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safyresky · 9 months

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Something Angry This Way Comes...

(Jacqueline Dies AU: Part 2! Finally! Read Part 1 HERE >:)

---

Somebody was at her daughter's grave.

This, of course, was a possibility. Winter knew that. Of course it was. After all, she had had aunties and a grandmother and a few little friends here and there. And her father came frequently, too. He always left fresh flowers. So did she. She liked to see them. It gave her a minute sense of relief to know that he was still on this earth with her.

Even if they hadn’t talked in centuries.

She hoped he felt the same when he saw her own offering at the base of the monument that bore the name of the little girl that was taken from them far too soon.

But Wednesday was her day to visit. Wednesday was open court at city hall, which meant that everyone who would visit would be tied up in politics and stuffiness and inquiries and all sorts of bureaucratic nonsense that would keep them busy for the day. And the only other person who would visit was locked away.

Nobody was around.

That’s why she had chosen Wednesdays.

Nobody would be.

But somebody was at her daughter’s grave.

The season sped up, her brow furrowing through a layer of ice as she got closer and closer to the marker. The figure became clearer. A woman. Standing in front of the monument with her hands on her hips. Something gold clutched in her right hand. Clothed in a familiar shade of dark blue. A pile of snow-white hair, perhaps meant to be curls but not quite curling, down to her mid back. Windswept, as though she had just met the wrong side of a north wind on a particularly stormy night.

She was within shouting distance. Winter hadn’t spoken in…quite some time. Not loudly, at least. But she tried. She inhaled; she opened her mouth, about to say EXCUSE ME quite loudly and forcibly and sternly, when something snapped under her foot.

The woman’s shoulders went up; she turned slightly, staring at Winter.

She gasped. The eyes, same colour as hers but a shade or two darker. The nose, an equal mix of hers and Blaise’s, like both kids had had, but not as crooked as his. Her chin, her lips, her hairline—she knew exactly who this woman was. But how? How was it possible—it wasn’t. Not in April, and certainly not this early in the month.

The bouquet fell to the ground; Winter’s hands flew to her mouth, eyes pricking and heart racing as all the pieces clicked into place.

Her daughter was standing at her own grave.

---

This was NOT how her day should have been going. She had not expected to be standing at her own fucking grave when she woke up very much alive this morning.

She was SUPPOSED to be doing a favour for Myles. He had needed a pot to trap some kind of chaos-y shade in because he had accidentally freed it and then promptly broken the pot when he tried to trap it again. The other Legates were preoccupied and he was trying to wrangle it and couldn’t grab a pot while he was chasing the thing, and she had, of course, offered to help. After all, she wasn’t doing much else; it was April, wintery things were tapering off, there were two weeks left before Summer and Winter went on this year’s vacation, and for all intents and purposes she and Jack were done for the first part of the year and quite relieved about it, too. It had been a nasty March and Winter was presently brewing a nasty ice storm for April that Spring was sure to be very, very mad about.

So she started ransacking the manor to find a pot that looked similar enough to the one Myles had described, hoping to finish up fast because it was date night and Dite was taking her to the KEG which, yes, a totally regular ordibeing restaurant, but she loved it. The steak, the atmosphere, and how FANCY it tried to be when it really wasn’t a FANCY restaurant, when you thought about it. She thought it was hilarious (and enjoyed the steak); Dite thought she was hilarious (and enjoyed seeing her ham it up whenever they went).

While she tore through the gallery, Jack had shouted about needing to do a thing for Father Time; she shouted back a see ya, wondering if maybe there were some old vases and such in the basement that would work.

Ten seconds later, a time splinter had appeared in her room, trying it’s very best to kill her, Jack saving her ass in a nick of time, and promptly roping her into the time-related debacle he had found himself dealing with that, SURPRISE, is your problem now too, little flurry!

So off she had gone with him, into the endless expanse of timelines and alternate universes, chasing the time splinter from one universe to the next, trying to lure it to the universe that had created it so they could finally destroy it.

But the stupid sliver had gotten smart.

It had managed to separate the pair, shooting them out in two different universes. They had tried to grab each other before being shot right out of the timestream, but unfortunately both of the frosty Frosts were a little bit on the shorter side and the last thing she had seen before nearly SPLATTING on the frozen solid tundra was her fingers slip right out of her brother’s as he was dragged into a deep purple portal opposite from her, disappearing as she was sucked into her own time portal with a disgusting sounding SLURP.

She had just barely made enough snow to cushion her fall before she was unceremoniously dropped into this freezing cold universe, the portal snapping shut above her.

In her hand, the timepiece had started cracking.

“Oh no. No, no, NO, not THIS shit again,” she said desperately, hoping that when she looked at the time piece it wouldn’t be doing what she thought it was doing—and it was, yep. The purple chrono-quartz below the intricate golden lines snaped and cracked into three pieces, phasing through the time piece with a deep glow and a low thrum to match. The three pieces floated way up into the sky, then blasted forward, much to her dismay.

She watched them disappear over the horizon with a sigh, leaving a trail of purple dust in its wake.

She knew the drill. Something in this universe needed to be fixed before she could try to escape it.

So, with a sigh, she started forward, following the time trail before it disappeared completely.

---

And that’s how, an hour later, she found herself face to face with her own bloody grave.

It was a nice marker, for sure. Blues and yellows with snowflakes etched all over it, a fluffy blanket of the stuff sitting on top of the three peaks a foot or two above her head. Her name was etched into the stone, as clean as though it were carved yesterday, but the date on the stone showed otherwise. She felt her breath hitch in her throat when she read it.

556 CE.

The Day of Darkness.

She had died.

Jack had killed her dead.

“Oh,” she said, quietly. “Fuck.”

She glanced around, awkwardly; it was quiet. Empty. A wind briefly ruffled the vines and ivy twirling up the side of the monument.

The chrono quartz had gone this way. The trail, now gone, had ended right above the monument. Her monument. Her fucking GRAVE.

If she was dead, she was dead. There was no fixing that.

But there was something she did need to fix, and quite frankly, the less time she had to spend in THIS timeline the better. Timelines where she didn’t exist were one thing. But a timeline where she had died? Heebie-jeebies galore.

So, she got to work.

She walked around the monument a few times, careful not to disturb the flowers that had been left at the base. She scrutinized the thing top down, feeling more and more unsettled the longer she searched—but nothing.

The pieces weren’t there.

“But the trail...” she mumbled to herself.

With a sigh, she ran her hands through her hair, resting them on her hips. Trail had gone here. Time pieces were not here. Where had they gone, then? Had someone come by and taken them in the hour it had taken her to walk up here? Although, the time pieces could phase through objects. And planes, too. Did the pieces maybe—

There was a crunch; she jumped, startled, her shoulders shooting up.

Someone had joined her.

She turned her head, gasping when she saw who was steadily rushing up the slight incline towards her.

“Winter?!”

The woman, now in front of her, certainly looked like her mother. The small gasp sounded just like her; the height checked out. But her eyes were cold as could be, even colder than she had ever seen when her Winter had been frozen. There was no warmth on her face; her hair, usually thawed and perched in a sort of snowman esque double top bun Jacqueline couldn’t ever figure out, was frozen stiff. Her body was shaking, but her hair did not move. It was in one big, sleek bun; even the sticky-outties she had that Jacqueline had to deal with too were somehow smoothed back and in place (a miracle if there ever was one. There was a reason Jacqueline called them her hair sticky-outties).

“Oh my word,” the woman croaked. “It is you.”

She collapsed to the ground, straight up sobbing, and Jacqueline had never felt so uncomfortable in her entire life. She sighed, gently sitting down on her knees and placing a hand, very carefully, very softly, on her Mother’s knee.

“Well, yes, but also, no.”

Winter’s face shot up. “Of course not. It’s not a convergence date.”

“I gathered. I’ve never seen this place so empty in my life.”

“And you—she—you. You were little when you. When you.”

“Died.”

Winter nodded.

“Yeah, I noticed,” she said, gesturing back to the date in the stone.

“I don’t understand—”

“That makes two of us,” Jacqueline said. “You don’t happen to have three pieces of chrono quartz on you? Time crystals, I think they’re also called? They would’ve appeared very suddenly about uh,” she reached into her pocket and pulled something long and flat out. “An hour or so ago?”

Stunned into silence still, unsure what to even do or say, choking on all the emotions in her throat, Winter shook her head no.

“Dang. That would’ve made this way easier.”

“Made what easier? I don’t understand,” she said, smothering the emotions and finding her voice. “What is going on? I’d thank you kindly to explain it to me,” Winter snapped, still shaking a bit. “Who are you?”

“Jacqueline. Jacqueline Frost. Your daughter. That’s who I am. But I’m not from this timeline,” she answered, thrusting her hand back into her pocket and rummaging about. She pulled out a long, light blue, leather wallet, and cracked one of three sides open. She slid it onto Winter’s lap, pointing at the photo in the clear pocket on front, usually reserved for a licence. “This is the timeline I’m from. See? There’s me. And you and Dad,” she said, pointing to the couple above her.

Hands shaky, Winter reached out and brought the wallet up to her face. She could scarce recognize the couple in the photo. Blaise was laughing, his eyes crinkling in the corners. He held her tightly, his suit molten, his hair living up to his namesake (she missed his fiery locks). The woman beside him was even more unrecognizable. Warm. Not frozen at all. Her hair a messy double bun, with her own laugh lines to match his. They held onto each other tightly. She could almost feel the ghost of his warm embrace, the surety that came with one of his hugs.

And there was the woman in front of her. Her daughter, her baby girl. Grinning with snow falling down her face, a pale hand having smooshed a snowball right onto the top of her head as the photo was snapped. Winter glanced over, briefly, to the figure beside this Jacqueline.

That was her baby boy.

Beside her. Alive and well. Both of them alive and well.

She looked up at Jacqueline, her eyes wide. “It is you. But it isn’t. And this is how we are, where you come from?”

Jacqueline nodded, gently pushing Winter’s thumbs down. “And there’s more of us.”

Winter looked back down, moving her thumbs the rest of the way. “Oh.”

Below the two eldest were a pair of twins, most certainly. Both took after Blaise; both had fiery hair, and both were making the silliest faces you could possibly imagine. Fingers stretching the mouth of the girl, her tongue sticking out. The boy blowing a raspberry, making little bunny ears behind the girl’s head.

“Oh, look at them. Little spitfires. We always wanted to have more kids.”

“I shouldn’t ask. I shouldn’t get involved, I should just find my shit and get out of here, but holy shit, I need to know. What happened to you?” Jacqueline asked, gently sliding the wallet out of her mother’s hands.

“I—we—oh. Oh, I don’t quite know, come to think of it. Nobody’s ever asked,” she said, another sob escaping. “I—we. It. Everything was so—” she flailed her hands in the air a bit, trying desperately to find the words she wanted to say.

“It’s okay, take your time. I’m not going anywhere. Not until I find those crystals,” she said, glancing surreptitiously at the monument behind her with a frown.

“He killed you,” she finally said, her breath hitching. “You died in my arms. There was nothing we could do. The storm…it…we couldn’t get to the Springs in time and you. You died.” She pressed the base of her palms to her eyes with a shaky inhale. “He ran. Your Father and I laid you to rest. We watched your little tiny body pop off into Rosehaven. And then we had to face what would come next.”

“Both kids gone in different ways,” Jacqueline mused, looking thoughtful.

Winter nodded, without looking up. The icy white dress she wore blurred beneath her tears. She sniffled. “Yes. And your father, he had to find your brother. But he couldn’t bring himself to start, he was feeling so much—and he hardened his heart not long after I did the same to myself.”

“Oh,” Jacqueline said, realizing what had probably happened. Blaise was a very dutiful sprite, though very emotional. And she had heard the stories from the both of them, about the war of succession, and how Blaise had tried, fruitlessly, to reason with him, not wanting to hurt his brother—but learning that if he wanted to end it, do what needed to be done…he’d have to put aside those feelings to focus on the task at hand.

And so he had.

“We drifted, I suppose. We didn’t talk; he threw himself into trying to bring you justice,” Winter said, gently laying her hand on Jacqueline’s cheek. Her breath hitched again; Jacqueline brought up her shoulder, squishing Winter’s hand between it and her cheek with a soft smile.

“That wasn’t going to bring me back,” Jacqueline said softly.

“That’s what I told him!” Winter said with a huff. “He didn’t reply. A conversation with him was rare. So, I found solace in the mountains. And eventually I made them my home,” she said, with a helpless little shrug.

“So I died, and you ran off to the mountains and became the new Snow Queen.”

"I suppose...yes. I did.”

“Why not come see me on a convergence? They aren’t rare. They happen once or twice a year.”

“I couldn’t bring myself to. Neither of us could.”

Jacqueline stood up. “So let me get this straight,” she said, her prior annoyance coming right back, with a slight pinch of anger dusted on top. “I died, and instead of supporting each other and sharing your grief, you and Blaise both decided to harden your hearts and run away from home? And you didn’t come to see me?!”

“Your father didn’t run away from home,” Winter said, standing up gracefully and folding her hands in front of her. “He’s still there.”

“But he ran away from his home,” Jacqueline said, pointing at Winter’s heart. “And so did you. All the way up in the mountains! And you left me alone, waiting?!”

“I visit you every week!” Winter snapped. “So does your father!”

“You visit my MARKER! NOT my ME! I can guarantee you, Winter, that that little girl sat and waited on the other side for the very first convergence after she passed, hoping to see her Mom and Dad and Brother again.”

“HOW could you KNOW that?!”

“BECAUSE I AM HER! And I may not have died, but when this,” she said, gesturing violently at the date on the stone, “happened to me, and I recovered BECAUSE you and Dad worked together to keep me stable UNTIL you could blaze a trail to the springs, I waited! Every day, for so long, I sat and waited and hoped that he’d come back but he didn’t. And now, now, I’m learning, that not only did he not come back, nor did my PARENTS?!” Jacqueline let out a little squawk of rage, stomping around this version of her Mother. “She’s still a little four-hundred-year-old girl over there! Do YOU think she understands all THIS?!” Jacqueline said, gesturing at all of Winter. “NO! SHE DOESN’T because I DIDN’T until I was like, fourteen hundred! And she doesn’t get that luxury. She doesn’t get to grow up and figure it out herself, so the LEAST you COULD’VE done was gone to visit her during a goddess damned convergence!”

Winter was stunned. What horrible things to say, she thought. But they were true. And Jacqueline was right. Winter felt…lost. More so than usual. A lot of. Things. Were coming to the surface and she was utterly speechless.

“Nothing to say? That’s not surprising, you’re about as frosted up as they come, eh Mom? I’ll leave you to your fake visit, then,” Jacqueline said, stomping back down the way Winter had come up, a trail of frost sprawling out from her boot every time one hit the ground.

“Wait! Jacqueline! Where are you going?!”

“HOME,” she said angrily, flashing one last frustrated look back up at Winter before disappearing on the spot.

Winter was left to her solitude once more. Alone. She should have been relieved.

But she wasn’t.

“Home…” she murmured to herself. She gasped, eyes growing wide. “Oh dear,” she said, setting off after Jacqueline.

---

How had this day gotten so out of control?!

She couldn’t believe what she had seen. First her own grave, then a mother so far lost in her grief she was barely recognizable? And learning what had happened? The Convergences existed for a reason—to see the loved ones you had lost, if only for a brief night. It was a nice time! It was fun! Roseterra glowed and would be filled with both the living magibeans and the dead, laughing and catching up and talking about what they had missed on both ends of the things, and god if she had died, she knew she would’ve waited in the hopes she’d see Mom and Dad and Jack again and—

“Oh my gods. Jacqueline. FOCUS,” she said to herself, as she pushed open the rusty gates and stomped up the pathway. The roses were sad. Wilting, but not dead. The ground looked weird, not covered in snow but frozen solid. The Manor loomed ahead. Pristine as the day it was painted white. Not a scorch mark in sight. The windows were dark and cold; not a single light was on. Her home, usually cheery and loud and happy, was cold. Cold, dark, and empty.

“This is all sorts of fucked up,” she said out loud.

What was she going to do today originally? Oh yeah! Find a pot, trap a. Thingy, then enjoy a steak at the Keg with the love of her life. Perfect day! Would have been a PERFECT day!

But now she had seen her own grave, confronted her lost in grief mother, yelled at her for ignoring her daughter even though she was dead, and was now stomping up the derelict stairs to the front porch of Frost Manor, the wooden deck boards greying, not a single piece of colourful mismatched patio furniture in her sights. What even was this place?

She didn’t bother to knock; she tried the door.

It wasn’t locked.

The door swung in with a creak, a cold gust of wind blowing down the hallways. It echoed, a low hum throughout the empty halls. The ghost of what could have been. The windowpanes rattled; the cobwebs, built up over time, gently waved in the draft. She ran a finger along one of the shoe racks as she closed the door, a trail left in the dust.

She walked in, the metallic clink of her boots echoing throughout the cold marble hall. The door to the front room with the window she waited under was closed shut. Ha, she thought, the symbolism not lost on her.

The blue parlour was closed, too; she tried the handle. Locked. Made her way into the kitchen.

It looked lived in. It was cleaner than the rest of the house. The plants that Spring kept giving them still sat in their perches, but they had seen much better days, most certainly; and there were less of them than she remembered. She stepped around the table (noting that the leaf had been taken out and it had been brought down to its smallest possible size) and poked her head into the living room.

Empty. Pristine. Dusty. Cobwebby. Severe lack of throws and cushions.

“Oh, Dad. What have you done,” she mused, leaving the doorway and heading back out into the hall. She glanced up the stairs. It was dark as ever up there, the draft howling down the steps. She shoved past, beelining to the other side of the steps.

Ballroom. Library. Closed. No light.

But the office…the dullest glow under the crack.

She stepped carefully; lightly, like the first few snowflakes that slowly drifted in on the wind, landing on the ground softly. Quietly. She placed her hand on the doorknob. She frowned. Maybe…just to be safe.

She knocked; her fist flattening, splayed out on the door.

There was no answer.

She turned the knob, opening the door a crack. Peeking one eye in, she glanced around.

The fireplace was on, but not roaring. The embers softly cackled, the fire out of food. Jacqueline stepped through the door, glancing around the office. The firewood was right where he kept it, back at home.

She grabbed a couple of smaller logs, not quite twigs but not quite sticks, and gently lay them in the fireplace. She may not have been able to create fire, but Blaise sure as shit made sure his kids could start fires regardless of their elemental backgrounds.

The flames licked the logs hungrily, the simmer becoming a crackle. Satisfied, Jacqueline moved away from the fireplace, trailing her fingers on the solid mahogany trim of the desk as she surveyed the office.

It was certainly lived in, that’s for sure. The chair was worn, the cushion in dire need of reupholstering. The desk was a tidy mess, piles of paper stacked neatly. Orderly. It was a stark difference from her dad’s office back at home, with papers laying around all over the place, pens and quills beside half written notes, the coaster sporting rings from numerous warm drinks.

The coaster on this Blaise’s desk was too clean. Far too clean.

There was a thunk out in the hall. The door slammed shut; a heavy footfall approaching. Jacqueline gasped, turning quickly to face the door. The coaster went flying, hitting the mantle as loud as it possibly could, and falling to the ground with a clatter, making sure to do three flips before settling for MAXIMUM NOISE, of course. Just her luck on this fine, fine, day.

“Who’s there?” a voice said. It was familiar, but also…not. It was gruffer than usual; a little hoarse. And there wasn’t much warmth. Yeah, a weird sentiment, but when her dad spoke, you could just feel a sort of warmth, usually. She backed up, behind the desk, finding herself shifting into a defensive stance and unsure why.

“I heard you drop the coaster,” he said, his footsteps coming towards the office. “Final warning. Who’s. There.”

The door was shoved open, and Jacqueline gasped once again, this time, in surprise.

“What the fuck happened to you?!” she said, equal parts confused and almost…disgusted, the same time that Blaise growled and said, “Who the hell do you think you are?!”

It wasn’t that he looked bad. He just didn’t look like Blaise. Like, he did but he didn’t. Granted, Jacqueline had never actually seen what a frozen summer sprite looked like. Or I guess stony, she thought, as she quickly eyed him up and down, still in her defensive stance.

His fiery hair was out, but not the usual greying-orange. It was dark. Ashen. Grey flakes drifted down every so often. It was a fire that had burnt completely, leaving nothing but ashes in its wake. His usual molten suit was dark as obsidian. Like lava that had rapidly cooled. His face was lined, but not in the way she was used to; he looked frownier than he did at home, his smile lines faint as could be. Though she could make out the faint crinkles of crow’s feet still near his eyes. It should’ve been a welcome sight, you know? Like, maybe her Dad was still in there somewhere.

But it was not. It only made her feel more unsettled.

“Like, did someone like, set you on fire with fire that wasn’t like, fire you’re fireproofed to? Is that ash coming off of your HEAD?!”

“I don’t answer to you,” Blaise said, taking another step into the office. “You answer to me. You’ve broken into my house.”

“You left the door unlocked! I’d hardly call that breaking and entering.”

“Who are you, and what are you doing in my house?”

“You don’t know who I am?”

“I know who you look like, but that’s not possible. There’s no way. Tell me, is this a trick? Is he trying something? Centuries without a peep, and now this? Was he biding his time? You sound just like him.” He took a step closer with each question, Jacqueline stepping back with each of his steps. He rounded the desk as she rounded the other side, the door now behind her. “You have ten seconds,” he said, with a fierce air of finality.

Jacqueline inhaled, shoved her hands in her pockets, and spoke very, very fast.

“I am exactly who you think I am but also not quite! I’m not from this timeline, I’m from a different one and I have proof, here you GO,” she said, tossing her wallet at the ashen man in front of her. “And please don’t burn it. It has all my ID in it. Which is kind of important. I still get carded at the LCBCS.”

Blaise looked up at her, his orange eyes stony. Suspicious. His lips were pressed together in a tight line, but he humoured her; he had been presented with evidence, after all. Fair is fair. He watched her wearily, cracking open the wallet without looking.

“Clear pocket. Right on the first fold.”

“Hands where I can see them,” he growled.

“Alright, alright, chill,” Jacqueline said, putting her hands up and glaring right back. “Take a looksie. See for yourself.”

Only when her hands were above her head did Blaise glance down at the photo.

His breath hitched. He tried to take it all in at once; all six figures. He glanced back up as he reached the middle, matching the young woman in the photo below him with the young woman looking a little more pissed off with each passing second in front of him. The Jack look, as Winter once called it, when he saw his eldest beside this version of Jacqueline. And below them, below the frosty pair, was a fiery pair, making goofy faces. Summer sprites. Like him.

Twins.

“They get along?”

“Too well some days, which would be worrying if they didn’t occasionally tackle each other down for a quick little fistfight. But like, they’re not going to start a war, since we both know that that’s what you’re thinking about, eh?”

Blaise didn’t reply. He glanced back down at the photo. He snapped his fingers, a little flame appearing on his pointer finger. He touched it to the wick of the candle beside him, surveying the photo in better light. Winter. His darling wife. Toasty warm and laughing, looking up at him with all the love in the world. The flame flickered; he looked at the man beside her. Lit up like the goat in Sweden during the holiday season, all smiles and laughter. He tilted the photo. The glare from the candlelight obscured it, his own stony face looking back at him instead.

He fell back into his seat, shoving the wallet across the desk as he collapsed, holding his head in both hands, completely messing up his ashy hair.

“What is going on here.”

Jacqueline put down her hands, heading over to the east side of the office. “Well, in the timeline I’m from, I survived,” she said, dragging over the spare chair. “You and Mom staunched the bleeding and stabilized me. Kept a close eye on me until you could get to the springs and finish the healing process. You, mostly. Once the wounds were taken care of, Mom passed right out,” she finished, the chair stopping in front of his desk. “But right when it happened, you worked together. And you both saved me. Amazing what happens when you work together, instead of, you know, hiding away from one another and hardening your hearts and not talking ever at all and ALSO, not VISITING ME!”

“HEY. I visit you every day! Except Wednesdays. Town Hall is on Wednesdays.”

“And convergences,” Jacqueline snapped, slamming her hands on the desk before sitting down on the chair, surveying Blaise with a very, angry look. “You don’t come on the one day you could actually see me. What the fuck, man.”

“Watch your language, missy. You may be from a different timeline, but I’m still your father.”

“You’re actually nothing like my Blaise,” Jacqueline said with a sniff, leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms. “He—”

“SAVED you. I get it. I didn’t. I couldn’t.”

“No. I mean yeah, he did. But no. He was there for his family. Looks to me like you haven’t been. They needed you, Blaise. And you did this instead. And I know for a fact that you needed them, too.”

“I—” Blaise stopped, opening and closing his mouth. He frowned, clasping his hands together and placing them in front of his face, lost for words.

“Mhmm. Yeah. That’s what I thought,” she said, shifting in her seat. “Look, I won’t be all up in your, uh, ash for too long, Blaise,” she said. “I came for one thing. Well, two things, actually.”

“What, to yell?”

“No, that just comes with the territory. I am a very angry sprite. It’s very inconvenient most days.”

“You inherited my temper, I see.”

“Regrettably,” Jacqueline said, scrunching her face. “But that’s not important right now. What I need to know is why the hell. This!” she said, gesturing to him. “Why did you do this?”

Blaise’s posture, up until then, had been immaculate. But when the ghost of his daughter demanded to know why this had happened, his shoulders fell; his back slouched, his stony façade turned sad. “You were murdered,” he simply said. “By my son. Your own brother. I couldn’t let him go unpunished! You died. But he was—he is my son. But you were—are—my daughter! My emotions were blinding me to what needed to be done, once again, and so I—”

“Got stoned.”

Blaise frowned. “Har-har,” he said, unlaughingly.

“I don’t like puns,” Jacqueline clarified.

“A shame,” Blaise said back. “That was a good one.”

“I never would’ve guessed,” Jacqueline snapped back. “So you did this, and then went on a whole catch me if you can kind of journey with Jack?”

“He needed to be brought to justice! You needed justice!”

“DID I?” Jacqueline demanded, shooting out of her seat. The chair teetered behind her briefly, choosing not to fall over. “Because I am DEAD. I don’t need ANYTHING when I’m DEAD, Dad. And here’s the thing, right? We’re not ordibeings. We’re MAGIBEINGS. And our afterlife actually lets us VISIT WITH THE DEAD ON CERTAIN DAYS! YEARLY! SOMETIMES TWICE A YEAR! So instead of going to see me on a convergence, you decided you knew what I needed and just, just, became obsessed with this chase and for what? I’M not the one who needed justice. You thought that I did. That you did. But that’s not what you needed and we both know that, don’t we?”

“How could you know all of this?”

“Because I AM Jacqueline! I am that little girl who died in her mother’s arms, but I didn’t die! And do you know what I did when I got better, Dad? Hmm? I WAITED. I waited for my brother to come home, and he never did. So I can guarantee that your little girl waited convergence after convergence, hoping to see you and Mom and even JACK, but none of you came! None of you came! You left her waiting. Left ME waiting!”

“We couldn’t—I couldn’t. I couldn’t bring myself to go and face you after all that had happened—”

“Save it. I’m not the one who needs to hear it. She is. And she’s not here. I am.”

She took a deep breath in, composing herself, pushing off the desk and heading towards the door.

“I’m going to go now before I EXPLODE. Just one more thing before I go,” she said, turning around. “You wouldn’t happen to have come into possession of three time crystals about, oh, an hour and a half or so ago?”

“Some what?”

“That’s a no, then? UGH. Lady damn it ALL,” she said, stomping down the hall.

“Jacqueline, wait!” Blaise called after her, rushing to catch up with her. “Where are you going?”

“I have one more place to check for those time crystals. You and I both know where I’m headed next,” she said, a literal icy undercurrent in her voice. “Tell me where you put him.”

“I—you can’t. It’s too dangerous.”

“Like hell it is! I can handle myself, and you know that if you don’t tell me I’ll find out one way or the other, Blaise. So tell me. Where. Did. You. Put. Him.”

Blaise sighed. “We built an entire prison just for him. The rehabilitation programs at the Pen did nothing for him; he refused to even try. He escaped multiple times, and each and every time I was there, ready to find out how and stop it from ever happening again. One too many escapes later, and the Assembly decided to fund a whole new prison just for him. A solitary. That’s what we’ve called it. The Solitary. It’s in the East.”

“Oh my goddess of the springs. A whole ass prison just for him? This is the worst timeline I have been in today. I hate it here. Right, I’m gonna head out and do that, and you know what you’re going to do? YOU’RE going to go to your wife and give her a hug, for Frost’s sake! You need your loved ones, Blaise. Stop being stupid.”

And before he could reply, she stomped out the front door and poofed into a shower of light blue sparks and snowflakes, disappearing.

“Jacqueline!” he shouted, though he knew his efforts were in vain.

She was long gone.

The shout echoed. But it sounded…off. It sounded…

It wasn’t his voice.

He stepped out onto the porch. A figure stood by the gates. Graceful; shapely.

He’d recognize her anywhere.

“Winter?” he said, quietly.

“Blaise,” she replied, just as quietly.

Something had changed. Something shifted. They both stared across the path at each other, the winds howling.

They ran.

They both ran, beelining down the path, crashing into a familiar, comforting embrace. She still smelt the same; Blaise pressed her head close to his chest, breathing her in deeply. And he was still so sturdy; his hugs were still so very comforting, Winter was happy to learn, as she pressed herself against his chest, her ear on his heart. Hearing it beat.

“I’m so sorry,” they both said at the same time, still hugging one another.

“I don’t know why I didn’t open up,” Blaise said. “I’m sorry. I should have shared with you. I should have supported you.”

“And I you,” Winter said, squeezing him tighter. “I’ve had the strangest encounter today, and I... I needed you. Need you. Miss you.”

Blaise sighed, content, squeezing her tightly. “And I you. Tell me something, Winter. Did you see an adult Jacqueline today?”

“I did,” she said, pushing herself off his chest to look up at his face. She placed her palm on his cheek, rubbing it softly with her thumb. She smiled. “Did you?”

“I did, too,” he said, placing his chin on top of her head. The tinniest peck pressed onto his neck. His heart fluttered; sparks drifted up from his head. “She yelled at me. A lot.”

“She yelled at me, too. But she said some things that got me thinking, and brought it all back. As if seeing our fully grown dead daughter wasn’t enough, she was also. Oh. There’s this phrase the winds have whispered to me...ah! Yes. She was spitting facts, and all of that brought everything back. I don’t know why I shied away from you, darling. I needed you. I need you. I love you. And I’m sorry.”

Now Blaise pulled away, his large hand on Winter’s small face. He gave her a warm smile, rubbing her cheek as well. “Not as sorry as I am. I need you, too. So much. I love you,” he said, kissing the top of her head. “And I’m sorry for pulling away and throwing myself into the stupid game of cat and mouse Jack and I played—oh. Oh shit,” Blaise said, blanching.

“What? What’s wrong?”

“Jacqueline. She's heading his way,” Blaise said, squeezing Winter’s arms. “We need to hurry. I don’t know what she’s planning on doing, but if she’s headed towards him...”

“There is no way that could possibly be good,” Winter agreed, rushing after Blaise, the two heading east as fast as they could.

---

Deny it all as he might, she’s still always just there.

It was very irritating.

She’s stopped giggling; there’s no whispers of whoops or silly sounds anymore. She’s just there, looking sad, and he brings the book closer to his face so he doesn’t have to see the ghost he trapped in the Solitary with him. The Solitary. He really oughta think of a better name.

But he just doesn’t have the energy, the drive, the…whatever.

There was a reason he froze the place solid and stayed put.

He tried to focus on his book. Reading the same sentence, over and over. He exhaled, annoyed, putting the book down and expecting to see her in front of him.

But she’s gone. There are no flickers of white or quick wisps of messy dark hair turning a corner.

It’s empty. The wind blows through the area, mournfully. Even with the furniture he had gotten, the other odds and ends, it is still loud and echoey. He sighed.

Creak.

What was that?

He strained his ears. The creaking was getting louder, shifting into a loud CRACK, somewhere above him. He looked up so fast he almost gave himself whiplash.

The ceiling was splitting.

“What?” he croaked, his voice not as hoarse as you’d expect.

Down the hall, there was a smack. A bang. A shink or two. A thunk against the wall, and a low groan.

“Marcel?” he called out.

Footsteps were approaching, but they didn’t sound familiar. They’re boots. There’s a weird metal click to them. He shot up, hands aglow, ready for whatever. Whoever was coming his way.

But nothing could've prepared him for who stepped through the tunnel.

She was an inch or two shorter than him; very much most definitely a winter sprite. She stopped in the doorway, looking at him unimpressed, an eyebrow raised. He found himself backing up; he could see the similar features, and his thoughts drifted back to the ghost of the small girl he was always seeing. Add a touch of roundness and a bit of baby fat and unfreeze the hair, and, well.

It’s her. It’s one hundred percent her.

“Marcel’s DEAD,” she said.

“What?” Jack asked, what little colour there was in his face draining.

“Ha! I’m kidding. He’ll be fine,” she replied with a small, impish smile. It dropped suddenly; she squinted. “Probably. So quick question for you, Jack,” she continued, walking right up to him without a care in the world. “Was the several meters of ice to keep people out? Or keep you in? Because let me tell you, it was a shit job. I cracked through it easily.”

“You can’t be here,” he heard himself saying. “You shouldn’t be here! You…I…”

“YEAH. I am AWARE. You killed me dead. This is the FOURTH TIME TODAY someone has REMINDED ME, as if you can easily shake coming face to face with your own damn grave marker,” she said with a huff. “So what’s you’re deal? I’m surprised you let yourself get captured. My GOD you look frosty,” she finished, right beside him now. She knocked on his frozen spikes.

“Hey! Cut it out,” he snapped, pushing her hand away.

“No need to be nippy,” she sassed back, hands on her hips.

Jack straight up recoiled. He was pretty damn positive now: the sprite in front of him was his long dead sister. A little younger than she would’ve been now, had she survived. Had she lived. Had he not…killed her. He backed up a few steps, the edge of the plush seat hitting the back of his knees.

All the thoughts, all the feelings, all of the things he had wondered that he had pushed down down down came screaming up to the surface as he collapsed into his chair.

For once in his life, he found himself utterly speechless.

“Okay, so I’m going to guess you’ve just been living in denial,” his sister said, not a ghost but actually real, and alive, and in front of him. “You sit there and process, I don’t plan on being long. I’ve about HAD IT up to HERE,” she half yelled, putting her hand high above her head, “with this AWFUL timeline. You know how my day started, Jack? I just needed to find a pot for Myles. That’s it! To trap a little chaotic shade! And NOW I’ve been pulled into yet ANOTHER alternate universe, and goddess above, I thought the one where Bernard and I were a THING was bad, this one is by FAR worse!” she said, her arms crossed at her chest briefly before she dropped them, the ground around her cracking in response. “I’ve already tried Mom, and Dad, and if you don’t have what I need then I am going to have to do something very, very crazy that only one other person I know of has done before and lived to tell the tale. Did three time crystals, little purple-ish quartz looking things, appear around you about, uh,” she pulled something out of her pocket and squinted at it. “Three hours ago?”

Still speechless, Jack shook his head no.

“Goddess damn it ALL!” his very alive, very angry little sister said, throwing her hands down and stomping her foot. The cracks below her deepened. “I have a GIRLFRIEND, I don’t have the option to seduce a powerful castor right now!”

“You have a girlfriend?” Jack found himself asking.

“What, you got a problem with that?”

“No, of course not, I—”

“Yeah, I know dude. I’ve met some of your partners,” she said with a smirk that made Jack blush a bit and clear his throat. “Some of them are real cool. There’s one that Fiera’s like, determined to fight for some reason that’s very baffling to all of us—”

“Who’s Fiera?”

“Oh. Right,” Jacqueline says. “I died so the twins never came around, right. Here you go,” she said, throwing a long leather object his way.

Snatching it clean out of the air, he flipped open the unbuttoned side, coming face to face with a wallet sized family photo.

“Fiera’s the girl on fire, and Fino’s her twin, the boy who is also on fire. The universe I come from, where I survive, they exist.”

Jack stared at the him in the photo, happily smooshing a pile of snow on his Jacqueline’s head, their younger siblings below them making funny faces, and their parents above them, together, lost in each other’s eyes. He felt a pang in his chest as he came to the quiet realization that, oh. He kind of. He kind of missed them.

A pale hand stretched out in his peripheral. He glanced over; Jacqueline had her hand out, looking unimpressed. “Wallet please,” she said.

He snapped it closed, passing it back to her.

“Thank you,” she said, shoving it back in her pocket. She turned on her heel, heading back out the way she came.

“Wait! Don’t. Don’t go yet,” he said, unsure why but knowing he couldn’t let her leave just yet.

She stopped in the doorway, standing still; head tilted.

“I didn’t—I never meant to. It wasn’t my intent—” he took a deep breath. “You know, right? You know it wasn’t. That I didn’t. That I—”

“Never wanted to hurt me,” she said softly, still not turning around. “It was an accident. You were having a big emotions night and your powers were going crazy, and your hand slipped. Yeah. I know. You told me. That is, my you told me.”

His shoulders sagged; he could feel something...wet trailing down his cheeks. He touched his cheek, brushing away tear tracks of all things.

His sister watches. For the briefest of moments, as their gazes meet, the fury falls away. She looks so very concerned, and he can see her hands twitch upwards, not in defence or offence but as though she wanted to reach out and give him comfort.

“I’m sorry,” he finally said, voice barely a whisper.

And then it’s gone. The fury is back. She took a deep breath in, nostrils flaring. “It’s not me who needs to hear that,” she replied, rage withheld. “It’s her.”

And for a moment, he feels her. The little ghost he trapped in the solitary with him. He whips around.

A flicker of white.

A tress of dark hair, disappearing round the bend.

He turns back around.

The other ghost, the real one, is gone.

---

Stepping over the unconscious guards and hopping out of the Jacquie-sized crack in the ice she had made, Jacqueline stopped, bending over, hands on her knees.

She could feel herself breathing very fast. Her heart was racing; there was a nasty heat behind her eyes. She wanted so badly to just stop, and cry, and sob, because holy shit. Holy FUCKING shit. This day is so. What the fuck. This TIMELINE is so. What the fuck.

“OKAY Jacqueline,” she said out loud, snapping back up. “Focus.”

Her voice sounded heavy. She took a deep breath in; held it a bit, staring at the tips of her fingers before finally exhaling. “We can have a nice long frustrated cry later, when we’re NOT trying to escape the JACQUELINE DIES timeline.”

Another deep breath. Her hands pressed together, in front of her face. Her nose scrunched, forehead wrinkling as she thought of her next steps.

“I need to break into Rosehaven,” she mused, tapping her lips. “Which means, off to the east I go! I’ve got a wicked old witch to see. But first!”

Turning around, Jacqueline rested her palms on the icy walls beside her exit. With a fierce look of concentration, hands aglow, the ice beneath her grew, covering the dent she made, a smooth patch appearing right over the jagged, pointy, inside out job.

“There we go,” she said, surveying her work, hands on her hips. “All patched up! Now onto the hard part,” she thought out loud, turning to face the mountains in the distance.

Two sharp peeks protruded in the night, a little structure on the tip of each one. The cliffs below them were dotted with hundreds of other huts and shacks and cottages, windows glowing in the dark, foliage twirling all over the settlement.

She took a step towards the skyline. Then another. On the third step, she disappeared, a bright flash of light blue light in the quickly darkening evening.

---

Something felt...different.

Jack tried to go back to his book and his plush chair, but found that for once, he was unable to shove all the feelings deep, deep down and go about his not-so-merry way. They were coming up; his insides were on fire. His cheeks wouldn’t stop getting wet.

Everything he had held back for years was coming up, and he couldn’t do anything about it.

He stepped out into the hall. Tentatively. Sort of surprised but not quite when nothing happened.

The barrier seemed to be down.

The guards were slumped against the walls, carefully placed in somewhat comfortable positions. Their weapons were abandoned; Jack waved his hand, a north wind billowing through the hall. It picked up the weapons, and, at his command, tossed them deep, deep, deep into his personal quarters.

A quick scan of the guards. They seemed okay; a little worse for the wear, but Jack didn’t see any blood or broken bones.

“Marcel?” he asked, crouching beside the guard closest to the door. He waved his hand in front of Marcel’s face.

The man groaned, unmoving.

Fine. Probably. Just like she had said.

Standing back up, Jack frowned, deep in thought.

He needed to move, to act, to do something.

But what?

He figured he had a few minutes, if he was lucky, before the guards get back up and were able to recast the barrier again. He stepped back; something rolled under his heel, crunching.

Marcel’s wand, snapped in two.

Well, so much for the barrier, then.

Alright. Good. More time to, to think. To decide. To figure something out.

He thinks back to the angry ghost. Something she had said. There was something there that had his fae senses screaming. A quick run through their conversation until—

I have a GIRLFRIEND, I don’t have the option to seduce a powerful castor right now!

“Oh no,” Jack said, paling.

He knew exactly what she was going to do.

But she’s dead! If this version of her were to try it...

“She’ll be trapped,” Jack realized.

With that in mind, his decision was easy as could be. He couldn’t save her then.

But he could save her now.

He straightened. Shook out his arms; his shoulders. His fingers crack. He lifts a foot, then slams it into the ground.

Around him, the prison shuddered. It began to shake. The fault lines she had left grew larger. Chips of ice rained down around him. He sliced a hand through the air. The walls on his right began to splinter and fracture, the light within growing dim as the place rumbled. He sliced his other hand through the air, the walls on his left mirroring their reflections.

He moved both arms up again, and sliced them both down through the air with a whoosh.

The walls didn’t just break.

They shattered.

The ceiling came down, the ice chunks bouncing off of the air above Jack, slamming into the ground around him.

In seconds, the entire icy exterior crumbled, the walls he had frozen so long ago coming down with it.

Outside, the sky is dark. Reddish purplish. The sun is going down in the distance. The air is fresh, if a little cold, and sharp. He inhales it, deeply. It’s wintry. Quite odd for the Eastern Province, but Autumn was known to have a bit of a chill, and Jack was certain that his presence here had effected the weather patterns a good amount, too.

Besides, what was a little more oddness? This whole day had been weird already, and it was only going to get weirder.

He stood still until the prison finished crumbling around him. The guards were unscathed; chunks headed their way magically redirected themselves, landing away from them. It’s the least, Jack thought, that he can do for them. After all, they had been very kind to him, and they hadn’t needed to be at all. Not for him. a criminal; a murderer. Of sisters. His own sister.

"Snap out of it, Jack!" he scolded himself, shaking his head and turning on the spot.

Onto business, he thought, straightening his jacket. Doing up a button and readjusting his cuff links. Glancing wearily at the pointy mountains in the distance.

There is only one castor he knows of that will happily help Jacqueline.

The same one who had helped him centuries ago.

Ice and dust drifting about, the Witch's Peaks in his sights, Jack made his way forward, determined.

But three steps in, a tiny gasp reached his ears.

He stopped dead in his tracks, tilting his head; listening.

Something…someone was there.

And though it was just a tiny little gasp, it rang familiar. So very familiar.

But that wouldn’t make sense, Jack thought. She wouldn’t be here. It couldn’t be…

“JACK!”

Him too?

Okay, now he was a little scared.

He turned on his heel, looking behind him. Two figures stood together in the distance. One was calling for him; a loud, recognizable voice. He could make out the shape of his palm up against his mouth, his other hand clasped tightly in the hand of the woman beside him. A whole head or so shorter than him, her other hand was in front of her mouth, gently hovering above a shocked ‘o’.

“JACK!” he called again.

“Dad?” Jack said, quietly. “Mom?”

The dust rippled between them. The air finally cleared, revealing Blaise and Winter, his parents, standing hand in hand a short distance away, staring at him with unreadable expressions, as rooted in place as he was.

---

“Look. Gwen. I already TOLD you, I don’t know WHY there’s such an uptick in chaos right now! NOR do I know WHY the air tastes like dark magic!”

“That is BULL and you know it, Cheri.”

“I would LOVE to take credit for this, but I have no idea what this is, girlie. And you know I’m telling the truth! Your goody-goody magic can sense it.”

“Okay, yes, but you’ve messed with it before! and you LOVE lying it's one of your FAVOURITE things!”

“It really is, but listen. Gwen. I’m using your name. not your little nickname. Obviously, I’m being legit right now. Look, don’t get your tutu in a twist, alright? I’ll look into it and if it’s bad bad, I’ll take care of it!”

The door to a small room opened, a witch swathed in black and red waltzing in, huge fuck-off combat boots clunking on the hardwood floor. With a roll of her eyes, she tossed her hat onto the mantle and stopped dead in her tracks when she noticed the woman perched on her desk.

“Your Grand Darkness,” the woman purred, saccharine, miming a curtsy while staying seated.

Cheri recognized her instantly. She smirked. “Ou. This is gonna be good.”

She turned on her heel, Gwen smacking right into her chest.

“CHERI!”

“Sorry Glenda, I’m a bit busy right now,” she said, shoving the tulle covered witch out the door. “We’ll chat later, a-buh-bye,” she finished with a wave, the door slamming shut behind her.

“CHERI!” Gwen shouted from the other side as Cheri cackled, sliding her broomstick through the door handle. She turned around, a feral grin on her face as she surveyed the woman perched on her desk, ignoring the jiggling of the handle and frustrated yells from the other side of the door.

“So you're my little trouble maker today, aren’t ya?” she asked, sauntering up to the desk and surveying the sprite, chin resting on her knuckles.

“Guilty as charged,” the sprite said, hopping down off the desk. Oh, she was tiny. “Look, your darkness, I don’t have much time. And I’m in a very happy, committed relationship with a literal goddess, so seducing you for help is like, out of the question.”

“Oh shit, a goddess? Which one?”

“Pleasure,” the sprite replied, lickity-split. “Greek.”

“Ha-HA, nice one! Up top,” Cheri replied, holding up a hand.

The sprite flushed, but, grinning, high-fived her back.

“Thanks for not leaving me hanging there, girl,” Cheri said, walking around the sprite and looking her up and down. “That would've been awkward. Would’ve had to cover by turning you into a toad or something,” she added, throwing herself into her seat, her feet landing on the desk. “Now I also don’t have much time. The chaos in the air today is ripe for the picking and I have yet to do that, thanks to politics, yuck. So, cut to the chase.”

“I need to break into Rosehaven,” she said.

“Deja vu!”

“Yeah, I know, don’t remind me. Short and sweet or long and complex?”

“Short and sweet baby.”

“Great! I’m from another timeline, and I’m trapped here until I can find the time crystals that power my way home,” she said, shaking a small, golden object in her hand. “Rosehaven is the last place I could think of them being, and I need to get in there and get them back because let me tell you, your Darkness, if I have to stay in this timeline for one second longer? I am going to burst into flames and just EXPLODE.”

Cheri laughed. “You're cute,” she said, recrossing her feet. “I can get you there. But what do you have to offer in exchange?”

“Even more chaos than is presently brewing,” the sprite said with a clever smirk. “In three hours I’ve managed to completely throw off every single Frost, leading to the chaos you’re sensing right now. If I’ve played my cards right, and if I manage to pull this last bit off, the chaos will straight up triple.” She frowned. “That is, if I remember magical chaos theory correctly. I didn’t pay much attention in world magics class,” she admitted with a silly little grin, scratching the back of her head. “And, it’ll piss off a lot of magibeans.”

“Glenda too?”

“Oh, her lightness especially.”

Cheri cackled. “Count me IN,” she said, hopping up and rummaging around the shelves packed FULL of ingredients and artifacts. “One plane shift coming right up.”

“Thank the fucking goddess,” the sprite said, relieved.

“Fair warning, though,” Cheri said over her shoulder, lobbing all sorts of shit into her cauldron. “You're already there, technically. There's a good chance you may get stuck. Rosehaven will let you in, but getting out? Hmm.”

“I’m hoping the time nonsense helps with that,” the sprite replied nonchalantly. “And honestly? Given the choice, I’d rather be stuck THERE than HERE in this timeline. I’ll take my chances, your darkness.”

Cheri laughed. “A sprite after my own heart.”

---

Time passed.

Maybe minutes, maybe seconds; maybe hours.

The parents stared at their son. The son stared at his parents. The dust cleared, exposing them all to one another. Mother and father looking particularly icy and ashen; son looking just as icy, if not more, than mother.

It’s Jack who speaks first, unsurprisingly.

“I know what this looks like, but it’s really not,” he found himself saying, trying very hard to keep the desperation out of his voice. “We can play chase later, you can bring me in again or whatever, I literally do not care, because there is something WAY more important that I need to be doing in a general that-away direction,” he said, pointing towards the rocky crags in the distance that hid Roseterra. “I don’t want to do this the hard way, but I will if I have to!”

“ARE YOU OKAY?!” Blaise shouts across the way.

“I—wait. WHAT?”

The tension, the readiness for battle, the urge to run away, all of it leaves at once. Jack stood, dumbfounded, unsure what to do with himself.

Blaise and Winter shared a look and, with a slight nod, gently walked towards him hand in hand.

Run says his brain.

Don’t, says his heart.

He stays.

Soon enough, they’re face to face. My god they’re old, Jack thinks.

Blaise and Winter think the same thing as they come face to face with their son.

Jack blinks.

They blink back.

Winter opens her mouth to speak; the words die before they can even come out. Unable to say much of anything at that precise moment, she squeezed Blaise’s hand. He nodded.

“Are you okay Jack?” he asked again.

“I—uh.”

Jack looked around, the remnants of the icy walls crystallized around them. The guards have yet to stir; his furniture and possessions are littered about as the wind blows, papers fluttering. The Solitary has been obliterated.

“Mostly.”

“Oh, thank heavens,” Winter finally says. Her eyes are shiny.

“I—okay. WHAT is HAPPENING.”

“We were worried about what she might have done.”

“She—Jacqueline? You guys saw her too?!”

They both nodded.

“Thank the LADY. Look, we don’t have time right now to unpack all of this. We need to go,” Jack says, starting forward.

“Jack, wait.”

“Go where?!”

“To Roseterra!”

Now it’s their turn to be dumbfounded.

Annoyed and short on time, Jack let out an exasperated sigh.

“I know you won’t believe me and that’s fine. But that was her! It was Jacqueline! And she’s about to do something so incredibly stupid and if I don’t go after her right now, immediately, she’s gone! And I can’t…I can’t let that happen again,” he says, voice cracking. “I couldn’t save her then, but maybe I can now!” Jack admits. “I…I didn’t want…I never…I didn’t mean to…”

And he feels tears running down his cheeks. How embarrassing, he thought to himself, sniffing and trying to dry the corners of his eyes.

Suddenly, he’s warm. Very, very warm.

“I know,” Blaise says, quietly, in his ear. “I know. I’m sorry.”

“I loved her,” Jack finds himself saying into his dad’s chest, trying to keep the emotion out of his voice. A usually effortless task that’s really not working for him today. “I never wanted to hurt her and when I did, I—”

“Shh, it’s okay, darling,” Winter says. Jack can feel her arms around him now too. “It’s alright. What’s done is done,” she says, soothingly. “We can’t undo it.”

“But we can help you now,” Blaise said, letting up from the hug. “Whatever you need. We'll help. We're here with you.”

“Winter’s right,” Jack said, lifting his head off of Blaise. “We can’t bring her back. I wish I could! I’d give anything to make it right. But there isn’t anything I can do. In fact, I think it’s safe to say I’ve done enough,” Jack said.

Blaise chuckled, his hairline glowing.

“But what I can do is this. Because somewhere out there is another Jack, who has his Jacqueline; another Winter and Blaise who have her, too! And I don’t want them to lose her. I don’t want them to go through everything we’ve gone through,” Jack said, gesturing around him.

“What is she planning on doing?” Blaise asked, bewildered.

“The thing she travelled with, it has pieces. She was looking for them, and if she visited all of us and we didn’t have them, then there’s only one place left to look.”

Blaise paled. “She’s going to make the jump?”

“One HUNDRED percent. She means business, I mean, look what she did to the guards! To MARCEL!”

“She did that?” Winter asked, eyes widening.

“Uh, yeah,” Jack said, the duh left unspoken but in the air.

“Is it weird that I’m proud?” Winter asked.

“No,” Blaise said. “I am too.”

“It’s impressive,” Jack agreed. “RIGHT! WE HAVE TO GO,” he shouted, rushing forward. "We've wasted enough time as is, best to try and head her off at Roseterra! Cheri's probably already gotten her everything she needs—"

“Jack, wait! Hold on a second—how does he still have this much energy,” Blaise asked Winter, exasperated.

She laughed. “I’ll grab him,” she said, lifting a finger.

A pile of snow shot up in front of Jack. He slammed directly into it. It pushed him back gently, spinning him around to face his parents.

“What,” he snapped.

“Just don’t move for a second,” Blaise said, lifting his palms. They glowed; between them, his staff appeared. He placed it on the ground, uttered a few words, and boom! A circle appeared around Jack.

He glanced down at it, watching the runes and sigils appear in the circle. There were a lot. He grimaced.

With one last incantation, Blaise lifted his staff and slammed it into the ground. The small symbols and shapes cracked, disappearing until the circle was empty. It faded into the ground, Jack feeling lighter than he had in centuries.

“What was all THAT?!” he asked, equal parts offended on his own behalf, and impressed that it took that many enchantments to keep him imprisoned.

“Don’t worry about it,” Blaise said, a couple of sparks popping off of his ashen head. His roots seemed to be glowing now too. “Let’s go save your sister, yeah?”

And with that, the trio rushed off.

---

They made it, but not soon enough.

They slid to a stop, dust flying as Jacqueline turned to level them all with the same icy glare. Below her, the ground was shifting, shimmering and glittering. In her left hand, she held a glass object. In her right, a piece of chalk.

“Jacqueline, don’t!” Jack said, stepping forward.

She let out one single, sharp HA. “I do what I want, Jack,” she said, coldly. Looking them all dead in the eye one at a time, she dropped the glass ball onto the ground, right into the shimmering circle.

It shattered, and a pink cloud poofed up. The writing on the monument blurred, a small portal opening up, wider and wider until it was as tall as she was. A bright light surrounded her. Jack held up an arm, shielding himself from the light while still trying to keep a visual on Jacqueline. Behind him, Blaise grabbed Winter. She hid her eyes in his chest, while he, similarly to Jack, shielded his own.

They stood, watching helplessly, as the silhouette of Jacqueline stepped into the portal, disappearing.

It snapped shut, the glow diminishing.

All three of them moved forward, only to be stopped by some sort of unseen forcefield.

“Oh dear,” Winter said, as she watched the two men try and break through it. She tilted her head, the north winds blowing. “I’m afraid that won’t work, dears,” she said.

“What do you MEAN it won’t work? We gotta do SOMETHING!”

“We’re going to lose her AGAIN, Winter!”

“Rosehaven has placed the barrier there. It doesn’t want us to interfere. It’s up to her now.”

“And what, we’re just supposed to stand here and wait?!” Jack asked.

“Precisely,” Winter said, the winds blowing happily behind her.

“And what do we do in the meantime? Talk?!” Blaise asked.

“I don’t see why not,” Winter said, chipper.

Both men looked at each other, distraught.

---

The light was very pink. Blinding, nearly. It smelt like flowers. It felt…amazing. Like she was safe; like everything would be okay. She was home.

Her anger, frustration, annoyance, and fear all disappeared as she came to a very sudden stop.

She opened her eyes.

It was still very pink.

She seemed to be in some kind of large, stone gazebo. Vines twirled up it, a leafy canopy hanging down around her. Flowers bloomed. A fountain trickled somewhere nearby. In front of her stood a podium.

“Welcome to Rosehaven,” said an ethereal voice. “Name, please?”

“Jacqueline Winter Frost,” she said. “Here to see one Jacqueline Winter Frost, if you please.”

The hooded figure looked up, perplexed. Their head tilted under the hood; the material gently creasing. “How curious,” they said, gliding over to Jacqueline. “You are here again, and yet, you are already here.”

Jacqueline looked right into the darkness within the figure's hood. She pulled the time piece out of her pocket.

They recoiled. “Well now, that explains it,” they said. There was a swirl of petals and their hood fell back, revealing a pale face, messy dark hair in a pixie cut of all things, and very familiar brown eyes. They danced with all sorts of warm hues. Red. Orange. Yellow. Like fallen leaves. “May I?” they asked gesturing to the time piece.

Jacqueline nodded. She placed it flat in her palm and held it out for the Hollow.

“Time magic. Well, the good news is you’re safe from being stuck,” they said with a knowing smile. “Here, hold onto that.”

“And the bad news?”

“Hmm?”

“You said the good news. Usually that means there’s bad news to follow?”

“Yes. Well, as the Hollow charged with guarding the entrance, I can’t just let you in, of course.”

Jacqueline sighed. “Oh, gosh. Is it riddles? I am very bad at riddles. I hope it isn’t riddles. I’d say combat but we’d be locked in combat forever, wouldn’t we? Cant fight to the death in the afterlife, can we?”

The Hollow laughed. “Nothing so severe and no riddles for you, snowflake. I have a very simple question you must answer for me.”

“Oh. Uh. Okay.”

“How’s Autumn?”

Jacqueline blinked. “I’m sorry?”

“Autumn? Your Aunt? How is she.”

“I don’t know. This isn’t my timeline. I have no idea how any of my aunts are—”

“I only need to know about Autumn. Your Autumn.”

“My Autumn?”

The Hollow nodded. “I committed a crime, you see. I brought the light life that gave your aunt breath over to Harvest. That is not the duty I was charged with by the goddess. I was supposed to take life, not give it. So, I was punished with door duty.”

“Door duty? For such a steep crime?” Jacqueline asked.

“It was fated,” the Hollow said with a wink. “I am Hollow Eve. Autumn is as much my daughter as she is Harvest’s. We like to know how she’s getting on, in every timeline.”

“This happens a lot then?”

“Nope! Not at all! This is the first time a Frost from another timeline has found their way in here. Carpe diem,” she said with a knowing smile. “How is she back at home?”

Jacqueline blinked. “Oh! Well. She’s doing quite alright,” Jacqueline said, recalling when they last talked. “She recently got into Bones. It’s a show, not the actual bones. That only happens around Halloween. Anyway, she binged that and loved it! She’s still trying to see if she can yield anything from the scar, but no luck yet. She thinks she’s getting close, but she thinks that every year,” Jacqueline said fondly.

“Bones. I shall look into that show I think. Come then, Jacqueline. I will take you to see Jacqueline. We can walk and talk,” they said, gliding over to the exit. “I will grant you safe passage throughout Rosehaven, and back again.”

“Huh,” Jacqueline said. “This was easier than I thought.”

“She was expecting you.”

“That rambunctious little bugger, I knew it. It’s just what I would do.”

Eve laughed. “Fated,” she said, once again. “Come along then, snowflake. Right this way. It’s tea time. Impeccable timing.”

“Fated, even?” Jacqueline teased back.

Eve laughed. “Indeed! Now you're getting it. Let’s get a move on. And tell me more about my child, if you please.”

“Sure,” Jacqueline said, more than happy to talk about her aunt, though it was harder than she had expected.

Not that she didn’t know much about Autumn; they talked regularly, as she did with all three aunts. No, it was just…Rosehaven was beautiful. And as they walked, Jacqueline was enthralled with it, trying to take it all in while sharing all her favourite Aunt Autumn stories. Her multi-tasking skills were not to be found today.

The hills rolled out, impossibly far; the pink sky was bright. Flowers were all over the place, blowing in a breeze that smelt like all of her favourite things: freshly baked cake. Snow. Dite. The beach. Trees towered high, the oddest creatures popping in and out of them, flitting through the sky, over branches, and winding between their feet. Fun little houses dotted the landscape, dwellings matching each magibean that sat, lounging; basking. Playing instruments, working with magic both alone and with their neighbours, explosions of sparkles happening both near and far as magic sprouted up all around them. The pathways sprawled out in the distance, leading to lush forests, jungles; desert, even! And far off in the distance, mountains; a tall, lonely castle, a sharp contrast off in the horizon to the warm and cozy dwellings that surrounded them.

Jacqueline had actually stopped to frown at it for but a moment, as Eve told her not to dwell for too long and come along, if you’d please. And tell me more about Halloween, if you’d be so kind.

And so, the pair continued on through Rosehaven; Jacqueline trying fruitlessly to take in as much detail as possible while telling Eve all about her daughter. Aunt Autumn. They delighted in all the stories Jacqueline shared, as they wound through the lush expanse, Eve practically sparkling the more she heard of Autumn.

Finally, the path widened, the trees growing taller and wider, covered in vines, flowers all over the place. Water trickled in the distance; they walked under a natural stone archway, coming into a beautiful garden. Butterflies fluttered about, the sweetest of scents tickling her nose. The woods and stones and vines and flowers wound together tightly, forming all natural furnishings. At the centre of it all, a stone. A stone that was both devoid of colour and all the colours at once; sparkling faintly, magic shimmering around it.

Just behind this stone was a table. Made of wood and bark, and surrounded by stumps shaped like chairs, a beautiful spread of treats and sweets sat. A teapot glinted in the light, steam coming out of the spout. Four cups sat in saucers, two filled, two more waiting. At the top of this round table sat a woman.

She looked old; ancient, even. Her hair was long, the green still making itself known through the grey. Leaves sat at the top of her braids, turning into flowers, then back to leaves again. Colourful leaves, trailing into frost at the very bottom. Her multiple braids clinked together as she nodded along, green eyes soft, paying rapt attention to her small companion, a soft smile on her dark face.

Her companion stood on her stump chair, talking animatedly and bouncing in place as she used her whole entire body to describe something. Her pigtails bounce as she grinned, blue eyes sparkling, flyaway hairs decorated with snowy beads, a little flower tying each braid off at the end.

Eve cleared her throat.

Both figures stopped talking, turning to look at the pair. The little sprite grinned, bouncing in place once again. The old woman smiled, head tilted.

“Hello, Eve,” she said, her voice soft and loud, sounding like rushing water but also like a soft breeze. It hit Jacqueline, then, exactly who she’d come face to face with. The little gasp slipped out, much to her dismay. The tiny sprite giggled about it. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”

“Mother Gaia. Mistress Frost. You have a visitor,” they said, bowing deeply, and gesturing towards Jacqueline. Flushing, Jacqueline curtseyed deeply. “One Mistress Frost,” Eve said.

“Mother Gaia, it’s an honour,” Jacqueline said, reverent, not sure how long she should bow for.

The woman chuckled. “There’s no need for formalities, dear. Up you go. There we go. Now, I don’t think I have to introduce my companion to you, do I?”

The child giggled. So did the young woman.

“No,” she said.

“We’re good! We know each other!” the child said, bouncing in place. She turned to her older self, meeting the woman’s fierce gaze with one of her own.

“Do you have them?” Jacqueline asked.

With a small smile, she opened her little fist. In it, three pieces of glowing chrono-quartz sat, charged and ready to go.

“Oh thank the goddess,” Jacqueline said, relieved.

“Did you bring me what I wanted?”

“I think the heck I did,” Jacqueline replied, grinning. “May I sit?”

“Please do,” Mother Gaia said, gesturing to the stumps. “Eve?”

“I’ll float, thank you.”

“Have some tea, darling,” Mother Gaia said. Not waiting for an answer, she waved her hand. The pot poured out a cup, cream pouring in along with some honey. The saucer and cup floated, then, landing right in front of Eve’s outstretched hands.

“Thank you, Mother Gaia.”

“Of course. Now then. What have you been up to, my dear?”

“All sorts of nonsense,” Jacqueline said with a sigh, slumping in her seat. Elbow on the table, she held her head, taking a moment to rest. “Chased all three of them down to find those,” she said, pointing lazily at her child self’s hands.

“Are they coming?” the child asked, hope glinting in her big blue eyes.

“I did you one even better, Jacqueline,” she replied, selecting a brownie off the snack tray. “They’re here.

“HERE?!”

“Like, outside, but yes, they are. All three of them.”

“ALL of them?”

“Even Jack.”

The little girl brightened at that, bouncing in her seat again. “Yay! Thank you,” she said, earnestly.

“Of course. Riled them up real good, too,” she added, taking a bite out of her brownie.

“Very much so,” said Gaia. “I can feel the chaos from here.”

“Well you gotta do what you gotta do,” both Jacquelines said, one around a mouthful of brownie. They stopped and looked at each other, blinking, and immediately laughing.

Gaia smiled. “I hope the little one didn’t cause you too much trouble,” Gaia said, booping little Jacquie’s nose fondly. The child let out a teehee.

“She absolutely did,” Jacqueline said, her child self giggling fully now and plopping down in her seat. “You sent me on a goose chase and a HALF girl! Dang! And this on top of the day I have had,” she said, grabbing a tiny cupcake off the platter and peeling off the wrapper. “I was supposed to help a friend find a thing, and then these time shenanigans happened and then I found myself looking at my own GRAVE! I’ve had to yell at my parents and visit my brother in PRISON for KILLING me,” she said, eating the cupcake whole. “I mean, I figured I’d probably visit him in prison more than once in our lifetimes, BUT FOR MURDER? OF MY ME? Would much rather do that visit ALIVE, thank you kindly. Uh, no offence,” she said, embarrassed, glancing around the table as she swallowed the cupcake.

“None at all,” Gaia said.

“I’ve no concept of life,” Eve said. “I simply exist.”

“I’ve been like this for FOREVER! It’s allllll good, Jacqueline,” said the kid, patting her hand.

“I just. I have had a very long day and really want to go home and get a hug from my girlfriend and—”

“WE HAVE A GIRLFRIEND?! WHO? WHAT’S SHE LIKE? IS SHE PRETTY? STRONG? CAN SHE THROW ME? CAN SHE THROW YOU?! CAN SHE THROW US BOTH?”

“Yes to all of that,” Jacqueline said.

“I’m so cool,” kid Jacqueline said, grinning at Gaia.

“The coolest, I'd say,” Gaia said, grinning back. “Now then. Finish up your tea. Have some as well, Jacqueline; you’ll need this particular blend for the journey ahead.”

“Oh?”

“Special properties. They’ll make the planar shift less…cumbersome on the way out.”

“Cumbersome?”

“It was nice coming in,” Eve said. “But it’s quite the opposite going out. This should help. And since you told me what I needed to know, you have my blessing to take as long as you need. I’ll make sure the portal closes when you’re ready,” Eve added, directing the last bit at tiny Jacqueline.

“Got it,” she said, with a determined nod. “Are you coming too, Gram?”

“No child. I’m much too old to be making these planar shifts. I’ll be right here waiting for you to get back and tell me all about it,” she said, eyes crinkling at the corners when she smiled.

Tiny Jacqueline smiled, hopping off her seat and right into Gaia’s arms in a hug.

“Thank you,” she said, squeezing the matriarch.

“Of course,” she said, squeezing back.

“Whenever you’re ready,” Eve said. “Both of you.”

And so, finishing their tea, the two of them got up. Thanking Gaia once again, Jacqueline waited beside Eve, hand outstretched to her child self. “Shall we?”

“Yes please,” Jacqueline said with a grin, taking her hand.

“Then let’s go,” she replied.

Hand in hand, the two sprites started forward, Eve gliding in front of them, leading them back to the lobby, as they called it. Once they had gotten under the gazebo, the vines snapped, cascading down from the roof and blocking the entrances. With creaks and groans, the vines grew larger and larger, entangling amongst themselves to keep from easily being breached.

“Not to worry; this happens with break-ins. I’ll take care of things here. The two of you,” she said, placing a hand over the spot Jacqueline had appeared in upon her arrival, “Do what you need to do, okay?”

“Sure,” Jacqueline said. Beside her, kid Jacqueline scooted closer, grabbing her arm with both hands and tugging.

“Psst,” she said. “Down here.”

Jacqueline sunk down, worry creasing her face. “Yes?”

“What if…what if they’re not there no more? What if we go out there and they’re gone? I…” she sniffled, her lips wobbling.

“Oh, hey now, kiddo. It’s okay,” Jacqueline said, picking herself up and seating her on her leg. “They will be there; I promise. And if they’re not,” she looked left, looked right, and came right up to her ear. “I’ll hunt them down for you myself. Just for you. Okay?”

Eyes wide and teary, the child nodded. “Okay,” she said. Reaching over, she grabbed Jacqueline’s other arm, pulling her hand up to her face. In her palm, she dropped the chrono-quartz. “I’m ready,” she said, sliding off of Jacqueline’s knee and grabbing her hand.

Behind them, there was a sort of fwoom. A bright light filled the lobby, the portal home opening up for them. Glancing back down at her younger self, Jacqueline stepped forward.

“Ready? For sure?”

“Yeah!”

“Then let’s go.”

And, keeping her younger self behind her, Jacqueline stepped back through the portal.

---

Tuckered out, the three sprites sat, backs against the barrier that would not drop. It had been nearly an hour; they had talked. They had waited. They had come to the realization that they hadn't had to run all day. They could've poofed.

Suddenly, a low thrum.

They shot up, Jack throwing himself in front of his parents and watching as the portal that had closed up opened once again. A silhouette appeared; tall. A mess of hair. She stepped forward. Behind her, her arm still in the portal, she gave something a gentle tug.

A second silhouette popped out. Shorter; smaller. Hair braided.

All three gasped.

The light cleared. Looking a lot less angry now was the older Jacqueline they had come across today, hand in hand with the little girl they thought they had lost, looking as perky and happy as she always had, if a bit translucent and shimmery.

They stared at her. Jack wide-eyed. Winter crying behind her hands. Blaise tearing up.

It was Jack who, yet again, broke the silence.

“Jacqueline?”

The little girl ran, then, closing the distance very fast. She hopped up, slamming right into her brother’s chest with enough force to knock him down. He barely had time to recover before her arms were around his chest, squeezing the life out of him with a hug.

“I missed you,” she said, squishing him very tightly. Jack blinked for a moment, before squishing her back just as tight, if not more.

“I am so, so sorry Jacqueline, I never meant to hurt you! To, to kill you! It was an accident. I love you. I’d never hurt you, not. Not knowingly. Not like this.”

“It’s okay,” she replied, still holding on tight. “I forgive you. It was an accident,” she said, finally letting Jack go. “But what I DON’T forgive you for is NOT coming to SEE ME!”

Still sitting on Jack’s legs, she huffed, crossing her tiny arms. “I waited! I waited the whole time to see you guys! Every single converse-convert-converge—”

“Convergence,” Jack and not dead Jacqueline both said at the same time.

“Yeah! That! I waited for you and mom and dad, but you never came,” she said, turning to look up at her parents. “None of you came. Why’d you leave me all alone?”

When Jack and Blaise didn’t respond, Winter spoke up.

"We messed up," she said, sinking down to the floor, looking at her little baby girl. She reached out, gently caressing her baby’s face. Rubbing away the tears with the pad of her thumb. “We made a very big mistake. We tried to save you, and when we couldn’t…”

“We turned away from each other,” Blaise admitted, sinking down now too.

“We ran away,” Jack added, frowning at the floor. “I…I don’t know about mom and dad, but it seemed easier to run than to face up to what had happened. To deal with it. And, and thinking of going to see you…what would I have even said?”

“Well I think you’re doing okay right now,” Jacqueline said, softening a little.

Jack grinned. “Thanks, Jacqueline.”

“Anytime, boss,” she said, saluting very silly like. Jack chuckled.

“I think we all hurt you a little bit, didn’t we?” Winter asked. “Not coming to see you. Doing what we thought best.”

“What we thought you’d want,” Blaise added.

“All I wanted was to see you guys. I didn’t want you to run away from each other. I just wanted to see you all together and maybe sometimes still be there too,” she admitted, poking her lil’ fingers together. “I’m DEAD. You can’t change that. Not by running away or playing chase or anything silly like that.”

“I know,” Winter said, swooping Jacqueline up off of Jack’s legs. "We know." Pulling her in close, Winter gave her child a big squeeze. “I’m sorry, dear.”

“It’s okay, mommy,” she said, hugging Winter tightly. She looked up at Blaise over her shoulder. With a smile, she stuck her little arms up.

Blaise grabbed her so fast, crushing her against him. “I’m sorry, too,” he said, gruffly. He let out a sob. “I thought I knew what you wanted, but it wasn’t about what I thought. I was wrong. We were wrong. I’m sorry, Jacqueline, so, so sorry.”

“It’s okay daddy,” she croaked, enjoying the warmth that came with the territory. “I’m just glad you were all still here when I got here. I was afraid you’d all have left. That maybe you didn’t…you didn’t want to see me.”

“What?”

“Jacqueline Winter Frost!”

“We’d never!”

“Well you all did a very bad no good awful job showing that,” she said with a pout, wiggling out of Blaise’s arms and plopping on the ground, crossing her little arms. “Do better.”

Up by the grave marker, Jacqueline chuckled. Get their asses, Jacquie, she thought, pulling out the empty time piece. It had a slight glow to it. She pulled out the chrono-quartz. They also had a slight glow. Almost there, she thought, placing them into the face.

“Don’t you worry your little head off,” Jack said, grandly, poking the very top of said little head. “We’ll do better now. I’ll make sure of it.”

“You promise?”

“I promise,” Jack said.

“We all do,” Blaise agreed, Winter nodding enthusiastically beside him.

The tiny sprite’s eyes grew big, her lip wobbling before breaking out in a huge smile. “YAY!” she said, jumping around, trying to hug all three of her family members at once.

“How have you been?!” Winter asked suddenly, grabbing Jacqueline and squishing her tightly. “Are you okay?”

“I am now,” she replied, hugging back. “It’s very nice where I am! Very pink though. I stay with Gaia. She’s real nice and looks lots like Mother Nature and lets me call her Gram. She makes really good tea and always has sweets and...”

Jacqueline sighed, relieved as she watched her child self go on and on about Rosehaven and how everything had been for her on the other side. There was a click and a whir; she glanced down. The watch was ready. The cracks had sealed, the time chunk once again in one piece. Clicking the knob at the top, she watched as the arrows whirred, and the purple turned blue.

“Got him,” she said to herself, relieved, pressing down on the face of the timepiece.

In front of her, a deep purple portal opened. Shoulders sagging, she stepped forward, glad to leave when all of a sudden there was a tug on her skirt.

“Hmm?”

She looked down. Kid Jacqueline stood beside her with a soft smile, hands behind her back.

“Yes?”

“Thank you,” she said, rushing forward and hugging her legs.

“Awwh,” Jacqueline couldn’t help but say. She bent down, squishing her dead self tightly. “You’re welcome. Give them hell, okay? And one more thing.”

The child blinked, letting herself be picked up by herself. “Yes?”

“I’m sorry you died,” she said, face falling.

The child in her arms giggled, covering her mouth with her hand. “It’s okay. I can’t change that. And you can’t, either. Nothing can bring me back completely. But you did me a big help,” she said.

“A big help?” Jacqueline asked, the corner of her lips twitching.

“Yeah! You helped me help them and now we can make a difference. Look! Lookit!”

Tightening her grip on her kid self, Jacqueline looked down at her parents and brother. They were chatting, standing up now; waiting patiently for Jacqueline to head back their way. Blaise and Winter were deep in conversation. Jack said something; the pair laughed, Blaise’s hair actually smouldering. Jack glanced up their way, head tilted.

“GIVE ME TWO MORE SECONDS!” the tiny child yelled, turning back to her adult self. “This is all I ever wanted,” she said, throwing her little arms around Jacqueline’s neck.

“I know,” Jacqueline said, squishing her tight. “Me too. I’m glad I could help.”

“Me too!” she said, pulling out of the hug.

“And if they EVER act out of sorts again, let me know. I’ll knock some sense into them.”

The child laughed. “Okay!”

“Alright,” Jacqueline said, and, with one last squeeze, released little Jacquie. “Off you go,” she said, watching as little Jacqueline ran down the incline, waving at her.

“BYE JACQUELINE! TRAVEL SAFE! I HOPE YOU WIN!”

“Me too,” Jacqueline said, waving back and stepping foot into the portal. The watch was ready; and so was she.

She glanced behind her once more. Jacqueline hopped up into the air, throwing herself at her parents. Blaise was teary eyed; she latched onto his neck like a little koala, Blaise, grabbing his wife and son and squishing them, too. There was cracking; a pop. Blaise’s hair lit up.

With one last deep breath, Jacqueline hopped into the portal, watching as it slowly closed on the four Frosts hugging one another very tightly, basking in Blaise's firelight before she was yanked into the time stream, the watch glowing and pushing her through to the proper timeline.

---

The portal shut; the angry ghost was gone, leaving them with the ghost they had missed the most. Jack watched it shut, wiggling his way out of the hug.

Or at least, trying to.

“So, uh. Not to ruin the moment or anything,” Jack said, Blaise not letting go. “But um. What now? Where should I go?”

“House arrest seems our only recourse,” Blaise said, sternly. “Your Mother and I can keep a close eye on you there. What do you think?”

Jack blinked, taken aback. He smiled; small, soft. "I think I'd like that."

#this is 15k lmao. sorry not sorry ;)#oh and translator's note: LCBCS stands for liquor control board crystal springs #it is 100% a play on the ontarian LCBO >:)#dani writes #the one where jacqueline dies #jacqueline dies au #jacqueline dies au part 2 #frowny shots #tho tbh this thing is so comfort idk if i CAN call it a frowny shot #it's also long enough that tumblr is having a time with it lmao. so my edit was FAST #ANYWAY. SORRY. FR. ABOUT THE LENGTH! I SHOULD;VE SPLIT IT BUT RLY WANTED IT OUT ALL AT ONCE #crystal springs #time splinter bits #ocs #tsc #tsc3

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gutsby · 3 months

Text

Hating Game

Pairing: dbf!Joel x Reader

Summary: Celebrating your dad’s birthday at the yacht club becomes damn near unbearable when Joel Miller brings a date along too. Jealousy and hate sex ensue.

Warnings: 18+. Food fight turned hatefuck (don’t ask). Cockwarming and semi-public sex on the bridge deck. Oral (m! and f!receiving). Daddy kink. Dirty talk. Age gap. C*mplay. Katoptronophilia. Orgasm denial. One risqué Viagra joke. Drinking games. Descriptions of vomiting. Joel cockwarming you while smoking a cigarette <3

Part 1 | Part 3

"Can ya try that one more time, sweet pea? For daddy?"

You can. Try, anyway. Controlling your tongue while he’s buried so deep inside you is a far harder task than expected, though. Especially when he’s so still.

Joel sees it. Feeling a twinge of pity, he leans over your body and digs his hips even deeper—not thrusting, but still granting a modicum of friction as he takes another drag of his cigarette. The hot, heavy throb of his girth pulses like your own fucking heartbeat, and your eyes roll back.

An orangutan on roller skates would’ve had more grace.

A grizzly bear in hibernation might’ve been more lively.

A fucking cross-eyed octopus reciting Shakespeare would’ve been less strange, alarming, and painfully awkward to see than your father’s best friend the week after he’d railed you senseless in the front seat of his car.

Joel Miller had shown up with a date, for Christ’s sake.

Of course, you’d been three cocktails deep and playing stack cup with a random group of gentlemen on the bridge deck at the time, but that was almost immaterial. This was your dad’s fifty-first birthday party—one of the rowdiest nights the Austin Yacht Club had yet to see—and yeah, you planned on getting belligerently shitfaced on Dirty Shirleys and obscene amounts of catered food.

You’d never thought to bring a date of your own, though.

That was just distasteful and crass, all things considered.

Presently, you slammed your ping pong ball to the tabletop and watched it make a wide arc over your cup.

“Fuckfuckfuuuuuck,” you whispered low as the man four spots down made it in, and the man after him bounced the ball straight into his own on the first go. He moved the tall, swaying stack of red Solos immediately to your right, and you knew from the jump you were fucked.

Tommy Miller was a master at stack. You could already see the sly smile on his face from the corner of your eye.

Just as Mötley Crüe gave way to Hall & Oates on the speakers overhead, Joel’s brother crammed his stack of cups over your own and made a smug, triumphant bow.

“All you, kid,” he grinned and slid the second to last cup in your direction.

You could’ve cursed his whole bloodline, Joel included.

There was no way in hell you were getting stuck with death cup again—the last, cruel punishment for the loser of the game a mix of three different types of liquor, soda, and a spritz of Natty Light. Filled to the brim and waiting to be downed by whoever didn’t sink the final shot.

You squared your shoulders and locked the fuck in.

Bounced the ball once. Twice. Christ, this was hard. The man to your left was struggling too, but he seemed just as determined and twice as skilled, and you were pretty buzzed. A second later, he made it in and, of course, slid it right back to Tommy, who was practically overcome with laughter.

“MILLER! MILLER! MILLER!” Men were not creative when it came to chants. Or beating fists on furniture.

“Quit shakin’ the shit!” Tommy roared, tapping his ping pong ball deftly onto the table’s surface.

You blinked a few hazy, anxious thoughts out of your head and tried with everything in you not to miss this shot. The instrumental bridge of ‘Maneater’ was sinking its teeth in your soul and taunting your nerves to no end.

You took the ball, swallowed hard, watched the cup, and flicked your wrist, at last, from a singularly perfect angle.

The ball was a millisecond away from making it in.

Tommy Fuckstick Miller managed to stack you first.

A chorus of obnoxious, wholly drunk howls rang loud in your ears, and suddenly, the attention was back on you, the unhappy victim of the game’s most gruesome drink.

You didn’t hesitate. You pinched your nose and guzzled from the cup before the torment could go on any longer.

You did well at first.

Opened your throat like a pro and cleared it down to the last fourth of the drink, to the point where you could see the slick white bottom side of the cup clear as day.

Your mouth had just flooded with the final draught of death cup when a familiar guitar riff caught you off guard.

You weren’t sure why it had to happen that way, but after being forced to listen to the song some five thousand times on your road trip with Joel, the tenor of Billy Joel’s voice was like nails on a chalkboard to you now. Grating. Nauseating.

Vomit-inducing.

Swiftly, you ran to the nearest railing and lost your last drink—and your whole dinner—over the side of the boat.

You yakked into Lake Travis like you never had before.

And, just as that stupid, forever-tainted song surged on, you heard footsteps approaching. A moment’s pause. Then a hand on your back. Patting gently and, seconds later, lowering a cup of water to the side of your head.

Your face was still dangling upside down off the yacht. You didn’t want to be touched.

“Go to hell, Tommy,” you muttered.

“You first,” he said, chuckling.

You didn’t sit so much as slump back onto the deck with your head in your hands. The whole boat had gone sideways in your mind, and Tommy’s outstretched arm looked more like a bubbling lump than a friendly gesture.

You groaned at the sight of the cup and shook your head.

“I’m alright, okay. I’m good.”

Then, when the cup didn’t waver:

“Can they change the fucking song already?!”

Tommy cocked a brow and squatted down next to you. He set the water aside.

��Got a problem with dad rock or somethin’?” he smirked.

You shook your head no—it wasn’t the music that was making you sick but the man Tommy called his brother that made you wanna vomit again. The thought of that man tangled up with a svelte brunette who looked fresh off the cover of Sports Illustrated when he couldn’t even be bothered to shoot you a text after the condom broke last week. Like he just didn’t give a shit if you were alive, dead, or pregnant with his child. Unfortunately, you had nothing more to throw up, and your eyes were on fire.

Tommy slung an arm around your shoulder and pulled you into his side. Took a handkerchief out of his pocket.

“No more Dirty Shirleys for you, young lady,” he chided, dabbing lightly at the tears that had trickled out.

“No more men for me,” you grumbled quietly.

You couldn’t see it then, but you could feel him trying not to smile. He tugged you closer.

“Boy trouble, huh?” he said, “Whose ass needs kickin’?”

Your brother, actually. Curb stomp that fucker, please.

You shrugged instead.

“Some guy from school.”

Tommy nodded, waiting for you to elaborate. When you didn’t, he just assumed you wanted to keep it to yourself—which you did—and squeezed your shoulder softly.

“Well…you know you’ve got your dad, me, and Joel to beat the shit outta any guy, any time, any place, right?”

You wished it were that simple. You wiped your nose and nodded all the same.

“And…” Tommy started again, working slow to get you back on your feet, “Most guys your age don’t know their ass from their fuckin’ elbow, honeybun. Don’t take it too personal if he’s dumb enough to lose a gem like you.”

The corners of your lips twitched slightly at his words. Almost smiling by the time he had you up on your feet.

“Thanks, Tommy.”

“Anytime, kiddo.”

You might’ve rolled your eyes when he pinched your cheek, but the water he held back up for you to drink looked far too appetizing, and you knew he meant well. You took the cup from him and started to chug.

Again, you’d almost made it through the whole refreshment when a sound threw you off. Abruptly.

“Where have you two lovebirds been?!” Tommy chirped.

You lowered your water and almost regurgitated again. Bile jumped up in your throat, and you just narrowly managed to keep it all down with a cough and a sputter.

Joel and Ms. Centerfold were at the far end of the deck.

Joel was tucking his dress shirt back into his pants.

Are you fucking kidding me?

“Gettin’ nasty on her daddy’s yacht? That’s bold,” Tommy cackled, nudging you playfully.

Your face was bloodless. Every last ounce of pretense and decorum had spilled out with your dinner, before, and now you were just staring at Joel blankly. Numb.

You watched him shove the last clump of his shirt under the waistband and straighten up slightly. The woman at his side flashed you and Tommy a blinding white smile.

“Might say the same for you,” she called back. She seemed to be eyeing you both with a half-curious look.

Tommy made a face as if to say ‘yuck—what the fuck?’ and threw his arm around you again, shaking you lightly.

“She’s like my little sister, Ashton. You’re fuckin’ gross.”

Little sister. Nice. Like a knife twisting inside your gut.

If Joel took any notice of the comment, he didn’t show it. He just stood there, dull and impassive as a loaf of bread. Every coarse lineament of his face was unreadable—just as bleak, bland, and uncaring as the eyes staring out of it. Then he fished around in his back pocket and pulled out his lighter and a pack of American Spirits. He passed the latter to Ashton and leaned over to give her a light.

Throwing yourself off the boat seemed like the most logical next move out of anything available to you.

That’s when you knew you were off your shit and needed to leave the bridge deck—immediately.

“Need a drink,” you mumbled, starting off the other way.

Tommy was hot on your heels, following fast after you.

“That’s— that’s actually the last thing you need, I think, sweetie. How ‘bout some lemonade?”

“Can you spike it with bleach?”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

Tommy followed you down the staircase straight through to the galley, past the throngs and pockets of partygoers crowding the main dining area. Hitting the bar was a bad idea—wait staff knew you well enough to sense when you were utterly trashed, sad, or both—so you slipped toward the wine cooler and quickly sidestepped Tommy.

“No! No way. Nuh-uh.” He was still trying to block your access to the fridge when you grabbed hold of the door.

“Hair of the dog, Thomas.”

“That’s not a thing. That’s— you just projectile vomited off the deck, dude. You need a breather.”

You stopped just long enough to let Tommy pry you off the refrigerator handle and back to the kitchen island. You were pissed off, sure, but also not nearly prepared for another drop of alcohol if you were being honest with yourself. Your head was still spinning when you sat down on the counter.

Once you were settled, Tommy got to rifling through the cabinets, and you pressed a hand to your forehead.

“So how long’s that been going on?” You couldn’t help it.

“Wha- oh, Joel and Ash?” Tommy hummed from deep inside a cupboard. He came out with a small blue box.

You winced at the nickname. Watched him go from the pantry to the sink, fill a glass halfway, find a spoon, and tear the box in two, along with a couple chalky tablets.

“They’ve been…weird.” The sentence was punctuated with a pinch of his brow and a frown. He started stirring.

“Weird how?”

Your feet were dangling over the edge of the island; you pretended to gain a sudden interest in a smudge on the toe of your shoe.

“Weird like…I don’t know,” Tommy tossed the spoon in the sink and turned back to you. Holding out the cup, “They’ve been ‘friendly’ for years—Ash is a coworker of ours—and Joel swears it’s nothing more…but I dunno.”

He ended his speech again with that weird intonation and grimace, like he wasn’t so sure if he believed what he was saying himself, then shook his head and shrugged. He watched you take a sip of the Alka-Seltzer and urged you to get the whole thing down. It tasted like shit.

“Christ, that’s salty,” you coughed.

You didn’t want to keep going, but Tommy tipped the glass back in your hand and made you finish.

“It’ll help with your stomach,” he said before strolling over to the caterers’ fridge to look for bland food options.

“So if they’re not a thing, why’d he bring her here?”

You didn’t care what Tommy thought of your questions. He knew you were eager to hear the tea in any situation.

You watched as your friend procured a hand of bananas and some bread. He gave the fruit to you and took the bread over to the toaster, where he dropped in two slices. You couldn’t quite tell if he was contemplating an answer, didn’t want to spill, or hadn’t heard the question at all. He snagged a plate and a butter knife while you peeled apart your snack, silently dying to know the truth.

At length, Tommy shrugged. Again.

“‘Cause Joel’s a goddamn drama queen and doesn’t know what he wants, I s’pose,” he said.

Ain’t that the truth.

Then, after a minute:

“Had his panties in a wad ever since he went to Boston.”

You stiffened hearing that. You couldn’t pretend to be invested in your shoe scuff, the floor, or the food in your hand any longer. Your eyes flitted up to Tommy to see if his expression had shifted any.

It hadn’t—he was just looking for strawberry jam.

“You hitched a ride home with him then, didn’t you?” he asked casually.

You swallowed and nodded. You watched Tommy retrieve the two freshly-warmed pieces of toast that jumped up to greet him and, having found the jam he wanted, slapped them both on a plate and lathered them up. You muttered a quiet ‘thank you’ as he slid them over.

You were almost too scared to ask more questions, but you knew you had to find out. About Joel, Ashton, anything Tommy might’ve gleaned about your trip home from Boston. You found you could hardly sit in one place and had to step off the counter to eat your food.

“Joel’s been, uhh…how do Gen Z’s say it? Trippin’ balls?” Tommy reached for a banana himself and started in.

“Tweaking,” you corrected him.

“Tweakin’, yeah. Joel’s been a real fuckin’ tweaker lately.”

“In what way?”

“Just…shuttin’ himself in is all. Wouldn’t talk to me or your dad or anybody for days after he got back. Didn’t show up for our monthly Bingo matchup at Mando’s—and he hasn’t missed one of those in almost six years.”

You pursed your lips, equally mystified. You knew just how seriously your dad and his friends took those games—how rare it was for Joel to turn down any opportunity to drink, play Star Wars-themed Bingo, and shoot the shit with his buddies over Coors Light and cheese curds. You took another bite and waited for Tommy to continue.

“And there’s— there was this…thing he— I dunno.”

Suddenly, it seemed your friend had lost the power of coherent speech, and he was rubbing the back of his neck, flashing a half-sheepish smile, and shaking his head. Contemplating whether he should share something with you and ultimately deciding against it.

You raised both eyebrows.

“What?”

“Nah, it’s dumb, really.”

“Tell me.” You took a far-too-large bite of your banana and had some trouble getting it down.

“Well, he…” Tommy trailed off, shifting his gaze from yours to take a look at his own shoe, for a second, “When me and your dad were riding with Joel to a work site…we, uh…found a box of Plan B in his glove compartment.”

Half-chewed banana and toast almost flew across the room while you spluttered and choked and just barely managed to cover your mouth to keep it all in.

“Right? Threw me for a loop, too,” Tommy grinned as you beat your chest with a fist and fought to keep yourself breathing, “Your dad damn near had a baby when he picked that little box and those booty shorts up himself.”

When he what?! You wanted to scream, just picturing your straight-laced, conservative father flipping a Plan B box between his hands, in shock, and then…your shorts—when the fuck had you taken your shorts off again?

Right, when you were busy trying to scoop some more of Joel’s jizz from your cunt as he raced you both to CVS.

Good times.

You held your hair back and leaned over the sink, spitting two more chunks of banana and bread down the drain. Tommy reached around behind you for the spigot and filled another glass with water as he tried not to laugh.

“Easy, now,” he said, patting your back like he’d done for you before, “Joel didn’t happen to mention this lady friend to you now, did he?”

“No,” you choked. You wiped your mouth clear of any spit and food residue and slowly blinked down into the sink, feeling an old wave of nausea begin to settle over you. Accepted the new glass of water from Tommy and hoped he wouldn’t notice the tremor in your hand as you did.

The man seemed completely oblivious. Still standing close behind you, Tommy rubbed circles in your back and leaned a little closer.

“Death cup really got ya, huh?” He smirked, and you realized then that he very much was like an older brother. This whole situation with Joel was fucked on so many levels and would be fucked tenfold if Tommy ever found out.

You turned around and felt yourself steadied between two warm, broad palms—‘Wanna sit? Lie down?’—and then you were shaking your head, reaching for another banana and trying like hell to seem semi-composed, though every neuron in your brain was firing away at a million miles per second and your legs were feeling like scrambled eggs.

“I’m okay.”

“Yeah?”

Suddenly, one of Tommy’s hands had moved up to brush a few strands of hair from your face, and you felt your skin radiating raw heat. A deep-seated anxiety, too.

He’s going to find out—what if he already knows?

What if Joel tells Tommy?

What if Tommy tells dad?

Your mind was reeling, on fire, still working in earnest to find something to tell your friend to say you were fine, just dizzy, and definitely not fucking his big brother.

Your brain was drawing blank after blank after blank.

Just then, a clatter sounded nearby. Both of you jumped.

When you shot a look to the source of the intrusion, you nearly folded into Tommy from secondhand humiliation.

“Nice hands, feet,” the younger Miller called over to Joel, who was currently trying to recover the dozen-odd pots and pans he’d knocked over at the threshold of the room. You stared at the two in a mixture of confusion, disbelief, and disgust—the latter reserved exclusively for Joel.

You set your drink down, held your hand over your stomach, and pretended to head for the bathroom.

“Be right back,” you muttered, brushing past both men.

You knew you wouldn’t be back at all if you could help it.

Still clutching your banana in one hand and your raucously churning tummy in the other, you climbed the galley stairs fast to get back up to the bridge deck. You almost tripped over both your heels trying to make it up the steps so quick, desperate for solitude and quiet.

Another hair metal hit from the ‘80s was playing overhead, but fortunately, the deck was free of people. You stumbled over to one of the catering tables, looking helplessly for something that might settle your belly, but no, this sickness was coming straight from your head—from that insufferable munch of a man, Joel Miller.

You gingerly approached the railing behind the table and prepared yourself for another round of dry heaving.

You rested both elbows on the metal, looked out toward the dark, glassy water beneath you, then hung your head in abject defeat. You slid your tongue across the roof of your mouth and waited for the vomit to come.

The only thing that followed were footsteps.

Heavy, thunderous sounds making their way up the stairs.

“Stay back, Tommy. Please.” You raised a hand to the man approaching softly behind you, not turning your head, “That Alka-Seltzer stuff didn’t work for shit.”

“Shoulda stuck to water, sweet pea.”

That made you pivot.

Not a quick tilt of the head or a twist to the side, but a full-fledged 180-degree spin on your heels, hand to your gut, what-the-FUCK-are-you-doing-here turnaround.

You stared ahead and felt sicker than you had all night.

Then, pointing one crooked, accusatory finger his way without thinking, you hardly knew or heard what you were saying before the words came out. It sounded a little something like, “Joel, you goddamn fucking idiot.”

Joel didn’t flinch.

In fact, he seemed supremely unfazed.

He just held your fuming gaze and frowned.

“You tryin’ to fuck my little brother or somethin’?”

Your hand had closed around your banana on the table before his words had hung in the air for even a second. You flung the fruit full-force at his head, enraged.

Unfortunately, you were drunk and your aim was shit. Your yellow boomerang-like weapon of choice barely made it within three feet of its target before it glanced off a light fixture and struck the ground with a thud.

Accuracy be damned, you weren’t quite done.

“You left the fucking Plan B out for my dad to find?!”

Just when Joel tried to answer, or perhaps hurl another accusation in your direction, you stuck your hand in the closest catering tray you could find—a serving of green peas, as it was. You lobbed a handful at the man as he started to draw closer, and this time, you managed to land a pretty hefty spray. Joel only rolled his eyes.

“I didn’t leave it there—you did,” he retorted.

“My shorts, too?!”

You grabbed another fistful of peas and threw it. Joel was able to dodge it right before making it to the other end of the table. He gripped the edges of the wood in both hands and stood stern—imposingly—opposite you.

“Your shorts, your fuckin’ problem, sweets.”

Just when you reached for another green pea projectile, he surprised you and made for the tray right beside it.

Shortly, a glob of garlic mashed potatoes struck the front of your dress and slid slow, almost sluggishly down the pristine pink silk fabric before falling at your feet. Joel’s aim was evidently much better than yours.

You brushed what chunks of food you could get off your chest and pinned him with a wide, incredulous look.

“You’re a Grade A fucking asshole, you know that?”

“You’re a bit of a shithead too, potato tits.”

“FUCK you!”

“Already DID!”

You would’ve flipped the whole table if it were in your power to do so. Would’ve toppled all the tables, kicked the chairs, took a lighter to the curtains and sent the goddamned yacht down in flames if you had to—that was how much you despised the man in front of you.

Instead, you threw your hands up and stormed off.

“Maybe I will fuck Tommy!” you barked as you started toward the stairs, “I’ll fuck your brother’s brains out, and you can screw Ashton all you want, how ‘bout that?”

You’d made it about two feet before Joel grabbed hold of one of your wrists and yanked you back. You didn’t hesitate to throw a gruff—and ultimately fruitless—punch that hit him square in the chest. He didn’t budge.

“You don’t mean that,” Joel sneered. He shook your whole frame with one simple flick of his forearm.

“I’ll tap your whole bloodline like a keg, Miller. Try me.”

Again, you tried to shake him off, but the hand only constricted around you tighter. Then it was walking you backwards, slowly, almost carefully, until your back was to a wall and your eyes were searching his, angry as ever.

“You’d break your daddy’s heart with that one,” Joel said just above you, voice lowered considerably.

“Yeah?” you challenged, “Maybe if I was less of a shithead I would care what my dad thought. But I’m not. So I won’t.”

“Wasn’t talkin’ about your father, darlin’.”

Joel was good.

He was an insufferable ass and he was good.

Then you remembered the radio silence over the past seven days and the fact that he may or may not have fucked someone else earlier that night—possibly right where you were standing—and he lost all appeal real quick. You shoved him hard in the chest once more.

“Don’t play that shit with me. You, of all people—” You made as if to read him the riot act but cut yourself short, deciding it wasn’t worth your time explaining human empathy to a man who believed bootcut jeans and all things Ely Cattleman were peak fashion, and just learned what ovulation was last week. Then, sliding along the wall and trying to head to the stairs again, you felt Joel’s leg slot between your own.

“What did I do?” he said, curious.

Before you could answer, his thigh had stirred in place, grazing lightly over the spot the hem of your minidress had exposed to him. You ignored it.

“Doesn’t matter,” was your non-answer.

Joel seemed intrigued by the ambiguity and only lowered his head to get closer to yours—‘Then why’re ya so mad you’re throwin’ dinner food at me, darlin’?’—puffing warm breaths on your neck and only smiling when you flinched back. He took your response as a cue to keep pressing, both figuratively and physically.

“Just wanted attention or somethin’? That what it is?” Joel’s voice was as saccharine as it was taunting, words paired with a hand circling light across your thigh. He wasn’t moving in, and it was tearing you to shreds inside.

“Fuck your attention, and fuck you, Joel.”

Words hardly reflecting how you felt internally.

Swiftly, then, the hand at your leg was raised to your face—cupping it with a bit more force than you expected. Joel’s grin stretched even wider.

“Attention and discipline,” he mused aloud, “Two things dad never gave his little girl growin’ up, I see.”

Before you could reply, he was squeezing your face even tighter and nodding his head, as if already anticipating your answer. Then, somehow lower, “Such a filthy mouth on her, too. Never knows when to keep it shut and how to be polite to someone who fucked her so nice already.”

You might’ve whimpered if you didn’t also want to throat punch the motherfucker and knee him in the balls. When Joel started stroking your cheek, you groaned instead, and you hoped he would hear it as chagrin, not arousal.

“I can help with both of those, y’know—” His thumb rubbed a little harder, and his leg moved up. You pressed your hands flat to his thigh to keep him from teasing, but the man would do no such thing to oblige you. In fact, he just shifted his leg back and forth…and back, again. A ripple of bliss from the friction sparked low inside you.

“I can give you attention, and I can scrub that mouth clean if that’s what you really need,” Joel continued, “Just say the word, darlin’.”

“Fucker.” That was your word.

And it worked well enough for Joel.

In the next instant, he had you half-carried, half-dragged across the deck and thrown onto the table where you’d lost that dreaded game of stack. Solo cups still littering the surface, and puddles of beer soaking in through your dress, you made a sound of disgust and tried to thrust yourself up, just to fail. You squirmed and swatted at the man standing in front of you, who easily kept you pinned to the surface with one palm laid calmly on your belly.

He reached into the back pocket of his trousers and retrieved his lighter and cigarette pack.

“Someone could catch us,” you hissed, helpless, unsure of what else to say to show you weren’t giving in just yet.

Joel lit up in four seconds flat. He sucked in a breath.

“I roped off the stairs coming up,” he replied.

He what?

You moved back, slowly, on the surface when Joel worked a hand to his belt buckle, and you heard half a dozen plastic cups fall to the floor behind you.

You would not be his date’s sloppy seconds—ever.

Joel yanked at your thighs and pulled you back to be straddling his hips, shrugging his pants down; you couldn’t bear to keep looking when he lowered his briefs.

He took another drag and eyed you hungrily, happy to see you all sprawled out and pretty before him. The tight fabric of your dress had cinched over your hips and left you bare to just panties, making him grow even harder.

“Joel.”

He worked his dick out of his pants and moved the head to trail slow along the seam of your barely-clothed cunt. Even through the lace, he could feel how wet you were. He notched the tip at the space where your panties had parted just slightly to the side and felt your arousal pool even wetter around the end of his member. He grunted.

“Joel, I—”

“Daddy’s gonna give ya attention, sugar. Hold still.”

You couldn’t. Wouldn’t. You splayed your fingers over the hand that was trying to guide his cock into you and clenched your jaw—every carnal fibre in your being telling you not to do what you were about to try anyway.

“You fucked her didn’t you?”

Joel flicked the ash off his cigarette, “No.”

“You brought her here.”

“Had to.”

Your face was flushed and likewise flooded with smoke, curling slow from Joel’s lips before it painted the air an opaque, muddied grey above you. You wriggled your hips away from his, and for once, he didn’t try to stop you.

“I saw you tucking your shirt in. Tommy said you fucked!”

“Tommy’s about one fry short of a Happy Meal, honey,” Joel puffed once more, “He’s always sayin’ shit like that.”

Incredibly, he’d managed to use about a dozen funny words in that old Texas lilt and still say so little to actually answer your question. When the pinch in your brow told him you weren’t quite satisfied, Joel let out a sigh.

“Ash spilled pebre on my shirt. I had to change.”

Oh.

“And you—” you started.

“—have no fuckin’ right to know, one way or the other, because you’re the one who said we’d just ‘fuck and forget it,’ remember?” Joel interrupted, reminding you of your own curt words from your Bronco boning session.

Again, you tried to speak and found yourself spoken for, Joel carrying on as casual as ever as he sucked the last life-breath from his cig and stared you down, cynically.

“Your dad’s the one who made me bring her tonight. Said I seemed ‘down’ since the last gal I fucked wasn’t around—I didn’t have the heart to tell him it was his daughter—and here we are,” Joel smiled, wryly, and flicked his cigarette into the lake. You would’ve liked to tell him littering was a crime that trashed us all but refrained.

You were too busy staring at his lips, wondering why he hadn’t kissed you yet. You reckoned all the pea flinging, swearing, and swinging might’ve played a small part.

At length, Joel slid a new American Spirit out of its pack and wrangled you back to his hips as he lit up again.

“Happy?” he said, after a beat.

You weren’t sure whether to nod or cross your arms. Beckon him in with both hands or kick his bunched-up pants, belt, and boxer briefs away altogether and keep the bratty act going. You didn’t like being wrong.

At any rate, it didn’t matter. He’d called you on your bluff.

Still smoking, still smiling, still happy as a clam at high tide, Joel pressed his length straight up to your folds and watched you squirm on the wood underneath him.

“Gonna listen now?” he hummed.

“Uh-huh.”

Good, his wretchedly deep brown eyes seemed to say. Good that you were here, good that you were spread wide and supine beneath him, good that you’d gone all soft and pliable under his touch and were watching him now with a look that said you’d let him do just anything.

Good that he could fuck you.

Great that he wasn’t planning to—not fully, anyway.

Joel wasted no time taking your answer in the affirmative to slip past your panties and push deep inside your sweet cunt. When your walls stretched and cried all around him, he sighed and gripped your legs even tighter. He gritted the cigarette between his teeth and brought your ankles to rest over his shoulders, sinking in even deeper. Then he had to hold steady inside you and keep you flat on the table in front of him, and just when you whined to fuck me now, Joel, fuck me right now, daddy, please, he stilled. He took a big, long drag and didn’t move an inch.

He’d teach you some discipline one way or another.

“Joel, please,” you groaned again, hands bracing the table to start fucking up and down on his shaft, before he put a stop to that fast and held you firmly in place, “Please, Joel, I need you so fucking bad, daddy, please.”

Joel tapped his ash to the side and ignored your pleas.

He felt your walls contract around him and tried not to grunt. He focused instead on the smoke overhead.

“Wanna say that nicer?” he asked, deadpan. Then, staring expectantly down at you, while you flushed and struggled to stay still, “Keep that mouth a little cleaner?”

Fuck, did he have that father-figure tone down to a T.

You laid there before him and almost forgot his cock was wedged inside you for a second. He seemed so sincere.

“I wan— want you to move, daddy, I-I-I don’t know how else to say i— FUCK!” Your pussy spasmed around him when the tip of his pubic bone grazed your clit. That squeaky clean mouth of yours was nowhere to be seen.

“Mhmm,” Joel nodded anyway, pretending to be observing your behavior as he might for a clinical trial. Like he was testing a new drug, not his dick inside your cunt, practically clenching in Morse code around him.

“Can ya try that one more time, sweet pea? For daddy?”

You could. Try, anyway. Controlling your tongue while he was buried so deep inside you seemed to be a far harder task than you could’ve ever expected, though.

Joel sensed it. Feeling a twinge of pity, he leaned over your body and dug his hips even deeper—not thrusting, but still granting some modicum of friction. The hot, heavy throb of his girth pulsed inside you like your own fucking heartbeat, and your eyes rolled back.

“Fucking shitsucking DICK BITCH CUNT! FUCK!”

Sounding every bit the uncouth novice in a COD lobby chat circa 2009, you knew you didn’t have the faintest hope of earning Joel’s strokes now. You hated yourself for it—and Joel, too, for subjecting you to such cruel and unusual punishment for just needing to fuck him hard.

You were desperate and heated. Five seconds away from yanking your sex off of his and going to town with your own fingers, you felt a palm press down on your tummy.

Damn Joel and his super-sized hands.

You could barely breathe, much less pry yourself off.

Joel was quiet and calm. Stuffing you full and puffing away at his cigarette the whole time. He smirked.

“Ain’t that difficult, honey,” he said, hardly losing his will or his sympathy when you shot a raw glance his way, “Stay still on this cock and ask daddy nicely, ‘s’all ya gotta do.”

He could tell by the look in your eyes you couldn’t stand to play nice—but needed to cum. He watched you swallow your pride, soften your eyes just a bit, and when you felt you might implode from all the feeling, whined,

“Please make me feel good, daddy, please, I need it.”

Joel breathed and eased back just an inch, lowering his hand to thumb softly at your clit. You keened.

“That’s my sweet girl.”

Still just rubbing that bundle and looking down while you came unraveled, Joel thought you perfectly sublime. He’d kill to keep you there like that, eyes rolling and skin soaking the table beneath you both in sweat and arousal. He stared down at the place your bodies were connected—a sliver of his cock visible and soaked with your juices—and he felt a wave of desire crest over his mind. Panting, quietly, he brought one hand to your hip and kept the other working furiously over your clit, trying to ignore the urge to rut inside you. It was self-discipline for him, too.

He wouldn’t let you know that yet, though.

He crushed the cigarette between his teeth and kept still.

“Ya like that, sugar? Like daddy stuffed inside this pussy, makin’ ya beg real pretty for me?” His husky Southern drawl ran like molasses off his tongue, thicker now when he was balls-deep and half-drunk off your cunt.

You watched his mouth, intrigued, and saw a long line of spit drip deliciously from those pretty, stubbled lips of his to your lower ones, making the spot more filthy and warm as your fluids mixed together. Still, Joel didn’t move a thing more than his thumb—but the sounds from you both were growing louder and more desperate.

The gentle squelch of spit, sweat, and arousal running all down your pussy, paired with those noises you made when you were feeling this good and squeezing him tight, was enough to send Joel straight over the edge. Now he didn’t have the strokes or any motion to focus on before him, just you—he flicked his cigarette away the second he sensed you were getting close yourself.

“Sweet little thing,” he cooed, still rubbing in circles, “How’s my baby feelin’?”

You clawed at the table beneath you and knocked your head back once or twice on the wood, humming a quick, ‘Good, daddy, good’ in the most hoarse and pathetic voice you’d ever used, and Joel smiled. You hadn’t cursed out loud in a minute and seemed to be taking his touches well. He’d have to give you some form of reward.

Gently, Joel pulled back and made a shallow thrust inside you. Both your body and his jolted with pleasure.

“FU—n stuff, fun stuff,” you hissed, trying hard to mask the expletive.

In truth, Joel was struggling too. Just one stroke inside you and that coil inside him was about ready to burst.

“Fun, huh?” he teased, keeping his motions down to quick pistons as he laid his palms flat on either side of your head, “Daddy make ya feel fun-ny, does he?”

“Yeah, he does, he— ah, SHIT right there, right there!”

Evidently, he’d found your G spot.

Joel stilled inside you as soon as the foul word escaped.

You whined. Loud. Almost tempted to burst into tears.

“Nononono, that doesn’t count, Joel! That doesn’t—” Your voice was shortly supplanted by a whimper when the man went back to thumbing your clit, hips rendered still once more and cock wedged deep inside your core.

“What’s it gonna take to make you behave for me, huh? Do I have to talk to your daddy again?” Joel seethed.

You shook your head quick and felt him circle your clit even harder, more punishing now. Your body craved the friction from his cock but could barely contain the words that were coming out now. You pinched your eyes shut, feeling your orgasm creeping closer and closer, and whimpered gently, desperately, ‘Fuckfuckfuuuuuck.’

Whether it came down to making terrible plays at stack cup or getting your clit torn apart by Joel’s thumb, you simply could not keep the filthy language at bay.

You weren’t going to listen, that much was clear.

Joel had no choice but to make you learn a different way.

So, prying his fingers and his cock from your cunt, he reached across for your hips instead—pulling you off of the table and pushing you down to the floor, at his feet.

He smoothed a palm over the top of your head and fisted your hair in one hand, his cock in the other, and brought his hot, swollen, slick-coated length within an inch of your face, stroking fast.

Your gaze flitted from the sight in front of you to Joel’s eyes, back and forth, stunned and in utter disbelief. As you felt your own climax crumble and recede from you at once, the sound jumped up your throat before you could stop,

“What the FUCK is your problem, Joel?!”

“There it is,” Joel just flared his nostrils as he jerked himself above you, “There’s that nasty fuckin’ mouth.”

He pulled your head even rougher and tipped your chin back to meet the scowl on his face. Pleasure had almost swallowed the man whole, yet his expression scarcely betrayed a trace of it, eyes cold and jaw clenched tight.

“If that mouth can’t be good for me, can it open real wide and show me how a dirty slut does it?”

You were beside yourself. Holding his gaze like a bomb might go off in his brain any second—something you’d be happy to see—you scowled as well. Begrudgingly, and knowing Joel wouldn’t ease off of this punishment until he’d made you pay for your language, you nodded.

“What’s’at?” Joel snapped, stroking himself even faster, “What do ya want me to do, sugar?”

You gritted your teeth and silently wished they were crushing his balls to powder between them.

“Want…you…to cum…on my face.”

“Little louder, sweet pea, can’t hear ya from up here.”

The sound of his palm working over his cock again and again, shimmery and slick with your arousal soaking it, was almost too much to bear. You watched, forlorn and silently boiling with rage as Joel stared down at you, as merciless as he’d ever been. Mocking, almost, it seemed.

“Want you to…cum on me, please.”

“One more time, darlin’,” Joel pressed, pupils blown wide with desire, “Be real sweet and say it one more time f—”

“I WANT YOU TO CUM ON MY FACE, YOU FUCKER.”

That sparked the first real smile on Joel’s lips you’d seen in a while, and then he was watching you cockily, nodding.

Before you could even think to blink, stand up, or storm off again, you felt a fat, sticky-wet glob of warmth hit your cheek. Then another. Then another. Then another. You winced and flinched back, but Joel held your head in place, in front of his cock, and gripped you firmly as he unloaded rope after rope of his cum all over your face.

By the time he was finished, your skin was glistening. Coated in the stuff and still blinking through strings of the hot, sticky mess as Joel stood over you, chest heaving fast as he pumped himself through his release.

Must be fucking nice.

When the downpour had slowed to a trickle, two thick fingers swiped at a dollop of cum on your cheek. Then, wordlessly, they moved down to your mouth.

“Open,” Joel commanded.

You’d barely parted your lips a quarter of an inch when he pushed both digits inside. Swirled them around in your mouth and made sure to cover every soft, wet contour and crevice before pulling out with a pop.

He wiped at your other spend-streaked cheek and repeated the action, plunging his fingers in and out of your mouth to make sure you cleaned him thoroughly. This was more of an act meant to tease than anything else, you knew, almost demeaning in the way he stood there and nodded his head while murmuring, ‘’Atta girl.’

You hated how much you liked that stupid show of dominance—and, even worse, how good he tasted.

Joel brushed your tongue with another fingerful and watched you bob your head in time. He hummed his approval and scanned your face for any spend left over.

There was a lot. He paused, as if considering something.

“Drop ‘em.” Joel motioned to the straps of your dress.

You did as he said and pulled both bands down at once. When your breasts spilled out of the fabric, you watched Joel lower his gaze and, fixating on the spot you’d just exposed to him, take two—no, three—careful fingers to collect the remainder of himself and spread it downward.

Joel took his cum and smeared it all over your tits.

He was equal parts meticulous, gentle, and gratuitous in doing so, and he took pleasure in every second.

With a heavy-lidded, glossy gaze trained unwaveringly on your chest, Joel rolled each nipple between forefinger and thumb and fell into a trance. Rubbed you up and down every inch he could find and groaned at the sight. Glazing your skin all over with him and savoring it.

You couldn’t deny the feeling of being marked in a way so degrading, dirty, and adoring at once had a dizzying effect on you, too. The look in his eyes, and the soft brush of his fingers, almost quelled your rage entirely.

Almost.

When Joel pulled your spaghetti straps back into place—and you, in turn, back onto your feet—you yanked away. Forcefully. While Joel straightened up, silently cursed his bad back, tucked his dick in his pants, and started to reach for your waist, you jabbed the fastest, fattest, fuck-your-whole-family middle finger in his face and took off.

“Honey—”

“Don’t.”

“But I—”

“Have some goddamn fucking nerve.”

You’d nearly made it to the staircase again, heels turning to start down the first steps, when Joel sidestepped at lightning speed and blocked off your passage. All you saw then was the front of a starch white dress shirt and a light patch of chest hair peeking out from the highest button, crowding your vision, moving in time with every manoeuvre you tried to make around him. He smelled like sweat and fresh citrus. Perhaps a hint of vengeance.

You wouldn’t meet his gaze when he grabbed your face. Tried to shrug him off when he made as if to pull you into a hug—‘Are you off your shit?! Are you?! People are right downstairs’—and Joel just smiled. Grinned like a jackass eating briars, about five times too smug for his own good, and drew you into his chest by gentle turns.

You weren’t sure why you recoiled when he kissed you.

Hell, you’d done it a dozen times before—albeit a bit more frantically, in a way to say ‘I need to fuck you’ when words just wouldn’t suffice—but this one was different. Deeper. Joel was gripping both sides of your face and still grinning as he kissed you, feeling your muscles slacken some and your frame meld gently into his.

You hated it.

“I missed you,” Joel murmured between kisses.

Hated him.

“How’s my baby been, huh?”

Oh, you know, just waiting. Hating you a little. Hoping we didn’t inadvertently create a baby ourselves, courtesy of your prehistoric condoms.

“I missed you.” Gently. Again.

You tensed in his hold when his lips trailed down to your neck. You felt a low flutter. It was like your feet had been glued to the floor and your tongue left wholly immobile; you let Joel caress, kiss, and whisper down your skin like every cell beneath his touch wasn’t seething en masse.

Your stolen climax. Broken condom. Close call with your father and Tommy. Radio silence ongoing for days.

You couldn’t wrap your head around any of it, or him, or how grossly inconsistent the man’s every move upon you now seemed to be with the way he’d acted all week.

Joel slowly descended your body.

“Like I said, honey…you fuck with my head,” he said soft against your dress, then your legs, then the space in between them.

“Makes two of us,” you grumbled back.

You braced your weight against the railing over the stairs just behind you when he slipped your panties to the floor. Then he tucked them snug into one of his back pockets and brought his face to your wet, aching core.

“Discipline doesn’t come easy, does it?” It sounded like something trapped between a question and a declarative coming out from the side of Joel’s mouth.

Fortunately for you, he didn’t try to clarify which of the two he meant, or do much else at all except eat your pussy from that point on. He kissed your thighs, gripped them tighter, then wedged his face between them while you held fast to the metal behind you. You stifled a moan when his tongue traced over the seam of your cunt.

You didn’t have to like the man to love what his mouth could do for you, you silently reminded yourself.

Love it you could—and would. Without shame.

Granted, you were still sensitive as all hell from your last almost-orgasm of the night, but Joel knew how to work his lips and tongue around it. He swiftly lapped between your folds, teased a finger at your hole, and wrapped his warm lips around your clit to suck once or twice, and you were damn near ready to spiral in seconds. You fisted the soft salt-and-pepper hair at the top of his head and rutted your hips in short, shallow motions against him.

“Good girl,” Joel crooned, welcoming each thrust with another swirl of his tongue, “That’s my sweet baby.”

“Joel.”

You traded expletives for the simple repetition of his name, not wanting the pleasure to stop. Joel hummed and sucked and held your legs around him even tighter.

You sighed, almost whined, and dug your fingertips into his scalp, feeling your climax building quick inside you.

Joel’s mouth was working faster, sucking harder, drawing smaller and crueler circles, lapping eagerly against your arousal and giving it everything he had, it seemed, to work you up to your release. He grunted when you yanked hard on his hair but didn’t stop.

In fact, the bastard just kept trying to talk you through it, fluid movements of his own tongue and lips be damned.

“Doin’ so damn good for me, sweet pea, keep goin’.” There was an apology in there somewhere, working hard to atone for the orgasm he’d denied you right before.

Four more flicks of his tongue and a gentle endeavor to pump his fingers in and out, again and again, right above that soft, spongy pad of pleasure deep inside had you teetering over the edge of a cliff.

You tore your gaze from Joel for a second, preparing for that sweet and lusty consummation, when your head turned to the side just slightly. You almost groaned.

Your own hot, flushed, and fucked-out reflection was the first thing to greet you in a sliver of a mirror on the wall. Just beneath you, as you could’ve expected, there was Joel—kneeling between your legs with his chin tipped up, beard coated in moisture and pleasure and warmth. You weren’t sure why the sight from this angle had such a strong effect, but something about the full view of your bodies in motion gave your stomach a pinch. A burn. You ogled the glass and made a sound audibly higher in pitch than a whimper as Joel suckled and tongued at your clit.

You came just like that—gripping the rails, fisting his hair, rutting your hips, and staring implacably at that mirror.

When Joel resurfaced, you were still fully transfixed.

Gawking at how fucking nice he looked between your thighs. How filthy it all was to be seated on his face and cumming for his tongue while the rest of your father’s dinner party mingled blissfully unaware downstairs.

When you saw Joel rise, you jerked your head back.

You weren’t sure why it felt like being caught, but it did.

Just as you began to murmur some half-assed apology his way, you felt hands on your hips and a rock-hard bulge at your rear as Joel spun you round in front of him.

He shoved you flush against the mirror so your tits were pressed up to the glass. He gave you a quick once-over.

Slid the straps of your dress off your shoulders and shimmied the fabric down your chest, once again.

With your breasts splayed out in front of you and your hands pressing hard on the mirror—as if letting up the slightest bit might send you straight through it—you tried to crane your neck. You felt the sticky squelch of cum and fresh spit painted over your chest, muddying up the glass with every movement you made. Your chin dug deep in your shoulder as you cocked your head to the left, eyes searching for Joel’s behind you.

You heard the clink of a belt, followed by a rustle of fabric. Then a hand slamming close beside your head on the mirror, while another worked industriously to free his cock from the confines of his trousers once more.

“Joel,” you breathed, still tender from your climax.

“Hm?”

He was gruff as he rubbed and smacked your bare ass with his cock. Let it rest on the soft, fleshy shelf between you two and teased his length over that space.

“Did someone take his little blue pill today?” you teased.

“Fuck off.” You saw a flicker of a smirk in the mirror.

No way Joel Miller was getting a full-fledged erection twice in the same ten minute span. That shit didn’t happen outside the realm of porn flicks and a woman’s wildest fantasies when it came to men Joel’s age. He knew it just as well as you but tried to feign indifference when he pressed the head of himself to your folds. He did, however, suck in a breath at the new sensation.

He could do this.

He could cockwarm you raw, tonguefuck your cunt, ravage and render you all but brainless on the surface of that mirror, and still have the wits about himself to take another breath. He could show those shit-for-brains college boys he’d been battling for days in the depths of his mind how much better he could fuck you than them.

Really, Joel was just manifesting at this point.

He hadn’t busted a nut and fucked this quick since Bill Clinton had been in office. All hat and no cattle whatsoever for this pussywhipped cowboy.

“Better hope I go easy on ya, sugar.”

“Best believe I won’t.” You would’ve winked if you weren’t so bone-crushingly aroused and fresh off your peak.

Joel had just chuckled, more than a touch nervous, and began rubbing your warmth to coat himself in it—angling his slightly apprehensive penis up to your cunt when you straightened some. Rather than keep your tits to the mirror, you chose to press your back against him, ass snug to his front and eyes roaming wildly over the reflection of your two forms. Both of you flinched when the head of his cock hitched around your entrance.

Joel’s Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat just over your shoulder. He pressed a kiss to your skin.

“Gotta be the sweetest thing I ever seen,” he whispered into your ear. Meeting your gaze in the mirror and lifting his hips just so before breaching your folds.

He hoped you’d take it for sweetness and not just a vicious strain of anxiety or weakness as he prepared for the first thrust. He’d need a second, a minute—maybe a goddamned hour, if he was being real honest. You were too damn pretty to be fucked by a two-pump chump.

Joel nudged his nose against your ear and tried to stall. Pausing a beat.

“Never been humped and dumped before, yaknow.”

Wait—the fuck?

That came out wrong.

You cocked a brow and tilted your hips. You didn’t seem keen on talking but had no choice but to humor him.

“The hell’s that supposed to mean?” you hummed.

Joel balked at his own stupidity, trying, and failing, to remove his foot from his mouth and remedy his words.

“I mean, I— I get it,” he returned, too fast for his liking, “I’m no texter myself, I just…thought, uh, maybe—”

“Miller. Spit it out.”

Your body was all but leaking arousal before him and the man was trying to divert the conversation to…phones?

Joel winced.

Felt his member deflate with embarrassment just a bit.

NO! No. No. Just…fuck. Stay hard. Please, stay hard.

He’d done it to himself. Tried to hamper sex for a second too long just to give his dick a fighting chance at survival and ended up mucking things up supremely. Per usual.

“You never texted me back.” He sounded blunt now. Rushed.

Joel watched you raise both eyebrows.

“Texted you back?” you scoffed.

“Yeah…texted, called, snipchatted, whatever.”

Your face didn’t change despite the glaring Gen X error.

“You never texted me, Joel!”

What?

Suddenly, the dick wedged between your legs and hovering over your cunt seemed to be the last thing either of you could be bothered to worry about.

“I’ve…been texting you all week. Called a few times too.”

“Like hell you have. You ghosted me and went off the grid this whole fuckin’ week—Tommy said so, too.”

Joel cringed again to hear his brother’s name brought up in this context and shook his head. You were wrong.

“512-867-5309. Been trying to talk to you all goddamn week, see how you were, and you never responded,” he said, indignation creeping into his tone against his will.

At last, your expression dropped.

From furious to frowning to just fucking annoyed. Your lips were drawn tight in a line across your face.

“My number is 512-867-5305, dipshit.”

“Huh?”

“5 at the end, not a 9.”

“…No.”

“Yeah…”

Shit.

Joel Miller had made his fair share of flubs in his life, but fucking up the phone number of his best friend’s daughter whose pussy he’d accidentally cum inside the week before seemed almost criminal. Too fucking asinine and rookie-level dense to ever recover from. He blinked.

“Thought you…hated my fuckin’ guts,” he confessed.

You threw your hands up in disbelief, frustration. Fury.

“I do— believe me, I do,” you snapped, “But not for that.”

‘That’ meaning the last time you two bumped uglies. Joel wasn’t sure whether to take heart or step back.

“What’s’at mean?” he asked.

You pushed your feet a little further apart on the floor and pressed back into Joel. He took that as a decidedly good sign and reached for your hip. Then took his cock, again, which had invariably twitched and swelled up at the smallest motion from you.

“Means we’ve got plenty of reasons to hate each other, but fuckin’ ain’t one of ‘em,” you shrugged, angling your ass in the perfect place for penetration. Joel was just about back to full-mast and buzzing as you spoke, “I can get over the whole…old dude taboo—you being dad’s friend and all—I just couldn't stand the thought of you leaving me in the lurch when shit got weird at the end.”

‘Weird’ meaning risky. Virulent. Damn near catastrophic if it ever came to be that one of Joel's swimmers had latched onto one of your eggs and knocked you up. The fear of pregnancy, and every bloodcurdling, awkward conversation to ensue, had been amplified tenfold by the thought that Joel didn't even care one way or the other and couldn't be bothered to text, call, or otherwise show that he didn't totally regret what you'd done in his car. You could handle a clean break, but leaving it on such uncertain terms had been torture. At length, you sighed.

Joel was nosing behind your ear now, a bit less tense.

A little more laid-back and warm this time around, as he, like you, had gotten to exhale a breath of relief realizing that neither of you had deliberately tried to fuck the other over, or ghost, just yet. You'd been pissed at him all night, and he'd been busy barraging a perfect stranger somewhere in Austin with strings of texts and calls all week, but the two of you were ultimately OK. For now.

“But you still hate me, huh?” Joel spoke low against your skin and felt you soften just a little.

You nodded, careful not to slacken too much.

“Mhmm.”

Now Joel was almost glad to have taken that brief, heated detour, because his dick had made a complete comeback and was aching to tease you some more. He grabbed the base of his length and slotted it slow as ever between your folds. Rolled his hips forward and pushed you both a little closer to the mirror. One of your hands flew up to steady yourself, and Joel’s hand followed. He laid his palm over the back of yours and pressed in.

“It’d be a real shame if you do,” he said, smirking as he notched the tip of his cock just within the tight ring of muscles at the groove of your cunt, “For a second there I was starting to think you might’ve liked fucking me, too.”

In the next second, Joel was easing inside you. Feeling you arch into the motion and grabbing hold wherever he could across your front, he pulled you into his chest and felt a streak of coarse pleasure lick up the full length of his spine. Your walls were squeezing him in a brand new way, a novel position, and he was starting to fear there wasn't any place he could fuck you that wouldn't send him veering for release within his first two strokes inside.

He bucked his hips a little something like an amateur, he thought, getting used to taking you like this. You were moaning, holding his fingers between your own atop the mirror as you squeezed your pussy tight around his cock, and he hoped that meant you hadn't minded the few stuttered, desperate strokes he'd delivered at first.

“I love…fucking you, Joel,” you seethed at last.

Then, wordless as it was pointed, finding his gaze in your reflection, ‘I still hate you, Miller. There’s a difference.’

He slammed into your ass and quickly got the sense that you liked it this fast—loving, lusting, or despising him otherwise. Almost needed it a bit frantic and rapid-fire when he was fucking you from the back, he reckoned.

Joel looked you in the eye from his view behind you in the mirror and saw it clear as day. He almost grinned.

You were wildly fucked out and in need of quick release.

For once in his life, he could oblige you on that, easy.

He slid his cock in and out, rutting much quicker than he ever thought you’d want it, and he grunted. Slipped a hand between your thighs and felt you pulse around him, involuntarily, when his fingers found your clit. He could tell by that grip, and those febrile little whimpers, that you were loving this just as much as him and probably were as close, if not closer, to a new, shuddering climax.

Joel plunged deep inside your cunt and drew you closer.

Taking your throat in one hand, he nudged your body into the glass and smirked, drunk with the feel of you.

“Ya like it when I fill this pussy, huh? Love feeling me deep inside this needy little hole?” he murmured, slow and taking care to draw out the syllables in each word.

You nodded that you did. Rocked your hips back to meet his thrusts and moaned.

“I love it, daddy,” you managed weakly, “Love it so much.”

The fingers at your clit increased in speed, and Joel rutted into you even harder, relishing the soft squelch between your bodies as he moved. Then he reached for a fistful of your hair and, instead of pulling back like he might normally have done, he pushed in. He pressed your face in the mirror, turned to the side, and pistoned his hips even faster. Felt your moans spill out across the glass and mix with his own, and he couldn’t help but let a raw, primal impulse take over his thrusts—and tongue.

“You make the prettiest fuckin’ noises, y’know that?” Joel breathed, hunched over and close to your ear.

Before you could so much as acknowledge his praises, bob your head, or moan in response, he shifted the hand in your hair again. This time turning your face toward the mirror, he brought your lips within inches of the glass and made you watch him fuck you, again and again.

You trailed your gaze over your full reflection and almost whined out loud, ripe with desire and ready to cum just seeing how good he looked as he took you from behind.

With his brow furrowed, pupils blown, hair a fucking mess, lips parting slightly with the strain of every grunt and moan, and hips rolling repeatedly, furiously into your own, Joel looked about as handsome as you thought you’d ever seen him. You felt the soft nudge of his tummy behind you, the tightened grip on your hip and in your hair, and within seconds, you were nearly there.

“My pretty. fuckin’. girl—” Joel managed through gritted teeth, each word punctuated with a thrust, “—and her pretty. fuckin’. moans.” Then, bringing his beaming, sweaty expression right next to yours in the mirror, “Ready to cum for me, pretty girl?”

You curled your toes into the floor and nodded, slotting your fingers through his own when he planted a hand above you again,

“So— so close, daddy.”

Joel squeezed your fingers back. Kept your faces damn near side-by-side in the mirror and relished the marked change in your features when he grazed that spot inside. You let out the filthiest, fuckdrunk moan and didn’t need another stroke—you came around his cock with a tight, pulsing spasm, seizing his hand, rocking your hips back into his hard as the pleasure washed over your body.

Joel’s cock absorbed every last delicate throb, hot and heavy enough to send the man spiraling himself. He braced his front tight against your body and kept fucking you through your release, groaning a vicious, desperate bout when he felt that deep-seated urge to spill his seed.

Fuck. He’d have to pull out. Now.

Just as his own climax was close at hand—close as he could ever, or should ever feel it while still inside you—Joel reached down for your hip to pull out and cum all over your ass, but he was brought to a stop. Swiftly.

To his surprise, it was you pulling off of him—sliding off his cock and dropping to your knees as if to take him in your mouth.

Thank fuck.

Joel grabbed his dick as quick as he possibly could and moved to start stroking himself over your face, when your hand closed around his own. Stopping him. Again.

You grinned.

Feeling the slightest twinge of retributive pleasure at seeing him like this, just like he’d had you, your smile stretched even bigger. Joel could’ve wept at the sight.

You brought your lips to his cock and grazed it, barely.

“Wanna try something fun?”

He knew better than to let a moan slip at a time like this.

Not when he was sitting at the dinner table; not when he was surrounded by the people he knew and loved the most. Not when he was celebrating his best friend’s fifty-first birthday, and certainly not when that man’s daughter was currently perched between his thighs, out of sight from every eye at the party but his.

Joel lifted the tablecloth. He almost came on the spot.

This was your idea of ‘fun.’

Payback by any other name would’ve smelled as sweet.

Seeing your mouth open wide and your lips curled tight around his hot, throbbing member, Joel couldn’t help but ache for reprieve, or else a split-second lapse of judgment—one where he forgot all sense of decorum and simply went to town on that pretty little face of yours. But, as it was, the rest of the party was totally oblivious to your absence, and he didn’t want to draw attention to it, or him, by roughfucking your mouth.

That would come later.

No, now he would let you glide your mouth gently over his shaft, leaving trails of thick spit and hints of a shiny pink lip gloss in its wake. He’d let you bob your head softly—self-assured in a pace you got to set—and he wouldn’t lay a finger on your face or let a thrust of his get in the way, because this was all about you giving him the pleasure. Maybe making him squirm just a little, too.

That didn’t mean he couldn’t steal a glimpse every now and then and pin you with an expectant look when he wanted something done his way. The room was dimly lit and everyone in it drunk; Joel would gladly take the risk.

‘You can go deeper than that, sweet pea.’

‘Nope, three-fourths ain’t enough, I need your mouth around me whole.’

‘You did wanna make daddy feel good, didn’t ya, sugar?’

He didn’t have to speak a word of it out loud for you to know what he meant. What he needed. You loosened your jaw and stretched your lips even wider, whining just a little when the head of his cock grazed your tonsils.

“Fuck that feels nice,” Joel said aloud.

You froze.

Then, without missing a beat, you heard him continue just as comfortably, speaking to the people around him,

“Y’all feel that breeze comin’ in?”

Sick fuck. You continued to suck him anyway.

One hand braced tight against Joel’s leg and the other moved shamelessly between your own, and you tried not to moan, but the sound escaped anyway. No one heard it, but Joel felt it reverberate down his shaft, and he gripped his glass of Merlot like a vice. Your dad shot him a curious look from across the table but said nothing.

“Can’t get enough’a her, huh?” Tommy grinned beside him.

“What?” Joel faltered. Set his drink aside carefully.

Down below, you dragged your mouth just far enough to take his tip between your lips and suckle. Joel grunted.

“The wine,” Tommy said, still smiling, “You must love it.”

Joel let out another strangled breath that he tried to pass off as a chuckle and nodded.

“Got me on my fuckin’ knees,” he admitted.

And that was the truth. Starved for air and blinking through tears as you knelt down to blow him, it was still you with the chokehold on Joel, and both of you knew it.

Try as you might to convince yourselves otherwise, the man was enrapt. Too spellbound to turn down your offer of sucking him dry under the dinner table just minutes after he’d almost cum all over your face, Joel was in it, and he was in it deep. It was just that small matter of you being his best friend’s daughter that made him loath to admit it. At any rate, he had your tongue licking strips up his cock and felt a sudden, sharp clench in his stomach.

He knew he wouldn’t last much longer. Neither would you.

Joel couldn’t see it then, but you’d practically soaked your own hand from how hard you’d been rubbing your clit—ignoring his orders not to touch yourself there—so turned on from just sucking his dick and needing to feel relief while you selflessly, secretly pleased him beneath the table. While Joel reached for another draught of wine, you brought one hand to his balls and kept the other at your cunt, triple-tasking like the efficient little slut he needed you to be: sucking, cupping, and rubbing all at once to get the two of you off in one minute or less.

You guided him down to the furthest place in your throat, then pushed him even deeper. You gagged just slightly and felt a hand reach down for your cheek. A thumb began to rub at the tears welled up at the corners of your eyes.

‘Sweet thing hasn’t felt a man this deep before, huh? Wanna swallow some more?’

You nodded that you did. Couldn’t actually hear him now, or see much else besides the soft tufts of hair on his belly, but you could feel a light, heady warmth seep into your brain.

You rutted your hips and just hoped no one dropped a fork nearby. Bucked desperately into your hand and felt the heat start to swell to a whole new feeling, and suddenly you were whimpering, whining on Joel’s cock from under the shade of the table and cumming all over your fingers.

Joel returned a quick smile from your father and cracked a joke about the Super Bowl. Raised his hips just the slightest bit and wiped one of your tear-soaked cheeks.

‘Almost there, hon, keep that throat open for daddy.’

All you could do was cry and try your best. Wild feelings from both the slow, deep facefuck he was giving you and the flurry of euphoric aftershocks coursing all throughout your body made it almost impossible to bear, but you obeyed your sweet and strong and steady-handed Joel and sensed a blossoming desire crop up for something else.

You wanted to taste him as he blew his load in your mouth, flooded your tongue with his spend, and painted every inch of your insides with that hot, sticky stuff.

You needed him whole.

Your Joel.

In tune with your thoughts—or perhaps just overcome with a need to see you before he reached his peak—Joel raised the tablecloth the slightest bit when Tommy wasn’t looking. His gaze locked on yours, and his tongue darted quick between his lips. He cocked a brow. Brushed his thumb again and looked down as if to say,

‘Ya want this, darlin’? Want all of me?’

You gave a soft nod, and that was all he needed.

No sooner had you given him the green light than his cum went pulsing out in ropes, coating your throat and eventually your whole mouth as you held still and took it all.

There was so much more than you thought. So much of Joel that had been waiting to give your mouth a proper fucking glaze that once he’d started he just couldn’t stop. Above the table, your dad shot a pointed look in his direction—‘You good, man?’—and it took every ounce of strength in Joel’s body to grit his teeth tight and nod.

He’d filled so much of your mouth it was spilling out.

You tried to hold steady, keep your movements extra slow. You’d heard your dad’s voice and just knew there’d be a lot more on the line than Joel’s dribbling seed if either one of you fucked up now. Your breath caught in your chest, and you felt too afraid to even swallow.

“I just…came,” Joel started, and your head almost cracked on the wood surface from how abruptly you flinched back,

“—to the realization—”

“—that you…are so…motherfuckin’ old, my friend.”

Your father’s laugh was the first you heard, followed by Tommy, his friends, and a dozen other party guests.

The next thing you felt, to your complete and utter shock, was Joel’s cock brushing your cheek. Then your lips. Then your tongue. He slid his still-hard member through the ‘o’ your mouth had made in awe and started to move in gentle motions back and forth, like a man all but aching to get a feel for your wet, sodden walls.

A man who couldn’t risk a glimpse now, but wanted more than anything to see the mouth he’d just filled.

Your father’s words hadn’t even cooled in the air.

Joel Miller, you sneaky, freaky fuck.

As the laughter subsided, and Tommy scooted back in his chair to take leave of your table, you felt a spark ignite. Whether it was yours or Joel’s or both your perverted minds suddenly alight and insane with the same thought, you couldn’t be sure, but you could make out the sound of a tablecloth flipping back up above you.

Joel slipped his dick out of your mouth and grinned. Took a firm hold of your face under the table so his fingers were coaxing your jaw to unhinge before him.

It was the lowest, slowest, menacing sort of sound you’d ever heard from him before, but it was his all the same.

Speaking to you now, softly, “Show daddy, darlin’.”

You thought you might like to see him that way forever.

Eyes honey-soft and glazed, thumb toying at your lip. Chest heaving up and down in time to your own breaths and growing ragged as you opened your mouth to him. He was sated and somehow unfulfilled—a bottomless pit of raw prurience as he stared down and held your gaze. Hair tousled, pants unbuckled, cock resting comfortably against your cheek, the man looked wonderfully undone and half in love with your sweet face peering up at him.

You couldn’t deny you loved doing this, too.

You’d just wished he saw Tommy before Tommy saw you.

#C*MPLAY IS BACK IN A BIG WAY #IT NEVER LEFT #joel miller smearing it on YOUR FACE????? IN THIS ECONOMY???#i would never shut up #i already never shut up but especially then #joel miller #joel miller tlou #joel miller smut #joel miller imagine #joel miller one shot #joel miller x reader #joel miller fanfiction #the last of us #tlou #the last of us fic #joel miller x you #dbf!joel

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