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lassieposting · 3 years

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Bit late and random but it's the anon you leave food out for here to give away I am also bi and I think exactly the same as you about bi val pretty much, every time Derek offers me representation my reaction is to slowly, hesitantly take it and say "thaaaaaaaaanks..." while rolling my eyes, in much the same way one accepts their least favourite flavour of sweet from an annoyingly enthusiastic uncle-type-individual. Ironically I feel I had more in common with her before the bi shit started up.

What I find really amusing is that Landy actually did reasonably well at representation when (and only when) he wasn’t trying.

Oh god, this got long, anon, my ass rambled.

tldr; I'm glad actual bi people dislike bi val (or how Laundry handled bi val) as much as me, this will probably offend at least one person but i don't really care, Dirty Laundry wrote better rep when he didn't mean to write rep at all, and if he ever starts trying to "represent" groups I'm part of I'll take him out back like a dying horse and shoot him.

Like, yes. He had stupid and potentially offensive shit - I say potentially because what offends one member of a group won’t necessarily offend all of them. His attitude to mentally ill people is, frankly, disgusting. We’ve had “Skulduggery can’t be abused, he doesn’t have feelings”. We’ve had “eVeRyOnE iS bI eVeNtUaLlY”. We had Ping, who seemed to be pretty much universally offensive. And that's what's always going to happen when a straight, cis, white, wealthy, male author tries to write marginalised groups he doesn't know shit about, because inevitably he's going to fall back on stereotypes.

But we also had:

SEXUALITY REP: Phase One's nonstraight characters were treated like the straight ones, and like, isn't that the whole point? There was no need for a massive Coming Out Story TM to grab for those sweet sweet Woke Points, because sexuality isn't supposed to be important to mages. I never understood why Val needed that whole Coming Out Panic storyline. Like...Des and Melissa are ridiculously supportive, encouraging, loving parents. They accepted you dating a ~19 year old when you were ~16. They accepted you revealing you could do fucking magic and that you'd been lying to them for like seven years. They took your undead buddy in stride and the most pressing question your dad had was whether magic toilets exist. There is zero reason to think that "I'm bisexual" is gonna be the thing that makes them flip and throw you into the streets in disgrace, Valkyrie. Come on.

Tanith had girlfriends and it was just mentioned casually, because it's normal.

China had massive UST with Eliza. That was an opportunity right there to not only include a f/f relationship, but also to bring back one of the few precious surviving characters from Phase One, using characters and a relationship that already had several books' worth of setup and tension and interest from fans.

The Monster Hunters have a casual conversation about which one of the Dead Men they'd date.

Ghastly has a conversation with Fletcher about the pain he's been through being in love. He never uses any pronouns.

It was confirmed at one point re: the Dead Men that at this point, after 300-odd years, everyone's been with everyone else at some point.

Thrasher is gay, and while Scapegrace's...everything...is treated as a joke/comedic relief, Thrasher's love for him isn't. He's completely devoted to Scapegrace, and that in itself is not played for laughs, even though the rest of the scene usually is. Thrasher's description of their first meeting is essentially a love-at-first-sight situation for him.

"ABNORMAL" RELATIONSHIP REP: Age gap relationships are normal for mages. Off the top of my head, using only canon, canon-implied or almost-canon ships:

Ghastly/Tanith (~350 year age difference)

Tanith/Sanguine (~250+ year age difference)

Tanith/Saracen (~350 year age difference)

Caisson/Solace (~250 year age difference)

China/Gordon (~400 year age difference)

Kierre/Temper (~500+ year age difference)

If you include fan ships, there's also things like Mevolent/Serpine or my Mevolent/Vile, which are both ~600 year minimum age gaps based on the timeline, or Valdug (and its variations) which is ~400 years.

Now, whether you consider this kind of rep positive or negative is up to you, but it’s there.

MENTAL ILLNESS REP: more like "Which characters in this series don't have a mental illness or a personality disorder?" I have some of these issues, but not all of them, so this is just how I read it, but:

ADHD: Skulduggery

Dissociative Identity Disorder: Skulduggery & Vile

Dissociation: Skulduggery again, most notably in DD and DB

Schizophrenia (or similar): Valkyrie & Darquesse, Valkyrie "seeing" Darquesse's ghost thing in Phase Two

Impostor Syndrome: Reflectionie

Autism: Clarabelle

Trauma/PTSD/CPTSD: Skulduggery, Valkyrie, China, Ghastly, Erskine...pretty much everyone has a believable, understandable, morally grey trauma response in this series. People struggling with trauma are spoilt for choice of characters to see themselves in.

TRAUMA REP: This series is a trauma conga line, but everyone has a believable, understandable, morally grey trauma response in this series. I see little bits of myself in more than one Phase One character.

Childhood Abuse (of varying degrees & types): Skulduggery, Carol & Crystal, Omen, Fletcher, Ghastly, China, Bliss, Sanguine...

Estranged Family: Skulduggery abandoning his crest, Fergus & Gordon, China & Bliss

Bad Romantic Relationship: Skulduggery is also very clearly an abuse victim. He’s got a solid history of romantic attachments to women who manipulate, use and gaslight him for their own agendas. There's a whole paragraph in SPX about how Abyssinia broke him down, isolated him from his friends and preyed on his desperate need to be loved, all classic abuse tactics.

And I’m personally a huge fan of this backstory for two reasons:

1) Society likes a plucky victim in media. The "My suffering made me stronger" type of victim. And it's not always like that in real life. Not all survivors come out of their abuse stronger or kinder or more understanding. Some of us come out cold and fucked up. Some of us end up as emotionally stunted, bloodied-nails-and-bared-teeth survivors, broken in ways that can't be fixed and sustained by enough rage to power a small sun. But society doesn't like to tell the story of that kind of survivor, because we're not usually a likeable protagonist. When we're shown in media, we're usually the sympathetic villain, or maybe the antihero. But Skug is someone who's done awful things and lost pretty much all his faith in humanity and been burned more times than he can count, and he still makes the conscious choice to try and be the good guy when he could so easily go Evil Supervillain on the world, and I don't know about any of y'all, but I've modelled myself on him in that. I've made the choice to do something good when all I really want to do is just become a horrible, shrivelled ball of nastiness and revenge. And that's because I saw him do it and realised that I could do that too.

Skug is an incredibly capable, strong, masculine Man's Man. He gets in fights all the time, and he usually wins. He's military, an industry that's Really Bad for stigmatizing weakness and mental illness, and he's right up at the top of the hierarchy. Almost everyone is afraid of him. He's a straight up cold-blooded killer. Skulduggery Pleasant is precisely the type of person who's not normally portrayed as a victim of anything. Nothing about him screams "victim" at all. But his abuse history is insidious. He's so conditioned to respond in a certain way to abuse from the women in his life, probably from a very young age, that despite all that strength and capability and stubbornness and ego, he just goes along with it. And it's an established pattern going back hundreds of years. He keeps going back to China, even though he knows she's bad for him and his friends keep telling him to stay away from her. Abyssinia latched onto him when he was traumatized and vulnerable and weaponized it against him to make him easier to control - and when she reappears, hundreds of years later, she jumps straight back into using, tmanipulating and gaslighting him and not only does he let her, he doesn't even seem to realise that behaviour is abusive. He thinks it's normal! That's how he's always been treated by his long-term girlfriends, with the notable exception of Wifey. Even when Val is being fucking nasty to him in the first couple books of Phase Two, sniping and lying and blaming him for everything under the sun, he just takes it. There's no attempt to tell her she's being unreasonable, no telling her to fuck right off and give her head a wobble, no defending himself even when she's bitching over something that isn't even his doing. And this is a man who has an absolutely gleaming steel spine the rest of the time; Skug has no problem saying no to anybody else, but he can't get past the way he's been taught to treat the important ladies in his life. Skug is a walking reminder that anyone can be a victim of abuse, even the ones who seem least likely to be susceptible.

GENDER REP: This one is the most iffy out of the bunch and definitely was not done very well in the eyes of the people who matter most, but I'll include it anyway because it mattered to some.

So there's Nye, who's...agender? Genderless? And uses "it" pronouns? Nye was generally considered horrible rep because it's also a war criminal and experiments on people and I've seen people say "Well I don't want to be seen like that" but? It's still possible to be a war criminal and also genderless. I never saw the two things as being related or relevant to each other.

There's also Mantis, who's in exactly the same gender/pronouns boat as Nye and always seems to be forgotten about, which sucks because Mantis is a war hero. It fought for the Sanctuary during the War and they never lost a battle when it was in command. It's called out of retirement to fight for the Supreme Council in LSODM, ends up fighting alongside Skulduggery during the Battle of Roarhaven, and ultimately dies attempting a very brave, very risky strategy. Mantis is, unreservedly, one of the good guys. It was also my introduction to sentient beings using "it" pronouns, and did it in a way that felt natural, so when I met my first person online who used "it" pronouns and hated to be referred to as he/she, it was...weird, but not as weird as it would otherwise have been, because I was like, "Oh yeah, like the Crenga. Okay."

And then there's the Scapegrace sex change plotline, which...I might have an unpopular opinion on this one. From what I’ve seen, trans people don’t seem to think was handled well or with any sensitivity at all. I’m not trans, so if the trans community says he was being offensive to them, I’m not going to claim otherwise. But...I first read the Scapegrace plotline as a young teenager in a tiny rural school with zero diversity, going through a period of being deeply confused about my own gender identity. He was more or less my first introduction to the idea that genitals =/= gender. I was relieved, at that point in my life, to read someone having a lot of the same thoughts I was having about being in the wrong body. So while it may have been badly done and yeah, the series would probably have been better without it, it did make at least one kid suspecting she might not be cis go “Huh! So there are other people who feel like this.”

Thrasher is also implied to be legitimately trans/gender-questioning, and that's not played for laughs either.

So? Phase One, while it absolutely had faults and issues and things that were just "Oh god why", was actually full of rep, at least compared to the other series that I read as a child/teen. But? As soon as Dirty Laundry started trying to be woke? He fucking sucks ass at it. Aside from confirming Phase One's hints that Skug has a background of abusive relationships, every single attempt at shoehorning rep into Phase Two is Bad.

The painfully OOC, forced, badly-written awkwardness of Val suddenly being rabidly horny for women out of fucking nowhere. The stilted, forced cringiness between her and any of the women she's flirted with - contrast that with Sorrowscorn's interactions, full of natural chemistry that had us all like 👀 I mean, I never shipped Val/Melancholia, but I could always see why people did - they had miles more chemistry than Val/anyone in Phase Two.

The fucking mess that is v*litsa, because if someone says "I'm really not interested in friendships/relationships right now", clearly the route to true love is to bulldoze their boundaries and forcibly insert yourself into their life and proceed to treat them like a delicate soft uwu flower, completely ignoring the horrible things they've done, while gleefully damning their best friend as an irredeemable monster for the exact same things, which is. You know. Gonna affect your so-called love's self-confidence and self-esteem because she knows she's no different to him. Y'all know I love an angsty ship, an unhealthy ship, a ship with fucked power dynamics, but I literally cannot roll my eyes any further back in my head at this shit. I never read Demon Road, but from what I've heard from friends who did, it does seem like every time Laundry tries to write an f/f ship, he comes up with a cringey abusive/manipulative caricature and tries to call it rep, and he needs to Stop.

Val's Mental IllnessTM arc. It's funny how he wrote Skulduggery as a wonderfully complex character with deep-rooted psychological damage and long-lasting trauma, but believes he wrote a character with "no feelings" - but when he tries to delve into the damage the world of magic has done to Val, he turned her into a weak, whiny drug addict who treats everyone around her like garbage and is so selfish and dislikeable that I? Honestly can't even reconcile Phase Two val with Phase One val. They're two completely different people. He's shown on Twitter that he doesn't have any respect for mentally ill people, and it shows. Other mentally ill people might see it differently, but the whole thing just makes me go "yikes".

Never, who has no personality outside of being genderfluid, and whose pronouns make no sense. I'm sorry, I have never met an nb person who insists that you change from male to female pronouns multiple times in a sentence, every time you refer to them. It's confusing as fuck. Now I have been told that Never has apparently received some character development in the last couple books, and if so, fair play, but I quit reading after Midnight, and Never and the rest of the personality-less new characters introduced in Phase Two who just seemed to be 2D Stereotypes to snag Woke Points were a big part of why, so. Development too late, I'm afraid.

(Now, if anyone is looking for a well-written genderfluid character, I recommend the Tawny Man trilogy by Robin Hobb. I have a lot of issues with her as a writer, and unfortunately I hate her POV character which puts me off the series as a whole, but she wrote the Fool/Amber/Lord Golden and their gender identity/approach to sexuality with so much more respect and realism. That is the kind of rep nb people should be getting: 3D, complex, realistic characters whose gender is only a tiny fragment of their personality, not the be-all-and-end-all of their existence. You know. Like cis people get. Nobody wants to be represented by a 2D cardboard cutout stereotype.)

Anyway idk how much sense this makes it just really amuses me that Laundry would include all this rep completely unintentionally and then go on Twitter and remind us all that actually he's a massive asshole via insensitive/offensive tweets about the groups he'd actually done a fair job of including (i.e. Skulduggery has no feelings, mentally ill people should find another series to read, the bullshit about Val being "heteromantic bisexual" on Twitter and then spouting all the "the woman she loved uwu" shit in the books (proving he has no idea what he's talking about), eVeRyOnE iS bI eVeNtUaLlY. He can only write half-decent rep when he's not trying and he inevitably outs himself as having a really shitty attitude towards those people anyway, proving that ultimately it's all either unintentional rep or performative wokeness.

#skulduggery pleasant #sp meta #derek landy hate blog #Anon #fire message #anti valitsa #anti val #anti phase two tbh #phase two fans will not enjoy this post

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travllingbunny · 4 years

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Having spent a couple of years in The 100 fandom, one of the things that always strikes me is the gap between the canon characters and their fanon versions. Almost every character has at least one, sometimes two doppelgangers in fanon. These fanon versions often contradict each other, since the fandom has apparently been sharply divided for years. In other cases, there is one definite fanon creation that’s widely popular and mostly uncontested.

Which of these fanon creations do you find most boring, and which ones may be actually kind of fun?

Fanon!Clarke 1: The show’s main villain. This character is completely selfish, spoiled, tyrannical, absolutely loves murdering people and committing genocide, and spends all her time scheming and manipulating people so she could achieve her evil goals (which are to keep her friends and family alive). Likes to risk her life and “sacrifice” herself just because she always wants to be the center of attention. Has always been abusive to Bellamy by.. telling him nice and supportive things about himself, but not nice and supportive enough, and cruelly allowing him to go on a mission that was his own idea and his plan (an example of how unequal their relationship is and that she always orders him around). Doesn’t care about anyone, except maybe her adoptive daughter Madi, which makes her annoying and a traitor for not prioritizing her friends’ safety over her daughter’s, except for the times when she’s prioritizing her friends’s safety over her daughter, which makes her a bad mother.

Fanon!Clarke 2: Minor character, notable for being Lexa’s love interest. (See below.) This young, occasionally confused lesbian was a damsel constantly in need of saving by the show’s hero, Lexa, and didn’t do anything important until meeting Lexa, and learning from her how to be a leader. Still not too good at it, probably due to the bad influence of the show’s villain, Bellamy (see below), with whom she has an unhealthy, toxic platonic relationship but for whom she doesn’t really care, at the same time. Had a bunch of things happen to her, such as losing both her parents and a bunch of other important people in her life, having to mercy kill her first love minor crush (at the time when she still thought she was into men), constantly fighting for survival, being left almost alone on a deserted planet for 6 years, having her body stolen - but none of this ever traumatized her, the only thing she’s ever been affected was Lexa’s death, which she spends all her time talking about, 24/7, even 6.5 years later.

Fanon!Bellamy 1: The show’s main villain. Evil, violent white man (as a consequence of having a younger, white sister, which makes him white because biracial people don’t exist), constantly angry, goes around killing people in bouts of rage. Racist and hates Grounders (who, naturally, are a race - as descendants of a group of people from a cult that used to live in a bunker). Super into killing civilians and committing genocide. Probably stupid and uneducated. Killed his sister’s boyfriend and somehow indirectly killed the show’s hero, Lexa. Is indirectly to blame for anything wrong that ever happened in the show. Also likes to abuse Clarke (see Fanon!Clarke 2).

Fanon!Bellamy 2: A very unusual character that consists of two different people: in seasons 1-4: the sweetest, most sensitive and softest clean shaven boy in the world, who wore his heart on his sleeve and spent all his time telling Clarke how much he loves her (even without ever actually having told her anything like that, or asked her out on a date, and even while sleeping with other women, but that’s this character’s special power). Never killed people, except when he did, but that only happened because the writers hated him and he was OOC. As of the start of season 5, turned into a cold, unemotional bearded man who is totally in love with evil Echo (see below) and doesn’t care about Clarke at all (which makes his actions in a lot of season 5 and all of season 6 a complete mystery).

Fanon!Octavia 1: The most perfect human being in the history of the human race. Has never done anything wrong in her entire life. When she beat up her brother savagely, it’s because he deserved it, everyone she’s murdered deserved it, and she was never a tyrant - people just didn’t realize that, as the perfect leader, she needed to have absolute power. She was also a victim of manipulation by evil Abby (see below), who made her decide to force her people to become cannibals. But forcing people to become cannibals was also the right thing to do. Was betrayed by everyone, including her treacherous brother and all the other traitors who didn’t appreciate her leadership.

Fanon!Octavia 2: A monstrous epitome of white supremacy, this character enjoys going around beating up various people of color just for kicks, enjoys cultural appropriation, and even decided to be born because she knew this would be an act of aggression against her MOC half-brother, whom she emotionally abused by her very existence.

Fanon!Abby: One of the show’s main villains, this character is incompetent and clueless but at the same time a vicious schemer, manipulating and exploiting the younger women in the show. (See above.) Can’t take responsibility, as seen by the fact that she didn’t blame herself for everything Octavia ever did. Messes things up because she still wants to mother her 18-year old daughter, which makes her annoying. At other times, pays more attention to trying to save her dying boyfriend than to trying to mother her 24 year old daughter who seems fine and able to take care of herself, which makes her a terrible mother.

Fanon!Lexa: The show’s main character and hero. Even though she was in just 16 episodes, didn’t join the show until halfway through season 2 and died 4 seasons ago, the show is still all about her. A pure cinnamon roll who never did anything wrong, the greatest leader and strongest fighter, able to single-handedly defeat all the bad guys, but also a visionary peacemaker who did the unprecedented action of doing what Clarke advised her to do. Actions like betraying her allies, throwing people off the top of a tower, letting her own people die, were all wise leadership choices and therefore morally right. (Anyone who feels differently is probably homophobic.) Possibly a woman of color (because of a mismatched foundation and/or because you can’t be a part of a technologically underdeveloped society and be white). Will come back in the series finale to save the day, in spite of having been dead and cremated 131+ years ago.

Fanon!Echo 1: The show’s central character since the start of season 5. An epitome of pure, 100% unadulterated evil, this character has no appealing, redeeming or just human qualities, but nevertheless, possesses an incredible screen presence that makes the fandom obsess over any second of her screentime and talk about every single thing she does or says (or even about her hairstyle) more than about anything else in the show.

Fanon!Echo 2: The strongest and most badass of strong female characters, as seen in the fact that she is good at fighting and killing people and at carrying out other people’s orders (including that of her boyfriend’s). Has never been portrayed as a villain or done anything wrong that could possibly make any of the viewers dislike her - the only possible reason for anyone to dislike her is jealousy over her great, epic romance with Bellamy.

Fanon!Pike: Worst person ever, this villain was just racist towards Grounders (who are a race, see above) with no reason whatsoever and never had a sympathetic or tragic backstory to explain his views and decisions. He imagined that his people were in danger when in fact, everyone else was peaceful and tolerant and it was just him ruining everything. Invented a story about Azgeda being genocidal against his people and murdering the majority of them, including 15 children, right after they fell on Earth - which never happened because we didn’t see it. Somehow he manipulated everyone else into remembering that, too. Probably a cannibal and definitely a Nazi and Donald Trump 2.0, comparisons which are perfect because Pike is the epitome of racism because he not only killed Grounders, he executed a black guy by shooting him in the head. Strangely, Pike also looks like a black guy, but he can’t be one or this is unimportant, because using guns makes you white and only Grounders can be POC because they use medieval weapons.

Fanon!Roan: Clarke and Bellamy’s best friend. Spends all his time hanging out with them just because he likes them and really wants to see them get together. May be an Azgeda king or something, but that’s not important, because it’s not like he has political motivations for his actions. Super loyal to Clarke and never did anything like break alliances or kill his allies or march on Arkadia to attack her people or do any political scheming. Probably has a secret “Bellarke Forever!” tattoo.

#the 100 #the 100 fandom #canon vs fanon #clake griffin #bellamy blake #octavia blake #abby griffin #roan kom azgeda #charles pike

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marauders-map-irl · 3 years

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this is Not An Accident (written very poorly by me)

TRIGGER WARNINGS: R*PE, M*RD*R, SELF-HATE, R*CISM, H*MOPH*BIA

Living here, in this small, ignorant town, going to my small, ignorant high school, looking like I do, loving who I do, sucks. And that’s to say the least. For some background, I live in a small town in the countryside of Tennessee, called Greenton. I go to a high school called Cookie-Cutter, which is pretty ironic because it is much like a high school you would see on tv.

Everyone pretty much hates us here. I can’t say that I blame them, though. I hate me too. My family is the only strange family here; everyone else is pretty normal (extremely so). Everyone mocks us and bullies us. My mum is African American and my father is Irish. They both joke that we’re the 21st century version of the Brady Bunch.

There’s 7 of us, including my parents and I. I’m right in the middle of my brothers and sisters, and perhaps the most normal, but that doesn’t say much. My eldest brother is John (20), and he’s the oldest of us all. He’s mixed like the rest of us, he’s cisgender male and gay. Then comes my eldest sister, Moira (19), who’s non-binary and pansexual. There’s me next (16), and I’m cisgender female, asexual, and aromantic. After me came my trans (female-male) brother (12), Mikey, and he’s heterosexual. Lastly came my sister, Brittany (9), who’s showing signs of being demiromantic.

We’re the only people that aren’t white in the entire town, and we only came here to help dad’s parents in retirement. The town is extremely ignorant, and it doesn’t help that we came from a big city either. In school, I’m an outcast, though I suppose it’s better than being constantly bullied still. They’ve stopped all contact with me completely, deeming my lack of wanting any sexual activities at my age strange. The teachers even think I’m weird too, and as such have either called on me excessively or just stick to grading my perfect papers and not making any conversation with me if unnecessary. I tend to get perfect grades, what with having absolutely no platonic ties to anyone outside family.

That brings me to where we are currently. In math class, staring out of a window I’m somehow always seated by. The teacher, whatever her name is, is droning on and on about a group project worth half of our final grade for the year. Three people just either groaned or were making tiny grunts of displeasure, meaning I was in a group this time. This project must actually be important. I look up about 4 minutes later, when someone sits next to me and taps my shoulder. Looking up, it’s the very person that continues to poke fun at me, Jessica Kaileia. Well, Jessica, 1 of her most loyal cronies, and another nerd. Sam, I think his name is, and I recall he always eats a slice or two of pie everyday at lunch.

“Do you need something?” I ask Jessica coldly, averting my eyes quickly from her makeup-caked face.

“We’re project partners, Mckinlay. Otherwise I wouldn’t risk my wellbeing talking to you, trust me,” she smirks slightly and her cronie sniggers, but I just roll my eyes and Sam snorts.

“So we’re using last names? Didn’t think you liked your last name anymore, what with your father being a serial killer, Kaileia,” Sam says, making me hold in my giggles as Jessica shrieks.

“You forgot the part where her mum left her for a woman,” her cronie says in disgust, clearly trying and failing to conceal her own laughter.

“Mackenzie!!” Jessica says in a shriek that would rival that of Petunia Dursley.

“Watch your volume, Ms. Kaileia,” the teacher says in her monotone voice, barely glancing up from her issue of The Quibbler.

“Yes, Ms. Binns. Sorry, Ms. Binns,” Jessica says, rolling her eyes before returning to glare at Sam and I respectfully.

“What was the assignment?” I ask, wanting to rid myself of these potentially cruel people as quickly as possible.

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll get it done by tomorrow and put your names on it. I am second in our year. Of course, I will need your first and last names, well, not yours Kaileia,” Sam states, staring at the packet of instructions and not looking up at us once.

“Yes, well I’m first so I’d actually like to do the work, if you don’t mind. Not that princess Allura and her bestie Romelle here would appreciate getting a fair share of the project,” I say, snatching the packet gently and looking it over.

“Who are they?” the cronie asks, making both Sam and I snort.

“Homewreckers one and two,” Sam says as I divide the instructions in half and give the easy half to Sam.

“Language, Mr. Avery,” the teacher’s monotone voice rings throughout the classroom and Sam apologizes half-heartedly.

“Wait, why do I get the easy part of the assignment?” he asks me offrontedly.

“Because I’m the first in our class,” I answer easily in a ‘duh’ tone, to which he nods with a slight frown.

The assignment was straightforward and easy, although to Jessica and her friend, it would be like rocket science to a 3 year old. I set to work, knowing that if I start now, my half would be done by the end of lunch hour. I didn’t pay much attention to my bullies, though them being in my peripheral didn’t support the cause at all. They were seemingly doing their nails (more like the minion doing Jessica’s nails) and talking about stereotypical popular girl things. The tiny bits that I actually heard made me roll my eyes so hard and so often I was worried they might actually get stuck.

“What’s your name? I need to know for the project,” I ask the she-devil’s minion, but she looks to Jessica for confirmation before speaking.

“Clara Maythers,” she mutters, as though the mere thought of speaking to someone as ‘abnormal’ as me scared her very being.

I nod half-heartedly before adding her name to the list and continuing the project, trying once again to ignore the ignorant bastards behind me. I turn slightly when I see Jessica forcing Clara to hold up a magazine for her to read while she blows her wet nails dry, making sure I couldn’t see them at all. When I was looking over what I had, the intercom came on and the principal spoke. Her voice shook with laughter and I’m sure her face was turned up in a smirk. It was probably another prank. This is Cookie-Cutter, after all. We’re a very stereotypical high school and I’m a very… let’s just say mold-breaking student.

“Could Ms. Alessia Mckinlay come to the front desk to be collected. There has been a family emergency,” she says family as if she doesn’t believe my strange family is one, and I’m sure she doesn’t. There’s incoherent words being said to the principal and she grudgingly continues. “Please,” and after that, the intercom cuts off and all heads turn my way.

I make my way to the front office, as asked, and am hit with sneers, sympathetic looks, and pretty much everything between hate and loathing. I’m not even able to make my way to the front office before my parents steer me away from looking in the lobby. I look at them with a mix of skepticism and worry. Principal Maera did say there was a family emergency, after all.

“What happened?” I ask, trying to look over my parents’ shoulders and failing, due to them forming a wall in front of whatever they were hiding.

“Your sister… There was an accident and…” mum cuts herself off there with a choked sob, making me look to my father for the remaining explanation.

“They…” my father then stops himself, opening and closing his mouth repeatedly, either searching for the right words or not wanting to say them aloud (although in retrospect, it’s probably a mix of both).

At this point, I’m worried for all of my sisters, frustrated with my parents for not telling me what’s wrong, and attempting to stay positive and force all the negative thoughts from my head. I manage to shove through the human wall before me and my body freezes at the sight. Laying in front of my eyes is my little sister, Brittany, battered, bruised, broken, and lifeless. Her pants are down to her ankles, her rainbow underwear just past her knees, and blood is drying and caking around her…

I tear my eyes away, but they somehow end up right back at her. This time, though, I’m studying her face. It’s frozen in pain, but there’s also an air of peacefulness present. There’s bruises forming around her neck and littering her face, but I try not to focus on that. I try to focus on all her happy memories. I try to focus on her laughing as mum caught her cheating in Monopoly. I try to focus on dad hiding a grin as she stole a bit of the cake batter for my birthday last year. I try to focus on Brit. But it’s so hard. I try to focus on her happy times. But I always end up looking into her wide, horrified eyes.

My body’s seemingly on autopilot now, because I somehow make it over to my 9 year old sibling to shut her eyes properly, but I didn’t think about it. I thought about how someone could do this to a child. I thought about who could do this to a child. I thought about why someone would do this to a child.

But soon enough, a camera flashes, and then 2, then 5, and then I’m surrounded not only by my baby sister’s blood, but light from what seems like millions of phones. Soon enough, I feel like I’m under a microscope, and viscous scientists are picking apart my every move. Soon enough, I’m back to the main lobby of Cookie-Cutter High School in Greenton, Tennessee. And soon enough, the laughing, mocking, sneering, jeering students return full force.

I hear my mum crying in the background and muttering something about this being an accident. About it having to be an accident. That just makes me mad. Does she not see the freshman taking pictures of her youngest child’s corpse? Does she not see the sophomores laughing mercilessly at her and my tears alike? Does she not hear the juniors yelling at us that our whole family is a disgrace to human-kind? Does she not hear the seniors telling us that we all deserve the same fate? Does she not see my principal’s smug smirk as she watches the whole event and does absolutely nothing?

“This wasn’t an accident. How can you beat someone up on accident? How can you rape someone on accident? How can you murder an innocent child ON ACCIDENT? I get that you’re in shock or whatever, I really do. BUT HOW THE HELL COULD YOU POSSIBLY THINK THIS WAS AN ACCIDENT? PEOPLE HAVE BULLIED US EVER SINCE WE MOVED HERE! THEY MOCK, TEASE, PUNCH, BUT NOW THEY’VE GONE TOO FAR!” my father is telling me to stop yelling, but I don’t hear him. All I know is that I see red, whether that be from the blood pooling at my feet or rage, I have no clue. “DON’T YOU SEE THEM LAUGHING, RECORDING, YELLING AT US?! DON’T YOU SEE HOW THIS COULD NOT HAVE POSSIBLY BEEN AN ACCIDENT?!” and by now, I’m crying, but she has to know. She has to become aware. She has to stop this. She has to. “Please,” I say to no one in particular, taking my sister’s dead body in my arms and sinking down to sit on the floor.

I can’t do anything but hug my now limp sister and pray that this is just another practical joke. Hope that she’s not really gone. Wish that I could have been a good big sister and protected her.

She had so much life left to live. She was only NINE, for god’s sake! She was going to grow up! She was going to make it past the fourth grade! She was going to do well in school and get into the college she wanted to go to! She was going to be successful in her career and her life! She was going to die when she was old and senile and only after beating a terminal disease like cancer, because that’s the stubborn bastard she is. Was.

This wasn’t an accident.

#tw // rape #tw // murder #tw // homophobia #tw // racism #angst with a sad ending #writing sample

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let-it-raines · 5 years

Text

Second in Command (34/35)

Summary: Life as the “spare to the heir” isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be when you’re the supposed screw-up of the family, but people don’t know what really happens behind closed doors.

Rating: Mature

A/N: I’m just going to throw these words at you and pretend that I haven’t already written the final words to this story. Thanks for being such wonderful readers for all this time! I really, truly appreciate it!

Double line break of “-/-” means we’re changing POV and skipping ahead in time!

AO3: Beginning | Current

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Sequel : 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15

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“Darling,” Andy says out of nowhere, and Killian practically snaps his neck with how quickly he turns around to look at his son who is cupping his wife’s face with his small hands as he speaks to her with an intense focus, “listen.”

“I am listening, Andy,” Emma laments as she looks directly into Andy’s eyes while her legs are still covered with all of his toy trains.

“No, darling,” he sighs, making just the most ridiculous face that makes Killian feel such a kinship with the way that he moves his small brows across his forehead, “listen. I want biscuit.”

Why the hell is he calling Emma darling? What has made him decide to do that? And he’s definitely not getting a biscuit when he’s already had one today and they’ve still got to go to his parents’ house for dinner. He’s already going to be rambunctious because he’ll be around Alex and Lizzie. They’re so much bigger than him, and as nice as they are to him, they don’t exactly wait around for a one-and-a-half-year-old when they can run so much faster.

“Andy, what is her name?” he asks, pointing at Emma simply out of curiosity. “Is it Mummy?”

“Nooo,�� he laughs as if Killian has just said the most ridiculous thing in the world, his blue eyes lighting up with such joy that Killian can’t help the way the corners of his own lips tug up into a smile. “She’s darling.”

Andy doesn’t quite say the word correctly, a few letters changed with others, but he has no trouble understanding exactly what his son is saying. It’s taking everything in him not to laugh. He doesn’t want Andy to think he’s laughing at him. He simply wants to laugh because his little lad is convinced that his mum’s name is Darling, and Killian doesn’t hate it. He actually quite loves it, but it does mean that he probably needs to start calling Emma by some different names more often.

“I like when you call me Mommy,” Emma sighs, lifting Andy off of her lap and up in the air while he giggles.

Emma looks over to him, a watery smile on her face, and he simply reaches over and places his hand on her shoulder, squeezing the soft material of her t-shirt. She’s been having such a hard time lately, and even when she’s happy he can still tell how upset she is over not being pregnant yet, how much it’s weighing on her mind. He is too. He wants another child so badly that it physically pains him sometimes, but he also knows that with how Emma is blaming herself, he could never say that. It’s not her fault. It’s no one’s fault, and he remains optimistic that things will be okay despite months of heartbreak.

Besides, they’ve got this lovable munchkin who means the world to him even when he’s having a crying fit so loud that Killian swears his eardrums have burst. Maybe his eardrums did burst and that’s why it doesn’t bother him so much anymore.

“Biscuit,” he repeats, and Emma’s eyes roll before they crinkle, lines forming that she claims are from her being thirty, but that he knows are from laughter. Laugh lines are the good ones, and he’ll be a wrinkled up old man as long as it means that he’s lived a good life.

“After dinner, Andy. We have to go see Gammy and Grandpa. And Alex and Lizzie.”

“Yay Lizzie.”

“Yeah, yay Lizzie,” he laughs, clapping his hands together and reaching over to take Andy out of Emma’s arms. Alex would be so mad if he knew that Andy preferred Lizzie to him. He wouldn’t care about it until he found out, but oh boy would he care afterward. “We’re going to see Gammy, Grandpa, Liam, Abigail, Alex, and Lizzie. And you can play with your horse.”

“I love how you say that like it’s an actual horse.”

“Maybe one day it will be. I’ve still got to get out there and teach you how to ride. We should go to the stables next week. The weather is supposed to be nice, spring finally coming in.”

“I’m not going to go spend a nice day out getting my teeth knocked out by a horse.”

“Oh, come on. That won’t happen.”

“It will.”

“It won’t.”

“Darling is silly, Daddy,” Andy laughs before crawling out of Killian’s arms and waddling over to play with his trains again while Killian can’t even bother to hold in his laugh, especially when he twists his head to look at Emma and sees how her cheeks are flushed.

“He takes too much after you. Just saying. Far too cheeky.”

“That is not at all a bad thing.”

“Yeah,” she sneers, even if there’s no venom behind it, while taking the toys off of her legs, “whatever. I’m going to go get dressed to go to your parents’. You can handle your mini me.” Emma stands only to immediately sit back down, her eyes tightly closed while her hands grip into the cushions, the material bunching as much as it can while her knuckles go white.

“Darling,” he whispers, reaching over and laying his hand over hers while his heartbeat ticks up a few paces, worry settling itself in his stomach, “what’s wrong?”

“I’m dizzy. I don’t…It was just for a moment. I stood up too quickly.” Her eyes open again, but she doesn’t look at him. “I’m fine.”

“Emma, the last time you were dizzy you were – ”

“Don’t. please don’t. I can’t think about that right now, okay? And before you ask, I don’t want to take a test. I’m tired of them and of getting my hopes up. We have to go to your parents’ place. I don’t have time to get upset about everything again.”

“Can we at least talk about it later?”

“I don’t know,” she mutters before she’s slowly getting up from the couch and walking out of the room.

He doesn’t want to get his hopes up either, but they already are. How could they not be? He just wishes that she’d talked to him, that she’d take a test and make sure she’s taking care of herself. Watching her faint in her early weeks of pregnancy with Andy was terrifying, and he wants her to be safe. He knows that she is, that she will be, but he also knows that this is now all that he’s going to think about for the rest of the evening.

And it is, even as they eat dinner with his family, the conversation flowing across the table from nearly everyone but Emma. She really only talks to the kids when they talk to her, but she will join in on occasion. It’s bothering her too. He can tell. Liam’s been telling a story about his time in the Navy, talking about some antics he and his mates got up to, and even with everyone laughing, Emma doesn’t. Maybe she’s heard the story before. Liam does tend to repeat himself when it comes to his younger days, but he believes that Emma’s simply preoccupied with her thoughts.

He wishes he could take her out of them.

“So Killian tells me your house is nearly finished building. Are you excited? Emma? Emma dear? Are you excited?”

“Oh yeah,” she startles, fixing her napkin in her lap and straightening up. “I’m thrilled. It’s absolutely beautiful, and I think we’ll be able to move in over the summer. I think Andy’s really going to like the pool and having the backyard. He and the dog are pretty much the same that way.”

“You’ll have to come see it, Mum,” he says, reaching next to him and resting his hand on Emma’s thigh, tapping his fingers against her skin so that she can feel him. “The master has these windows that open up onto a balcony that’s just over the garden and the pool, and you’ll love the kitchen.”

“I’m just sad that you guys are moving away from us,” Abigail whines, looking at Emma before glancing at him. “I know it’s only twenty minutes, but that’s so different than being able to walk over to visit.”

“Abi, they’re probably leaving so that we can’t do that anymore.”

“Damn, you guys have discovered our secret,” Emma laughs, a genuine smile forming on her face for the first time in a while. “I’m going to miss you guys too, but I’m sure we’ll still see far too much of each other. We just want the space to raise Andy, you know? And we don’t always have to be near the offices like you guys.”

“We completely understand, Emma. I’m simply teasing. You already know that I’m going to be bothering you all the time. Ruby and I will, really.”

“Ruby asked for her own room there, so she might move in.”

“With Graham?”

“Nah, he’ll get to stay at their home. They can visit each other on the weekends.”

“That’s quite the marriage there,” Liam laughs.

“Oh, I don’t know,” Abigail playfully laments, leaning back in her chair and stretching her arms over her head, “only having to see my husband two days a week sounds like a grand plan.”

“I’m sitting right here.”

“I know, darling. I’m hoping that you get the hint.”

“Darling!” Andy squeals, and Emma looks at him, her lips pressed tightly together for a moment until her entire face lights up in laughter while his does the same, the both of them unable to hold it together over his new obsession with the word.

“Have you two gone mad?” Brennan asks as he takes a sip of water.

“No, it’s just,” Emma giggles, reaching over to get Andy out of his high chair so he can sit in her lap while she smooths his hair back from where it had gotten a little wild. It’s got a curl to it now, almost like a swoop, and either he or Emma are always trying to calm it down. “Andy started calling me Darling today, so he really likes that word. I think he might think it’s my name even though he knows that I’m Mummy, right?”

“No. You’re Darling.”

“That’s adorable,” Abigail sighs. “Alex and Lizzie never do things like that.”

“Because your name is Mummy,” Alex says flatly as he squirms in his chair. “Can we go play now?”

“Finish those peas, and then you can go.”

“I’m finished,” Lizzie points out, pushing her empty plate forward.

“That’s because you like peas, Elizabeth,” Alex murmurs under his breath in the same manor that a teenager would. He’s six, but he’s got some spunk.

“My name is Lizzie,” she spits back, huffing her chest up to make herself bigger. This is obviously a fight they’ve been getting into lately, and so much like with Andy, even when he shouldn’t laugh, he can’t help himself. “I don’t like Elizabeth.”

“Guys,” Liam sterns, staring the both of them down with the same glint in his eye that Killian remembers Brennan getting when he and Liam were younger, “calm down. Alex eat your peas and stop teasing your sister. Lizzie, why don’t you take Andy with you so you guys can play in the playroom?”

“I’ll go with them,” his mum volunteers, pushing back in her chair and walking over to the other side of the table so she can take both Andy and Lizzie to the playroom. “I think I need so Gammy time with my grandbabies.”

“Andy is the only baby.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Allison says, her face stern. “I think I need some time with my grandchildren and then my one grandbaby.”

“Thanks, Mum,” he and Liam say at the same time before everyone dissolves back into conversation, Alex eventually finishing his peas and running off to the playroom to join his sister and his cousin far before dinner ends and everyone goes back to their respective homes with children who stayed up far too late and ate too many sweets. Andy finally got another biscuit, even if it was a small one.

After they have him asleep in his crib, they both walk to their room so they can change out of their dinner clothes and into pajamas. It’s been such a pleasant day, May deciding to actually be warm for once, but their house is cold enough to still need to dress in thicker pajama bottoms, most of which are already packed up in moving boxes. He’s just pulled on a t-shirt, his head getting stuck in the hole, when he notices that Emma is sitting on the bench in the closet still dressed in her clothes from dinner.

“If I…if I,” she begins, picking imaginary lint off of her pants. “Will you sit with me as I take a test? I know I said I didn’t want to, but I think I have to. I can’t turn my mind off.”

He can’t either. He can’t turn his mind off, can’t get it to shut up as his head pounds and his heart thrums, but it’s probably nothing compared to how Emma is feeling.

“You don’t even have to ask, love. Why don’t you go ahead and change though, okay? It’ll make you feel better.”

She nods her head before getting up from the bench and stripping out of her clothes and pulling on the first soft thing that she finds. She’s pacing herself, going as slowly as she can, but he doesn’t say anything as he watches her and the way that she fidgets. Honestly, the only thing that’s keeping him from fidgeting is keeping his focus on her, on making sure that he’s strong for the next few minutes.

For every minute to always be sixty seconds, the time never changing, never altering, it seems like this is one of the longest sets of minutes in his life. There were the minutes of waiting to know if he was going to be accepted into university, as if he would ever be rejected for who his parents are. But he was still nervous, still anxious about getting in on his own merit. There were the minutes before the first time he slept with Emma, all of the heightened nerves and emotions and flat out anticipation making everything seem so much more heightened than it was. Then there was the entirety of their holiday when he was about to propose. For that entire dinner he was anxious, so anxious that he didn’t ask until they were on the beach when that was not what he wanted. Those minutes seemed to drag on and speed up all at once. But then again, there were also the minutes right before he got married and the minutes right before he became a father for the first time. Those two moments, well, they likely get equal billing to this, and watching Emma’s leg rapidly tap up and down while she watches the timer on her phone doesn’t help.

“You know,” he begins, strengthening his grip on Emma’s hand from where their fingers are interlocked, the pad of his thumb running over her knuckles and around her engagement ring and wedding band, “we’ll have been together for ten years in a little over three weeks.”

“I know,” she whispers so quietly that her voice barely reaches her ears. “I have a gift for you hidden somewhere I’m not divulging, and you’re taking me to Scotland for our anniversary weekend.”

“Aye, I know. We’re going to have a great time.” He squeezes her hand again before bringing it up so that he can brush his lips over her knuckles once, twice, three times more. “You infuriate me more than anyone else on this planet, but I also love you more than anyone else on this planet. Don’t tell Andy that because he gets his own little category.”

Emma chuckles as she leans her head onto his shoulder, hair sticking up and getting caught in his mouth while her tapping slows a bit. “I promise I won’t tell him.”

“Good. You’re my best friend, Nolan, and I – ”

“Woah, talk about a flashback. You’re calling me Nolan again.”

“If I keep calling you darling, you’re going to have to change your name according to our son.” He twists his head to kiss the side of her head, smelling her perfume and the faded smell of her shampoo from this morning. “You’re my best friend, and Emma, as much as I want that test to be positive, as much as I think it’s going to be after we’ve tried for so damn long, if it’s not, you will still be the person I love most and the person who I want to eat horrible food with at two in the morning while we watch television. Nothing is ever going to change that.”

“How are you so damn good with words?” she sighs, nuzzling into him further. “Like, you are stupid good with them, and it’s not fair because I still can only do that on occasion. I can’t think of a single thing to say to you that doesn’t sound dumb. I guess I love you.”

He chuckles into her hair before pulling back and leaning down to kiss her shoulder. “I love you, and I don’t need your flowery words. I never doubt your love for me, and when I have my emotional meltdowns, you always know what to say too. I think we can look at the test now.”

“Can you do it for me? I know that sounds pathetic – ”

“It doesn’t,” he says, rising from his spot on the edge of the bathtub and standing to grab the pregnancy test that’s on the counter without letting go off Emma’s hand. He closes his eyes for a brief moment, gathering the strength, before he’s picking it up and looking at a little screen that very clearly says the word pregnant. Emma’s pregnant. She’s pregnant. They’re having another baby, and he does not wish to control the way his lips are tugging up on the corners or the way his heart is beating a quicker pace in his chest.

It could beat out of his chest right now, and he wouldn’t care.

“Killian, what the fuck does it say?”

He turns back to look at Emma, releasing her hand so that he can cup her cheeks, holding her gaze to his and staring at the freckles that run across her nose the way that her eyes are shimmering with tears. “I can’t wait for this kid to grow up so I can tell them those were their mum’s words in the moments before she found out she was pregnant.”

“Really?” she chuckles, the water already falling to her cheeks. “I’m pregnant?”

“Really,” he smiles, contentment spreading across every inch of his, “you’re pregnant.”

-/-

“Are you nervous?” Killian asks her as they wait backstage and listen to some of the other speakers at the women’s conference they’re attending today. Or really, she’s attending and Killian’s secretly tagging along because he’s weird and wanted to watch her speak. He’s being supportive, and she appreciates it, but she’s freaking out a bit right now. Her speech is as personal as she was allowed to make it, which she kind of feels like defeats the purpose of the women’s empowerment that’s going on today, but she also knows that five years ago no one in this family would have been allowed to do this because it would be seen as too political.

It’s not. It’s…human. Speaking up for women is human, and so this is simply another patronage that she is lucky enough to support and to bring attention to and not some kind of political statement. If she wasn’t speaking, she’d likely be bouncing with excitement and anticipation over this.

“I’m terrified,” she whispers, adjusting herself in her chair and smoothing down her dress over her protruding stomach. She’s six months pregnant, but sometimes it’s still so weird to look down and for something to be there that’s not always there. But it’s not like she can forget. If her body didn’t scream with the changes every day, she’d be reminded by Andy every day when he says hi to his baby sister or Killian when he’s far too overprotective and worries about her if she eats too much ice cream. She thought he’d calm down this go round, especially since the actual pregnancy has been so much easier (the months leading up to it not so much), but it might be worse. It’s sweet, but she wants to be able to pick up her two-year-old without Killian freaking out.

“You’re going to be fantastic. I know.”

“You’re biased. You don’t think the speech is a little much? That it’s not too privileged?”

“I think that you are afforded different opportunities and advantages in life but that doesn’t mean your experiences aren’t important.”

“There you go with your wise words again. It’s amazing how you can also be so dumb.”

“I love you, my sweetheart of a wife.”

“I know, right? I’m pretty much the definition of kindness.”

“And humble.”

“Oh, definitely humble. That’s what I put on my business cards.”

“Emma,” Isabelle says, interrupting them and pulling her out of her distraction and back to the reason she’s here, “they’re ready for you.”

“Thank you, Isabelle,” she sighs, rising from her chair and straightening out her dress as much as she can. “Alright, babe, wish me luck that I remember how to speak.”

“If our kid can do it, I have faith that you can too.”

She rolls her eyes before squatting down and briefly kissing his cheek. Isabelle guides her to the side of the stage, and when she’s introduced, she walks out and stands at the podium, her heel turning a bit underneath her. She’ll never quite get used to doing things like this. Spending time with kids and sitting at stuffy dinners, sure. Giving speeches, well, that’s different. She’s kind of regretting being here right now. She feels ridiculous.

But no. She wanted to do this. She wants to do this. She wants to support everyone who she can. This is a good thing.

“I am a lot of things,” she begins, swallowing the lump in her throat that always comes whenever she speaks in public. “I am a wife, a mother, a daughter. I am a former bartender, a current Duchess, someone with dual citizenship, a patron of charities ranging from education to mental health to arts and athletics. I am also a television enthusiast, someone who loves to eat every dessert I can get my hands as well as someone who enjoys running until my legs feel like jelly. And then, you know, eating actual jams and jellies.”

She takes a moment as the crowd laughs to tuck her hair behind her ears and take another deep breath. Why are there so many people? No, she’s not going to freak out. She can do this. It’s fine. It’s just talking.

“You can label me with every word in your vocabulary. A lot of people have labeled me in words that I cannot repeat here because I like to play as a proper lady sometimes. But here’s the thing, on top of these labels, on top of the ones that I embrace and the ones that I hide behind, I’m Emma. I’m Emma, and I am my own human being, my own person with all of my own interests and wants. Being a wife and a mother are two of the most important things in my life, but I cannot be either of those things without loving myself and knowing who I am as a woman first.

I spent a long time hiding behind the shadows and allowing others to control my life with their narratives of who I am. I was a thief, a pushover, a commoner, an unfit bride, and a horrible mother who refused to follow tradition for not showing off my newborn child five hours after giving birth. I was untraditional, uncaring, crass, and I was someone who was labeled all of these things by people who have never met me. After this speech, I’m sure I’ll be labeled the same things by more people who have never met me, maybe even some who have. So here’s my point. For your entire life, people are going to try to tell you who you are. They just are. It’s going to happen no matter what you do. But here’s the thing, you have the ability and the power to push back, to fight back, and to say no, I’m not those things. And even better, you have the ability to show them exactly who you are.”

She hears the claps. She really does, but these lights are bright, and her daughter is doing some kind of Olympic level gymnastic routine in her stomach. That’s really all she can focus on as she regulates her breathing again and runs her hand over her stomach, resting it there while she looks back at her page, the words written in large, printed letters. The kicks comfort her. They’re proof of the life she wanted for so long.

“We as women have the difficult challenge of being cornered into a box and not allowed out. If I cry over having to leave my baby at home, I am weak. If I get excited over being pregnant, people think that I don’t care about having a career. If I love my husband, I am not my own woman. If I spend time to do things for myself, I am neglecting everything else in my life.

You know what? That’s not true. I can love my child in the same way that you all can, and it makes me strong. And if you don’t want to have children, good for you. It’s your life, and you shouldn’t do something that’s not right for you. If I am excited over being pregnant like I am right now, I can still be excited over getting to stand here speaking to all of you as a part of my job no matter how nervous I am. Being a mother does not mean you have to give up your life. It’s a way of adding to it. I can love my husband with every fiber in my being, but that does not at all mean that I am not my own person. And I can spend time with my friends, spend time away from home, spend time doing things that make me happy without being told all about how I have a baby at home. Trust me, I know.

What I’m trying to say is to drop the labels and simply and unapologetically be you. There is no better thing that you can be, and I hope that everyone here can be of service to you and to all of the strong women in your lives. Thank you for having me here today.”

She nods, smiling out at the crowd before she’s walking away with her heart pounding in her chest while her face heats. She was terrified to give that speech, terrified of how it would sound using herself as an example when she lives a privileged life, but she had to listen to herself and allow herself to follow everything she just said. She had to do what felt right to her, and while she never imagined having such a platform to help others, she’s glad that she does.

She’s definitely going to avoid public speaking for a little while, though.

“You’re bloody amazing,” Killian sighs when she gets to him, his hands palming her cheeks before his lips are slanting over hers in a kiss that makes her head reel from the emotion behind it. “I’m so damn proud of you.”

“Thank you. I think I’m going to go vomit now.”

“Pregnancy or nerves?”

“Both.”

-/-

“Okay, buddy,” Killian sighs, holding onto Andy’s hand as they walk through the back hallways of the hospital, “we’re about to meet your little sister. She’s really rather small, and like you are with Indy, we have to be gentle, okay? With Mummy too. So no jumping on the bed.”

“Why?”

“We don’t want to hurt Sutton or Mummy.” They walk up to the door, Thomas greeting them when they get there, and he picks up his son before they push through the doors, David and Mary Margaret’s backs the first things they see when they enter.

“Mimi,” Andy shrieks, squirming in his arms until his can get a hug and a kiss from his grandmother and eventually his grandfather. “I’m a big brother.”

“You are indeed,” David tells him as Killian walks over to Emma and leans down to briefly brush his lips over hers while she holds Sutton. It’s been six hours, and he still absolutely cannot believe that he has a baby girl. She’s beautiful. So is his wife.

“Hi, love. How are you feeling?”

“I’m okay. This still sucks, and she’s not latching, which is freaking me out. I want - ” she sighs, leaning back in bed and closing her eyes, a piece of her hair falling in her face “ – I want to take a nap, but I want to see Andy, okay? She’s quiet now, so it’s probably a good time for you to have brought him since I’m sure he won’t want the screaming banshee that I can already tell you that she is.” Emma looks down at their daughter then, running a finger over her cheek. “I love you, baby, but you are a handful already.”

“We’ll get that all figured out in a minute, okay? It’ll be fine, love. You want me to get Andy from your dad?”

“Yeah.”

“Dave, can I have my kid?”

“You have to say please,” Andy huffs, sticking his chest up as David walks toward him. Killian’s just about to say it when Andy gasps, his hands going over his mouth while his eyes blow wide. “Is that my sister?”

“This is your sister,” Emma laughs, holding Sutton up the slightest bit while David gently puts him down on the bed. “Can you say hi, Andy?”

“Hi,” he whispers, waving to her as he slowly walks toward Sutton and Emma. “She’s small. Can she talk?”

“Not yet,” Emma says gently, puling Andy closer to her while he keeps watching Sutton. “When she gets bigger like you, she’ll learn how to talk.”

“Can I hold her?”

“You can help me hold here. Um, hold on,” she mutters, adjusting Sutton in her lap. “Babe, can you get a pillow for him?”

He nods his head and turns to grab her breastfeeding pillow, figuring it’s sturdy enough for this as he adjusts it around Andy while he settles down next to Emma. It’s a bit of a complicated maneuver to safely get Sutton situated on the pillow and in Andy’s small arms as he looks down at her with a soft, pensive smile on his face.

“How did she get out of Mummy’s tummy?”

Emma’s cheeks flush, his doing the same, and he hears David snicker behind him. “You know what, Andy, I’ll tell you about that later.”

Andy shrugs before looking at Sutton and then Emma’s stomach, his brows pushed together in thought. Yeah, they’re definitely going to have to figure that one out later before he comes up with one of his ridiculous theories.

-/-

“Don’t we have to turn around at some point?”

Killian hums next to her and tightens his arm around her shoulder, fingers taping against her sweater while she gets a sniff of the spice of his cologne. “Most likely. The end of our property is just up ahead, and as much as I love Ruby and Graham, I’m not sure how much I trust them with a newborn and the wild child that’s itching to go swimming even though it’s still chilly.”

“They’ll be fine, babe,” she sighs, tucking her hand into the back pocket of Killian’s jeans and playfully squeezing his ass as they walk. “They’ve watched them before, or at least Andy. And Sutton is two months old, so all they really have to do is not drop her. Besides, I’m really enjoying our full transformation into an elderly retired couple with our walk.”

“Weren’t you just the one who wanted to turn around?”

“I mean, yeah, but I just wanted to make sure we didn’t walk all the way back to London when we’ve finally left it.”

“Considering I’d have to carry you home on my back were that to happen, I, well, wouldn’t let it happen.”

“Hey,” she laughs, slapping his ass again, “what the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“I don’t have a death wish, so I’m thinking it’s not what you’re leaning toward.”

“And what exactly do you think I’m leaning toward?” He stops walking even as she keeps going, so when he tugs her back, she nearly stumbles and falls into the lush grass, dew still coating the blades. Or maybe it’s residual rain. She’s not exactly sure, but it doesn’t matter as long as she doesn’t fall. “What was that for?”

She sees his brows raise, then settle back into their normal resting place all the while one corner of his mouth ticks. He’s obviously trying to school his features, to keep from saying whatever it is that’s on his mind…which makes her completely sure that whatever it is he wants to say is going to make her mad. He’s so predictable in that way. Or really, maybe being together for eleven years means that she knows him a little too well.

Plus, those baby blues tell all.

“Nothing, my love,” he promises, wrapping his other arm around her and pulling her into an embrace while he brushes his lips across his forehead. Yeah, he’s definitely holding his tongue and trying to distract her. “Let’s keep walking until we get to the swing.”

“You’re going to have to fulfill your worst nightmare and carry me there because I’m not moving until you tell me what you were going to say.”

“I was going to say I don’t want to carry you and, you know, some other stuff that I’m seriously not going to say out loud.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m a weak, weak man who is incapable of carrying my wife unless I know that the faster I get her to the bedroom, the faster I’m going to have to have sex. So I could carry you go the swing now if certain promises are made.”

“I’m not having sex with you on the swing. Oh God,” she laughs, slapping his chest and leaning back so she can look in his eyes, the blue dimmed under the shade of his baseball cap. It’s a Yankees one, and she’s pretty sure that he stole it from her back when they were dating. “Is that why you had this swing built so far away from the house? Is it a sex swing?”

“Emma,” he bellows, leaning down and pressing his face into her shoulders while his entire body moves with laugher, the vibrations running through her from how close they are, “no, I did not build a bloody sex swing. I’m also not sure that you realize that that is something entirely different.”

“I know what a damn sex swing is, and you know that’s not what I meant.”

“Mhm, sure, love. Sure. If you want to hop on your old man’s back, I’ll carry you to our sex swing.”

“Nah,” she sighs, pulling back from him and reaching down for his hand so she can interlace their fingers and run her thumb over his knuckles, “I can walk. Take me to your sex swing.”

“You’re ridiculous.”

They walk a few more minutes until they come up on two large oak trees that twine together, obviously having grown here for much longer than any of the other trees and flowers they had planted when they were building the place. Her green thumb has gotten better since she planted the small garden outside of their apartment, but it’s definitely not enough to keep up with everything here. There’s so much beauty out here, much more than in the city, and even as her sneakers gets soaked in the damp grass, she’s so damn happy to be living here with her family.

The privacy is wonderful too. They can walk the grounds without worrying about anything. It’s like having freedom again.

She settles down onto the cushioned swing, not swaying until Killian settles down next to her, but then she pushes off the ground and starts moving them, causing the chains to gently hum and rustle with each movement. She’s going to have to bring Andy and Sutton out here one day. Andy will like the swing, even if it’s not like the one on his playground, and, well, maybe Sutton will like looking around at all of the leaves above them and the squirrels that are running around. She loves looking around, love focusing on her surroundings, and even though Emma sometimes thinks that her daughter is already attempting to be as different as possible from her brother with the fits and the crying, she does enjoy being swayed and getting to see everything around her.

There are so many similarities in her two children, so many that she already sees, but the moment Sutton was born without any hair but the tiniest of peach fuzz and the with features fairer than even Emma, she knew that this was not going to be another Killian. Sutton was going to look like her, even if her features are already changing, like a mix of the two of them but also her own person. Genetics are so strange, and even if she remembers studying them in school, she can’t quite explain her children. For all she knows, if they’re crazy and decide to have another one in a few years, that one could have hair as red as the flecks in Killian’s beard. That would really be something else.

“So I was thinking that we should go on a date sometime soon.”

“Yeah?” she asks, lifting her feet from the ground and curling them underneath her while she rests her head on Killian’s shoulder as he keeps them swaying.

“Most definitely, and as much as I love going on walks with you and hanging out on our sex swing, we should probably go somewhere without the kids being on the same property.” “Is this like when you made me leave Andy all night?”

“A little bit. But mostly I just want to take my wife on a date. We didn’t get to do that while I was courting you, so I feel like we still have so much to make up for.”

Sometimes he talks like he’s from a different century, and she’ll never be over how much she loves that.

“I don’t think we need to go on retroactive dates.”

“Well, that’s not really what I meant. I just meant that I like going out to dinner with you or sneaking into a movie or a play. Hell, we can go on a hike or to a football match. Just trying to keep the romance alive since my sex swing isn’t doing that.”

She chuckles to herself before twisting and propping herself up to glide her lips over his, almost instantly deepening it into a gentle push and pull. He tastes like his tea, but she doesn’t really notice that as she thinks about how much she loves him and how much he makes her laugh with his ridiculous jokes that literally no one else in the world would find funny. He pisses her off sometimes (a lot of the time), but then they have moments like this, the gentle quietness of nature surrounding them, and she wonders if all of the hell they went through to get here was actually quite so painful.

“Have I ever told you of the wonders that you are capable of with that mouth of yours, love?”

She laughs against his lips, their skin brushing together while Killian’s hand snakes up under her sweater and rests on the skin of her back, his skin warm compared to the early spring chill that’s still roaming around them. “You have, but it’s usually not quite in this context.”

“So dirty.”

“Hm, you usually say that too. I love you, you weirdo, and I definitely think that we should go on a date.”

“See, I always knew you’d come around to my plans. I’m very convincing.”

“Well, it sure as hell isn’t because of the wonders you can do with your mouth.”

He pinches the skin of her back before kissing her nose, the gentlest of touches that has her fluttering her eyes closed and trying to memorize this moment as one of the good ones. “You say that now, but wait until we go to dinner, and I drop the lettuce of my salad down my shirt.”

“You are a messy eater. That’s where Andy gets it from.”

“Eh, possibly.”

“No, definitely.”

“Whatever you say, darling. Just wait until Sutton stuffs a fistful of popcorn in her mouth instead of one or two pieces at a time. That’s what you do.”

“I do not.”

“You most definitely do.”

“Whatever.”

“Hey, Emma?”

“Yeah?”

“I love you too, you popcorn eating weirdo.”

-/-

She falls.

And then gets up.

And then falls again.

It’s this continuous cycle, but every time he gets up to try to help Sutton walk, she refuses his help. It absolutely cracks him up how independent she is, that sometimes she won’t even let him hold her hands for her to take a few steps around the room when she’s trying so hard to move. She’ll let Emma, the Mummy’s girl that she is, and on occasion, she lets him when she’s feeling particularly affectionate. It’s the funniest thing to him. Andy was the sweetest, calmest baby, and Sutton, well, she’s an absolute spitfire who is definitely some kind of karmic payback.

He’s not even sure if he believes in karma, but Sutton kind of makes him. He knew the first kid wasn’t difficult enough…and the first kid was damn difficult.

And while Andy favored Emma for a long time, mostly in his early days, he did come around to Killian eventually. Maybe he’s simply seeing it differently. Or maybe Sutton has much more obvious favoritism. Hell, Emma probably thinks that both of their kids favor him, even if only Andy looks like him. Sutton is all Emma.

Looks and personalities, though…two totally different things.

“Sutton, sweetheart,” he coos, adjusting himself on the ground and clapping his hands together. “Do you want to walk to come see Daddy? I think that sounds like a great idea, but you usually think otherwise.”

“So condescending there, Daddy.”

He twists his head to Emma standing in the doorway, her hair messily piled on top of her head and her t-shirt falling off her shoulder like it nearly always is. She must have finally woken up from her nap, and she obviously had a good one if the pillow creases on her face are any indication.

“I’m just speaking the truth. You try coming to get her to walk.”

Emma rolls her eyes before stepping into the room and over him so that she can take Sutton’s hands in hers as Sutton stands from the ground. “Alright there, baby girl, Momma needs you to walk with me, okay?”

Sutton’s face turns red for the briefest of moments, the tears and protests on the verge of coming to fruition, but then the red fades and she’s left with Emma’s creamy skin as her lips press into a straight line and she focuses on walking with Emma. It’s like watching magic happen, really. He’s got these two bloody incredible girls in his life, and they’ve got this bond that blows his mind. He definitely is jealous of it sometimes, jealous of the way Sutton doesn’t want him, but he likes that his loves have this bond.

He doesn’t understand how in the world he could have them, how he could have made one of them. It’s…sometimes he doesn’t deserve them, but man is he glad for them.

“Yay, Sutton,” Emma cheers when they take a few steps before Sutton insists that she sit down, crying out “Momma” until Emma releases her hands. “You did so good, Sutton, but you’ve really got to walk with Daddy sometimes, yeah? He gets a little jealous.”

“I can hear you.”

“I know. Don’t we have another one of these?”

“He’s in the playroom watching a movie, and I’ve got the camera on my phone. He hasn’t moved from the couch.”

“Good,” she sighs, reaching her hands down for him. “Why don’t we go in there and join him?”

He nods his head as he takes her hand, pushing up on his legs and ignoring the slight ache in his knees from standing from such a low position. “I think that sounds like a plan.”

Emma scoops up Sutton, and they walk out of the nursery and down to the end of the hall to the kids’ playroom. This room is nearly always such a mess, toys and clothes and pillows scattering across the floor and the tables despite the closet of bins that he swears he cleans up every single day. But it’s better that things are mostly contained in here, even though he stepped on a Lego in the living room downstairs yesterday, and he nearly screamed “fuck” so loudly that the kids could have heard him and woken from their naps. That would have been something else.

He does love this room, though. They have this set of windows at the end of it that stretch from floor to ceiling, and it looks out into the yard and to this oak tree that he thinks he might build a tree house in one day. He knows that they don’t age well most of the time, that children grow out of using them, but they’ll enjoy it for a little while. Besides, he and Emma get the cushioned swing out near the end of the property and the view of the pool from their bedroom. The kids can get this.

Some day.

“What are you watching, bud?”

“Chicken Little. The sky is falling from the sky, Mummy.”

“Oh no,” Emma gasps, settling down next to Andy on the couch and settling Sutton in her lap while Killian grabs some blankets out of the basket and dims the lights a little bit.

“Don’t worry, Mummy. I checked our sky. It’s still there.”

“Oh, okay. Well, that’s good.”

He snickers under his breath and then sits down in a recliner, propping the legs up only for Andy to scramble over to him and sit on his lap, his bony limbs poking Killian over and over again until he finally plops down in the small open space left in the chair and tugs the blanket up over his legs too, looking up at Killian and flashing him the widest grin. Andy looks so proud of himself, and Killian has no idea why. He’s probably hidden Killian’s wallet or something.

The movie continues to play, everyone settling into it, and then out of nowhere, Andy speaks. “If my name is Andy and Indy’s name is Indy, does that mean Indy is my sister and Sutton isn’t?”

“I’m sorry…what?”

“Is Indy my sister?”

His eyes glance over to Emma’s, and she simply smiles and shrugs, giving him absolutely no help for how to answer this. His son’s name is eerily similar to their dog’s, and sometimes he wonders how they didn’t plan that better. He didn’t ever really think that would be a problem though.

“Well, Indy is part of our family like me, Mummy, and Sutton.”

“And me.”

“Yeah,” he chuckles, tugging up on the blanket again, “and you. And we all love Indy, but she’s a dog, remember? She has all of that fur and we pet her and she barks.”

“And eats gross food.”

“That too. So her name sounds like yours, but Sutton is your sister and we love her too, right?”

“Yeah, but she cries.”

“She’s not crying right now.”

Andy tilts his head to the side, his gaze falling away from the television and toward his sister who’s intently watching the movie while Emma’s fingers play with her small wisps of hair. Without any kind of warning, Andy scrambles up from his spot, kicking Killian multiple times before he’s off of the chair and moving to sit on the couch while he stares at Sutton with rapt fascination like she hasn’t been alive and living with them for a year.

Finally he nods and reaches over to kiss Sutton’s cheek in a move so gentle that Killian feels his heart swell for a moment before going back to a normal, functioning size.

“I love you, Sutton,” Andy whispers while Sutton tries to decide if she likes her brother or not, her eyes slanted as she studies him. She’s always kind of wary of him at first, but then again, she’s wary of anyone who’s not Emma. “You’re not a dog, but that’s okay.”

They spend the rest of the day in the playroom, watching movies and letting the kids run their toys over the two of them before they feed them dinner and get washed up for bed. It takes far too long every night, but it’s not like they can simply not feed or bathe their children. That would be inhumane and bad parenting among so many other things. But it gets done, and the moment he closes Sutton’s door, the wood clicking into place, Emma takes his hands and intertwines their fingers while the corners of her lips turn up into a smile.

Beautiful.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Oh, Killian,” she mutters, walking backward down the hall and tugging him with her, “I know that you’ve gone all soft on me, but I still like to think that you know when I’m trying to seduce you.”

“Is that what this is? Because I don’t know if you’ve looked at yourself today but – ”

“Jackass.”

He tugs her closer even if she resists a little bit until their chests are pressed together and he dips his head to softly glide his lips over hers, staying still for a moment until she begins to move against him, her hands letting his go so they can wrap around his neck, fingers teasing his hair, and his hands find her hips and the skin that rests under her shirt, warmth in every inch of it that buzzes across his own skin.

She’s soft, always so soft even when she’s firm.

“Am I still a jackass?” he whispers when his nose is still heavily pressed into her cheek.

“Absolutely, but I’ll allow it.”

“Oh thank goodness.”

She chuckles against his lips, the vibrations traveling across his skin too, before she’s unwrapping herself from him and walking down the hallway and disappearing behind their bedroom door. By the time he joins her she’s setting up the baby monitor on the bedside table and stripping out of her clothes, tossing them on the glider.

“Someone is eager.”

“Someone is efficient,” she shrugs, reaching back and unclasping her bra until her breasts are exposed to his gaze, a shiver running down his spine that has nothing to do with the high speed at which the ceiling fan in this room is running. “And cold. I’m cold,” she laughs, quickly hoping into bed and pulling the comforter over herself while he laughs and strips out of his clothes as well. The fan has to do with Emma’s shivers, apparently.

“I love you,” he sighs as he lifts the comforter and settles down on top of her, feeling both the warmth and chill of her skin as their lips come together again.

“I love you, even though you’re not a dog.”

“Oh my God,” he laughs, trailing away from her mouth and moving down her neck, working all of the places he knows Emma loves while his hands move across her body, exploring and teasing and making her gasp from his touch, especially when he begins stroking her, wetness gathering at his fingers as Emma’s hips buck up into his in a motion that’s delightful and enticing while his lips move over her breasts.

Glorious, glorious breasts.

“K-Killian,” she stutters when he slowly starts pumping his fingers inside of her while his thumb rubs her bundle of nerves in slow, practiced circles.

“Like that?”

“Like that.”

It doesn’t take much longer as he teases her, and he didn’t realize how keyed up she was before they started as her hips buck at a more furious pace and she falls apart beneath him, alternating between whispering quiet words and muffling her loud curses against his shoulder.

“I’m still cold,” she sighs, and he grunts in response before covering her entire body with his, hoping that his warmth and the blankets that surround them will help as he guides himself inside of her, her warmth enveloping him and making his eyes roll back at the pleasure of being inside of her while he moves her left leg to rest over his hip, opening her up to him.

“Still cold?”

“I think that can be fixed if you start moving.” She smiles up at him with the most innocent of smiles, something he would see when they’re out working together, but then she thrusts her hips up, causing him to nearly lose his balance, and pulls his lips down to hers so that they can slide together in a rhythm that matches the thrusts he’s slowly moving into.

He takes his time, experimenting with thrusts and angles and depths, and as the minutes move on, the unsteady beat of his heart not at all matching up with the hum of the fan or the chirps of the insects outside, he finds himself in a position that’s good for the both of them. Emma’s breath is unsteady as well, her heartbeat likely beating a similar rhythm, and as her skin heats, sweat beading at her forehead and dripping down her skin, she mumbles for him to move onto back until he’s pulling out of her and rolling over onto his back only for Emma to settle her knees on either side of his thighs and slowly guide him back into her warmth as she moves above him.

He’s been with her for over a decade, since she was a little under twenty-one and him twenty-three, and over the years he’s seen her change, her personality and convictions and her body. She’s so much stronger now, so damn confident in herself that when he looks at her, he’s still amazed that she’s chosen to love him and to be with him. He knows how much shit she’s put up with over the years, a lot of it before him, some of it because of him, and likely even more of it that has nothing at all to do with him, and he’s watched her handle it with grace and with bravery and something undeniably Emma.

Softness and strength all at once.

Emma.

As she moves above him, her hips swiveling and driving him into madness while his hands explore her skin, kneading her ass and her breasts in the ways that she likes, he watches her with as much focus as his muddled mind allows him to. Her breasts are heavier than when they first met, two children likely causing that, and while Emma sometimes complains about not being able to get away with going braless anymore, he selfishly is not going to complain about that. Nor will he complain about the curve of her hips, the firmness of her ass, or the faded tiger stripes on her stomach from carrying their children and from simply living life.

Really, he’d be a fool to complain about anything. He’d also be a bit of an ass.

So he doesn’t. He won’t. His body has changed too, his life as well, and he’s simply glad that they’ve changed together instead of growing apart.

“Fuck,” he stutters when Emma leans forward and wraps her arms under his shoulders while her lips trail down his neck, the pleasure in his spine becoming concentrated at the base while his hips start doing the work, snapping up into her while she nibbles on his ear, her breath hot and lips soft. “Fuck, Emma. That’s incredible. You’re incredible.”

She gasps when his hands grab onto the globes of her ass, guiding her as she whispers dirty words into his ear that have him closing his eyes as his pleasure reaches him, the thrusts becoming erratic and his mind blurring for the shortest of moments even though he tries to keep the presence of mind to rub his fingers over where they’re joined to let Emma fall apart as well.

“I love you,” she sighs as she rests on top of his chest, not bothering to move even as he slips out of her and the need to cleaned up calls to them. Her lips trail across his chest and up his neck until they’re slanting over his lips, the salt of sweat prominent on them. “And I’m still cold.”

“I love you, darling, but I cannot possibly understand how you’re still cold. You’re literally sweating.”

“It’s making me cold.”

He snickers against her lips and nuzzles his nose into her neck, nipping at the skin for a brief moment before rolling them over and covering Emma’s body with his. “I’m going to go get you a washcloth and some flannel pajamas, okay?”

“My hero.”

He rolls his eyes before getting up and making his way to the bathroom to get the washcloth and some clothes.

“Hey Killian?” Emma calls, and he turns around to see her bundled up under the white of the comforter with only her head showing, her hair matted and tangled from the day and their activities. The sexiest women he knows is also the most adorable, and the affection he feels for her continues to grow.

“Yeah, love?”

“That’s a nice ass you’ve got there, so if you want to, you know, not get dressed, that’d be fine with me.”

He winks. “As you wish.”

#second in command #cs fic #cs ff #captain swan #captain swan fic

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nerd-bastard · 5 years

Text

ok so over the... /checks calendar, past five days i have managed to tear through act one of DQXI and hoo boy. hooooo boy.

i fucking love this game *_*

@flutiebear thank you so much for your notes, they were super helpful!! my thing with JRPGs is mostly the turn based combat-- i can get SO BORED with it, i definitely prefer ARPGs where i can button mash things to death. DQXI seems to have found some kind of sweet spot for me tho, where battles are just long enough for me to like. pick a strategy and implement it, and get satisfactory results. sometimes those satisfactory results are just Talc helichoptering an entire group of enemies to death in one swing, which scratches my ‘button mash them to death’ itch :D I definitely like the easier monsters and relaxing while i play too, i’ve literally failed exactly ONE boss battle and that was bc my initial strategy sucked, not bc i didn’t have the muscle to pull it off. and omg, THE NO’S. BEST TIP EVER, THANK YOU.

and, as per your request, thoughts! :DDD full disclosure, i watched a playthrough up through the MMA tournament before I got the game, so these aren’t exactly first impressions. tons of screenshots and rambling below the cut, RIP mobile users :(

OH and because I got it on PC, i literally modded it before I even fired up the game lol. found some nice retextures on the mod nexus and installed the orchestral music overhaul too, it’s nice. The retextures are Wild Side Erik and Chainmail Luminary, i love them and I recommend the hell out of ‘em. Just a heads up so folks know why my Erik and Hero look different :D

ALRIGHT I WAS TOO DISTRACTED TO TAKE SCREENSHOTS FOR THE FIRST PART UP THE TOR but: i love gemma and i would die for her and sandy, and so would Talc. also christ, slimes are the most adorable enemy ever, DQ did a good thing with slimes.

/NERVOUS LAUGHTER

horsey!! her name is Whisper and Talc loves her :D

so, initial Hero headcanons: Talc does not want to be a Luminary. He wants to stay in Cobblestone, and continue spending days at a time alone in the wilderness hunting for his family and culling monsters and riding horses and whittling wood and carving soapstone to pass the time. He knows he’s not Hero material-- he has to work too hard to hold his temper, and he’s too stubborn, and and and (he’s fine-- he just really wants to be like Chalky, but he’s a 16 year old kid who thinks good people ((like Chalky)) don’t have to try so hard to be good people, not a man with 60+ years of experience and time to mellow out. he’ll get there.) So Talc’s plan is 100% ‘Go to Heliodor, explain the situation to the king’s Knights and give them the pendant so one of them can go defeat the evil instead, then go home to Cobblestone.’ and well. We know how that turns out.

the most hardened, you say ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

THIS FUCKER. WHAT IS THIS FUCKER. 47 HOURS INTO THIS GAME AND I DON’T KNOW WHAT THIS FUCKER IS. ARE YOU GOOD? ARE YOU EVIL?? ARE THERE A BUNCH OF YOU, OR IS IT JUST FUCKING YOU FOLLOWING ME EVERYWHERE? TELL ME

THERE HE IS!!! THERE’S MY BOY!! <3_<3

In Talc’s defense, he was trying to open the jars, not smash them. yes i absolutely have to reconcile breaking into people’s homes and smashing their stuff with his character, he’s a country bumpkin who struggles to remember the concept of ‘private property’ and is so stupidly strong from rock climbing and swinging a greatsword around that is is a genuine struggle for him to lay hands on ceramic without shattering it. he’s a bit of a bull in a china shop, and it’s only growing up with Gemma that let him develop a reflex-bordering-on-instinct to be as gentle as possible with other human beings that, unfortunately, does not translate well to inanimate objects.

also... ngl, it took... a minute for that accent to grow on me. that accent, man. more like ‘those accents’ JUST PICK ONE AND STICK WITH IT DUDE

talc: you know those days when you’re like ‘this might as well happen, adult life is already so goddamn weird’

also, those SHOUJO SPARKLES. i will NEVER BE OVER THE SPARKLES.

holy shit i love Erik’s expressions and poses so much, he’s so fucking expressive (all the characters are, the voice acting and animation in this game has been a delight every step of the way, but i just. adore Erik’s in particular, everything he does is so endearing to me.)

ARE YOU KIDDING ME WITH THIS QUEST NAME, IT COULD NOT BE ANY LESS SUBTLE

little did he know what monster he had created

seriously tho i LOVE the crafting system in this game, it’s a good challenge and a little frustrating when one of the random events screws you up, but SO SO SATISFYING when you finally get your +3. also it works really well with my headcanon that Talc is very much a “show your love by providing the ones you care about with anything they could possibly need or want” type of person. he’s actually very good at anticipating said needs/wants and has a knack for giving his friends things before they even properly knew they needed/wanted the thing. he also has a tendency to...kind of forget that he can get things in return, and gets really flustered and happy when he does get something which also leads to a tendency to treasure and consequentially hoard small dumb things BECAUSE they were gifts.

this is where Talc’s heart starts to go doki-doki-- he's very much a people pleaser, if he can make folks happy it makes him happy. the little bit of trouble is it was pretty much the status quo in cobblestone, and a little bit taken for granted by the time he strikes out-- not by everyone, or all the time, for sure, but getting out into the world and getting a sudden influx of gratitude is like crack for him. Also Erik is Nice and Handsome and was happy to do all the talking in downtown Heliodor so Talc didn’t have to worry about it, so Talc now definitely wants to keep Erik. It’s also hilarious to Talc that Erik is clearly skilled with knives, and yet has zero clue how to dress or cook a rabbit-- he’s very determined to keep the city boy alive (watch me walk this headcanon back in a few days when i finally get his back story and it turns out he lived off the land for years)

oh man, my HEART, MY HEART. even knowing it was coming, playing through this part was rough, especially since now it’s my Talc running around the ruins of the one place he wanted to live out his days protecting. ;_; that was his job, that’s what he was good at and contributed to his home, except for the one time it really, really needed him. he’s more than a little fucked up about it, but it’s a big part of him really leaning into the Luminary role- he can’t stand the thought of it happening to anyone else.

this. this is kinda a big deal for him, after cobblestone. after learning people blame him for Dundrasil, and then feeling responsible for Cobblestone, he’s already starting to have tiny, niggling doubts about ‘oh shit what if i AM some kind of darkspawn??’ Fighting alongside Erik through the Kingsbarrow and getting to feel like he’s helping and protecting Erik helps, and then so does this.

it also plays right into his thing for doing justice-- which, he tries to hold Chalky’s words close to his heart, he does, and his vision isn’t the first time Chalky has had to encourage him to let grudges go. it was the main motivation for the vast majority of his pranks as a kid: make Gemma cry by telling her proper ladies don’t play at catching frogs and getting dirty? enjoy the frog hidden in a jar leaping out at your face, old lady. accuse him of being a darkspawn and throw him and his family in jail? hell yes he is going to help this thief steal your greatest treasure, and love every minute of it.

and now, to wrap things up bc this post is already way too long and i’ve got. the rest of act one to yammer about later:

YES

YESSSSS

YAAAAAASSSSSSSSSSSSSS

in conclusion: this is a good game and a good ship and i already have 300 words of fic sitting in my gdrive <_<;;;

#dqxi #dqxi spoilers

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lovemesomesurveys · 5 years

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1. Why did you stop liking the last person you liked?: Over time I just moved on. Nothing was going to come of it and we had drifted apart. He honestly just like disappeared. One day I saw he had deleted Facebook and Instagram and I have no idea what happened.

2. If you were dating someone seriously for a long time and were considering marriage, would them not wanting kids (or wanting kids; if you don't want them) be a deal-breaker?:  This is an interesting question because I don’t see myself ever getting married or having kids, so it’s hard to answer this. I’m not sure what I would do because I can’t even imagine myself in that situation to be honest.

3. If someone cheated on you, would you give them a second chance?: I don’t know. My first reaction is to be like, “NO”, but again, I think you don’t really know unless you find yourself in that situation (which I hope I never do). I think it would depend on the situation and other factors.

4. What do you think about before you go to bed?: Everything and anything. For some reason my brain likes to go to some weird, sometimes dark, places.

5. Are most of your friends virgins?: Just me.

6. Could you date someone who was a different religion than you? What about be just friends with someone of a different religion?: I could be friends with someone of a different religion, but as for a relationship that could be complicated. I’m not sure.

7. Do you enjoy sexist and racist jokes?: No. 8. What about dirty jokes?: Eh, some can be funny I guess. 9. Could you date someone with a kid?: No.

10. Do you respond to texts that just say "lol" or "haha" or just a smiley? Why or why not? Not usually. I don’t know how to respond to that and I feel it doesn’t need a response.

11. Do you think you're easy to talk to? Are you a better talker or listener?: I’m a better listener. 12. Who was the last person you were "in a relationship with" on Facebook (including anyone you may have put "in a relationship with" for a joke)?: I’ve never been “Facebook official” with anyone, ha. I also haven’t done that for a joke.

13. Do you think a relationship with a 16-year-old girl and a 35-year-old man would work out? Do you think age differences like that (when they're under 18) should be legal?: Uh, well, that’s illegal first and foremost so there’s a lot of issues there. I wouldn’t support any relationship if one of them involved was underage.

14. What's one job you would HATE to have?: Shout out to the janitors out there for real. 15. Be honest. When you hear someone wants to be an artist or musician, do you automatically think "Oh gawd, they're going to fail and be a loser forever..."?: No, I don’t think that, but I do think that it’s going to be hard for them to find work because that’s just the reality of those professions.

16. When you write, what do you usually write about?: I haven’t written anything since I last was in school. These surveys are the only writing I do anymore.

17. Were you ever "the other man/woman"? How did it turn out? How do you feel about it today?: No.

18. Have you ever cheated? What have you learned from it?: No.

19. What do you think of open relationships? If your partner suggested it, what would you say?: I wouldn’t be okay with that all, personally.

20. If you had a girl right now, what would you name her (full name)? What about a boy?: Sigh.

21. Are you crushing on anyone right now?: Alexander Skarsgard.

22. Are you a party animal? Why or why not?: No I'm lame as shit. <<<< Ha, same.

23. Do opposites truly attract, or would you rather date someone more similar to you than different?: Of course I’d like to have things in common with the person I’m with, but differences are good, too. We don’t have to like or do all of the same things. We’re different people. It’s good to have your own interests as well. Plus, when there’s differences you can inform each other of things that you may not know about it and it can be fun and interesting.

24. Could you date someone with no job, no car, and no goals?: I instantly want to say no and then I realize that wait, that someone is me.

25. Would you ever date out of your race?: Yes.

26. When you have old clothes/whatever that you don't want anymore, what do you do with it?: I donate them.

27. Do you still have a landline, or does everyone in your family just use cellphones?: We do still have a landline. We give that number out to doctors and such.

28. Are you religious?: Yes.

29. Do you like the "guys/girls you can't have" or would you rather have someone upfront, honest, and good for you?: Apparently that’s the case because no one wants to be with me.

30. Are any of your clocks set in the 24-hour (sometimes called "army time") format? Do you knowwhat 18:08 would be in "regular" time?: No they’re not. Yes, it would be 6:08PM.

31. What are five personality traits that would make you instantly not want to be with someone romantically?: Cockiness, arrogance, controlling, disrespectful, and humorless.

32. What about five traits that would immediately catch your attention?: Sense of humor, patience, compassion, reliable, and trustworthy.

33. Ever had a relationship last under a week? Do you even count those as relationships?: Ha, after my first boyfriend and I broke up we got back together at one point for a few days. I don’t count it as a relationship.

34. Do you celebrate "month-a-versaries" or do you just do it yearly?: I would just do it yearly.

35. Is it okay to fool around when you're single?: Yeah.

36. If you're single, do you still mess around?: I haven’t even been talking to anyone in that way for a few years now.

37. What does your work uniform look like?: No job.

38. What's the oldest age someone should be living at home at (if they're NOT going to school or because they moved back in due to a divorce/lost their house/or another tragedy)?: Who am I to say.

39. Is there anyone you know who hasn't changed much (personality-wise; not maturity-wise) since middle school?: Yeah. 40. Are you attending college after high school? Which one? If not, whatcha gon' do?: I did, yes.

41. What curse words do you find to be the most offensive?: The F word when used excessively.

42. Do you have any sexist beliefs?: I don’t think so.

43. A teenage girl wears a revealing outfit to a club and gets date raped. Did she "bring it upon herself" because she was dressed that way? Or is that mindset just sickening?: Wow, absolutely not. That mindset is very sickening. Let’s put the blame where it’s due, which is on the rapist. No matter what someone is wearing, it’s not an open invitation for someone to take advantage of and abuse them. Ever.

44. What kinds of books do you normally like to read?: Young adult/New adult novels.

45. What do you put in your coffee?: Flavored creamer or cream and sugar.

46. Do needles make you pass out?: No, but I do get really hot and weak whenever I have get blood drawn.

47. Do you have any friends who spend all their time with their partner, but when something goes wrong, they come back to you? Even though they ditched you for their partner a bunch of times?: It was like that sometimes.

48. Do you think being gay is a choice?: No.

49. Do you think you're good-looking? Why or why not? Nope.

50. Would you have sex before dating someone?: No.

#personal #text #survey #surveys

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homosociallyyours · 5 years

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a friend just posted a pic on fb of the coffee shop we used to hang out at, taken way back in the day. it’s just a shot of the place taken from inside, looking out the big glass windows and onto the street of downtown chattanooga. but one friend pointed out that she could see another friend’s van parked across the street, and one of the baristas came on and said he’d taken the photo and then proceeded to post a bunch more.

anyway i’m feeling nostalgic so i’m posting about it. memories behind the cut.

i started going there when i was maybe 15 years old. i don’t remember why, but it’s likely that the artsy nerd club i was a part of (we stayed after school to watch amadeus and monty python and we’d sometimes go to the local art museum) went there after a meeting one day. or maybe someone told me about it. anyway, it was my favorite place to go. i would drink pots of tea, always trying new things.

on my 16th birthday my parents got me a teapot from there and a gift certificate to buy tea with. i had that teapot til it broke a year ago. 20+ years! it moved with me to and from college, to nyc, california, texas, and back to california. damn.

anyway after i’d been going for a while i started talking with the owner. his name was ian, and he was pretty young. he loved tea and coffee and he had a roaster where they’d make their own coffee. it was loud and lovely, and for a long time it lived up front, right by a little elevated area with couches. when it was running you couldn’t hear anything and had no choice but to either shout or be quiet.

ian encouraged my love of tea, and offered to keep track of everything i’d tried in a little notebook that was kept behind the counter. i got to make notes on every pot i drank, and i remember writing “terrible! grass!” after my first pot of green tea (it was oversteeped--my fault--and probably made with water that was too hot--their fault). i had my first pu-er there, and fell in love with its damp leaf flavor and that turned earth scent that it has. i drank multiple pots of jasmine pearls and wrote a caffeine fueled poem about it with a friend. i loved that little coffee shop.

i don’t remember when i went from hanging out inside to hanging out outside, but i feel like i was 18 or so. the older people (they were probably barely 21-25, fucking babies) sat out there smoking and drinking coffee. i developed a crush one summer on a guy who made me think of arthur dent for some reason (don’t ask because i don’t know) and we went on one awkward date and didn’t kiss, and now i wonder what’s happened to him and if he, too, wasn’t straight. who knows? someone, i’m sure, but i can’t remember his last name anymore so is it even relevant?

i’d never felt cool til i went off to college. it was like leveling up without trying, like when you’re playing a game and do one action and suddenly all your stats are refilled and you’re like...this is unexpected? but i’ll take it? i think that’s why i decided i could really sit with the outside tables. that and my bff, who was dating someone who was friends with a lot of those people, would show up sometimes and sit out there.

(if you’ve actually been reading along so far, here’s where i’m gonna introduce you to a bunch of people i’ve never talked about before and will likely never mention again. just so you have fair warning.)

the cast of characters shifted a lot, but there were always the constants. scott, the barista, who was much older than most of the people hanging out but looked young and seemed young. i look back with adult eyes and question the relationship we had, but at the time i just thought it was cool that someone so much older thought i was worth hanging out with. but he was 30 when i was 19, and man that’s a lotta years. he had a summer where he hit on my friend and i constantly, after his wife left him and he was kinda floundering a bit. but it never went past flirting and it never bothered me, though like i said it kinda does now. we were still hanging out when i was 21 and we’d go get beers after the coffee shop closed at ten or midnight. he’d turn up obnoxious music really loud and i’d sometimes help close.

there was gabe and george, brother and sister in a family of people with names starting with the letter g. george was tiny and cute and either very drunk or very hyper from coffee at all times. gabe was a nerd who was usually quiet but loved to play scrabble, and we’d take the board inside sometimes and battle one another. he was much better than me, i won’t lie. liz and ever were both writers who would play with us sometimes. ever had changed her name at some point (to ever; any name she had before is irrelevant) and when we met she explained the meaning of her new name, which i won’t give because damn it’s very google-able.

she was a so fascinating to me, always talking about some feminist theory or philosopher, and i always felt so smart when we’d hang out. like a Serious Thoughtful Adult and not a kid. and liz was less serious but no less smart. she played scrabble a lot more and for a while we got pretty close. she took me out after coffee sometimes to a shitty bar with pool tables and tried to teach me how to play pool. she had her own cue and even though she was like 5′2″ she could break like nobody’s business. i never figured out how to do that part.

alex would come with us sometimes. he was tall and handsome and rode a motorcycle, and was the first openly bi guy i ever met. one time he invited me over to his house and we laid around listening to the smiths and talking. he burned me a copy of their greatest hits that i still have, all scratched up so it probably doesn’t play anymore. he crashed his bike more than once driving drunk. dumb fuckin kid. now he repairs coffee machines and sails, i think. life is funny.

a few other people ran in groups. meg and waide and the aforementioned jason and ardyce. some people called meg “big megan” and another megan (her family was really wealthy, rich southern politicians who knew the clintons and have a mention in sweet home alabama--the song, not the movie) was “little megan” because she was still in high school. i joked that i was medium megan, but the whole thing was awkward because big megan was fat and i was small fat and little megan was skinny. i’m gonna blame it on thoughtless dudes, but who the fuck knows? we all pretended not to mind it anyway.

waide ended up being a connection with other people who i met later. my hometown is weird in that it’s actually a pretty big part of the southern punk scene, so a lot of punks i meet have spent time there, and anyone over a certain age probably spent time at the bar waide worked at (the stone lion, and then maybe also the pickle barrel) so he’s one of those people who i’ll end up mentioning even though we haven’t spoken in years.

at some point a kid named ory showed up. i think he was 16 when he started coming around, and i used to call him puppy because he was excitable and silly, full of energy one minute and then mopey crashing the next. like a lot of people there he drank a lot and would be fucked up sometimes and make dumb choices. i always wanted to protect him. when i was 22 (and he was 19, i think) we ended up sitting together at the second lotr movie and having some kind of weird chemistry. that summer i drove him home one night and we had a super heavy make out with lots of clothed grinding. honestly the furthest i’ve ever gone with a cis straight(ish, he hooked up with a couple dudes but idk if he’d say he’s bi) dude and it was awkward in that we never talked about it? and then he came to visit me a couple years later in new york because he was in the navy, and he got super drunk and passed out on my couch and was a mess because he literally never stopped being a puppy.

he’s fucked up now, fully cancelled bc he said shit about girls rock camp (really dude?) and also probably cheated on his wife on their honeymoon? idk, it was fb rumors and then he deleted. but i’d believe it, honestly.

and then there were all these absolutely random downtown characters: dirty mark (a crusty punk who was drunk or high most of the time) and shirtless dave (yeah he really didn’t wear a shirt that much) usually came as a pair. sometimes dave hung out with a guy my friends and i called blue hair. he once hit on my friend and she panicked and gave him my number instead of hers because her brain didn’t make up a fake number fast enough.

there was sandy the flower man, who just passed away a couple weeks ago. he’d get flowers from local florists and go around on his bike, stopping into the coffee shop or to bars with roses and carnations and daisies. people gave him money usually, but sometimes he’d just hand you a flower because he wanted to. i saw a picture from a memorial and there was a portrait of him that was sat on top of his bicycle, all of it surrounded with flowers on flowers. so pretty. it’s what he deserved.

things changed around 2005 or so, i think. by that time, all the old baristas had left and the kids who came in were all weirdly religious and went to the christian college on the mountain. they made shitty coffee and sometimes played xtian rock and most of the old regulars couldn’t take it anymore. ian got sick around that time, too, and ended up selling the place. they stopped carrying much tea, if any.

but they finally sold the space and moved in like 2015. i remember the first time i drove by and didn’t see the lights on inside. it felt like seeing a friend from grade school all grown up, maybe the kid you had a crush on but they have a family now and you don’t think they’d recognize you at all so you just have to walk away. gone.

fuck this post is long as shit, i’m sorry for anyone on mobile. but damn it was good to get my memories out.

#long post #text post #personal #coffee shop memories #i thought i was so grown up

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womenofcolor15 · 4 years

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EXCLUSIVE SNEAK PEEK: Tamar Braxton Says She Wanted To Be Engaged To David Adefeso, But She Didn’t Want To Marry Him On 'Get Ya Life'

Tamar Braxton opens about her engagement to her now-ex fiancé David Adefeso and why she didn’t want to marry him on an upcoming episode of her new reality series “Get Ya Life.” She also dishes on her ex-husband Vince Herbert’s relationship with David…or lack thereof. Catch our exclusive sneak peek inside….

Fans will get a peek into Tamar Braxton’s life behind-the-scenes to see the events that led up to her shocking suicide attempt. In July, the singer was rushed to the hospital when her fiancé David Adefeso found her unresponsive after she allegedly ingested an unknown amount of prescription meds while simultaneously drinking alcohol.

Months after the suicide attempt, all hell broke loose when the Nigerian businessman filed a restraining order against the Bluebird of Happiness singer, accusing her of domestic violence while he was driving her to a mental health facility to get treatment. The accusations came out days before the premiere of Tamar’s new reality show, “Get Ya Life.”

Following his claims, Tamar sources said David was the aggressor and threatened to take Tamar’s life in a murder-suicide. It’s a mess. And now, fans get to see some of the events that led up to the tragic moment Tamar attempted to take her own life. Needless to say the are no longer together.

On Thursday’s episode of Tamar’s new reality series “Get Ya Life,” the “Angels & Demons” singer sits down with her friend/manager Mona Scott-Young to answer some “adult questions” about her relationship with David. Was Tamar ready to walk down the aisle again? Nope. The reason? She shares it all in our sneak peek.

Tamar was also asked about her ex-husband/son’s father Vince Herbert’s relationship with her then-fiancé David…or lack thereof.

Check it:

youtube

Chile…

You can see it all play out on a new episode of “Get Ya Life” set to air tomorrow, September 17th at 9pmEST on WEtv. It’ll be doozy.

While Vince hasn’t publicly addressed Tamar & David’s volatile relationship, apparently, he’s letting David know exactly how he feels. In a series of leaked text messages (seemingly after Tamar’s suicide attempt), David asked Vince for an address where he could send Tamar and her son Logan’s belongings.

”Hey Vince, I’m currently spending time with my mom on the spiritual journey she and my pastor brother-in-law and I have been on the past few months,” David allegedly wrote to Vince in a text message. “As I described yesterday and as I’m sure you can relate to, I need to heal and the only way I know to do that is using the spirit and word of God.”

In Vince’s response, he said he only hit him up to “keep the peace” after Tamar told him she had been trying to receive her and Logan’s belongings. Then, Vince went IN.

”It is now safe to say she’s moved on from this vile and abusive relationship and hearing the tape from the other day, I don’t blame her,’ Vince allegedly wrote. “Tamar is getting help. As you know she has been in deep therapy from Dr. V who treats and care for people like Tamar…”

He continued, “Please know that after the stunt you pulled on Saturday you seeing my son is absolutely out of the question. You used a 7-year-old boy and his emotions for your own publicity stunt. Never again will you be alone with him for any reason. You used Tamar’s love and trust for you and manipulated time with Logan to use him for your Instagram and likes…’

”After heating you threaten Tamar’s life, I believe the last thing I would do is give you an address for you to find her. I don’t mind having a police escort to make sure everything is cleared out. The way you packed her things the last time was disrespectful, and it looked like a bunch of trash. She nor Logan deserves that.”

Vince made it clear to David that…he is NOT his friend and never will be.

You can see the alleged screenshots here.

This situation gets uglier by the minute...

Photo: YouTube Screenshot

[Read More ...] source http://theybf.com/2020/09/16/exclusive-sneak-peek-tamar-braxton-says-she-wanted-to-be-engaged-to-david-adefeso-but-she

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bellringermal · 7 years

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What sort of man is Gerhman for you? (Same question as with Maria)

He is a handsome piece of trash and I love him. THE END.

Oh, if only things were that simple! :P I will try not to turn this post into the ramblings of a shameless fangirl but I promise you nothing.

What I want to clarify right here at the start is that Gehrman is, overall, a good man. Yes, he is flawed, yes he is a closet pervert and yes he never really felt guilty for the slaughter of Fishing Hamlet. But all of this is what makes him the more human and relatable character in the Soulsborne series in my opinion and what intrigued me in the first place.

So, lemme give you some juicy and 100% fanmade backstory for this bad boi :P

Gehrman’s character and personality are definitely the results of his upbringing. Born frail and sensitive, he was forced into martial training since a young age and denied to pursue what was probably his true calling in life, that of the artisan. He had to ‘grow up fast’ to help to sustain his family (Gehrman’s childhood/teenage years follow the disastrous conclusion of a war between Carim and a foreign nation) and because of that he never got the chance to assiduously attend school. When he got hired at Byrgenwerth as a handyman at the age of 16, he could barely read and write. This poorly paid job was for Gehrman a pivotal turning point, because it allowed him to escape the clutches of his overly strict father and gain access to a world of higher-cultured people such as the students and personnel of the college.

And as time went on and Gehrman proved himself a skilled and hard-working lad, he forged a long-lasting friendship with the college’s gatekeeper/janitor Edmund and the sinister but caring scholar Dores. These two, are easily the most influential people in his life beside Master Willem. Dores and Edmund encouraged him to get back to study, lending him books and laboratory equipment so that he could put his -rusty, but brilliant- skills at use in his free time and asked Master Willem to grant him the permission to attend lessons alongside the students. Finally able to express himself without neglecting the martial training he got from his father, Gehrman quickly became essential to Byrgenwerth as a whole, serving both as a groundskeeper (and trust me, you need someone like that when your college is located in the middle of a damn forest!) and custodian. Everything that ever mattered to him, everything good that ever happened to him and that gave Gehrman some sense of pride or accomplishment was tied to Byrgenwerth and to the benevolence of Master Willem who provided him a place where to stay in exchange for his services. No wonder the soon-to-be First Hunter would become fiercely loyal to the Byrgenwerth’s cause to the point of self-detriment.

When the scholars unlocked the entrance to the Tomb of the Gods and faced the horrors of the Labyrinths for the very first time, Gehrman was right in the front line, clueless an unprepared. That first ‘hunt’, that resulted in dozens of students getting killed and our ‘hero’ crippled and scarred for life, was an experience so horrifying and traumatizing that most people would’ve just called it quits “Fuck the college, I’m outta here, I don’t get paid enough for getting my face eat by giant undead werewolves”-style. But Gehrman, somehow, probably out of fear of losing everything he ever cared about now that Willem considered him useless because of his injury, endured. He swore to himself he would find a way to fight the beasts and vanquish them and as his leg healed after the amputation he spent months researching and tinkering with weapons at his (at the time, quite small and disorganized) worktable. During that time, Willem hired several groups of mercenaries hoping that they would be able to clear at least the first floor of the Chalice but obtained no concrete results. Still bound to his wheelchair, Gehrman observed their equipment and strategies, trying to grasp what those experienced warriors were doing wrong and what he himself would do wrong in following his father’s teachings. Once able to stand on his two legs once again, Gehrman asked the captain of the mercenaries to listen to him, offering some advice and explaining what he had learned from the Pthumerian texts Dores was able to translate. The mercenary scoffed him at first, but then decided to listen to what the young man had to say and asked him for a demonstration. Impressed by the rudimental but quite efficient trick weapon (Gehrman’s first creation was the Saif, in my headcanons. Not the Burial Blade) the captain allowed Gehrman to train with his men and share his knowledge and tricks with them. The next expedition in the Chalices would be their biggest success so far and that very night Gehrman would come back to the college with a wide smile on his blood-smeared face and the severed head of a Scourge Beast as a trophy. He was 24 years old :3

But the real story begins almost 20 years later. 20 years that Gehrman spent devoting himself to the Hunt completely, perfecting his techniques, forging new weapons and taking the place of the captain of the mercenaries becoming, in fact, the Hunter Chief of the group, now composed of more than thirty members, all students of his. He came from nothing and crawled his way up to the top, taking pride in his accomplishments despite the fact that he had to put aside everything else, including his private life (which had been quite depressing and lonely since his childhood friend, Therese, married someone else) and with the constant awareness that everything he has is still just a kind concession of Master Willem and that he could lose everything in the blink of an eye. His workshop, his money, even his comfy studio filled with mechanical creations, everything belongs to Byrgenwerth.

Even now, as a grown-ass man with a reputation and devoted students of his own, Gehrman is still very much the same insecure boy he was when he joined Byrgenwerth. He still holds a grudge towards his father (it’s a mutual thing) is a walking disaster around women, is very dependable on Dores and Edmund and never questions Master Willem’s orders, not even the more despicable ones. And trust me, Willem often asked him, Dores and Edmund to do things that are, to put it simply, quite fucked up. For science, of course.

Overall, Gehrman means well. He does his best, tries to be impartial when it comes to his students and genuinely cares about their safety and well-being. He has seen many of them die in the course of his career and always blamed himself for their demise. Even if they signed up a contract knowing what they were getting into, that doesn’t make the departure of a colleague or friend any less painful for him, reason why he takes upon himself the responsibility of finishing off his students on the battlefield if there’s nothing that can be done for them. He is a really demanding teacher (which reminds him of how his father used to treat him and Gehrman kinda hates himself because of that. Yep, he definitely has daddy issues) and someone who wouldn’t hesitate to kick you out if you don’t behave, but he would do this only because he doesn’t want to see you dead.

Surprisingly, all the above also applies to Maria. No matter how much into her he is, during training, he never treated her differently than his other students. Never went easy on her because of her higher social status or the simple fact that she is a woman. (I mean, Gratia, Izzy and Henriett are women as well and they know that Gehrman doesn’t give a damn and they are glad he doesn’t.)

Speaking of which, it’s time to make this post even longer and spend a few words on Gehrman’s mania. He immediately found Maria extremely attractive since their very first encounter, and in a genuinely perverted way at that. He immediately had his mind filled with all sort of naughty thoughts while his reasonable side was there to remind him to “keep dreaming bro, that ain’t going to happen”. And at first, he was kinda okay with that. No matter how beautiful she was, Maria was a real pain in the ass at first and not someone Gehrman would’ve wanted to form any sort of relationship with. So his thoughts were, for quite some time, just thoughts. And not even particularly intrusive ones. But as time went by, the more he got to know Maria the more he realized that she was literally everything he ever looked for in a woman. That was the moment the whole drama began because at that point he became afraid of what Maria would’ve thought of him if she ever found out about his infatuation with her.

That is the point in the story when he began to hide, lie and avoid her while still dying to see her. This part is my favorite because Gehrman is very conflicted and does a bunch of dumb shit in pure cheesy Period Drama style. The worst thing he does is probably idealizing Maria beyond belief, putting her on a pedestal where no one (not even himself) can touch her while gloating about the idea that he is the one responsible for her talent. Which is relatively true, but doesn’t excuse the ‘ownership’ he claims over her skills. On a good note, he is very aware of how twisted his feelings have become and feels guilty about it, reason why he acts cold and distant towards Maria. A behavior that doesn’t fit with that of the other hunters who are now friendly and well-disposed towards her at this point in the story.

His internal turmoil is the reason why I do find Maria’s reaction to his extorted confession absolutely brilliant (props to Daisy who wrote it

Now, I could keep on rambling about these two for hours and about how the Old Blood and its effects on them (and the setting) affected the story but this post is already TOO long XD

#ask #gehrman the first hunter #headcanons #gehrmaria

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mubal4 · 5 years

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The Dash

When you look at a gravestone, what is most important? - - - The Dash

I have heard or read what is above many times. I believe the point, it is not about the date we were born or the date we die, it is what we do with that time in between. What do we do with the dash? Not sure why but I was a conference yesterday and there was a woman speaking, Marsha Petrie Sue – she was actually very good and receive a few great nuggets from her. It was weird because the conference was for my actual job and I was with a bunch of law firm administrators, but they brought in Marsha to talk about mindset and personal growth……as it relates to business though. There was one point, and I completely forget watch she was talking about, that this question above entered into my head. That started me down a rabbit whole, but I was forced to get back to the present. However, over the last 24 hours I have thought more about it; and, with all the events that are going on in the world, I think it is causing me to reflect deeper and deeper on “my dash.” I have been recalling a few podcasts that I have listened to this week and some of what I have read; I keep thinking, “who am I becoming?” “Who/what do I want to be remembered by?” “What do I want my dash to mean?” I recall the Billy Yang podcast I referenced on Monday in my blog and his interview with Jason Gruenwald; Jason was speaking about his mom and dad, that they are workaholics and that Jason always jokes to his dad that he can’t take any of the money he makes with him when he dies. Jason is speaking from perspective because he recently buried his wife after her fight with cancer. That has come back to me, the money situation, what is enough, what do we need? The accolades? The praise? The respect? Power? Toys? House? Car? To each his/her own right? I haven’t been thinking about these because of how much I have or the lack there of; just about if they fit into my dash? None of them do, that is the funny thing. Yes, the past me believed many of these things were important; the most important in some cases. Blame it on me being young, ignorant, misguided, a douche 😊, whatever the case; I was immature. Well, I will hold off on that judgment there because I know there are folks out there that may think that what you accumulate, money, accolades, status, is what the dash is for, and that is perfectly okay and they are not immature, or a douche 😊. I am just saying I was!!

I think that is the great thing though, we get to define what that dash is supposed to mean; what I will mean. The hard part is defining it; well, maybe not defining it but, maybe living it!! The more and more I thought about this and spend time reflecting on it, for me, it is simple………….

My dash = Good Husband. Good Father. Good Human.

That is all. I don’t need anything more than that. Simple? Sure!! Easy? Hell no :O! There are moments each day that I fail at all three; maybe it is the same moment 😊. I am trying to have some humor in this but also working to share my heart and maybe some nuggets. I don’t think, whatever you dash is, it is supposed to be easy. It is hard work to be a good husband, I think incredibly hard work, especially in todays day, to be a good father, but I do think, of the three, it is most simple to be a good human. But yes, I do fail. Can we just be kind to one another, have empathy, sympathy, and compassion; to smile, laugh, love and be calm, at peace, breath!!! Are all those simple? Absolutely. However, when your soon to be 16 year old is driving and some dumb ass runs a red light, cuts in front of her, and freaks me out (more me than her) well, let’s just say all of the above went out the window…………possibly with some hand gestures and choice words 😊😊😊. So, at that type of moment, I wasn’t displaying any qualities of what I want my dash to be. For me, that is okay because I am not always going to; none of us are always going to be “on.” Even that person that wants their dash to be all about their fame for example, are they always going to be viewed in that light, by everyone, all the time? No way. We all have flaws, imperfections, and “shit in the basement.” That is a great line from the movie “Balboa,” when Rocky is trying to work somethings out after Adrian’s death and everything going on in his life. He wants to fight again because he has “some stuff in the basement still” that he needs to get out. Wow, I just referenced a Rocky movie 😊. I am all over the place!!

But I think that is a good point too, I read somewhere this week that “we should all leave it on the field.” Most of the time this is used in a sports analogy, specifically football but it can be spread across anything. For the purpose of this blog, we will use it with life and of course, relate it to “the dash!!” When our time comes, do we want to be well preserved, fresh, and looking like new? Does that sound like we left it all out there? Or, do we want to come wildly to the finish line, arms flailing, cut up, bruised, limping, screaming like all hell with a huge smile on our face saying, “wow, I really left it all out there; that is living.” – I’d go with the second option and I believe most would too.

We can’t take anything with us; we just can’t and don’t. When that last breath leaves our body, so does everything else………. unfortunately. Our memories, our experiences, our love; all of it gone. But what are we able to leave behind? Our love, our shared experiences, our impact, our lessons, our wisdom, our character! At that same conference yesterday, and I have been to hundreds of these things right, I got to meet, well, a number of people, but there was about a handful that I was able to spend some time with either talking or in group discussions. There was a word that kept coming up, whether said by me or by others…….”connection.” I referred to it and used in here many of times and I believe that that is something that is important in our culture; we want to feel connected, be connected, and have a connection to one another. However, this was the first time, in my professional career, in a business setting, that it was discussed and felt with many. How many times are you in meetings or other networking events and everything is disingenuous? Hell, just a conversation with an acquaintance can feel fake. I am guilty of just like anyone and it isn’t to be mean it is just we are racing through life. Yesterday we knew we were there all day and we were working on things together so maybe that had something to do with it but the energy; I felt really connected or I had a connection with so many good people. Maybe I was just more open that day, calm and relaxed? I don’t know and I completely went off on a tangent here, but my point is how are we connecting with people? Are those connections part of that dash? I mean, I would love to have some positive impact on everyone I meet and be able to connect with them in many ways. Many times, I am just not in that moment you know. Rushing from one thing to another and not present? Other times, well, some people don’t want anything to do with it and they are in their own moment. Having the awareness, I think is key because then we know where we are and what we may need to do to change. I don’t always catch myself not being a good husband, father, or human. I am learning though 😊. I think we are all on that journey. Kind of cruised all over the place here so I will try to land this.

Whatever you feel you want your dash to be, when that number to the right of it comes up, will be able to say you left it all out there? I don’t mean you have to be going a million miles an hour toward it; small baby steps each day is all that counts but are you standing up and taking those steps each day? Falling down, getting up? Falling down, getting up? I know there are some days you want to stay down and, maybe it is a good idea that you do; but are you getting up the next day? Is that dash moving your needle? For me, it all has to do with what my wife and kids will say about me when I am gone? Yes, I do think about this moment, however dark that may seem, but I think we are living a lie if you don’t come to grips that we will all die at some point. Right now, I have control over what my wife and kids will say to me when I am gone, and you know damn well I am going to impact that!! I know death sucks and I know many don’t like to talk about it, but it is real and happens to all of us, and it is natural; it really is. So, if there are now that I can do each day that will help impact my wife and daughters to say, “he was a good husband, he was a good dad, he was a good human” I am going to try to do them; crazy drivers on the road or not 😊!

#whatsyourdash liveforthedashnotethedates whoareyoubecoming leaveitalloutthere

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let-it-raines · 5 years

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Second in Command (Epilogue - Part 6)

Rating: Mature

A/N: And we begin with a flashback (ending with the double line break) with a chapter that comes around full circle in several ways :D

Found on AO3: Beginning | Current

Tumblr Chapters: | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14| 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20

Epilogue Parts: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6

Tag list: @nikkiemms @resident-of-storybrooke @kmomof4 @wellhellotragic @ekr032-blog-blog @bmbbcs4evr @onceuponaprincessworld @jennjenn615 @a-faekindagirl @mayquita @captainsjedi @captswanis4vr @kristi555 @teamhook @skyewardolicitycloisdelena91 @branlovesouat @dreadpirateemma @alys07 @andiirivera

She hears his footsteps making their way down the hall, the still slightly unfamiliar layout of his house (or apartment as he calls it even if this is definitely not an apartment, the multiple stories and staircases disagreeing with her definition of the term) making it difficult to discern where exactly he is until he’s right outside of the door, the noises completely stopping as Killian presumably halts just outside, only the door standing between them. He wants to come inside, she already knows, but he’s likely being hesitant because of her mood today. She doesn’t blame him. She wouldn’t want to be the one to have to navigate talking to her today either. She doesn’t even really want to be her right now.

It’s not often that she has reason to hide herself away, to turn off the lights and cover herself with piles of blankets in a feeble attempt to keep the world away from her. But they’re just blankets, and they only keep away the cold. They don’t keep away the warring thoughts in her mind, the ones she’s kept at bay for years now. If anything, locking herself away like this has allowed her thoughts to creep free from their cages and to fester in their freedom, multiplying and expanding into demons that she shouldn’t have to fight alone.

But then the door knob turns, the hinges on the heavy wooden frame making the slightest bit of noise, and she sees her boyfriend’s head pop in, a sullen look on his face. She’s not alone, hasn’t been so in years, and thinking that she needed to fight this by herself was a mistake. She knew it the minute she told Killian not to follow her when she came home last night.

“Hey, can I come in?”

“It’s your bedroom.”

“Emma,” he sighs, taking a step inside and closing the door behind him, “we have to talk eventually.”

“I just needed a day to myself. I don’t really want to talk to anyone.”

So maybe old habits die hard, and maybe as much as she wants a support system, she doesn’t actually want to talk about this anymore. It’s all they ever seem to talk about.

“I understand that, love, but you’ve been holed up in here since yesterday.”

She groans, throwing her head back against the pillow before sitting up and resting her back against the headboard, bringing the comforter with her so that she’s still wrapped in its warmth. It only takes a nod of her head for Killian to get the hint that it’s okay for him to come sit down, and he quickly steps over to the bed and settles down onto his side, keeping noticeable space between them.

They’re silent for seconds that stretch into minutes. Killian sits quietly with his ankles crossed and hands folded together in his lap, and she knows that he’s waiting for her to say the first words. He extended the olive branch, and she’s the one who has to take it. That’s how they work, even if it’s not what she wants right now.

“I hate this,” she finally grits out, bunching the comforter with her fists. “I want to go back to how things were before. I want to live in the shitty apartment above the pub and have you come visit me at midnight so that we can get drunk and stuff our faces with onion rings and pretzel bites and not have a care in the world besides how bad our hangovers are going to be.”

“Darling, you know we can’t do that.”

“I know. I know that. I know that we made this decision together even if we were pushed, not really having a choice of our own, and I know that what we’re doing is going to be worth it. But God, Killian, I feel like I’m drowning.”

Tears well up in her eyes, and she closes them to try to get the water to go away. But the hot tears stay, and when she can’t take having her eyes closed anymore, she opens them only for the tears to furiously fall. She wants them to stop, needs them to stop, but it’s like the dam has broken and she really is drowning. Shit. She really hates crying.

She hunches forward to curl in on herself, wrapping her arms around her knees and letting the comforter fall from around her while Killian’s hand rubs up and down her back in soothing circles, silently trying to help her through this, which really only makes everything worse. This isn’t fair. She knows that life isn’t fair and that it’s absolutely ridiculous for her to be bemoaning how much her life sucks right now while having a meltdown in a fucking palace, but she feels how she feels.

Her dad used to say something about not comparing her happiness to others in the same way that she shouldn’t compare her sadness to others, and she wishes she could remember the exact phrase now. She’s pretty sure the gist of it was to not compare, that comparison is the thief of any joy.

“I’m so sorry, my love. I’m so, so sorry. You don’t deserve any of this.”

She chuckles under her breath, but it’s all snot and tears, her throat getting clogged until she coughs to try to release all of the mucus and emotions that are stuck there. “I really hate people, you know? First, we have your asshole of a family, then my asshole of an ex, and now there’s just assholes everywhere giving their opinions on everything I do like it’s any of their business. I just want to be with you, to be in love, without having the rug pulled out from underneath me. It keeps happening.”

“Things are going to calm down,” he reassures her, his hand practically rubbing a hole into her t-shirt with how much it’s moving. “We’re working on it. We have the statement, our legal team, your security. It’s going to be better, and you won’t have to go through things like this anymore. There won’t be any more sobbing in the bedroom.”

“How can you say that? I’ve been with you for five years, Killian. I know the hell that you go through. I know that the same will be happening to me.”

“You learn to live with it. That’s all I can say. I wish I could help more, protect you more, and while I can’t promise you anything that is out of my control, I can say that I think the worst of it is over. We can literally only go up from here.”

Sighing, she leans back into his embrace, letting him wrap his arm around her shoulder and tucking her head against his side while he whispers soothing words against her forehead, pressing kisses against her temple between every statement.

“Why can’t we have fights like normal people?”

He chuckles against her hairline before rubbing his hand up and down her arm. “The other day you got right pissed at me for chewing too loudly. That’s normal. We have normal fights all the damn time. They simply don’t usually end with one of us hiding away in the bedroom and staining the pillowcases with our mascara.”

“It washes out,” she answers automatically, wondering why the hell he’s concerned with that of all things right now. But then he cups her chin, turning her face to look at him, and the smirk on his face makes her realize he was messing with her. Oh. She really is all out of sorts. “Are you really trying to pick a fight to prove a point?”

“I’m trying to pick a fight to make you feel better.”

“That’s weird.”

“Eh.”

“No seriously.”

“But is it though?”

“Weird? Definitely.”

“Brilliant is a much better fit, I think.”

“Debatable.”

“I repeat. Is it though?”

Her breath hitches as she realizes what it is he’s doing, distracting her from everything with his nonsensical words and stupid faces that he’s been making while they’ve been bantering back and forth. He’s…she’s known for a long time that she wanted to be with Killian for the rest of her life, something that she never thought she would be thinking about any man after Neal, but she really is willing to go through hell for him. It’s all insane and a little bit unreal, but he knows her in a way that no one else does.

Killian knows how to distract her from her problems. He knows and understands that she likes to be by herself, doesn’t mind it at all, but that there are times when she wants to be with him or her friends and families. He knows the things that she thinks about when it’s two in the morning and she can’t sleep, and he knows how to read her when no one else in the world can.

They’ve come from worlds that couldn’t be further apart, but at their cores, they’re the same. And that’s exactly why they work at the end of the day. She understands him and the places where he’s broken, and he does the same to her.

But he also just makes her laugh, and he makes her happy. And she has to convince herself that sometimes in the future, she won’t remember the time she crumbled under all of the stress and pressure of this new life she’s been slowly stumbling into for over half of a decade.

“Can we get pizza delivered here, babe?”

His head recoils, but a bright smile stretches across his face, obviously happy that she’s now smiling too.

“Yeah, love, I think we can do that.”

The moment she steps off the plane, she can already feel the difference in the weather in Spain versus back at home. There are still days where she wakes up to let Indy outside that she has to bundle up in a jacket and in thick clothes from the occasionally biting chill of late May. But it’s the first day of June now, and they’re staying in Mallorca for a little over a week to get away from work for a little while. And for their two-year anniversary, but the stars simply seemed to align for them to be able to get away for that day.

She and Killian load up into the car after packing away their suitcases with Thomas’s help. She hadn’t wanted him to come, hadn’t wanted the security while they’re off on vacation, but it was apparently necessary, though he does promise that he and the rest of the team will be as discreet as possible. She loves Thomas. She really does. He’s like having another uncle, but you don’t really want your uncle to travel with you on vacation with your husband.

True to his word, after dropping them off at their house, Thomas leaves to make his way to the house next door, leaving she and Killian to explore their home for the next few days. As nice as it is, all she really cares about is the fact that as she walks through the rooms, there are floor-to-ceiling windows that look out onto the beach, the clear blue ocean and rocky hills of the area in full view no matter where they are in the home. She can already feel the sand between her toes and the ocean air tangling her hair, and she absolutely cannot wait.

They both love being near the ocean. It became a hobby and rare thing for Killian to be near the ocean when he was younger, even with his love of sailing, but she grew up within a few minutes’ walk of the ocean and a sandy beach. And while the sands weren’t as white and the water not as clear, it’s still the same when it comes down to it.

Sighing in contentment, she steps over to the sliding glass doors in the living room, bypassing the cozy white couches with light yellow pillows and what have to be the softest looking blankets she has ever seen, and opens the door, taking a step out onto the deck and immediately feeling the sunshine beating down on her face and the breeze blowing through her hair like every cliché that there’s ever been of a woman on the beach.

She hasn’t felt this relaxed in weeks, even when sitting in the comfort of her own home, and she can’t help the smile that stretches across her face.

“You happy, love?” Killian asks, taking a step behind her and wrapping his arm around her waist so that his fingers mess with the protruding strip of skin below her t-shirt and above her leggings, the fit of his arms not quite the same as what she’s used to.

“So happy. This is fantastic. It’s been far too long since we’ve been to an actual beach.”

“Aye, the beaches in England aren’t exactly the same as beaches like this.”

“Yeah, what’s up with that? Can we get your dad to fix them?”

He chuckles beside her before his lips find her temple. “I’ll add it to the list of things to fix. I’m sure it’s the biggest problem we’re facing right now and totally in his control.”

“Stop,” she groans, rolling her eyes at his teasing. “You know what I mean.”

“I do. What do you want for lunch? You haven’t eaten since breakfast this morning.”

“Surprise me. I’ll go unpack while you cook, okay?” She turns to head toward the staircase when she stops, biting her bottom lip and muttering a curse underneath her breath. She didn’t think about this, and it’s by far one of the things she hates most about being pregnant right now because she could totally lift those suitcases without any issue. “Killian, I need you to grab the big suitcases.”

“You really didn’t want to ask me to do that, did you?”

“Not at all.”

After she and Killian get the suitcases upstairs, he goes back downstairs to fix them dinner all while she puts away their clothes into the closet. She’s always been one to live out of her suitcase while on vacation, but Killian likes to hang clothes and fold them into draws. He claims it saves time when they’re packing up to leave, but she’s never seen proof of that. Of course, it probably doesn’t help that she leaves her stuff piled on a chair after she wears them.

She’s always thought if there’s anything for she and Killian to come to major blows about, it’s going to be how she handles her laundry.

She takes a moment to explore their bedroom, running her hands along the mattress and feeling the softness of all of the blankets and pillows. It’s beautiful, and then she sees the door that leads out to the balcony, the glass panes blocked by the closed blinds. After turning the knob, she opens up the door, the heat of the sun not beating down on her skin up here, the canopy surrounding her letting her have the view of the ocean when she doesn’t want the heat. Yeah, she could definitely get used to this.

The rest of the night passes quickly, the two of them eating the stir fry Killian whipped up, and then settling out on the back porch to watch the sun set like the elderly couple they are.

And that’s how the first few days of their vacation go, waking whenever they please and wandering out to the beach, letting the sand sink in between her toes as she walks along the shoreline, picking up the occasional broken shell so she has something to fiddle with. She can’t walk far from the house, though, the strip of land that’s private to them only stretching so far, so when she walks the length of it, she makes her way back to where Killian is reclined in a chair under the umbrella reading one of his books and toeing into the white sand so that he’s dug a deep enough hole for a small child to play in.

After four days, both of their skins slightly sun kissed, Thomas clears them to go into town, sweeping a small café in the harbor for them to eat dinner. It’s a beautiful night, the sailboats traveling in and out of the harbor while people mill up and down the docks. It’s still far too early for people to be eating, at least by Spain’s standards, so she and Killian have a relatively private night, only Thomas sitting out on the open patio with them as well as another couple who seems to be three sheets to the wind.

“Do you want to see if we can go sailing tomorrow?”

Killian takes a sip of his wine, his profile turned to her so she can see the defined line of his jaw and the gulp of his throat as the wine travels down. “Aye, that’d be nice. Do you think you’ll get queasy?”

“No, why would I get queasy?”

He turns to look at her then, his eyes especially blue with the ocean behind him. “You’re pregnant. Some pregnant women get nauseous while out on the ocean, no matter where they are in the pregnancy. Or that’s what the books have said.” “We’ve really got to expand your literature choices, babe.”

“Really? Because I was reading about the actually delivery earlier and – ”

“Woah, woah, woah,” she groans, holding her hand up and clapping it over his mouth so he’ll shut up, “we are not talking about that tonight. No baby talk, no pregnancy talk, and especially no delivery talk, got it?”

“Got it.”

So they don’t talk about anything baby related, leaving it all behind them as she has Killian in stiches imitating Liam when he got drunk at his birthday party and started singing songs to Abigail, much to Abigail’s embarrassment. Forty was really hitting him hard, apparently, and as much as Liam likely doesn’t remember that, she has video proof to save that forever. Her face begins to hurt the longer their dinner goes on, far too much smiling and laughing in such a short period of time, and she knows it’s time to go home when Killian starts snorting instead of his usual laughter.

They walk home from the restaurant, their hands intertwined as they navigate the small streets and corner shops on this side of the island. She makes a mental note to stop by some of them sometime later this week, but right now, all she really wants to do is go back home with laughter lines on her face and amusement constantly moving through her belly. Killian regales her with a story of him as a child when Allison took him to a water park and how he’d fallen off the raft on the way down the slide. She’d never heard that story before, had never heard how he broke his arm that day, and even though she’s sure that it hurt like hell, she can’t help but laugh imagining a young Killian flying off the slide.

“You’re bloody sadistic if you find that funny.”

“Oh come on,” she tugs on his hand, bringing his knuckles up to her lips to kiss while the house comes into view, “you were laughing while you were telling the story. It’s funny.”

“You’re messed up, darling.”

“Never said I wasn’t. Besides, I think we’re a bit delusional tonight because there’s no way in hell we’re this hysterical.”

When they get to the house, walking up the steps and standing on the front porch, she begins fishing for her key to unlock the door when Killian stops her, yanking on her arm and pulling her toward him so that she’s looking up at him while he smirks down at her.

“What?

“Will you go out with me again, Emma?”

She snorts, shaking her head back and forth before wrapping her arms around his neck and playing with the hair at the nape of his neck. How is it always this soft? “I feel like you’ve asked me that before, and I also feel like my answer will be the same.”

“So a yes?”

“Obviously,” she sighs, leaning up so that her lips can brush his. “You are a damn good person to date.”

“That’s good. I feel like you might have married the wrong man had I not been good and wining and dining you.”

“Well, I can’t have any wine right now, but we can still do all of the fun post date activities.”

“Yeah?”

“Absolutely. I didn’t put on my good bra not to get lucky tonight.”

Killian throws his head back in laughter, the lines in his neck straining, and she kisses the underside of his jaw before unhooking her arms and shuffling through her purse for they key, unlocking the door and stepping inside with Killian at her heels. She takes a minute to unstrap her wedges, her feet thanking her the moment she’s barefooted and back to her normal height, before quickly walking over to the staircase and heading upstairs, Killian at her heels.

She moves to unzip her dress herself, but Killian’s hands stop her, moving her hair over her shoulder and kissing her neck and down her back as he slowly unzips the dress, the material falling off her shoulders as he goes. Every touch of his lips sends the smallest of shivers throughout her body, and she sighs in pleasure as his scruff rubs against her skin.

“You are so beautiful, Emma.”

She feels her cheeks heat in response to his words, in response to the way his voice dips low, and for a moment, she feels like they’re about to sleep together for the first time instead of the thousandth. But then her dress gets stuck on her protruding stomach, something that definitely wouldn’t be there had this been their first time together, and she’s shaken out of her thoughts. Besides, as special as that time was, it’s better now. There are no awkward pauses, even if there are awkward movements and the occasional cramped leg, and he knows exactly how to make her sigh and moan in the ecstasy and the pleasure of it all.

Once she gets her dress off her body, she turns to face Killian, slanting her lips over his and immediately tilting her head as his tongue licks into her mouth in a warm, wet slide that makes her body tingle the slightest bit, desire building in her core. His hands find her bottom, lightly kneading her ass while his hips slowly roll into hers, his hardening length evident through his jeans even with the slight barrier that keeps them from pushing together as much as they used to.

Slowly, Killian backs them up to the bed, her eyes only opening to make sure she’s not going to trip over anything on the way to the mattress. She doesn’t, gently falling back against the mattress while Killian kisses down her chest, fingering at the lace of her bra while making sure not to press his body weight down on her. Her hips jaunt up into his, making him growl into her skin, and she closes her eyes while his tongue traces over a nipple, bringing it to a hard peak while his fingers pinch and squeeze at the other, driving her into madness while he’s still fully dressed.

Yeah, this is so much better than the first time.

“Take off your clothes.”

“Well, you have to buy a man dinner first.”

“I did,” she laughs, opening her eyes and seeing him smirking down at her with his tongue running over his bottom lip, which does not help her impatience at all. “I paid that bill.”

“A very good point.” He pecks her lips before standing and quickly unbuttoning his shirt while she reaches around and undoes her bra, letting it fall off her shoulders and tossing it to the corner of the bed while she pulls off her underwear, having to squirm to get them off all while Killian easily shucks his pants

She kind of hates him for how his body is still the same when she has to sleep with pillows stuffed under random body parts to be comfortable.

Before she can move, Killian takes hold of her ankle, the wetness of his lips tracing the lines of her skin as he moves up her leg while his fingers deftly dance across her skin and his whiskers leave red marks where they brush her. He continues to move while she watches him, her gaze only leaving his when he gets to her inner thigh and she has to close her eyes at his touch, the sensations all too much for her. Then there’s a slight nibble, followed by a harsher bite, and her eyes fly open while she gasps.

“W-what the hell was that? Are you trying to give my thigh a hickey?”

“No,” he promises, kissing the spot where he just bit, “but I was trying to get you to open your eyes.”

“You could have just asked.” “Where’s the fun in that?”

She shakes her head as she laughs, propping herself up on her elbows to give herself enough momentum to lean forward and wrap her hand around Killian’s cock, gently stroking it to hardness while he clenches his jaw and hisses at her touch.

Yeah, she really likes that she has this kind of effect on him.

“Sit down, babe,” she tells him, releasing his length and moving back so that he can settle down on the bed, propping himself up against the headboard. She crawls over to him and plants her knees on either side of his thighs and lines his length up to her entrance, teasing him the slightest bit just because she can, before sinking down onto him and letting him fill her.

He feels good, always so good, heavy and thick within her in a way that makes her breath leave her body every damn time.

His hands find her hips, holding on tightly and steadying her while her hands land on her shoulders, fingernails digging into the skin and leaving crescent moon marks all while she takes this in. “You okay, Emma? You’re comfortable?”

“Yeah, yeah,” she says, nodding her head and bending down to slide her lips over his as her hips begin to move. She’s always been a fan of long, deep thrusts that are slow enough to drive her mad but lately she’s been all about short and shallow, letting Killian hit that spot inside of her that makes her gasp for breath. So that’s what she does, using the strength in her legs to move above Killian while his lips press hotly into the skin of her neck, making her gasp and groan with every brush of his lips and slide of his tongue.

“You feel fucking fantastic,” Killian whispers into her ear, nibbling down on the lobe as his warm breath ghosts across her skin. “You always do, and I don’t think I’ll ever tire of you.”

He’s said the words before. She knows he has, likely many a time, but she doesn’t care, not with the way that he feels or the way that his voice sounds, deep and husky, his accent rolling off his tongue while she continues to roll her hips.

When her movements get a little more intense, her hips allowing him deeper, he groans into her mouth, her teeth lightly biting his upper lip while his fingers leave marks of their own in her hips. But then one hand moves from her hips at the same time that his tongue moves into her mouth, still tasting of the wine he had while at dinner, and his thumb finds them where they’re joined, alternating between slow, gentle circles and hard, fast rubs. Her orgasm takes her breath away, overwhelming her to the point where she can’t keep moving and has to hold onto Killian while her pleasure bursts and curls around her.

As she comes back to herself, Killian gently moves her to lay back against the mattress, making sure she’s comfortable before he slides back into her and finds his own pleasure, slowly fucking her into the mattress while he hovers above her. It only takes a few more minutes before he’s groaning above her and whispering every obscenity he knows as he spills himself into her, every word he says coming out on a stuttered breath.

She looks up at the ceiling, watching the fan turn in circles all while Killian continues to breath into her skin, somehow still not having collapsed onto the bed until he nearly does, pulling out of her with a hiss and leaving her feeling oddly empty all the while he walks away and into the bathroom, giving her a view of his spectacular ass.

She’s so glad that he’s her forever.

For reasons other than the spectacular ass and the impressive bedroom skills, but she still kind of feels like some kind of sated mess with her sweaty hair and quickly beating heart.

Killian comes back a minute later with a warm wash cloth, gently wiping down her thighs and her core before throwing it in the basket in the corner of the room as he crawls under the sheets and settles himself down. She stills needs to get up, to go pee, but she’s basking in the glory of it all.

“Wear yourself out there, darling?”

“Yes,” she answers honestly, tilting her head and looking at him with a timid smile stretched across her lips. “My thighs feel like jelly, but I’m good.” She has to push herself up, standing and giving herself a bit of time to adjust to standing before heading to the bathroom and peeing, washing her hands and her face afterward before heading back into the bedroom, not bothering to get dressed as she crawls into bed with Killian. They’ll probably be in the mood again later, and it’s not like it’s cold in here.

But she does pull the blanket up over her while scooting over and settling in under Killian’s arm, letting him tug her closer with his arm wrapped around her shoulder and his lips pressing into her hair.

“I kind of missed date night.” “Aye, me too. I’m sorry that we’ve fallen behind on that.”

She leans over and kiss his shoulder, right where there are still a few marks from her fingers. “That’s not your fault. We’ve been busy. It’s hard for us to go out places, and I like chilling with you at home. I don’t have to wear pants.”

He snickers into her hair, all while his hand rubs up and down her shoulder. “That is a good point, but you deserve to be romanced. Truly.”

“I have a very romantic husband, even when he doesn’t realize it, so I think I’ve got it pretty good in that department. Plus, you know, I am obviously the most romantic of the two of us.” “Well, of course, darling. I won’t even debate you on that.”

“You don’t want me to get mad at you, huh? Because we both know that’s not true.”

“Exactly.”

“You deserve to be romanced too, babe.”

“Well, I was. A very beautiful woman bought me dinner tonight, and then I got lucky. What more could I ask for?”

God, she loves him.

The waves wash up onto the shore, clear blue water turning into white crests that rush over her toes and cause her feet to sink into the wet sand while the sun beats down on her skin. She knew it would be hot here, she’s on an island in Spain in June after all, but after so many years living in England, weather like this takes some getting used to, especially with the heat wave in the past few days. Sweat is beading at the nape of her neck and down the small of her back, so when she and Killian get back to their house after their walk, she decides to take a dip in the ocean before going to relax on the deck.

“Come on,” she urges Killian, grabbing on his wrist and encouraging him to follow her into the ocean, the cool salt water already feeling much better than the balmy air.

She wades out until she can barely touch the sand at the ocean floor, floating while Killian continues to have his feet firmly planted on the ground. It’s so incredibly quiet out here, the occasional boat driving by in the distance or a seagull calling out before dipping into the ocean for a flopping fish, and she’s really enjoying being able to get away somewhere different than what she’s used to.

A small wave crashes over them, her pulled-up hair getting wet, and when she looks over at Killian, he’s spitting out water while his hair sticks down on his forehead. She chuckles under her breath before wading over to him and wrapping her legs around his waist, her stomach making the fit different than usual, and pushing herself up to push his hair back, the strands somehow filled with sand.

“What the heck did you do? Dive down and bury your head in the sand?”

Killian clicks his tongue as one hand finds its way to rest under her thigh, holding her up, while his other hand moves to rest on her face, thumb tracing her cheekbone. “It’s the beach, love. Sand is everywhere.”

“Not this much.”

“Well, I’m obviously special. What happened to us going up to the deck and having something to eat? I’m starved.”

“I was hot.”

“You are hot.”

“That’s very nice of you to say but also not your best compliment.”

“Oh, it wasn’t a compliment. I was simply saying your skin feels warm.” She slaps his shoulder before brushing her lips against the salt-covered skin there. “We can go inside to the air conditioning if you’re too hot. It’s getting to be the middle of the day, anyways. Protection from the sun and all that.”

“I just want to stay out here for one more moment, and then I want to go inside and take a shower.” Killian waggles his eyebrows then, amusement filling his features. “Alone, Cassanova. I know we’ve done it before, but shower sex is not that great. And I’m not risking the whole falling thing, not even on our anniversary.”

He sighs dramatically, tiling his head back and giving her access to his throat, allowing her to press several kisses there until she gets to his jaw, his scruff having grown out this week. “That may seem sensible. I guess a bed will do.”

After a few minutes of enjoying the water, a few more fish swimming over her legs and causing shivers to run through her body, they begin to move back to shore only for Killian to stop before she can start rising out of the water. She runs into his back, nearly falling back but catching herself on his shoulders.

“What are you doing, babe?”

“There’s a group of photographers to our right, up on the balcony of the house that’s back by the lagoon. Fuck.”

She gulps, knowing that the privacy they were enjoying is truly over. She doesn’t mind the photographers sometimes, understanding that it’s a part of her life now as absolutely insane as that is, but she minds them now that she’s supposed to be on a private vacation enjoying one of her last few times with Killian…just the two of them.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

“I don’t – I don’t want pictures of me in my bikini. They’ll tear me apart and then sell the pictures for my stomach. And I don’t want them getting any more fucking pictures than they already have.”

“Okay,” he sighs, his jaw clinching in frustration while his hands ball into fists. She knows he’s having to restrain himself from shouting at them because there’s no one who hates photographers more than Killian. And if what they were doing wasn’t totally legal, the house they’re very obviously renting fair game since they’re not stepping foot on the property she and Killian are staying on, she’s sure he would try to take some kind of legal action…or smash cameras. Not that he would do that, but she’s sure he wants to. “Stay here, love, and I’m going to go get you the big beach towel to cover yourself.”

She wades a bit back in the ocean, trying to conceal herself even with the clear water, while Killian jogs up ahead, letting himself get photographed as he grabs the towel from their deck and jogs back to her, holding the towel open and blocking them from seeing her until she can wrap the white material around her, trying not to think about how they likely have already gotten pictures when they were walking on the beach or when she and Killian were just making out.

“I want to smash every single one of those cameras.”

“I know, love, but we can’t. Come on, let’s go inside.”

The anger and irritation festers and grows all while she’s in the shower, the cold water not doing anything to cool her down, and by the time she gets out she doesn’t realize that she’s shivering until her teeth start clattering together. God, she shouldn’t be so pissed, but this bothers her the more she thinks about it. She gets it. They’re public figures, so obviously they don’t have privacy. But more than that they’re human beings with real lives and real feelings, and she wishes this wasn’t how things worked. She wants to be able to go somewhere outside of the walls of their home and be them without people attempting to take pictures.

She throws on some pajama pants and a t-shirt, twisting her wet hair into a bun on the top of her head, not caring about the tangles that will inevitably be there, before heading back out in the bedroom to find Killian closing the blinds and curtains they’d opened this morning. When she peaks around the corner and stands on the balcony to look downstairs out into the living room, she sees that he’s done the same with the blinds in there.

“Thomas says as long as they stay in the house, anything they take is fair game. If they step onto the beach, though, that’s when we could do something.”

“I know.”

“When did you become an expert on this?”

“Right about the time that our relationship went public and I was pretty much stalked.”

“It’s going to be fine, love.” He shrugs, smiling at her with that big, toothy grin of his. “It’s just some pictures. There’s a hell of a lot of pictures of us out there.”

Something twists in her gut, the anger that was heating inside of her while in the shower reaching a boiling point, all of her thoughts and fears suddenly in the forefront of her mind instead of locked away in the back. For someone who was so pissed about it while outside, Killian seems perfectly fine now.

“No, you don’t get it,” she bites, her entire body heating again while she flexes her fist. “This isn’t about you or me. This is about Andy. I don’t want him photographed and stalked and all of that insane shit when he’s a child. That’s disturbed, and he shouldn’t have to deal with that just because of who his parents are.”

“I think I do get it, Emma. Welcome to my entire life.”

She scoffs, throwing her head back while she paces the bedroom, taking her hair down and twisting the tips so she has something to do that’s not smashing something. “Yeah, yeah. I know. I’ve heard it and seen it all a million times, but you seem to not think this is a big deal.”

Killian raises his eyebrows then, his face recoiling while his lips part before settling into a straight line. “Of course I think it’s a big deal. I’m the one who saw them, who stopped you from getting out of the water, who let them photograph me so that you didn’t have to be.”

“Yeah, well, how can I ever thank you for your heroic acts?”

“Fuck, Emma, what the hell is wrong with you right now? What have I done to make you pissed at me?”

“Maybe it’s the fact that the only reason I’m even in this situation is because of you. The only reason I have to worry about the privacy of my baby is because of you.”

“Wow,” Killian whistles, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning against the door to the balcony. “That’s fucking low, Emma. First of all, I know that this is my fault. I’m aware of that every time something like this happens, and that kills me. But secondly, Andy isn’t just your child. He’s mine too, and his safety and privacy are a priority to me far above my own. You of all people should know that by now.” He storms across the room then, heading into the bathroom and slamming the door behind him so that it shakes in its frame.

She slaps her hands on her thighs, her entire body humming with frustration, before taking a step out of the bedroom toward the hallway and pacing, her feet practically running a hole into the wood. It’s been a long time since she and Killian yelled at each other like that, and she feels every word he said settling into her bones, the realness of it making her feel heavy.

The moment the words came out of her mouth, the ones where she blamed Killian for being the reason she and Andy don’t get to live a life or normalcy and privacy, she knew that she was wrong, that she had been the one to fuck up. Killian was being calm, rational, trying to talk her down. That’s what he does even when his blood is boiling inside, and she went off on him.

Shit.

Shoot. They’re supposed to be working on cursing.

That went out the window the moment she suggested it. Not yet. They can figure that out later.

Suddenly, the weight becomes too much, the heaviness of knowing that she hurt Killian makes her sink to the ground, resting her back against the wall and wrapping her arms around her knees while hot tears sting in her eyes, a few of them falling on her cheeks. She knows talking to Killian will be the easy part, she knows he’ll forgive her and she him, but she still said the words, laid the blame on him, and knowing him as she does, she’s sure he’s in the shower blaming himself and taking her words to heart.

Shit.

She screwed up.

How could she have been so dumb? She knows exactly what Killian has been through for his entire life. She knows about all of the stress and the lack of privacy, the inability to just be a person who screws up without being scrutinized by everyone in the world. She’s seen the emotional toll it’s taken on him, watched him shut himself off from the people he loves, watched him sob over it, and she still told him that he didn’t understand. She still blamed him for their child having to experience the same thing, as if that isn’t one of Killian’s worst fears, one of the things that she finds him up in the middle of the night worrying about.

She’d once woken around three in the morning to find him caressing her stomach, promising to be a good father even though he didn’t have one of those for the first three decades of his life, and it took everything in her not to sob and let him know she was awake.

She’s obviously some kind of evil glutton for punishment because this should not have happened. She should have been better.

Andy starts moving in her belly, something that’s pretty much a constant now, and she wipes her cheeks, removing the salt from her skin, before running her hand up and down the curve of her stomach.

“I’m sorry, kid. I just…your daddy and I love you a lot, but you’re going to have a weird life. And I don’t know if you’re going to hate it or love it, but I’m…we’re going to try to make it really good for you. It’s not going to be like when your dad was a kid. We’re not going to put you through that.”

“Emma,” Killian sighs, her head snapping over to where he’s standing just outside the bedroom, a towel tied around his waist while water beads on his chest, “what are you doing on the floor?”

“I don’t know.”

How much time has passed that he’s already out of the shower? How long was she pacing? How long has she been sitting here? She doesn’t even know. It’s all blurred together and confusing, and she doesn’t remember anything but the hurt look on Killian’s face before he walked away.

Killian sighs, taking a few steps over to her and reaching his hands out for her to grab. She takes them, feeling the warmth of his palms as he tugs her up. “Come on. Let’s go talk.”

She nods, knowing it was coming, and finds her feet, following Killian into the bedroom. He drops his towel, his bare body doing absolutely nothing to help all of the emotions she’s going through, before sliding into a pair of sweatpants and settling down on the bed. She doesn’t know what to do, where to sit, and when her gaze finds Killian’s, his face twists, lips pursing, before he pats the mattress next to her.

“I’m sorry,” Killian sighs as she settles down onto the bed, making sure to keep space between them.

“No, no, Killian. I’m sorry. It’s not your fault. Every bit of that fight is on me.”

“Every bit of this is my fault. You’re only in situations like this because of me.”

How did she know he would do this? He stormed out of them pissed at her, and rightly so, and then managed to turn all of this onto himself. He’s got to stop doing things like this when it isn’t his fault. He should be able to recognize when things are on her.

“Hey,” she coos, tentatively reaching over to him and placing her hand on his thigh. “I chose this, okay. I chose you knowing the consequences of my decision. I don’t like a lot of them, but I love you. We didn’t go through all of that shit three years ago for you to get all self-loathing now, especially when I’m the one who fucked up and picked a fight because I was upset about something outside of your control.”

He scoffs, and she sighs, reaching up to caress his face, feeling the pricks of his ungroomed beard under her skin. “This isn’t a problem that goes away simply because we have a conversation about it. Those pictures are still going to exist. Those and a million more over the years are going to happen. There are going to be pictures of us, of Andy, of any other children we have. People are going to follow him to school. It’s fucked up, but it’s real.”

She feels the sting of tears in the back of her eyes again, all of her earlier thoughts coming back to her all the while Andy flips around in her stomach, making everything so much more real in the moment than any hypothetical she could think up.

“I don’t want that. At all. He’s just a kid, an infant. He hasn’t even been born yet.”

“Emma,” Killian soothes, taking her hand and bringing it to his lips, kissing up and down her knuckles, “we’re going to figure this out. We’ll hire more security. We’ll live somewhere more private. We’ll do absolutely everything we can to protect him. I will not live in a world where our son has to have a childhood like mine.”

“So what do we do?”

“Right now, nothing. This is shaping up to be a pretty shitty anniversary, and I’d like to move on from this. I nearly punched the stone wall in the shower, but then I realized a broken hand would only make this worse, don’t you think?”

“Definitely. So you’re not pissed beyond belief at me?”

He clicks his tongue, and the nerves start to stir in her stomach until he wraps his arm around her waist and pulls her closer. “I was. Emma, I get how upset you were. I was too, but we’re a team, you and me. You don’t carry these burdens on your own. You do a hell of a lot more than me when it comes to Andrew, and I fully intend on making up for that, but I promise you that I have his best interests at heart. But this has been my entire life. I’ve never gone anywhere without looking over my shoulder and at some point, I just accepted it. But that doesn’t mean I’m accepting it for the two of you.”

“You shouldn’t have to accept it for you either.”

“Eh, but I have. I’d love my privacy too, but I’m willing to take the focus of the media if it means that you guys get to live in relative privacy.”

She turns her head and pushes up so that she can brush a kiss against the corner of his lips, taking his left hand and fiddling with his wedding ring, the cool brush of metal a constant reminder that they’re in this together.

“When we get home, let’s talk to Brennan and Thomas about it, okay? Or we can at least save it until tomorrow. Today is our day, and I’m sorry that I ruined it. I...we’ll talk tomorrow.”

“Aye, love. It’s ours. You’re so easy to please sometimes, darling.”

“That’s probably how I got pregnant.”

Killian barks out a laugh then, throwing his head back before wrapping his arm further around her waist, tugging her impossibly closer and rubbing his hand up and down her sides. “I love you, my little weirdo.”

“That’s not my favorite of your terms of endearment.”

“But it’s a very apt description of you.”

“Eh,” she protests, leaning her head against his shoulder, “but I love you too. You want to have Thomas go get us some pizza and then not leave this bed for the rest of the day?”

“Definitely.”

It’s later that they’re resting in the darkness of the bedroom, the white comforter pulled over them with a half-eaten box of pizza (yes, they really did travel to Spain only to eat delivery pizza) resting on the floor (the bed was getting uncomfortable, okay) and the television playing in the background, when she feels the baby move for the first time since a few hours ago, his usual movement having quieted.

She grabs Killian’s hand, bringing it over to her stomach and resting it there. “Can you feel that?”

He doesn’t say anything, humming in contentment while his fingers tap against her belly. “Is that…is that him?”

“Yeah, that’s him. You can feel it?”

“Aye,” he chokes out, his voice trailing off while his hand stays perfectly still. She’s watching his hand until she turns to watch Killian’s face and the way that he’s intently focused on his hand over her stomach, the softest of smiles on his face. “Hello, Andy.” She feels him kick again, this time a little bit harder. “Hi. I’m so glad you’ve finally decided to let me join in. Mummy was having all of the fun, and I was getting jealous, little love. I thought I’d been talking to her stomach like an idiot for nothing.”

“Hey,” she protests, reaching over and slapping his shoulder, “you have been looking like an idiot for a reason. Not for nothing.”

“Always so comforting with your words, my love.” “I try.”

“Did you convince him to kick for me today since you forgot my present at home?”

“If I had that kind of control, he wouldn’t kick on my bladder, and I wouldn’t have a mushy, distracted brain with crazy hormones. Also, thin ice, bud. Thin ice. I’m still mad at myself for doing that.”

Killian snickers beside her as he moves his hand off of her stomach and wraps it back around her shoulder. “Don’t be. We can have an entire extra day to celebrate. Plus, we have the frozen cake at home.”

“Oh God, that stuff was disgusting. I don’t want to eat it again.”

“It really was nasty, wasn’t it?”

They stay inside the house for the last few days of their vacation…or holiday. Some American terms simply don’t die. She almost goes out a few times, not wanting to let these people win and keep her from living her life, but at the end of the day, she’s happier staying inside and simply relaxing. If she were to go out, she knows she’d be anxious and riled up, so curling up onto the living room couch and binge watching all of the shows they’ve missed sounds like the end of a perfect vacation to her.

It’s a smooth flight home, even if the turbulence causes her to have a bit of nausea, and they’re greeted by Indy the moment they walk in the door, several notes from their dog walker left on the kitchen counter detailing the times she was let out and fed.

“Hey, my girl,” she coos, scratching behind Indy’s ears while her tail wags so ferociously that she could knock down furniture. “I missed you. Yeah, yeah. We’re going to have to not leave you for so long. That’s not fair to you. Babe, let’s take her on a walk after we rest for a bit, okay?”

“Sounds good to me.”

It’s later, after they’ve rested and unpacked, that they’re putting Indy on her leash and heading toward the front door when there’s a knock and then a ring of the doorbell. When Killian’s unlocks it and swings the door open, Brennan is standing on their doormat.

“Can I come in, son?”

#second in command #cs fic #cs ff #captain swan fic

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