#like imagine her dying wish is to see her youngest daughter married. and what the heck is my desi muslim aunt going 2 do.

[falling-pages]

the Hosts as Dads

I'm late for Father's Day but WHOOPS! have some fluff

-

Tamaki:

Literally his greatest wish in life is to have a family, so he would be desperate for kids

As soon as you’re ready to have them, he’s ready

Worships you and your baby bump

To him, you are a goddess--you create life, you carry the most precious gifts in the world

He passes out the first time you go into labor

And is a bawling MESS when he holds his child for the first time

Cannot stop crying and cooing over the baby

Wants as many kids as you do, and then begs you to pop out another one

Maybe 5 or 6

Impulse buys EVERYTHING

Tamaki we’re only having one baby we don’t need three cribs

Tamaki we already have three toy boxes FULL--

Raising his sons to be little hosts and his daughters as little ladies

Spoils them ROTTEN with all the affection he never received as a child, but they’re all so sweet and not brats because he’s their dad

Refers to himself as “père” or “papa” and you as “maman”

Teaches his babies French, of course

He has very strong European genes, so most of the kids end up looking more like him

IMAGINE THE TINY TAMAKI DOPPLEGANGERS TODDLING AROUND SPEAKING HALF-FRENCH HALF-JAPANESE

Honestly? Becomes a stay at home dad

Teaches his little ones to play piano

Kyoya:

Doesn’t have the first inkling of how to raise a child

Straight up when he finds out you’re pregnant his first words are, “Good, the Ootori Company will have an heir.”

Kyoya I stg--

Holds you in extremely high esteem as you carry your children

Not really the doting type, but he does make sure you have everything you could ever want

Very subtly checks on your comfort, if you’re in any pain, etc and tries to fix it

Chooses not to watch you go into labor. He doesn’t think it proper and he honestly believes he will be a hindrance

He stops breathing when he sees his child for the first time

A little baby girl with a full head of black hair

Of course he loves her, but he doesn’t know how to articulate it

All he knows is that he doesn’t want to be like his own father

But one day you were out of town overnight, and all the nannies had gone home so when the baby cried, Kyoya had to check on her

And when he held that baby and truly looked at her, looking at his future, holding his entire world in his arms, he fell apart

Sat in the rocking chair and CRIED as his baby went back to sleep

After that his favorite thing to do is have her nap on his chest while he reads a book

And just likes to look at and admire her

Second child is a son

Daughter is bossy and business minded; son is laid back

Both kids need glasses

Hikaru:

Okay we know this boy has no patience and very bad impulse control

So it comes as no surprise to anyone when he knocks up his college girlfriend

Is a surprisingly well-adjusted dad

His parents were never really around for his childhood, and even though he had Kaoru, his little baby boy doesn’t, so he’s as hands-on as possible

Proposes to his girlfriend on their child’s first birthday. All the pictures have the kid smashing cake in them

Every single host is dying at the opportunity to babysit

Hikaru is still as reckless as he was when he wasn’t a father

I mean, he has a little more common sense, but not much

Thank God for Kaoru

Imagining 19-year-old Hikaru sitting in his sophomore tech & software classes with his baby in one arm and writing notes with the other hand

Showing up to his first day at his internship with a diaper bag, computer bag and baby strapped to his chest

You and he wait a while before the next kid--get married, start your careers, settle down

Baby boy is the ring bearer

Your son is pushing six when you have another baby boy, then three years later you have a girl

The middle child is an absolute angel, while the oldest and youngest are devils

Hikaru likes to sing to the babies when they’re fussy. He’s horrible at it, but nothing calms them like their father’s voice

Crawls into bed with them to soothe them when they have nightmares

Imagine walking in on them one morning, toddler’s head curled on Hika’s chest, him sprawled out, both of them drooling buckets

Roughousing with his boys and his girl, playing football, wrestling, just being a goofball

Please. dad Hika with a baby strapped to his chest is sending me to the astral realm

Kaoru:

He would love to father his own kids, but I firmly believe he would adopt as well!

Have two of his own, and then adopt one or two

Would also be a really great stepdad, I think

Cracks Dad jokes as soon as he finds out you’re pregnant

Normally a sensitive soul, he becomes extremely protective

Holds your hand and kisses your forehead during labor

Has the biggest, brightest smile through his tears when he holds your son for the first time

Does most of his work at home

Also keeps the baby in a harness strapped to his chest

He loves carrying the diaper bag and will bite anyone who tries to take it from him

His kids are his biggest inspiration, so he decides to open a kids clothing line

Your babies are the models

Because of that, one of them pursues modeling as a career and Kaoru couldn’t be more proud

They all look like him, but they don’t look like Hikaru, which is weird and messes with your head

He’s the perfect Dad. He spoils them but is also very disciplined

Spends quiet Sunday afternoons sketching and cooking with them

Mitsukuni:

All his babies are tiny. Doesn’t matter how tall you are. Your children are tiny

They have his body type, too. Small, bird-like, narrow bones

But they still kick ass

He didn’t give them a chance to opt out of martial arts. They don’t have a choice--it’s the family business, and they will learn it

Unsurprisngly, they’re all very good at it

They train often with Uncle Chika and their cousins

He cheers and coaches them on at competitions

He’s offended when they don’t share his sweet tooth

I mean, they like candy. What child doesn’t? But you raised them to not be obsessive about it, which displeases him

Takashi:

Lord. Don’t get me started on him as a dad

He is a family man. It’s in his blood. That’s how he was raised and trained and taught

So he will pump eight or ten kids into you if you let him

Cries the first time he finds out you’re pregnant

Worships you like a desperate man kneeling at the temple of his god

Belly kisses. Forehead kisses. Really tender palm kisses. Kisses, kisses, kisses.

How else could he thank you for giving him the most special gift?

Even more protective than before

Scary dog privileges

Has to have a hand on you/the bump at all times

He’s so tall that he has to lean down a little to reach it, but he doesn’t mind

Prefers to hold both you and the baby, so he reclines on the couch and pulls you and the bump into his lap, wrapping his arms around you and encouraging you to rest against his chest. Let him carry the baby for a little while

Thinks you look ravishing in the maternity clothes

Stares daggers at anyone who tries to touch your bump, curling an arm around it and turning you away with a low growl

Goes slightly feral whenever you reach your due date

Each labor is difficult, but he lets you crush his hand. He’s pretty silent, but he wipes your forehead and grunts with you. Seeing you in pain makes him feel pain

When that precious little baby is delivered, he just stares at them without a word. He can’t believe that you and he made something so perfect and innocent and pure

His hands are so big. He can hold the baby in just one palm

Smiles the brightest when holding his child

He was raised with honor and chivalry and a moral code, so he raises his children the same way

Teaches both his sons and his daughters how to be kind, gentle, and nurturing while also teaching them self defense and other fighting moves

Diaper changing pro

Y’all have kids pretty close in succession, so while you’re at work he can be seen walking with a baby in a chest harness, one strapped to his back, one in a stroller and a toddler holding his hand

Sorts out and categorizes what heirlooms will go to each child

BIG emphasis on birthdays. He’s a man of tradition, and feels happiest when his children are honored.

all of your kids have his jawline and his height

-

-

-

#ouran high school host club #ohshc #tamaki x reader #ohshc x reader #kyoya x reader #hikaru x reader #kaoru x reader #mitsukuni x reader #takashi x reader #tamaki suoh x reader #honey x reader #mori x reader #tamaki suoh #kyoya ootori #hikaru hitachiin #hitachiin twins #kaoru hitachiin #mitsukuni haninozuka #takashi morinozuka

[ladyviserra]

Any ideas for being the Lannister that Sansa is forced to marry? Maybe Cersei, Jamie & Tyrion’s younger half sibling/Tywin’s youngest son from a second wife? Or maybe even Tyrion’s legitimate son? Closer to her age and kinda also v v done with his scheming family? Wants to make the best of the situation they’re in? Did they meet before this or was he summoned to kings landing for the wedding & told about it when he arrived to thwart the tyrell plot? Feel free to throw around your own ideas! Thanks!

sansa stark being married to a lannister

Tywin possibly wanted another child with who he can have some use

Tywin gets a son from his second wife and for now he is satisfied

I imagine he is born a at least 3/4 years earlier than Sansa

One of the better Lannisters

Tywin's son would be ambitious and very into politics

I see him as a little bit of Tyrion and some other bit like Jaime

Sword fighting with Jaime was probably the way they were close

Playing games with Tyrion, but not being close enough, wanting to show he was still loyal to his father (and was on his side)

Cersei would spare looks at her younger half-brother but would consider him more like a family than Tyrion

A respectful and promising young man someone Tywin would be proud of

He was probably with Tywin, when the rest of his children went to Winterfell

He arrived at King's Landing just before the rest of the family, Tywin leaving him welcome them, get close to the family as he had charm to him to which Starks are too naive to notice

Starting a friendship with Arya

Avoids being seen with his family, trying to make it seem like he is the best Lannister

Not liking Joffrey's behaviour to Sansa and finding it incredibly rude but having a great advantage with it, making himself look like a saviour by apologising for his manners

Sansa having a crush on him and Joffrey (Joff being handsome and I bet Cersei and Jaime didn't get all of those good looks only from Joanna, plus Tywin's son is charming and young lad)

Attending the Hand's tourney, but doesn't participate in it

Saving some time to talk to Eddard who already heard how good he was with his daughters, gaining respect from Lord of Winterfell

Then Robert died and Joffrey became king

And Ned was executed, Sansa being not so keen about it

Reporting all of his work to his father who is in a battle with Robb

Keeping his friendship with Sansa while failing to find Arya

Letting Sansa come to him whenever she is upset about the way she is being treated

After Tywin comes back from the war, Joffrey puts Sansa aside and is betrothed to Margaery, Tywin arranges a marriage between his youngest son and Sansa

Now when Sansa hears of the news she is still sad about her families' death but is happy about the fact she wouldn't be marrying the King

Not a bad option, heiress to Winterfell as his wife, not a bad match at all

In this wedding, however, there is no humiliation, not even for Sansa because this is Tywin's real son who is being marry

So even if Joffrey's dying wish was to make fun of his uncle and former betrothal it wouldn't happen ( Lannisters are not fools and won't be treated like one)

Tyrion on the other hand is the target his nephew decided to test

Eventually, King's wedding comes around and he is killed, of course, his " dearest " uncle is blamed for poisoning him, but not Sansa

Rising a suspicion on who could it be, even believing it was Tyrion he is on the side of the Lannisters

Oberyn once again is chosen to be Tyrion's champion and dies

Fleeing from his execution, Sansa and her husband are sent to Casterly Rock after Tywin's funreal

What I think became a trauma for him, after his father's death he immediately becomes Lord of Casterly Rock (Cersei is a woman, Jaime is in Kingsguard and Tyrion wanted criminal) making Sansa Lady of Casterly Rock

In Westerlands I would say they fall in love, genuinely and live there with his mother and the rest of the family

Not visiting King's Landing at all and seeing where his sister's madness has gone to and now being the man he was destined to be he turns against the throne and his half-sister

That angers Cersei as he was one of her blood, betraying her

Earning the trust of many Cersei's enemies the queen doesn't attack him

Rushing to North and with Arryns crushing the Boltons

From then he returns to Casterly Rock and has a good chance of stopping Greyjoys

Eventually finding Bran and making Sansa very happy, the rest is not his concern so what happens in King's Landing bothers him the least(Cersei mostly likely dies, Jaime too and Tyrion is probably still hanging around with Dany having much more use of her)

Lovely ending, they stay married and have children, living happily ever after

Less nice of an ending, he dies from the wounds he received during the battles

#sansa stark #sansa stark imagine #sansa stark x reader #asoiaf #a song of ice and fire #game of thrones #asoiaf fic #sansa x reader #asoiaf sansa #asoiaf imagine

[collecting-stories]

Saving Grace - JJ Maybank

A/N: A You Are Ok drabble set ten years in the future 

You Are Ok Masterlist | Outer Banks Masterlist

✰ ✰ ✰ ✰ ✰

The Maybank house had sat empty on the cut for almost five years until JJ’s dad was released from prison. You and JJ had been down in Florida at the time, moved out of his cousin’s trailer and living in an apartment in the everglades. Talking about going home but unsure what the OBX had to offer at that point. It was barely two weeks after that when you both flew home, Luke Maybank had overdosed and the house was empty once again.  

It stayed empty while the two of you gutted the entire place and refurbished it. While JJ and you stayed at the Chateau or Kiara’s place, while you found a job and found out you were pregnant, while JJ got a job for himself in the area and went back down to the everglades to empty out the apartment.  

JJ laid the tile in the bathroom himself and fixed the plumbing. You painted the inside and outside of the house, planted a garden, bought a chicken coop. You and JJ moved in to the house and just like that you were back in the OBX.  

-

You sat outside on the porch, drinking a cup of coffee despite the hour nearing eight o’clock at night. The baby monitor was sitting beside you, a soft gurgling coming from the receiver. You were waiting for the familiar sight of JJ’s truck pulling down the long driveway in the dusk. The headlights were already on, flashing on you for a moment as he parked and then cut off, the engine dying.  

“Hey, what’re you doing out here?” He asked, climbing out of the front seat of the car and bringing a bag of chinese food with him.  

“Waiting for you to bring me egg rolls?” You joke, before turning serious, “I saw my dad this morning, at the grocery store.”

“Did he see you?”  

“Yeah...it was, really weird?” You suggested, reaching for the bag. JJ shook his head and held the bag away from you, a silent ‘I’ve got it’ as he leaned in and gave you a kiss. You wrinkled your nose at the familiar smell of fish as you pulled away, “how was work?”

“Alright...” he shrugged, “what did your dad say?”  

“That he wants me to come to church on Sunday.” You replied, following him inside.  

“You wanna go?” It was a question but the way he asked you knew that he already knew the answer.

“I mean...I’m not gonna like, start going to church with them every week and ya know, go back to how I was but...it might be nice. I do miss my family and, I want to have boundaries but maybe they don’t have to be like, huge ten-year silence boundaries where we never speak. I do want Willow to know her cousins; I think. What do you wanna do?” You asked, passing plates across the counter to him.  

A tinny half cry sounded from the monitor on the table and you both turned to look over at it, waiting for a crescendo of cries that you’d grown used to in the last four months. When silence settled back in, you both seemed to exhale in relief. You wanted to eat and finish this conversation before JJ ultimately showered and fell asleep until Willow’s usual one a.m. wake up.  

“Whatever you want.” He replied, never submitting to making the decision for you when you wanted him to. “Not exactly like your family’s a big of me.”

“Can’t imagine why,” you bumped his hip with your own, kissing his cheek. “Not like you totally corrupted their youngest daughter or anything.”

“Oh no, do not blame that on me.”

“I didn’t run away to marry myself.”

“If you go...” JJ posed, turning to follow you to the table, “do you want to go alone?”

-

You stood frozen in place, holding a box of cereal in your hand as you stared across the small expanse of Heyward’s shop, your dad there by the fresh produce, comparing two different apples with each other. The Outer Banks was a small island but you ran in very different circles and, in the three years that you’d been home, had avoided seeing your parents. Or anyone in your family.  

You’d driven passed the baptist church, a sign boasting a new assistant pastor, one of your brothers, when you’d first moved back but hadn’t actually seen anyone. The possibility of seeing them again had been a long debate between you and JJ when you’d finally decided to leave Florida for North Carolina. It had been hard in the very beginning, missing birthdays and anniversaries and new babies, but over time the ache had dulled and you had shifted your attention away from what you were missing and focused on working through the things you could heal in yourself.  

Now you were frozen. If you left your basket of groceries now you could make a beeline for the door and be out before he saw you. But then the bell above the door rattled as a customer came in and the baby swaddled against your chest started to fuss. Before you could attempt to placate her, your dad was looking over. For a moment you were certain he didn’t recognize you. Ten years was a long time. But then his mouth quirked into a frown and he set down the apples he was holding.  

“Ace?” He questioned, the old nickname feeling foreign to you. It’d probably been ten years since anyone called you that.  

“Hey, dad.” You nodded your head at him across the small store. You felt like tacking on a ‘surprise’ for good measure. ‘Surprise, I’m in the OBX, surprise, I got a kid...’

“When did you uh, when did you come home?” He moved across the store to be near you though he refrained from reaching out for a hug. You wondered if a decade had been just as hard on him as it had on you. Cathartic and healthy and freeing but hard. He seemed more mellow, you thought that before he might’ve pulled out a bible and started admonishing you.  

“JJ and I moved back three years ago,” you admitted, slipping his name into the conversation as if to prove a point. “He got a job on a fishing rig.”  

“Will you...would you come to church? We could have lunch afterward. Or you could just be there?” He offered. Ten years hadn’t changed his beliefs at all but it had made him miss you. Not knowing where you were or what you were doing felt like an ache in his chest that never went away. The anger had subsided to sadness and guilt.  

-

Seeing your dad had been startling enough and you had almost wished, while you were standing there in Heyward’s, that JJ could’ve been with you. Though, you weren’t entirely sure that would’ve helped anything in the long run.

“I think my mom would probably be nicer to me if I brought Wills but maybe, I mean, my dad already saw her. He didn’t ask about her but maybe...” you groaned, burying your face in your hands for a moment as you tried to gather your thoughts. “Why didn’t we stay in Florida?”

“Cause we both spent seven years talking about how much we wanted to come back to the OBX...and my dad-”

“Jay.”

“Look. My dad was an asshole okay, he was a fucking nightmare but you know better than anyone that not getting to see him at the end...that was the worst call I’ve ever gotten in my life. Knowing Ricky was the only one up here and that he was alone. You should do whatever you want to do and I’ll be there, right next to you, just like I’ve been for ten years, but I don’t want you to have any regrets.” JJ replied, honestly.  

You nodded, looking down at the plate of food and pushing your fried rice around. You knew that JJ was still hurting, that gutting a house didn’t take away all the memories that were trapped inside. “God I hate when you’re right.” You sighed.  

“Don’t let your dad hear you talk like that.” He teased just as the monitor went off again, this time for real. You leaned against the back of the chair and groaned as JJ stood up. “I got it.”

“No, it’s okay, I’ll get her.” You stood too. “You need a shower, and sleep.”  

“I haven’t seen her all day,” JJ pointed out, following you down the short hallway to the bedroom that used to be his. It was painted in yellows and oranges now, with a crib and a rocking chair and baby books. A sunset mural painted on the wall from Kiara’s girlfriend and a chandelier of stars from Sarah.  

“What are you gonna do, take her in the shower with you?” You joked, lifting the fussing baby up out of her crib, “hey bubba, what’s the matter?”

“You have to feed her right? So feed her in the bathroom.”

“Oh sure, Jay, that’s super comfortable for me. I would love to feed her while I sit on the toilet.” You grumbled, already knowing that you would probably, definitely end up caving to him and doing exactly that.  

“I’ll put dinner away and do the dishes.” He promised, “and I’ll punch you’ll dad if he says anything to piss you off.”

#jj maybank x reader #jj maybank x y/n #jj maybank fanfic #jj maybank x fanfiction #jj maybank fic #jj maybank fanfiction #jj maybank imagine #jj maybank x you #outer banks imagine #outer banks fanfiction #outer banks fanfic #outer banks fic #obx fanfic #obx fanfiction #obx fic #obx imagine #collecting stories imagine #you are ok series

[elisaphoenix13]

A Quick Reunion

I actually wrote this before Episode 5 of WandaVision came out. 😂

It was his usual round of dimensional hopping. He even brought Athena along. But the dimension he stopped in was the same time and place as when he left but...it was different. New York was how Tony described the snap to have been like and after subtly questioning nearby passerbys, he quickly discovered what was different.

Thanos had won.

The snap had been reversed but it was clear that the titan had continued with his...genocide. Anyone brave enough to walk around on the much quieter streets still had fear in their eyes. As if they were waiting for the mad titan to come around the corner and decide they were done living their life. If there even was such a thing. Stephen could tell this dimension didn't have long despite Thanos' attempt to save all living creatures from the same fate his people succumbed to.

He stopped here though because something compelled him to. He wasn't sure what it was yet, but he definitely wasn't going to bother trying to save it. There wasn't anything he could do for it. He simply waited. Waited for whatever it was to reveal itself so he could do what he needed to do and move on.

Then he sensed it. It was coming fast and if he was correct, it would go right by the alleyway he was standing by in. So on instinct, he threw a hand out and caught the shirt of whatever sped by him, and his eyes widened. He only ever had that instinct with Thomas but when he looked to see what he caught, he saw blue eyes looking at him in bewilderment.

"How did you do that?" The thick Sokovian accent hung in the air and Stephen knew exactly who he had at his fingertips.

"You...where's Wanda?" Stephen asks and the man's face twists in emotional pain.

"She is dead. She died a long time ago. How do you know about her?"

This is why he was compelled to stay here. Pietro was alive and well in a dying dimension and he could take this opportunity to reunite Wanda with her brother with little to no consequences. They were still the same age from a quick glance at the man and he clearly lost Wanda like she had lost him in their original dimension…

"What if I told you I could take you to her?" Stephen says as he carefully releases Pietro.

"Why should I believe you?" The Sokovian looks at him skeptically, and the sorcerer didn't blame him.

"You don't have to, I suppose. My name is Stephen. Doctor Stephen Stark-Strange. I'm the Sorcerer Supreme and it is my duty to protect reality...in my dimension, your sister is alive and well, but…"

"...I'm dead?" Pietro finishes and Stephen nods. "Normally I wouldn't, but it can't be much worse than this."

Stephen sighs with relief and smiles. "I assure you, things are much better."

Stephen told him everything. From when he died in their original dimension to their victory against Thanos, and their current living situation. He didn't want Pietro to be thrown into the chaos of the tower without some kind of warning. Of course there would be the reunion between the twins but that was to be expected. By the time, he was done, Pietro looked antsy at the possibility of seeing his sister again and Stephen had to keep himself from laughing.

"Okay...I will go on one condition." Pietro says.

"What would that condition be?"

"Tell me how you caught me so easily."

Stephen chuckles. "I have a son that's a lot like you. It's instinct at this point." He pats Athena's head. "He is a friend."

"Wait...didn't you say there's a tiger too?"

"We have a zoo." Stephen rolls his eyes. "The animals just need to be introduced to you. Do you have anything here you want to get?" When Pietro shakes his head, Stephen opens a gateway. "Are you ready?"

"No. Not really."

Pietro takes a deep breath and it leaves him with a woosh before he steps forward and through the portal Stephen had made. The sorcerer and wolf followed immediately after and the gateway closed behind them as the man looked around the family floor. It was quiet, but Stephen knew that was short lived and any moment now, someone would break the silence. For now, Stephen let Pietro take everything in at his own pace.

The first thing he did after looking at Stephen for permission was raid the fridge. He couldn't blame him. Knowing Thanos, food was probably rationed and scarce so Stephen let the man eat whatever he wanted. Pietro ate like a starving man and it was half true. Only when he slowed down did he walk out to the balcony and take New York in.

"It's alive." Pietro says softly when Stephen joins him.

"Just give it a few minutes and it will be more alive than you ever could imagine." The sorcerer chuckles.

"Where is my sister?"

"I'll have her come up soon. I just figured you would want a few minutes to adjust to the change first."

Wishful thinking. The moment the last word left Stephen's mouth, William popped up next to him holding Valerie. Pietro jumped at his sudden appearance and Valerie immediately reached out for Stephen who took her without hesitation.

"You're back." William says. "That was fast."

"Yes, well, for good reason. Did you two go on your own adventure?"

"We went to Japan to look at the cherry trees. Val brought back a handful of blossoms." William says with a smile and then looks at the man standing by Stephen. "Who's he?" He asks quietly.

"Ah. Would you bring Wanda up here please?"

"Umm...sure."

With that, William teleports away while Valerie looks at Pietro nervously. Stephen quickly soothed her and made sure to tell her that he was safe and a friend, and she visibly relaxed a little bit. She would warm up to him on her own time.

"You said Stark earlier...that you are married to him." Pietro says and Stephen nods. "Where is he?"

"Probably down in the lab with our youngest and risking her hearing."

"How many children do you have?" The man asks curiously.

"Seven. Plus an honorary one. We'll explain later but you'll meet everyone eventually." Stephen says.

"Who will meet who?"

Both Stephen and Pietro look over and find Spiderman sticking to a window near the balcony. Peter crawls over until he gets to the balcony and flips onto it as his mask falls back.

"Who's this?" The teen asks.

"You'll find out soon enough."

"Do all of your kids have powers?" Pietro asks, a little perplexed.

"No. Our oldest fights like Tony. Peter and the twins have powers, and so does my oldest daughter and honorary daughter. Our two youngest seem to be normal." Stephen answers.

"Huh…"

Stephen leads Pietro back inside just as the elevator opens and Wanda steps off with Vision and William.

"Stephen? William said you asked for me." She calls as she rounds the corner.

The moment she steps into view, both she and Pietro freeze and look at each other. Silence filled the air as they stared at each other and then Wanda finally looked at Stephen and glared.

"This is not funny. I never thought you of all people would go this far!" She says dangerously and Stephen holds up a hand to placate her.

"He is not an illusion. He's very real. I...found him while dimension hopping."

Wanda takes a shuddering breath and moves closer to Pietro and the twins regard the other for what seemed like forever. Just when Stephen started to doubt his decision, Wanda threw her arms around her brother and cried. Pietro immediately returned the embrace and they spoke to each other in Sokovian until Wanda finally moved away to cup his cheeks.

"It is you." She smiles through the remains of unshed tears. "I missed you so much." She then looks at Stephen and hugs him tightly. "Thank you."

"You're welcome. I know it's not the same but--"

"You've given me another chance with my brother. It's more than I could have ever asked for."

Stephen smiles softly. "Spend time with him. Show him around the tower, but be back by dinner time."

"Yes, Mom." Wanda laughs and kisses his cheek before grabbing Pietro's hand and dragging him toward the elevator.

"Did you just call him Mom?"

"I'll explain." Wanda says as she and her brother leave with Vision and the elevator closes again.

Stephen was left with Peter, William, and Valerie and the two boys looked at him in surprise.

"Wait…that was Pietro?" Peter asks, pointing in the direction said man had left in.

"Yes. I found him in a dying dimension and saw it as a rare opportunity." Stephen nods. "He'll likely stay on their floor."

"He kind of reminds me of Thomas." William says.

"I'm not surprised. They are a lot alike. Very similar powers." Stephen puts Valerie down and she wanders into the living room to play with Levi and Athena. "Would you mind helping with dinner?"

"Okay." The younger teen nods and Peter points to the elevator again.

"I think I'll go get Bucky...or Cassie. You know... someone who can cook."

Stephen chuckles as Peter dashes off while his suit recedes into his bracelet, and the sorcerer and William head into the kitchen to start dinner. They would be making a lot, so if Peter managed to wrangle Bucky and Cassie into helping, it would go by easier and faster. They started with pulling out ingredients and prepping, and both Bucky and Cassie fortunately joined them a little later. Diana came with Cassie, but she went to join her sister in the living room and Stephen had the suspicion that there may be another tea party.

"Okay...I see the usual people but Friday said we had a guest." Tony says as he comes around the corner, holding Lucy in one of his arms.

"More like another permanent resident." Stephen says.

"Did you adopt another kid?"

Stephen huffs. "Not this time. I brought someone back from the dead...in a way."

Tony looks at him skeptically. "Do I have a zombie in my tower?"

"Our tower. And no. Just someone from a dying alternate dimension." Stephen says as he hands some vegetables to Bucky.

"Who's the zombie?"

Stephen rolls his eyes. "Pietro."

Tony pauses. "As in...Red's twin brother?"

"The very same."

"... somehow I'm not surprised. I'm going to change Lulu's diaper."

"Better you than me."

Tony laughs and heads upstairs to face his daunting task while the people in the kitchen work on and finish dinner. It was sort of a ritual at this point. If someone new joined the team, a huge dinner was made and everyone went up to the family floor to eat and welcome the new member of their dysfunctional family. From the few stories Stephen had heard about Pietro, he would fit in just fine.

Tony changed Lucy and joined their other two girls in the living room until dinner was ready, and when it was, Stephen had Friday call everyone up to eat. Harley and Thomas had come home from wherever they had been (probably terrorizing the city) just before dinner and were helping set the food out. Team dinners were more like buffets so that everyone could serve themselves and find somewhere to sit which usually meant anywhere. The living room, the second floor pathway that served as a secondary dining area, the balcony...it got crowded when they had these dinners.

Everyone got upstairs except for Wanda and Pietro, but Vision said they were on their way up. Once Stephen announced there was another team member joining them, everyone looked at him skeptically (and even asked where the kid was, which Stephen ignored), but then the twins finally arrived at the penthouse and the original Avengers that had met Pietro froze. It lasted all of two seconds before they swarmed and hugged him, but thankfully the man didn't seem too overwhelmed. Either he remembered them from his dimension or Wanda had explained how close the Avengers were. Maybe both.

"I'll be sure to tell Clint so you can terrorise him next time he and the family are in town." Natasha says with an impish smile.

"Oh yeah. I miss him." Pietro laughs and Wanda points to the table full of food.

"New family members get the first plate." She says as she leads him over to the table.

Once they get their food, everyone eventually steps in to get their own before dispersion throughout the floor to eat. Laughter echoed through the floor over dinner and after, drinks were poured and games were played as per the usual tradition. Pietro was dragged into a game of Never Have I Ever, and Stephen knew he and Tony would soon join the game. Tony was already heading over, but Quill had pulled Stephen aside.

"Hey...will...will you take me with you one day when you go dimension hopping?" He asks quietly.

"Quill…" Stephen sighs. "I got lucky with Pietro. Your mother--"

"I know. I know...but I thought maybe I would get the chance to say goodbye to her properly?"

"Maybe. I can't promise anything." Stephen says softly and the celestial nods.

"That's okay...I appreciate it anyway."

"Why don't you go get a drink?"

"And have to drink way more than anybody else? Alright."

Quill huffs and walks away to join the drinking game and Stephen has the kids go up to their rooms for the night. William went into Harley's room, Cassie went into Peter's, and to Stephen's surprise, Thomas went into Diana's. Probably to watch a movie. Valerie and Lucy were already down for the night and the animals were content in their corner, so the adults could party without worry.

That was a lie.

Thor was already challenging him to a drinking contest with Asgardian ale.

Stephen sighs.

#mama bear au #stephen strange #supremefamily #tony stark #ironstrange

[lykaokrios]

Predestined Sea - F!De Sardet x Vasco: Part 1

Fandom: Greedfall

Paring: Captain Vasco x F!De Sardet

Word Count: 1,467

Description:  Larke De Sardet knew there was always a chance her uncle would use her as leverage in some arranged marriage. What she hadn't expected was for it to be a contract marriage with the Nauts, leaving her married to a young Captain she'd never met.

AU Where the events of the game didn't happen, she is actually the daughter of the Princess, and she's not going to New Serene (at least not yet). I gave her a name because it's going to fit into the story at later points, and I just want her to have an actual first name :)

Warnings: Mild swearing, though AU may be some spoiler stuff

My AO3

Part 2

“You are asking me to do WHAT?” Vasco asks, not believing his own ears. Surely he’s mistaken.

“We wouldn’t ask this of you if we didn’t think it was what is best for the Nauts,” his Admiral says firmly. “I know it’s not ideal. But we are working on the details of the contract.”

“How would me marrying a noble from the Congregation possibly help the Nauts? And why would a noble family agree to this, they marry their children off to other nobles not us,” he insist as he crosses his arms.

The admiral sighs and lays a draft of the contract on the table. “There are things happening I can’t fully explain to you, but we need someone involved in their politics for our benefit.”

Vasco narrows his eyes at her as she talks, “Who exactly is this noble that just our marriage would significantly help the Nauts in Congressional politics?”

“Prince d’Orsay’s niece.”

“What!” Vasco shouts leaping from his seat. “You want me to marry a lass in line for the throne?”

“She’ll never take the throne,” she dismisses quickly. “The Prince has a son. Sit down.”

“That doesn’t make it any better,” he mutters as he slides back into his seat. “What are we or they getting from this?”

“The idea is she will marry you and become more... sympathetic to us. But long term being your children will be in the high court helping make policies and decisions. They’ve been raised living in the courts and on our ships, with a noble mother and Naut father. We’re also getting better ports, and a better standing on Congregation lands,” she explains.

“Children? You’re already putting children into this?”

“Yes. As for what they will receive, better prices on voyages, transporting goods, and priority over the other nations. Both sides are getting good outcomes.”

“And I’m expected to just leave my ship, marry a noble and live in the courts like a pet?” He scoffs.

“No, you’ll get married and go back to your ship. You can take her with you if you two wish, or you can just come back and visit her. You will have to make appearances for some events with the both of you and you obviously have to have children, but we’re willing to work your schedule around it all,” she finishes.

He rolls his eyes, “The day the niece of the Prince wants to live on one of our ships under the direction of a Naut Captain is the day I eat my hat.”

“I’d suggest getting a replacement hat ready then,” she teases. “We’ve of course done research into her. She seems quite fond of the water, much to her uncle’s unhappiness.”

“So the oddest noble,” he sighs. “Maybe she won’t be awful, but why is it me?”

“The Prince was specific on who she married.”

“He chose me?”

“Not by name of course. But he wanted a high ranking Naut within five years of his niece that could be composed enough to attend court when need be.”

“Who old is she?”

“23.”

“I... see,” he mutters. “And I being the youngest Captain at 25 have fallen into this trap.”

“That’s why it’s you Captain Vasco. We regret the need for this, but I do not see it changing the path of your career. If you’re not an admiral by the time you’re my age, I will be very surprised.”

“So when is this happening?”

“That’s why I had you bring goods to Serene, they are here. We’re meeting with the Prince and his niece in two days.”

“Shit.”

-

“Uncle you can not be serious,” Larke De Sardet insists as she stands across from her uncle. “I can’t marry this man.”

“I am, and you will,” he states firmly, the frown growing on his face.

“I do not even know him!” She all but shouts, adrenaline pumping in her veins. The pit in her stomach growing.

“That’s how most arranged marriage work, you will meet him in two days, and you will marry him within the month and that is final,” the Prince snaps back.

“But uncle!”

“If you say one more word and force me to leave my seat to deal with you, you shall regret it child,” he growls at her. “You are to meet me in this room at sunrise the day after morrow. Dismissed.”

Nodding obediently, Larke turns on her heel and rushes out the door, the tears prickling at her eyes as she blinks to force them back.

Her mother and her cousin Constantin stand nearby waiting for her, but she brushes past them without a word heading for the back of the palace.

She hear’s her cousin shout her name, but she continues on her path until she hits the back door of the palace and takes off into a run.

She ran until her lungs burned and the sea air raced into her nostrils. Ripping off her fancy dress and kicking off her shoes, she discards them on the beach before she wades out into the water and stares across the open sea at the setting sun.

She’d always loved the ocean since she was a child. She was told her father was an explorer, that he spent his life uncovering the unknown, mapping out places she couldn’t imagine. A part of her had always hoped one day that could be her.

Looking further down the beach, she spots one of the Naut ships in the far distance and sighs. She didn’t want to marry a man she didn’t know. And knowing her uncle he’d go for the highest ranking person he could, which probably meant a much older man.

A chill goes up her spine at the thought, and she trudges back to the shore before plopping down to let the dying waves crash against her feet.

She sits for what feels like ages, until the sun finally settles behind the water and she allows herself to lay back in the sand to look up at the stars.

They’d always been another interest. All the pictures astronomers and Nauts had painted in the sky. Each with their meaning and story to go with the random combination of stars. There was always something comforting about being under the stars.

Under the vast open night sky, with the sound of the waves in the background was her one true ‘happy place.’

After a short while the sound of footsteps comes from further up the beach, her ears pricking at the sound before a smirk crosses her face as she hears her cousin utter a curse.

“Fair cousin, don’t try to drown yourself in the sea to escape a man, that’s a terrible plan,” he teases as he too kicks his boots off and sits beside her.

“Could have fooled me,” she chuckles. “Sounds preferable to the situation I’m currently facing.”

Constantin sighs heavily and places a hand on her shoulder, “I tried to talk him out of it… it didn’t go well but I tried.”

Glancing over at her cousin, she notices the evident bruise on his cheek, “Constantin… don’t fight with your father over me. You know he doesn’t change his mind. I love that you want to stand up for me, but you know him.”

“Unfortunately I do,” he agrees. “But I had to try. That a man is going to take away my dear cousin without my approval is a hard fate to accept.”

“He’s taking me away?” she questions, immediately sitting up to face him. “A Naut is taking me away, I’m going on a ship?”

“I spoke with your mother and apparently she fought with my father over the contract and put her own requirements for the marriage,” he explains. “That father couldn’t marry you off to someone more than 5 years your senior, and that you be allowed to travel with him if you so choose.”

“My sweet mother,” she sighs with relief. “I still want nothing to do with this… but she made it what she could I suppose.”

“Auntie is quite distraught over it all,” he admits. “I sat speaking with her after you took off. She hopes this will end up being a good outcome for you, getting you away from the palace and away from my father for awhile.”

“He’s not an easy man to get along with,” she agrees.

“He hates me, he just gets annoyed with you,” Constantin adds with a shrug. “I’ll never be good enough, and you’ll always be wrong. I suppose there’s nothing we can do about that.”

“I suppose,” she says unhappily before looking back up at the sky.

“Who knows, maybe you’ll fall in love with a handsome Naut Captain and run away to the seas,” he teases her with a smile.

“Fuck off.”

__________

Part 2

#captain vasco #vasco #de sardet #greedfall #de sardet x vasco #greedfall vasco #fanfiction

[asoiafdrabbles]

II.46

With his firstborn child staring up at him with eyes it shouldn't have, Jon Baratheon's entire world falls apart. 

Margaery/Jon (Nearly Everyone Survives the Rebellion AU)

Jon stared at the babe, feeling sick.

"Your great-grandmother," Margaery rushed to say, gripping their son desperately, "she was a Targaryen. That could--"

He laughed, and the sound was broken, fragile. Madness, he thought, hysteria building, there's madness in my blood.

"It's not that and you know it's not. That--our enemy was right."

For almost all his life the deposed King-Across-the-Sea, the Targaryen that had abducted his mother, had claimed Jon was his son. Nothing his mother said or did, none of his father's assurances, had stopped the lizard's insistence.

And he'd been right the whole time.

"I'm not a Baratheon. He's," Jon looked at their son, tears coming to his eyes, "he's not. By the gods, Marge, when father--when the King finds out--"

They were at Highgarden, the only boon in this situation. Margaery had asked to give birth in the comfort of her childhood home and his father had given them leave, though reluctantly. The midwife, the maester, all of the servants around them were the Tyrell's. They would put the blood of their liege before Robert Baratheons, especially as many still held some loyalty to the Targaryens--one of the reasons Jon had married the sole daughter of the Lord of the Reach to begin with.

His father--his supposed father--would not be running through the halls ready to murder the dragonspawn in their midst here.

"I will call for my family," Margaery said, finally, her voice the silk-wrapped steel he had grown to love. "Grandmother and Willas will be able to help us in this. If only it was the hair...we could have dyed the hair...."

But of course, when the rest of the Tyrells arrived, after Margaery cleaned up and the wetnurse fed their son, things got even worse for Jon. They wanted his son on the throne, their blood on the throne, and knew that King Robert would never allow it.

Rhaegar, though, could be persuaded. His eldest son was still his heir, but had only two daughters. The general mirth in the room made Jon feel sick.

Had his mother lied? he wondered as he blocked out his good-family's plotting. Had she known all along or simply hoped he was Robert's?

His parents had never gotten along well, but they had worked on it. Robert slept around, but was careful of bastards. Lyanna had hobbies that were frowned upon in a highborn woman, but with the king's full consent. They both loved Jon and mourned the fact she couldn't have anymore children.

Robert had no trueborn children. Only two bastards, as far as Jon knew. Stannis had a daughter. Renly had no children, would never have any children.

The Tyrells were right, this could be the end of Robert's reign.

Jon's stomach lurched and he stood, leaving the room without bothering with excuses. When Rhaegar found out...he could only imagine how much gloating there would be.

From the first moment they'd met, Rhaegar had treated him as though he were a rebellious child. Sometimes perhaps even a fool.

In the brief battles, when none of the Targaryen loyalists would lay a finger on Jon except...except his brother, he supposed, now, feeling sicker still. His older brother, who enjoyed knocking him around but never seriously injuring him. Who would sometimes go so far as to lecture Jon on his footwork or grip right there in the battlefield. Who had always believed their father about Jon's identity.

In the attempts at negotiation, Rhaegar would insist Jon be acknowledged as a Targaryen and given to his 'rightul' family. It would never happen, no negotiator Robert sent, and certainly not Jon Arryn when he attended, would ever agree to such nonsense. Jon was Robert's heir, his only son, and even if he'd had a dozen more Robert would never make such a concession to Rhaegar.

There were books in Essos that called Jon "Aemon Targaryen" and listed him as Rhaegar's youngest son, legitimized by the rightful king, and called Robert his step-father. He'd seen some of them in his travels, full of morbid curiosity that Uncle Stannis or Uncle Benjen could not dissuade him from. The maesters would be so upset that those were the correct ones.

"Jon?"

He turned, realizing he'd made it to a garden and halfway through its small maze without even noticing. And there was Uncle Renly, looking at him in concern.

"Did something happen? Is the babe...?"

Jon stared. He had no idea what the Tyrells had decided on, if they were going to pretend his son had not lived in order to hide him. And Renly...what side would he fall on? He resented both his brothers and had always been good to Jon, and was so close to Loras, but family, blood, would surely come first.

"I...it's...I don't know," he finally decided on. "They're seeing to him now."

Watching Renly's face crumple at the thought his child could be dying, Jon desperately wished he could trust him. Maybe he'd find out soon. Maybe he'd find out he hadn't lost everyone.

"Can I...can I ask you a question?"

Renly put on one of his calm masks, the sort he war at court, and nodded, motioning Jon to come closer. "Of course you can."

He licked his lips, sitting down on the bench beside Renly and cataloging, despite himself, all the differences between them. If he'd looked just a bit less like his mother no one would have ever believed he was Robert's, surely, he was nothing like Renly and the brothers were so alike.

"Have you...heard anything new about the Targaryens?"

At that, Renly's eyes narrowed. "If you're worried that they might try something, if you have an heir--"

"I, yes, and...other things. I just wanted to know. After the last time I went to Essos, father hasn't told me anything."

The last time, a routine trip to speak with the Iron Bank, and a not-so-routine kidnapping attempt. He'd been ready for something, but not for the Sword of the Morning to try to make off with him. Robert had been spitting mad when he'd returned home and told him.

Margaery had just found out she was pregnant and had made him promise to stay put until the baby came, playing the part of dutiful wife.

Renly frowned, thinking. He was on the Small Council, but he rarely bothered attending. Most of what he knew came from going on hunts with the King or gossiping with courtiers.

"Just the usual. They're still slowly conquering Essos from their so-called Valyria and claiming Westeros as theirs. Stannis is worried they'll be making an attempt on the Stepstones soon and we all know Dorne would welcome them with open arms if they did."

Jon nodded. Valyria...the city they'd founded. Restored. If he had to run with his son, if the Tyrells couldn't protect him...he'd go to Dorne and then from there onward to Valyria.

He hated knowing how smug Rhaegar would look when Jon showed up with a purple-eyed babe of his own.

"Thank you, uncle. I should...go check again."

"I'll go with you, Jon."

Renly's arm around his shoulder gave Jon strength, it was all he could do not to fold into his hold, but he managed to pull away. "No, thank you. I...Margaery doesn't like to be seen when she's not at her best."

The appeal to vanity was enough to convince Renly and Jon was stalking back in the direction he came, heart hammering in his chest.

Margaery was still meeting with her family, but their son had been placed in their rooms. He was a tiny thing, with a few strands of dark hair and those horrible eyes.

"What should we call you?" he muttered to the boy, who could only stare up towards him.

They'd been planning on Steffon for a boy, but Jon could hardly do that, now. Rickard, perhaps, would not be a claim to a family he did not have, but...but if the boy were to be a Targaryen king....

He could be like Jon, he supposed, with a name from both sides of the family. But even now that he knew it wasn't a mad lie, he still didn't like that idea for himself, let alone his son. He did not want another child to feel like he was feeling now, so torn over...everything.

"Rickard for now," he muttered, finally. "Or perhaps it should be Torrhen?"

Margaery's mirthless laugh let him know she had entered.

"We're to pretend like he's sickly, that no one can see him."

"It will give us an excuse not to return when we normally would have," Jon agreed, shoulders slumping at the thought of the Red Keep, of home.

"...Willas has a way to send word to King Rhaegar."

"You're always so careful not to call him 'King' at court. Was that just for show?"

"Jon. Have I ever done anything to make you think I'm disloyal to you?"

He looked up, eyes narrowing, searching her words for the Tyrell doublespeak she was so good at. "Have you suspected all along? That you were marrying a dragon, not a stag?"

She hesitated just long enough for him to have his answer, and she knew it. "You wouldn't believe me if I had told you. And what would you have done, if it were some other woman who gave birth to a Targaryen babe? If it was someone like Sansa or Myrcella?"

That, he knew, could have been a disaster.

"Was this just your grandmother's plan or was it Rhaegar's?"

Again, she hesitated, and he felt sick. As crown prince, he was used to people trying to use him, to manipulate him, but he had never suspected it would go this far.

"You are the mother of my child," he said, finally, "but do not think I will forgive you for this."

There were tears in her eyes to match the tears in his, but he could not care. His entire life had been a lie and it seemed like almost everyone around him had known.

Notes: I imagine this as Rhaegar surviving the Trident but it still being a brutal defeat for the Targs. He returns to the Red Keep and just basically ignores his father and takes the rest of his family to Dragonstone. Then after King's Landing falls they go on to Essos. Since he's an adult and a proven leader/warrior, and has like half of Westeros wanting him back as king, he gets much easier support than Viserys and Daenerys did.

Kinda like with the Blackfyre Rebellions there's wars and battles on and off throughout the kingdoms, but Robert doesn't have a firm enough hold to punish the loyalists the way he'd like. Meanwhile part of gaining enough power and leverage to take back his throne is Rhaegar re-founding Valyria and conquering parts of Essos from it, recreating the freehold, basically.

For the Baratheon stuff: the timeline was different, like when and in what order, and Jon wasn't conceived until maybe a month before Robert came to "free" Lyanna. So she basically had 'celebratory sex' with him in order to make sure if she had conceived with Rhaegar that no one could know and...it worked. Jon was "premature," but it was a really hard pregnancy on Lyanna and she almost dies, so no one really thinks anything of it. Jon has dark hair, so he's not as obviously not-Baratheon as Cersei's kids and also Robert tried to cut back on bastards (I imagine he mostly sleeps with professionals) for Lyanna's sake.

#character: jon snow #character: margaery tyrell #ship: margaery/jon #verse: survived the rebellion #character: renly baratheon #verse: jon baratheon #theme: parentage reveal #genre: angst #ship: renly & jon

[shelleysbysshe]

Questions from a new Romantic era fanatic: Why does everyone hate polidori and who the hell is keats?

Hello, dear anon, and welcome to the World of Romanticism! There is no turning back now. This post will be super long, so if you wanted short answers, I beg you to forgive me for that, but I wanted to write something consistent and detailed, with many links for further reading in case you (or anyone else) are interested. Just click on “keep reading” (if you’re on the web. I’m not sure if there is this option on the mobile app).

Well, people hate John Polidori because he was an asshole in Geneva. To give you a few examples of his ridiculous behaviours: during a sailing trip, he hit Byron’s knee with an oar — Byron turned his face away in pain. Polidori, instead of apologising, remarked that he was glad to see that Byron was capable of demonstrating emotions. Byron got so pissed he said that if Mary wasn’t on board, he would have thrown Polidori overboard. The situation, according to Thomas Moore, went like this: “Be so kind, Polidori, another time, to take more care, for you hurt me very much.” — “I am glad of it,” answered the other; “I am glad to see you can suffer pain.” In a calm suppressed tone, Lord Byron replied, “Let me advise you, Polidori, when you, another time, hurt any one, not to express your satisfaction. People don’t like to be told that those who give them pain are glad of it; and they cannot always command their anger. It was with some difficulty that I refrained from throwing you into the water; and, but for Mrs. Shelley’s presence, I should probably have done some such rash thing.“He also purposefully picked on Shelley. On Moore’s words, “Polidori had become jealous of the growing intimacy of his noble patron with Shelley”, and even wanted to duel him after he lost a sailing match. However, Shelley was a known pacifist. Byron, on the other hand, offered himself to duel Polidori, claiming that “though Shelley has some scruples about duelling, I have none and shall be at all times ready to take his place.” Anyway, here’s what the physician wrote about Shelley when they first met: “bashful, shy, consumptive; twenty-six; separated from his wife; keeps the two daughters of Godwin, who practise his theories;”There was also that one time when Polidori asked Byron “what is there you can do that I cannot?”. Byron’s answer was priceless: “I can swim across that river—I can snuff out that candle with a pistol-shot at the distance of twenty paces—and I have written a poem of which 14,000 copies were sold in one day.”

Judging by what I’ve read so far, I’d say the guy was such a pain in the ass, that Byron didn’t even trust him. On a letter to Hobhouse (June 23rd, 1816), he wrote: “that child and childish Dr. Pollydolly contrived to find it [a bottle of potash] broken, or to break it (…)”

Apparently he was a decent person only when he was around Mary, probably because he had a crush on her.

Anyway, Byron was no saint — I adore him (more than I should, probably), but I do know he was a complex person. However, Polidori was the worst, and Byron didn’t deserve that.

Polidori’s journal from 1816 is available online for free. If you wish to read it, you can find it here.Another useful link: Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 by Thomas Moore. Also, fun fact: his sister, Frances Polidori, married Gabriele Rossetti. Therefore, John Polidori was Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s and Christina Rossetti’s uncle (although he died before they were born).

And now to who the hell is John Keats Well, here we go…Born in 1795, John Keats was a working-class man — someone whose life was quite frustrating, and surrounded by death (he died at 25, but still outlived his parents, his grandma and his brother). He wanted to be a poet, and to be among the great English poets when he died. Therefore, he began writing around 1814 (if I am not mistaken), and his poems were filled with beautiful lines about nature, beauty, imagination and words about his muse, a young woman named Fanny Brawne.Most of his contemporaries, however, didn’t like his work — it is said that his poems sold barely 200 copies back in the day. Byron, for example, despised Keats as a poet — he used to criticize his poems, and once he even said Keats’ works were a sort of “mental masturbation”. He mentions Keats in Don Juan (Canto XI, stanza LX. He kinda mocks the myth surrounding his death*), as well as in his letters.Shelley, on the other hand, loved Keats, and wrote a massive elegy on his death, Adonaïs, which probably helped keeping Keats’ legacy alive. When Shelley drowned, his body was identified because he had a book of poems by Keats in his pocket. Ironically, Keats didn’t like Shelley that much.Unfortunately, Keats fate was not a fair one: he contracted tuberculosis, probably from his brother, who died of consumption in 1818. The symptoms got worse around 1820, so it was decided that he should retire to a warmer climate in order to survive. In November of the same year, he arrived in Italy. However, because Keats was medically trained, and had already seen people dying of tuberculosis, so he knew he was going to die soon. He knew exactly what was going on, and that moving to Rome wouldn’t work. He knew was doomed.The poor man died in Italy, of tuberculosis, at the age of 25, in 1821, believing he was a failure. He was the youngest of the English Romantics, and also the first one to die.Even though his life was quite bitter, he always did his best to see beauty in every thing that surrounded him — quoting his Endymion “a thing of beauty is a joy forever”; and quoting Keats himself (from a letter): “"If I should die,” said I to myself, “I have left no immortal work behind me - nothing to make my friends proud of my memory - but I have loved the principle of beauty in all things, and if I had had time I would have made myself remembered.“”.From the state his lungs were after his death (described by his friend Severn on a letter to Fanny: “the lungs were completely gone. The Doctors could not conceive by what means he had lived these two months.”), one can only imagine how much he agonized and suffered during his last days.He was buried at the protestant cemetery in Rome (same place as Shelley). On his tombstone, one can read “This grave contains all that was Mortal of a Young English Poet Who on his Death Bed, in the Bitterness of his Heart at the Malicious Power of his Enemies Desired these Words to be engraven on his Tomb Stone: Here lies One Whose Name was writ in Water. ”After his death, Fanny Brawne suffered a lot for about 8 years of her life.John Keats became quite successful a few years later, during the Victorian era, and his poems deeply influenced the pre-raphaelites, and even Tennyson. Nowadays, he is considered to be one of the greatest English poets, as he so ardently desired to be during his lifetime.If you wish to read his poems, I recommend Ode to a Nightingale, On Death, Ode on a Grecian Urn, When I Have Fears, La Belle Dame Sans Merci, Bright Star, Isabella or The Pot of Basil, and This Living Hand. You can read more about John Keats’ life here and here. You can read Keats’ letters here

*The Myth surrounding Keats’ death was that he died because of the stress generated by the harsh comments his poems received. Obviously, that was not the case…

And that’s it.

Thank you very much for asking! I hope you enjoyed my answers! If you, or anyone else has any other question about the romantics, you can ask me here.

#this was the longest ask i've ever answered #lord byron #percy shelley #john keats #john polidori #romanticism #a few typos here and there #I'm sorry? please ignore them

[alternislatronemhq]

Congrats, Beth, you have been accepted to AL for the role of Narcissa Malfoy (FC: Skylar Samuels). Ahhh, Beth, really well done! I think it’s really easy for Narcissa to be seen as this innocent flower who just got dragged along into the dark side by her husband, but you have totally shattered that trope. Your Narcissa is a complex woman who has a mind and heart of her own as well as the courage to follow that. She’s going to be in such an interesting place in this game, and I have full confidence that you’re going to portray that with justice! Please send in your blog (no sideblogs for first characters, please) in the next 24 hours and be sure to take a look at our new player checklist.Welcome home, we’re so excited to have you join the family!

OOC

name — Beth age — 24 pronouns — She/Her timezone — CST activity level — I currently have literally nothing time consuming going on irl until mid-August. I’m a teacher, so I’m on break until then. After that, I will be restricted, but I’ll have weekends and at least one or two nights a week to do rp replies. I’ll also often be online enough for plotting, even if I’m not actively writing replies that night.

IC Overview

name — Narcissa Malfoy faceclaim — Skylar Samuels, Margot Robbie Samara Weaving age — 30 (Birthday: December 14, 1955) gender — Cis female sexuality — Undefined and unconcerned. As far as most people need to be concerned, Narcissa is attracted purely to her husband. That said, she’s never put much focus on how she feels about other people outside her husband. She’s not opposed to the two of them seeking comfort with other people but she cannot imagine it happening completely outside their marriage. Communication is key to any power couple, in general and in the bedroom, especially if the bedroom isn’t theirs.

patronus —Runespoor. Narcissa couldn’t help chuckling when she saw those three heads. A snake, of course, which a family history in Slytherin should approve of, but also three. Narcissa is the third of three daughters. She watched her family decide they should bite off a head. Andromeda was gone before Narcissa cast her first patronus, although Narcissa would never admit it was a memory of the three of them together that led to her first corporeal form. On the personality end of things, it fits as well. Narcissa is certainly not quick to act, and she tends to spend a lot of time both imagining and criticizing what those choices might lead to. The duality inherent in her patronus feels accurate to the way her mind works (This was according to the Pottermore test, and honestly I agree with it so much.)

boggart — Narcissa’s boggart is Draco as a baby lying there with gasps and whimpers as he slowly turns blue and loses air. It’s not just about her son dying but rather seeing him fading as Narcissa stands unable to do anything to save him. She has never been able to banish a boggart at this stage. Eventually after her baby has “died,” the boggart shifts between people like Lucius and Bellatrix screaming at her that she’s a failure and a betrayal. She can’t banish the boggart at that point either. Narcissa’s biggest fear is in many ways her world crumbling around her with no way to stop in and blame pointed squarely at her for being unable to fix the situation. A good pureblood wife holds her family together. Narcissa is terrified she won’t be able to do the same.

IC In Depth

personality traits —

After a life time of learning to think about legacy above all else, Narcissa has become incredibly pragmatic. She looks at each situation for how to problem solve, rather than taking the time to consider her own emotions. Some might consider Narcissa repressed, but she would prefer to think of herself as quiet and complex. There is a lot going on under the surface, even to the point that she is an over-analyzer if she doesn’t immediately know how to act. She is not rash, nor does she let her emotions get the best of her often. She can be short-tempered when pushed, but Narcissa has spent years learning to hold back. Above all in public, she is polite, although she can come off as cold to people who don’t know her well. She would prefer that, though, to people knowing too much about her opinion. Narcissa firmly believes it is better for others to see her as distant and aloof if it means staying adaptive in a changing situation, as she has had to do socially.

character biography —

Narcissa Elladora Black was born the youngest of the Black sisters. She was the finishing touch in a trio of wonderful daughter, even if her parents would forever mourn their lack of sons. From her position as the youngest, Narcissa grew up even more spoiled than her two older sisters, but it was always clear to her what her duties were. Like her sisters, Narcissa knew it would be her job someday to marry well to a pureblood husband with a strong family name, and it would be her duty to uphold that family and produce heirs to continue her husband’s family line—a line which would naturally be hers then. The Black family are full of tradition and self-ties, but practicality was important above all else. While Narcissa did hope that within a few generations, her children could be tied back to that proud family name, she wasn’t silly enough to think that her family now would come above her husband.

She hadn’t expected that truth to be thrown in her face in such an ugly way as Andromeda took the first opportunity to muddy herself. Narcissa would never admit it later, but she did send a letter to Andromeda begging her to come back. A baby could be dealt with or left with the father. It wouldn’t make her the most desirable, but surely there would still be a pureblood husband for her to take on. Andromeda never responded. The whole experience was really the first time in her life that Narcissa had ever had fantastical version of the world shattered. Things weren’t perfect and couldn’t always be fixed. A strong family name could be sullied in an instance. Before Narcissa even had that husband’s legacy to protect, she was having to choose it over family.

When Lucius Malfoy began to court her, Narcissa was delighted. Here was a man who cared about appearances, both his own and his family’s. He was not the cold unfeeling man she’d been mentally preparing herself for. He was warm and delightful, and if Narcissa was willing to experience her wedding bed with him before she had a ring, well, that was nobody’s business but their own. Narcissa sparkled as a bride and shined as a new wife. She had only one issue. Narcissa seemed unable to carry children to term. After three miscarriages—Omega, nine weeks, Lysandra, twenty-six weeks, and Orane, thirteen weeks—Narcissa began to fear she would never carry a child to term. When she became pregnant a fourth time, Narcissa spent the better part of a year treating herself as delicately as possible and accepting weekly visits from a trusted healer. She couldn’t lose another baby. She wasn’t sure she could handle naming a fourth child that she never got to properly hold.

Then all Narcissa’s wishes upon magic were answered on June 5, 1980 with a beautiful baby, only four weeks early and there to fight. Despite her initial worries that their miracle would be snatched away, Draco thrived. They didn’t know he was Draco then, of course. They mistook their baby for a girl based on what information they had to go on then and named her accordingly. It was only a few years later when they understood what their five-year-old had to tell them that Lucius and Narcissa changed tactics. Narcissa and her child sat down together to talk through constellations and possible names associated with them. She’d been named for mythology—a concession her father had made on Daughter #3 to Rosier preferences—but Narcissa wanted her son to better fit what she considered the proudest part of his family history. Once Draco had decided upon his name, Lucius immediately announced him properly in The Prophet. The Malfoys never looked back, and they had no time for anyone who did.

Prior to that realization, Narcissa had lived with a certain level of constant dread. They had a beautiful, perfect child who would always be enough in Narcissa’s eyes, but she couldn’t help hearing her mother’s voice in her ear, grooming her from a young age to know that part of her duty as a pureblood wife was to carry on the Malfoy line. Could she and Lucius settle for one perfect child if that child would one day lost the family name? Her parents had stopped, but that had been after three children and with other male Blacks to potentially pass on the family name, which Orion eventually did. Especially in a time where family name and heritage meant everything, Narcissa wasn’t sure she could justify stopping without a proper heir. Then again, she never wanted her baby to feel like not enough. Her own parents had never explicitly guilted the three girls, but it was a known fact of life. Narcissa didn’t want that for her baby. Once Draco’s voice could be heard, it shocked her not because it meant the hard decisions were made—although that certainly helped—but rather because Draco was once again perfect, as he always was. Narcissa would have loved him and supported his choice in any situation, but as it was, she only added another reason her child was the greatest blessing she could have received.

But motherhood was not all Narcissa’s life focused on. Lucius had been recruited in many ways to join the Dark Lord’s ranks, and it was a great honor. Narcissa would have preferred neutrality as a self-preservation mechanism, but she did believe in those ideals and could appreciate what the Dark Lord was trying to do. She herself never joined, but she did support Lucius’ choice and often acted according to the Dark Lord’s whims. When he fell, it was a great shock to her system, but Narcissa couldn’t take the time to figure out how to feel about his loss. She had to keep her husband out of prison and their family reputation high. They were no longer servants to anyone but each other, and Narcissa scrambled to fix their situation.

It took a few years before she felt trusted. That time was full of swallowing her thoughts and smiling nicely, but the same had been true among the Death Eaters. She was simply swallowing a different kind of thought. The Malfoy family had always held power, and the same could be said of the Black family. Bellatrix and her husband had fallen from grace, but Narcissa needed to do as she’d always been taught and put Lucius’ family name above her own family blood. If that meant reaching out to a sister who she’d long above mentally severed, fine. Narcissa would do it. She and Andromeda would never truly be what they’d been, and Narcissa couldn’t look at her niece without mourning her bloodline and lack of title. Still, they were rebuilding. Slowly change for the better had happened.

Now Narcissa doesn’t know what to do. The Dark Lord’s return threatens all of the work she’s been doing. She still believes in purity and the ideas he’d promised, but she still doesn’t like the methods he’d stood for. She likes her husband free and isn’t sure a return to the Death Eaters’ full power will allow that.

plot ideas — Perhaps Narcissa (and occasionally Lucius) host regular tea events, maybe once a month. After Voldemort’s downfall, they started curating a little more charity into their guest lists. Now with rumors of his return, it’s a careful balance of the traditional gust list one month and their pity invites the next.

extra —

Headcanon: Narcissa cannot go to sleep without signing Draco a lullaby. Her night feels incomplete. On nights when Lucius puts him to bed, she sneaks in after to sing for his dreams. Now that he’s getting older, she’s terrified for the day he decides he’s too old for her to sing.

Headcanon: Narcissa doesn’t technically have a job, but her proficiency in charms, herbology, and potions could have made her a healer. While she knows only the basics of that profession, she does keep a lush garden and greenhouse. She also enjoys potion making and often makes at home things that other purebloods might buy. She would never lower herself as to sell them because her station is so much above something so ordinary, but that doesn’t mean she won’t give them to friends or occasionally use her own potions as a bartering chip.

Headcanon: Narcissa has always felt quite at home on a broom. In some ways, she was relieved the first time she played Quidditch and hated it because it didn’t fit the image she was trying to curate. Flying, though, is something she could never give up for image.

Pinterest board: https://www.pinterest.com/myrpboards/narcissa-malfoy/

#al:accepted #narcissa malfoy

[media-burns-deponia]

oc dump

you know what I haven’t done in a while, talk about my little pack of Elysians. So let’s get some facts out there.

first I’m gonna mention a lot of stuff with Chase because he’s the most fun to think about. So let’s start with the fact his family is full of shitbags. He’s the fourth and youngest sibling in his family who run a medical production company. One of his siblings being Kurt who you may have seen from my elysian rp blog. And when I say his family is full of shitbags, I mean everyone but him is just awful in some way. From greedy to possessive to ruthless they are just all terrible. But Chase came out a pretty good guy, perhaps that life threatening tumor he was born with and quickly got removed actually saved him. While his family likes to be greedy Chase prefers to spend most of his money throwing parties for his friends. He is also only half siblings with all his brothers as his mother isn’t able to have her own children thus his father had plenty of mistresses. In fact his biological mother is also Marinette’s mother, that woman never seems to just stick around for the kids though.

He is also a lovestruck idiot to Luna and will spend every possible second he can to tell others just how amazing his girlfriend is. He also does really want to marry her but if he did then his family would instantly disown him and though he’s perfectly fine with that he would prefer to still be part of the family to get the money for those parties. One day though, he will say screw it all, secretly take a big chunk of money right from under their nose, and throw the greatest wedding he can.

And just saying those parties he throws is usually just him buying out a cafe or small restaurant for the night so the group can do as they please without disturbing others, i.e. dancing on the tables, singing at the top of their lungs, just letting all these 20 somethings act like stupid teenagers again. 

Now onto someone else, since we mentioned her how about Marinette. She’s half sisters with Aurora, only connected through their father. She’s also really terrible at love as she has now been through 3 divorces, she just rushes into stuff too fast and the guy breaks things off. She also has a massive phobia of reptiles and amphibians, she’ll scream bloody murder if tiny little Kingsley gets out of his cage, oh just imagining her seeing poisonous is also very fun. 

Let’s also bring up her father then shall we. Sebastian has been through two marriges, one ending in divorce, the other ending in his wife dying after child birth, so he kind of just gave up finding love after that. Speaking of his wife Lenore before coming to Elysium, because of the worsening conditions on Deponia she developed a heart condition that made it very weak. But she could still live with it fine. Then came the pregnancy though and even though she knew the risks of it she wanted to have her child anyway. At least she went out peacefully as she got to see her daughter Aurora’s cute little face just once. Because Sebastian also knew the risk though he blames himself a bit for the loss because he didn’t push hard enough to try and protect his wife. The guilt has sent him in a slow downward spiral where now basically every waking hour he spends working and he looks like he hasn’t seen the sun in three years or been to sleep in a month. Aurora is making him better though.

Let’s also bring up how Aurora and Octavius met, shortly after being adopted Octi’s parents needed a babysitter for the little guy as they wouldn’t be able to watch him all the time. They were at first planning to just get a nanny bot but then saw the next door neighbor children having fun with their nanny clone. One of Lenore’s wishes before her death was that the girls would have something alive watching over them when she or Sebastian couldn’t, she didn’t want a cold robot to babysit them. Thus after Aurora was born Sebastian ordered a custom clone to be their nanny. Seeing the kids and clone, Octi’s parents soon had the brilliant idea and went over to their neighbor to ask if his clone could also watch over Octavius. It seemed perfect, since it’s next door it’s still basically at home, and Octi would grow up with two guaranteed friends. Thus started the wonderful friendship between the three. The three also now have a somewhat matching pajama set where the basic design is the same between all three, but the specific picture used in the designs are different. Octi’s is covered in stars, Aurora’s is covered in little suns, and Marinette’s is covered in moons

ok I think I got most of that out of my system, time to shut up now and return to the void.

#Deponia #deponia ocs #elysians #media won't shut up #man did that end up being a lot #i just have a lot to say about all my characters #and im still not even done #but it is enough for now

[roselinewynters]

⌜   CIS FEMALE, SHE / HER   |   paradise by coldplay, gryffindor, infp   ⌟    ⏤   meet ROSELINE IDUNA WYNTERS ; a TWENTY TWO year old who kind of resembles JOSEFINE FRIDA PETTERSEN, don’t you think? she originally hailed from ARENDELLE where she lived with her mother, QUEEN ELSA (   FROZEN   ), but word is that she’s been continuing to explore the world and enjoying every minute of it this past year. she’s always been pretty OUTSPOKEN & HARDWORKING, but has gotten way more CONTRARIAN & HOT TEMPERED since she woke up. maybe her powers of ICE & WATER MANIPULATION can help in taking down the dome. you can check out her stat page HERE & her pinterest board HERE.

i’m running because i can, because i MUST,            because i want to see how far i can go before i have to stop.

part one of two : the backstory.    (   trigger warnings for talk of fire and death.   )

born august 24th, 1996 to queen elsa and her husband, oskar christensen. the second of two children, the eldest, christian wynters, being ten years her senior.

she was never much like her mother, much to elsa’s chagrin. she could dress her young daughter in flowing blue dresses and braid her platinum hair back like her own, but rose was always interested in what was beyond the castle walls.

she spent all of her early childhood outside. elsa sometimes remarks that it was her formative years spent deep in the forest that made that itch to be free so strong, even when she couldn’t AFFORD it. 

high on her fathers shoulders, right at christian’s heels - she would return to the castle covered head to toe in mud, her smile something savage. sometimes, she would come back with nothing more to show for the adventure the three of them had been on than a handful of acorns and twigs caught in her hair. other times, she would have a tiny rabbit in her pocket, or a frog clutched between both hands. she always wanted to show her mother, even when her mother’s nose would undoubtedly turn up.

she doesn’t remember these days much, anymore, but she does recall that they were HAPPY. no matter how weary elsa was of both her children preferring the great beyond than their lessons at home, she would settle into the crook of oskar’s arm in the evening while christian played with little rose on the carpet, the four of them a happy family.

then christian grew up. he grew DISILLUSIONED. he was sixteen years old and attending more lessons everyday, preparing the crown prince for the life that he would be living, soon, as king of arendelle. and he rebelled. the excursions with his father and his little sister weren’t enough. he LEFT in the dead of night, he came home in the middle of the day. he made friends with all of the wrong people, and he was punished for his misdeeds, of which there were MANY - but he didn’t stop. it got worse. he brought his friends home with them, and the maids had to shoo them out the back door early in the morning before elsa would see, lest she lose her temper. she would leave on diplomatic missions and come home to find the portrait room trashed, a party broken out while she and oskar were away. and they’d try to reason with him, they would try to discipline him, but he was only trying to have fun - at least, that was how it started. 

and then, it happened. he was seventeen years old when the fire broke out ; no one knows how. later, a few of his “friends” would be sentenced for reckless endangerment, and one for manslaughter. rose doesn’t recall the details, though she’s told how lucky she was, how quickly her father ran into the flames to pull her from her bedroom, at the very end of the hall of the wing that caught fire. she’s told how lucky they ALL were, really, that a part of the castle burned. but she doesn’t remember the night for the fear that gripped her in the moment she awoke - she was just a kid. she remembers it for the aftermath. for her father dying, hours later, from smoke inhalation. for her brothers friends on the stand. for christian, his reputation already on a fine line amongst the people of arendelle, being DISOWNED. 

he left before he had even attended oskar’s funeral. she never said goodbye.

for her part, elsa never spoke of it. she hadn’t been at home, at the time ; away on a trip to the fitzherberts, politics coming before home. she had never known what was going to happen, of course, but she felt a responsibility upon her shoulders for it. 

and rose was crown princess, over night. new lessons replaced the old. new rules were put in place. she was to conduct herself like a young princess should, and that meant with grace and humility. you can imagine, then, how both of them felt when the other did something they didn’t approve of ; that didn’t fit with their ideas for ROSE’S life. she would return from gathering ants for her farm and be more severely reprimanded than ever before - her father had always been a buffer, and with him gone, there was no one. elsa would command something, anything, and she would do what she could to get away from it. she had gotten used to freedom that she couldn’t keep, without christian there.

the first time she ran away, it was in the heat of an argument. commanded to stay in her room, rose had slipped from her window before she had even thought of the consequences, saddling up her horse and riding out the front gates before her mother could even alert the guards. she got as far as three towns over when they dragged her back.

the second time, she had three weeks of freedom before they found her. and every time after, she got LONGER. much like when she was a child, rose found that the world outside of the castle walls was infinitely more interesting than the one inside of them. she met people that she found entrancing. she saw things that she could never have dreamed up. she would return, surrounded by guards, her pockets overflowing with trinkets from wherever it was that she had been. and no matter how hard she tried, elsa couldn’t stop her. and she really wished she could. the older rose got, the more that she reminded her of oskar. the more she felt she was going down the same path as CHRISTIAN. and nothing could have scared her more than that. 

the final straw was rose attempting to leave on a boat. the guards found her in the nick of time, and it was the only time that she had ever come back in tears, kicking and screaming that she didn’t want to be there anymore. when she asked where she was going, rose told her that she was going to find christian. the next morning, elsa shipped her to walt disney academy - the most prestigious boarding school in the world, and the one place she hadn’t tried. they promised they could sort her daughter out, and she liked to see them try ; but at walt disney, rose had more freedom than ever.

she found friends. she found happiness. she used her power, and instead of eyes on her, worried of what might become of the young princess - people were in awe. rose could explore on her holidays, spend weekends away, but with no one actively searching for her during those times, she didn’t struggle to come back. in a way, her being difficult had always been out of SPITE - out of feeling like her mother wanted to control her, and actively rebelling against the thought.

and she met carter. her best friend. her soulmate, if you believe in such things. she watched him date all the wrong people while wishing that he would notice her, yet in spite of her feelings, she was there for him all the same. leaving him came to hurt the most. they had just one moment, one maybe, and then - he was gone.

part two of two : what u missed on glee.

over time, distance made the heart grow stronger. rose leaving the school was often a sore point for her mother, but with time, she came to see that she couldn’t stop her, and the angry calls ended. they talked about things, like adults. aired their feelings. tried to understand one another better. and rose forgave her mother for all of her shortcomings, while elsa came to see that she had perhaps been parenting too fearfully, after all that had happened in the past. rose was not christian. she was oskar, through and through. when her youngest wanted to drop out of school, though it was not what she wanted for her, elsa allowed it on the condition that when she had her fill, when she thought she had seen all the world had to offer her, she would come home. rose couldn’t have asked for a better setup.

her first stop? the great forrest, where finally, she and carter admitted their feelings for one another and decided to leave ; the adventure being beyond each of their small worlds, all along. she showed him all her favorite places, and they discovered new ones, together. they were happy and in love, and it was nice for the world to see - however much the people of arendelle approved of their crown princesses life, they couldn’t be mad when they got to see such loved up photos of her with the future king of the great forrest.

when they got engaged in front of notre dame ( pre fire ), those strange fans of real life royals went wild. they were going to have a HUGE wedding, and everyone would attend ; except that had never really been them. they knew eventually they would stop traveling, and shirking their responsibilities. they knew that someday soon, they’d get word that their parents had put together everything for their big white wedding. so they got ahead of the game, at least so that they could do it THEIR way first, and married in vegas. they were about to get frisky on their honeymoon when this happened.

#wda: intro #*・° ❆ － ❛ sᴏᴍᴇ ᴘᴇᴏᴘʟᴇ ᴀʀᴇ ʙᴏʀɴ ғʟɪɢʜᴛ ʀɪsᴋs — roseline wynters. #i rlly just .... removed w/e angst she had #she was such an annoying char prior to my first revamp #n now she's BETTER .

[hitchell-mope]

Ok I’ve been working on something for years that I hope to make it into a tv show one day but probably can’t because once upon a time beat me to it

So imagine

Michael darling single handedly stopped a war that was never meant to end at the cost of his life and to correct “something” the universe sees fit to tear open a hole in the fabric of reality which all cartoons bleed through. Disney Pixar Simpson’s marvel dc blue sky laika everything you can think of are now inhabiting the real world the only humans left are Wendy darling and her close family and friends

Disney’s taken over Great Britain and Ireland. Mickey and Minnie are the king and queen until they see fit to retire

Simpson’s are now in Hollywood Bart is filthy stinking rich and the Whitehouse is his mansion

So on and so forth

Main characters

Jane Ophelia Emerson: now known as Jaime aster blonde hair blue eyes around 5 foot 8 inches. Has magic like the whole of her mothers side of the family. Unlocks it when she meets Peter Pan for the first time. Like her mother and grandmother before her she fell for him hard. So imagine the bitterness when she discovers she wasn’t the first to fall for him and she won’t be the last seeing as he’s fated to be her son in law. She stops her and her friends physical aging process when she’s 16 because she’s terrified of growing up and having to leave everything behind. Gets married to three guys. James pleiades Hawkins from treasure planet. An evil bisexualversion of superman she was forced to create out of two variations of kryptonite (black and pink). William smees illegitimate son that he got from a hooker on the neverland pier. Padraic hutchins. And together they’ve adopted three kids not much younger then them. Youngest to oldest. Timothy Tiberius Turner. Horrid Henry. Alice Liddell. Preferred drink is olive oil until she decides to stop aging then she goes all out on the booze. She really does not like using mjolnir but that’s exactly why she can use it. She killed her own cousin after Peter Pan was taken advantage of. Speaks how she was raised. Posh. But the angrier she gets the more common she sounds.

James pleiades Hawkins: nicknamed Plei shoulder length brown hair turquoise eyes five foot nine. Space cadet. Made a little mistake in that he wished he had magic when holding an empty lamp. This means he’s now a genie but he can appear normal except when angered and he turns an olive green. His lamp stays hidden in Jaime’s blood stream. Very protective of his kids. From montressor but speaks with a middling California accent

Kal: under duress Jaime creates him by combining black and pink kryptonite (according to what I’ve read black turns him evil and somehow pink turns him gay I don’t know why so please don’t ask) so imagine a five foot eleven inch evil bisexual superman built like a tank flirting with anyone he sees. There are limits. He cannot go after anyone younger then Jaime or older then Wendy. Or anyone she is directly related to. Has a side thing going with she hulk (cause of that man of steel woman of Kleenex problem). Looks so much like Clark Kent (blue eyes jet black hair) that once the bitterness has subsided they eventually declare themselves twins. Actually talks with a Kansas accent (it’s a pet peeve of mine) hair goes to his shoulder blades

Padraic Hutchins: five foot ten. Mixed race but unless he showed you a picture of his father (mr smee who is like really white) you wouldn’t be able to tell. Dark black skin (think terry crews) dark blonde waist length hair. Emerald green eyes. Met Jaime when he was working as cabin boy (and hooks personal stool master) on the Jolly Roger. Jaime offered him a deal. Sword fight just him and her. She wins he becomes her butler and all that entails. He wins she becomes his butler and all that entails. It comes to a stalemate. He decides to go with her though. (If you had to wipe hooks ass wouldn’t you leave given a chance) invents a new method of killing when getting revenge on a racist homophobic cop in Springfield. He may look like terry crews but speaks like Katie McGrath (his accent is Dublin posh)

Merida: jaimes best friend. Scottish. Really really curly bright orange hair halfway down her back. Grey blue eyes. 5”8. Harsh rivalry with Clarabelle cow Clarabelle keeps calling her fat by accident. She is not fat. The slightly barrel like figure she has is pure muscle. Moved in with Jaime after an absolutely blow out fight with her mother and hasn’t looked back since. Met Parker through tragedy. The were on an excursion with the parr children and dash died in front of her. Completely destroyed her for months. Tried to change everything about herself to feel better. None of it worked. Cut and straightened her hair. Tried to lose weight (just became addicted to caffeine). She even gave up archery (which if you know her is a serious cause for concern). And through it all Parker was there

Peter Benjamin Parker: the group calls him Parker because there are one too many Peters in the world and they needed to differentiate. Brown hair that grows out to his chin. Brown eyes. 5”9. Splits himself so he can have a somewhat normal life. There is now three of him. The original with Merida. Petey living with aunt may. Spider-Man. Parker actually grows to like the venom suit and through magic is actually able to control it. Realised he was bi when he kissed Padraic to cheer him up after Kal was being a jackass. Then harry arrived. Still has his native New York accent but it interchanges with a British accent after he’s lived in Kensington for some time.

Melody: Danish princess. Daughter of Ariel and Eric. Granddaughter of king triton. Black hair blue eyes. 5”8. Has a thing for blonde men. Was attracted to Cody before he told her he was asexual then she layed off him. Eventually gets with zephyr. Non practicing catholic except in one respect. Jaime gave her her own trident. Loves to swim. She’ll shrink herself down and use a wine glass if she has to. Always wears her hair in a ponytail

Zephyr: French Romani. Blonde shoulder length hair in a pageboy style cut. Green blue eyes. 5”9. Always wears the outfit he had on in his film only now it’s in an older more mature style. Smitten with melody when they met but she had a thing for Cody so he couldn’t say anything. He just got steadily more drunk. Scarily flexible. Likes to hang from chandeliers with his toes. Bit like a blonde Dick Grayson. Non practicing catholic in the same way melody is.

Cody Anderson: Swedish but has spent a lot of time in Australia. 5”11. Blonde hair long enough to braid. Keeps it in a man bun 90% of the time. Asexual. Much rather run climb or play video games then date or sleep with someone. Poor thing has been conscripted as Kals wingman. He absolutely hates it. He just tells the intended targets the truth and if Kal can’t seal the deal on his own merits it’s not Cody’s problem. Apparently can survive on one hour sleep.

Alice Liddell: one of Jaime Plei Kal and Padraics adoptive children. 12 years old. 5”5. Reality warper. Mostly this means she can make a portal to wonderland through any surface. But then she gets magic and all bets are off. Adopted because we birth parents were about to have her committed to an asylum because she kept insisting wonderland is real (it is of course but they have literal Victorian sensibilities and to them Alice has cracked) favourite Dad is Plei. Blonde hair half way down her back. Blue eyes. Actually does look like Jaime a little bit except Jaime’s hair is more of a tawny gold colour and Alice’s is more yellow. Like Jaime defies the dumb blonde stereotype. Uses her powers in very creative ways. Eventually ditches the pinafore

“Horrid” henry: except not really. His biological parents are just jackasses who scapegoat him so the worm is the professed golden child. Reddish brown hair and definitely fulfils the firey redhead stereotype. But manages to use it in helpful ways after Henry’s his own magic. Loves his chemistry set. Many a stink bomb was made from it. 5”4. 11 years old. Green eyes. Favourite Dad is Kal. Again like Zephyr, he always wears the same outfit. Adopted because Jaime could see that he was miserable at his own house and was always happiest when she was babysitting him.

Timothy Tiberius Turner: brown hair blue eyes pink hat. Still has his fairy godparents because Jorgen Von strangle is terrified of Jaime (the girl unionised death). Not stupid per-say but he doesn’t think things through. Favourite Dad is Padraic. Adopted after Jaime went to talk to his fairies and saw his babysitter strapping him to a torture wheel. Definitely the baby of the group being 10 years old

Harry Osborn: 5”9. Black hair blue eyes. Bi. Enters a relationship with Parker and Merida. Hung up on Parker for longer then he’d care to admit. But always believed (as Parker did) that he was straight. Strikes up an odd friendship with Jaime over the “Peters who have ruined their lives” (Parker and Pan) the only difference Osborn is now with his Peter and Jaime doesn’t love her one anymore. He revels in the fact Parker feels the need to protect him and their respective positions in the relationship have changed. Was dying before he used magic to cure the unknown disease that would ravage his body. Couldn’t use his fortune to find a cure because his fathers will stipulates that he’d be disinherited if he tried to cure himself. That and he wanted to defend himself properly should the need arise

Ashton Darling: Jaime’s cousin born in the same hospital month day and the exact same time. Shoulder length tawny gold hair blue eyes same height as Jaime. It’s a running gag that he and Jaime look so much alike they could easily be the same person cloned and don’t think that before puberty when her hair was shorter they didn’t pull pull a twin switch. They even have the same taste in men. Fictional with bright eyes. Expected a bigger reaction from Jaime when he came out to her. She knew and they carried on as normal. Eventually starts dating Jack Frost from rise of the guardians. His parents are fans of that 70’s show. His younger brother is called Topher

Jack Frost: pure white hair blue eyes. 5”9. Always in the same outfit. Guardian of fun. Has a sibling like rivalry with Elsa. She thinks he’s annoying and he thinks she’s boring despite them having the same powers. In Jack Elsa sees what she could have had. Yes Jack was lonely but he made the best of it for centuries and he had people to talk to (North toothania bunnymund and Sandy) whereas Elsa retreated into herself scared of going near others. Though they come to an understanding and when Jaime gives the shovel talk to Jack Elsa gives the shovel talk to Ashton. Ashton and Jack met in similar circumstances to Merida and Parker except the Ashton and Jack’s weren’t nearly as tragic as Merida and Parker

Taran: 13 years old. 5”6. Red hair green eyes. Dalbens ward but somehow ends up staying at Jaime’s (admittedly insanely cavernous) flat more then necessary and everyone knows why except him. Alice has taken a shine to him. He doesn’t quite know why. Gurgis still attached to his hip. He and Eilonwy drifted apart but they are still friends. Has next to no idea what’s going on more than half the time

Felicia Hardy: old friend of Harry and Parker. The friend that would not leave. Her father died and she still is not over it. Cinnamon colour hair hazel eyes. 5”8. Hapless. That is until the symbiote infects her and almost starts a war with the galactic federation.

Johnny Storm: like Parker the group just call him storm. 5”9. Mid length spiky blonde hair. Blue eyes. The human torch. Enters the group by happenstance. Works at Oscorp on an intern. When Parker took the fall for what Felicia was blamed for harry had a bit of a panic attack demanding that he and Parker weren’t separated again so to assuage him Parker takes him on a holiday in a private suite in the death hotel. But then Storm arrives with this contract he needs harry to sign and it escalates from there so now Merida has three boyfriends who are also dating each other one of which is in intergalactic jail.

There are a multitude of alternate realities that are accessed through a full length mirror in Jaime’s flat. Some have diffoerent circumstances or flipped morality/genders or different outcomes. For example

Different circumstances: Clark crashed into the Wayne’s greenhouses and the shock set off Martha’s labour. Clark married a one Diana prince and had two children. Oliver Kingston Wayne and Barry Allen Wayne. Bruce is the drink uncle who accidentally joined a big brother program and Clark is making damned sure Bruce is honouringthe commitment. Oliver dances at a club to be self sufficient. Barry meanwhile is obsessed with chemistry. Clark stayed home with a sick Alfred that fateful night and has never forgiven himself. So he became superman to make sure something like that never happens to anyone else. Bruce however became a preteen alcoholic. Chardonnay is his drink of choice. Their pool cleaner a mr Arthur curry and their chauffeur is a mr Hal Jordan

Different outcome: Professor farnsworth took over New New York with an army of bending units aided by his insane son Phillip. Leela is Phillips personal slave. An impoverished Amy Wong is his public slave (Leela is a sewer mutant). Carol Walt Larry and Igner are incarcerated for trying to throw a coup

Flipped morality: Snow White, jealous of her fathers affection for his new wife, killed her father and blamed grimhilde for it. She learned dark magic and killed the queen in a mirror storm then took over the kingdom with only seven diamond armoured dwarfs. All when she was fourteen.

Flipped gender: Cendrillon used as servant in his own home until he’s able to go to the ball aided by his fairy godfather. The princess saved him with a glass slipper

You get the idea

The characters relation ships with their parents:

Jaime and Wendy had a major falling out because Wendy kept trying to put her solutions in alignment with Jaime’s problems. Eventually Jaime moved next door into a flat in Mickey and Minnie’s castle. And now Jaime’s the queen. Wendy is 5”10 tawny gold hair almost always in a bun. Blue eyes and always dressed in blue. Mid to late forties. Edward Emerson. Think Henry cavil in prime superman mode greying at the temples in either army fatigues or black denim. One year older than Wendy. Besides George he is the only mortal in the family and being mortal he can use a magic wand (no one quite knows why only mortals can use wands)

Plei’s mother Sarah looks the same as in the film. Now you need to go through trauma for your magic to settle. And Plei’s trauma is seeing his father Leland a gain in god know how long. It does not go well

Kal have a rivalry with Clark because Kal sees Clark as a wimp who is wasting his powers on helping people and Clark thinks Kal is a no good miscreant. Their parents though treat Kal the same way they treat Clark. Doesn’t matter if he’s a close W he’s their son. In return Kal values them and does not hate them like he hates Kal (high praise in deed)

Smee just wants Padraic to be happy and if that means Padraic being in England in an entirely different dimension then so be it.

Elinor got impatient with Merida taking so long to choose a suitor and then Merida decided to try and find a boyfriend from non options (read as she doesn’t love the clans sons). So they had a hard he blow out fight which led to Merida moving in with Jaime and she’s barely looked back since

May doesn’t know Parker is no longer st school and he is not planning on telling her. And besides she’s got Benji

Ariel and Eric know everything and as long as melody isn’t hurt they’re fine with it

Phoebus and Esmeralda are just like Ariel and Eric

Cody’s mother isn’t in the picture anymore

Alice’s parents tried to have her committed so their relationship is next to nonexistent

Henry’s is his parents scapegoat so his brother retains a veneer of so called “perfection”

Timmy’s parents are negligent and let him be babysat by a psychopath who repeatedly tries to kill him. His fairy god parents are crazy but at least they care

Norman put a stipulation in his will that if harry seeks a cure then he will be disinherited. So try to gage their relationship from that

John darling came out as bi and his wife couldn’t handle it so she divorced him and took Ashton and Topher to New York. John remarries Casey mulligan. Casey is actually Jamie’s ex husband (don’t get worried it was some stupid new law that all marriages in England are legal. Including playground marriages. Jaime and Casey’s happenedwhen she was five and he was nine). So they got a quickie divorce. And as it turns out Casey has a son from his ex girlfriend. Casey junior (get it?). So now John is a 42 year old divorcee remarried to a twenty year old with a 10 month old step son and two teenage children. Annalise got remarried to Ashton’s high school crush, his Australian swim coach

Jack’s family died a couple centuries ago so what accounts for his family are the guardians a boy who remembers him less and less every year. Elsa who sees him as who she could have been and Anna who just wants everybody to get along. Then there’s kristoff who just wants peace

Taran still goes to see Dalben henwen fflewder and eilonwy when he can

Felicia’s last words to her father were “piss off” so she desperate to make amends with his ghost

Well you know about the fantastic four.

Jaime has become a children’s advocate. Simple stuff like babysitting and making sure the recess gang isn’t split up. But she isn’t up to date on slang so when a mourning 13 year old Angelica pickles drunk dials her, Jaime has no idea what’s the girls saying. And she takes it upon herself to punish the “evil children” ie DW Reed, 3 year old Angelica Pickles, manny heffley, Francine nebulon the children the make their older siblings lives a living hell.

Simpson’s:

Jaime aged up the child population of Springfield by ten years. Barts twenty Lisa’s eighteen Maggies twelve and so on. She also given them special powers. Bart has super speed Lisa HAD telekinesis (she abused it so she losed it. Painful rhyme I know) Maggie has electrokinesis milhouse can ghost through objects Nelson can put national monuments on his pinky nail. Ralph can bend reality to his will. Sherri can teleport Terri can fly. That sort of thing. Though some have non active powers. Moe can not die no matter how hard he tries. Homer and barney have regenerative livers (so they can be sozzled all the time) Bart has inherited Montys fortune and company

#mine #copyright me

[betweensceneswriter]

Second Wife-Chapter 16: Comfort

Second Wife Table of Contents

Second Wife on AO3

Previously -  Chapter 15 : By the Ballocks Jenny’s always been good at putting Jamie in his place.

“Jesus!” [Jamie] said, unable to stop himself. “Ye’re lucky ye kept yer maidenhead!” An ugly flush washed darkly over her from stays to cap, and his jaws dropped. “Laoghaire MacKenzie! Ye werena such a wanton fool to let him take ye virgin to his bed!?”

"I didna ken he was marrit!” she cried, stamping her foot. “And it was after ye wed the Sassenach. I went to him for comfort.”

"Oh, and he gave it ye, I’m sure!”

"Hush your gob!” she shrieked, and picking up a stone watering pot from the bench by the shed, hurled it at his head (An Echo in the Bone, 676).

     The house smelled of meat and sweets, and every corner was filled with joyful noise.  Jamie still couldn’t keep all the little people straight, especially as Angus and Anthony, Matthew and Henry insisted on not staying in one place and constantly showing up in different configurations, but he was getting better. 

     Young Jamie’s wife was Joan, and they had handsome dark-haired Matthew and Henry, as well as baby Caroline.  Caroline was just a wee thing, whom little Joanie had latched onto, especially adoring the baby because Joan shared names with her ma.

     Maggie was married to a tall, quiet man named Paul Lyle.  They had two active boys named Angus and Anthony.  Four-year-old Angus had lost his two front teeth in a headlong jump into a table, and Jamie felt a twinge of remembrance, thinking of his own toothless friend of the same name—fellow cattle thief, ruffian, and rescuer, whom he’d lost in the Rising.

     Then there was Kitty—Katherine Mary—who was said to have a young man, and might soon be engaged.  The younger ones were the twins, Janet and Michael, and the youngest was Ian, who had been just a babe when Jamie left.

     Fortunately, it didn’t require the knowledge of names to play the silly games the little boys begged for.  “Nunka Jamie” quickly gained popularity as a great red-haired lion who would hunt the boys through the forest of furniture, a copper-maned pony who gave galloping rides about the house, and a terrifying Goliath, who did an impressive performance of falling to the ground when the boys, each playing David in turn, had flung their only-slightly-smelly stockings at his head.

     He finally collapsed, panting onto the couch, only to be attacked by the foursome, who demanded that Nunka Jamie tell them stories.

     Jenny smiled at the sight, and pointed the little band out to Laoghaire.  “The boys love their Papa, but Ian canna play wi’ them in the same way,” Jenny said.  “Can ye imagine—Marsali and Joanie having wee ones some day?  Jamie will be a wonderful grand-da.”

     Laoghaire smiled at the thought.  It was good to see Jamie here at Lallybroch.  Somehow he seemed more settled and comfortable.

      They had all gathered around the huge table in the dining hall for dinner: Ian and Jenny, James and Joan, Maggie and Paul, Jamie and Laoghaire, then Kitty, Janet, Michael, Ian, Marsali and Joanie. There were too many people to seat the entire family, so the four youngest boys had been fed first, and spent dinner time running wildly around in the great room, making their mothers start in terror every time there was a crash, and only relax when the loud sound wasn’t followed by devastated wailing.

     Jamie looked at his sister and Ian, sitting next to each other.  Their eyes sent each other messages without words. He knew marriage was not perfect, but he could easily see the depth of love and mutual understanding they had for each other.  And Jenny had spoken sense to him.  How could he judge ‘til death do us part’ from four months of marriage?

     Flanked by her daughters, Laoghaire looked happy, which made Jamie breathe easier.  Marsali’s hair had dried in golden ringlets.  Wee Janet sat next to her and the girls were giggling and whispering—apparently having become even better chums through the experience.  The boys had mucked out the stalls for their part in the foolishness, and had been thoroughly chastened by their da and uncle about their responsibility to treat young ladies honorably, beginning with their own sisters and cousins.

     But truly, no harm had been done.  For much of the afternoon the girls helped cook in the kitchen.  Joanie, slightly disappointed to not be able to swim, had satisfied herself with playing school with the wee boys, who made wonderful misbehaving students; Joanie was able to make them stand in a corner to her hearts’ content. 

     Wasn’t this what life was about? Jamie thought.  Family, and work, and food.  It was easy to feel satisfied with such abundance to table, though Jamie did consider, looking down at his belly, whether he should perhaps eat less pie.

     After dinner, after Nunka Jamie had worn out the young boys with playing (or perhaps it was the other way around), the family gathered in the hall to give Marsali her gifts.  Gifts for birthdays tended to be simple.  Young Jamie’s Joan gave Marsali some soft wool she had spun and dyed herself.  Ian and Janet gave her a worn novel that had already seen several owners and many years of use.  Laoghaire had sewn and embroidered her a new shift.  Maggie gave her a new tortoise-shell comb for her hair, which made Marsali flush.  It was quite fine as a gift.

      “My gift for you is not down here,” Jamie said.  “I want you to choose something from a trunk we have of clothing.  You are tall enough, and they aren’t getting much use.”

     Eventually the young families headed home or to their rooms: Young Jamie and his wife, boys, and baby to their apartments at Lallybroch, Maggie and her husband along with their boys off to the Lyle farm.  With a smaller audience, Jamie reached into the pocket of his jacket and fished out a small packet of folded paper, handing it to Marsali.   She opened it, read it quickly, and blushed a fiery red.

     Laoghaire had calmed slightly since the swimming incident and tried to reassure herself.  There was a fire of independence in Marsali that perhaps she had not had as a girl.  In addition, Marsali had a ma to talk to her about men and what they wanted, and what they would do to get it, and how she should behave to get what she wanted, two things which were diametrically opposed.

     Sadly, Laoghaire herself had none of this advice as a fifteen-year-old; and as a result, she had gone about it all wrong.

☆☆☆☆☆

     After she left the tavern, in the shy bliss of being known by John Robert MacLeod, Laoghaire could hear his words ringing in her head.  How could that bastard James Fraser say no to this beauty?  He’s a fool!  Oh, ye are so bonny, yer breasts like pillows the gods would sleep on, yer eyes sparkling like sapphires, yer lips like roses in a garden.

     The words continued to echo as she slipped into her house, retrieving her shift and dressing in her attic room.  She continued to hear them as she bid her brothers and sisters goodbye again and headed back toward Leoch.  John Robert was right, Laoghaire decided.  Jamie Fraser was a fool and Mistress Beauchamp a true witch to steal him away from her.  Only then did she realize she was walking past Geillis Duncan’s shop.

     She opened the door and a cacophony of scents assailed her nose.  Pungent, sweet, bitter, acidic, herbal.  The main portion of Geillis’s business came from running a perfectly respectable and effective apothecary.  But there was also the less-advertised menu of well-known potions and charms she would sell.  One just had to know what to ask for. 

      “I would like to buy an ill wish,” Laoghaire said, pulling her coin purse out of her pocket.  “One for a woman who has stolen a man.”

      “Aye?” Geillis asked.  She began bustling about the room, retrieving sticks, bones, string, and herbs. “Do ye have any of her hair?” Geillis asked, as she began to assemble the items at a back table. 

      “No, but I can add some when I place it in her bedchamber.”  Laoghaire’s nose wrinkled at the thought of Claire’s great tangled mop of hair.  How Jamie saw anything in her. . .

      “’Twouldna be for Mistress Beauchamp…I mean, Lady Broch Tuarach, would it?” Geillis asked, from behind the divider used in case any customers should enter who were interested only in the reputable half of her business. That woman deserved her reputation as a witch, Laoghaire thought.  She knew too much; seeing everything with those strange green eyes.

      “And if it was?” Laoghaire asked.  “Would ye not sell it to me, then?”

      “’Tisn’t my business to judge my customers,” Geillis remarked.  “’Tis just my business to know my customers.”

      “Aye?” said Laoghaire. 

      “And from what I see, ye are a pretty young thing,” Geillis said, green eyes glowing preternaturally.  “If ye end up wi’ a man before ye marry, ye must make sure to not sleep wi’ him for 10 days after yer courses.  And if ye do catch a bairn, ye must come to me for a tea which will help the bleeding to come.”

     Finally Geillis emerged from the back, carrying a crude bundle of sticks.  She wrapped it up in a piece of cloth, and handed it over to Laoghaire in exchange for a few coins.

      “Wrap three hairs around the center, if ye can find any.  And place it under his bed.  The charm should drive him away from her.”  Geillis looked at her shrewdly.  “I canna tell if it will draw him to you, though.”

      “I dinna think I need that,” Laoghaire said primly, thinking of John Robert.  He loved her, and they would be married.  Laoghaire nodded in thanks, then rushed away, hoping to find a time to slip into Jamie’s chamber unnoticed.

      “Laoghaire,” called a male voice from behind her.  The street was loud, so she turned, half hoping to see John Robert.  Her face fell slightly as she saw Hugh instead.  “Where ye headin’?” he asked cheerfully.  “May I accompany ye?”

     Laoghaire sighed, but there was no escape, so she let Hugh fall in step with her.

      “’Tis good to see ye again, Laoghaire,” he said.  “Ye look lovely today.”

     Of course she did, Laoghaire thought, lovely enough that she had a man.  She had no need of this gangly, pock-marked teenager.

      “What’s that?” he asked curiously, pointing at the small fabric-wrapped bundle. 

      “Mistress Beauchamp asked me to bring her something from Geillis’s shop,” Laoghaire said, pleased that she was clever enough to think on her feet.

      “Ye mean, Mistress Fraser now, aye?” Hugh said.

     Laoghaire gritted her teeth, her eyes narrowing as she thought of Jamie and Claire together.  “Ye shouldna be so gleeful, Hugh,” she snapped.  “Ye know I cared for him, and I thought he cared for me.”

     Hugh stopped, taken aback by her response, and Laoghaire stalked on angrily, alone.  “I didna...Laoghaire!” he called after her.

      Laoghaire slipped into Jamie’s room when he and Mistress Beauchamp were in the hall for supper.  She scouted just long enough to see that their plates were filled, as were their glasses, and they were surrounded by people curious about the circumstances of their marriage.  Though the two sat next to each other, Laoghaire could see from their body language that they were not happy.  Jamie was not touching Mistress Beauchamp, and though he was often looking at her, she was not looking at him, sitting with her chin up proudly and her lips set.

     She snuck down the hallway, checking in both directions to make sure she was not seen as she entered the room, the ill wish in her hand.  It was tidy.  The bed was unrumpled and neatly made.  If they were acting like newlyweds and taking each other to bed many times a day, or if they had bedded each other right before dinner, Laoghaire thought, the bed would definitely be messier.  

     What was messy was the hair brush.  Laoghaire scrunched up her nose in disdain as she pulled a few frizzy hairs off the brush, then wrapped them around the center of the talisman.  Her heart thumping in her ears, Laoghaire approached the bed, knelt on the floor, and pushed the bundle underneath.

     She was about to leave the room, but her curiosity was not satisfied.  Laoghaire had done enough laundry to know the tell-tale signs of people bedding each other—stained sheets, particularly when the pale, roundish stains were slightly lower than center of the bed.  She blushed as she thought of John Robert.  She had bled, just slightly, but he had been ever so gentle.  And he had enough forethought that he’d laid down the cloth so they didn’t dirty the couch.

     With a glance over her shoulder, Laoghaire pulled down the covers, revealing the sheets all the way down to the feet.  No stains; none whatsoever.  And moreso, the sheets were only wrinkled in two separate areas, very close to the two edges of the bed.  They were not taking each other to bed, and they were not even sleeping close.  She felt vindictive pleasure settle in her stomach along with her nervousness.  Carefully, she spread the covers back in place, crept out of the door, and headed back to the kitchen to do her work.

     She needn’t have been so worried about being discovered while placing the ill wish.  The dinner went late into the evening.  Laoghaire felt especially happy to see Claire head off toward the sleeping wing alone, while Jamie seemed to be heading to a meeting with Dougal, Colum, and Ned Gowan.  Colum wore an angry frown, and Jamie looked like he was heading to the gallows. 

     Poor man, thought Laoghaire.  No one to comfort him tonight when he goes back to his room.  That cold Sassenach witch.  Maybe if Jamie drank himself into a stupor, he would at least take what he deserved from a wife.

     She thought of trying, just once more, to intercept Jamie, perhaps as he headed back to his room.  But as she was doing one last round of the  tables, pouring whisky, water, and tea, a hand touched her elbow.

      “Lass,” said a husky, masculine voice.  “How much later are ye serving tonight?” 

     She turned to see John Robert MacLeod, sitting smilingly at the table.  Her heart leapt.

     Bending down as if to pour water into his glass, she whispered, “What are ye doing here?”

      “I couldna be apart from ye, Laoghaire.”  John Robert responded.  “I invented some business to bring me up to the castle, and Colum has provided me a chamber for the night.  Will ye come to me, then?”

     Laoghaire had blushed, and looking for another way to delay and talk longer, spilt an amount of water on the floor.  She bent down to wipe it up, considering.  Again?  Twice in one day?  Her stomach clenched, and she could feel a warmth in her lower abdomen just from hearing his words.

      “I dinna think I can,” she said.  “’Twould be too hard to slip away.”

      “Oh, but Laoghaire, I canna go another hour without havin’ ye near me.  Yer beautiful eyes, your lovely form.  Ye are drivin’ me insane with desiring you.”  He truly sounded desperate for her.  It made Laoghaire’s body throb with wanting.

      “I canna sleep there, but I could come for a time,” she whispered back.  She wanted to go, truly just to hear him say such things to her again.

☆☆☆☆☆

      “Look, ma,” said Marsali, excitedly coming over to Laoghaire, dangling a shiny bauble from her wrist and placing the note in her mother’s hand.  “Fergus sent me this bracelet wi’ stones that look like sapphires in it.  He says such nice things.”  Marsali blushed. “That...that the stones are the color of my eyes, and made him think of me.”

     Her daughter’s eyes were like sapphires, Laoghaire thought, her heart sinking; sparkling at the flattery of a man.

Chapter 17 : Married Laoghaire couldn’t wait to be married.

#Jamie fraser #Laoghaire MacKenzie #CanonCompliant #Why did Jamie marry Laoghaire? #Why did their marriage fall apart? #Outlander fanfic #BetweenSceneswriter

[cbk1000]

I just read the most profoundly disturbing thing I have ever beheld with my own two fucking eyes, and I need to rant about it. You guys can’t help me process it any better, but at least we can all join together in a mighty chorus of ‘what the ACTUAL fuck??’

This is not a funny post lamenting another weird creature/human atrocity that I delved from the darkest depths of Amazon, this is a situation where I’m putting the rest of this rant under a cut because I’m going to include large chunks of text that romanticizes child molestation.

You have been warned. Do not read on if you can’t stand that sort of content.

So, if you’ve been following this blog for a while, then you’ve seen me gleefully lampooning the batshit romances of an author called Mary Anne Graham. This is the author of pee hole fingering fame and that one time a man’s top ho killed herself using a wooden paddle she had carved into the exact likeness of his penis because he was having too much gay sex with his boyfriend and neglecting his harem. There are always anatomical oopsies galore (including a man having two different openings to his anus) and general wtfery that’s usually absolutely hysterical.

I picked up her new book on Kindle Unlimited a while back, read most of it, guffawed my way through it as usual, and then forgot about it for a bit while I read other books that understand metaphors actually have to make sense and melting eyes do not denote desperate infatuation, but rather some kind of deadly disease. I went back to it today deciding I’d push through it to the end, since my Kindle said there were only twenty minutes left to the end of the book.

What a fucking mistake that was.

This book was full of the usual hilarious dipshittery until the last few minutes, when it suddenly took the most disturbing turn I’ve ever seen. I’m going to post the synopsis so you understand the basic premise of the story, and then I’ll summarize the scene leading up to what I’m going to copy and paste, so you understand the context.

Synopsis:  Russian gypsy Prince Vladimir Batalova didn’t await meeting his soul mate. He’d known her for years. She was the daughter of Tobar, the gypsy who married Vlad’s mother and saved her from her abusive marriage. Vlad’s noble father abhorred the youngest son produced by his idiotic marriage to a dirty gypsy. Tobar accepted Vlad, treating him as family, equal to his own son, Nic, and his daughter, Mala. Vlad returned Tobar’s affection and considered Nic his brother, but Mala? He’d never felt brotherly about Mala. Vlad spent years dreading the letter that would tell him of Mala’s marriage to a fine gypsy lad. Instead of a letter, he got Tobar and Nic delivering Mala to London to save her from certain ravishment. They asked Vlad to fulfill his mother’s dying wish: that Mala be brought to him to enter society and find a husband. Now, Vlad must turn the gypsy he loved into a debutante, find her a husband and have her under his roof, within touching distance. Even with the help of all his friends, the sixth sense he shared with his buddy, Boz, and some faerie magic, Vlad knew he could never find a happily ever after. His forever was forbidden unless he convinced Mala that the bond they had shared wasn’t the one they should share – and that taking each other was worth losing the family they both adored.

So, they wind up getting married under English law, everyone is happy, everything is shiny, etc., and then Mala is suddenly carried off by an unknown horseman. Vlad figures out that it’s her brother and that he’s taken her back to their encampment, so he and some of his friends hightail it over there to get her back. Turns out Mala is not willing to go because she has convinced herself that because he didn’t perform a Romani wedding with her, he means to throw her aside and vanish eventually, just like he did when she was younger (shortly after meeting one another and becoming family, he suddenly up and took off and never explained why). He says it’s because he’s a demon or some shit, and the reader is suddenly made aware that he has this deep dark secret connected to why he ran away years ago, though at no point prior to this does the narration mention that something ugly is gnawing at his conscience. (Conveniently, it explains that the secret is so terrible even he forgot about it. But then he remembers it well enough to make a very detailed confession of something that happened years ago.)

Mala tells him that she will not return with him unless he confesses this secret and she can judge whether or not he truly loves her and will be faithful to her for all time.

So he does: ‘”I swear to you that I’m no deviant. I’ve never had a sexual interest in children. Never. Well, never until you were twelve and I came to meet your Papa and attend his wedding to my mother. Mother introduced us and my heart stopped. I froze and don’t even recall if I spoke. Then you ran up to give me a hug in welcome and my most private part unfroze with a vengeance.”

He paused for breath and to give her a chance to kick him and run away--but when she did neither, he continued. “I was horrified at myself, but helpless against the force of my response. Through the ceremony I positioned myself behind a small shrub of a convenient height and vowed not to so much as look at you. Course, I couldn’t look at anyone or anything else. When the women began dancing around the couple after the vows, I watched your budding breasts jiggle when you kicked and imagined myself...,”

A noise in the background halted his words, and he jumped ahead. “That night, around the fire, Tobar gave an amazing, emotional speech, where he said that in marrying my mother, he acquired another son. My blood father hated me for existing as I was a living reminder of his unpardonable lapse of judgment in wedding a damned gypsy. Your father accepted me, Russian blood and all. I couldn’t repay his affection by lusting after my step-sister. I left that night and vowed to stay away until whatever demon that had possessed me was evicted.

He then muses over the following two months, which were apparently filled with a bunch of orgies. He begs Mala not to push him to tell her about this part, because she doesn’t need to know everything. Also, apparently becoming a ‘nude buffet centerpiece that any party guest could stroke or taste or lick or nibble’ is much worse than sexually assaulting a child that her father entrusted to you for protection after welcoming you into his family. Mala agrees not to push him on the orgy stuff, and he continues:

“I thought it possible that I’d exaggerated the event in my mind. I returned about two and a half months after we first met, vowing to treat you as a younger sister. I kept my vow until I spotted you as I rode in, strolling in an area secluded from the caravan by a stand of trees. You were flirting with a lad a couple of years older. He brushed your hair back and tilted up your chin for a kiss he never got. I leapt off my galloping stallion, stormed over and told the brash bastard that if he so much as looked at you again, I’d geld him. I was jealous as hell.”

“You were?” Mala asked. “I thought you were acting like an enraged big brother.”

“No,” Vlad said. “Hell, no. Despite my every vow and intention, my love, I have never, for a single second, felt like your brother. My obsession with you grew worse, and more obvious. Your father says he saw it and so did Nic, but neither of them had a clue how low I’d sink, how evil I’d become. I kept myself mostly under control that visit, save for a few brush ups with some of the other fellows who had dreams and intentions that I destroyed rather ruthlessly. It was my next visit when my demon overthrew my will. That’s when the true evil started.”

“That’s nonsense,” Mala said.

“No, it’s not,” Vlad said. “All I can say in my defense is that the first time was accidental. I was away from the tribe, fishing and trying to clear my head and cool my loins. I succeeded only in aggravating the fish. After I packed up my gear, I strolled in the woods for a bit. A splash and a giggle drew my attention, and I stalked to a stand of trees and dense brush and peered through. ‘Twas you, dressed only in sunlight and your golden skin. You were bathing. Your youth, my supposed honor and morality, all of it commanded me to leave and give you privacy. I didn’t. After that, every night, at every campsite, I did it again and again.” 

Mala blinked. “You watched me bathe? And the other girls as well?”

“There were other girls?” Vlad asked. “There are no other girls, Mala. There are no other women.”

He steeled himself and continued. “And yes, I watched you, but I did more. I pleasured myself as I watched. I invaded your privacy and desecrated it. I reviled myself for it then and every moment since then. I ordered myself to stop but I didn’t. I couldn’t. I’d leave so I’d have to stop, but I could not stay away. Then came my worst transgression. One winter’s night, your father and brother left with the other men to scout and liberate some horses. They asked me to sleep inside the vardo with you. I tried to do the right thing and made myself a separate pallet, but you complained of the cold. It took pitifully little for me to join you in your cozy nest. You cuddled up to my back innocently, for warmth.”

Vlad paused and closed his eyes, but she made a noise of protest so he looked at her again. “My flesh felt every sweet inch of you, and I ate it up like a starving man at a banquet. Eventually, I drifted off to sleep. When I awoke, our positions had reversed. You’d turned over and I spooned you. My arm lay around your waist, but I moved it up until your breasts rested upon it. I jiggled them, slightly, imitating the way I watched them move whenever you danced. You didn’t wake, and I recalled your father and brother’s jokes about how deeply you slept. So I cupped your breasts through your gown, teasing your nipples to pert fullness that I couldn’t see.”

“Oh my Great Duck,” Mala said. “I thought I dreamed that. You turned me over, and climbed atop me, didn’t you?”

“To my everlasting damnation, I did,” Vlad said. “I hiked up your gown and positioned myself against your feminine mound. I moved your gown off your shoulders to uncover your breasts. I sucked you and humped you like an animal until I found the most shameful, the most splendid release of my life. I was beyond disgusted with myself, so I got up, cleaned up, and went outside to build a fire or kindle it or something.”

He goes on to say that he afterwards fled and “signed on to crew a ship leaving for America. I needed an ocean’s distance to keep me away else i’d return and likely do something even worse.”

So, he has just confessed that when she was a child, he took advantage of the fact that he was a trusted family member to peep on her while she was bathing and wank to the sight of it, and then sexually assaulted her while she was sleeping. This confession, btw, takes place in front of her dad and older brother. She probably is disgusted and horribly upset and they kill him with their bare hands, right?

Nope. The whole purpose of this scene was for the heroine’s insecurities to be soothed and for her to realise that the hero has wanted her and only her all along: 

Mala watched shame and love battle in Vlad’s eyes and recognized it as the expression she’d seen there for years. She hadn’t understood it then, but she understood it and him now. ‘Twas with effort that she managed not to dance as she said, “Ask me again.”

He then asks her to marry him once more, her dad and brother are like, “Yay! Let’s get this gypsy wedding on the road”, they have a Romani ceremony, and then the book ends with this scene:

Vlad drew her close for a kiss, but paused to ask, “Do you finally understand that I’ve loved you since the moment we met, that I’ve never willingly spent a second apart from you, and that I will hold you in my arms, my heart and my life until eternity ends?”

Mala was crying too hard to answer, so she nodded as he took her lips with tender intent, feeding her back happy tears, flavored with a taste of forever.

I’m going to fucking DESTROY this thing in a review. I cannot fucking believe a functioning adult actually wrote this as part of a romantic happily-ever-after. This lady likes to talk about how her characters are all a ‘little batty’ because they’re just so in love and it’s all a bit tongue-in-cheek--no, you unbelievably stupid fucking asshole, they are not ‘a little batty’, they are literally child rapists. Confessing to your bride that you were obsessed with her when she was a CHILD and that you FUCKING MOLESTED HER IN HER SLEEP is not a goddamn HAPPY ENDING!!!!!!!!!!!!

#i'm fucking incensed #i don't even know how to process this #what the unholy fuck is wrong with this woman #how the fuck could you think this is romantic??? #this is the book that makes fifty shades look completely well-adjusted

[gootie]

Donald Francis

My friend is dead.

He passed Sunday. It was cancer.

His death didn’t surprise me. Don enjoyed any and all of the pleasures one can squeeze out of life. He drank and smoked whenever and wherever he damn well pleased. Despite his bad habits, deep down, I truly believed he would outlive me.

Don introduced me to Bob Dylan, Donovan, Captain Beefheart, The Chambers Brothers, George Clinton, Van Morrison, Bill Withers… so many hours spent listening to records on his front porch. Few words were said. The music said everything.

Don gave me my first motorcycle. A 1972 Honda 500. Just a little mosquito of a bike but it was perfect for me to learn to ride with. We’d work on our bikes in his garage, listening to music and emptying the little refrigerator there of the many bottles of beer it held. Sometimes we’d tinker away through the night till the sun came up.

Sometimes we rode down country roads through Indiana into Kentucky and back again. Seemingly endless cornfields gave way to deep woods and then hills and valleys. We rode past a lake surrounded by wilderness that looked so crystalline and still one could imagine it had been there untouched for centuries.

One time we were making a blind turn around a steep hill and we rode straight into a congregation of deer and wild turkeys. Amazingly we somehow avoided hitting any of them. Don leaned on his horn and sped through their ranks. I gave my bike some gas and followed behind him. I remember seeing all the animals scrambling like mad for the woods. There were even some little mice or some kind of varmint scurrying among them. We stopped at the first greasy spoon we found and laughed our asses off over hot coffee and some pie.

Don had three daughters, each uniquely bewitching in their own way. The oldest was wild with a good sense of humor. She looked like the love child of Siouxie Sioux and Ziggy Stardust. The middle daughter had a quiet and reserved beauty though she had no idea of it. The youngest was sunny and bubbly and seemed to be the most balanced of the three. I married the youngest and Don gave me his blessing. We were family and I was proud to be his son in law. I took his daughter away with me to San Francisco but we remained close, visiting regularly and often.

Don’s wife Karen fell ill and nobody could figure out what was happening. My wife and I went to Indiana to be near them and help out around the house. I was close with Karen too and it was hard watching her slowly dying. It was harder for her children. Maybe harder still for Don. Eventually the doctors diagnosed her with a rare cancer and began an aggressive treatment program. Karen died a few short months later anyway. She was too far gone and too much of the fight was taken out of her.

Don drank a little more than before. Beer brought sleep but the haze of alcohol lingered. Cocaine helped wake him up, then pills to level off. The drugs made him edgy and the booze made him mean. One night we had an argument about it and he let into to me like a lion. Knocked me across the room and over a table. I got up, jaw stinging, bruised and bleeding, looked at my wife and we left. I would not and could not fight my family. I couldn’t fight my friend.

That was the beginning of the end for me. Don did eventually clean up. He reached out to me. I listened. He made amends but it was never the same between us. Everything was falling apart anyway. After her mother died and her father came undone my wife changed. Maybe she thought life was just too short and wanted to be free. Maybe she just needed a new start. She and I barely talked except to argue. She soon left me and just like that, I wasn’t part of that family anymore.

Don called me out of the blue a couple years ago. He just wanted to say hello and asked how I was doing. It felt good to talk to him. We talked about rides he went on and what music we were listening to. I wish we had talked more.

I don’t miss my marriage or my life back then. I don’t miss the motorcycle or that record collection either, but of the father figures I’ve collected over the years Don was one that really meant a lot to me. When he called I realized how much I missed him.

I miss him still.

#thinking out loud #death #lost friends

[luisa184]

Fail Again.

Thanos voice haunts him, asleep and awake. His taunting words, the satisfaction. He knowledge that he’d won and that Thor had failed.

AO3 Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18606283

Fun Fact: I did not find a single scene with Thor funny and hated everyone in the theater for laughing.

He knows what they think. He can see their hidden smiles, the glances from the corners of their eyes, the snide remarks. He might be drunk and fat and weak, but he’s still not stupid. He just doesn’t care.

Brunhilde is as amazing as he had always imagined Valkyries to be. She leads their people while he is busy searching for the next bottle and playing games he has no care for, just so he can say he’s doing … something. She is queen in all but name and in the few moments when Thor stops to think — mostly at night — he is proud of her and hates himself even more. It’s a wonder sometimes, how that is even possible.

Still: the people don’t want him as their king anymore. They think him weak and pathetic and incapable. Thor is fine with that. He doesn’t want to be their king anymore, either.

He’s just there, breathing, because he has to. Because he can’t die, can’t give up completely, while so many where lost. Half of the whole universe. His family.

Not while it’s his fault.

“You should have gone for the head.”

Thanos voice haunts him, asleep and awake. His taunting words, the satisfaction. He knowledge that he’d won and that Thor had failed.

“No resurrections this time.”

It gets quieter when he’s drunk. It doesn’t go away, not completely just that — quieter.

So he just — is. And wishes he could rest and stop hurting and having to stay alive all the same.

And then there’s a knock on his door and faces he had secretly hoped to never see again and words he secretly never wanted to hear.

Bring them all back, of course. Of course the rest of the team would find a way.

But, he thinks as he ignores their pity, what about my family? My home? Can you bring them back, too?

He’s always been selfish.

And they do it. Or rather — they do it.

He’s of no illusion that he was any help. It’s honestly a wonder that Rabbit got the Reality Stone while being stuck with him. He knows. He should care more about that.

But — being in Asgard. Running by Lo- by his cell, his beautiful mother — He had tried so hard to forget what he’s lost, what he had failed to protect and then it was all right there in front of him, just at the tips of his fingers — and at the same time further away than ever. This was the past, and he was an intruder and ever second he so much as looked was stolen.

But he had to come here; no one else knows their way around Asgard; no one else knows where Jane will be. He has to face this. It’s only because of his failure that these missions are necessary.

“You should have gone for the head.”

He fails, as it is his norm. He just — can’t.

He’s not even sure what about Jane upsets him so horribly. Their break-up had been mutual and without resentment and her loss is the one that hurts the least. He had never dared to even check but there was even a 50% chance that she was still alive.

He just can’t bare seeing her here, in Asgard, knowing his mother will die in a few hours to protect her, knowing his little brother is down that way — all so close, yet so unreachable, gone forever, because he hadn’t — because he couldn’t -

He runs the other way. Rabbit has a better chance at this without him breaking down screaming and sobbing in the corridor.

He hates himself, truly. More than Loki had ever dreamed about.

And hey — look at that. The first time he so much as thought his name in the last five years.

All praise Thor, the god of thunder!

They return to the present and Natasha is lost. Dead.

Had Thor known that there would be a sacrifice he would have begged them all to go. But he hadn’t known and once more someone dear and wonderful and important is dead.

Another friend gone without a chance to say goodbye.

He just wants it all to stop.

When it’s all over he takes a moment to think back to his mother. Her words are not as much as a comfort to him as she had probably hoped.

Still, he had seen her. Talked to her, touched her. It’s a gift he had not deserved.

Loki should have been there, too. It makes it bittersweet that he hadn’t been and that he had not had the courage to tell his mother — to tell her that his baby brother is dead because he had failed to save him.

“The sun will shine on us again.”

She would have been heartbroken to know what faith awaits her youngest. Loki had always been her favorite.

He had been Thor’s favorite, too.

Still, he is glad that the lost have returned. That these amazing humans managed to do the impossible; that his failure has been undone.

He leaves them as soon as he can. Every second, every heartbeat that he’s around them hurts. They remind him of a past he can’t have ever again, a pain that they all feel, even now that they have — won.

It doesn’t feel like victory.

Every time he closes his eyes he sees death. His mother, laying there still. His father, turning to dust. His brother, thrown away like a doll. His people, massacred on the floor of a burning ship. Heimdall, a sword in his chest. Natasha with lifeless eyes, even though he had never seen her. Tony, burned by a power he should not have had to wield. All dying with so much to live for.

He wishes he had spent more time with them. With Natasha and Tony. These amazing, strong humans; resisting and wielding forces meant for gods and winning always, till the end. Dying to save the universe. Brave, strong as Thor could only ever wish to be.

He had heard them talking, the other Avengers, while Tony and Rabbit had built their time travel machine. Tony had married the beautiful Pepper and had an even more beautiful little daughter.

Thor wishes he would know how to help.

Pepper and her child, with losing husband and father.

Clint with losing his best friend, a part of his family.

But he and Tony had never been as close as he wishes they had been. He doesn’t think Tony would much approve of him approaching his little family when he can’t even cope with himself. No father wants a pitiful, weak drunk around their five-year-old child.

He wouldn’t know what to say to any of them, either way.

But all of these are just excuses. The reasons he’s running from them, running from earth and these amazing humans is simple: he had had the chance, right there, in the beginning. He had had the chance, and he had missed, he had failed — Thanos had been right there and had the chance to kill him before any of this would have been necessary, and he hadn’t and — and now two of the most important individuals that Thor had ever met were gone.

Their little team, so precious to him, short of two, because the had failed.

“You should have gone for the head.”

#endgame #avengers endgame #endgame spoilers #a4 spoilers #endgame fic #endgame fanfic #thor #thor odinson #survivor guilt #avengers endgame spoilers #god of thunder #fanfic #i made myself sad

[escupelo]

12:48am

The complexity of the human brain is said to be the biggest mystery on earth. How it works, how it connects. Why our past reflects on our present and our future. To me, the complexity runs in how our brains connect to our hearts. How our feelings connect to our thoughts. 

My mom is a person who has had a tough childhood. Not in the usual way most people think: poor family, no food, barely an education. No, not in that way. My mom had everything a kid of her generation could wish for: a wealthy family, an elite education, travels abroad and all the food anyone could ask for. Yet, she lacked in love. My grandfather was an incredible person, a self-made man. First generation of Arab immigrants meant he had to work for what he had, and damn did he work for it. He was tough and strong-headed, determined to succeed. My grandmother on the other hand, she is a whole new universe on her own. Her father died when she was very young, and she lived in a house with her six siblings and four cousins as well as their father and her mom, both were widows. They lived in the mountains and they had no money and no food. Once my grandmother and her siblings grew older, they started working and helping out with the home economy, but before, all my grandmother remembers is always being hungry. She would have no food and she would starve. During my mother’s childhood, my grandmother was not a physically caring and loving mother, she would not caress her kids and she was tough on them, very tough. My mother grew up alone in that sense. Now moving on to my mothers siblings.

My mother is the youngest of four kids. One of them is a lawyer, like my mom, who has basically done nothing successful throughout his whole life. He relied on my grandparents to sustain his family for a long time. My oldest aunt, had an adventurous life, she was a headache for my grandparents. A dancer in New York, married [and divorced] an architect who was a wreck, drugs, alcohol, all part of her life. And the middle daughter, my never-known aunt. Now, this is something I don’t usually talk about. I recently found out about this and once I added all the stories I had been told, I realised the truth. My aunt died from a drug overdose. She was surrounded by disastrous people who dragged her into this world. She was a wreck. My grandparents did not want to admit this to themselves so they never got her the help she needed. She died. I had always been told a story that she had a brain aneurysm and that my grandmother woke up to her with a headache and she died. This was not the truth. My grandmother walked into a room where there laid my aunt, overdosed on some drug, heroin, cocaine, I don’t know. She died in my grandmothers arms. 

My grandmother has struggled with depression her whole life, yet it got worse when all of this happened. Imagine, just imagine, your kid dying in your arms overdosed. It’s all this things you see in movies and never think it can happen to you. Well, it happened in my mom’s house. Looking at my grandmothers past you can understand her behaviour and the way she is today. She will never forgive herself for what happened. My mom, you look at her today. She is paranoid every time I go out, I drink. She is scared that I will go down that same road. She is always judging who my friends are, but this, now I realise, is because she is scared that I will make the wrong friends, just like her sister did, and end up where she ended up. She suffers, a lot. She is always talking to me about my relationship with my sister, telling me I have to fix it, she's my sister is what she says. I always complain about it but now I understand. She lost hers. She lost hers to a drug abuse. I understand now. 

My point here is, you can never judge a person based on only their acts and without understanding their past. I might complain about my mother and her obsessions all the time but god bless her and what she's been through, I’m surprised she isn’t worse. My grandmother, always quiet and sad. Look at her past, comprehend her story, and you’ll get a way bigger answer than just her face.