. “I wouldn’t want him, or any of my children, on the grounds of that house!”

Gideon was taken aback. “Why? What’s she done to it?”

Will said darkly, “It’s what she hasn’t done.”

#

Gideon could see Will’s point. Tatiana hadn’t done anything to the house. Nothing to change, or clean, or preserve it in any way. Rather than restoring it or redecorating it to her own tastes, Tatiana had simply allowed it to rot, blackening and collapsing in on itself, a ghastly monument to Benedict Lightwood’s ruination. The windows were clouded, as though fog were seething indoors; the maze, a black and twisted wreckage. When he opened the front gate, the hinges screamed like a tortured soul.

It did not bode well for the emotional state of its resident.

When Benedict Lightwood died in disgrace from the late stages of demon pox, and the full history of his infamy was revealed to the Clave, Gideon laid low. He didn’t want to answer questions, or hear false sympathy for the damage done to his family name. He shouldn’t have cared. He’d known the truth of his father already. Yet it stung his pride, when he shouldn’t have had any pride left in his besmirched name.

The houses and the fortune were taken away from Benedict’s children by order of the Clave. Gideon could still remember when he had found out that Tatiana had brought a complaint against him and against Gabriel for the “murder” of their father. The Clave had first confiscated their possessions, and finally laid out the situation: Tatiana Blackthorn had petitioned the Clave for Benedict’s fortune to be given to her, as well as the Lightwood’s ancestral house in Chiswick. She was a Blackthorn now, not the bearer of a tainted name. She made many accusations against her brothers in the process. The Clave said they understood that Gideon and Gabriel had had no choice but to slay the monster their father had become, yet if they were to speak of technical truth only, Tatiana might be considered correct. The Clave was inclined to give Tatiana the full Lightwood inheritance, in hopes of settling the matter.

“I will fight this,” Charlotte had told Gideon, her small hands tight upon his sleeve and her mouth set.

“Charlotte, don’t,” Gideon begged. “You have so many other battles to fight. Gabriel and I don’t need any of that tainted money. This doesn’t matter.”

The money hadn’t mattered, then.

Gabriel and Gideon discussed the matter, and decided not to contest her claims. Their sister was a widow. She could live in the former Lightwood manor at Chiswick in England, and at Blackthorn Manor in Idris, and welcome. Gideon hoped she and her son would be happy. As it was, Gideon’s memories of the house were, at best, ambivalent.

Now he waited at the front door, its paint mostly peeled off, with deep gouges here and there, as though some wild animal had tried to get in. Maybe Tatiana locked herself out at some point. After a time it swung open, but waiting behind it was not his sister but a ten year old boy, looking somber. He had the midnight black hair of the father he’d never met, but he was tall for his age, willow-thin, with green eyes.

Gideon blinked. “You must be Jesse.”

The boy narrowed his eyes. “Yes,” said the boy. “Jesse Blackthorn. Who are you?”

Jesse, his nephew, after all this time. Gideon had asked so many times to see Jesse when he was a child. He and Gabriel had tried to go to Tatiana when she had the child, but she turned them both away.  

Gideon took a deep breath. “Well,” he said. “I’m your Uncle Gideon, as it happens. I am very glad to make your acquaintance at last.” He smiled. “I was always hoping for it.”

Jesse’s expression did not improve. “Mama says you are a very wicked man.”

“Your mother and I,” Gideon said with a sigh, “have had a very…complicated history. But family should know one another, and fellow Shadowhunters, as well.”

The boy continued to stare at Gideon, but his face softened a bit. “I have never met any other Shadowhunters,” he said. “Other than Mama.”

Gideon had thought about this moment many times, but now found himself struggling for words. “You are…you see…I wanted to tell you. We have heard that your mother doesn’t want you to take Marks. You should know…we are family first, always. And if you don’t wish to take Marks, the rest of your family will support you in that decision. With the—the other Shadowhunters.” He wasn’t sure if Jesse even knew the word Clave.

Jesse looked alarmed. “No! I will. I want to! I’m a Shadowhunter.”

“So is your mother,” murmured Gideon. He felt a slight twinge of possibility there. Tatiana could have disappeared like Edmund Herondale, abandoned Downworld entirely, lived as a mundane. Shadowhunters did, sometimes; though Edmund had done it for love, Tatiana might do it out of hatred. That she had not gave Gideon hope, although, he was sure, foolish hope.

He knelt down, to be closer to the boy. He hesitated, then reached out for Jesse’s shoulder. Jesse stepped back, casually avoiding the touch, and Gideon let it go. “You are one of us,” he said quietly.

“Jesse!” Tatiana’s voice came from the top of the entrance stairs. “Get away from that man!”

As if prodded with a needle, Jesse leapt away from Gideon’s reach and retreated without a further word into the shadowed recesses of the house.

Gideon stared in horror as his sister Tatiana drifted down the stairs. She wore a pink gown more than ten years old. It was stained with blood he well knew was more than ten years old as well. Her face was drawn and pinched, as though her scowl had been etched there, unchanged for years.

Oh, Tatiana. Gideon was flooded with a strange amalgamation of sympathy and revulsion. This is long past grief. This is madness.

His little sister’s green eyes rested on him, cold as if he were a stranger. Her smile was a knife.

“As you can see, Gideon,” she said. “I dress for company. You never know who might drop by.”

Her voice, too, was changed: rough and creaking with disuse.

“Have you come to apologize?” Tatiana went on. “You will not find exoneration, for the things you have done. Their blood is on your hands. My father. My husband. Your hands, and your brother’s hands.”

And how was that? Gideon wanted to ask her. He had not killed her husband. Their father had done that, transformed by disease into a dreadful demonic creature.

But Gideon felt the shame and the guilt, as well as the grief, as he knew she intended him to. He had been the first to cut ties with his father, and with his father’s legacy. Benedict had taught them all to stick together, no matter what the cost, and Gideon had walked away. His brother had stayed, until he saw proof of their father’s corruption he couldn’t deny.

His sister remained even now.

“I am sorry you blame us,” said Gideon. “Gabriel and I have only ever wished for your good. Have you—have you read our letters?”

“I never was fond of reading,” murmured Tatiana.

She inclined her head, and after a moment Gideon realized this was the closest she would get to inviting him in. He stepped across the threshold nervously and, when Tatiana did not immediately shout at him, he continued inside.

Tatiana led him to what had once been their father’s office, a sculpture in dust and rot. He averted his eyes from the torn wallpaper, catching a glimpse of writing on the wall that read WITHOUT PITY.

“Thank you for seeing me,” Gideon said as he took a seat across the desk from her. “How is Jesse?”

“He is very delicate,” said Tatiana. “Nephilim like yourself wish to put Marks on him, because they are intent on killing my boy as they have killed everyone else I love. You sit on the Council, do you not? Then you are his enemy. You may not see him.”

“I would not force Marks on the boy,” protested Gideon. “He’s my nephew. Tatiana, if he is that ill, perhaps he should see the Silent Brothers? One of them is a close friend, and could come to Jesse at our house. And Jesse could know his cousins.”

“Mind your own house, Gideon,” Tatiana snapped. “Nobody expects your son to live to Jesse’s age, do they?”

Gideon fell silent.

“I expect you want Jesse to marry one of your penniless daughters,” Tatiana went on.

Now Gideon was more confused than offended. “His first cousins? Tatiana, they are all very young children—”

“Father planned alliances for us, when we were children.” Tatiana shrugged. “How ashamed he would be of you. How is your grubby servant?”

Gideon would have struck any man who spoke of Sophie so. He felt the rage and violence he’d known as a child storm within him, but he’d desperately taught himself control. He exercised every bit of that control now. This was for Thomas.

“My wife Sophia is very well.”

His sister nodded, almost pleasantly, but the smile quickly became a grimace. “Enough pleasantries, then. You came to Chiswick for a reason, did you not? Out with it. I know what it is already. Your son is like to die, and you want money for filthy Downworlder remedies. You’re here as a beggar, cap in hand. So beg me.”

It was strange: Tatiana’s obvious, undeniable insanity made her insults and imprecations undeniably easier to bear. What was she even saying? What Downworlder remedies? How could remedies be filthy?

Had Benedict destroyed Tatiana as well? Or would she always have been like this? Their mother had killed herself because their father passed on a demon’s disease to her. Their father had died of the same sickness, in disgrace and horror. Will Herondale could dismiss it all as nonsense, but could it be a coincidence that Tatiana’s son, and his son, were both sickly? Or was it some weakness in their very blood, some punishment from the Angel who had seen what the Lightwoods truly were and passed his judgment upon them?

“I need no money,” Gideon said. “As you well know, the Silent Brothers are the best of doctors, and their services are always freely available to me. As they are to you,” he added with emphasis.

“What, then?” Tatiana said. Her head cocked slightly.

“Father’s papers,” Gideon said in a rush of expelled breath. “His journals. I think that the cause of my son’s illness might be found there.” He found he didn’t want to say Thomas’s name in front of his sister, as though she might decide to conjure with it.

“A man you betrayed?” Tatiana spat. “You have no right to them.”

Gideon bowed his head to his sister. He had been prepared for this. “I know,” he lied. “I agree. But I need them, for the sake of my child. You have Jesse. Whatever our differences, you must understand that we could both love our children, at least. You must help me, Tatiana. I beg you.”

He’d thought Tatiana would smile, or laugh cruelly, but she only gazed at him with the impassive, mindless stare of a dangerous snake.

“And what will you do for me?” she said. “If I do help?”

Gideon could guess. Get the Clave to leave her alone, to let her do as she wished with Jesse, for one thing. But in Tatiana’s madness, who knew what she would come up with.

“Anything,” he said hoarsely.

He lifted his head and looked at her, at his mother’s green eyes in his sister’s pitiless face. Tatiana, who would always break her toys rather than share them. There was something missing in her, as there had been in their father.

Now she did smile. “I have just the task in mind,” she said.

Gideon braced himself.

“On the other side of the road from this estate,” Tatiana said, “is a mundane merchant. This man has a dog, of an unusual size and vicious temperament. Quite often he lets the dog run free in the neighborhood, and of course he comes straight here to make mischief.”

There was a long pause. Gideon blinked. “The dog?”

“He is always making trouble on my property,” Tatiana snarled. “Digging up my garden. Killing the songbirds.”

Gideon was utterly positively sure that Tatiana did not keep a garden. He had seen the state of the grounds on his way in, left to crumble as a monument to disaster no less than the house itself.

There were definitely no songbirds.

“He’s made a disaster of the greenhouse,” she went on. “He knocks over fruit trees, he throws rocks through windows.”

“The dog,” Gideon said again, to clarify.

Tatiana fixed her piercing gaze on him. “Kill the dog,” she said. “Bring me the proof you have done this, and you will have your papers.”

There was a very long silence.

Gideon said, “What?”

#gideon lightwood #will herondale #tlh #the last hours #chain of gold #cassandra jean #flash fiction #cog2 #november

[shmegmilton]

Could you do something about how Theo's death changed Burr? You said that her death 'permanently changed Burr’s demeanor' and I can't find much about Burr's later years so I wondered if you could explain it to me. Thank you.

      Yeah, that sounds about right. A lot of the info we know about Burr in the last 20ish years of his life (after returning from Europe, so 1812-1836) has sort of been haphazardly cobbled together by historians, so you only really get a ‘clear’ picture across multiple Burr biographies. We know that he continued to practice law in New York, but most of the supplementary information we have comes from other people; first-hand accounts by friends, newspaper articles, anecdotes, etc. 
Burr himself was obscenely quiet during this time period, partly (I assume) to lay low from debt collectors & people who want to chastise him for being the evil mastermind who shot Hamilton in cold blood or whatever. And partly because he was depressed for a very long time, it seems.

    The first thing that should be noted is Theo’s death came about 6 months after her son (& Burr’s grandson) Aaron Burr Alston, who he was also very attached to & called him Gampy (Burr’s nickname was Gamp so he was Gampy ie. Little Gamp). Gampy’s death effected Burr in an entirely different way, because every instance we have of Burr interacting with children was largely positive—he loved children. After Gampy’s death he seemed to go out of his way to be kind to children & to spoil them with all of the treats and gifts he never got to give Gampy. Something extra sad to note is that he loved to give little coins to children (either out of his own pocket or a pot on his desk), and one of the gifts he had been stockpiling for Gampy was coins…

Now for Theo, I haven’t been able to find any of Burr’s letters to her during this time (I’m not sure if they even survived), but we know that he tried his best to console her & convinced her to be with him in New York. It took about 6 months for her to finally say yes, so he ordered a ship (The Patriot) & a family friend named Timothy Green (who also died on the ship) to escort her from SC to NY. They of course never made it be NY, and to this day not only do we not know what happened to the ship, but we literally don’t even know where the shipwreck is other than its probably somewhere off the coast of North Carolina. There were some theories about a possibly pirate attack (The Patriot was a former privateer ship) but Burr choose not to believe it.

Burr & Joseph Alston (her husband) took up a correspondence during this time (strangely, we have some of Alston’s letters but none of Burr’s seem to have been found) where they confided to each other about their worries. Alston makes a very poignant implication during one of the surviving letters where he says that Burr must feel “severed from the human race.”

Theo wasn’t just Burr’s daughter—she was his only child to survive to adulthood, and one of his closest political & social allies, considering that the majority of the country now hated Burr for the 1804 Duel and the 1807 Conspiracy. She was really all he had for comfort, & Burr constantly mentions how much he misses her (& Gampy) in his European Journal. I can only imagine how devastated he was.

Another note, Charles Burdett (Burr’s adopted son who I’ll talk about in a moment) published a book with some of Burr’s old letters (that he must have been personally given, because I haven’t seen them published anywhere else.) One letter was written during this time period to a woman named “Kate” & he basically admits being too depressed to reply to people.

Burr also allegedly spent weeks or even months visiting the docks every day with the hope that The Patriot might be there. The death of his daughter gained Burr a bit more public sympathy, but the attention was still largely negative. People treated him like a cryptid almost. Not just because he was notorious, but because he was so socially withdrawn that it was rare to see him in public.

—

In 1878, Charles Burr Todd wrote A General History of the Burr Family in America (with Genealogical Records from 1570 to 1878). It’s a handy book with some unique information about Burr that I have yet to see in any other biographies, including a full physical description of what Burr looked & sounded like in his later years ([HERE]), and an interesting essay that Judge John Greenwood, who worked under Burr as a clerk from 1814-1820, presented to the Manhattan Historical Society after Burr’s death ([HERE]).

The Greenwood essay mentions that Burr owned a cat, which he definitely did not own during his 4 years in Europe as there was no mention of it. This implies to me that he purchased and/or adopted it because he was lonely, because there is no other account of Burr owning a pet of any kind before or after this.

Burr also adopted two children around this time, Charles Burdett & Aaron Columbus Burr (Aaron Burr Colombe). ACB is a strange case because, despite having a very public adult life—no one can seem to agree if he was French or American? Or who his mother was? Or his birth year? Some sources say 1808 and others say 1816? It’s bizarre. People also can’t seem to agree whether Charles Burdett was born in 1814 or 1815. There is also a third child (Henry Oscar Taylor, born 1818) who is documented having lived with Burr by 1833.

All of these boys are a mystery because no birth or adoption certificate exists (did they even have those back then?) so it’s unclear where they came from, who their mothers were, or at what point they came into Burr’s life—Burr’s movement & the timelines of their birth make it a bit too hard to say for sure. My personal theory is that (regardless if they were biologically his or not) Burr chose to take these children in to try and alleviate his own loneliness.

One last thing of note about Burr’s later life is that in 1823 he chose to take in Luther Martin (the lawyer who argued his 1807 case), who had recently had a stroke and had nowhere to live. He took care of him until he passed away in Burr’s home in 1827.

Burr would of course die a little less than 10 years after that (the majority of it spent fighting his divorce & dealing with his own strokes). I wish I could write more about this time period, but that is truly all we know about it.

I guess the key takeaway from this is Burr ultimately devoted a lot of his time to charity work & helping others, most likely as a way to deal with grief or find meaning in his life again.

#Aaron Burr #Theodosia Burr Alston #Theodosia Burr #Charles Burdett #Aaron Burr Alston #Luther Martin #Burr Family #Anecdotes

[ladysarahsakura]

Bucky Barnes X OC Ember

Note: Ember is my OC character for Marvel and is the daughter of Hades and Persephone. I also do not own anything here but my own OC I hope you enjoy!

They met in 1940, Sarah worked in a small flower shop in Brooklyn that James “Bucky” Barnes and Steve Rogers chose to pop into that one afternoon. When James saw her, he couldn’t fight the urge to talk to her. He asked her for her help with picking out flowers for his mom and all Steve could do was smirk at his friend for fumbling his words at first. After making their purchases and paying, she told James to let her know how his mom liked them when he could. A week late, he caught her on her way home and James offered to walk her. He grinned when her cheeks bloomed a soft pink against her fair skin as she accepted. As they walked, the pair got better acquainted and learned they had similar interests. Bucky started slowly falling deeper and deeper for her as he watched her enthusiastically talk about her childhood. Once at her doorstep, he chose to ask her out to dinner next weekend and was ecstatic when she said yes. Over the next year, dinner dates turned into dancing, beach trips, picnics in the park, even to a few movies,. They were very much in love, more than once Steve would hear his best friend tell him, his mother and his siblings about how she was the one for him and that he wanted to marry her. By December though, the young lovers’ plans made a drastic change. The U.S had entered the fight over and Germany and Bucky had been drafted. Soon he was being shipped off to Camp McCoy in Wisconsin along with the other young men in his regiment. The week before his departure was heartbreaking for them. H promised to come back to her after the war was won and to write to her every single chance he got. She promised to wait on him and to keep an eye on his family and Steve until he returned. She gave him a small, leather-bound journal to use and said it was an early Christmas gift. He smiled softly at her with tears in his eyes as he grabbed hers, a small necklace with her birthstone as the pendant. On the day of his departure, he huggled Steve, his mom and his siblings goodbye and when Sarah handed him his bags, he pulled his girl into a deep kiss and repeated his promise to her and told her he loved her. He watched out his train car window until they were all out of sight. Sarah waited a full year and a half but was sadly called back home by her father before her soldier’s return home. When James came home and she was gone, Steve gave him the letter she told him to give him which said how much she loved him and how she would be back in Brooklyn before he got back from the war, gave a new mailing address and a promise to be there when he got home.

Sarah had a secret, a secret she was terrified to tell James, and that was who and what she truly was. Her birth name was Ember, her parents were greek gods- Persephone and Hades. She did wish to tell James the truth as they were slowly talking about spending their lives together, even if it would’ve cost her his love. She returned to the Underworld realm due to her father being swamped with new souls and paperwork due to the war overseas in the mortal realm. She returned to Brooklyn in 1945, only to learn Steve had taken part in a military experiment and became Captain America only to crash a plane into icy waters and couldn’t be found and that Bucky- her Bucky- was gone. She mourned with his family and helped them however they needed her to until once again she was called to the underworld, to mourn on her own time.

Fast forward to 2011, now a member of S.H.E.I.L.D, being told by Director Fury that Steve was alive. He put her in charge of helping him when he woke up which didn’t go as planned. After calming her old friend down, she explained everything including what she was and why she never told Bucky. He assured her that he would’ve loved her no matter what. She longed to see him again to know if that was true, little did she know she would get that chance.

2014, she was just as shocked as Steve and Natasha to find Bucky not dead but brainwashed by H.Y.D.R.A. An ability she possessed was mind-reading and memory recovery which can only be used through direct contact with the person wishing to have their memories recovered. As Bucky- now the winter solider- went to grab her, she twisted his human arm behind his back and slammed him to the ground, before her hand could reach the back of his headache had flipped them around, grabbed her by the throat with his metal hand and was about to hit her when he was knocked over by Sam Wilson. She didn’t join Sam and Steve going against Bucky when they encountered the winter soldier on the Triskelion but did assist Steve in Romania when they finally tracked down his location.

Present time after the blip so much has changed. Sam is now the new Captain America and Ember and Bucky finally had a moment of peace to catch up. His memories were still hazy about her but he knew she was important to him. Each passing day he remembered her more and more, mainly as the girl at the flower shop and the girl he took to dinner a week or so after. He trusted her wholeheartedly and once learning what she was and of the powers she possessed, he trusted her even more. She didn’t shy away from him, she wasn’t scared of him even after their violent meeting again after almost 60 plus years, she sided with him against her other friends, and now that Steve had retired, he spent almost every day he could with her. He loved the city but for once he took his therapist’s advice and moved out of Brooklyn. Instead of living with Sam, he moved to Pennsylvania which was where Ember was. In a two-bedroom cottage in the rural part of the state with an attached Morticia Addams style conservatory that housed all matters of plant life, was where she settled. Buck lived in a studio apartment in the neighbouring town which was only a few minutes away from her however he felt as if he belonged beside her. The two shared a usual breakfast and sat at her kitchen island when more memories of her flooded his mind. By this time she had already told him the truth of who she was as well as her parents and they had even met Bucky. As she reentered the kitchen from watering a few of her plants, she saw the look on Bucky’s face and grew concerned, “ You alright, Buck?” His gaze rested on the pendant that was around her neck, “ I-I gave that to you. In 1941 before I had to leave for training, didn’t I?” He sounded scared almost. His memories of him and Steve had come back in droves after being woken from the cryostasis and with Shuri and the other Wakandan scientists help. His only memory of her was being the girl from the flower shop as well as her truth she told him after he was woken up and Bucky internally panicked thinking he messed something up somehow. “Yes. You gave it to me as an early Christmas gift because you wouldn’t be there. Bucky, an ability I have is memory recovery did Steve or Sam tell you that?” She spoke softly to him trying to ease his panic. When he said no she went on explaining what her ability could do. When she activated this ability, she could take someone into their own mind and show them the memories they oppressed or couldn’t remember. He stood slowly and walked to her side of the island and grabbed her hands, placing them on his cheeks, “I want to remember you. Please.” Ember studied his eyes for a moment before her hands glowed a soft blue. Suddenly, she and bucky were back in 1940’s Brooklyn and Bucky smiled, pointing out what places were still standing in the modern-day. The two took the path he and small Steve took every day until they spotted himself and Steve making their way home from work. A perk was nothing in your memory could be tainted so the pair followed through the crowd, not worried about getting caught. His hand instinctively grabbed hers as they followed young Bucky into the flower shop she worked at. Another perk was you could hear the person’s inner thoughts from that time so suddenly Bucky heard his voice talk about how pretty she was and he saw Ember’s cheeks turn that same soft pink again. Suddenly the memory shifted to him walking her home, asking her out to dinner, and a feeling of anxiety washed over them, ‘Bucky had been nervous about their first date’ she thought fondly. Memories played of them being in her apartment, of her meeting his family and the bear hug his mom gave her, Suddenly they were in his childhood bedroom with small Steve drawing away as Bucky got ready for another date with her, “ I’m telling you, Steve, she’s the one. I’ve never felt this way about someone before.” Small steve chuckled and told his friend that was the fifth time he’d told him that. Again the memory changed to Bucky at Sarah’s apartment, laying on the full bed she had, talking about the future as

she worked on a new yarn project. Present Bucky suddenly asked to stop and immediately the world changed back to their modern selves in her cottage. She went to let go of Bucky’s face, scared she’d done something wrong but he didn't let her go yet just had her back facing him. “ I fell in love with you quicker than I ever thought I could fall for someone. I remember going to the jewlery store to get your necklace that day and looking and engagement rings because I wanted to surprise you with a ring I had been eying fr months” there was a small pause,. “Why didn’t you tell me what you were back then?” His voice was soft as he turned her around to face him, slowing whipping the tears from her face, “ I-I didn’t know how. I-I thought you- you’d hate me or think I was lying or just some freak. When I finally wrote everything down the way I wanted to say it, you got drafted. I didn’t want you to hate me when you left. I wanted to make sure you were happy before you left.” She began sobbing, trying to shrink in on herself when he pulled her into him. “You really think that would’ve made me hate you? I mean it would’ve been a surprise, yeah but I fell in love with you for you not for what you are, that doesn't and didn't matter to me. I loved you then and I love you still.” Bucky suddenly felt very nervous, saying he loved her after decades apart wasn’t easy and letting people in wasn't easy for Bucky anymore, but he knew she was worth it still. He just hoped she felt the same way he did. He saw her fighting with her own brain, trying to think of how this would affect him now. He took her face in his hands and proposed something to her. Making new memories, a second first date and if after a few dates, they still wanted each other then they’d pick up where they left off. He saw her smile softly and it made his heart skip. Slowly leaning in, he kissed her softly, almost scared until she chose to deepen it. The memory of the first time they kissed popped into their heads along with all their other kisses. Pulling away he chuckled, genuinely happy again.

For once, he felt safe and at home.

#james buchanan bucky barnes #bucky barnes x reader #fluff #mcu #marvel oc

[rjhpandapaws]

A Hand in the Matter

Ch8: Make a Home Here

Richard would eventually learn that when seeking help he should probably ask Connor rather than Silas, and he shouldn't ask them both. It was a mistake he probably wouldn't make again given how it went this time.

The Family Feud

UnluckyNine: I need help. I think I made a mistake.

UnluckyNine: I don't think I'm ready to have someone in my apartment for two days.

UnluckyNine: I know its only Gavin, but this is kind of a big deal.

Sixty-Second-Set: Its still a couple days away right? Just cancel last minute, that's what I would do.

Sixty-Second-Set: Wait. Who is Gavin?

Sixty-Second-Set: Why is he staying with you for two days!

Sixty-Second-Set: Where did you meet him? Have you seen him before? Is his name actually Gavin?

Sixty-Second-Set: Do you have proof he's real? Are you sure he's not a serial killer?

RunawayArkait: Silas, stop. Gavin is a friend of Richard's from school.

RunawayArkait: He's staying the weekend because he is helping Richard renovate his apartment.

RunawayArkait: They met at the cafe. Yes his name is Gavin, and they go to school together so obviously they've seen each other.

RunawayArkait: He's not a serial killer Silas. He isn't smart enough.

RunawayArkait: Anyway Richard, you want to do this right? It would be best to just get it over with. Because if you don't do it this weekend, it will just be hanging over your head for whenever you reschedule it.

Sixty-Second-Set: Solution! If he isn't there at a decent time, don't let him in.

RunawayArkait: As someone who was an hour late to their own birth, I don't think you should be the one to give time based ultimatums.

Sixty-Second-Set: Fuck off, Connor. You were an hour early.

UnluckyNine: Thanks for the help. I'll just see how I'm feeling on Friday

RunawayArkait: It'll be fine Nines, you'll see.

Sixty-Second-Set: Call Connor if you need back up.

Sixty-Second-Set: He can call Nora, or whatever her name is, and she can come kick his ass.

RunawayArkait: Her name is North, and he won't need to because its going to be fine.

UnluckyNine: Thanks for the advice

Sixty-Second-Set: Of course! That's what big brothers are for.

RunawayArkait: Its gonna be fine. I promise

The rest of his week was spent getting ready for Gavin to come over. Cleaning. Making sure he had sheets and a blanket big enough for the pull out bed. Cleaning the pull out bed. He went grocery shopping and bought snacks and junk food like what he had seen at Gavin's apartment. Almost texted Gavin on several occasions to cancel, and then deleted them. After the longest and most stressful week in recent history, it was finally Friday. There would be no backing out last minute, he wasn't Silas. On top of that, he was actually looking forward to seeing Gavin. As if on cue his phone lit up with a message from the man in mention.

Gavin Reed: Getting ready to head your way. Need me to pick anything up on my way over?

Me: No. Not that I can think of.

Gavin Reed: Alright, see you soon.

Richard set his phone on the kitchen island and gave his apartment another once over. Making sure everything was where it was supposed to be, that his apartment was presentable. Richard himself was dressed in a more relaxed way than usual. He had on blue sweatpants from Silas, that said University of Idaho Theater Fest down the left leg, and an oversized blank white hoodie. He didn't want Gavin to give him a hard time for going over dressed at home a second time. His phone vibrated against the counter top.

Gavin Reed: On my way up to you.

Me: Ok. The door is unlocked.

He put his phone back down on the island and made his way over to the door and unlocked it. He glanced at the shoe rack by the door. A small grey thing. The impulse purchase that had started all of this. He smiled and headed back to the kitchen.

Normally he would be waiting in the living room, but that was going to be Gavin's space for the weekend. He leaned against the counter until his nervous energy became too much to handle. He opened the fridge and dug through it, looking for the bottles of soda he had bought. He heard Gavin come in, followed by the sound of his shoes hitting the shoe rack. He looked up when Gavin spoke.

"Where do you want this?" He asked gesturing to the bag on his shoulder, an excited smile curling at his lips.

Richard straightened up and pointed at the couch since that was where they decided Gavin would be spending the weekend. With that taken care of, Richard grabbed the two bottles of old fashioned soda and set them on the island. He turned to grab the bottle opener since he didn't know if they were twist tops or not. He slid a bottle over to Gavin when he came back to the kitchen.

"Thanks." Gavin said as he took the bottle, "I got you something, a bit of a house warming gift."

Gavin's other hand came up and he placed a hastily wrapped box on the counter. He slid it over to Richard like it would have bit him if he didn't. Richard opened it carefully, not wanting to tear the paper. The box didn't have a label or anything that would hint as to what was inside, and Richard didn't want to shake it in case it was something fragile. He set the box down on the counter and carefully opened the top. He took out a white mug. Richard turned it over in his hands to see if it had a design on it. He found 'Silence is Golden' written in pretty light blue font. He set the mug down so he could sign and felt a smile tugging at his lips.

'Thank You.' He signed, 'I Love It.'

"I'm glad," Gavin said with a smile of his own, "I saw it in the campus bookstore and thought you might like it."

Richard took a drink from his bottle, trying to ignore the clutter on the counter. Gavin had gotten him something, saw it and thought Richard would like it. Connor and Silas were really the only other people who did that.

"What's the plan for tonight?" Gavin's voice pulled him from his thoughts. He was heading for the living room, "Online shopping, actual shopping, relaxing, or starting on changing around the place."

Richard came to sit beside him on the couch, leaning into the back rest some. Gavin, on the other hand looked like he had melted into it, he looked relaxed and comfortable. A contrast to the tensness that was still clinging to Richard, he was trying his best to relax. His fingers were tapping against the bottle in a rapid staccato pattern. He didn't really want to do anything tonight. If he was honest, he didn't want to do any of this, but Gavin was already here and it was too late to back out. He figured they could just hang out for tonight and worry about the apartment tomorrow.

He finally set the bottle down since he had come to a decision. Richard tried explaining this to Gavin, but he couldn't find signs that conveyed what he meant that were also signs that Gavin knew, and he didn't want to fingerspell everything. He let his frustration out as a sigh. Gavin was picking up ASL quickly, and Richard was proud of him, it was just that he was feeling more than what child-sign could express. So it was only natural that his texts didn't even scratch the surface either.

Me: Could we stay in tonight? Relax and maybe look at things online?

Me: I don't think I'm ready to do much else yet.

"That's perfectly fine," Gavin said as he turned on the tv, flipping to some cartoon he liked listening to, "We'll only do what you're comfortable with."

That was how their afternoon went. Gavin told Richard about his week as he looked at stuff online. Writing down a list of things he wanted to buy and the stores the website said he could find them at. It was comforting to come up with a plan for the weekend so it didn't feel so much like he was going into this blind.

Hours passed and they were just talking. Gavin was talking and Richard was texting his responses. It was a normal evening for them, up until Gavin's stomach growled loudly interrupting the story Gavin had been telling.

'Food?' Richard signed, not bothering to hide the amusement. He was feeling a little hungry himself.

"Yeah, that would probably be a good idea," Gavin said, a laugh hanging onto his words as he covered his stomach, "You in the mood to cook or is it a take out kind of night?"

Definitely a take out kind of night. Richard couldn't cook to save his life and he wasn't about to expose Gavin to that. He pulled up the app and tapped on his usual Italian place and picked the same thing he always got before handing the phone off to Gavin. He took his time picking before handing the phone back. Richard placed the order and Gavin went back to his story.

The conversation fell away when the food arrived. The two of them falling into a familiar and content silence. They relaxed like that for a time, eventually passing notes. Gavin in the mood to talk, but not in the mood to speak. It was nice, and they stayed like that for hours. Enjoying each other's company until Gavin yawned bad enough that it sounded like something in his jaw broke.

"So how are we doing this Nines?" Gavin asked, rubbing at his face and muffling his words.

'You Take Couch.' He signed slow and clear since Gavin was tired, 'I Take Bed.'

With that established Richard began packing up the remaining food and putting it away. Leaving Gavin to handle the garbage. It reminded him of when he spent the evenings at Gavin's. Getting the pull out bed set up didn't take long and he let Gavin get ready for bed first since he looked like he was going to fall asleep if he stayed in one place for too long. It was new, but not unsettling to have someone else here, but he supposed it was because he was used to being around Gavin.

He took his turn getting ready for bed, and once he was done for the night, he checked in with Silas like he promised he would.

Me: I'm not dead.

Silas: Did he do anything weird.

Me: No.

Me: He bought a coffee mug as a house warming gift which was nice

Silas: You're alright then?

Me: I promise.

Me: I'm going to bed now.

Silas: Sleep well.

When morning rolled around Richard got ready for the day, a grey turtle neck paired with dark jeans, and made his way to the kitchen as quietly as he could. Being mindful of Gavin, who was still passed out on the couch. He got the coffee grounds out and into the machine before he heard signs of life from the living room. Gavin came into the kitchen as though summoned by the spluttering of the coffee machine.

"Good morning Richard," Gavin managed through his yawn, his sea green eyes barely showing signs of life. "How did you sleep?"

'Good Morning.' Richard signed back with a smile, 'I Slept Fine.'

The kitchen fell silent after that. Gavin was leaning against the counter, in the small corner made by it and the fridge. His eyes were open and he was looking around, but it didn't seem like he was seeing anything. Richard hadn't gotten to witness pre-coffee Gavin before, and now he understood why Gavin's texts this time of day were only one word. It was kind of endearing to see a new side of Gavin.

Richard grabbed mugs as the coffee finished, a plain one for Gavin, as well as the one Gavin had bought him. He poured Gavin's first, leaving room for the abysmal amount of cream he felt the need to add to his coffee, and pointed the semi-alert male in the direction of the fridge. He poured his own next, then returned the pot to the machine.

"That's some good coffee," Gavin joked tiredly when he caught Richard looking at him.

'You Monster,' Richard signed back with his free hand and pulling a face to make his point.

Silence settled over the kitchen again, though this time it was content rather than exhausted. Richard was absently staring out the window, going over the plan for the weekend in his head. Today they were shopping, picking up the things Richard had decided on last night. He liked them and hoped they would make his apartment feel less like a hospital room.

Gavin got ready quickly after he finished his coffee and met Richard at the door when he was ready to leave. They were taking Richard's car because Gavin had brought his bike over. He was glad to have Gavin with him since he'd never done any important shopping like this before. What he had now was a collection of things that used to belong to Connor and Silas that had sat in storage when they had moved. The things they were getting today would be Richard's and would finally make the apartment feel like it was his.

Richard had made a list of stores along with what he hoped to find at each one last night. When they arrived at the first store he found a place to park that was relatively close.

'Ready?' He signed at Gavin as he got unbuckled.

"Yeah." Came Gavin's reply as he got out.

Richard joined them and they made their way inside. The store was big and had an open floor plan with furniture on one side and decorations on the other. He made his way through the store picking things out that were on his list, crossing them off as well as other stores as he got them. He also picked up a few novelty things that caught his eye, including a present for Gavin. It was a mug that said 'cunt' in black print with the letter 'c' making up the handle. He figured Gavin would get a kick out of it given his sense of humor.

The other stops went similarly. Richard getting things off his list as well as a few other things that caught his eye. Some of them for Gavin when he did well on signing or passed his Psychology tests. None of the places they went had the shelves he wanted for his room. One place had some that were similar, and he bought them for his office. They were going to try one last place before giving up and ordering them online.

The store his phone directed them to was massive. The website said they at least sold the shelves he was looking for, but didn't say if they had any in stock. Looking couldn't hurt.

He and Gavin wandered the store. Following the signs in hopes of finding the shelves. They were stopped in an aisle trying to get their bearings. Richard didn't think they were going to find the shelves here. He was going to say as much to Gavin, but he saw a girl in the store's uniform coming toward them. Maybe she could help.

She spoke to them as she approached, "Can I help you and your..." her eyes moved from Richard to Gavin and then back as she chose her words, "partner find anything specific."

Richard froze. His partner? She meant Gavin, he knew that much, but it wasn't like that. They weren't like that. It wasn't like that. Richard tried telling her that but his signs wouldn't cooperate. He turned to Gavin, silently begging for help because he didn't know how to get out of this situation.

"Oh, uh. No. We're alright, thanks." Gavin sounded just as embarrassed as Richard felt, he hadn't explained that they weren't together, but his words had gotten the sales clerk to leave them be, which was just as good.

They stared at one another for a long while, the silence between them wasn't awkward, but there was something hanging in it. Gavin broke into a smile and then broke down into uncontrollable laughter. It got to the point that he was nearly doubled over. Richard's own anxiety was beginning to subside and he couldn't help but smile at Gavin, the other's delight rubbing off on him. They didn't find the shelves, but that was fine.

"Let's head back," Gavin said when he finally had control over his breathing. "We can pick up some food on the way back. Then order the shelves when we get back to your place."

Richard found himself hyper aware of how close he was to Gavin the rest of the night. Keeping a friendly distance between them and decided he could give him the mug another time. He didn't want to give Gavin the wrong impression.

They continued talking about it, Richard taking delight in Gavin's awkwardness. They exchanged pleasant stories and memories well into the evening. The late night hours became early morning and when they were both sagging into the pull out bed, Richard decided it was time to get some sleep.

'Okay,' Richard signed as he stood with a yawn, 'Bed Time.'

He let Gavin use the bathroom first again. When Richard was done for the night he climbed into bed and messaged Silas.

Me: Today was interesting

Silas: What did Garrett do?

Me: Gavin.

Me: He didn't do anything, but a worker at a furniture mistook us for a couple.

Silas: You said he wasn't doing anything!

Me: He wasn't. We were just kind of close

Silas: Why?

Me: We were lost.

Me: Anyway, its late so I'm going to sleep.

Silas: Be safe

Me: Always

Richard woke up at his usual time, the late night not quite beating natural habit. Like yesterday, Richard went about making coffee as quietly as possible. Since they were staying at the apartment he was back in comfortable clothes. The same blue sweatpants as before and a loose black t-shirt with an old style cat emoji on it. Just like the day before, the smell off coffee brought a barely coherent Gavin into the kitchen.

"Morning." Gavin muttered, sounding like he would much rather be asleep. "Today's the day. Are you excited?"

'Morning.' Richard signed back, choosing to answer Gavin's question with a nod. He didn't look awake enough for more signing.

When the coffee finished he poured Gavin's first sliding it over to him so he could get around to actually waking up. Richard poured his own next, holding it in his hands to soak up the warmth. He found himself watching Gavin, and rolled his eyes when the other all but moaned into his coffee. Understanding the sentiment, Richard lifted his own mug in a mock salute.

"Look. One of us can't function before eleven in the morning." He complained, hiding a yawn behind his mug before he took another drink, "Its not my fault you can't wake up at a normal time."

'Waking Up Afternoon Not Normal,' he replied dryly, winking at Gavin in place of a smile. Richard found morning's to be the most peaceful time of day and he liked them the best.

"Richard." He groaned gesturing to the window with his free hand, "Its the weekend. Its practically against the law to wake up early on the weekend."

'Yet Here You Are.' Richard felt himself smiling as he signed, 'Awake Early Sunday Morning.'

Gavin rolled his eyes and gave a genuine but tired laugh, "Okay, no need to be so damn smug. You've made your point."

'Have I?' Richard asked with the quirk of a brow.

This earned him getting flipped off by Gavin. He rolled his eyes again and hid a broad smile behind his mug. Gavin finished his coffee first and cleaned his mug out in the sink, setting it aside when he was done.

"Alright, I'm going to start by cleaning up my shit from the living room," he gestured in the vague direction of the couch, but Richard got the idea. "Then where do you want me?"

'My Room.' Richard signed before finishing off the rest of his coffee and cleaning out the mug.

Richard went to his room with every intention of redecorating but caught sight of his open closet doors. Part of making this apartment his was getting rid of those. He walked back out of his room to the hall closet, he opened the door and dug around until he found his tool kit. Richard took it back to his room and got started on the doors. He was working on the one farthest from the bedroom door. He got the top hinge detached without a problem. With that out of the way, he sat down and got to work on the bottom hinge. He heard Gavin knock on the doorframe before he spoke.

"What," Gavin started from behind him, sounding genuinely confused, "are you doing?"

Richard, personally, thought what he was doing was rather obvious. He was taking his closet doors off their frame. He gestured to the door as a way to get his point across and got back to work.

"Okay," Gavin continued, sounding just as confused as before, "and you're taking the door off its hinges because why exactly?"

Richard took a deep breath, letting it put as a frustrated sigh. After making sure the door wasn't going to fall if he left it unattended, he turned to face Gavin.

'I Do Not Like Noise They Make. Help Me.' He emphasized the last two signs by pointing at Gavin, then at the door that was still standing.

"You have a plan of what you're gonna do once they're off?" He asked as he walked over and leaned against the frame of the closet.

'No.' He stopped for a moment, wondering if they could fit in his car, deciding they couldn't he moved on, 'Do Not Want Them Here.'

"We'll figure it out I guess," came Gavin's response as he stood upright again, he eyed the door before he looked back at Richard, "you got anything to make this easier or are we just gonna brute force it?"

As much as Richard would have loved to see that, he didn't think the complex owners wouldn't like it too much if they couldn't replace the doors. He reached behind himself for the screwdriver he had been using and handed it to Gavin.

They worked in silence after that. Getting thr doors off and finding a place for them took longer than Richard thought it would. They settled for sticking them in the back of the bathroom closet, he found the irony of that a little amusing. The shelves for his room wouldn't be coming in for another ten days, but everything else could be set up today.

He took his time in his room, reorganizing things as he got it put together. Richard enjoyed himself as he redecorated his room, relaxing as the space came to look more lived in. His room came to have a blue and grey color scheme that he found calming and visually appealing. He took a picture of the finished product to send to Silas and Connor, making sure Gavin wasn't in the shot. Silas would lose it if he saw him in Richard's room, he would get the wrong idea.

The office came next, and setting up the shelves took the longest. Organizing them was easy though. The one to the right of the door as you came in was for books and paper work, the one to the left came to hold office supplies, a ship in a bottle, and a Lucky Cat statue from Gavin. Like with his bedroom, Richard took a picture to send to his brothers once Gavin had left.

Richard worked on the bathroom next, which didn't take him long. It was just changing the shower curtains and putting up different towels. The shower curtain was a blown up picture of the beach. Another picture that was sent to his brothers.

The last room left to do was the living room. Richard left it as the last room so Gavin had time to get all of his stuff together. He started with the media stand, placing ocean themed glass globes on either side of the tv, and light blue fairy lights along the front of the shelf. He placed two grey costers in shade order from lightest to darkest on each corner of the coffee table and a line of three white-blue electric candles along the center of it.

The couch was the last thing left to be decorated. Richard went back to his room to grab the bags of throw pillows. When he came back he couldn't find Gavin. Assuming he was in the bathroom, Richard started on the couch. He was smacked on the back with something soft, and turned to find Gavin triumphantly holding a pillow with "fuck off" stitched into it with light purple thread. He smacked Richard again, this time in the chest. It was on now.

Richard took a pillow off the couch and grinned at Gavin who seemed to realize he was a little out of his depth. He threw the pillow at Gavin causing him to back up, it hit him in the chest anyway. He ducked under the next one and threw his pillow at Richard. He caught it effectively disarming Gavin.

He backed Gavin into the wall with a barrage of pillows and was poised to throw the "fuck off" pillow when Gavin finally called his surrender.

"Okay! Okay!" He managed between bouts of laughter, "I'm sorry for smacking you with that pillow. Even if you deserved it."

Richard still threw the pillow, hitting Gavin lightly in the shoulder. They got to work setting up the pillows at each armrest, some along the back. Gavin placing the "fuck off" pillow in the center so it could easily be seen. When he moved away from the couch, Richard took a picture of the living room, making sure Gavin was in the shot this time, and sending it to his brothers.

"There its perfect." Gavin said, turning to face Richard with a smile as he put his phone away, "home sweet home."

Richard returned the smile, something light and warm making its home in his chest as he looked at Gavin, 'Home Sweet Home.'

For the first time, it felt true. This apartment was finally a home, a place where he could simply be, rather than be confined to. It was a new feeling and he liked it. Richard hoped one day he had the right words to thank Gavin for this.

#A Hand in the Matter #dbh #d:bh #d:bh reed900 #dbh reed900 #reed900 #d:bh gavin #dbh gavin #gavin reed #dbh rk900 #rk900 #nonverbal nines

[septicbro1005]

Can anyone explain a pretty thorough explanation of who Peter is? Because a friend asked about him, and she said wouldn’t mind the whole thing, and I realized, I know the whole thing but it’s in my head and I can’t explain it, I just know who he is. ~🐢

Okay, so I can try to do it, but I may start info-dumping, so feel free to eliminate whatever your feel isn't necessary. If anyone else wants to add-on or just rb this and say whatever the hell they want about him, be my guest. i'm gonna put this under the cut in case i ramble too long

so i'm assuming this is peter from the x-men movies and we're not talking about pietro maximoff as an entire character. peter is the son of magneto (erik lehnsherr) and his mother (unnamed in the x-men movies as far as i'm aware)

erik had an affair of some sort with peter's mother before leaving, causing her to birth and raise peter on her own. peter is born a mutant, his mutation being superspeed. for some reason, his mutation also caused his hair to be a silver color. he also is likely a kleptomaniac, though i don't believe that was ever confirmed in canon (charles xavier called him a kleptomaniac, but this was without use of his powers, so this could just be something to make people laugh or mere speculation)

we first see peter in x-men days of future past, back in the year 1973, where i do believe he's 18 or 17. he's shown to have an extremely messy room (which is his mom's basement), and seems to love sweets as his walls are lined with several different name brand desserts and he also manages to eat a popsicle at scarily fast place. he's a little bit sassy, asking charles, hank, and logan "powers, what powers? you see anything strange here? nothing anybody'd believe if you told 'em?" he also enjoys video games, seeming to go as far as purchasing/stealing full arcade cabinets.

he's asked to break erik (who doesn't know he has a son, and peter isn't aware erik is his father yet) out of the pentagon. he's suspicious until logan showcases his mutation, going with them without seeming to ask any other questions. he is then forced to go into the pentagon in a uniform stolen from a guard (who he duct taped to the wall of an elevator), pretending to deliver a meal to erik. he uses his super speed on his hands, causing them to vibrate the glass cell so much until the cell breaks open. he then speeds erik back to the elevator, asking him what he did and poking fun while he does so. asking "what you do, man? what you do? what you dooooo? why'd they have you in there?" and once he gets his answer, he just waits a moment before asking him some other random questions. he mentions how his mom used to know a guy who could control metal, yet neither of them realize erik is peter's father.

erik and peter end up meeting up with the rest of their group. then literally one of my favorite scenes in cinema happens.

He just has all the fun in the world, racing around a pentagon kitchen and fucking around with the guards. he gives them wedges, makes them punch themselves in the face, and all of that fun stuff, all in slow motion. he moves bullets out of the way too, just listening to music and smiling most of the time.

that's about all you really get to see of him in that movie, but he has a much larger presence in X-men: Apocalypse. it's now 1983, and peter is either 27 or 28, still living in his mom's basement. there's still loads of random (and quite possibly stolen) goods lining his walls and such, but he's eyeballing a card about Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters he likely swiped off of charles ten years ago. he's watching the news, seeing how erik ended up killing several policemen in (i believe) poland. he wants to go after erik, implying that he now knows erik is his father. his mother finds that he was watching the news, saying she can't stop him from trying to find his father, but that it's not a good idea. of course, peter decides to go anyway.

a while later into the film we get another fantastic slow-motion scene, which is also one of my favorite scenes in cinema.

This time, instead of fucking around with guards in the pentagon, he is saving everybody in the X-mansion from an explosion. and he has fun with it from the first few people. he messes around with people's hair, does things with flair, and throws some really bad kisser in the air. (just realized that rhymed, and i'm too lazy to change that, so enjoy)

after this whole scene happens, he's then knocked out and brought to a government facility and kept there until he's broken out by cyclops, jean grey, and nightcrawler. they then do their best to fly to cairo, egypt, to save charles from apocalypse (who wants to take charles' body and wipe out the human race, yadda yadda)

erik is working for apocalypse in this movie, which peter realizes, demanding he goes with the group to cairo. he's going solely to see his father and let him know. peter goes with mystique up to where erik is, and after mystique gives a monologue about family, erik asks peter what he's doing there.

"i'm your... i'm here for my family too."

erik doesn't connect the dots, still unaware of his relationship with peter. peter and mystique go back to meet up with the rest of the group, which have saved charles (sorta) and peter decides to go fuck up apocalypse. except apocalypse had an uno reverse card on him, and he dislocated peter's arm and broke his fucking knee. so the speedster was out of commission.

unfortunately, he didn't get to do much else in X-men Dark Phoenix, only getting about five minutes of screen time. he didn't get to tell erik about his relations at all. (which i'm super salty about, but we'll let that slide.)

peter has a much more confident facade he puts up, coming off as cocky and sarcastic, usually using tongue in cheek humor. though he's also very self-deprecating in his own humor, calling himself a "loser" to lighten the mood.

so, uh, tl;dr: peter maximoff, the son of magneto, is a guy with a confident and sassy mask he uses to cover up some good ol' insecurity. his mutation is super speed which he uses for mundane tasks, but he will get serious if ever required.

so sorry if this is too long, i just infodumped like crazy, lmao. can you tell this dude is my comfort character?

#sweet asks for septic #mr dibbles anon #anonymous #mr dibbles my beloved #peter maximoff #quicksilver

[lorei-writes]

Fairy Tales for Bedtime

Connected Souls

Kenshin x MC Fantasy AU (Fairy Tale-ish) Choose Your Own Ending*

Hello friends, I think I will be rather busy this week... But, I managed to write this story, even if it was a bit more rough than it usually is ^^” I hope you like it :D 

Content Warnings: none; possessiveness for one of the endings (Nightmares) 

*- Fluff or Angst

What set them aside were their dreams. Whether the thing that connected them was magic or some sort of physical web was uncertain. Many theories were forged to explain the phenomenon, none gaining more recognition than the other.  Perhaps it was to remain a mystery forevermore? Regardless, the truth stayed the same: their souls were grouped into pairs, the first – and every following – dream after the birth of one's soulmate showing their silhouette at the distance that separated them from each other.

Far, far away, in a land behind two mountains and three seas, there lived peculiar kind of humans. It was not in their appearance nor the language they spoke, both being nothing unexpected for the region of their origin. Their cities emerged, grew and developed as those of any other nation, blooming by rivers and lakes, building ports by the ocean, feeding off of meat and entirety of gifts of nature. What set them aside were their dreams.

Whether the thing that connected them was magic or some sort of physical web was uncertain. Many theories were forged to explain the phenomenon, none gaining more recognition than the other.  Perhaps it was to remain a mystery forevermore? Regardless, the truth stayed the same: their souls were grouped into pairs, the first – and every following – dream after the birth of one's soulmate showing their silhouette at the distance that separated them from each other. As such, people dreamt – and they waited, hoping for eternal happiness to reveal itself to them.

It was said that, at creation, a human was split in two, and only through finding their other half one could become whole again. Some would travel the land, searching for this particular person – some would wait in despair, never once getting the dream they so desired. She, however, was neither of the two, instead waiting patiently for the day to come, the person that was meant to be her salvation always appearing to be within the limits of her city. If it indeed was fate, they were meant to meet one day, weren't they?

She worked at her parents' bakery, living with them in the tiny loft above their business. Their days used to be peaceful, filled with simple labour, but also some sort of warm contentment and appreciation. Their shop becoming increasingly less busy, they struggled to make the ends meet. They thought their situation over and over again, finally coming up to a conclusion: they needed to change. As such, they cleared out two rooms and put beds in them, setting them aside to be rented to travellers passing through the city. Only one room remained for their family to live in – and yet, it was a happy life, her parents loving each other and her so very much. She was their only child, after all.

Her days used to be pleasant in their monotony: she would wake up before the sun rose, go downstairs, prepare the dough and return to her bed while it rested. She'd get up after her roughly three hour nap, her father and mother already having started to prepare pastries to be sold on that particular day, their bickering seemingly only ever stopping when they had to put goods in the oven to bake. If no particular orders were placed beforehand, she'd go to the front of the shop and sweep the floors once more before opening it, only then taking her spot in front of the counter. She'd daydream whenever she could, thinking of the person that was supposed to be her soulmate. Had they visited the bakery by any chance? Had she seen them? Had they spoken?

Would it even happen any day?

She couldn’t think of the future anymore, matters of finance trapping her in the present time. At first, she was not concerned – worse periods could happen to any place, she reasoned with herself. Prices did grow occasionally, less people travelled in certain years, people did have to adapt.

Yet, if all of that was true, why did it become so impossibly hard to get up in the morning?

She didn’t have to wake up early to prepare the dough – her father did, no cakes he’d usually make being sold anymore. She’d lay in bed as he exited the room, watching carefully her mother’s reaction.

They were happy, weren’t they?

She’d still take her post behind the counter, even if hardly anybody came around. She could take silence while being alone... Only when being alone. At least she had time to think.

Why didn’t she know what to do?

A tiny bell hung above the door frame rang, the sound initially not registering in her mind. She blinked away the confusion, a practised smile lighting up her face. “ Welcome!” she exclaimed, the man grunting something in reply. He walked over to where they would once display their cakes, seemingly absent-mindedly staring onto the empty counter. “ Excuse me? Sir?” she asked politely, looking over her shoulder to check whether she could count on help in case anything happened. “ Four bread rolls,” he spoke immediately, seemingly coming back to reality. He turned his head to look at her. As if he guessed her thoughts, he added: “ I have money to pay. Don’t worry.”

Coins hit the counter, the man taking his purchase with him to the back of the room. Turned upside-down chairs resting on top of few remaining tables, he lifted one of them up and put it on the floor, soon taking seat in it and beginning to unravel various bundles with food hidden inside. “ Sir...” she started, unsure as to what she should say. He wasn’t technically doing anything wrong. “ Please, miss, “ he replied instantly, the knife in his hand having stopped. “ There is no other place to eat in quiet in this city. Please.” What could she say? She only nodded.

The man came again the following day – and the day after that, and on one after this one as well, repeated over and over again until weeks since him first appearing there began to stretch into months. She watched him, never daring to do anything else, even if it felt awkward at times. Yet, it was enough to satisfy her curiosity, at least for the time being. Without realising it, she began to daydream again, thinking up stories of who he could be. Was he a nobleman? He certainly could be one, if she had to base her judgement on looks alone. She watched him cut bread into slices, always scolding herself for even wondering how could somebody be so graceful while doing something so simple, so ordinary and grey.

Yet, her curiosity only expanded. Seeing that hardly anybody came around just either way, she walked over from behind the counter. The small wooden doors closing behind her, she set two cups down in front of him, taking the other seat. “ Hmm?” he hummed, his brows knitting in confusion mixed with discontentment. “ You always drink from the flask… So I thought you wouldn’t mind using a cup and if you are already doing that, you may just as well share.” “ And why would I do that?” “ Because the next one is on me.” He obliged.

His name was Kenshin, as she learnt. That day, they talked a bit, the man appearing to be in a hurry. She was almost certain she scared him away, that he wouldn’t come ever again… And yet, he did, and she sat with him. They soon began to eat meals together, so many views they shared during them aligning perfectly.

However, there was something more important: he matched her dreams so, so well. Apparently, he had moved roughly around the time she saw the silhouette get closer to her, and was now living three streets away – and although she couldn’t see it quite clearly just yet, she was sure he was the one for her. More time flew by, butterflies rising inside of her stomach. The door to the bakery closed behind them, night streets glowing. Hand in hand, they strolled down the city alleys, searching for stars painted over the sky above them.

Thick coat of darkness enveloped the park. Alike to little children, they sneaked inside of it, his fingers tightening around hers as he put his other hand on the hilt of the sword at his hip. So happy she wasn’t thinking straight, she let him lead her, thoughts of her parents being worried about her having evaporated from her mind long ago. They sat under a tree, hidden from all curious eyes – and, ironically, their own as well. Trying to rid himself of the uneasiness, Kenshin spoke first: “ I have something to tell you.” “ I’m listening then.” “ I think you might be my soulmate,” he uttered, his hand moving to caress her cheek. “ I think it’s you I’ve seen in my dreams.” “ Let’s check,” she replied, unable to hold back the excitement.

His back resting against the tree trunk, he reached towards in an invitation. Nestled against his side, she closed her eyes, breathing in his scent as to calm herself.

Dreams

She finally fell asleep. Expecting nothing more than confirmation, she looked around, the dream beginning to form – and yet, it was not what she could ever expect.

Somewhere off, far in the distance, possibly further away than her home, even if just a little more, she saw a man. Had he left her? No, impossible, too little time had passed for him to walk up to there. She blinked – but how? She was so sure. They spoke for months, they understood each other so well. How was he not her other half?

Worse: whose half was he? Who could he belong to if not her?

Who could understand him better than her?

Jealously beginning to build up in her, she closed her eyes inside of the nightmarish vision, refusing to believe it.

Could she be happy with her soulmate if it wasn’t Kenshin? Could she be happy with Kenshin if he wasn’t her soulmate?

Would he even want to try?

She snapped out of her sleep, sitting straight abruptly as she sit up. Scared, she looked around, few lights of the dawn slowly diminishing the darkness. Her eyes having found his face, so ridden with regret and conflicted, the words got stuck in her throat.

No.

“ I’m sorry…” he spoke, his gaze drifting away. “ It seems we were mistaken. I didn’t mean to put you in this situation.” Was he saying what he was thinking? Was he forcing out the words he should be saying? “ No, I...” she tried, too stunned to form a coherent thought. “ I think we should go. I’ll walk you ho...” he stopped, her hand catching his and pulling him back down. “ Do you really mean all of this?” she cut him off. “ Do you really mean all of this and agree with the consequences?” He didn’t reply. “ Answer me, Kenshin.” Silence. “ Kenshin. Tell me what you really think.” His elbow propped on his knee, he hid his face inside of his free palm, his fingers tightening around hers once more. “ I can’t let it out.” “ Why?” she pushed him further. “ Because I may not be able to control it.” She got closer to him, staring at him intensely. “ Then don’t. Tell me, Kenshin.”

He did, his lips closing around hers in a kiss. Her hands digging into the fabric of his shirt, she pulled him closer, her body pressing against his. If words weren’t an option, she’d let him know a different way – thorough action, through holding him, through not running away. Their lungs beginning to beg for air, they pulled back. “ I don’t care about you not being my soulmate.” “ Being with them would make you...” “ Shh,” she pressed a finger to his lips, silencing him. “ I don’t want anybody else. I can make myself whole by myself. I’m not a part of anybody else, I’m me and only me – and with you, we can be two separate souls put together by choice. I don’t want it any other way.” She saw something glisten within his eyes – a ripple over the surface of the ocean, wind playing over the grassland? She couldn’t quite tell, his eyelids closing too fast for her to think of it longer. His arms reached to hug her, pulling her into his lap in one swift motion. Kenshin embraced her, hiding his head in the crook of her neck. His grip getting stronger and lighter in consecutive waves, she stroked his hair gently, humming into his ear. “ Yes,” he uttered finally.

She knew he was broken – and yet, she couldn’t dream of anything else.

Nightmare

It wasn’t Kenshin.

It wasn’t Kenshin.

It was not Kenshin.

Whoever she saw, they were too far away – and yet, having just woken up, she wasn’t quite sure as to what she should say. He wasn’t either, looking all so lost, so full of conflict and regret.

She said yes, they could try. But how was she supposed to forget?

Kenshin wasn’t hers.  He couldn’t make her whole again. Yet, she smiled, she continued to share her meals with him, to laugh and talk of the future, just like they did before the night that day. Perhaps she could make it work for her.

Was he searching for his soulmate? Did he really want her? How could he?

Did she want him?

No, no, no, it was all wrong to even begin to think in that way. However, she couldn’t stop it either – she embraced it, letting speculations swallow her.

Who was that woman he was looking at? That man? Was it them? He was hers! Kenshin was hers! Was he… Was he having second thoughts? Was he unsure of her? Was he...Missing something? Of course he was, he must have been, he must have missed all the things she didn’t have!

He must have searched for the other part of his soul. What else could he do? She was lacking! She was not enough! She could never be enough! If only she could, she’d cage him, her beautiful little bird…

No, no, no, it was all wrong to even begin to think that way!

She must have been searching for excuses, there was no other explanation – it was never him, it was her! He didn’t deserve somebody like her! And she… She wanted to be made whole. She waned for somebody to complete her, she wanted somebody she could complete! Yes! They were just not matched well!

But why did she want to keep him away from anybody else?

Why was Kenshin looking so suspiciously at her?

She did not have a cage. Not yet, at the very least.

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