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justjuiceyboy · 3 years

Text

new beginnings

in which Happy is the readers tattoo artist

word count: 1,637

warnings: swearing

(a/n: I’m basically becoming a blog for Happy, will get back to writing Juice soon, just got this idea and knew I had to run with it. Hope you all enjoy and if you ever want to request my asks are open! Love you all, thanks for supporting!)

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7:45 p.m. The sun was setting, causing an array of colours over the buildings of Charming, lighting up the place like a movie. The air was fresh, warm as it was the middle of July. You strolled along the footpath and kicked a small rock as you walked, to calm your nerves. You had made the quick decision with your friend to get tattoos together on this day. But you were walking alone, friendless.

You were not ever going to get a tattoo alongside your ’friend’ who you had caught sleeping with your boyfriend of two years. Two years and he threw it down the drain. With your best friend nonetheless. You just packed your things as he tried to claim his innocence, even though you caught him in bed with her. You were lucky to find an apartment that day that someone was trying to get rid of. At least you had somewhere to stay, even if the entire situation wasn’t ideal.

You still decided to go through with the tattoo, wanting to use this as an opportunity for new beginnings.

You were brought out of your daydream by the pinging of your phone, google maps telling you that you’ve reached your destination. You looked around, wide-eyed, not really knowing what to expect. But here you were, standing outside a small shop adorned with a sign stating “Mallen Tattoos”. This was the place you were looking for.

Pushing open the door, you were instantly met with the smell of cigarette smoke and disinfectant. At least they use disinfectant, you thought to yourself, trying not to show any emotion.

You walked promptly up to the front counter and coughed to get the man's attention. He looked up at you from where he was sitting and gave you a warm smile, accompanied by “You alright Darling?”

You were insanely put at ease by his kind demeanour and you smiled back at him, “Hi, I have an appointment for a tattoo at 8, booked it a few weeks ago?” He started flipping through a book that was on the desk and stopped, raising a brow, “says here that there’s gonna be two of you?”

You sighed, having forgotten that obviously, your best friend was in on the booking too. You told that man that it was just you and handed over some ID, hoping he’d still allow you to be tattooed even though it was only one client. You handed over the money for the tattoo in hopes that that may persuade him further. But once again he smiled and got up from his seat, bringing you through a small hallway to a spacious room with four big leather chairs for tattooing. He gestured to one of them and you sat down.

He brought over a clipboard full of waivers for you to sign and then spoke once again. “Oh, I forgot to tell you Miss, but the artist you wanted, well, he’s sick today. Real bad infection! But anyways, we have a different guy here who gets tattooed all the time, very talented too, if you’ll take him instead?” You could tell he was nervous as to how you’d react. You’d spoken to the other artist on the phone and he’d done practice drawings of the tattoo and sent them to you so you were pretty nervous to let a new artist just take over but before you could weigh up the pros and cons you just nodded. New beginnings, right?

He let out a sigh of relief that he had been holding in and apologised for all this which made you laugh. But you stopped laughing as soon as you saw your new tattoo artist.

A tall figure entered the room, walking over to the man who had led you here. They seemed friendly with each other as they talked. Your nervousness was now back in full force as you surveyed the man who was about to ink your body. He was bald and you could see the tattoos going up his arms. He had an extensive collection which you assumed went much further than just his arms but your view was covered by the plain white T-Shirt he was wearing. He was quite scary, never creating a smile the entire time the other man was talking to him. Your tattoo artist was handed a few pages and he nodded after looking through them, finally making his way over to you who was sweating in the leather chair.

“This is Happy! He’ll take great care of you don’t worry! If you need anything you know where I am” the overly jolly man as he waved goodbye to you both and returned down the hall. Happy. The man in front of you was anything but Happy, with his scary look and overly built body. You knew he was a part of the Sons Of Anarchy biker gang.

You finally made eye contact with Happy and your nervousness increased once again. He was a good-looking man and you knew this tattoo could take some time. Being trapped in close contact with a man like this would terrify anyone. Also, he has some menacing eyes that you felt nearly bore holes into you when he looked.

“Do you know where you want it?” He questioned suddenly, you hearing his voice for the first time. Your mind instantly went to the wrong idea of what you want where and you choked out an exclamation of “what?!”

“The tattoo, where do you want it?” He stated not changing his expression. You mentally hit yourself in the face for going to the dirty side of things and once again was only barely able to speak when you said “ribs.”

He nodded and set up with the pre-made stencil as you lifted your shirt over one shoulder, half your body on display now. He focused on the task at hand and lay the stencil whilst you tried to look anywhere else but at him, knowing that he’d make your knees go weak and you’d say something stupid again.

Once you agreed to the positioning, he began the process of the needlework. This was the first time you’d been tattooed and you didn’t know what to expect in regards to pain. The second he hit the skin, you jumped. He looked up at you and raised an eyebrow and you smile sheepishly so he continued on again. There was no small talk which you were thankful for. You were trying not to make a big deal of it but you could feel every touch, especially when he brushed off your boob whilst doing the linework.

He began filling the shape and shading and you let out a quiet ‘fuck’ and a breath. The man finally broke the silence as he stopped tattooing for a quick minute and rustled around in the pocket of his leather kutte. He pulled out a packet of cigarettes and held it one out to you. Talk about a hygienic practice, but you couldn’t judge right now, anything to take your mind off the pain.

“It helps, especially first time,” he concluded, lighting the cigarette and bringing it up to your lips. You took a drag and felt more relaxed now so he continued on again, placing the cigarette in between his own lips. But this time he kept talking, probably to distract you.

“Why the tattoo?” He asked, without looking at you of course, as he was busy staring at the skin beside your breast. You decided to give in to the small talk, mainly because you wanted to see what you could find out about the man who held a needle to your ribs and a cigarette hanging out of his mouth.

“I booked it with a friend but I found out she was sleeping with my boyfriend so I’m not really sure why I still came if I’m being honest,” you told him, not being wary that you were spilling the truth to a stranger.

“Sounds like a dick” he stated point-blank, making you laugh quietly. “Yeah, she was.”

“Meant the boyfriend. He was obviously stupid,” he mumbles, one eye flicking up to you as he pulled away again. He took the cigarette from his mouth and reached up to you again to let you have a puff. You weren’t sure if it was the air or the cigarette smoke clouding your judgment but the entire scene felt slightly erotic to you now. Hot man, feathery touched on your body and sharing a cigarette between both of your mouths.

Happy seemed to have unwavering confidence as he watched you take a long drag as he spoke again, “You need a real man.” Now it was your turn to mumble, “beats me when I’ll find one of those.” It only took him another five or so minutes to finish on the tattoo and he then wrapped the area for you in silence.

He wrote a few things on a piece of printed paper and handed it to you, telling you it was just the care instructions and told you how to wash the area. You thanked him and he nodded again, signaling that you can go. You left the room and walked out the door of the shop, waving to the friendly man at the front desk.

The air was now brisk as you turned on your heel, ready to walk home. You were about to stuff the paper into your pocket as you noticed what he wrote at the bottom.

‘If you’re still looking for that real man, call me’

It was accompanied by his phone number and a small smiley face, which in turn made you smile. Looks like you’ll be seeing him again soon and not just for another tattoo. As you said, new beginnings, right?

#happy #happy lowman #happy imagine #reader x happy #happy lowman x reader #happy lowman imagine #soa #sons of anarchy #sons of anarchy x reader #sons #imagine

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gumnut-logic · 3 years

Text

Mosaic Beach

It has taken me since Thursday morning (it is now Saturday night) to write this goes-nowhere-piece-of-fluff. I had a low level migraine Wednesday night and felt awful Thursday morning, so the first 850 odd words are me visualising being in a better place other than outside my daughter’s school. Then Scott had something to say and promptly ate my fic. But then at least he was thinking about Virgil.

Also, Gordon is evil.

As always, many thanks to @tsarinatorment @scribbles97 and @janetm74 for the read throughs and support. You guys are amazing to me :D

I hope you enjoy this totally lazy fic ::hugs you all::

-o-o-o-

It was a lazy day.

Virgil suspected John, who had been kicked off Five the day before, had Eos routing all but the most dire situations to local authorities whether Scott authorised it or not.

There were days where Virgil wondered if Scott was really in charge, since John had so much ultimate say.

But that thought was for another day. He was tired and it was likely going to be a day off - please let it be a day off - and he was going to find a corner of the Island to sit alone and scribble in his sketchbook.

He ended up on Mosaic Beach, a personal favourite on the edge of the caldera. Gordon had mentioned it the day before regarding the quality of flotsam available after the last storm and Virgil thought he would see what he could find.

It was overshadowed by an ancient pokey tree brilliant in red blossom and the sand here was a mass of black and white swirls as the coral detritus fought the eroded igneous rocks – the reason they had given it its name. Gordon was right - there was all sorts of things tossed up the sand and Virgil spent the first half hour wandering along the strip of sea wrack picking up shells and whatever caught his eye.

One of the shells appeared determined to return to the ocean and it was with a small smile that he picked up the tiny hermit crab and watched it curl up into its shell.

Holding it gently in his palm, he sought the shade of the giant tree and sat down on the sand in its shadow. Here the breeze was gentle, the sand cool and, leaning back against a rock, he set the little crab down on a smooth patch of sand, along with his small hoard of shells and let it scamper across the little landscape that resulted.

Sketchbook out, he spent the next few minutes sketching the crab madly as it moved about. It shifted angle at random and he found himself increasingly switching from real life to a character sketch. A little personality sprouted from the page that reflected the little crab’s determination.

Ever aware of the crab’s needs above his own, he sketched fast, took a few photos and then gathered the little creature in his hands once more. He trotted down to the rock pools at the edge of the beach and found a spot he felt the crab would be happy.

Crouching down, he watched it scamper into the water.

His lips curved into a smile.

Gordon would know what species it was, where it lived and how to best care for it. Virgil was pretty sure he knew what type it was. Mel was pedantic about crabs and had given them a list of ‘these are endangered, tell me if you see them, kill one and I will kill you’. Fortunately or unfortunately, it wasn’t a long list, so Virgil had memorised it. This little guy...he should be happy here.

The crab found some weed and promptly hid under it.

The rockpool drew Virgil’s eye a little longer before he finally stood up and let the breeze cool his face. A sigh at the sun’s warmth and he wandered back to the shadow of the pokey tree and sat down again.

The little crab stared up at him from his sketchbook, spritely and determined.

Kind of like Gordon really, despite the claws.

That prompted a smile at the thought of his fish brother’s reaction to being compared to a crab.

He would squawk, but he would love it.

Virgil returned to sketching the shells and bits of coral he had collected. Rearranging them, repositioning for lighting. He picked one up and stared at the colours created by a little mollusc. He was ever amazed at what Mother Nature was capable of. Simple geometrics and chemical formulae made one of the world’s strongest and most beautiful substances in nacre. Another broken shell showed the rainbow of colour that he knew his paintbrush would never quite be able to capture, much less the pencil and stick of carbon he had with him today. He was left with a little snapshot from his phone...which was never quite the same either...and what his memory could provide.

Perhaps it was nature’s way of ensuring it was always the most beautiful.

He shifted to scribbling down the beachscape after that. It wasn’t the first time he had drawn this beach, but as with all beaches, it was different every day as the tide sculpted it.

His fingers grew more and more lazy, his lines wandering through more emotion than reality as the day drifted on. At some point, he ate the sandwich he had packed, quite happy to not care what time of day it was and refusing to look at his watch.

Eventually the sketchbook was set aside and he let himself just stare out at the ocean lagoon, eyes tracking the movement of the distant waves and the laps of the ripples against the shore.

And nature’s rhythms lulled him to sleep.

-o-o-o-

“Hey, big bro, you might want to drop by Mosaic Beach before the tide comes in.” Gordon waltzed past the desk Scott was sitting at with a smirk on his face.

“What?” Scott’s brain was still stuck in working out what the hell Simmonds meant by the ‘urgent memo’ that had interrupted his afternoon off.

“The snoring is scaring away all the wildlife.” With that Gordon grabbed a book off the shelf on the far side of the room and backtracked out the way he had come in...without another word.

Scott was left staring where his brother had been.

But then Gordon was worth ignoring some times.

He turned back to his display and continued to try and work out why Simmonds had ordered sixty plastic flamingoes and then memo’d him about it in a panic.

It took him a good few minutes more before throwing it back at Simmonds’ supervisor in Japan with a ‘concerned’ note.

What did Tracy Industries need with sixty plastic flamingoes?

He shook his head and forced himself to stand up and not invest any more in any comms from the business. Today was hopefully his day off and he refused to fall into the trap of losing himself in all the things that required attention.

All the things.

He paused mid rise.

But no. No! Vacation day. He forced himself away from the desk and out onto the balcony.

It was a beautiful out here. The afternoon sun was blazing in a brilliant blue sky without a single cloud. The sea was murmuring far below. It was an artist’s dream.

He blinked as certain Gordon utterings connected neurons together.

A frown. “Gordon!”

No answer.

Another frown and he strode back inside, following the recent tracks of his fish brother down to the kitchen.

Scott found him reading at the table, a phone that was most definitely not his in one hand and the book in his other.

There were lots of photos of crabs.

“What are you doing?”

“Confirming the identification of a crab.”

“Why?”

“Virg found one down on Mosaic Beach and I wanna make sure it is what I think it was so I can report it to Mel.”

The dots that had been connecting earlier fused into a solid line with an arrow pointing directly at Gordon. “And where is Virgil?”

“Snoozing on the beach.”

“And why do you have his phone?”

“Because his drawings were excellent, but I needed a colour shot.”

“Gordon!”

His brother didn’t even look up. “What?” But then he blinked and frowned at Scott. “He’s fine. Well above the high tide line.” A glance down at the book again. “There, that’s it. Oooh, Mel is going to be so excited.”

Scott glared at Gordon for a whole second longer before storming over and snatching the phone out of his hands. Without another word, he strode out of the kitchen and took the path that would lead him down to the reported beach.

Younger brothers were hard work.

The little beach wasn’t the closest on the Island. Probably one of the reasons Virgil chose it to get away from pesky younger brothers. Trust Gordon to find him anyway.

He fingered Virgil’s phone in his hand as he walked. The green leather case was embossed with an elaborate dragon design.

Looking at it, all he could really feel was fondness.

He must be tired. Grandma was right. He needed a day off.

Easier said than done. It wasn’t like he could park himself on a beach and fall asleep.

He grunted as he stepped over some rocks to start the climb down to the little cove. The path was thin and wove amongst several pōhutukawa trees – or pokey trees as Alan called them, their dark green leaves adorned with puffs of red blossom. Birds darted between them squawking at each other. That combined with the surf in the distance and the breeze rattling palm trees, it wasn’t the quietest of places.

Nevertheless, he found his brother sprawled against a rock under the largest pokey tree at the edge of the beach, snoring his head off.

Definitely noisy.

Virgil was dressed in an old pair of work shorts and a t-shirt with a hole in it. Both sported spatters of paint and clearly showed how relaxed his brother was trying to be.

Beside him on a rock, carefully placed, no doubt by Gordon, the brat, was a sketchbook and a box of drawing tools. Virgil’s artist backpack lay folded up supporting his head - again likely Gordon.

Virgil snorted and curled up just a little more against the rock.

Gordon was a shit, but he was a kind one. Virgil slept like the dead and would likely need one of those waves off in the distance to wash over him if he was going to wake up before he wanted to.

Staring a moment longer, Scott sighed, gave up and sat down beside his brother. He dropped the phone onto the sketchbook and looked out at the beach.

Virgil continued to snore.

His biggest little brother had always snored. Scott had cornered him and got him tested for a variety of sleep issues, but he was fine. Just loud.

The terrible two used to make a point of pointing it out as much as possible. But that was before the hydrofoil accident.

Gordon didn’t know it, but due to his injuries, he now snored, too.

The ribbing about snoring in the Tracy household had dropped to a minimum since, Gordon the only unknowing ribber.

But Virgil remained the major noise maker and the brothers worshipped the soundproofing in the villa.

Regardless of the racket, Scott did find it strangely quiet out here. Sitting on the sand with nothing to do was oddly relaxing. Of course, he wasn’t really one to do nothing and Virgil’s sketchbook was right there. Gordon had obviously already stuck his nose into it and Scott was pretty sure Virgil wouldn’t mind if he took a peek.

Would he?

Lifting the phone off the book, Scott carefully picked it up and nestled it in his lap...ever, ever so careful. Okay, so he had some respect and not a little fear of damaging Virgil’s artwork.

The pages were thick and stiff and likely designed to support wet media as much as dry. Most of the work in it was pencil, however, maybe some charcoal? The darks were so deep in some that they had to be.

But Scott was no artist and really only had eyes for the content.

The first page found him looking at himself. Virgil had obviously either captured Scott’s likeness on the sly or drawn from a photo or holoprojection. His drawing stared up at him in almost all three dimensions. The expression on his graphite face was thoughtful, almost wistful. He could see his rendered self was thinking or planning and totally distracted...which was likely why he had no clue his brother had captured this shot.

But the artistic strokes were strong and sure, simple in their complexity.

Scott blinked, moved that his brother was so talented and capable.

Though he really shouldn’t be surprised.

Turning the page, he discovered their grandmother.

He had to smile. The concentration on Grandma’s face was almost comical. A bowl and a recipe book sat in front of her and the very tip of her tongue stuck out of the side of her mouth as she frowned at whatever she was reading.

There was a touch of caricature in the drawing, a little exaggeration, but done with love and fondness, not mockingly. His grandmother was beautiful.

Scott swallowed and turned the page to find several detailed scribbles. They looked like pieces of machinery and the pages had notes written down the sides.

It was a spark moment. He knew Virgil well enough for that. One of those times when his thoughts all came together and saw him running naked out of the shower to grab whatever he could find and get it written down.

Several major equipment improvements had occurred exactly this way. It appeared that at some point, this sketchbook had been the nearest note book and had borne the brunt.

He stared at the diagrams, doing his best to work out exactly what they were. Sharp notation, numbers, that had to be the backend of a pod. It clicked. This was part of the pod assembly redesign from the previous year. Virgil had come to him with some major improvements, including a pod body redesign. What followed had been a massive overhaul of all the ‘birds’ assembly systems and a whole new set up, including colour changes according to which Thunderbird housed which pod. Virgil and Brains had been buzzing for weeks.

And it was possible it had all started here on this piece of paper. Now he could see the scribbled down inner workings of the assembly mechanism and the shape on the second page was a worked and reworked pod shell.

He glanced over at his brother who was still snoring peacefully. Virgil was amazing. Scott could not have been prouder of what his little brother had achieved. Yet Virgil never really boasted or bragged or even highlighted what he had done. He was just there. Always there, one step behind him ready to help.

He must be really tired because now he was getting emotional. There had been a few times in the last couple of years where he had come close to losing Virgil. He hadn’t, but there had been nightmares and many a night where he had spent reassuring himself that his biggest brother was still with him.

And yes, he could stand outside his brother’s bedroom door and listen to him snore.

It gave him comfort.

Gordon had caught him once.

That had been a heartbreaking moment.

Because his fish brother hadn’t said a thing, just reached up, squeezed his shoulder, dropped his forehead against Scott’s arm and just stood there for a solid moment. Another gentle squeeze and he left, not even looking up at Scott before he was gone.

It said more than any words.

Scott sighed and turned the page...only to come face to face with Gordon again. Though this time the joy in their fish brother’s eyes was lighting up the page. He was grinning at a shell and there was a speech bubble - ‘Virgil, come and see this!’

Scott had to smile. Gordon was notorious for sharing his beach discoveries. Virgil was usually the target because at least he knew a little bit about their little brother’s fascinations. Scott loved to see Gordon happy, but honestly, he couldn’t tell the difference between one shell or another. He tried. He honestly did, but Virgil had the patience of a saint and was much more engaging.

Scott loved to watch the two of them instead.

And yes, he saw Virgil sneak things into his pockets. Usually shells, but occasionally rocks and bits of coral. Those finds made their way back to Virgil’s studio and there was a whole corner devoted to marine still life.

Which was why it was no surprise when the next three pages of sketchbook turned out to be exactly that. A curly shell, a pile of cockle shells - Scott knew those at least - they were good for fishing. The third page had a plan for a reef painting. It had scribbled notes, much like the pod redesign pages, but this was based around a sketched layout. Scott frowned at it...it was vaguely familiar. He would have to ask Virgil about it when he woke.

The next two pages sported today’s efforts. The same beach he was sitting on emerged from the paper, along with some sketches of a crab. The first few were realistic, but the last one had the little hermit crab with an IR symbol on its side and one of Dad’s old uniform hats perched on top of its shell. It bore a sash that resembled Virgil’s despite the lack of green colour and one of its claws was bigger than the other in a very exo-suit-like way.

That had Scott grinning. This was no doubt the reason why Gordon had run for the crab book. Mel, in her position of Director of the Kermadec Expedition south of them on Raoul Island, was very particular about the endemic crabs on all the islands in the area.

He wondered what she would think of them inducting crabs into IR.

He wondered what she was doing today and if she might be available later for a nice evening together.

That thought was very distracting and had nothing to do with crab identification at all.

Virgil snorted, rolled over off his backpack and face first into the sand.

Scott startled, fully expecting a woken bear of a brother to surface from that.

But Virgil just kept snoring, now snorting sand as well.

He placed the sketchbook down, scrambled around his brother and gently shoved the folded backpack under his head again.

His fingertips brushed sand off Virgil’s face.

And he found himself sitting beside his brother again.

Why was he out here?

Because Gordon was evil and dangled the concept of Virgil drowning in the tide simply to aggravate him enough to do exactly what he did.

Gordon was a shit.

But a good one.

Another sigh and he lay back against the rocks and got comfortable, because, let’s face it, he wasn’t going back up to the villa without Virgil. His brother was safe, sure, but walking off and leaving him to the elements ran against his grain.

And Gordon knew it.

He would throttle, and possibly hug, his fish brother later.

Besides, it was nice out here, taking a moment to just be.

Virgil would approve.

Virgil would fake being asleep just to get him to do it.

Scott’s eyes darted to his now softly snoring brother, a sudden suspicion at the forefront of his thoughts. He would put it past either of Virgil or Gordon’s conniving ways to conspire to get him out here.

Virgil was drooling a wet patch onto his backpack.

Ugh.

Well, maybe not.

Perhaps he was just being paranoid.

Perhaps he just needed to relax.

Relax.

He closed his eyes and folded his hands in his lap. Kayo was good at meditation. So was Gordon. Virgil did some connecting with nature thing that seemed to work for him.

Exhibit A snorted as if in agreement.

He could try.

Out of all the sounds he could hear, only one really held his attention.

That same soft snoring. No waves or wind or birds squawking brought him any kind of comfort.

The sound of his brother breathing evenly beside him, safe and sound, was the most beautiful sound in the world.

What that said about him...well, he didn’t care right now. He was tired and worn out. Maybe Gordon was right. Maybe this is what he needed. He should care, should be annoyed, but the rhythm was lulling and, god, he was so tired.

So goddamned tired.

Virgil kept breathing and Scott followed him into sleep.

-o-o-o-

Hidden in the foliage of the grove of pokey trees behind his two brothers, Gordon just smiled.

-o-o-o-

#thunderbirds are go #thunderbirds #thunderbirds fanfiction #Virgil Tracy #Scott Tracy #Gordon Tracy

49 notes · View notes

jobrookekarev · 3 years

Text

My Sweet Joy, Always Remember Me

Chapter one of one

Words: 8715

Summary: In the midst of quarantine, Levi convinces Jo to download Tik Tok, and she quickly becomes addicted. So when a certain trend comes around, Jo couldn't pass up the opportunity to poke fun at the man who left her. Back in Kansas, one of Alex's teenage patients shows him the video of Jo and Luna, and he instantly goes back to Seattle to meet the girl he assumes is his daughter, only to find that Jo has another surprise in store for him.

Fandom: Grey’s Anatomy

Relationship: Alex Karev/Jo Wilson.

Characters: Alex Karev, Jo Wilson, Levi Schmitt, Luna Ashton, Izzie Stevens (Mentioned), Eli Stevens (Mentioned), and Alexis Stevens (Mentioned).

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences.

Additional Tags: Angst and Fluff, Babies, Pregnancy, Tik Tok, The Intimacy of napping together, Rated T for swearing.

Read at AO3

Read at FFN

AN: Did I write a fic about a Tik Tok? Yes. Do I regret it? Absolutely not! Link to the Tik Tok this is based on: https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMebyxQeQ/

A big thank you to the jolex group chat for once again distracting me from what I should be writing with ideas of what I could be writing. They supplied some of the lines and ideas for this story, and I am thankful for all of their help and support.

……………………………………………………………………

It was a slow June day on the Pediatric Ward at the Children's Hospital where Alex worked in Kansas City. Ever since the pandemic, things had slowed down, although he still had his regular surgical patients.

“Hey Marco,” Alex said, coming into the room of the teenage patient. He had assisted in a leg amputation due to cancer on the kid a few days ago and was eager to see how he was progressing.

“Hey, Dr. Alex, do you have Tik Tok?” Marco asked as he still looked at his phone but even bothered to glance at Alex as those little clips of music played.

“Nope,” Alex said as he checked over the kid’s vitals and pulled the bandage back to look at the incision. “Everything looks good. Are you having any pain?”

“Not really, you guys got me on the good stuff,” Marco replied, giving him a nod as his mask hid his smile, and Alex could tell that he was a little bit out of it. “Okay, but you have got to see this one. I think it's you?”

Alex's eyebrows came together. He didn't know anybody in his life that would make a Tik Tok of him. Except maybe Zola, but according to Meredith, she mostly just made dance videos. Nonetheless, he went over to Marco’s bedside and waited for him to pull up the video expecting to see Zola. Alex was, however, surprised when a video of him and Jo popped up.

“I'll never forget you,” the artist sang over the video. “They said we'd never make it.”

The video was of the two of them on their wedding day as they kissed and then turned to the crowd, all smiles, and the little caption read. “To the man who left me in a letter, thanks for the gift.”

The video changed and suddenly, it was a video of Jo sitting in a rocker in the loft holding a baby. She smiled at the camera before tilting it down to the baby in her arms, who looked up at the camera with newborn colored big blue eyes from where she was swaddled in a pink blanket.

“My sweet joy, always remember me.”

“Sorry, man,” Marco said, having read the expression on Alex's face. “The videos are funny but, it's a sucky way to find out you got a kid.”

Alex just stood there in shock as the video replayed again before he grabbed the phone. He waited for the video of her and the baby to play again before he paused it. He couldn't believe it. Jo had their daughter. She must have been pregnant when he left. Jo had gone through a pregnancy, and high-risk preterm labor, and now she was taking care of a medically fragile preemie, their preemie baby girl, all alone. All because he had made the dumbass decision to move to Kansas without even talking to her. Because he had left, Jo and their daughter were alone.

Their preemie daughter. The baby girl didn't look very big, she was definitely a preemie, and she was still on supplemental oxygen with oxygen cannula tubes in her nose. His mind filled with the possibilities of any health complications their daughter could’ve had, from brain bleeds, lung issues, hip dysplasia, or congestive heart failure, and so on.

Why didn’t Meredith tell him? Although, they hadn’t spoken since he left. Of all the people he thought would tell him if he had a daughter, Meredith was at the top of his list. He understood why Jo didn't want to tell him, although the fact that she didn't still hurt. The fact that Meredith, his best friend in the world, didn't tell him that he had a daughter, hurt even more. A sense of karma came over him as he wondered if this was how Jo felt when she found out about the twins.

He let the video reply again and stopped it on Jo and the baby. Jo was dressed in a tie-dye T-shirt with her hair thrown up in a bun. She looked tired but happy as she showed off the baby in her arms. Alex thought she was absolutely beautiful, as beautiful as she looked the day he said goodbye to her.

He remembered what she looked like when he turned back to look at her, one last time, after he made it through security. Her dark hair was flowing over her shoulders in beautiful waves, and she had a gorgeous smile on her face. She excitedly waved to him and blew him a kiss before the crowd surrounded him, and she disappeared from his view. The image of her smile as she blew him a kiss had replayed in his mind over and over again the past six months.

He just stared at the photo of her for a couple of minutes as the ache in his heart consumed him. He had a heartache, a longing for her since he left, and he had carried it around every day. He missed her more than he had ever missed anyone. He missed her more than words could describe. He missed her more than anything else in this world and every day, he fought the urge to go back to her.

Now he had a reason to go back because she had had their daughter. Their beautiful, wonderful little girl. She already looked a little bit like Alexis with her little tuffs of blond hair. Alex couldn't stop staring at them in the video. He tried to quickly do the math, he had left six months ago so, but she must have been pregnant before then, although the baby looked small, about 5 lb or so. It was June now, so Jo had to have gotten pregnant in November or October. Maybe she knew before he left, maybe she didn’t. They were so focused on arranging the witnesses for Meredith’s trial, and he was so busy working at Pac North before he left. Some days he barely saw her except for when he crawled into bed.

That was the thing that he regretted most, that he didn't spend enough time with her, which was why, the week after Meredith’s trial, before he left, he spent as much time with Jo as he could. He visited her on her lunch breaks, he was there when she got home, he made dinner with her, and watched TV with her on the couch, and he made love to her every night. At the time, he had lied and said it was so he could spend as much time with her before he went to visit his mom, but he wanted one last perfect week with her before he broke both of their hearts. The memories of that week, of Jo’s beautiful smile, were something he thought fondly of as he slept alone in his one-bedroom apartment.

“Can I have my phone back now? I can send you the video if you want?” Marco said as his words brought Alex out of his head.

“Umm yeah,” Alex said as he handed the phone back to Marco, still in shock at the fact that he and Jo had a daughter. “Please send that to me.”

He was absolutely floored at the fact that Jo had had their baby, as Marco sent him the video. Alex quickly clicked on it and downloaded the app as his feet carried him out of the room. As he waited for the app to download, he wondered if Jo had posted any other videos. As he found a quiet spot in the halls, the app loaded, and he clicked the link and followed the icon to Jo's page. There he was greeted with a handful of videos. Some of them were of Jo dancing with Levi or by herself, but there were one or two videos of their daughter.

One was of their daughter, which was a series of photos to the song, you're my sunshine. The photos started off when the baby was in the incubator, looking no bigger than his hand, and Alex guessed that she was about 26 weeks old. Alex looked over every photo, every video of the little girl. He was so distracted by the photos and the videos of the baby that he almost ran into a nurse. Alex quickly apologized before he came out of his daze.

He had to go back to Seattle. He had to see Jo and their daughter. He had to be there for them. He had missed so much of her life already, including Jo’s pregnancy and her first breath, her first days of life, and he was filled with guilt and regret. Alex ran over to the lounge to get his things, cleaning out his locker while he quickly called the chief of surgery and quit on the spot. Alex hated this job anyway, he loved the kids, and he wanted to make sure that his patients, including Marco, were okay, but he needed to go home.

Alex rushed over to the apartment he had in Kansas City. He had been staying there since the start of the pandemic. He and Izzie had agreed that since he was still working in direct contact with patients at the hospital, he would move out and get a separate apartment as they didn't want to risk transmitting this to the kids. Izzie had stayed home with the twins as with her job in oncology, she could do mostly remote consults, with only having to go on to the clinic on an as-needed basis with covid negative patients. Alex had been video chatting with them every single night and had distance visits with them at the park every Saturday and Sunday. Although, he had been considering getting his own place since before the pandemic started. He thought that he could make it work with Izzie, but the two of them were never in love.

It only made his homesickness all that much harder, and the urge to go back to Seattle all that much larger. The one thing Alex had realized during this pandemic was that he didn't have to be in Kansas to be a good dad to his kids. He could see them part-time and visit them on the weekend, and he could do that from Seattle. Lord knows he was rich enough to fly out every weekend. He had made up his mind as he packed up his car with everything he would need to move back to Seattle. Alex got in his car, setting his GPS for the address of the loft in Seattle. As he drove past the endless crop fields, he smiled in anticipation of soon seeing their daughter and his wife, it never did feel right to call her his ex-wife.

……………………………………………………………………

Going back to Seattle was like coming home. Everything was so familiar in Seattle, whereas everything had been so foreign in Kansas, even though he had been there for months. The drive over to the Loft was just muscle memory as he allowed himself to enjoy his surroundings. The thought of seeing Jo and his daughter filled him with excitement, despite how he knew that Jo may not be happy to see him. He hoped that she would at least let him meet his daughter, and then maybe they could work out a schedule where he could see her.

As he pulled up to the Loft, he couldn't help but sigh in relief. He was home. For the first time since he left, he was home. He had stopped back at the hospital and had tested negative before he left for Seattle as he knew with a medically fragile child, he would have to be extra careful. Still, he grabbed a mask and hoped that he would at least get to hold her.

He ran into the apartment complex and took the stairs two at a time up to the metal gate that led to the laundry room. It was locked, as usual, so he used his key but stopped in front of the familiar red door. He paused and knocked because although it had once been his home, it wasn't anymore, and Jo earned as much privacy as she wanted. Alex heard wrestling and footsteps with muffled voices until the door slid open, but instead of Jo on the other side, he was greeted with Schmitt in a grey mask.

“Oh boy,” Levi said, before he turned around, and Alex followed his gaze until his eyes landed on Jo holding their baby.

For a second, he froze as he stared at her. There she was, standing before him, no longer a memory but real. She looked better than the photos and videos he had seen, even as she looked tired with her hair up in a messy bun. She was wearing his grey Iowa Hawkeyes t-shirt, which definitely had spit up on it despite the burp cloth thrown over her shoulder.

The little girl was dressed in a blue onesie with pink flowers and green leaves, and she had a matching bow on her head. She also had the oxygen cannula tubs taped to her cheeks and had the heart and oxygen saturation monitor wires trailing down to the floor. Jo’s lips were parted as she stared at him. Alex wanted to take a step forward, to go to her, to see their baby in her arms with his own eyes, but he kept his feet planted in the entryway as he just stared at them. The girl that was possibly his daughter and his wife.

As he thought about it more and more throughout the long drive from Kansas to Seattle, he questioned whether this baby was truly his. However, the video was pretty damning evidence. Then again, Jo had always had such a soft spot for the little orphan NICU babies, and sometimes he joked about her adopting one, so maybe she finally did. Somewhere in Montana, he thought about turning around and going back or just calling Meredith and demanding an answer, but he couldn't bear the thought of going back to Kansas. He knew he belonged in Seattle, regardless of whether she had Jo or a daughter.

“Is she, is she mine?” Alex asked, finally finding his voice.

“No,” Jo said with a shake of her head as she looked over at Levi. He went back over to her and she quickly transferred the baby into his arms. Alex was confused at first until Jo pulled up the T-shirt to reveal her rounded pregnant stomach. “But this one is.”

……………………………………………………………………

From the moment Jo laid eyes on Alex, all she could do was stare at him. She felt relief that he was finally home. He was finally going to meet the child growing inside of her. He would be there for her and for their child. Alex was finally home. Yet, the relief and excitement faded as reality set in. She felt so betrayed because he had left without a single thought to her, nor the child growing inside her.

He seemed to stare at her as she handed Luna off to Levi. She put a hand on her belly as she felt her baby kick again. From the moment she laid eyes on Alex, the baby had done flip flops inside of her as if they could sense that their father was near.

Alex still seemed to be in shock, but so was she. Jo didn't even know why he would assume that Luna was his. Nor why he didn't already know she was pregnant, especially after she had left so many calls, voicemails, and text that had gone unanswered. He was back, but only for their child, not for her. Yet, seeing as they were one in the same for now, Jo knew that she owed it to her child to allow their father into their life.

“We should talk,” Jo said as she finally let her shirt drop before she walked towards Alex.

Alex just nodded as he continued to stare at her. His eyes flashed between her face and her belly, looking at her and their unborn child. He finally seemed to come back to reality and looked around the room, his eyes glancing at Levi and Luna.

“Is this a good place to talk? I tested negative before I left, and I drove straight here from Kansas. I haven't seen anyone since I left two days ago,” Alex seemed so unsure and so worried as he looked at her. It was so strange to see it on the man she knew was always so confident even while groveling with her.

“I can take Luna for a drive, it might help her fall asleep anyway?” Levi offered, already moving around. He gathered Luna’s things to transfer her oxygen to the portable tank they kept in a backpack by the door and placed her in the car seat.

Jo knew the loft had changed so much since he had left. It looked so different yet still the same where his weights used to be there was now a twin bed set up with a dresser and a few other things as Levi had moved in. Where the dining room was, there was now a crib, a dresser with a changing station, and a rocking chair where his lounger used to be. Next to a rocket-shaped shelf, a rocketship carpet completed the space themed Nursery that Jo had set up for Luna and their baby.

Alex seemed to watch her every move as Jo helped Levi get Luna in the car seat and send her off with a kiss and a wave. Levi gave her one last look, but Jo just gave him a nod before he closed the door behind him. She had been so thankful to have him around. Even in the midst of covid with everything else they all had going on in their lives. Between being pregnant and adopting Luna, he, Meredith, and Link had all been there for her. Jo had still felt so lonely because the one person that was supposed to be there wasn't.

She put a hand on her stomach as she felt the baby do flip flops inside of her, so she rubbed up and down. It always seemed to calm the anxious baby inside of her. Alex took a step forward, and his hand moved as if he wanted to reach out and touch her, but then his hand quickly dropped, and he just looked down at the floor. She wanted him to feel their baby, but she could tell that he was hesitant to touch her again.

Jo went over to the couch, their couch. The one that she bought for him, that they had spent countless nights on together. She fell in love with him on this couch, she made love to him on this couch, hell she was pretty sure they made the baby on this couch. She sat down on one end and moved away the pile of Luna’s laundry and the extra pillows and blankets to create a space for both of them. She wasn’t sure she was ready to have him so close, but it was just instinct and habit and the love she would always have for him. Jo patted the spot she made for him next to her as he slowly made his way over to her.

He still seemed to be a little weary, and she could tell that he was nervous as he sat down next to her, and looked at her bump. “How far along are you?”

Jo knew he was asking just to be sure, but she guessed that he had already done the math in his head. “24 weeks as of yesterday.”

“Are you, are they, are you both healthy?” Alex asked as he rubbed his hands up and down his pant legs as he tried to find something to do with his restless hands.

“Yeah, we're both fine, she’s measuring big, but Carina says we've got the dates right. She looked perfect at the 20-week anatomy scan and at the ultrasound I had a few days ago,” Jo said with a nod as she continued to rub her belly up and down.

“She, it's a girl?” Alex asked, catching her words as he looked up at her with a little bit of a smile.

“Yeah,” Jo said, watching his smile as his eyes seemed to light up. “It's a girl.”

Alex looked so happy and his eyes were bright as he laughed. It was the expression she imagined he would have when she told him she was pregnant. She was happy to see how excited he was for their daughter. He reached out again and put his hand on her belly. She remembered the way that he pulled her in for their first kiss and the shock of electricity between them. It had been pulling them together ever since. She felt that shock now and she knew Alex felt it too as he looked up and briefly caught her eye before he looked down at his hands again. His hands on her body for the first time in six months were an instant comfort. She immediately relaxed as she moved his hand to where the baby was kicking. As his hand settled, his thumb absentmindedly rubbed her belly and Jo relaxed further back into the couch.

“Hi baby girl, it's your Daddy. I'm so excited to meet you,” Alex said, letting out a little laugh as she kicked his hand and he leaned down to kiss her belly without even a second thought.

This was how it was meant to be, the two of them, together for this pregnancy. For a moment, Jo pretended that he had never left.

“She's strong like you,” Alex said, looking up at her as the baby continued to kick his hand. “And like Alexis too. She'll climb anything and she runs all over the farm.”

At the mention of his children, Jo immediately froze up. She didn't resent them, but they were the reason why he left. They were a constant reminder that she was in this alone. Alex felt the tension in her body as his thumb stopped moving and he looked up at her.

“Jo, I know I left, and I'm sorry…”

“No,” Jo said, instantly getting up and putting some space between them. “You don't get to do that. You don't get to try and walk it all back with I'm sorry. You left me, Alex.”

The tears instantly spring into her eyes as she began to cry, and her breath hitched as she tried to inhale. She just felt so broken, so hurt by everything that he did. Alex just looked up at her with his big puppy dog eyes. He gave her the same eyes in the front yard of Amelia and Owen's house all those years ago after he assaulted Deluca. She knows that he had grown up again since then, but after what he did, she doesn't know how things could ever go back to how they were before.

“After everything we've been through, after you promised me again and again, every day that we were together, that you would never leave and then you left!” Jo said, her voice rising as she yelled at him. “You left me pregnant, and alone, and scared. I called your mom and I knew that you weren't in Iowa. You didn't return any of my calls or my texts. You didn't even text Meredith back. I thought you were dead or that worse, that you were cheating on me, and then to find out that you were cheating, it broke me, Alex! But I couldn't let it break me because I was pregnant, and I had to keep it together for our child, and I did. You left and I, I carried on. I went to work, I went to my doctor's appointment, I built a nursery, and I got support from our friends, but not from you. I did everything without you. I am so furious at you for leaving. I am so hurt that you cheated on me. I am so broken because you left. You ignored me and you ignored our daughter. I am more hurt for them than I am for myself because they didn't ask for any of this. I get you leaving to be with your kids, but you had a kid here with me, and you ignored her. I sent you texts and photos and calls and emails, I sent you a freaking letter Alex, and you just ignored all of it!”

“What? Wait, Jo, hold up,” Alex said, standing up and shaking his head as he closed his eyes. “What phone calls, what letters, what texts, I haven't heard from you in months. The last text I got from you was a week after I left asking me if I was okay and how my mom was doing?”

Jo paused, gently wiping away her tears as she just stared at him as confused as he was. There was no way he was lying to her. He looked so genuine and Jo knew that regardless, Alex would never lie to her. She knew him almost as well as she knew herself. Alex Karev was many things, but he wasn't a liar. He dropped everything to be there for his and Izzy's kids and she knew he would never ignore his daughter with her.

“When you stopped returning my calls, I got worried. As soon as I found out that I was pregnant, I called you, and when you didn't pick up, I sent you a photo of the pregnancy test and then later of the ultrasound photo. I left you voicemail after voicemail, and I kept texting you, right up until I got your letter and the divorce papers, back in early February. I sent them back to you with a letter telling you that I was pregnant. When you didn't reply, I thought, I don't know.”

“Jo, I swear to you I never got any of your phone calls or your texts, or the letter, look, check my phone if you don't believe me,” Alex said, as he looked at her holding his phone out to her and she knew without having to see it, he was telling the truth.

Regardless, Jo took the phone and opened it up. The lock screen was a picture of Alexis and Eli. She paused as she stared at them. She had never seen a photo of them before, but the second she did, she knew they were Alex’s kids. Eli was the spitting image of his father and Alexis had his eyes and his smile. They were so beautiful, and she knew that he had instantly fallen in love with them the moment he had seen them because she fell a little bit in love with them too. The two little mini Karevs staring up at her were absolutely adorable and innocent in all this.

Jo put in the password that was still the same and quickly scrolled through his text until she found her name. Sure enough, there was the text that she had sent months ago, asking about Helen, and then nothing. She clicked on the little sidebar and quickly discovered the reason why.

“You blocked me,” Jo said, crossing her arms as she handed the phone back to him.

“What? Alex asked, his eyebrow shot up in surprise as he looked at the phone. “I swear I didn't.”

“If not you, then who? Your other ex-wife or your current wife or girlfriend or whatever the hell she is to you,” Jo couldn't help the malice in her voice and the hatred she had for the woman who had torn them apart with her actions. She was so angry at them both, but especially Alex as he was her husband, and he had made the choice to cheat on her.

“Izzie, fuck,” Alex said as he turned away from her and let out a cry of frustration. “I knew it was weird when I hadn't heard from you. She said it was for the best, but I knew, I knew you wouldn't just stop texting me, but then I thought that maybe you figured it out already, and I don't know.”

He clenched his jaw and looked like he wanted to throw or kick something. Jo grabbed one of Luna’s stuffed animals from the couch and held it out to him. He looked back at her with soft eyes as they both remembered when they used to throw things at the wall together. That memory seemed like a lifetime ago. Alex grabbed the toy and threw it against the wall. It made a satisfying clunk as it hit the metal doors of the cabinet. Alex let out a heavy sigh, having gotten all his frustration out before he sat back down on the couch.

“I tried to teach that technique to Eli and Alexis, but Izzie blew up on me for it. She said it would teach them to be violent and throw things, but honestly, it's the only thing that ever calmed me down. You were the only one who understood my anger,” Alex said as he looked over at her before shaking his head and looking away. “This whole situation it's so messed up. It was all a mistake.”

Jo looked down at the situation in her belly as her baby kicked her hand again. This whole thing was a mess. She didn't want to put Alex in the same position that Izzie had, having to choose between the life that he loved and his responsibilities to his child.

“Look, Alex, we’re fine. We're both doing fine without you. When you left, I stepped up and I figured out how to do this on my own. I've done everything alone, and you know what, I'm pretty damn good at it. So good that when I fell in love with Luna, I didn't even think twice about applying to adopt her and becoming her foster mom. I'm good on my own. I can raise our daughter without you.”

“But you don't have to, Jo. I want to be there for you and for our daughter, for all of it, I want to be on the phone with you for all your appointments, and I want you to hold my hand while you're in labor and screaming at me for knocking you up. I want to be there for our daughter's first breath and when she starts walking and talking. From her first day of school to when she graduates and goes off to college and every sleepless night in between. I want to be there for you and for her,” Alex said as he pleaded with her, all but begging on his knees for her. “I am so sorry, Jo. I swear to God, I didn't know that you were pregnant. The other day this kid showed me this Tik Tok of you and Luna with a photo of me saying that I was her father. That's why I thought she was mine.”

Jo couldn't help the smile as she let out a little laugh and shook her head. “ I downloaded Tik Tok during the pandemic and kind of got hooked. I thought it would just be a funny video for our friends and I don't know. I guess a part of me did think that you would find it, or at least I hoped that you would.”

“If I had known and if I had seen your messages, I would have never....” Alex trailed off as he shook his head, looking down, still ashamed.

“Would you have left?” Jo asked, her voice just a whisper. She knew the answer, but she needed him to say it.

“Leaving Seattle was the worst mistake I've ever made,” Alex said, looking up with her voice and his eyes full of such hurt. “I love my kids, I do, but Kansas isn't my home. Izzie and I, we. I didn’t sleep with her while we were married, I want you to know that. However, once we were divorced, I did try to start a relationship with her, but we were so different she didn't get it. She didn’t get me, not like you do.”

As Alex talked just looked up at her, his eyes full of longing as he got up and came over to her. They were so close that Jo could smell the familiar scent of his cologne and she could see the sparks of gold in his eyes. Her body involuntarily relaxed as he got closer. She longed for him too. All she wanted was to be in his arms again, to wrap her own arms around his neck, to hold him and have him hold her. However, the distance they created between them kept them apart.

“And now, with the pandemic, I barely see them.” Alex continued with a shrug. “I live in a crappy one-bedroom apartment in Kansas City and it sucks. Izzie stays home with them and I only see them through video calls. They meet me at the park on the weekends, even then we stay six apart and they miss me, but they're okay without me. I'm not okay without you and I know you're not okay without me either.”

It's a bold statement, but they both know it’s the truth. Jo felt the tears collect in her eyes again as Alex mirrored her expression, looking about two seconds away from falling apart as well. Just the acknowledgment that she needs him, that he needs her, and that they need each other, was overwhelming.

“I never wanted to do this without you. Every time we talked about kids, I was so terrified, but I knew that I could do it if I had you by my side. When you left, I realized that I could do this regardless, but I don't want to do it alone. I don't want to do any of this without you.”

Jo dissolved into a mess of tears as they streamed down her face. Alex took a quick step forward and he wrapped his arms around her as she truly fell apart. She fell apart in Alex's arms and buried her head in his shoulder, feeling the warmth of his body and feeling his lips against her head. His arms instantly wrapped around her waist and it was everything she had wanted for the past six months. It was in that moment she realized that Alex was truly back. She cried even harder, especially as she felt his chest shake under her as his body was wracked with sobs of his own.

Alex pulled her over to the couch and she sat on his lap as he wrapped his arms around her. They just sat together and cried. Eventually, they cried themselves out and just sat together in silence. Jo curled her fingers into his shirts and pressed her forehead against his shoulder. Alex ran his fingers through her hair like he always used to do as his other hand rested on her belly, feeling their baby move under his hand. She inhaled the sweet scent of his cologne and felt completely surrounded by him. For the first time and six months, Jo felt like she could breathe again.

Everything was how it was always supposed to be. Even if it was just for a moment, it was like a spell had been cast upon them, freezing them in time and allowing them to have just this moment together. Between being pregnant and having a newborn, Jo was exhausted, and she knew Alex hadn't slept since he left Kansas. They both fell asleep in each other's arms on their couch, truly resting for the first time in six months.

They must have slept for a few hours as by the time they woke up, the sun was low on the horizon, streaming golden beams in through the windows. For a moment, Jo pushed away the harsh memories as she woke up in Alex's arms. She pressed her nose into his neck and he seemed to forget it too as he laid a kiss on her forehead. They heard the door squeak open and finally got up. Jo could feel Levi’s eyes on them, but he didn't say anything about it.

“So we went for a little car ride, but she took a nap. Then after she woke up, I took her to the park, and we just watched the birds and sat on the grass and hung out,” Levi said as he lifted Luna out of her car seat and Jo greeted her girl. “I had some ice cream, and Luna had her bottle. She ate about 3 oz and then proceeded to spit up all over me.”

“Oh did you have fun with Uncle Levi at the park,” Jo cooed at Luna as she held her close and pressed a kiss to her little head before inhaling her sweet baby scent.

Levi moved to transfer Lunas oxygen tubes back to her machine. They kept Luna’s oxygen machine next to the couch on the side of her nursery as the 25 ft. oxygen tubes allow them to move around her nursery, the living room, and even into the kitchen.

“Let me help,” Alex said as he stepped forward and quietly helped Levi set up the machine.

After they started a machine and sure that it was working, Levi escaped to the bathroom. He gave them one more look before he disappeared and turned on the fan as if to give them added privacy.

Luna seemed content as Jo smiled down at her oldest girl. Of all the hurt she’d had in the past six months, Luna had been a wonderful bright spot. Jo couldn't help but fall in love with her, especially after Val died. Jo felt the need to step up and take care of her. Besides, she couldn't imagine sending her into the foster care system, so she had started the process of adopting her. The baby in her belly made her a mother, but Luna made her a mom. She made Jo realize that she could do this, but as she looked over at Alex, she knew she didn't have to do this alone.

Alex leaned against the couch as he watched them with curiosity. As Jo turned around to look at him, he smiled at the little girl in her arms. She walked over to him as he tentatively stepped closer before Jo transferred Luna into his arms.

“Alex, this is Luna, my little liver baby,” Jo said, smiling down at Luna with such affection as she rubbed her thumb over Luna’s cheek. “She grew on the liver of a patient that came into the ER. I operated on her mom, Val, and Carina delivered her. When Val didn't make it, I decided to adopt her. It was kind of impulsive, but I just looked at her, and I knew that she was mine. She came home with me a few weeks ago. She loves the little star mobile that I hung above her crib, and she only falls asleep to the Twinkle Twinkle Little Star song. She hates bath time and loves snuggles, so I babywear her all the time. I talked to her, and she just stares at me, but I know that she’s listening. I love her so much and she's just, she’s perfect.”

Alex just stared at her, taking in her words with a large smile before he looked down at Luna. She waved her arms up at him, reaching out for him as he reached down to grab her finger and shook her little hand. “It's nice to meet you, Miss. Luna. I'm Alex, I'm your Sissy's dad, but I look forward to getting to know you as well.”

“Autumn, I was thinking of calling her Autumn, Attie for short, since I'm due in October,” Jo said, putting a hand on her belly and feeling her baby kick again.

“Autumn, that sounds perfect, and I guess I owe you full naming rights,” Alex said as he smiled back at her before looking down at Luna again and sticking his tongue out at her as she cooed.

There was something about seeing Alex with her daughter that was just so perfect, and After everything that had happened today, Jo found herself falling back in love with him again. It was one of the reasons why she fell in love with him in the first place because he was so good with the kids, and he was kind to her after he found out about her past. He was gentle, and kind, and understanding throughout this whole thing. He never once blamed her or tried the force his way back into her life. He just wanted to be there for her and his daughter. He was the Alex that she had fallen in love with. Although she knew, he was still the Alex that had left her.

Luna fussed and began to cry as Jo stepped forward to take her back. She waved her arms around and reached up and pulled out her oxygen cannulas as Jo cursed.

“How well does she do off oxygen?” Alex said, quickly moving to put the tubes back in her nose as he looked over at her oxygenation monitor. He swayed back and forth as Luna continued to fuss and throw her arms around.

“Okay, for about 20 minutes or so. She had a branchial cyst, so they had to resect part of her lung. Hayes thinks she’ll have to be on oxygen for a few more months or so,” Jo said as she went over to Luna’s dresser where she kept all of her medical equipment and grabbed the extra tape and things so they could redo the tape.

Alex set her down on the bed as Jo came back over. They worked together as Alex used the wipe to remove the stickiness for the existing tape while Jo held Luna’s arms to keep her from pulling it out again. Alex put the nose part in Luna’s nostrils before he gently taped down both sides of the tubes on her cheeks, and Jo adjusted the tubes positions. It wasn’t the first time they had redone an oxygen cannula together, and they worked as a team so effortlessly. It was the same way that they used to work together at the hospital.

As they finished, Jo picked up Luna and bounced her as she calmed down. With Luna now calm and content, Jo set her in the bassinet at the end of her bed. She just looked at him and felt a pull to him as she took a step towards him. Alex’s lips parted as she pressed up against him, as close as she could with her baby bump in between them. She reached out to put her hand on his cheek as he closed his eyes and tilted his head into her hand. She knew that he missed her touch as much as she missed him. Jo couldn’t help but wrap her arms around him as she leaned in for a kiss. They deepened the kiss as he wrapped his arm around her, and Jo moaned into his lips. Alex eagerly pressed his lips against her, and it was like coming home. Nothing about the Loft, or the hospital, or anything in Seattle had felt like home since Alex left, but his lips, they felt like home.

They didn't break apart until they heard the squeaky door to the bathroom open again as Levi appeared. Jo turned around and pressed her fingers to her lips as if it would keep the kiss on her skin. She glanced over at Levi as he looked between them and instantly read their body language. For someone who could never figure out if a guy liked him back, Levi sure as hell read Alex and Jo like a book.

“So I'm guessing you're back,” Levi asked, raising his eyebrows and looking between the two of them. “Does that mean you're staying here? Do I have to move out? Like I know I could move in with Taryn if I needed to, but we're in the middle of a pandemic and her roommate is really mean!”

Jo wasn't sure as she looked over at Alex, who just shrugged. “It's up to you, whatever you're comfortable with. I can get a hotel room or maybe stay with Meredith?”

“Well, I guess you can stay. Besides, I need someone to send out at 2:00 in the morning when I get a craving for burgers or when Luna runs out of diapers, but maybe you should sleep on the couch for now,” Jo said as she bit her lip as she looked over at him, but Alex just nodded.

Alex moved around the apartments as if he had never left as he began to make dinner for them. Jo picked up Luna again and sat down in the rocking chair in her nursery space as Levi started to help Alex relearn where everything was after he had organized the fridge. An easy banter started up between the three of them and Jo put a hand on her belly as Autumn started to do flip-flops again while Luna was the opposite as her eyes fluttered close. Jo held one of her daughters in her arms as she put her hand on her belly where her other daughter was. She looked up at her ex-husband and baby daddy as he made dinner with her gay best friend and little brother. It was the weirdest family dynamics she had ever had, but she was content.

……………………………………………………………………

Later that night, Jo stared up at the skylights. She had just gotten Luna back down after a bottle, and now she was trying to return to sleep herself. Yet, sleep evaded her and part of that was due to Autumn doing flips in her belly. She was currently swimming around like a little fish and keeping Jo up as they pressed against her organs. Jo took a deep breath, which quickly turned into a yawn before she realized she had to use the restroom. Her quick trip to the toilet only made Autumn more active. Jo sighed as she laid back down and she rubbed her belly up and down. This usually helped to calm Attie down, but tonight she must have felt particularly acrobatic as she moved around. Jo wasn't sure what she did, but suddenly, she felt a twinge of pain in her stomach as Autumn kicked her, hard.

“Aw fuck,” Jo swore as she rubbed her hand against her lower abdomen.

“Jo, you alright?”

She jumped and sat up as she looked over to see Alex sitting up on the couch. “Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you. It's just the baby moving around and she kicked a little too hard. I'm not used to having to be quiet as Levi usually puts earplugs in at night, and Luna will sleep through anything.”

To her surprise, Alex just chuckled as he got up and came over to her, sitting next to her on the bed and putting his hands on her belly. “Hey, Attie, you be nice to your mom, yeah?”

Instantly the kicks in her belly became softer as Attie quieted down. Jo raised her eyebrows in surprise as she looked up at him. Throughout her pregnancy, no one had been able to get her to calm down so quickly.

“Wow, I can't believe that worked,” Jo said as Alex smiled, he pulled his hand away, but Attie’s kicking started up again, and she got Jo good in her kidneys as she cringed and held her side. “Or not.”

“Lay back,” Alex instructed as she complied and laid back down as he adopted that adorable grumpy look that she loved so much. He put his hands back on her belly and leaned forward to whisper to Autumn. “Hey you, I thought we agreed that you were going to be nice to your mom? It's been a long day, and she agreed to let my sorry ass stay with her. I think the least that you and I can do is let her get some rest.”

Instantly Attie calmed down to the sound of her father's voice and Alex looked up at her. He seemed so proud that he had gotten his daughter to calm down and looked up at her with a smile.

“Thank you,” Jo whispered, letting out a breath of relief.

“No problem, besides, it's the least I can do as I’m part of the reason why she's kicking you,” Alex said, as a soft look appeared on his face and he just seemed to stare at her for a moment.

She could tell that he was head over heels in love with her. She used to catch him with that look when she was on his service as an intern, and it was that same look he gave her when she met him at the end of the day when he worked at Pac North. It was the look he had given her all throughout their relationship and even on the day he left. After he walked through security, he turned around and gave her that look before he paused and waved at her before he disappeared into the crowd. Jo remembered that day like it was yesterday, just as she remembered the hurt of the letter that was still fresh in her heart.

After a moment, Alex got up again, but the second his hands left her belly, Autumn started up again, and Jo scrunched up her face, and she beckoned for him to come back. He instantly came back and put his hands on her belly. Once again, Autumn calmed back down as her hard kicks and flips became light flutters in her belly.

Jo let out a sigh as she reached out to grab his hand and gave it a squeeze. “Could you stay?”

“Are you sure?” Alex asked as he tilted his head just a little bit.

Jo just nodded because the truth was that she wasn't sure that she should let Alex back into her bed, but he seemed to be the only thing that calmed down their daughter. He crawled in bed behind her like he had done when they were together. As he moved back to his spot in the bed and laid behind her before he wrapped his arms around her to rest on her bump. She had missed being held by him like this. They were never one for cuddling, but she liked knowing that he was right there next to her. She missed the way that he used to roll over in the middle of the night and hold her close just for a moment.

Attie seemed to have calmed down for the night and Jo closed her eyes. Jo didn't know where they would go from there, but she trusted that he wasn’t going anywhere. She knew she shouldn't trust Alex again, but somehow she did. She always knew that he would be a good father and that it would be one of his best traits. He left her to be with his children, but a part of her knew that he wouldn't leave her child and, by extension, her. Jo would always allow Alex to love their daughter.

Alex seemed a little hesitant, but eventually, she felt him relax against her as he pressed a kissed her cheek just like he used to. Jo both loved it and hated it, as she felt a mixture of hurt and love for him right now. It wasn't something that she was unfamiliar with when she was with him. She knew there was still hurt and the need for healing, but the love was always there, and she wanted that love for her daughter. So she let him stay and fell asleep in his arms.

……………………………………………………………………

AN: This is absolutely just a one-shot, so don’t ask for a sequel.

#jo wilson #alex karev #grey's anatomy #jolex #otp: home and heart #grey's anatomy fanfic #levi schmitt #luna ashton #izzie stevens #alexis stevens #eli stevens #my work #my writing #my fanfiction #luna wilson

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xpao-bearx · 3 years

Text

Part 1 HERE

NOTE: OMG I really wasn't expecting for the previous first part of Heavenly Sins to blow up as it did, but I just wanted to give a huuuge THANK YOU to all of you amazing folks!! 🥰🥰🥰 Your support truly means so fooken much to trashy ol' meh and y'all are the reason I am writing this story series in the first place :')

I do have my ideas, but I still don't know much yet of what to do or even how long (or short) this story will get. So, if you would continue to give me your mindblowing support, it would seriously mean the W O R L D.

I do, however, very much enjoy writing Negan in particular so far. He's one of my absolute fave characters ever and JEFFREY DEAN FUCKIN' MORGAN NEED I SAY MOAR?!? 🥵💕💕

But this second part will be focusing a bit more on our beloved sheriff Ricky boi! Of course, Daryl will also get some much deserved love and attention tho I think he will appear in the story a lil later on.

Also, if you ever feel compelled, you are more than welcome to take some inspo from this story and make your own imagines and such! I'd love to see 'em, so please tag me 😁

P.S. There won't always be long ass notes like this, only if I wanna say something or bring up whatever is important. Also, if you wanna be tagged on any new/future story parts, then just tell moi and I will dedicate the latest one to the people who wanted to be tagged!

DEDICATED TO: The wonderful @buttercandy16 💖

"Heavenly Sins"

Part 2

After your little spiel, you haven't spoken to Negan since then. But on the way home after church, you passed by his house and found him tinkering away on his motorcycle (which you previously learned he interestingly named Lucille) in the garage. Not being able to help yourself, you paused in your tracks and just curiously watched him for a while.

His leather jacket was off, revealing a plain white t-shirt. The shirt was quite tight, and you noted how it perfectly hugged the taut muscles of his chest. Your eyes then slowly trailed to his toned arms, adorned by tattoos you wished you had a better look at. He stopped briefly, placing his tools down before grabbing the hem of his shirt and wiping the sweat on his forehead.

You didn't even think twice as your eyes dropped, hyperfocused on his abs. He wasn't the buffest guy out there, but he was lean and fit and--to put it bluntly--hot. A part of you screamed bloody murder to get a grip on yourself, to just turn your stiff body around and proceed on home. But another part completely squashed down those protests without even a fight; as if your pathetic excuse of a resolve wasn't even meant in the first place.

"Take a goddamn picture, darlin'. It'll last longer."

Your head snapped up, meeting the tantalizing hazel stare of Negan. His lips were curled in a smug smirk, and nevermore in your entire life have you wanted to both slap and kiss someone so badly.

But you only clicked your tongue, shooting him a sharp glare before (at last!) turning and walking away as you hid your blush. In the distance, his amused chuckle begrudgingly sounded like the sweetest fucking music to your ears.

♡♡♡

You woke up at 7:05 a.m. like you typically did the next morning, Monday. It was the dawn of a new week, and while most people dreaded it you actually didn't mind it so much. You had your job to thank for that.

Sure, it wasn't always easy, but it was worth it in the end. You loved teaching and spending time with the children, and you were even more ecstatic since you knew Judith was going to be at the daycare.

As you finished eating breakfast and preparing for the day, you grabbed your bag then went out the door. You opted to walk again today, the weather far too beautiful to miss plus the daycare really wasn't that far away.

Eventually arriving at your destination, you approached the daycare building's doors with a little spring in your step. Once inside, a young woman with her blonde hair high in a ponytail smiled and waved.

"Hi, Y/N! Goodmorning!" Beth Greene greeted energetically.

"Morning, Beth." You chuckled, the girl's radiant smile infectious. You've known Beth for some time now, especially since the Greenes were one of the oldest families in Alexandria and they were well respected. But you got along best with Beth, you thought she was the friendliest and she was also the latest hire of the daycare.

Stashing your bag away in your personal locker, you fixed yourself up a bit before getting your nametag and sticking it on your top. Looking up at the wall clock, you read that it was 7:50 a.m. Perfect, just in time for the kids' drop-offs.

You waited outside with Beth and the rest of the daycare workers, until finally the parents started rolling in. It was the usual; some of the children were wailing, snot snivelling down their nose as their embarrassed parents tried to tug them away from clinging onto their legs. You could only offer a sympathetic smile as you tried to help, while other children were much more relaxed and didn't even spare a second glance at their parents as they were dropped off.

"Well, that's about all of them." Beth piped up.

"Wait, we're still waiting for Judith." You said, searching for the toddler. "Rick said she'd be here."

Beth checked her watch, her brows creasing a little in worry. "That's odd. Sheriff Grimes is never late when he's dropping Judith off."

Just as she said that, there was a honk that disrupted the peace. You and Beth both spotted a crying Judith being held by Lori, the woman appearing utterly exhausted before her eyes locked with yours and didn't waste another second dashing towards you.

"Please don't run when you're holding Judith. Also, no honking is allowed on the premises." It was hard for you to keep the malice out of your voice, but you mentally gave yourself a pat on the back since you miraculously managed to not make it sound the worst it could get.

Lori raised a brow at you, but only handed Judith over to you. Judith immediately quieted down when she saw it was you, you cooing gently at her as she giggled and snuggled up comfortably against your chest.

"Rick will be picking her up later." Was all Lori said, pressing a quick peck on Judith's curly little head before parting ways. As Lori rushed back to the car, you saw Shane in the driver's seat shamelessly attack her neck with fervent kisses and you couldn't restrain an eyeroll.

"Fucking bitch..." You grumbled.

"Uh-oh. Bad!" Judith giggled again, clapping her hands gleefully.

"Right, right. Bad. Don't copy me, okay?" You laughed, completely forgetting about your aggravation as you rubbed your nose with Judith's and went inside.

♡♡♡

The rest of the day rolled along splendidly. No one threw a tantrum and for the most part, all the kids properly shared the wide assortment of toys and even did their activities orderly and on time. So, you decided to indulge them with a small yet much sought after reward.

Painting.

When it comes down to children, painting can be utter chaos. But you figured since they were being so good, you'd allow it. At the daycare you worked in, painting was quite a rare occurrence and that only solidified how much the kids adored it.

Once the materials were set out, it was a dizzying flurry of excited hands grabbing anything it could latch on to. As the kids went about doing their creative business, you found Judith all alone sitting in the corner playing around with some blocks.

"Whatcha doin' there, Judi?" You asked, sweetly calling out her nickname. "You don't wanna paint?"

"I wanna, but not with papers." She replied, shaking her head.

"Oh? Then where do you wanna paint?"

"I wanna paint on faces, but no one wants me to!"

"If that's the case, then I'd be more than happy to let you paint my face." You smiled.

"Really?!" Judith's whole face lit up, jumping up and wrapping her tiny arms around you as tightly as she could. "Thank youuu!"

You chuckled, ruffling her hair and watching as she happily gathered some paint and brushes.

♡♡♡

It was finally the end of a long day, and your face felt a bit itchy from the paint Judith put on you. But it didn't matter; as long as the little girl was happy, it was the best damn day ever.

You were holding Judith's hand as you waited outside for Rick to pick her up, and once he came up with his car Judith beamed.

"Daddy!"

"Hello, sweetheart. Did you have a nice day?" His face looked tired, his greying beard making him appear slightly older than he really was, but his smile was genuine as he carried Judith in his strong arms.

"The bestest! Y/N lemme paint her face!"

"She did, huh? What did you pai--oh my god."

You bursted into laughter at his reaction, flashing him a toothy grin. "In the words of Judi: You're a pretty tiger! Grr!"

"Now that you mention it, I can see it." Rick joined in your laughter, nodding his head. "Looks like we've got a talented lil artist in our hands!"

"Daddy, I wanna paint your face next! You can be daddy tiger and Y/N can be mommy!" Judith proclaimed.

You and Rick flushed pink at the same exact time, but Rick was quick to clear his throat and change the topic. "A-Anyways, Y/N, how 'bout me and the kids give you a ride? Thank you for today, by the way."

"No problem, and sure! Thanks so much."

As you settled in the passenger's seat, two hands covered your eyes from behind. "Guess who~?"

"Hmm..." You hummed, making a show of thinking. "Are you an elf?"

"No!" The hands were removed, Carl popping his head out from the backseat to look at you as he laughed. "It's me!"

"Oh, sorry! You're just so short, I thought you were an elf." You teased good naturedly.

Carl huffed, sticking his tongue out at you. "Y'know, in a few years, I'll be way taller than you!"

Once Rick was done buckling Judith into her carseat, he took his place in the driver's seat and drove out of the premises. You just talked about anything that came to mind: work, the weather, Alexandria's local shops, etc. To anyone else, maybe it seemed like regular boring conversation. But speaking with Rick was truly one of the highlights of any of your days. He was extremely easy to talk to, and he never failed to cheer you up. And it was obvious Rick was the same. He was allowed to simply be himself around you; to loosen up, momentarily forget about the stress and sometimes even the woes that came along with being the town's upstanding sheriff.

As you were nearing your home, Carl decided to cut in.

"Y/N, can we stay at your house? It's been a while since we had a sleepover." Carl asked, his baby blue eyes identical to Rick's alight with hope.

It wouldn't be the first time Rick and the kids would be staying over. You were very close to the Grimes family, sometimes even almost considering them as your own. You didn't mind it. Since you lived alone, it can get pretty lonely. And having people around surely brightened up the house and made you keep your sanity.

"I don't mind, but you gotta ask your dad." You chuckled.

Carl turned to Rick, pouting and giving his best puppy dog eyes. Rick rolled his eyes, but couldn't suppress an inkling of a smile.

"Yeah, yeah. But let me drop you and Judith off with Y/N first. I'll be back, I just need to get some extra clothes and essentials."

"YAY!" Carl cheered, Judith following suit as they both raised their arms and hollered.

"You're so whipped for them." You laughed, shaking your head as you looked at Rick.

"I ain't denying that." He sighed dramatically, grinning.

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omgkalyppso · 3 years

Note

Number 4 for the romance lyric prompt for any variation of the ot4!

4. ‘Cause girls like you run 'round with guys like me 'til sun down.

The lyric is from Girls Like You by Maroon 5 (idk how obvious this is without me saying it), and was added to the playlist specifically for Claude x Hilda though a lot of the lyrics have to be taken at face value because it could be interpret extremely negatively, though not that line, and not my intent. I'll try writing a few words of the stage-production au.

I didn't read over this when I finished.

Here's the first post of the stage-production au: [HERE]

Most of the cast were gone for the day, though the actors who had agreed to go out afterwards had lounged in the audience. Dimitri and Edelgard stood on opposite step ladders, as crewmen held them in place, going over the lines of their final battle with a choreographer and the director.

Dimitri would be atop a large dragon puppet someday, and Edelgard would be in her Hegemon construction, but for now, they were in t-shirts and jeans and trying their best to imagine what the final product might look like.

Hubert and Dedue stood by their sides, and had stopped crouching after the fourth recitation of their lines. By now had been brought chairs to sit upon, from which they each spoke their one line, to be shouted in production, as they supported the song shared by The Rightful King and The Flame Emperor in their epic moment.

From the orchestral pit, the production's vocal coach, Yuri, played an upright piano to guide their tune and tempo.

Hilda sat between Claude and Ferdinand in the audience. Each man whispering along with the song with a bounce of his head while she sunk into her seat, amused, and embarrassed by the prospect of joining them.

It was the most genial cast Hilda had ever worked with, and when Ferdinand, Edelgard, Manuela, Seteth and Lorenz had spoken of not drinking for seven weeks before a show, the bulk of the cast had agreed to go sober for the duration; though when they'd spoken of different dietary restrictions in the week leading up to production, there'd been very little consensus. Regardless, tonight would be the last hurrah for those who drank, as Hilda didn't anyway, and they were waiting to take their friends out for the night.

It was still relatively early as far as nights went, barely seven o'clock, but that was still late enough that people were missing dinner. Hilda could hear the crinkling of a paper bag from behind her, where Mercedes and Dorothea snacked on sweet and sour chicken balls.

After three more runs of the scene, Sweetpea, their stoic mint-haired director, declared, "I think that's it." They did their best to turn to address the rest of their team, in the wings and in the audience. "I'll see most of you in four days when we join Yuri for a, hopefully less chaotic, rendition of The Storm of Myrddin. Great work."

Hilda whistled loudly in support of her castmates, while her friends applauded and hollered. Dimitri bowed to their audience, and Hubert bowed to Edelgard who rolled her eyes and laughed as she exaggerated with one hand thrown skyward as she and Dimitri made their way down their respective stepladders.

"Thank you, Yuri," called Edelgard.

"Yes, thank you, Yuri," Dimitri agreed.

"We'll practice those low notes next time," Yuri answered, before waving up out of the pit to soften his implied criticisms. "You're welcome! We're getting there. There's a lot of range to cover."

Dimitri was still insecure by the time he joined his castmates in the aisles as they marched to the exit, "Did it sound that bad?"

"No," Claude snickered.

"It's Yuri's job to strive for perfection," Dedue observed.

Hilda held her hand in front of her lips for a moment, considering her contribution. Once they were outside, she jut her elbow into Dimitri's stomach so he grunted in surprise, stumbling back into Felix.

"Eugh!"

"Hey, watch it!"

Hilda shrugged. "Just remember that sensation?"

"Don't be mean," Sylvain exaggerated with a whine, giving Dimitri his sweater he'd been holding onto.

"No, I—" Dimitri tried to mimic the same position his mouth had been in, tongue drooping forward in his mouth as he sought the pitch of his exclamation.

"You broke him," Hubert declared, his brow furrowed, at the same time that Claude, Edelgard and Dedue were following Dimitri's example and carrying a deep monotonous tone.

Edelgard even turned it into a line that Yuri had probably been concerned with, that she would sing below The Rightful King's pleas, "So that none will suffer I must forfend—"

Dorothea answered her with The Rightful King's following line, "Living and dead, I will not forget those whom I defend."

"We're not doing that," Felix said, flat.

"Right," Annette agreed, which seemed to surprise him. "Resting voices."

"Resting voices," several people echoed.

They followed Dedue to a Duscur place for dinner, and wolfed down their wraps as they waited in line at a club that might be large enough to accommodate their large group.

"You didn't bring your date?" Lorenz asked Felix.

"We're not dating," Felix said, as if on instinct. He thought a moment. "Wasn't this just for cast?"

Lorenz shared a frown with Hilda before he assured Felix, "I doubt anyone would have complained even if you'd brought someone unrelated to the production. We'd have been happy to—"

"Don't listen to him," Claude said, turning from Leonie so he could wrap an arm around Lorenz. "Or I mean, do, because you could have brought anyone you'd wanted, but also don't because Lorenz just chickened out of asking the other make up artist to join us and hoped they'd have tagged along with Mia."

Felix snorted.

"That's not what happened," Lorenz objected.

"Oh, sweetie," Hilda contributed with a pout. "That's exactly what happened."

"We just got to talking, and I got distracted," Lorenz contributed.

"You forgot?" Felix asked, aghast. Hilda brought her hands to her lips, failing to hide her amusement.

"It didn't come up," Lorenz countered.

"That's not better," Claude said, shaking his head. Lorenz shrugged him off and flicked his chest with all four fingers.

"Fat lot of good friends like you are."

The second floor of the club was open to the elements, archways acting as windows to the brisk wind of evening, and the bright shine of sunset. The breeze and drinks were welcome, Mercedes, Dorothea and Hilda taking turns sitting with their pitchers, yellow with alcohol and pink without, to protect them just in case.

Hilda found herself distracted throughout the night, watching Claude as he dipped Lorenz, and nearly dropped Dimitri, and joined Dorothea in a samba that she and Annette were soundly better at.

They danced together only twice, the first time early in the evening before the dancers and the night had hit their stride, when there was more laughter and embarrassment in their fun than indulgence. The second time had been later in the evening, when he was flush and tipsy, to a ballad that had them swaying slowly with his hand politely between her shoulders. She'd thought about stepping closer into his space, resting her head on his chest, facing the brunt of his sweat and his cologne, but hesitated — partially because of their working relationship, but mostly because Sylvain and Mercedes had whistled about the way Hubert had held the small of Edelgard's back and she'd stretched back in a smooth, flowing dip.

It was maybe an hour later that Claude found Hilda seated at a table by a south-facing archway, the dim red of the western horizon a memory of the now fallen sun, the deep blue to the east twinkling with a few visible stars over a small lake and parkland.

"You having a good time?" Claude seemed more sober now than earlier, unlike some of their friends, and Hilda smiled softly, glad of his attention.

She nodded and ran her fingers under her eyes. "Just tired. Worked early before practice, and will again tomorrow."

"I'm glad you made it," Claude said sweetly, and Hilda rolled her eyes as she sucked on a straw from a cup that was mostly ice.

"No one would have missed me," she contributed, her gaze darting to where most of their colleagues were gathered, some of their friendships spanning years and others only as long as auditions, but generally they seemed to feel closer to each other than she really felt to them. So far, anyway.

She felt slower at forming these deep friendships that others seemed instinctually born with. She wondered if she'd know any of these people long enough for that to matter.

"I just said I would've," Claude insisted, crossing his arms as he leaned into the table. His hair was wilting around his face, framing thick eyebrows and dark lashes that half-hid his green eyes. He needed to curl them, Hilda thought idly.

She blushed and pushed at the ice in her glass with her straw. "You just owed me a few drinks for improvising with you in your audition."

Claude chuckled and hid his smile in his elbow for a moment. "That was kind of you," he allowed. He looked at her directly, and promised, "But it's not just that."

"No?" she peeped, half teasing, waiting on the joke or the reveal.

"No," he said at a whisper. "Would you want to come over to my place on one of our free nights? I could make you dinner? We could just run lines, or...?"

"Or?"

Claude blushed and they both snickered softly. He shifted back and forth against the table, forcing himself to sit up, running a hand over his chin, clean shaven for his part in their production.

"Or whatever you like."

His smile widened as she considered it, and she wondered if it was because he wasn't facing instinctual rejection or because he could tell that she was interested. When she nodded, his shoulders fell, as if suddenly relaxed. A lot of people had rules about not dating people they worked with, the risk of rejection and the pain of a breakup always had a chance of hurting a production, but she could see the value of taking a few moments of flattery too far. Even if Claude tucked his heart away from something more, even if they only ran lines, she was looking forward to it.

#hilclaude #claude von riegan #hilda valentine goneril #fire emblem three houses #fire emblem #claude. hilda. mc. lorenz #faedolyn #mia cecile #only my original art was tagged for mia and i need to go through my posts and fix that later #the original intent of this au was for claude to ask fae out after the last showing of their performance but now that's lorenz's job i gues #i'm still ot4 obsessed. they'd all hook up #mia isn't even really in this but asdjfhgasdjm #if YOU (mutual) have an oc you want thrown in this au. let me know. it is a crack au #my writing #long post #i made this #the fanfiction i mean

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beholdme · 3 years

Text

All the Many Shades of Gerry - Chapter 8

Chapters: 8/19

Fandom: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Gerard Keay/Jonathan “Jon” Sims | The Archivist, Martin Blackwood/Gerard Keay, Martin Blackwood/Jonathan “Jon” Sims | The Archivist, Gerard Keay/Jonathan “Jon” Sims | The Archivist

Characters: Martin Blackwood, Jonathan “Jon” Sims | The Archivist, Gerard Keay, Tim Stoker (The Magnus Archives), Sasha James, Gertrude Robinson, Elias Bouchard

Additional Tags: Alternate Universe, Library AU, Librarian Jon, Artist Gerry, Trans Male Character, Trans Martin Blackwood, Canon Asexual Character, Asexual Jonathan “Jon” Sims | The Archivist, Ace Subtype - Sex Positive, Polyamory, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Romantic Fluff, Falling In Love, Boys in Skirts, Kissing, Demisexual Gerard Keay, Minor Character Death, Past Character Death, Canon-Typical Child Neglect, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Flirting, Minor Jonathan “Jon” Sims | The Archivist/Tim Stoker, Adventures in Hair Dying, Happy Ending, Banter, Gerry has a lot of sass, Gerard Keay is Morticia Adams, Jon is a very grumpy Librarian, Martin adores them anyway.

Summary: In which Gerry is a kaleidoscope and Jon and Martin can’t help falling in love with him.

He happens to love them back.

Find it on Ao3

[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7]

“We shouldn’t go in,” Jon tells his giggling partners very firmly, but they pay him no mind, and he gets dragged by the hand into the storefront.

The girl working the front desk looks up with a vaguely alarmed look on her face, probably because Gerry and Martin look drunk, despite it being 11 A.M. on a Sunday. They are not, although Jon can understand why someone would think that, as they march right up to the desk, faces flushed, still laughing boisterously.

“Is Melanie in? She’s a good mate of mine.” Gerry tells the receptionist.

“Yes, I’ll check with her if she has a second for you.” And she scuttles off to the back.

“It’s Gerry!” He calls off behind her, before turning to grin at Jon. “Don’t hover in the doorway, babe, Melanie doesn’t bite.”

“Melanie is in fact, perfectly capable of biting,” Jon mutters petulantly, as he moves further into the room to eye the art on the walls. “Especially when you used to date her girlfriend.”

“Oh look, my favorite emo goth boy!” Melanie yells, exploding out the back of the store, all 5 feet of her filled with frenzied energy. Her face immediately sours when she catches sight of Jon, hiding behind Martin. “And my least favourite douche bag.”

“Now, now firecracker, be nice to my boyfriend.” Gerry pulls her into a hug, which leads to a headlock and a swift jab to his ribs.

“I’m very happy to be nice to Martin,” She responds sweetly, blowing him a kiss. “What brings you lot over to darken my doorstep?”

“Piercings,” Gerry tells her with an unnatural amount of glee.

“Jon agreed to let me pierce him?” Melanie asks, perking right up at the idea of causing Jon pain.

“No!” Jon exclaims.

At the same time, Gerry says, “Nah, he’s not interested, but Martin and I were wanting something each.”

“Martin?” Melanie asks dubiously, eyeing up sweet-looking, pink-haired, cardigan-clad Martin.

“Yes,” Martin confirms with false solemnity. “Boyfriends who bleed together stay together.”

“You know,” Melanie remarks, grinning at them, “I have heard about that Pagan ritual.”

Jon has slunk over to a wall of healed artwork and concept designs, managing to avoid Melanie's barbs. As far as he is concerned, the art isn’t as interesting as Gerry’s work. Although, he supposes that what you can make beautiful on a canvas is very different from what you can make beautiful on someone's skin.

“I’ve got a bit of an opening now, what do you want to get?” She asks Gerry.

“Well, you know I’ve been wanting to have my nipples done.” He offers, teal eyes looking slightly wild.

“Yeah?” She grins in triumph, “I’ve been waiting for this day.”

“Yup and Martin has been considering something for his ears.”

“Hmmm,” She wanders over to Martin to examine him. “Open for suggestions?”

“Maybe.”

“They’re a good shape. Double helix?” She looks to Gerry for affirmation.

“Definitely.” He smirks, eyes lighting up with satisfaction.

"Two?" Martin looks slightly dubious.

"If you do them together, the pain is only a tiny bit more, and the healing time is two-for-one," Melanie reassures him, and Jon thinks it's the nicest she's ever sounded. "It's up to you though, of course."

Jon steals himself to brave the fray, going over to take Martin's hand. It's slightly clammy with the nerves that Gerry's enthusiasm has prevented up until this point.

"It won't be so bad, love." He presses a kiss to Martin's cheek, offering his support. "Just a small jab, then it's done."

"Let's do it."

***

There's a brief fuss with consent forms, aftercare instructions, and payment.

"I don't know what you lot," Melanie instructs Gerry firmly, gesturing between them, "get up to in the bedroom, but no twisting, no pulling, no biting, no sucking your nipples for 12 weeks."

Jon blushes, but Gerry and Martin aren't bothered. "Yeah, firecracker, I know the drill. This isn't my first circus."

"Kinky little shit," Jon mutters under his breath, but the goth only winks at him.

Martin's care instructions are less suggestive, and Gerry and Jon both promise to help him with it.

“Martin should go first,” Melanie pronounces, patting the piercing chair as she disinfects her hands and gloves up.

“Me?” Martin asks.

“Yup, yours will be a lot simpler, and I don’t want to traumatise you by making you watch nipple piercings before your turn.”

Martin climbs on the chair, looking a little pale, but resolute. Jon stands on the side not occupied by Melanie, gripping his hand reassuringly. Gerry stands slightly behind the chair, hand on Martin's shoulder.

The ear piercings are almost comically quick and easy. Two quick pinches, less painful than bee stings, and then Martin's ear is pierced and adorned with small hoops.

He sighs with relief and oh's with delight when Gerry hands him a mirror to check them out.

"I love it!" He exclaims, beaming at Jon and Gerry. They smile back at him, each taking a turn to kiss him on the cheek or forehead, their own relief palpable.

"It's just you and me now," Melanie grins at Gerry and gestures for him to strip.

He shucks off his trench coat and black t-shirt, and stands in front of her, completely at ease.

Jon takes a moment to wonder if he has managed to get himself into a relationship with a masochist. Not because of the piercings, but because Gerry seems to genuinely enjoy being friends with Melanie.

The nipple piercings seem to be a much more complicated process, with markings and adjustments, but several rounds of cleaning and disinfecting later, Melanie runs a metal piercing bar through first one nipple and then the other. Gerry hisses with discomfort but stands carefully steady.

She steps back to make sure they look straight and even, before declaring it a success.

"Nice," Gerry says succinctly, looking in the large upright mirror, nodding his head enthusiastically. He and Melanie high five, and she condescends to grip him in a firm hug from the side.

"You sure I can't tempt you, Jon?" Melanie asks him sweetly as she starts to clean up her station, Gerry putting his clothes back on close by.

Knowing she just wants to cause him pain, Jon tells her firmly, "No, thank you."

He is over by the wall again, looking at different art this time, including a picture of a tattoo that catches his focus. It's a playing card amid a complex arm sleeve, an Ace of diamonds, and despite a lifelong disinterest in tattoos, it speaks to him.

"I think you'd look better with a spade, love.” Gerry manages to startle Jon slightly, appearing beside him and wrapping an arm around his waist. Jon marvels at his apparent ability to read his mind.

“You think so?” Jon queries, softly. Gerry hums his affirmation. “It's a bit much though, don't you think?”

"You don't need the whole card, for what you want. Just the A and the spade. Small and bold." He picks up Jon's hand, indicating the spot below his thumb on his wrist.

Gently releasing it, Gerry grabs a pen and scrap of paper and rapidly draws out a solid, simple design.

Jon glances over at Melanie, extremely dubious. "Maybe we can go somewhere else to get it?" He whispers.

Gerry laughs warmly, tapping the small piece of paper. "I could do it for you myself."

Jon blinks at him, rather owlishly. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, I can give you the tattoo. I'm probably a bit rusty, but I did survive a full tattoo apprenticeship. I’ve done about a million over the years, although I had to give up my machine when I moved to London."

"You did a tattoo apprenticeship?" Martin asks from nearby, tone skeptical.

"Yup, when I was living in Edinburgh. All three years." Gerry tells them casually. "That's where I met Melanie, actually."

Jon and Martin exchange a baffled look, but choose to simply file it under 'Things Gerry tells us out of order.'

“Well, if you can do it...” Jon sounds a bit floaty but he is staring at the design yearningly, which Gerry knows is a good sign.

"Firecracker," Gerry yells over to Melanie, "Can I borrow your machine?"

***

Melanie makes the stencil while Gerry reacquaints himself with the tattoo gun, setting everything up and getting used to the weight of it in his hand again. The rhythm is always the same with tattooing and he feels himself fall into the past a bit.

When everything is ready, he gestures Jon over to sit in the chair, smiling beatifically.

Jon is shaking a little as he slides up onto it, and Gerry presses a reassuring kiss to his hand before he starts the prep.

"You ready?"

Jon gulps. "Yes."

Martin comes over to take Jon's other hand and Melanie hovers nearby, wanting to watch Gerry like a hawk the entire time he's handling her machine. ("It's the true love of her life," Gerry had confessed to Martin earlier. "Don't tell Georgie.")

Gerry follows the same procedure with any tattoo: cleanse, shave, cleanse again. Numbing cream, in this case, to prevent nerve twitches, then alcohol rub down. Eventually, he applies the stencil carefully, making sure to get it straight and in the correct place.

He checks with Jon, making sure that it is where he wants it. Jon confirms, smiling to see the design on his skin for the very first time.

As the buzz of the machine fills the space, Jon and Gerry make eye contact for a moment. Jon's earthy green eyes are wide, and Gerry can almost see where his pulse pounds through his jaguar vein. He stills a moment, really checking Jon's energy.

He's nervous, it's obvious to see, but Gerry can also see the real desire in him, and with a wink, turns to look down at his new canvas. He sets to work, the buzzing of the needle filling the air.

***

"I love it," Jon whispers to Gerry later, lying in the circle of his arms, Martin's warm weight at his back.

"I love it too." Gerry kisses his forehead sweetly, almost asleep. "Martin, what do you think of your ear?"

"I think boyfriends who commit to pain together stay together," Martin mutters drowsily, repeating his sentiment from earlier.

"Ah, yes," Jon mutters, "The great cosmic bond of suffering."

They laugh easily, the hot excitement of the day echoing within them, yet another thread in the colourful tapestry of their relationship.

#the magnus archives #jonathan sims #martin blackwood #gerry keay #jongerrymartin #fic #also on ao3

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groovybaybee · 4 years

Text

Greener - IV

I, II, III

(4k)

cw: mentions of abuse (nothing too intense but better safe than sorry), alcohol consumption

I am in the ocean. The water is warm and comforting as it hugs up against me with each gentle wave. It is calm and peaceful and in turn I am calm. I am in the ocean and I am calm.

You’re in your kitchen.

“Fuck off,” I whisper, eyes squeezed tightly shut as if they could shield me from the reality of the voice in my head.

I am in the ocean.

BUZZ

I ignore it.

I am in—

BUZZ

With a deep exhale, I open my eyes and face the brutal reality that the unkind voice lingering in my brain had been right. I am in my kitchen. The bright smiling faces tacked to the walls seem to mock me as I desperately try to regulate the rise and fall of my chest. My lungs unaware that I am not in the middle of a hundred-metre sprint and can probably relax a little.

Against my better judgment, I pick up the phone that had caused me to spiral in the first place. Quickly, I close Twitter, wishing I had never let myself fall down the thread of comments. I had known it would only cause me to panic but, almost masochistically, I did it anyway.

Thought I was supposed to be the one organising collaborations with big artists?? Nice work kiddo. Response to the video is pretty good so I can look into booking some studio sessions…

My focus falls away from my manager’s message. Of course, he saw this as a positive thing. It is a positive thing, really. Only a crazy person would find discomfort in their dream career being boosted along. This is the kind of thing I have always wanted. I want to make music. I want to have people see me and connect with me. But now that the opportunity is there all that I feel is fear.

You always were ungrateful.

For once, I do not try to argue with the bad part of my brain. I am ungrateful. How could someone get what they want and find reasons to still be the victim? I do not deserve any of this. How could I, in the sea of so many, be lucky enough to find traction in this industry? Yet all I want to do is run.

It is not even as though all of the new feedback is negative. To a degree, it would be understandable to want to run away were that the case. No, people were actually incredibly supportive of Harry and I’s impromptu duet. Complimentary even. I should be jumping for joy, but instead I find myself clutching for the countertop beneath me to tether me to the Earth.

Instinctively, I reach for my phone again, quickly dialling the first number I can think to.

“Hello lovely lady,” Lucy answers brightly.

“Luce,” I gasp, mouth remaining open but unable to find the words as my throat seems to tighten up.

“What’s wrong?” she asks, suddenly serious and I can picture her sat bolt upright. When I can’t formulate a reply, she speaks for me, “Are you at home? I’ll come over.”

“Yeah.” I manage to breathe out.

Time seems to warp as I listen to the background noise of Lucy buckling herself into her car and taking the short trip to my house. Only when I hear her set of keys in the lock do I hang up the call, something about her presence comforting me even through the phone.

“Let’s sit down, yeah?” Lucy says when she sees my face, undoubtedly wide-eyed as gravely breathes pass quickly between my lips.

She places a hand on my back and eases me away from the counter until my body meets the soft embrace of the sofa.

“Count to ten with me?”

Her voice is gentle and reassuring as she watches me, no doubt assessing how severe my state is and which battleplan she needs to access in order to help me calm down.

When I nod, she waits for me to utter a shaky and broken, “One,” before repeating it and moving from the sofa.

“Two,” she encourages.

She opens a window and moves back to the kitchen, returning with a glass of water as I reach “Four.”

We count together until we reach ten. Not unlike the other times we have done this, she waits for a moment as she observes if I need to start again, or if I am suitably calm enough for her to move on to the next step in her care plan. Deciding on the latter, she passes me the glass of water.

Gratefully, I take a slow sip.

“Want to talk or want distracting?”

“I feel…” I start quietly, uncertain as a sigh passes my lips, “I feel ungrateful and a bit overwhelmed.”

Lucy just nods. No judgment in her gaze as she digests my words. They dissipate into the air of the living room, sinking into the furniture and slipping under the tape of the unopened moving box in the corner.

“Is this about the video? Because if it is I’m so sorry for posting it, I just thought you two sounded so good and fit so great together and maybe you’d get a bit more recognition which you deserve completely and—”

“Lu,” I sigh with a small smile as she rambles apologetically. I pull her into a hug which neither of us expect. “I love you so much. You always know what’s right and you go out and do it. I’m just a bit batshit at the minute and can’t accept the good in things.”

“I love you.” Lucy mutters into my hair.

We sit for a while, arms wrapped tightly around one another, swaying slightly. Neither of us want to be the first to move, simultaneously needing to provide comfort and bathe in it. A smile fixes itself on my lips, one Lucy has always been capable of coaxing from me, even during my worst nights. But that is exactly the reason the smile carves its way on to my cheeks; it’s us. It has always been Lucy and me and it will be Lucy and me until our arms can’t hug and our lungs can’t laugh.

“I think,” I say softly, resentfully pulling away from our embrace, “it’s time to go through his stuff.”

Lucy nods, eyes a little watery. She sniffles once and that is enough to settle her.

“Shall I get wine?”

I cannot help the small bubble of laughter that bursts between my lips, but I nod, nonetheless. We move to set about our own tasks; Lucy gets a bottle of Shiraz and pours two glasses as I pull the, ever so slightly dusty, cardboard box into the centre of the room and peel away the tape sealing it.

I wait for her to return before opening the flaps, needing her next to me more than I could ever admit. Not that I would have to. She gives me a reassuring squeeze on the arm when she notices my sharp intake of air.

No going back. I force myself to believe that and open the box.

Peering into the box, it is less full than I remember, and that in itself pushes me along. On the top, lay a few t-shirts he did not come to collect. I place them in a pile on the living room floor, mentally noting it as one to donate. Beneath the shirts are a collection of photographs, some loose and some framed. Lucy stills beside me, nervously awaiting my tears. They would not come just yet. I remember placing the most upsetting things at the bottom. My heart clenches at the thought of seeing them again, but I push ahead.

I flick through the photographs, placing the newly empty frames to the other side of the box. It is not nearly as saddening as I had expected. Being able to pass over a timeline of our relationship is almost cathartic, knowing that I do not have to wait weeks and months between these happy memories captured in film.

“I loved that jacket.” Lucy says softly as we peer at a picture of my ex-boyfriend and I at the beach one night.

“So did I,” I smile, fingers running lightly over the glossy image, a bright red faux leather jacket which matched my painted smile. “Will didn’t.”

Lucy’s body slumps beside me and I feel the angry starting to stir inside of her. I put the stack of photos on the floor, deciding not to keep any, and peak back into the box. I can hardly help the laugh that rises from my chest when I see the next item. Not from joy, but from its sheer ridiculousness. My hands reach into the cardboard and pull from it a bathroom scale.

“You know,” I start, sadness and amusement mingling in my chest, “he fixed these, so I was always ten pounds heavier.”

Unable to see the dark humour that I do, Lucy’s eyebrows knit together furiously, teeth biting hard on the inside of her cheek to keep her from screaming obscenities.

I place the scale down on the ground before reaching in to retrieve the last item in the box. The second my fingertips touch the tape, the smile erases from my face.

Deep breath in.

Lifting the final photograph from the box, my heart breaks yet again. The memories from that night flush my mind, my whole body quickly covering in goosebumps in an attempt at defence.

Lucy is silent next to me, waiting for me to say something or react at all. I bring the image closer, throat drying a little more with each inch it nears. I gulp harshly, desperate for some of the moisture collecting at my eyes to travel to my mouth.

I stare down at the picture of myself in my parents’ garden, mum and dad on either side of me, the three of us beaming uncontrollably. We were happy and excited, I was moving to Los Angeles in a few weeks, completely uncertain if I would be able to make my dream into my career.

Turning the photograph over is what send tears falling.

Our sweet Violet,

Words cannot describe how proud we are of you. You are so brave it makes us question if you were adopted without us knowing. You have always been your own person and that is what makes you so very special. It is also the reason that we know you will succeed no matter what you do. You are a wonder. Go forward and show the world.

So much love,

Your biggest fans xx

The words are beautiful, so sweet and encouraging that reading them now makes me feel a fraud. Tracing my thumb over the lines of tape holding the fragments of the photo together, a gentle sob erupts from inside me. The torn object makes my heart ache enough to think it were trying to mirror it.

“This was the day I left him,” I manage to force out between sniffs and sobs. “When he ripped this… I couldn’t do it anymore.”

Reliving my breaking point is something I often find myself doing, experiencing the extreme high of my first ever headlining show, and subsequent extreme low when Will pointed out how unflattering the stage lights were. He took that night from me, stole its joy and tried to grind me back down to a level beneath him.

I cry hard into Lucy’s shoulder, not caring right now that I was ruining her t-shirt. She does not seem to care either, instead just rubbing my back soothingly and letting me get out the emotions I have kept locked away for so long.

It is only when I feel Lucy’s body shaking against mine that I pull myself away. My tears stop the second I see hers falling.

“I’m so sorry.” She gets out, eyes bloodshot as deep but silent sobs wrack her body.

“It’s okay.” I coo, hating seeing my best friend cry more than any object in that box.

“It’s not. I’m supposed to protect you and I didn’t see what he was doing to you.” She is starting to hyperventilate as the tears fall faster and heavier now.

“Hey,” I whisper, placing a hand either side of her head to get her to focus on me and really listen, “No one did, not even me.” My voice cracks slightly at the admission, but it is what we both need to hear in order to forgive ourselves even the smallest amount.

Our breathing regulates, the tears start to dry, and I look back to the image with a fond memory.

“Do you remember the day we left?”

Lucy gives me a breathy and snotty but genuine laugh. “Yeah. Mum packed me about five boxes of chocolate fingers.”

“And they wouldn’t let us go through security with them so we had to stand and eat as many as we could.”

We share a laugh at the fond memory, glad to remember ourselves so sweet and naïve.

I pick up an empty frame from the floor, slipping the taped-up photograph inside and set it on the coffee table.

“I’m not letting him have any more of me.”

She nods and we sit for a moment.

“Thank you for always being next to me.” I say, a lump forming in my throat yet again, however this time, my heart swells instead of breaking.

“You and me.” She says with a soft, slightly teary smile as she extends a pinky finger for me to connect with. Of course, I do.

* * *

“He said he wants to talk when he’s back from New York.” Lucy tells me nervously as she stares down at her phone.

“Could be a good thing.” I argue, reaching out my hand to lift my nearly empty wine glass from the coffee table. I bring it to my lips carefully, my laying position on the sofa not aiding my slightly messy actions.

“I don’t know, he got funny the other day when I left his place.” Lucy mutters, gulping at her newly replenished glass.

“Luce, I’m going to be completely honest with you.” I say, sitting upright and trying to avoid the urge to hiccup as I move. “I think he likes you, and I think you like him too… and I think that scares you a bit.”

Lucy pauses, chewing on my words before responding with a sigh, “I think you’re right.”

“When aren’t I?” I tease, earning an eye roll, “Seriously though, Joseph is great, and he would take care of you.”

“That’s scary.” Lucy whispers to herself more than me, “What do I do if I’m not the one looking after people?”

“You’ll always have to look after me.” I joke, squeezing her knee lightly.

“That’s what I got Harry for.” She teases, unknowingly making my stomach squeeze just at the mention of him. “What?” she laughs, noticing my sudden silence.

I tell her everything. Running her through every moment with Harry, from our first date excitement, to accidentally on purpose friend-zoning him, to breaking the surface on my past relationship. As I describe each of our encounters, I recognise the lightness in my chest when I speak his name. Each small interaction I recall seems to stoke the embers in my chest, burning hot and steadily as I catch her up.

“I think you like him but you’re afraid.” Lucy repeats my own advice back to me with a smug smirk.

“Wouldn’t you be?” I defend.

“Oh definitely, but if you like him why are you waiting around. Be brave.” Her voice is so calm and matter of fact that her words seem nothing but logical, all my excuses flying out the window as I let her advice sink in.

Except for one.

“I don’t think he likes me like that, maybe he did at the start… but not anymore.”

“You can’t know that unless you ask him.” She replies, again as if it’s the most blatant thing in the world. Which I suppose it is.

Maybe I should be brave. I look to the newly framed photograph and find my answer. Maybe I will be.

* * *

Lucy made me text Harry that night before she left. He replied before I had finished locking the front door.

Yesss are you free Friday? I potentially have an idea – Harry

Before I know it, I find myself in the car park of The Forum in Inglewood, Harry’s hand slipped effortlessly into mine as he guides us through backdoor after backdoor.

Adrenaline courses through me as we wind through corridors, hearing the support act through the overhead speakers. We had already missed part of the show and were desperately trying to make up for the time lost sat in traffic.

Harry takes care of everything, shaking hands with everyone we interact with and thanking them graciously when they help us locate our seats. I watch him, slightly awe-struck, as we make our way to our little section by the balcony. The space is more private than general seating and I wonder what strings Harry had to pull to get such incredible last-minute tickets.

“Comfortable?” Harry asks as we get settled.

I nod, afraid that if my mouth were to open, I would let everything slip. Who could blame me though? The kindness and sincerity behind his eyes are enough to make anyone swoon.

No time to dwell on the way his eyes glide across my face, the crowd roars, almost making me jump as they drag me from my daydream.

Up on stage, Fleetwood Mac take their positions. A kick drum meets with the first few notes of The Chain, sending thousands of screaming fans into overdrive, ecstatic to see their idols in the flesh. Harry and I easily fall into that category, excitedly squeezing the other’s hand as the song builds.

“Oh my God!” I scream, head thrown back momentarily, unable to contain my wonderment at whatever cosmic coincidence allowed this to by my life.

It is loud. I feel the drums rattle in my chest, bass swirling in the pit in my stomach. My free hand grips the bar of the balcony, desperately trying to tether me to reality before I float away into whatever heavenly dream I have fallen into.

The show goes on, each passing song appearing to be a fan favourite as the crowd only grows wilder and more liberated. I watch with glee as each and every person moves freely, dancing and singing excitedly as Second Hand News transitions into Say You Love Me.

My gaze flits back to Harry for the hundredth time since the show began, admiring the joy radiating from him. It is infectious and feeds me until my rays begin to pour out of me as well.

Harry is goodness. Any other day, I would have used this as a reason to drive a wedge between us. He brought happiness while I worried that I drained it from the world.

But here, with him, I know the truth. I feel the good and the beauty in the world, and I know that I am a part of that. I do not drain him, we fill each other up.

“Harry,” I desperately call over the music.

Instantly, his eyes are on me, smile still present but quickly glancing over me to ensure my wellbeing.

“I’m sorry I friend-zoned you!” is all I can think to say. Somehow, it seems to be enough. Harry lets out a beautifully easy laugh, dimples deep-set in his cheeks as he lets go of my hand in order to wrap both arms around me.

“It’s okay.” He chuckles, quickly letting go of me and turning me towards the stage so as not to miss anything. His arms linger around me, hugging me slightly from behind, swaying us almost anxiously.

“We don’t normally do requests, but this will have to be an exception.” Stevie says, her voice light as a playful smile finds its way on to her face. “This is Skies the Limit.”

“I was going to choose Storms but didn’t want to see you sad.” Harry utters in my ear, confirming every complimentary thought I have of him.

My jaw struggles to stay closed as I watch the band play my song. Harry did this for me. My favourite, non-depressive, song is playing in front of all of these people. For me. Because of him.

His name tumbles from my lips, breathless and unbelieving that I am not existing in some kind of simulation.

I turn to look at him, gobsmacked, when I find his tentative gaze. Never have I seen him so timid, as though I might think this gesture too much. I mean, it is. There is no way on Earth someone could deserve to feel so cherished. No one could possible earn this heart-swelling sensation. No one is worthy of this level of care. But here I am. I get to be with him and being with Harry is like every birthday rolled into one. He drives me wild and keeps me calm, often managing to do both simultaneously.

For once, I do not care what anyone else thinks. All that matters is the man standing in front of me and the decision I need to make. Am I going to let this pass me by and shy away from potential happiness yet again? Or will I be brave and take a chance?

Harry watches me cautiously as my brain tries to spiral and twist itself into knots of self-doubt. But every wonderful decision I have every made required an element of risk. What would my younger self think if she saw me fumble this chance? She was always so fearless, why can’t I be?

“Remember at Lucy’s? You asked what I’d do if I wasn’t scared.” I say, palms starting to sweat as I feel the edge of the cliff approaching fast.

Harry nods.

“I didn’t tell you that if I weren’t so scared, I would let myself fall for you...”

Our eyes search the other’s face; mine desperate for any sort of reaction, his cautiously awaiting a hint of insincerity.

“Funny thing is I don’t think it will stop me.”

And like that, the cliff is far behind me and I wait in limbo for any response.

My heart wishes for Harry to scoop me up in his arms, bend me low and kiss me like a solider coming home from war. My mind worries that he will throw up over the side of the balcony from sheer disgust at the very notion. However, Harry provides neither anticipated response. Instead, a stifled smile spreads across his face.

“I know,” he grins, “Lucy told me.”

“For fuck’s sake!” I laugh incredulously, my head thrown back in despair and amusement. I should have guessed she would continue meddling. “I’m going to kill her.”

“Do you think you could wait a while to do that?” Harry asks when I finally meet his eyes again, his hands slipping up my back, pulling our bodies ever so slightly closer together.

“Why?” I sigh, half-joking.

“So I can do this.”

Each of Harry’s hands settle on either side of my head, a thumb instinctively grazing across the soft skin of my cheek. I have just enough time to register his touch before his lips come down to meet mine.

Our first kiss is fuelled with longing and ignited with hope. A new type of excitement spreads through my chest as his lips melt with mine, soft and sweet, as all fears and doubts seem to drown out with the roar of the arena. Some other time I will tell Harry about Will and how he affected me, and things will be okay, because with Harry things are okay. He makes them okay. And with heaving chests and his forehead pressed against mine, for the first time in a long time, I feel the potential for a free kind of love.

masterlist

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dustedmagazine · 3 years

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Ian Mathers’ 2020: We’re stuck inside our own machines

I’ve had a song I loved in high school and haven’t thought much about since stuck in my head. The song “Apparitions” by the Matthew Good Band is a fine example of the alt rock of the late 90s; if you grew up then but somewhere down in the states (or elsewhere) instead of my southern Ontario you may well have your regional equivalents, and like this one they may not resonate terribly strongly outside of their time and place. It popped back into my head after a long time recently and of course 2020 has changed it a little. A song that as a teen I felt keenly as about loneliness (albeit also about how technology can feed into that) of course now plays on my nerves as another small piece of art about the way that most of us (those scared and/or responsible anyway) have only that relatively narrow, technologically mediated connection to the people we love. All of us, artists and listeners alike, are trying to fit our feelings and art and selves down these little connections, with some success.

On a personal level, 2020 wound up being stressful in ways we couldn’t have predicted even after the pandemic hit. In circumstances that could have seen governments on this continent support those unable to work (and those who shouldn’t have to), support those workers who are truly essential, support workers and renters and even landlords and small businesses, instead we got a near-total abeyance of those governments using the resources we provide them with to save any of us. On a personal level my wife and I were lucky enough to be able to work from home (not that it didn’t come with its own forms of stress, and now that I’m off until January I have several work/stress-related illnesses to recover from) but still saw friends and loved ones lose good, used-to-be-sustainable livings overnight, saw family businesses succumb to a near-total absence of effective government support after months of trying to keep above water, etc.

It is probably no surprise that this is not a situation conducive to listening to music, let alone writing about it; I have deliberately and happily kept busy on behind the scenes stuff at Dusted that I could still manage but looking, at the end of the year, at the amount I managed to actually create is demoralizing if not at all shocking. I’m not sure I think next year will be ‘better’ in many important ways, although at our job there is a growing feeling among coworkers that next year has to have some work/life balance because 2020 was, maybe more than anything else, unsustainable.

That’s not to say I didn’t spend a lot of time and emotion on music this year, and if nothing else constant sleep deprivation, stress, and panic meant I was probably open to being deeply moved by all sorts of art even more than normally (it’s gotten to the point where I can’t even read a sad or moving twitter thread out loud to my wife without getting teary, which is kind of… nice?). Funnily enough the band that did the most to keep me sane didn’t really put out anything in 2020. Personal favorite, Low, instead started, in early April, getting on Instagram with something they called on whim “It’s Friday I’m in Low.” With one brief break they have now done by my count at least 35 shows (catalogued here, by the way), every Friday at about 4 my time.

Admittedly it’s easier for Low to pull this off than some bands, since the 2/3 of the trio that sing are a married couple (they’ve had a couple of socially-distanced backyard shows with bassist Steve Garrington, but he’s mostly been isolating elsewhere). These shows have seen the band’s Alan Sparhawk take a mid-set break to do follow-up phone interviews with the acts featured in the COVID-curtailed touring bands series Vansplainingthat they started on YouTube, or just to give a tour round their vegetable garden and talk tips. It’s seen Alan and Mimi Parker draw on their impressive, 25+ year body of work (averaging 4-5 songs a set, I don’t think they’ve repeated themselves yet) and talk a bit between songs about pandemics, politics, song choices, and whether Alan should grab his bike helmet this time.

They’re not the only musicians out there speaking love and sanity (and playing music) into the strange digital interzone filled with hate and disinformation where we’ve all been forced to gather while locked down, but they were and the most consistent and steady signal being emitted each week. No matter how tired I was from work or what new symptoms I’d developed or what horrific thing I read into the news, even if I had to take an emergency nap while it was actually airing, every Friday the show was there. Once things do return to something more like normal, it’s one of the few things I’ll unambiguously miss about this weird-ass year.

So if that makes an argument for Low as my band of the year (admittedly again… it’s not like Double Negative has aged poorly, either), that does a disservice to those 2020 records I did connect with; even if there are still literally dozens I have to go through, many of which I expect to love, my top picks this year (if as unrankable by me as always) hit me as hard as any top pick in recent years did. So here I present a quick and informal top 5, which the rest of my top 20 following in alphabetical order. Here’s hoping for more time and space in 2021 for music, and even more than that, for more support for those who need it from those who could have been providing it all this time. (The Matthew Good Band, incidentally, always did best with their ballads. “Strange Days” is another I’ve had in my head these days; the image of moving “backwards, into a wall of fire” has stuck with me since the 90s and it’s never felt more grimly appropriate.)

Greet Death — New Hell

New Hell by Greet Death

This one is, in some sense, cheating; it came out November 2019. But that just means it’s the latest winner of my personal Torres Prize for Ian Being Late to the Party (so named because becoming slightly obsessed with Torres’ Sprinter just after I sent in my 2015 list was the first time I noticed that one of my favorite records of each year tends to get picked up by me just after I call it quits on the year, no matter how long I try to wait). This very doom and gloom slowcore/metal/(whatever, just know it’s heavy) trio at first felt very much like my beloved Cloakroom (whose Time Well has also won a Torres Prize) but sure enough nuances revealed themselves. Back in February it felt almost a little too negative, but then the rest of 2020 happened. And the extended burns of “You’re Gonna Hate What You’ve Done” and the title track remain searing.

Holy Fuck — Deleter

youtube

Probably the record I’ve been trying to write about the longest in 2020, and the one I’m most disappointed in myself that I just couldn’t get the requisite paragraphs together. It’s a wonderful effort from the consistently great Toronto resolutely human-created (and —mediated) dance music quartet, one that both feels like a summation of everything they do well, and with the addition of some outside voices (including strong turns from the singers of both Hot Chip and Liars) a step forward at the same time.

Spanish Love Songs — Brave Faces Everyone

Brave Faces Everyone by Spanish Love Songs

As the year got worse, this roar of defiance only got more crucial for me to hear every so often; I was a big enough fan of it, even after writing it up for Dusted, that when they solicited fan footage for a subsequent music video you may just be able to get a glimpse of me in it. (I’m the one in a “No Tories” t-shirt.) My punk rock-loving twin brother was the one who introduced me to Spanish Love Songs and we were supposed to spend an evening in June screaming along to them live in a packed, sweaty room. I need that in my life again.

Julianna Barwick — Healing Is a Miracle

Healing Is A Miracle by Julianna Barwick

It’s a sign of what 2020 has been like here that even just this album title leaves bruises, and while I privately worried Barwick would have a hard time following up 2016’s sublime Will (probably my favorite record that year), it seems that continuing to take whatever downtime she needs to keep focusing and refining her particular muse has once again yielded amazing results. Anyone who thinks they know what a Barwick track sounds like should really check out, say, “Flowers”, but much of this record absolutely sounds like Barwick, just even better than before. She also boasted my wife and I's favorite streaming concert of 2020, an absolutely gorgeous rendition of this album with Mary Lattimore showing up.

Phoebe Bridgers — Punisher

Punisher by Phoebe Bridgers

I joked on Twitter recently that I have far too nice a dad (and far too good a relationship with him) to be as obsessed as I am with Phoebe Bridgers’ “Kyoto”, but here we are. Like most of her generation, Bridgers’ social media presence ranges from shit-posting to inscrutable, but even though things are often just as hard to figure out in her beautiful songs (as they often are in life), there’s an emotional clarity to them that can just grab you deep down. Couple that with seriously impressive songcraft and the progress from her already astounding debut Stranger in the Alps and more than anyone else in 2020 I’m excited to see just where the hell Phoebe Bridgers is going to go, because it feels like she’s talented and hardworking enough to go just about anywhere and drag a lot of our hearts with her.

Other Favorites

Aidan Baker & Gareth Davis — Invisible Cities II

Anastasia Minster — Father

Deftones — Ohms

Hum — Inlet

Kelly Lee Owens — Inner Song

Mesarthim — The Degenerate Era

Perfume Genius — Set My Heart On Fire Immediately

Protomartyr — Ultimate Success Today

Rachel Kiel — Dream Logic

The Ridiculous Trio — The Ridiculous Trio Plays the Stooges

Sam Amidon — Sam Amidon

Shabason, Krgovich & Harris — Philadelphia

Stars Like Fleas — DWARS Session: Live on Radio VPRO

Well Yells — We Mirror the Dead

Yves Tumour — Heaven to a Tortured Mind

Five Reissues/Compilations/etc.

Aix Em Klemm — Aix Em Klemm

Bardo Pond — Adrop/Circuit VIII

Charles Curtis — Performances & Recordings 1998-2018

Coil — Musick to Play in the Dark

Hot Chip — LateNightTales

Ian Mathers

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seokiloquy · 4 years

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Lost In- What Word? Pt 2 - Akaashi Keiji

AU: Single Parent

Requested

Word Count: 2.7k+

Disclaimer: Fem! Reader, Time skip spoilers, just fluff

Pt 1 | Pt 2 | Pt 3

Another Saturday rolled around and the open field of the nearby park was close to empty. It was partially cloudy outside, letting the sun pour out periodically onto the grassy field. You kicked back, keeping a lackadaisical watch over your bags while trying not to fall asleep from the warm blanket that the sun gave you. The gentle heat that was settled into your stomach wrapped around your sides in a hug, it made it difficult to keep your eyes open and watch your son practice. It definitely didn’t help that in the moments when your eyes were open, your attention was mostly captured by the sturdy movements Akaashi made as he coached Naoko, and not Naoko himself.

This was one of those moments. Back facing you, the older man fell into a deep lunge, one leg stretching out further than the other. With his hands clasped together in an arrowhead shape and arms strengthened underneath his slim-fitting t-shirt, the ball fell right into the fleshy part of his forearm, bouncing high into the air with a satisfying smack. You quickly turned your gaze away toward the incoming dark clouds, biting the inside of your cheek.

“Nice spike, Naoko!” Akaashi encouraged.

You looked back to the rally that was taking place before you, smiling at Naoko’s large grin as he hit every ball with the near-perfect ability that had been developing over the past few weeks. Something hitting your cheek stopped you from spouting your own support for your boy. Looking up to the sky, your eye was assaulted by the same light sensation. Within seconds it began to pelt your skin harshly.

“Mama, it’s raining!” Naoko cheered, spinning with a large grin in his quickly soaking clothes.

You screeched at the feeling of cold water seep through your shirt to roll down your spine. Quickly, you grabbed the three bags off the ground, wrapping your arms as tightly around them as you could. From the corner of your eye, you could see Akaashi swipe a giggling Naoko off the lawn and point in the direction of the street. Naoko thrashed around happily in the older man’s arms.

The strong rain continued to stab into your skin as the three of you sprinted. Once at the dark-haired man’s car, he set Naoko down and began patting down at the non-existent pockets of his track shorts. “Keys,” he muttered repeatedly before spinning to pull his back out from your arms.

With the back door quickly swinging the door open, Akaashi lifted the young boy off the ground and pushed him into the back seats before helping you load the bags. The rain continued to pour down your back in small, cold waves. You shivered as the last bag was thrown in and the two of you began to round the sides of the car, hoping into the front seat.

Akaashi turned on the engine and cranked up the heat as you spun in your chair to try and dry off your son’s face, using your thumbs to wipe at his cheeks. “Keiji, do you have any— uh, clothes.. no, towels in here?” you asked.

He groaned, ruffling his hair to shake the water out. “Sadly no.”

A dissatisfied hum escaped you, as you spun back to face the front of the vehicle, listening to the rain as it bounced off the metal exterior. A roll of thunder echoed in the distance, soon followed by a flash of lighting. You sighed, “I guess we’re stuck here for a bit.”

Akaashi pulled the dar out of its lane, hand coming to rest behind your seat’s shoulder as he reversed. “I’ll drive you two home,” he said, smiling at Naoko as his eyes skimmed over the boy’s damp cheeks, “how are you doing bud, cold back there?”

Naoko hummed defiantly, shaking his head quickly, sending a few stray droplets of water Akaashi’s way. “Can we go play in the rain some more?”

You tried not to laugh.

Akaashi shook his head, finally pulling into the open lane, and faced the steering wheel. “Sorry kiddo, no can do.”

Akaashi felt a tingle tickle the back of his neck as he flipped through the storyboard sketches that Udai had prepared. The pages were messily put together and had misspelt notes covering the margins. Akaashi stared at a crude sketch of a newly introduced character on the page, trying not to laugh at the silly expression before flipping the sheet over.

"I think it looks good," he said, eyes skimming over the last page.

"Really? Not too bland? It is sort of a filler chapter," Udai yawned quietly as he splayed out on his chair as much as possible.

"I think you've included enough information that it isn't redundant."

"Wow. Thanks," the artist scoffed.

Early morning checks-ins, though required in the name of productivity, often left the undesirable feeling of doing a whole day's work in just under an hour. So when Akaashi stepped out of the small meeting space and saw that the sun was still high in the sky, he couldn't stop the audible groan that escaped him.

Chiyo laughed lightly, "long day?"

"The day's hardly started," Akaashi sighed, carding a hand through his hair, ruffling it at the back of his head. "I just want to sleep. I had a long weekend."

Ena gave the editor a smirk, "had fun with (Y/N) I presume."

"Oh shut up, Ena," Chiyo chuckled.

Akaashi slumped into his spinny chair, making it squeak at the fast movement and extra weight. Despite facing the other way, the light pouring through the window was incredibly bright, making him squint uncomfortably as he glared Ena's way. The other man gave him a conniving smirk.

"I wish that were the case. But not quite, I was dragged out by one of my friends to play volleyball yesterday. Apparently, their setter got bailed out and they needed a substitute. Everything's sore." Akaashi let out a pained groan, stretching his casual blazer covered arms above his head. He peaked a look over to your cubicle glancing at the unruly organization of sticky notes and pens that touched every surface except for your frames and monitor screen. "Where's (Y/N) anyway?"

"Naoko caught a cold, so (Y/N) is working from home today." Chiyo let out a pitiful whine.

The door to Udai's office opened slowly as the artist finished her sentence. It creaked as a mop of wavy black hair poked through. His nose pushed against the edge of the door as his eyes peaked over. "Poor baby Naoko is sick?" He asked, voice curling upwards. “If I could, I would make him some warm stew.”

“If you don’t get back to work you’ll fall behind,” Chiyo warned, not taking her eyes off of the large screen she drew on. With his frown becoming an unsightly grimace, Udai rushed back into his little office, berating himself for taking his eyes off of the paper for even a second.

Akaashi continued to stare at the empty seat on the other side of the frosted cubicle, biting his lip. He sighed, turning on the monitor on his desk, just barely ready to face the work he had to do for the next few hours.

Yukie opened the door, giving the taller man a familiar curled grin as she gestured for him to enter the apartment. He noticed the tall ceiling that had a fan hanging down from it and the plain couches that were covered with a soft-looking blanket. To his left was the open kitchen, where he carried over the stiff bag that he had been holding tightly onto. Yukie coughed, still holding the door open as she kicked on her shoes, umbrella in hand.

“I’m off to see some old friends,” she said. “I would say not to burn the place down, but it seems you brought food. See you.” The door shut gently behind her.

Down the hall, in Naoko’s room, you placed a cool towel against the boy’s forehead. “You really shouldn’t have played in the rain when Keiji dropped us off, now you’re sick.”

He moaned tiredly in response, trying to turn his head to feel more comfortable, nearly letting the towel slip. Shimmying the heavy fabric back into place, you let the tips of your finger trail along his hairline, feeling for his raised temperature as you soothed him. “Oh sweetie, it’ll be okay.” You pecked his forehead lightly, grabbing the empty glass that sat on his bedside table and tucking his soft orange blanket over his shoulders. “Go to sleep, it’s okay.” His eyes were already half-closed and you were rising to your feet when the door opened.

“I hope I’m not interrupting,” Akaashi pitched, having waited a few moments in the hallway to listen to the melting tone of your voice as you spoke to your son in words the editor couldn’t understand.

Awe immediately filled your stomach, fluttering like little moths trying to find the nearest light. You watch as the man bowed slightly in the doorway before taking a few steps to meet your side. Leaning down, the back of his hand came to cup the younger boy’s cheek. Your eyes widened as Naoko's head fell limp in Akaashi’s palm, nuzzling into the strong muscle beneath the man’s skin. The strange feeling nagged at you again, making your lips pull into a pursed smile.

“He played in the rain didn’t he?”

“Even after I told him not to. Maybe he would’ve listened to you better,” you chuckled, crossing your arms against your stomach as your brain took a moment to switch back to the staccato paced language, different from your native tongue.

“It’s a shame though,” Akaashi said, walking to the door, hand coming up to hover behind your back. “I brought some warm soup for him to eat, I guess it’s just us then.”

The both of you walked toward the kitchen/livingroom split, and Akaashi gestured for you to sit down as if he were the host instead of the other way around. He reached into the cabinets to pull out two bowls.

“Let me help yo—”

“You’ve done enough today by taking care of Naoko. Let me at least do this for you.”

The light soup, despite not being the sick one in the house, warmed you up easily as it’s delicate flavour ran over your taste buds with each spoonful. The two of you ate in silence, listening to the rain that spat against your windows with every gust of wind. You didn’t even realize that you had asked for seconds before the bowl was once again placed in front of you by one of his sturdy hands.

You quickly looked up to inspect the sharp corners of his eyes that smiled at you without needing any assistance from his mouth. The stare you were holding was quickly diverted to the bowl in front of you.

Before you even had the chance to notice Akaashi’s adoring gaze or the syllables that were about to fall off his lips, you blurted out.

“Thank you, Keiji. For everything.” You looked up just in time to see his mouth shut, waiting. “I honestly couldn’t be more thankful for everything you’ve done for us, I can’t put it into words.” You furrowed your brow as you maintained eye contact with him. “No, I seriously don’t know the words in Japanese. Don’t expect me to start spouting out a haiku for you just yet.”

He chuckled lightly, letting the melodic sound dance into your ears, making it even more difficult to put the right words together. You could feel heat burn the skin of your cheeks.

“I want to repay you somehow, so how abo—”

“How about I take you on a date?” he asked, leaning his elbows onto the counter.

You gulped, completely unable to get the words to escape you, and nodded.

Naoko, as you noticed over time since his initial meeting of Akaashi, has grown in unprecedented ways. Now, seven years since he was born, those small insignificant memories from when he was little had slowly faded into your subconscious, despite their images being engraved into your brain in those earlier years.

Your lip swelled from the bite mark you left as you watched him bounce on the wooden court, heals never planting into the ground.

Yukie, the sports-loving and nutrition enthusiast, was the first substance added to this boy of a chemical reaction; introducing Naoko (and by association you) to the keep up sport at the ripe age of three. Working with athletes on a day to day basis and being near them since middle school gave the maroon haired woman a leg up in understanding in comparison to non-sporty parents. As soon as she was able, she took on the position of something akin to a soccer-mom. Helping you enroll Naoko in sports as soon as he was able to walk.

At the time, Naoko never seemed all too interested in volleyball itself. More attracted to the notion of being able to bounce something around. It at least kept him away from your phone. But as he grew older, and people began to notice that he wasn’t originally from Japan, Naoko’s outer shell seemed to build a bit, only opening the door for a stray volleyball to roll in. He was so shy.

Akaashi, so similar in some respects, made an unknowing catalyst in the young boy’s reaction. Suddenly and rapidly evolving the young, shy boy into one whose outer shell had carved out a bigger door, letting more things in, and a lot more out.

At the beginning of the volleyball season, only a couple weeks ago, Naoko’s coach came up to you after a practice, asking if the young player would be interested in moving up a level in the club, joining the representative (Or Rep) team for his age group. Naoko had stared at you like a tiny tawny owl until you agreed.

Now, you sat on the small metal bleachers set up for parents to watch their kids play, letting the excitement bubble in your stomach as your eyes trained on the young boy set a ball up into the air for his teammate to spike into the opposing club’s side of the court. The blue and yellow ball smacked into the floor after flying over the short net.

“Good Job!”

Your vision, as the players set up for the next serve, shot to Akaashi who was standing next to you, hands open on either side of his mouth as he yelled out in support. You smiled as he sat down again.

“Thank you for inviting me to come watch him play.”

A laugh escaped you as your hand waved defiantly. “To be honest, it was Naoko’s request. I was just the messenger. Besides,” you prompted, gesturing slightly to your son, who’s smile tore at the corner of his squishable cheeks, the largest you’ve ever seen from him. “He wanted you to see his first ‘real’ game.”

Akaashi’s charming grin was hard to look away from and at.

“You know,” you continued, nodding over at the larger man that stood on the opposite side of the court with the rest of the players. “His coach told me that Naoko was a true prodigy after his try-out.” You bit your lip as you looked down at your fiddling fingers, feeling the light throbs begin to push against the back of your eyes. “Volleyball makes him so happy, and for him to know that he has talent is only pushing him further. God, he’s only seven and he’s already told me that he wants to be a volleyball player.”

You sniffled, hands clenching each other tightly. “I owe you so much Akaashi, you don’t even realize.”

His larger hand came to pull yours apart before holding the closest one gently in his palm. Letting his thumb swipe over the back of it. “You don’t owe me a single Yen, (Y/N). But hey,” he said, making you pick your chin up to face him. “If he wants to be a professional, I know a few cool guys he might want to meet.”

Sometimes I think about the fact that some of the people that have read our one-shots might share them with their friends or have a platform where they are popular, and it scares me and makes me happy at the same time.

Also, we changed our upload date to Sunday because it works better for Kiwi. - Bacon

Posted: 13/09/2020

#akaashi keiji #akaashi x reader #Haikyuu x reader #Haikyuu #x reader #oneshot #oneshots #haikyuu oneshots #haikyuu reader insert #reader insert #aus #haikyuu aus #fluff #haikyu #anime x reader #anime #manga x reader #manga

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ruby-assassin · 4 years

Text

Galton pride

this took me a whole year to write and i’m recyling mood boards....it’s a bad time for me

Nova looked up at the float. Tomorrow was Galton’s anual pride festival, and her team got their own float. “So, it came out nice.” She said looking at the fringe on the side and the signs and posters hung on it. Ruby had hung many “protect trans kids” poster as Oscar hung small bi flags on the elevated part they’d be standing on. Dana added flag from her house that had the words “girls love girls” in pink. Adrian has drawn some good pan posters too. Novas contribution had been the huge “love always wins” sign on the back of the float. She’s decorated it each of their flags for their sexualities, she thought it looked nice. “Nice?” Oscar asked. “It’s totally sick!” He high-fived Ruby who was grinning and covered in blue and pink paint. “Can you imagine us on this tomorrow?” She said as she climbed back on to it. “I’ll be here like ‘Trans right!’ And Oscar will be over here eating cotton candy that looks like a bi flag. And Dana will sit up there being gay and loving women! And Adrian will stand there with his pen and make rainbow renegades pins. And nova will stand here,” she pointed to the center of the float. “And wave awkwardly as she does.” Oscar and Adrian laughed. Dana yelled a ‘hell yeah!’ And high-fived Ruby. “Hey, I’m not that awkward.” Nova fought with a smile on her lips. “You say that now until you see the pictures of yourself tomorrow.” Oscar laughed and held out one of the beaded necklaces in the bi flag colors to Nova. “Wear that tomorrow, for solidarity.” He said as he put his own on. She smiled and put hers on too. “Okay guys, we need to be here at seven tomorrow. So wear a nice outfit and try and include some pride items too.” Adrian said as he shooed ruby and Dana off the float. “Ruby, didn’t you say you had face paint?” Adrian asked. “Yeah! I should have all the colors we need. I might not have all Dana’s colors though.” She said sadly. “It’s alright Ruby, I have my own anyway.” Dana winked at her and flipped her hair over her shoulder. “Okay well, let’s get home and rest before the main event tomorrow.” Adrian smiled at his team.

The next morning Nova showed up to the warehouse they were starting at earlier than needed. She wore a black T-shirt with a small bisexual flag colored heart where a breast pocket would be. Her hair was down as always and she wore a pair of dark denim short since it was hot. The necklace Oscar had given her was around her neck. Her combat boots made an echo in the large building as the only other people here were the council, Adrian and a couple civilians doing maintenance. Adrian waved Nova over to where he and his dads were sitting, an area with a couple chairs and a supply of donuts, coffee and waters. “Hey.” Adrian said with a smile. Nova smiled back and sat next to him. “Hi.” She smiled. “Hi Nova, how are you?” The captain asked. She turned to him, she still felt weird about everything that happened between her and the council. Sure she had tried to kill him, and sure she did hate him from the time she was a small child, but they mended everything with multiple meetings and countless crying session (all of them recorded from the captains office or the interrogation room). “Im good, I’m excited to be on the float this year. I’ve come to all of the pride parades you’ve had so far.” She tucked hair behind her ear. “It’s nice to see that you guys are not only representing the lgbtq+ community but encouraging the people in it.” This was something that’s never changed in her mind. She loved the colorful flags and the face paint and the shirts she bought herself every year, though she had to hide them from the others. Unlike Adrian’s parents, Nova’s uncle wasn’t supportive of this kind of stuff. Most of the Anarchists were like that too, leaving Nova with internal conflict and self hatred that filled her need for her Uncle’s approval. “It’s nice to hear.” Hugh said with his classic smile. Adrian swiped his hand over Nova’s and caught her attention. “Wanna go and put some finishing touches on the float?” He asked as he held up his pen. Nova nodded and stood with him. “I’ll see you out there.” Nova said to the super couple as they walked off, hearing them chuckle.

“So, you want to help me paint my face?” Adrian asked as they made it to their float. He pulled out his marker, ready to sketch out some paints. “Sure, though I’m not quite the artist you are.” Nova smiles as she hoisted herself up to sit on the float next to her boyfriend. Adrian smiled back at her as he drew the pots of paint on the different colors of fabric or tinsel that covered the wooden float underneath. “Well, I don’t think a tiny flag will be too hard.” He said as he finally drew a paint brush too. Nova took the small brush from him and dipped it in the blue paint, using her other hand to take his glasses off. “Stop smiling so much so I can paint your face, dork.” Nova said as she patted the apples of his cheeks as he smiled. “Sorry.” He said trying to be serious. “Force of habit.” Nova let out a small laugh and continued the stripes of color on his cheeks. When she was finished she nodded. “Some of my best work.” She said simply and handed the brush to Adrian. “My turn.” She said and leaned her face towards him. Adrian just laughed at her enthusiasm and drew up some purple paint. “You really are excited aren’t you?” He said as he dipped the paint brush in the first pot of paint. “I am.” Nova said, stopping when the paint bust was swiping against her tanned skin. “I’ve always loved the parade. My uncle was homophobic and it made things really weird, especially when I got a crush on a girl for the first time. I wanted to talk to him, but hsse shut down the conversation as soon as I asked ‘is it okay for two people of the same gender to be in love?’ It was scary and new and I had no one to explain.” Nova kept her eyes closed and waited for the cool sensation of the paint on her skin again but it didn’t come. When she opened her eyes Adrian was looking at her with a sad look. “Nova,” He started. “Nope. I don’t want pity. I just wanted to tell you. Some backstory, ya know.” She said and pushed hair away from her forehead. Adrian tried to look less sad as he went to paint her face again but it wasn’t working. “Stop being sad.” Nova said with determination. “No. That was a sad story.” He said and pouted extra hard. “Hmmm, will a kiss make it better?” Nova said as she leaned towards him. He perked up. “Actually,” Adrian said and smiled. Nova laughed and pressed her lips to Adrian’s. They shared a small kiss before they pulled back and Adrian continued to paint her cheeks. When Dana and Narcissa arrived they were talking about the days events and holding hands. They had started dating a while ago and Dana had invited her girlfriend to join them on the float today. She was explaining how after the parade they would all be free to enjoy the festivities and stalls the Narcissa when they arrived next to the float. “Hey.” Dana smiled and sat on the edge of the float. “Good morning.” Narcissa supplied as she leaned next to her girlfriend. “Hi!” Adrian smiled as he finished painting nova’s face. “Hey guys.” Nova said as she turned around to look at them. The group held a steady conversation even as Ruby and Oscar joined until the council stood on their own float and announced that the parade was gonna start soon so they had to get on their floats to prepare. Ruby, who was wearing a trans flag as a cape, climbed up and held her hand out to Nova with a smile. “This is gonna be so fun!” She said as Nova climbed up with her. “I ave no doubts about that.” She said as the others made their way onto the float.

The sun was hot, but Nova could barely feel it over the vast amount of happiness and excitement she felt as the floats made their way down the street. People waved and called out to them as they waved and smiled. Their float had a built in speaker and was playing various songs the council had approved. Some little kids on the sidewalks danced along as they passed, the sight making Nova smile. Ruby and her were on the middle podium, swaying and singing along to the music with smiled. Oscar was tossing out rainbow bead necklaces while Dana and Narcissa were crouched on the edge of the float talking to a girl who was walking along the sidewalk, she looked to be about 13/14 years old and seemed absolutely infatuated with the two girls holding hands. Adrian was on the back of the float, tossing out the rainbow renegades pins he’d made the night before. It was fun, Nova was having the most fun she had ever had and she was being herself while doing so. She didn’t have to hide in an alleyway and make sure no one saw her face, she didn’t have to stash away her pride wear before heading home tonight. She didn’t have to pretend anymore. Ruby grabbed both of her hands as an upbeat song started and started to scream the lyrics and jump around. She looked so happy. Nova matched her level of enthusiasm, singing along as Ruby had introduced her to the song that was playing a couple weeks prior. As the song came to a close, Oscar came to join them on the podium, making a joke about how Nova was stealing his girlfriend. Nova and Ruby both laughed, Ruby pulling Nova into a tight side embrace, squishing their cheeks together. “We’re in love, don’t even try to come between us.” Nova laughed and turned to kiss Ruby’s cheek, earning a wild giggle from ruby. Oscar pulled his girlfriend away from Nova and swatted at her like a cat. “No this ones mine, Adrian is down there, go kiss him.” HE made a pouty face as the two girls laughed at him. Nova eventually let herself down to stand with Adrian fro the last two blocks of the parade. He smiled at her as she stood next to him, a group of fan girls going wild at the sight of them together. Nova let how weird it was slip as she wasn’t ready to let it ruin her mood. The two of them smiled and waved all the people around them while talking about Adrian’s previous experiences the the parade. Nova laughed along with his stories and putting in her input where it was needed. As the float came to a stop at a street near the park where the stalls and activities were placed, the group hoped off their float and stood by the entrance, Nova’s excitement bubbled up inside her. “You look excited.” Dana smiled at her. “I’m overflowing with positive emotions.” Nova whispered. “Then lets go!” Ruby yelled, leading thier charge into the festivities.

#renegades #supernova #archenemies #nova artino #ruby tucker #adrian everhart #dana bell #nova mclain

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jawritter · 4 years

Text

A Thousand Years...

Chapter 1

Heart beats fast. Colors and promises. How to be brave. How can I love when I’m afraid to fall. But watching you stand alone. All of my doubt suddenly goes away somehow…..

Summary: A soulmate’s purpose is to shake you up, tear apart your ego a little bit, show your obstacles and addictions, break your heart open so new light can get in, make you so desperate and out of control that you have to transform your life, then introduce you to your spiritual master. – Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love

A new town, a new job, and a new life, one that you didn’t even expect……

Pairing: Reader x OFC Crystal, Reader x OFC Jessie Jensen Ackles x Reader.

Word Count: 1842

Warnings will include… Smut, language, unrequited/ requited love, cheating, and possibly more. This is gonna be a slow burn y’all!! This is brand new, so I will add to it as I know. Chapters will have warnings of their own if need be….

A/N: So my little cousin was watching breaking dawn in the living room, and I was folding clothes in the guest room… When the credits rolled and this song started, this fic hit me right in the face… I couldn’t escape it.. I don’t know yet how many chapters it will be! But If you want to be tagged let me know!! As always all mistakes are mine!! Feedback is gold!! Hope you guys enjoy this one!!

Fic Based on the Song A Thousand Years, by Christina Perri

Want more? Check out my Masterlist?

*****Masterlist*****

******Series Masterlist*****

Austin, Texas. A city that seemed to have a life force of its own. Full of art, culture, music, and people of all verities. There was very little that people didn’t love about this place once you visited it. It draws you in and keeps you there. Holding you like a giant magnet and never letting you go. Like it had its own invisible pull.

Well, that’s what it did for you anyway.

And what better place to start life over than right here in Austin, Texas.

If there ever was a place in your mind you could start fresh, make something different of yourself, it was here; and if there was ever a place you could hide from you past it was here too.

Pulling the last shirt out of your bag and folding it before placing it in your dresser, you take a deep breath and look around at your new apartment. It was small, only a studio apartment, but that’s all you could afford right now. Besides, it was a start. There was a waiting list to get into most of the places like this in Austin, and you were lucky enough to know the manager of this apartment complex. She was actually your sister-in-law.

Sure, it was cheating, but you always loved your brother and his wife; and when your life fell apart back home they were the ones that suggested you move here.

Shoving the memories down of a failed engagement, and a promise of love that was obviously a lie, you make your way from your bedroom to your kitchen. You put on a small pot of coffee and sitting down with your laptop at the bar, letting out a sigh as you looked around your small space.

There was no point in dwelling on the past, only the future mattered now, or at least that what you kept telling yourself.

You had been avoiding every type of social media and most relatives since Justin left you standing at the altar. You just didn’t want to talk about it anymore. It was humiliating enough to be the bride that apparently no one really wanted, and reliving it over and over again every time someone wanted to discuss it wasn’t something you wanted to do. That was one of the main reasons why you left your home town when you were invited to live out here.

Crystal and your brother Jessie were the only people you knew in Austin. There were no high school classmates you had a danger of running into at the local supermarket, there were no “almost in-laws” living up the street from you. There were no ex fiances that you could run into at random moments in this town. No one knew you, no one knew your past, and no one would ever know if you had your way about it.

You left all that behind when you got in your car and drove to Austin, not looking back, and burying that part of you deep, deep down; never to be dug up by anyone else again.

You were just about to log onto the resume builder to start working on your resume when you heard a pounding on the door. That could only be one of two people, so you didn’t bother getting up to answer the door.

“It’s open!” you yell in the direction of the front door, not even bothering to look up when the door opened and Crystal flounced into the apartment, dropping her purse down on the bar next to you before flopping down on the vacant bar stool.

“So, you get yourself settled okay?” she asked, looking around your apartment like she’d never seen one before even though she works for the apartment complex and looks at the same damn floor plan every day.

“Yup,” you mumble, popping the P at the end. Not bothering to look up from your computer as you did.

You were a little aggravated that your brother and his wife and insisted on paying your rent up three months ahead for you, giving you a “jump-start” while you look for a job around here that could support you.

“You are still annoyed with me for paying the rent up aren’t you?” She ask, a smirk on her tinted lips. She was always one to apply the makeup heavy, and when she was at work she laid it on pretty thick.

“Yup,” you said again, hopeful she’d just drop the subject so that you could concentrate.

You’d been working for a local bar while you were still in your hometown, and so far that’s the only “job” experience you had. So you were basically just staring at your resume, with your past employer's information on it, and nothing else…

Maybe this was going to be a little harder than you thought it was going to be.

Crystal looked over your shoulder at your laptop screen, reading over your last employment information.

“So...got any idea what you want to do now that you’re here in Austin?” she asks you, stating the question like you might bight her head off if she caught you in the wrong mood.

Maybe you had been a little touchy lately, but you’d been through a lot, and your trust in people was pretty much nonexistent at this point.

The one person you let yourself trust, the one person you thought you were going to spend the rest of your life with, had let you down in one of the most humiliating ways possible, and it was going to take a lot to get past that. Even though you didn’t even want to admit it to yourself, you were pretty hung up on what happened to you. It wasn’t even “hurt” at this point, you were angry with Justin, and with most of the male population in general.

“Not a damn clue,” you admitted, running your hand through your hair and getting up to fix your cup of coffee, walking away from the most pathetic work experience list that you’d ever seen in your life on a resume for a moment before you started to cry again.

So much for a fresh start.

You were going to starve to death before you could find a damn job with a list of work experiences like the one you had, or at least that’s what the little sarcastic voice in your head retorted to you before laughing maliciously.

“Look there are a lot of bars and things around here in Austin. My suggestion is go with what you know. It may not be exactly the change you were looking for, but it will keep you in food and clothes while you look for something different that will let you start out on a training level.”

You pass her a cut of coffee across the small island bar in the middle of your kitchen before setting back down with a defeated huff, staring at your computer like if you stared at it long enough, you could will it to change it to suit you better.

Sighing defeatedly you exit out of the resume builder and start googling local bars you could walk around downtown to and see if they need a bartender. Thankfully you had just renewed your liquor license before you moved here, so at least you had that working for you.

“It’s not all bad you know, you get to meet all kinds of people in Austin working at a bar. Musicians, artists, hell we even got a few famous actors that live around here! You never know, mister right might walk right into one of those places and sweep you right off your feet,” she said, giving you an elbow to the ribs. You grimaced at her from the top of your coffee cup.

“I’m not looking for Mr. Right or Mr. Anyone for that matter. I’ve had enough of dating, relationships, and men right now to last me a lifetime,” you retort a little more sadistically than you probably actually intended.

“Oh come on, Y/N! There’s nothing wrong with having someone to have a little fun with. You’re a young, attractive woman. Don’t count off all men just because of one asshole. You will be surprised by the men out there that would give their left arm to have a chance with you. You sell yourself too short,” she chided, watching your reaction closely.

Shrugging, your roll your eyes dramatically as your brother burst through the door, not even bothering to knock.

“What’s up, ladies?” Jessie said, sitting down a few boxes of pizza on the bar in front of you.

“Dinner is served! I thought I’d be nice and pick up dinner for you girls tonight since Chris has to work late and you’re just getting settled,” he said, leaning against the bar, looking over your computer at your computer before you slammed it closed.

“My hero,” you said with a sneer.

Crystal snickered at you before opening the pizza box and grabbing a slice. “Dear God. Pizza and coffee for supper. I feel like I’m in college all over again.”

“Fuck, at this point I wish I’d have gone to college. I’m never going to find a job here that’s not slinging drinks for a bunch of drunk men at all hours of the night,” you grumble, grabbing a slice of your own.

“So that’s up with the list of local watering holes you had pulled up there? Here I was thinking you just wanted to get tossed,” he said sarcastically.

“No jackass, it’s just the only job I’m qualified for,” you growl, shooting him the finger and causing a coughing fit from Crystal who was laughing hysterically next to you.

“Well, you know if you are not interested in the whole bar scene anymore there’s a fairly new brewery that has opened up in Dripping Springs, Texas. One of our local celebrities and his family opened it up. They might be looking for someone. It is out in the country, it closes fairly early, usually it’s shut down by like 11 at night. It’s a bar, but it’s not a bar. Hell, you might even like it. Live music, trivia nights, I think it’d be a good thing for you,” he said, walking around you grabbing a glass and feeling it with water before returning back to the opposite side of the bar.

Rubbing your face with your free hand and taking a deep breath you tried to decide what to do. It didn’t sound that bad, but could things actually work out like you were supposed to? Could things actually go that right, or would it be just something that you got your hopes up for again and got let down?

Jessie could see your internal battle, reaching across the bar he grabbed your shoulder and made you look at him.

“I’ll tell you what, both Chris and I have tomorrow off, let’s drive out there and see if they’re looking for anyone to hire. Either way, it might be fun. You deserve to have a little fun after everything that you’ve been through. Let’s just go have a good family day.”

“Okay, okay fine!” you said, leaning back and crossing your arms over your chest. “We’ll go check it out.”

Deep down inside there was a twinge of nerves you hadn’t felt in a very long time, and you didn’t know what to make of it, but you knew that if this worked out it could be the change you were looking for.

Could you really be that lucky?

———————————————————————————————-

Tag List:

@deanwanddamons @imabitch4jensen @rvgrsbrns @bi-danvers0 @onethirstyunicorn @i-love-superhero @onethirstyunicorn @akshi8278

Series Tag List:

@prettydeaneyes

@supersassyprobablysad

@fangirlxwritesx67

@ricanqueen20

@xhannahbananax03

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amphtaminedreams · 3 years

Text

If We Can’t Have the Parties, At Least We Have the Coats: Lookbook no.13

Hi to anyone reading,

It’s been a weird winter, right?

A winter that I REALLY did not need to buy as many clothes for as I have. You WILL save loads of money during this lockdown, I told myself. You WILL. And yet here I am in December, in exactly the same financial position I was in March. You would think that making the switch to an environmentally friendly wardrobe would mean I own less but now I no longer have the guilt of supporting fast fashion to hold me back, I’ve accumulated more clothes than ever. Part of a sustainable wardrobe is also about reducing your consumption so now I’ve mostly made the move towards only supporting transparent companies/small businesses, I can move onto the buying less part. I haven’t thrown any clothes away but still, I am not the clothes rescuer I think I am-more just an overdraft abuser. To add to that, for those of us actually following the rules (half the people I went to secondary school with flaunting their apparently unaffected social lives on Instagram, I’m looking at you) there aren’t actually all that many opportunities to wear new outfits. Not to go too first world problems, but it is a little shit when getting dressed up and doing your makeup is one of the things that you do to help you feel a little better, especially when the seasonal (and situational in these times) depression kicks in.

So yes, I have been extra af recently and combatted this with the decision to start making an effort to outfit plan for the most basic of tasks. We’re talking a full face of makeup and accessories for going into town to get a coffee or to meet a friend for a walk. I mean, I still go to Tesco in my trackies but if I’m seeing somebody else, I am sure as hell going to treat it as a reason to wear something nice. See the winter outfits section of the lookbook as your inspiration to do the same because I can guarantee you the sense of normality forcing yourself to take makeup off at the end of the day brings will actually make you feel a lot better. Genuinely the mark of exceptional times. We’ve also got the few days relief period over Christmas in the UK where we’re allowed to mix with a maximum of 3 other households, and ignoring the fact that it doesn’t really make any sense given that the number of people you could end up mixing with depends on the size of the households and is realistically completely arbitrary (I have a lot of feelings about how fucking moronic half the decisions this government has been making are but then again, what’s new?), I’m sure those of you with big families are gonna be partying. I’m only spending Christmas with my immediate family but I thought I’d put some more festive outfits together anyway. I know, I know, it sounds like I’m just bullshitting an explanation as to why I put this lookbook together when in reality I’m trying to make myself feel better about the damage to my bank account buuuut it really is more a case of being inspired by my Depop finds and if you are trying to quit fast fashion, I can’t recommend the app enough (especially if you know what you’re looking for). As I did in the last lookbook, I will make sure to include the tags of all the people I bought these pieces from but I also thought it might be helpful to make a note of some of the descriptors I used to find them so you can get more of an idea how to find the things you’re looking for too, as well as prices. I did include the names of the shops I bought the few fast fashion items I styled from too, mostly earlier this year or at some point over the last couple of years, on the basis that they may be a useful search prompt if you’re looking for something similar or the exact item-the majority are no longer available (disclaimer: I haven’t bought anything from Boohoo in a longgg time) to buy but you might be able to find an account that’s selling a used version. Don’t be put off by that-I’ve had to wash a couple of pieces but for the most part, that hasn’t been necessary. Charity shops usually wash things before they put them out, so you have nothing to worry about there either-I expect that they’re particularly thorough at the moment considering the COVID crisis.

Enough rambling from me for now! Enjoy!

-(SOCIALLY DISTANCED) PARTY SZN LOOKS-

Powder Blue Wide Brim Felt Hat/Fedora: £16.99

Structured White Mesh Oh Polly Mini Dress w/Ruched Detail: £27

Black PVC Beret w/Red Flame Detail: £14

Red Fit and Flare Dress w/Satin Corset & Tulle Skirt: £12

Black PVC Vintage Platform Boots w/Red Flame Detail: £27

White Satin Corset w/Straps: £8

Pinstripe Cropped Blazer Co-ord Set: £12.50

Oh Mighty Strappy Contrast Corset: £27

Contrast Check Cigarette Trousers: £15

Pink Topshop Gingham Blazer Co-ord Set BNWT: £35

White Strappy Corset w/Suspender Detail: £10

White PVC Beret w/Black Flame Detail: £14

Reworked Strappy Patchwork Sports Cropped Tee: £10

Black Combat Cargo Trousers: £5

Strappy Tie-dye Pretty Little Thing Corset BNWT: £15

PVC/Vinyl Zip-up Mini Skirt w/Belt Detail: £9

White Satin Cowl Neck Mini Slip Dress: £8

Urban Outfitters ‘90s Style Celestial Print Mesh Babydoll Dress: £15

-(SOMETIMES PRACTICAL) COAT SZN LOOKS-

UNIF Colour Block Oversized Jumper/Sweater: £25

Topshop Dark Wash Denim Kick Flare Jeans w/Frayed Hem Detail: £16

Vintage ‘70s Style Brown Faux Suede Western Blazer/Jacket: £15

Black Velvet High Neck Bodysuit w/Keyhole Detail: £4

Topshop Paisley Print Chiffon Midi Dress: £15

Brandy Melville Cropped Motorcross Slogan Slogan Tee: £13.60

Ragged Priest Gingham Cargo/Combat Trousers w/Utility Style Buckle Detailing: £33

Black Kappa Logo Beanie: £12

White Platform FILA Disruptors in Good Condition: £55

Black Fur Bucket Hat: £8

Celestial Silver Moon Detail Chain Belt: £18

Black Satin Cowl Neck Detail Midi Slip Dress: £15

Floral Print Platform Boots: £10

Blue Denim ASOS High Rise Mom Jeans: £12

Brown Vintage ‘70s Style Afghan Coat w/Fur Trim: £25

Teal Wide Brim Felt Hat/Fedora: £10

Topshop Floral Print A-Line Jacquard Mini Skirt: £7

Lana Del Rey Screen Printed T-Shirt: £9.99

Vintage Corduroy Contrast Stripe Trousers w/Kick Flare: £28

Anyone that read to the end, thank you so much as always and I hope this shows just how many in-trend pieces you can find second hand! I know I'm SUPER far behind to the point where it’s closer to the F/W2021 shows now than it is since the S/S2021 collections were showcased but I decided I am going to do a full length fashion week review. I also have a few moodboards planned and my next is gonna be one focussing purely on plus sized fashion as the feedback that I got from my New Style Icons post was that I could have included more bigger girls; I am so, so, SO passionate about body positivity and fat acceptance, especially since I know my own relationship with my body would be so much better if this kind of movement was more prominent when I was younger, so I don’t for a minute want anyone to think it was my intention to be exclusionary in any way. It bears repeating that I genuinely appreciate feedback in any form (as long as it’s not too mean and presumptive, lol) and I hope the next post doesn’t disappoint! It hasn’t been a good year for cinema due to COVID having lead to theatre closures, however I still do want to do another film tier ranking in the new year as that is something I really enjoyed doing last time. Any more suggestions are welcome!

As always, my inbox is always open if you need someone to talk to or just wanna chat about a post:-) I am constantly on the look out for new blogs to follow and people to interact with so any communication is welcome. I’m not sure if I’ll get another post finished before we enter 2021, SO I wanna say that I hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas and that this shitshow of a year DOES come to an end at 11:59PM on the 31st because THOSE MEMES ABOUT IT TURNING DECEMBER THE 32ND ARE NOT FUNNY! Here’s to our second attempt at our first year of the roaring twenties (because this past year it feels like we skipped them and went straight to The Great Depression, the likely incoming recession denial is real) and to happier times and good health for everyone.

Lauren x

DISCLAIMER: Background in the first 2 images are mine, others are not. I found them on Pinterest so not sure of the artists but if you do know, drop me a message so I can credit them!

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jaeminlore · 5 years

Text

Darlin’ | Lucas

summary: i love the way you soften my life with your love

words: 4K+

category: biker!lucas, fluff, tattooist on the boardwalk!lucas, reader just wants some sun

“I told you, I don’t want to move.” You open one eye and squint towards your best friend, Hana, who for some reason can never sit still.

It’s summer break, you can’t help but think. Exams just ended and it’s time to stay on the beach every day until you turn into a merperson. Summers in Salos are the best for this reason, and you have decided to spend your first week of summer promptly sleeping on the beach.

Hana doesn’t know how to relax, or rather, doesn’t know how to stop putting her nose in places that don’t belong. “But the bike show is starting today. There are going to be so many hot guys and girls there with their bikes.”

“I want a bike,” you grumble. Your timer beeps, so you restart it and turn on your back. “Go check them out and I’ll be here.”

Hana whines and pulls the hem of your bottoms, letting the waistband snap against your skin. “I can’t go alone!”

“Ow!” You rub at your waist. “I’m coming, okay? But you’re buying me dinner afterward.”

“Whatever,” Hana grabs your arm as soon as you’re done covering your top half with a hoodie. “Let’s go, I heard that all those hot tattoo artists have their bikes set up in front of their shop.”

You know what shop she’s talking about. It’s Neo Tattoos, owned by a few handsome, yet intimidating boys. They’re often the center of attention at most beach parties, always revving their bikes too loud in the parking lot just beside the beach. Parties with them are always exciting, because they come armed with a stick and poke gun and a business card for the customer’s more sober morning, where they can cover up what they drunkenly got at the party.

Businessmen, for sure.

“What do you even do at a bike show?” You grab your bag and swing it over your shoulder. Hana barely waits for you to slip your sandals on before she’s forcing you to trudge up the sand dunes, past the snow cone cart, up to one of the many boardwalk entrances.

An entire part of the boardwalk is set up with bikes. People’s motorcycles line the pathways, and their owners just sit in lawn chairs with cups of beer, waiting for someone to come up and spark a conversation about their souped up motor vehicles. Tourists fall right into the trap, traveling to the island just to take a peak at what these people have been working on for the entire year.

You like the show, mostly because you have sort of always wanted a motorbike, and these shows are a nice chance to find people willing to seek their old rides. But they can be terribly boring, and you have no idea why Hana would put the two of you through it. Even if there are cute boys attending.

Neo Tattoos sits further down the boardwalk, away from the pier and closer to the nightlife scene. Bars and restaurants line the boardwalk for people who have spent their entire day shopping or swimming. There’s a club somewhere around here, run by the same people who keep the karaoke cabana down by the beach up and running.

You stop on the way, looking at the different bikes. Hana drags you on, and the two of you stop just in front of the tattoo parlor.

The place doesn’t look like it belongs in front of a beach. The entire storefront is made of black bricks, all splattered with different neon paint. It looks cool at night, the neon paint glows in the dark and draws excited university students in.

You’ve considered getting a tattoo there, but you aren’t sure you what design you want. Even if you did, you might go to a different one just to escape the embarrassment that is Hana around cute boys.

Apparently today, you don’t get a choice.

There’s an annoying tingling of chimes that rings throughout the shop as soon as the two of you enter.

The man behind the counter greets the two of you. “I’m Johnny. What can I get for you two, today?”

“I want a tattoo,” Hana says. She’s putting on that sugary sweet voice that can win over just about anyone’s heart. “But I only have a twenty.”

You want to call bull on her lying ass, but she’s batting her eyelashes at Johnny and he seems to be actually considering it.

“Let’s see what we can do,” Johnny winks at Hana and then cuts his gaze towards you. “Did you want one too?”

“Not today, thanks.” You hug your arms close to yourself. “I’m just here to support.”

Johnny stands up, and he’s a pretty big guy. He towers over you both, with his wide, but lanky, posture. He’s wearing a white t-shirt tucked into blue jeans, and a long chain hangs off his neck.

You’re eye-level with the lock charm on the chain.

“Follow me,” he says. “Lucas is the only one taking walk-ins today, so hopefully you like his style.”

“She doesn’t get to choose a style with only twenty bucks to her name,” you quip, making Johnny laugh.

He turns the corner into a small, square room, where only one tattoo chair occupies the floor. Some unknown song plays from the large black and yellow speakers. It’s surfing music, something similar to The Beach Boys. It fits the location, but rejects the atmosphere of black and neon that these boys have cemented as their staple design.

There’s a sketching desk in the corner, where the previously mentioned speakers rest alongside a large monitor. The screen is taken fully by photoshop, where a tattoo design basks, just waiting to be praised.

You walk over; rest you hand on the back of the rolling chair, and stare at the design. It’s black and white ink. The silhouette is of a shark, but the body is a drawing of the beach. His fin is a wave, and his underbelly is the sand. It’s really beautiful. And when you look up at the sketches on the wall and notice that all of them are similar in their surrealistic nature. Charcoal sketches of beach scenes and ocean life and local fauna have you sort of mesmerized from the start.

“Do you like them?” Someone asks you from behind. It’s a new voice: deep and boyish, and you feel suddenly vulnerable for looking so deeply into someone else’s art.

“They’re really good,” You turn around as you reply, and any other words that might have made their way to your mouth are swallowed back down your throat, along with your dignity.

He’s just as tall as Johnny — Does this place only hire tall guys? — but he’s cuter, in your opinion. You can barely see his big eyes, hidden behind dark brown strands of hair. You follow the line of his nose down until you reach his lips. They’re ruddy and seem to be permanently formed into a pretty pout.

Then he’s smiling, and his teeth are bright and straight and you feel you breath knock out of your chest.

You manage to tear your eyes away from his mouth long enough to form a coherent sentence. “They’re really beautiful. Worth much more than twenty dollars.”

“Sorry?” He asks, cocking his head to the side.

Johnny nudges Hana forward gently. “Lucas, this is Hana. Hana, Lucas. She wants a tattoo but only has twenty dollars.”

Hana gives Lucas a shy wave. “Sorry if it’s an inconvenience.”

“Not at all!” Lucas chuckles, and it’s soft and melodic and boyish. “Most of these are customs or just freehand. Tell me what you’re thinking design-wise, and I’ll see what I can cook up.“

Lucas walks past you to sit on his chair, so you retreat to the wall, awkwardly cocking your hip, arms crossed over your chest.

“I’ll leave you guys to it,” Johnny slaps the doorframe and heads back towards the front of the shop, and you’re left to wonder what you’re supposed to do.

Lucas uses the wheeled chair to get around. He wheels to the other side of the desk and pulls a large binder out of one of the drawers. “Here are some of my minimalist designs. That’s pretty much all a twenty is going to get you, so see if any of these interest or inspire you.”

Hana flips through the book, and Lucas turns to you. “I didn’t catch your name.”

“Y/n,” you say, shifting your posture. “Here for moral support.”

Lucas locks his gaze into yours and repeats you name slowly, like he’s mulling it over. “Y/n. Would you like to sit down? You can take my spinny chair and I’ll go get a spare stool.”

“Are you sure—” he’s out of the room before you can finish your concern. You turn to Hana and shrug.

“He’s cute,” she whispers. She sits back on the chair and straightens her shirt.

You sit in the chair and roll over to the other side of Hana’s chair. “Are you gonna ignore the google eyes Johnny was giving you?”

“Oh, of course not.” Hana waves away your concern. “I got his number while you were snooping on Lucas’ monitor.”

“I wasn’t snooping!”

“You so were,” Hana grins at you, resting her chin on the palm of her head. “Anyways, I was gonna say Lucas is cute for you.”

“You’re impossible,” you shove her shoulder back with a shake of your head. “What did I say about summer boyfriends?”

“We don’t need them.” Hana pouts. She sticks her tongue out at you just as Lucas walks in. “I’m gonna get one anyway.”

“Get what?” Lucas sets his stool on the other side of Hana’s chair and looks at you.

You blink. “Um...” You avert your eyes to the loose thread sticking out of the chair handle. “Hana wants us each to have summer boyfriends.”

Lucas hums. He turns back to his desk and extracts the tattoo gun and a wrapped needle. He unwraps it and fits it in the gun. “Just for the summer?” His eyes are twinkling. Again, he’s asking you. It’s like Hana isn’t even in the room, which is new to you because everyone notices Hana first.

You almost answer. You’re about to when Hana shoves the book into Lucas’ hand. “I want the key design.”

Lucas pulls his gaze away from you and smiles at Hana. “Alright, let’s get started!”

☼

You visit the bike show later that week on your lunch break. Working at the small perfume shop on the boardwalk can be fun, but it certainly makes you want fresh air by noon.

You take a sip of the lemonade you bought and browse the bikes, stopping every once in awhile to talk to the owners.

“Y/n!” Lucas’ voice rings across the boardwalk. He’s in front of Neo Tattoos, leaning against a cherry red Ducati.

It’s way too hot for him to be wearing what he’s wearing. He’s wearing black skinny jeans and a leather jacket. His hair is down across his forehead again, slightly matted with sweat. He wipes his forehead and waves at you, arm long and tall above everyone’s head.

He looks incredibly dorky, and it puts a smile on your face. You walk over. “Aren’t you hot?”

“Just a little bit,” Lucas pinches his thumb and pointer finger together. Then he runs his fingers through his bangs and pushes them off of his forehead. “I look cooler this way, though.”

You look around, to see everyone else with their bikes. Most of them are in their swimsuits, or at least wearing only bottoms. You turn back to Lucas and push your lemonade towards him. “Take a sip before you get a heatstroke. And take off your jacket, at least.”

Lucas shrugs off his jacket, to reveal a red t-shirt underneath. “At least I match my bike.”

“This is yours?” You reach out and touch the shiny chrome. “It’s pretty.”

“Thank you!” Lucas brightens up. He slaps the seat. “It’s the first thing I bought after opening Neo with Johnny.”

“I’m gonna get one one day,” you tell him. He gives you your lemonade cup back and you take a sip. “And a tattoo.”

“You’re gonna ask me to do it, right?” Lucas grins down at you.

How could you say no to that face? “Yeah. I really liked that shark design, if it isn’t reserved.”

“No,” Lucas hugs his jacket to his chest. “I was just messing around with designs. Give me a call when you’re ready, alright? I’ll give you my number.”

You return from your lunch break with an empty lemonade cup, the number of a cute boy, and a smile on your face.

☼

The next time you get a day off, you head over to Neo Tattoos for your appointment with Lucas.

You two have been texting back and forth throughout the days. You’ve found that Lucas has a large arsenal of memes always at the ready. Another thing you’ve realized is that Lucas is the most adorable person you’ve ever known. He texts you every morning with a little picture of a baby sea turtle or dolphin or other baby marine animal. You reply with a random puppy picture you find on twitter, and every day it makes never fails to trigger an onslaught of heart emojis from Lucas.

It’s really cute.

Lucas is really cute. It’s probably too early to call it a crush, but it certainly feels like one, especially when you get called out by Hana for smiling at your text messages.

The chimes ring when you enter the parlor. “Hi, Johnny.”

“Lucas! Y/n is here!” Johnny yells into the hallway before turning to you. “He has been talking about this appointment all day.”

“Can you shut up?” You hear Lucas before you see him. He comes out of his room and smiles. “Hey, Y/n.”

“Hey, Lucas.” You scurry towards the back room, if only to avoid Johnny’s knowing stare. “How was your day?”

“Good. Better now that you’re here.” Lucas cocks his head to the side and gives you a cheesy smirk.

You shove his shoulder back and climb onto the big chair. “Let’s get this over with. I have a date with the sun later.”

Lucas falls back into his spinning chair and scoots himself towards you. He rests his elbows beside your thigh and gleams up at you. “You’re gonna ditch me for a nap in the sun?”

He looks so boyishly handsome, smiling at you like that. He looks like someone in love. Like someone who is staring at their significant other in admiration.

It makes you feel vulnerable and naked. You clear your throat and shove your arm in front of his face. “So, forearm?”

Lucas turns on some music and gets started, stopping every few minutes to check with you. “Does it hurt?”

“Not too bad,” you say with a shake of your head. “Just a little sting here and there.”

Lucas holds his left palm out. “You can always squeeze my hand if it gets too much.”

“Do you want to hold my hand that bad, Lucas?” you tease, and the pink that creeps up his neck is enough for you to reach forward and grab his hand.

You hold it in your lap while he finishes up the tattoo, never really squeezing it. At most, you run your thumb along the back of his hand.

It feels good, his large hand encased in yours. His skin is almost as warm as the smile he gives you from time to time.

Soon, with a low hum and one last wipe down, your tattoo is done. “Let me bandage it, and then you can go one your stupid date.”

You giggle. “Are you jealous of the sun, Lucas?”

Lucas brings your hand to his cheek and hums, looking up to the ceiling. “Of course I’m jealous. I want you to spend more time with me.”

“What would you have in mind?”

Lucas looks surprised. The color reappears in his cheeks and he clears his throat to collect himself. “Would you like to go on a ride with me? We could drive down to the pier and watch the sunset?”

You blink. Is Lucas asking you on a date? An actual date? As in, he likes you?

“U-Uh, yeah.” You match his grin and feel your chest warm. More confidently, you manage a nod. “Yeah, I’d love that.”

☼

You pick up dinner while Lucas finishes up his shift, and when you return, he’s got that stupid leather jacket on again. He sees the bag of fast food and opens his backpack. “Do you mind wearing this on the way?”

“No,” you giggle. “But let’s get going. I’m hungry.”

Lucas swings his leg over the seat and passes a helmet to you. He revs his bike. “As you wish.”

You swing your legs around and grab his waist, clasping your hands together. Palms against his abdomen, you can feel the smooth lines underneath. It flusters you. Still, you don’t move your hands for the bigger fear of falling off.

Besides, being this close to Lucas is quite nice.

Lucas parks his bike next to a bicycle rack just off the pier’s entrance.

“I’m not sure you can park here, Lucas.”

Lucas looks ethereal in the light of the setting sun. His large eyes peer down at you, and with a smile grazing his features, he looks like an angel. He shrugs, “It says bike rack.”

“You’re crazy,” you say, eyes bright.

Lucas bumps his shoulder against yours and grabs for your hand. Linking his fingers with yours, he swings your hands back and forth as the two of you walk towards the end of the pier.

There’s a railing for public safety. Lucas fits his long legs through the lower bars anyways. His feet dangle in the air. “Let’s eat!” He raises his fists in the air.

You avoid the annoyed stares of onlookers and follow Lucas’ actions. You fit your legs under the bars.

The two of you eat burgers and watch as the sunset returns to its bed behind the sea.

“It’s beautiful,” Lucas says. He reaches his hands out towards the darkening sky. “I love this island. I never want to leave.”

“Me neither,” you sigh. The lighthouse beam switches on, and the beam falls over the two of you before finding its place in the air. You watch the light turn. “I’m glad I came out here with you.”

Lucas grins. His cheeks are blossoming into reds and pinks and you like the way flustered looks on him. “Me too,” he says. “Genuinely. I really like you.”

“I like you too.” You scoot closer to him and rest your head against his arm. “A lot.”

☼

The sun is scorching. It causes an instant sweat the moment you walk under the rays. “Alright, Jaemin?”

The lifeguard waves at you from his perch, a silver whistle pressed between his lips. “Lucas was looking for you,” he says around the metal.

“Don’t tell him I’m here,” you say. “Give me a minute underneath the sun without him or Hana ruining it.”

“Copy,” Jaemin says with a salute, giggling at your perturbed expression. He’s been particularly happy lately. You wonder why.

No matter, you decide, choosing to focus on your plans for today: laying in the sun and ignoring life in general.

The island fills your senses. The sound of the waves; of children playing; of seagulls screaming for food. It’s everything Salos is, and it feels like home. Nothing makes you feel more at peace than here, on the beach. To feel the sand beneath you and know the entire ocean is only a few yards away; that’s heaven.

What isn’t heaven is when a large cloud covers the sun, keeping you from receiving warmth.

You open your eyes, ready to glare at the cloud in annoyance.

Only it isn’t a cloud; it’s Lucas. His large frame blocks the sun from you. His smile is just as bright, though, so you find yourself not minding quite as much. “Hey, Lucas. What’s up?”

Lucas gives you an apologetic grin and sheds his leather jacket. “Sorry for bothering you. I was on my break and I saw you over here. Can I sit with you?”

“Go for it.” You scoot over on the towel so Lucas has room.

He plops down, dropping his backpack in front of him. He extracts an apple. “Do you want one? I packed two.”

You take a bite of the offered apple and lean your arm against Lucas’. “How was your morning?”

“Good,” Lucas says in his deep voice. “Only two appointments, but the first one took three hours. My hands hurt.”

You take the hand he isn’t holding his apple with and begin to gently massage it. You knead circular motions into his palm and fingers, discarding your apple in favor of the task at hand.

“You don’t- You don’t have to do that.” Red blossoms across Lucas’ neck. He watches his hand encased in both of yours.

“I want to,” you say. Lucas’ eyes flit across your face, and you feel openly vulnerable with your face so close to his.

Especially now, when your face is bare of everything, save SPF 80 sunscreen. You can just picture your bright red cheeks and peeling nose. Maybe your lips are chapped too, since you forgot to apply chapstick this morning.

Lucas doesn’t mention any of this, so you assume you’re just overreacting.

“Y/n?” Lucas asks. He licks his lips, quickly, but you catch the motion.

You know what’s coming. Truthfully, it’s been coming since the day you met Lucas; when the tension began. Then came the feelings, and you’ve been stuck ever since.

Maybe Lucas has been stuck too.

He ever-so-gently reaches up and tucks a flyaway strand of hair behind your ear. His hands are sticky from the apple juice, but you can’t really be bothered to care right now. Not when Lucas is treating you so softly.

Your senses zone in on Lucas only. His large brown eyes, colorful tattoos, and too-long bangs falling into his eyes. His scent, like some generic body wash that smells boyish and soft, just like Lucas.

His lips, pouty and smooth and pink.

His fingertips trace down from your hairline to your chin. When his thumb swipes across your lips, your breath catches in your throat.

Then Lucas is leaning in, too fast for you to even think about what he’s going to do. Well, obviously he’s going to kiss you, but your brain seems to be filled with nothing but warning bells and signals screaming for you to lower your adrenaline levels.

His lips fold into yours almost perfectly. Your thoughts turn over into the feeling of his fingertips trailing down your neck. His palm rests in the junction between your neck and shoulder. He pulls your closer to him and sighs against your mouth.

You move your lips, smiling when his nose bumps into yours. He tastes like green apples. You rest your hand on his knee and lean in closer. You giggle at the surprised noise that escapes his mouth.

The sound of a whistle makes the two of you jump apart.

“No kissing on the public beach!” Jaemin shouts at the two of you, no real venom in his voice.

You kiss Lucas once more and give Jaemin the bird.

He whistles again. “That’s illegal!”

“It’s not,” Lucas giggles, hiding his face in the crook of you neck.

☼

You walk into Neo Tattoos. “Where’s Lucas?”

Johnny closes his magazine and looks at you. “Well hello to you, too.”

“I brought him a lemonade and my break is almost over,” you say in passing, heading for the back.

“Lucas!”

“Y/n!” He shouts back.

You enter to see him with a customer. He’s so cute when he’s focused. You look at his gloved hands and furrowed brows. It makes you lean against the doorframe and watch him fondly for a moment.

He finally looks away from his customer. “Hey, Darlin’”

His wide smile makes the trip across the boardwalk worth it. You hand him the lemonade. “I have to get back to the shop, but I wanted to see you real quick.”

Lucas stands up and pulls off his gloves. “You’re too kind. Can I come visit you after my shift and take you out?”

“I’d like that a lot.” You kiss him and squeeze him tightly. Hopefully he can feel all of your love through your hug.

Because you really love this boy. He softens your world and makes everything feel warmer. He encases you in an eternal summer, and you don’t ever want it to end.

#sounds of the summer au #biker!lucas #lucas fluff #yukhei fluff #lucas au #yukhei au #lucas scenario #yukhei scenario #destwrites

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isitgintimeyet · 4 years

Text

Road To The Aisles

AO3

So first weekend in December, time to put the tree up! And time for another chapter. Hope you enjoy.

Thanks to @mo-nighean-rouge @happytoobserve @wickedgoodbooks for their support

Chapter 14 : An Unwarranted Repercussion

Margaret was not a ready lover, but where she loved she loved passionately, and with no small degree of jealousy.

― Elizabeth Gaskell, North and South

Even though Claire had turned her back on Tom, she could sense he was still there, awkwardly dancing. She was becoming more and more annoyed with his behaviour. Her enjoyment was being ruined by a drunken letch.

A drunken letch who now moved closer and whispered in her ear.

“If ye give me yer phone number, I can call and we could mebbe discuss a feature spread…” he emphasised the last word before continuing. “... benef… bene… good for all of us. I’d like tae see ye again. I dinna think Jamie needs tae know. Aye?”

His hand rested on the small of her back. Claire took a step back, away from him, dislodging his hand.

“No,” she replied fiercely. “That’s not going to happen. We don’t need your magazine that much. I don’t know what gives you the right to think I would even contemplate that. I have been polite to you all night, but no more. So just fuck right off.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Claire noticed Jamie brushing past people to get to them. He very deliberately came to stand between Claire and Tom, his hand possessively around her shoulders, pulling her tight against him. She could feel the tension in his body, ready to explode at any moment. Jenny disappeared off the dance floor to fetch Ian.

“I’ll thank ye tae no’ put yer hands on ma fiancée,” he hissed. “D’ye think I wouldna see? Ye try one more thing like that and, so help me god, drunk or no’ I will take ye outside and punch yer fuckin’ lights out.”

Tom pulled himself up to his full height, five inches less than Jamie, and stared challengingly at him, a slight smile on his face.

“Come on, let’s go. Ignore him… be the bigger man.” Claire tried to guide Jamie away, but he remained stationary, feet firmly planted.

Ian came up on Jamie’s other side. “Och, man, ye dinna want tae be bothering wi’ this drunken wee gobshite. Ye ken I always have yer back, but this shithead is no’ worth our energy. Let him be. Listen tae what Claire says. Time tae go home, I think.”

Jamie’s body relaxed slightly as he allowed Claire to guide him away. He momentarily turned back to Tom.

“I mean it. Ye better hope I never see ye again, Mister Christie.”

*****************

Jamie was silent on the taxi ride home, apart from the occasional instruction to the driver. Once inside the house, he locked the front door and headed straight for the bedroom, taking the stairs two at a time.

Claire pottered around downstairs for a few minutes before following.

Jamie was in the bathroom, cleaning his teeth. Claire pushed the door open and turned her back to him.

“Unzip me would you?”

With the toothbrush wedged in his mouth, he did as she asked, before moving back to the wash basin.

“Are we going to talk about tonight, Jamie? Or are you just going to carry on not speaking? Because if that's the case, you may want to think about where you're planning on sleeping tonight. I'm not sharing a bed with you and your shitty mood."

Having hung her dress up, Claire quickly popped an old t-shirt of Jamie’s on and sat on the bed waiting for him to join her. Eventually he came into the bedroom, a towel wrapped around his middle and sat beside her.

“So?” she prompted.

“Weel…” Jamie started then ground to a halt.

“Hmm?”

“Yer man, Tom Christie. I could see how he was, wi’ ye all evening… trying it on wi’ ye. I didna like it. I had tae say something tae him.”

“And you did. So it’s over. We don’t have to bother about him again.”

“It’s jes’...” he hesitated again, staring down at his hands. “It’s jes’... I didna like the way ye were talking tae him, dancing with him. Giving him encouragement, mebbe?”

Claire rose and went to stand in front of Jamie. She tried to keep her voice calm. “Let me get this straight. He was trying to flirt with me and somehow it’s my fault? I don’t know what to say.”

Calmness be damned, Claire decided. “Actually I do know what to say… and you will sit and listen to this, with no interruptions.”

She took a deep breath. “Yes, he was talking to me, and I was being polite, not flirty, polite. There is a difference.”

The anger was now clear in her voice. “I was polite, talking about the distillery, the whisky launch in Japan. Trying to encourage him to do a feature for the magazine. That’s why I didn’t want to be rude to him… for you and your family.”

“But what about when ye were dancing?”

“What about it? I was dancing with Jenny. You know how much I love to dance. I was having a great time and he came up to me. I wasn’t dancing with him, I was trying to avoid him.”

“Ye could have stopped dancing, come back tae the table.” Jamie was unwilling to back down, although, as he snatched a glance at Claire’s face he knew this was a big mistake. He had an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach that he was fighting the wrong battle. His fury was with Tom Christie and his drunken flirting and now he realised that he was taking it out on Claire.

Jamie tried to continue talking but Claire held a hand up to silence him.

“I’m speaking and you can talk when I’m finished. So I was supposed to stop doing what I was doing, what I enjoyed doing, because of him? Oh, that’s right,” Claire’s voice took on a sarcastic tone. “The solution to men behaving badly, or inappropriately, is always the same -- women are expected to change what they do, what they wear, what they say. Why it’s always the woman’s fault, I don’t know. When will men realise they have to change their behaviour, not expect us to be forced to change ours?”

As Claire paused to gather her thoughts, Jamie seized his opportunity. “I ken ye’re probably no’ finished and I will listen tae whatever else ye have tae say but…”

He reached out to take Claire’s hand. Reluctantly she let him hold it, letting it rest passively against his palm.

“... but ye’re right. What I expected ye tae do back there… I tried tae make ye accountable fer his behaviour. Ye did nothing wrong and I wanted ye tae change yer actions. I’m that furious wi’ Tom Christie and I tried tae take it out on ye. I’m sorry. Am I forgiven?”

Claire moved and sat next to Jamie on the end of the bed, her hand still in his. She lightly stroked his palm.

“Well, yes, but think about what I said. You’ve no need to be jealous. Remember that. And remember not to take it out on me either. That's not fair. I don’t let it bother me when women flirt with you.”

Jamie gave Claire a quizzical look.

“Oh come on, don’t give me that look, don’t pretend that you don’t notice when women try and flirt with you. That makeup artist the other week, for example, making eyes at you and telling me how gorgeous you are.”

“Nah, Sassenach, it wasna that --“ Jamie stopped abruptly. He had been about to say that it did bother Claire when a certain woman had tried to flirt with him, but suddenly realised that it would be a very bad idea to bring Geneva into this conversation. And, he told himself, it wasn’t Geneva trying to flirt that made Claire angry, it had been her blatant attempts to sabotage their relationship.

"... it was… er… I didna ken that you notice," he finished lamely.

“Of course I notice. I notice all the time. And I don’t have a go at you about it, do I?”

Jamie shook his head. “Sassenach, I’m sorry. Are we good now?”

“Ok. Just remember what I said though. Promise?”

“Promise.”

******************

Jamie tapped lightly on the door and, without waiting for an answer, poked his head into the office.

“Am I disturbing?” he asked Ian and Jenny, both sitting at the small meeting table set up in Ian’s office.

“Nae more than usual,” Jenny quipped, pulling a face.

“Ah, sisterly love is a grand thing,” Ian joked. “Nah, ye’re no’ bothering. In fact ye’ve timed it well. We’ve jes’ got the proofs from the advertising agency. Do ye want tae see?”

The proofs were spread across the table. All contained the same elements, a background of purple heather-clad hills, Claire’s barely tamed curls and eyes and, in the foreground, the amber whisky in either a glass or bottle on its side, obscuring the lower half of her face. The difference between the variety of images lay with her eyes - some crinkled with laughter, some wide and dreamy, staring into the distance and some with an indefinable glint. Indefinable, that is, to most people but Jamie could swear he knew exactly what she was thinking about.

“They’re breathtaking. The colour of Claire’s eyes next tae the whisky…”

“Aye, I ken,” Jenny replied. “‘Twas a great idea of yers. Seems Claire is truly becoming part of the family business, does it no’?”

“I love that. She really belongs here wi’ me… wi’ us.”

“She does and all. And Wee Jamie in the car this morning told us he’s going tae marry someone with curly hair who fixes people.” Ian smiled.

Jamie took another look at the images on the table. “I dinna ken which I’d choose. Good luck tae ye making that decision.”

“Actually,” Ian gathered up the sheets. “We’re going tae let Brian have the final say.”

“Anyway,” Jamie settled himself in a spare chair and opened up his iPad. “That’s no’ why I’m here. After all that stramash wi’ Tom Christie the other night, I didna think the magazine would be keen tae feature us, but no, here, I’ve an email from his daughter Malva. She’s head of marketing there, aye? And she’s asking if we would be willing tae let the magazine feature our Japanese launch. How good is that?”

He looked across the table at Ian and Jenny, sitting with a slight smile on her face.

“What do ye ken?” he asked Ian.

Ian shrugged his shoulders. “It’s no’ ma story.”

“Jenny?”

Jenny reached for Jamie’s iPad and quickly scanned the email.

“I didna realise, but Malva’s wee lad is at the same pre-school as Jamie. I didna ken as the bairn is no’ called Christie. Anyway, I happened to see her, fer the first time at drop off this morning. I may have mentioned in our conversation that her da had been on our table at the charity gala and may possibly have made a wee bit of a drunken tit of himself, leading to a slight difference of opinion with yerself. She kens the value of business, she willna want tae risk losing our advertising. Hence the email… trying tae get back in our good books.”

Jenny passed the iPad back to Jamie and continued. “I didna mention Claire tae Malva. It’s bad enough having a drunken dickhead for a father, let alone a drunken, lecherous one.”

Jamie laughed. “Jenny, ye’re a marvel, so ye are.”

“Aye, weel, dinna the two of ye ever forget it.”

#outlander fan fiction #outlander fanfic #Road To The Aisles #Jamie Fraser #Claire Beauchamp #chapter 14

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marvelgbt-posts · 5 years

Text

Forever

{Peter Parker x Male Reader}

Warnings: none… angst…? slight self hate ig but idk you’ll see…

Summary: a peter parker x male reader where peter gets insecure about mj and readers friendship since he sees how good they look together and knew MJ had a slight crush on reader. Reader fixes the problem by cuddling him, giving him slight kisses on his neck and just some fluffy shit. also cute bby boy peter being all flushed and cute

I really hate giving MJ this role, but ok :/ and also, what do you us think about MJ and Peter in FFH? Personally, i dont like it. I’ll make it it’s own post, it’s mostly a personal preference though.

(not edited)

“OMG, [M/N]. You’re too funny,” MJ said, a slightly happier tone to her voice than usual. You smiled, taking the small smack to your arm with a soft laugh as well. Peter watched across the lunch table while Ned was too occupied with the game on his phone. He pouted; you seemed to be having way more fun with MJ than with him. Lunch was almost over- oh no, wait, that was the bell…

You stood up from your seat as Peter gathered his stuff. He waited for you to walk him to his next class, as you usually did so. MJ also stood up, looking at Peter, “Hey, loser,” Peter had found himself being called ‘loser’ a lot by MJ- probably more than he found himself being called that by Flash- but he knew she was joking, “Aren’t you and I together for History?” Peter nodded, “Oh yeah, I forgot,” he usually had Math right after Lunch, but today was Thursday. Thursday schedule was always weird for him. You began dragging yourself behind and in between them. Ned had already disappeared; his next class was all the way across the hall from where their classes were, so he had to hurry. You spoke up, “I have Biology next anyway. It’s right down the hall from there.”

“Neeerd!” MJ laughed, yelling into your ear. You tried to move away from the noise, a smile playing to your lips, “Oi, idiot, that hurt!” MJ smirked, “Good.” Peter fumed- he felt like he was the third wheel when it was supposed to be MJ. He was dating you, not her. Though, to be fair, not that many people knew. Just the two of you, Ned, Aunt May, Mr. Stark, Happy, and the rest of the Avengers. MJ didn’t, and Peter felt like he should tell her- if not for it being for the reason of ‘she should know because she’s my friend’, then at least for ‘omg stop touching him he’s my boyfriend’. And there she goes, touching you again. Though, this time she used her own shoulder to bump into yours instead.

Peter heard a small murmur, “Doesn’t MJ look really cute next to [M/N]?”

“Yeah, she’s definitely happier around him.”

“She smiled a lot when with him.”

“Their both into the arts; she likes reading and drawing, he likes music and (insert an artistic talent/interest).”

Soon, Peter began hearing things other than just small murmurs and chattering around him. It felt as if he could hear everything everyone was saying. Wasn’t that a side effect of his spider-like abilities? Perhaps it was, Peter couldn’t remember at the moment.

“Yeah, they’re practically made for each other.”

“They make a good couple.”

“Did you hear that MJ and [M/N] got a full score on their project for Art?”

“Oh yeah, they were parters, right?”

“Yeah, MJ made the layout of the sketch and [M/N] finished it up. He did his own thing as well, and they ended up getting their art submitted into the contest happening at the art museum.”

Then, Peter felt as if he couldn’t breathe.

“So cute.”

“Wow, they make a good couple.”

“Peter looks like such a third wheel.”

His own thoughts mixed with the other small talk around him, and it surrounded him in a pit of black.

“He looks like such a loser.”

“Wow, no one would be interested in him anyway.”

“No one likes a nerd.”

“Peter is a loser.”

“Peter is a nerd”

“Peter is lame.”

“No one likes Peter.”

“Peter-“

“Peter!” You shouted in his ear, and Peter jolted up. “O-Oh, yeah?”

“Isn’t this our class?” MJ asked, pointing to the door. Peter nodded sheepishly, looking over at you. You smiled, “Have fun learning about a bunch of dead guys. I’m off to math!” You pumped your fist up in mock excitement. MJ laughed and Peter gave a small chuckle, “H-Have fun.” You nodded, “Sure wont.”

***

3rd person P.o.V.

[M/N] met up with Ned, MJ, and Peter after school. “Hey guys!” He greeted, wrapping an arm around Peter’s shoulders. Peter resisted the urge to lay his head on the other male and just looked at him and smiled instead. [M/N] smiled back, but Peter felt like their was this other feeling in the other male’s eyes he couldn’t quite read. “Uh, hey,” [M/N] started, “Parker, you feeling up to a study session today?” Peter pretended to think, nodding soon after, “Sure, dont have any plans today anyway. Lemme text Aunt May, though, first.”

‘Study session’ was a code name for ‘miniature date at my house’. Peter had grown to love the words very much because then it was just them two, and it was normally [M/N] showering Peter in love and affection for the whole night- if he didn’t have Spidey-duty that day, that is. Peter pulled his phone out from his back pocket, pulling up Aunt May’s number. “Can I come too?” MJ asked, “Or is it just one of your gay things?” MJ huffed in amusement at her own joke, not realizing the irony of it. She tried sounding nonchalant about it, but not wanting to break her heart, [M/N] let her off easy, “Uhh, my house is really messy. I feel like Peter can handle it, but I dont wanna make you run off because you’re scared of my pigsty of a home.” He laughed. MJ chuckled, “Wow, gender equality, dude. Whatever happened to that?” [M/N] shook your head, “maybe next time. You don’t have anything and Peter usually spends the night, so it’d be weird, wouldn’t it?” MJ nodded, seemingly disappointed, “yeah, whatever. It’s cool.”

“Done!” Peter chirped, and MJ began walking off. Ned had also run off somewhere. “Good!” [M/N] smiled, “I have you all to myself for the rest of the evening!”

2nd person P.o.V.

Once the two of you made it home, Peter put his stuff down onto the floor in your room while you prepared some food. Since it was Thursday, you guys weren’t assigned that much homework, so you and Peter would probably finish it in the small intervals before classes. You prepared some snacks like popcorn and candy while Peter changed his clothes. He also took the time to pick out clothes for you- a loose white T-shirt with black basket ball shorts. He wore a white shirt- of course, a nerdy one with a scientific pun on it (the two atoms; one asking if the other is positive it lost a electron)- with one of your boxers. He walked out, socks protecting his feet from the cold floor. He scrunched his nose at the smell, smiling.

“You wanna pick out the movie?” Peter asked, wrapping his arms around your waist. You turned around, wrapping your arms around him as well. They made their way around both his arms, one hand holding the other to trap the smaller boy in an embrace. “No, you can pick,” you smiled, tilting your head to kiss Peters lips quickly, “so long as it isn’t Star Wars or Lord of the Rings again. Please. I can’t go through another marathon again.” Peter whined playfully, “But [M/N]!” You stuck your tongue out, “Too bad.”

Peter reciprocated the action, and you both let out a sigh of giggles. “Anyway,” you continued, “You want anything specific to eat?” Peter shook his head and you nodded. You let him go and he went over to the couch. He flipped though the many channels on the TV before settling on a Disney movie. “Is that Disney?” You asked, walking in with a bowl of popcorn, two sodas, and a plate of cookies. Peter watched in awe as you balanced everything. “Yeah,” he answered, “The Hunchback of Notre Dame.”

“Aw, sweet!” You fist-bumped the air, “love that movie.” Peter nodded, leaning to rest his head on your shoulder, he had been deprived of physical touch for a while. He just wanted to spend time with you, was what he thought as he wrapped his arms around you. Your arm wrapped around his waist while the other ate from the supported the bowl of popcorn on your lap. Peter stole some as well, and you watched as the movie began with its intro of the parents trying to save their defaced child from the protagonist.

“It’s kinda inappropriate, dont you think?” You asked Peter after a while, and Peter looked at you confused, eyes squinted Ashe seemingly judged you. “How? It’s a Disney movie?”

“Well, I mean, it talks about gypsies. Aren’t they visualized as prostitutes? And that seen where Esmeralda dances for that old dude, you can see he’s clearly turned on.” You shook your head, “never mind…”

When the movie was over, you cleaned up the remaining food and placed it down to be cleaned later. You carried a very, very tired Peter Parker up to your room. You laid him on the bed and dimmed the lights. He gripped onto you desperately, “Dont move, dont go anywhere…” he said, “Can we stay like this forever…?” He asked tiredly, and you laughed softly, “No, we have school tomorrow.” Peter whined childishly, “forget school. I can make us enough money by being Spider-Man, we dont need education.”

“Peter, my parents would kill me if they found out i dropped out of high school to piggy back on my superhero boyfriend for money.” Peter let out a huff, and the two of you let out quiet, breathy chuckles. He leaned close to you, noses touching. He then frowned, “Do you like MJ?” The question was sudden and it caught you off guard. “Well, i mean… yeah, we’re friends…”

“No, i mean… like like her…?”

You let out an ‘ohhh’, suddenly realizing Peter’s behavior earlier (the cause of your strange glint Peter noted earlier). “No, baby,” you smiled, “I’m not romantically interested in her, if that’s what you’re thinking.” “But,” he began, a slight pout on his lips. God, he was really tired, “she was all over you today, shamelessly flirting with you. You didn’t seem to mind it though…”

“Peter,” you began, stroking his hair a bit, “I dont like MJ. I like you. No, I love you. A lot. So dont think that.” You moved to lay Peter on top of you, taking his hands and intertwining them with yours as he made himself comfortable on your chest. “I know,” Peter started, playing with your fingers a bit, “its just… everybody says you two look good together. I guess i just didnt like the feeling of you with another person, even if it’s just the public appeal and not reality. Sorry…” You shook your head, “dont apologize, baby. It’s normal to feel jealous…”

Peter was quick to defend, lifting his head up to glare at you accusingly, “I wasn’t jealous!” You laughed, “yeah, and I’m not dating Spider-Man.” Peter sighed, resting in his previous position. He mumbled another, ‘I wasn’t jealous…’ and you just nodded. You began running your hands through his hair, to which he quickly responded by sighing and relaxing even further into your chest.

A few minutes of running your hands through his hair later, Peter got bored and slightly irritated of the position. He moved to sleep next to you, with you spooning him. You wrapped your arms around him and gently played it his stomach, felling up and down his abs. He whimpered lightly, curling a bit at the ticklish feeling. His body began to heat up; you could feel it. “Are you still upset?” You asked softly, and Peter nodded. You sighed, placing soft kisses to Peter’s neck. He leaned back, face flushed red as you continued up his neck to his jaw. He turned his head to face you, and gave you a soft kiss. You to didnt move, instead you stayed there and took in the presence of each other.

When you two pulled away, Peter had the brightest blush on his face. He huffed, eyes falling closed, “I wasn’t jealous.”

“Of course you weren’t,” you smiled, “who said you were?”

You turned off the light once Peter finally fell asleep. The two of you stayed like that for the rest of the night- and, to be honest, if you could, you would stay like that forever if you could.

Panicked gay moment; had no clue what to write for MJ, sry sry sry anon (._.”)

#peter parker #peter parker x reader #peter parker imagine #peter parker x male reader #mlm #mlm imagine #male reader #x male reader #marvel #seme male reader #male reader imagines #spiderman #imagine

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