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pretchatta · 3 years

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swoon june day 15: masquerade

this wasn't supposed to be one of the mature ones but I think it's ended up being too suggestive to call it teen. oops.

rating: mature; kanan jarrus/hera syndulla; 2.1k words

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For most beings, traveling inconspicuously meant wearing more clothes. A cloak, a hood or a full-face helmet made for a great disguise and could hide a person such that a casual observer wouldn’t look twice.

For Hera Syndulla, the opposite was true.

A twi'lek pilot was a rare sight in the galaxy. While her usual clothes blended in with most of the places she visited, there were always a few double-takes when people noticed her lekku. No-one expected to see a twi’lek in overalls and flying goggles, especially not a woman.

The result was that, for Hera, the easiest way to avoid attention was to remove clothes.

She would swap her cap and goggles for wrapping her lekku, wear something skimpy and revealing, and smear a bit of makeup over her cheeks. It was perfect – everyone looked right past her.

She hated it.

Her chosen aesthetic for today's recon was bar-dancer-on-a-break. Her skintight bodysuit felt like it was more negative space than material, with its low-cut neckline and several geometric shapes cut out of the sides and legs. The evening air was balmy enough that she didn’t need a jacket, and she felt very exposed. The chunky necklace she had accessorised with felt more like a slave collar than jewellery, and she shuddered as she wondered if that was why the look was so popular.

Hera resented the reason why an outfit like this worked so well. Her people had become almost synonymous with slavery, despite their numerous achievements as individuals and as a species. And yet here she was, donning the stereotype like a costume, reinforcing it to anyone who saw her. She just wanted to finish her recon, get back to the Ghost and take the whole lot off. In a normal way, not putting on a show for anyone.

Well, maybe she'd let Kanan watch. He was the only being in the galaxy she trusted to still see her as a real person afterwards. He would also never ask for it. If she ever did something like that for him, it would be because she wanted to do it, and because she knew he would take only what she was willing to give; he wouldn’t ask for more. A year of being more-than-crew had shown her just how selfless a lover he could be.

She shook her head to clear the train of thought as she approached the spaceport. It only took a few moments for her to realise she'd need to use the other advantage the outfit offered to get inside, for the place was crawling with stormtroopers. There had been a few on the main gate when she and Kanan had left earlier that day, but now she could see them patrolling the perimeter in pairs as well as actively checking the IDs of everyone trying to get in.

Hera sighed. She wanted to believe it had nothing to do with Kanan, but her hopes were not high. He was always finding trouble. Still, if she could get back to the Ghost then even if he wasn't able to meet her she could always fly out to his position and save him from whatever hairy situation he would undoubtedly be in.

She made her way around to one of the lesser-used entrances she'd been scouting on her recon, hoping for an easier way inside, but found it also guarded. The surrounding street was empty, however, and she could work with that.

Hera adjusted her well-padded cleavage in preparation for what she was about to do. Taking a deep breath, she fortified herself by squeezing one breast. The hard press of the small blaster tucked amongst the padding – the real reason she’d sewn extra into the bodysuit – reassured her that at least she wasn’t going in unarmed.

The two troopers standing guard noticed her as soon as she stepped into the road. Exaggerating the sway of her hips as she walked, she drew her lekku over her shoulders to twirl the end of one between her fingers. The troopers watched her approach.

"It is okay to go into the spaceport?" she asked with wide, innocent eyes. Her old Ryl accent came back to her easily, adding to the charade.

"We have to check your ID before you can go in," said the shorter trooper. He stood perfectly straight, holding his blaster a little higher than his fellow guard, who was leaning against the wall somewhat more casually. Hera guessed the one speaking to her was newer to the ranks of the Imperial army, and she hoped he wasn’t still sticking to the regulations so diligently that he would prevent her from doing what she needed to do.

"Oh… I have left my ID at home today,” she pouted, tilting her chin up and subtly pushing her chest forward. “I only want to visit my sister who runs that little food stand just inside for lunch. I won't be going anywhere – I have only ten minutes left of my break.”

The trooper was shaking his head. “We can’t let you in without ID.”

It would’ve been nice if that alone could have worked, but she hadn’t expected it to. She took a half-step closer to him and lowered her voice to a sultry purr.

“There is no way I could persuade you?”

He shifted nervously. “W-what do you mean?” he asked, glancing at his companion. “Like, credits?”

Another half-step closer, and she managed to tilt her head so that she could look up at his visor through her false eyelashes, even though they were a similar height.

“I don’t have any credits, but I’m sure there is something I can do for you,” she murmured. She was exaggerating the accent, rolling each resh and turning every thesh into a senth.

“Uhh… You – you mean…” he stammered. Hera heard a soft snigger from the other guard. Hopefully he would find this amusing enough to let her drag the rookie around the corner. She only needed to separate them; the rest was easy from there.

She cut him off by pointing down the road. “There’s an alley where I can show you what I mean. I think it even has a clean patch of ground that will not get my knees dirty.”

“Your – your knees–”

"Tell you what, kid,” the taller one said, finally pushing himself upright from the wall. “You watch the door and I'll sort out her payment."

That worked too. It didn’t matter which one went with her; stormtroopers were easy to take down individually when they weren’t expecting an attack.

They left the bewildered rookie to his post as Hera led the more seasoned soldier to the alley she’d pointed to. As they rounded the corner and out of sight of the door, she tossed one lek over her shoulder and turned to face him, breathing in deeply so that her chest rose noticeably. Now she knew where his attention would be focused.

Her fist swung up in a quick jab to his neck. She was aiming for the gap between his helmet and shoulder armour, where a hard enough blow should incapacitate him for at least a few seconds. Her other hand went for his blaster to disarm him.

But he was faster than she anticipated. Much faster; it was almost like he was ready for her. One gloved hand caught her fist, stopping it in its tracks, while the other dropped the blaster to the ground completely. Hera immediately twisted out of his grip and pulled out her own gun. She’d hoped to do this quietly, but making a scene was better than getting arrested.

The trooper quickly stepped back and pulled his helmet off.

“Woah, stop, it’s me!”

Hera was momentarily dumbfounded.

“Kanan?”

“Yes! Could you maybe put that down?” He indicated to her blaster, which was still pointed at his head. She dropped her arm to her side.

"What are you doing?" she demanded, dropping her accent to speak like her usual self again.

Kanan looked sheepish. "Well, I was hoping for a-"

"I mean in stormtrooper armour, guarding the spaceport!” she interrupted. “And do you really think I was going to go through with that? I didn’t even know it was you under there!"

“I thought you’d recognise my voice!” he protested.

She looked at him incredulously. “Not coming from under a bucket! And not when I wasn’t expecting it!”

"Okay, yeah, I realise I maybe didn’t think that one through,” he admitted, rubbing at the back of his neck. “But when I heard they’d increased security I was worried about you, so I was keeping an eye out to make sure you could get back to the Ghost. I thought you'd try one of the side entrances and this was the closest one to where you were going to finish your recon."

She opened her mouth to berate him again but realised it was actually a pretty good plan. Not to mention sweet – it couldn’t have been easy to take that guard’s place. He was lucky to have found one with a rookie for a partner. Maybe he hadn’t caused whatever it was that had got the Imperials worked up, either.

“Alright, your thoughtfulness has redeemed you.” She tucked her blaster back into its hiding place, noticing how his eyes followed her hands for a few moments before snapping back to her face when she continued. “Let’s get out of here.”

"You sure you want to go right now? We’re probably not expected back out there for a while yet..."

She could tell he was at least half-joking.

"Really?” She gave him a raised eyebrow. “I was lying about the clean patch of ground, you know. This alley is filthy, and I want to change."

"Okay, okay, I get it." He at least had the decency to look chastened, but she wasn’t really upset with him. She just wanted to go home.

"Just stun your friend and we can get back to the Ghost, love," she said gently.

He gave her a small smile before putting the helmet back on and retrieving his blaster. A few seconds later she heard the stun blast and followed him back to the road, where he was dragging the rookie’s unconscious body away from the entrance to hide it behind some crates.

Inside the spaceport, no-one stopped them. She was just a citizen with an escort, nothing to worry about. The Ghost was exactly as they’d left it this morning, and Chopper only needed a little encouragement to open up and let Kanan in. When the ramp closed behind them, Hera sighed in relief. It was good to be home.

She had to remind traffic control that she would have already had her ID and intent checked at the entrance to the spaceport. They begrudgingly gave her clearance to take off, and she heaved a deeper sigh as the Ghost entered hyperspace. They were away, no-one was watching her now, and she could be herself again. Kanan and Chopper didn’t count; they both saw her for who she was. They were as much her home as the ship.

Beside her, Kanan pushed himself out of the co-pilot’s chair. "I'm going to get out of this armour, then I'll fix that squeaky vent in the ‘fresher that you've been complaining about."

She heard him cross to the door.

"Oh, Kanan, could you hold on a moment?" she called over her shoulder.

He paused with one hand on the door control. "What is it?"

Hera engaged the autopilot and got out of her chair to slink over to him.

"I know I said I wanted to change, but there’s a problem,” she began, stepping close to him and lightly running a finger over his chestplate. “See, there's a stormtrooper guarding the door, and I need to figure out a way to get past him."

She glanced up at Kanan and saw he was grinning. "Maybe you could offer him something," he suggested.

She pushed herself up onto her toes so that their faces were level, her eyes on his mouth.

“I wonder what he might accept,” she whispered, her lips barely an inch from his own.

Then she closed the gap and kissed him with a slow, simmering heat. His arms came up to hold her, one hand stroking along her back. It worked its way around to her side, sliding up until his thumb brushed the side of one breast.

He broke away abruptly with a serious look in his eyes.

“You put the safety on your blaster, right?”

She gave him a sly smile. “Why don’t you check for me?”

His answering grin was accompanied by both hands sliding up her sides, and then he was giving a very thorough and enthusiastic check for hidden weapons.

#kanera #swoonjune2021 #kanan jarrus #hera syndulla #star wars: rebels #star wars rebels #pretchwritta #fic #swoon june

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dreamties · 4 years

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Slashers W/ a Punk S/O

T/W- q*eer is used a few times- in a positive, self affirming kind of way. But I can add other trigger warnings if needed. :)

A/n- Literally no one asked for this, but I wanted to make more HCs like the soft pastel one...so I just went wild and made them.

I included a little bit of punk culture into this as well, because it’s not just about the fashion, but since there’s such a vast variety within punk culture I mostly stuck with my experiences in the community, and some bits and pieces from documentaries(mostly live footage from “The Decline of Western Civilization”).

Characters: Billy/Stu, The Lost Boys, Norman Bates, Michael Myers

Will make one(s) for Brahms, Amanda, Helen or Daniel if asked

Billy Loomis + Stu Macher

so early 90s, the Riot Grrrl movement emerges

bands like Bikini Kill, Bratmobile, Heavens to Betsy or Sleater-Kinney

it’s a very female-powered oriented movement, but I notice that a lot of minorities tend to be drawn to this music and community (LGBT folks, people of color, etc).

both boys, and yourself, being outside of the norm and all (polyamorous relationship, gay/bi) are sort of drawn to it!

and sure there’s a lot of really great queercore/homocore bands, and there’s probably a good LGBT+ punk scene out there somewhere, but in a little town like Woodsboro? Hell no. Sticking with this fem punk movement, while again mostly a space for women in music- it’s the most accepted the three of you have felt outside of you’re relationship.

you’ve always been pretty into the music, stuff like Dead Kennedys, Black Flag, or the short-lived Germs- but it wasn’t until you stumbled upon Riot Grrrl that you really got into it.

the music, making zines about local-ish political issues(probably not so much Woodsboro stuff, more Cali in general and neighboring towns) and a few ones with queer themes and hand-drawn illustrations of your partners, and DIYing all your clothes

since you’re so experienced with DIYing your clothes and sewing on patches, you’ve helped repair the Ghostface costumes on numerous occasions. they kind of adore this(Stu is the only one that will- and does, frequently- admit that)

Let’s face it, the three of you do everything together- but you especially enjoy when Stu tags along for thrift dates.

he’s the more fashionable one, and he makes the whole experience more enjoyable- cracking jokes and just being his all-around goofy self.

Woodsboro is a very little town, so they don’t have much...but they do have a few small stores- usually you’ll make a whole day/date out of it though. driving to the next town or so over, since they have more stores and a better selection, and spending hours looking for cheap, old t-shirts, belts, clothes with funky patterns. heading out for pizza after.

Billy’s more likely to get into the music and everything with you(he’s kinda,, angsty, no offense to him)- will definitely go to shows with you.

just- imagine Billy in ripped jeans. and he’d have like one or two patches sewn on to it- one of them is your all time favorite band, and the other is a band that he found on his own time, and actually really enjoyed.

Stu is dragged along with you guys, you can’t just leave him at home- he’s gonna feel left out and sad. :(

He’s mostly there to keep y’all company- he really likes the energy of the shows though!

the two of them are such a chaotic duo though, so much so that you have definitely been kicked out or banned from a few venues. all for varying reasons. good grief these men can not be tamed.

The Lost Boys

as we all know, these vampires are total punks. so they’re gonna appreciate having a s/o who’s also into that whole scene.

How you meet:

you’re a baby punk, and it’s your first show ever, and you look so nervous. you’re dressed up in pretty plain clothes, a single homemade patch for your favorite band barely hanging to your jacket side(you were mid-way sewing it, when you realized you were gonna be late if you didn’t leave asap).

it’s a few local bands, ones you’d never really heard of really. you look anxious. but when they start playing? you look so unapologetically yourself, you’re so in the moment dancing- it’s completely mesmerizing to the boys. the music isn’t even that good, but you seem to be having the time of your life.

they greet you after the show, and you’re a tiny bit flustered- cause gosh, heck, they saw you. dancing. so embarrassing.

David is the one that introduces himself and the group, and initiates conversation. Dwayne’s a pretty quiet guy, so he just listens to what you have to say.

Marko’s pretty excited about you, and initiates in some small conversation, he may have complimented your little patch(Marko- patch jacket KING, complimenting your jacket?? more likely than you’d think)

and oh, oh- Paul is out there being a total chatty-cathy, and is absolutely bombarding you with questions. like, okay, Paul is pretty talkative, but the other vamps are a little worried that he’s scared you off. and you had seemed so cool :(

you end up pretty engaged in your convo with Paul though, even if all the attention is overwhelming. He ends up snagging a date for the five of you the following week.

once you start hanging out/dating:

y’all just hit it off so well those first few days. they all love how sweet & shy you are- but also how much of a badass punk babe you are.

Marko helps make your patch jacket(collecting ones for bands you enjoy, how to make your own, sewing them on, etc). you probably could have done it w/out his help, but my gosh- you weren’t going to pass up this opportunity. Marko gets really soft around you sometimes, since he doesn’t really do this activity with anyone else, it’s saved for you. 🥺🥺

Dwayne likes listening to you talking about the local scene(outside of the shows you go to- mostly about stuff he can’t attend, protests and meetings during the daylight.)

all of them(especially David) are very protective of you. I mean, generally. but also when you go to shows. they let you do whatever the heck you’re gonna do, but the mere second that someone even thinks about starting shit w/ you?? well, y’know. those vampire instincts kick in.

the four of them obviously share a lot of similar tastes in music- but they all have different favorite bands, & fave parts of the community. which, they can’t even fully participate in,, but it’s okay.

they, individually, introduce their favorite bands to you. and they get it in their head that oh, they said they liked it. they must like it as much as I do. and awkwardly coming out to the four of them, as they argue about your favorite band, “Well, actually- this *insert band they’ve never heard of or barely listen to* is my favorite.” and their just kinda like, oh, okay. please tell us more about them.

so it’s sorta like,, you’ve been learning all this cool knowledge from them, now you get to share cool knowledge with them.

idk. I think it’s cute. 💕

Norman Bates

so first off- let’s just pretend Psycho was in at least the 70s/80s for a moment. because realistically- the punk subculture didn’t really exist back then.

baby boy is absolutely fascinated by the way you dress (mother is less thrilled though)

imagine your jacket is getting a bit weathered, and needs some repairs- so he helps you to sew edges closed, and make sure the patches aren’t on too loose, etc

he enjoys hearing your stories of all the past shows you’ve gone to. you always get so excited about them, and he finds that so endearing. But he pretty much leaves the actual punk scene to you because of these stories.

he was already worried from the stories, and made sure you were well prepared for any trouble every time you left for a show.

but one time, you were able to get him to join you. never again though. he was so nervous!

the music was too loud! and he could hardly understand what they were saying- it was so confusing!

you stayed with him most of the night, standing near the back, holding his hand. he’d gently bob his head to the music occasionally.

but you accidentally found yourself swept into the crowd, but you looked so blissed-out in the moment, that he figured it would be okay for you to dance* over there for a little bit...right?

*Norman is still unsure if you’d even call that dancing.

Thankfully, nothing bad happened in the mosh pit.

you gotta give him lots of attention and reassurance afterwards though- you almost scared Norman half to death D:

He’s happy enough helping you out and listening to you though- and that’s okay for you, too. you still love each other lots, even if this particular interest doesn’t overlap.

Michael Myers

he thinks you’re outfits are pretty interesting.

he’s a little worried at first, when you start experimenting with putting things like safety pins in your ears. cause like- that’s not supposed to be in your ear, Y/n, what the fuck

if you make zines at all, Michael really enjoys watching you make the illustrations for them(not that he’ll admit to it though), and helps to find newspaper and magazine clippings to incorporate into the spreads.

you always show michael the final booklet before distributing it

he doesn’t talk a lot, so he doesn’t ask questions- but he often does the little head tilt once you give it to him. since he’s not very privy to current events, and a lot of your zines are political, you spend a lot of time explaining them in depth.

he has no use for any of this knowledge, but he listens on, intently.

Important note:

dear god do not bring this man to concerts and local shows with you.

it is a nightmare, to say the least

Michael is sort of,, emotionless sometimes, doesn’t really care for people at all, and if he does? definitely not in the same way most people do.

so imagine combining that part of michael, the fact that he’s also a giant stabby man, with super loud, energetic- almost aggressive- sounding music and a bunch of strangers that aren’t respecting any personal boundaries.

you need to keep him at the back of the venue- lest your local scene may go missing.

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oyubaat-tapcaf · 3 years

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Take Me To the Planetarium Chapter 3 - Shawarma

AO3 Chapter 1 Chapter 2

warnings: none

summary: Din has to pinch himself a few times during this chapter.

When Din arrived at Boba’s place he was ten minutes early. Of course, he was. He either gets somewhere too late or way too early, there was no in-between. He didn’t want to rush Boba, he probably wasn’t even ready to go yet, so Din drove round the block. When he arrived again he was only five minutes early. That was okay, he could do that.

He parked his bike on the sidewalk and set back. Din knew the street where Boba lived, it was near the centre of the city. Boba lived in an older apartment block with beautiful architecture. Din took off his helmet and looked at the trees that were framing the sidewalk. He liked being here already. Though, his gut was twisting inside of him like a snake. He was so excited to see Boba, but on the other hand, he was scared. Scared that Boba realised that Din maybe wasn’t how Boba thought he was. That Boba was disappointed by the show, that Din fucked up at keeping a conversation. That Din infodumped all the shit he knew about space and that Boba wouldn’t like that. That Din got too excited and wouldn’t stop talking...

Din got off his motorcycle and took off his gloves. It was pretty cold outside so he had to wear them, at least for the ride. He went over to Boba’s front door and raised his hand to ring the doorbell. Before he could actually press the button the door swung open and he was greeted with Boba’s always so welcoming smile.

“Hi, Din!”

Din didn’t even have time to be surprised because he immediately felt better. Boba had waited, he had been ready a long time ago. Also, he didn’t even try to hide it, because he didn’t need to. Boba didn’t try to act cool and uninterested. He showed Din that he was excited and had been looking forward to this whole...date (?). Because somehow, he knew that Din kept overthinking and he knew how to deal with that.

Din released the air in his lungs that he had been holding and smiled back at his date.

“Hi.”

He realised that Boba looked pretty good. He had put the effort into his outfit, just like Din had. He wore black jeans, that was ripped at the knees, together with a button-up that was also black. Though it had a white and grey print all over. Din couldn’t see what it was, the light wasn’t bright enough at the front door. Boba also wore a silver necklace and his hair looked like it had been styled at least a bit. The longer parts of his mullet were long enough to lightly brush his shoulders.

He held a leather jacket in his hand that was lined with a fluffy and warm looking fabric on the inside. It had a few patches sewn on it.

“Your knees will be freezing,” said Din awkwardly. Wow, what a great way to start a conversation.

Boba laughed and ran his gloved hand through his curls.

“You can keep me warm. Anything for the look.”

Din joined the laugher.

“Okay, I can do that,” he replied and gestured to the jacket. “ Also, I bet this is warm enough. Though, the ride isn’t that long.”

“That sounds good,” Boba nodded and stepped through the door and closed it behind him.

“It’s been so long since I’ve been in a planetarium. I’m pretty excited!”

Din watched Boba fumble with his keys and noticed the badass leather gloves he wore. Fingerless. Oh boy, this did something to him.

“I’m happy to help,” answered Din and walked over to his bike. Boba followed him and eyed up the vehicle.

“That looks cool. I wanted to get one too but I need money for that,” he laughed awkwardly, “My car costs so much since it’s pretty old.”

“It didn’t seem original to me. Is it tuned?”

Boba nodded and put on the huge leather jacket.

“Yeah, a friend of mine offered me to change a few things.”

“It suits you,” Din replied and watched Boba close the zipper of the leather jacket. “Ready to go?”

They both put on their helmets and Din sat down on his bike. He prepared for Boba to sit behind him. He felt the weight shift and Boba’s smaller body sitting down behind him. Boba made sure not to get all up behind Din immediately, which found Din very polite, though, he would’ve loved to feel the man pressing up behind him. He registered that Boba was already lightly resting his hands at Din’s waist. A shiver ran through his muscles which he luckily hid very well.

“Please don’t fall during turns,” said Din, his voice a bit muffled by his helmet.

“I know how to ride a bike you dingus,” Boba slapped Din’s waist and snickered.

“Well then, off we go.”

The bike started rolling, the engine started roaring and they both started to feel the wind on their bodies. The street lights began to blur and everything seemed far distant. While Din still watched the traffic, he realised how they undocked from the world and entered the wormhole where just the two of them existed. It was dangerous to start daydreaming while going 50km per hour through the city, so Din stopped hyper-focusing on Boba and concentrated on his bike.

As much as he’d love to enjoy the man’s presence behind him, there was no way he could do that for now without getting them both in trouble. Maybe, when he got used to Boba a bit more, then he’d be able to do both things all at once. But for now, he had to stay in reality.

As Din had mentioned before, the ride wasn’t long. Boba lived near downtown, which means they arrived after fifteen minutes. Din was already able to see that planetariums dome from the last traffic light. He already felt safer and way more grounded. The engine beneath him was rumbling like a sea monster in a horror movie, but the leather-clad hands on his waist felt angelic. He realised how happy he was to experience this whole situation. Planetarium in sight, on his bike, with the man he was crushing on. He made sure to remember to pinch himself when they arrive so he could make sure this wasn’t a dream.

The Moons of Iego was already greeting them with its bright lights that were nearly illuminating the whole street. The trees were touched by blue and purple, the dome of the building was brightly lit with yellow and orange. It looked like the sun.

The light show never failed to amaze Din.

The bike slowly rolled into the parking lot and through that neon sign that stated the name of the location. The sign gave Din the weird vibe of a romantic gothic style that went to a cyberpunk world. It had crooked metal bars that held the neon lights up, giving the whole entry a roughed up feeling. He was so in love with it.

There were already a few people entering the building, though, they still had plenty of time before the show started. Din liked to be early, the planetarium had an amazing interior with many cool pieces of art and items on display to learn about. Also, he wanted to buy Boba a drink.

They parked the bike and slowly got down from the seat.

After lifting his helmet Din turned to Boba and had to take a calming breath. The man was immersed in the purple light, threading through his curls and over his cheeks. A few spots of blue were on his lips and run down his neck, catching in his leather jacket. Din made sure to keep at least his mouth closed.

“What an amazing place,” he heard Boba whisper.

Din swallowed the rose that had just grown in his throat and tried to give Boba a good answer.

“I agree,�� he got out and distracted himself by fumbling his keys into the pocket of his heavy biker jacket. It dreaded him a little bit to think of all the times he will have to make sure today not to let his true inner feelings show to not appear too creepy. Even if Boba was very relaxed and open-minded, Din still had to make sure. He had to go slow.

“You ready to go inside?” Din gestured to the entrance of the building that was decorated with beautiful ornaments and statues of angels and aliens.

Boba said yes to that and they both made their way to the entrance.

Din hadn’t told Boba, but he had reserved two tickets for them. he just had to be sure to get the best seats. When they entered the first big hall of the planetarium he heard Boba gasp beside him. He related to that, the first hall never failed to amaze.

It seemed like it had no ceiling because of the light show, together with the way they decorated the whole room. Din didn’t quite get how they made the effect of the endless hall but somehow they did. In the corner’s of the room were bar’s made out of silver metal and plastic to appear like space stations. The menus were hung up high up in the air, also made out of neon signs. About four meters above Din’s head were moons and space shuttles hung from the ceiling. Soft ethereal music was playing and somehow, the voices of the other visitors were muffled by the architecture of the room. It was strangely quiet in here, all the time. Just like outer space.

“This is unreal,” he heard Boba beside him and turned to look at him.

“I know what you mean.”

They both just quietly stood next to each other for a while, soaking up the relaxing energy that the room was flooded with. After a while, Din turned back to Boba.

“Do you want a drink?”

Boba met Din’s eyes and gave him a smirk.

“Sure.”

They walked over to one of the bar’s and leaned against it.

“What do you want? I’m getting a ginger ale for myself.”

Boba scanned the menu and his eyes fell on the wine.

“I love drinking alone. I’m going to take that red wine.”

“You sound like a single mom on pinterest.”

Boba started to laugh and threw his head back.

“That’s my duty. I am a single mom on pinterest. Live laugh love”!”

Din joined Boba’s cackling and realised that they were probably the loudest people in the room. He didn’t mind….and that was strange for him. With Boba, all his urge to hide from society just fell from his shoulders and out of his pockets. Boba was so confident, he took Din with him.

“Make sure that you’re still able to get on my bike after the show.”

Boba raised his eyebrows.

“I think I’ll be fine. Also, you can help me get up there. And then I’ll just hold onto you.” he leaned a bit forward and took the wine glass that Din handed him.

Din got flustered at first, his instincts were telling him to run. And then...he realised that there was no need to hide or run. He was able to play along with Boba’s flirting. He was capable of actually leading this date somewhere. He was sick of letting things happen to him. He was going to make things happen.

“Is that so? Then maybe I should buy you more drinks, huh?” Din leaned a bit closer and watched Boba take a sip from the glass. It had been a while since Din had taken control in a situation like this.

“Yes you should, because that wine tastes amazing,” replied Boba with gleaming eyes. It felt like the whole room around them had gone into a blur.

“Only the best for you.”

Boba raised his chin a little and a smug smile spread on his lips.

“What’s your goal here, biker boy? Getting me into your bed?”

Din’s inner self huffed. It was hard to keep up with Boba’s confidence and fearless flirting. He wanted to scream “Yes, kinda! Let’s go home and let me throw you on my Star Trek sheets!”

But of course, he couldn’t do that. Also, he was still very happy to be here.

“Well first, you’re going to watch that show with me and you better pay attention because there will be a test tomorrow!” Din raised his index finger as a teacher would.

Boba picked up his joke and laughed after taking another sip of wine.

“Okay, I’ll try my best, sir.”

For a few seconds, it took all of Din’s self-control to keep himself from throwing Boba over that damn bar stool next to them. He looked away for two seconds, a soft smile on his lips. Then he remembered what he actually wanted to talk about this night.

“Boba, tell me about your band. I completely fucked up asking last time.”

Boba looked surprised at that question. He then looked a little flustered, Din liked that.

“We’re an alt rock band. I play bass. Uhm...we have an EP released but the quality sucks because we don’t have the money for a good record studio.” he took a sip of the red wine and Din could see a small blush forming on Boba’s cheeks. He wasn’t sure if it’s the wine or the conversation.

“And how many people are in that band? What’s the name of the band?”

“We’re four people, the name is Spying Neighbors. We have a guitar, drums, bass keys and vocals, our guitarist also does the vocals.”

Din chuckled at that name.

“Spying Neighbors? That’s a sick name. How did that happen?”

Boba chuckled too and emptied his wine glass.

“We started rehearsing years ago at our guitarist’s parents’ house and the neighbours kept watching us and sometimes they even called the police.”

“Let me know when there’s a show! I wanna come.” Din also emptied his ginger ale.

Boba looked surprised. Probably because Din didn’t seem like a person who would go to rock shows. Which was kinda right, but he loved music and for Boba, he would go to a fully crowded club, just to see the man on stage.

“I definitely will!”

A signal from the speakers let them know that the show will start soon, only ten minutes left.

“Should we go inside?” Din placed his clas on the bar and gestured to the theatre’s entrance.

Boba nodded and picked up the jacket he had placed on that barstool next to him.

They walked over to the entrance. As they stepped through it everything turned dark. The theatre was still dark on the inside and the way to the seats was only shown by small lights on the floor. They found their seats pretty fast because Din knew the way. He had been here many times. When they sat down, Din realised that the seats weren’t even that far from each other that he remembered. Maybe he had never paid attention to it because he had never been here with another person.

“Remember the test tomorrow,” whispered Din in Boba’s direction and got a small giggle as an answer. He wasn’t able to really see Boa’s features because it was so dark in the room. But that gave him the opportunity to really listen to his voice as he talked.

“I am always amazed by all that technical stuff going on here. Like...how does this even work? Amazing!”

His voice wasn’t super deep but it wasn’t high either. It wasn’t rough, it had a smooth undertone that Din had never heard anywhere before. Also, the way he spoke gave Din butterflies in his stomach. Boba said everything with so much meaning and honesty like it was just permanently edged in his voice. It made Din happy just listening to it.

“I know what you mean. Even if someone would explain it to me, I’d still have no clue how they make it so realistic.”

“Nah, you’re smart. You’d get it.”

Din snickered at that and shook his head.

“I’m not smart Boba, I’m just interested in certain things. If I’d be that smart, I’d be working at NASA, not as a web designer.”

“What about as a web designer for NASA?” replied Boba smugly and giggled. “No for real,” he continued, "I'm kinda glad you work at Smith's, if not I'd have never met you."

Din felt his chest tickle as he heard Boba's words. At first, he didn't know what to say, and when he finally wanted to answer, the dome-like ceiling above them lit up in bright colours and music started to play. The show began.

Din already knew the show, they changed a few things from time to time but overall it was still the same. But it still didn't fail to amaze him every time. He kept his eyes glued to the projected sky above them and followed the star signs with his eyes. He wanted to look over to Boba, but he was too afraid that Boba might notice him staring.

So he kept looking at the show and leaned back in his seat, taking some time to relax and think about his next moves. The show wasn't very long, maybe about 60 minutes. He didn't want to say goodbye to Boba so soon, so he decided to ask him what he wanted to do after that. He would offer him to go to his place. He even had cleaned it up, so he kinda had to invite Boba. He was sure Boba was up for it.

He realised that being around this man made him relaxed and so confident. He felt like interacting with Boba was easy. He didn't know if it was the way Boba made sure to listen to every word Din said. Maybe it was the confidence that Boba held that washed over Din too. He couldn't quite put his finger on it, it was a strange connection he had never felt before. Din had to make sure to hold onto that.

The show had been playing for a while now and the screen showed a gigantic nebula that formed right above Din and Boba. The seats were reflecting the yellow and pink lights and Din saw that it was really bright. Before he realised he looked over to his date. Boba was leaned back in his seat, hands clasped in his lap, eyes up to the fake sky.

The colours shone beautifully in his eyes and Din couldn't stop watching him. The way his tanned skin interacted with the yellow of the nebula, the way his eyes looked more precious than diamonds. The way his lips were parted was only slightly in awe.

Din had to pinch himself, for a few seconds he was sure he was dreaming. This whole situation felt off. As if he, Din Djarin, ever had the chance to buy this human being a drink. But he wasn't dreaming. Boba was real. Real, and he was locking eyes with him.

It should've felt unnatural or weird but no, it felt like it was meant to be. Boba looked at Din, obviously liked that Din was staring at him. He smiled kindly, head slightly cocked to the side. Din felt like the gravity of the room went out and he rose up from his seat. They were floating through space, long gone from the theatre and the other guests. It was quiet, though a soft humming sound was vibrating through the void, embracing them in its fluid waves, dancing on their bodies. A look around themselves showed that they were somewhere floating in our solar system, though the earth was not in sight. Din could see Saturn and Uranus from afar. The planets were easy to recognize due to their special characteristics. He looked back at the man across from him who was holding out his hand for Din to take.

They grabbed each other's hands softly, Boba's hand the same size as Din's, fitting between his fingers so perfectly. No words were spoken, there was no need for that. It was just floating, enjoying. Looking at each other and feeling each other's skin. The colours of the Nebula were dancing on their bodies just like the humming sounds did. Din had never felt so good in his life. He could stay here forever. But he had to go.

He was brought back to reality by the voice-over of the show saying something about flying back to earth and going home. Although he didn't want to, he let go of his imagination and found himself in his seat again. He and Boba were still looking at each other as if Boba had experienced the same. Din was sure that he didn't but it still felt amazing to keep that connection.

It took them a while to realize that the show had ended and the first few guests had stood up and run to the toilet. Din had to snicker at that.

Boba was still recovering from that weird Out-of-body experience he just had. For a short moment, that world around him had been gone and there was just Din. He kinda knew that Din had experienced something similar. Something had clicked between them.

Boba looked over to Din who sat in his seat back hunched over a little, watching the people exit the room one by one. He needed to thank him for that experience.

"Should we leave too?" Din looked at Boba calmly and stretched his back a little.

Boba nodded and stretched out his legs. He hoped that this date wasn't over yet. He had to make sure it wasn’t. Din probably wanted to do something else too.

They both got up slowly and walked next to each other to the exit.

They entered the big hall again, greeted by the spaceships that hung from the ceiling. Boba looked around and watched mothers and fathers fumble with their kids' jackets. They were in a rush, the kids needed to go to sleep.

Boba was sure that Din didn't want this night to end but he also knew that, perhaps, Din had problems communicating that. He prepared himself for asking. But he was surprised when Din just looked at him, completely relaxed and…

"Do you wanna go to my place? I even have wine at home."

Boba was taken aback at first at how simply Din stated the offer. Then he smiled and nodded. Of course, he wanted to.

"I'd love to do that," he responded with as much honesty he could find, which was probably a lot because Din gave him a big smile and ushered him to the exit.

They walked over to the exit, faster than they had when they entered and stepped through the door into the cold November night.

"Don't worry I'll make sure to stay sober to drive you home." Din zipped up his thick jacket that was layered with protection. Boba had to admit that he liked the way Din looked in that jacket. It made him look pretty broad and tall.

"A true gentleman, aren't ya?"

Din shrugged and fingered the keys out of his pocket then he put on his gloves.

"Only if I want to."

Boba shook his head in amusement.

"Are you hungry? We can get Shawarma on the way," added Din.

Boba loved Shawarma so he instantly said yes. He knew which store Din was talking about, he had been there a few times.

They reached Din's bike and both put on their helmets. After they both climbed up the vehicle Din started the engine and it roared through the whole parking lot. Boba felt really comfortable behind Din and he loved to be this close to him. He leaned in a bit, wrapping his arms around Din a little tighter than he should. Din seemed to notice but he didn't say anything. There wasn't much to say about it anyway.

They rode down the road and passed many bars and clubs. Loud music was playing everywhere and the people were laughing. The streets were alive, even if it was cold as hell outside. It was a magical experience, Boba could see so much more than when he drove with his car. It felt more real.

He was still warm due to his jacket but he realised that Din had been right, his knees were freezing a bit. Maybe he should've worn pants that weren't ripped. But this one looked so good on him.

They kept driving down the streets downtown and watched drunk people partying, Then they stopped at the Shawarma place. It wasn't crowded yet so it didn't take long to order. Din paid for Boba, again. Although Boba could pay for himself, he felt good getting spoiled, it made him feel special.

Din turned way more confident than Boba had expected before and he loved it. He kind of knew that Din wasn't a very shy person, in particular, he just needed time to adjust. Boba didn't think that Din was introverted either, he just waited for the right person to talk to. He had chosen Boba. The way Din drove the two of them through the traffic safely, still with a few extra turns. He wasn’t driving wild in particular you could just sense that he had fun.

He stopped the bike in a smaller street that was filled with small bushes and trees. There was nearly no space left for car’s only a few spots were for parking. Din turned off the engine and they both got off his bike. Boba could hear the leaves rustling in the cold November winds, and as romantic as this may sound, he started shivering. His breath was fogging the air in front of him and his knees nearly fell off.

“Let me put my bike in the garage, then we can go inside. You’re freezing,” said Din immediately and opened a big dark garage door next to a (probably his) front door.

“Yeah, okay,” responded Boba and wrapped his arms around himself. He couldn’t wait to eat his Shawarma wrap and talk to Din.

Din rolled the motorcycle in his garage.

After doing that he closed the garage’s door and hurried up to open the front door. They stepped inside and Boba found himself in a small hallway with stairs leading upstairs.

Din lead the way upstairs to the second floor, where he had his apartment. He opened the door while Boba stood behind him holding the small bag with their food.

“I can hear your teeth chatter, do you want a hot chocolate or tea, coffee, a blanket?”

Boba smiled at Din’s offer and took a moment to think about it as they stepped inside.

“Tea sounds good,” he replied and looked around the living room they had just entered. It wasn’t very big and looked quite comfy. A dark blue couch, big enough for maybe three people was placed in the centre of the room with a rather big TV across from it. A few shelves filled with DVDs and books and records were nearly everywhere. Though the shelves weren’t very big, it was just a lot of them.

What Boba liked, in particular, was, that there were also things just randomly placed on the coffee table, the TV stand and the floor. He saw small and big stacks of books and random stacks of paper, drawings, in the corners of the room. A record player that was rested on a vintage-looking stool, attached to a pretty high end looking hi-fi system.

There were also posters on the wall, Boba recognised movies like Mad Max and The Matrix and a few horror movies. He also saw a painting of an artist he didn’t know. He slowly got rid of his jacket and Din took it from his hands and place it over an armchair that seemed to function as some kind of wardrobe. The same with their helmets.

Din walked across the room to switch on some lights. He didn’t switch on the big overhead light, only the smaller ones that were placed around the room. They were shining in different colours like yellow, green and a lot of red tones.

“I can’t stand bright lights, I prefer those dimmed ones,” explained Din.

Boba nodded, he understood that.

“So tea?” Din gestured to a door arch that probably led to the kitchen.

“Yeah.” Boba started walking over to Din and realised that the warmth of the room was already seeping into his body.

“I see a lot of books,” said Boba.

“Yeah, I read a lot. That’s probably no surprise. Gimme the food real quick, I’ll put in on some plates,” said and placed and turned on an electric kettle. He turned to Boba and took the bag from his outstretched hand.

Boba watched Din place the still-hot food on two plates while the water got heated up.

“So, did you like the show?” asked Din.

“It was amazing. Thank you for that experience. I really enjoyed it. The nebula was probably the best part.” Boba thought back to the moment they had when they both met their eyes during that part of the show.

Din smiled as he listened to Boba’s answer.

“That’s great to hear. I am amazed every time I go there. It’s never the same. What tea do you like? I have apple or black tea.”

“Apple.” said Boba and leaned against the door frame.

“Are your knees still working or should we replace them with robotic ones?” joked Din and brewed the tea for Boba.

“Yes, probably. I can’t feel them anymore…” said Boba. Well, that might be a bit too dramatic.

“You can sit on the couch and I’ll give you a blanket. C’mon, the tea needs to brew for a while.”

Din walked over into the living room again and took a fluffy looking, mustard yellow blanket. Boba followed him and sat down on the velvet couch after Din ushered him to do so. Without a warning, he threw the blanket over Boba.

Boba wrapped it around himself, touched by the kind gesture. He looked at the pillows that lay on the couch next to him. They were brightly coloured a few had stars printed on them. It felt like Din bought them at many different stores and didn’t like to follow a consistent aesthetic. Also, the count of the pillows revealed that he probably spent a lot of time on this couch. The coffee table in front of him was made out of glass, it was shaped like a kidney. An Ipad was laying on top of it, together with a few magazines about robotics and design. Next to them stood a Funko Pop of Loki Laufeyson.

Din had picked a record he wanted to listen to together with Boba. He turned to Boba who was curled up on his couch scanning the coffee table.

“Do you know this record?” he asked and held it up in Boba’s direction “It’s Visions, by Grimes.” It was one of Din’s favourite albums.

Boba shook his head no.

“Then I will enlighten you now.” Din put the vinyl in his record player and the music started playing softly.

#TMTTP #bobadin #din djarin #boba fett #din djarin x boba fett #bobadin au #mandalorian au #star wars au #star wars fic #bobadin fic #fan fic #AO3 #fluff

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synchlora · 3 years

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several stories of tommys adventures in embroidery and mild (temporary) theft

bc i can't get them out of my head hhhh

back in the beginning of l'manburg, tubbo scraped up his knees a lot (a combination of young clumsiness and working on construction projects a 12 year old reasonably should not be allowed to) and, as you'd imagine, the knees on his pants got pretty ripped up. and while tommy was still honing his skills in sewing, he offered to stitch up some patches for his friend. the fabric the patches were made of didn't match the pants in the least and the thread was just a few shades too light in comparison to the color, the stitches spaced a bit too far apart, but they worked. and tommy, always one to add a flair to everything he does, used some extra green and purple thread he had to stitch some musical notes around the edges of each patch. tubbo has long since grown out of those jeans, but small musical notes still adorn various patches on his newer clothes. old habits die hard and so do nostalgic ones.

when fundy first came out, tommy wanted to do something special for him, something to make him smile. and so, he offered to sew up the old black jacket fundy never takes off. and while the fox boy was hesitant, he eventually conceded (after much pestering on tommys end) and tommy got to work on it. the jacket wasnt in too bad of shape, just needed more of a wash than anything. but for the parts that needed stitching, he used blues and oranges and pinks to patch it up. and along the front collar, he embroidered a bright trans flag. the colors weren't exact, it's not like he had many resources for new ones, but it was clear enough what the patch was. nowadays, when fundy is alone and feels (no, knows) he is forgotten, his claws absentmindedly drag across the now worn, soft patch that is fraying at the edges. and he doesn't know it actively, but somewhere deep in the back of his mind, he knows there is some love for him left out there yet.

the battle of manburg v pogtopia claimed all sorts of things, one of the more serious tragedies (/s) being jack manifolds signature blue-and-black hoodie. the damn thing was in tatters and tommy could not stand the sight of it, thinking through exactly how he could easily fix every time he saw it, if only jack would stop being so stubborn and let him sew it up. so tommy did the reasonable thing and stole it. the right sleeve was nearly disconnected from it and it was just torn up in general. and so he fixed it up with bright red thread, re-attaching the sleeve and darning a few singed holes in the fabric. and then he went about embroidering a circuit-like pattern that he'd seen jack work with before. he's not sure what any of it means, but whenever he sees wires and circuitry he thinks of jack. and right over his heart, he sewed sparks in golden thread erupting from the fabric. tommy returned the jacket in the middle of the night later on, keeping himself hidden while still ensuring the jacket made it's way back to its owner. jack never wore the jacket again.

in another feat of thievery, tommy stole nikis torn up cape for a bit. he imagined it'd only take him a day or two to fix up and then he'd be able to return it discreetly, no need for any fanfare or big, drawn out apologies (he HATES big drawn out apologies). but upon getting it, he quickly realized it'd take much more time than that. the cape had previously belonged to wilbur and that was quite evident in the deteriorating state of it. it was practically falling apart and he'd need more fabric if he was to even begin to fix it up. he chose a soft blue fabric to repair along the edges, intending to appear like calm ocean waves, though they turned out looking more like blue fire lapping at the edges. the other tears and small holes were fixed with some orange threads, and he decided a flair of some white tulips along the collar would accent it nicely. he returned it-- two weeks later than expected-- to a very pissed off niki. looks like a long, drawn out apology was due after all.

once, tubbo requested he fix up a vest of ranboo's that had gotten damaged from... well tubbo wouldn't say but the strange mix of burn holes and frantically cut slashes didn't clear up the history of the garment any more. still, as much as he wasn't entirely sure of ranboo at the time, he decided he was going to fix it for tubbo and tubbo only. he took out pink and blue thread to fix along the various tears. as strange as the damage was, he will admit it was quite easy to fix with such clean cuts to it, probably some of his best work. it was done a few days early and tommy sat stubbornly staring at the vest. as adamant as he'd been about not doing anything special for ranboo of all people (after all, he'd stolen his best friend, what'd he owe him?) tommy felt like the fabric was tragically empty. so he decided to compromise. and several months later during some insignificant moment doing some insignificant task, ranboo happened to glance a flash of purple in the corner of his eye. and he spotted several tiny, delicately sewn alliums inside the chest pocket of his vest.

wilbur was always a very dramatic person, feeling the need to not only narrate his actions with flair, but also to go about said actions with whimsy. whimsy that tended to get his clothes in a bit of a mess. just about every day, he'd come up to tommy with yet another new tear or hole in his clothes which tommy would endlessly feign irritation over before taking the garment and sitting around the fire with the rest of the small nations members and chat along as he sewed. wils old l'manburg outfit-- the casual one, the working jeans and leather jacket, soft with sun damage-- is covered in tiny embroidery work, random filigree designs, some shaky birds that gradually got more bird-like as tommy improved, even a small wing pattern sewn across the back of his jacket. every tear is sewn across in teal, the older rips faded to baby blue and the newer ones a bright cerulean. his old jacket is filled with stories, with love quite literally sewn through the fabric. but wilburs jacket from pogtopia is far more blank. it's sewn up, sure, but it's done with simple threads. basic sewing patterns in threads that match the fabric so well they practically blend in. if you know what tommys work looks like, it almost doesn't look like his. it's bare minimum, it's practical, and it's empty. but there is one single pattern that tommy has sewn onto it. it's a more recent addition, made since wilbur has... returned, for lack of a better word. a shakily sewn outline of a heart made in deep, indigo blue thread, it's weary pattern making it almost appear to be melting. wilburs not sure when tommy did it, but he's quite sure he knows where he got the thread. he cuts the knotted ends and tears the threads carefully from their place.

#MAN i just saw tommy canonically sews and i went fucking ballistic #so have these :]] i think a lot abt them #these arent all of the ones i wanna write these r just the first ones that i expanded upon #dumbass thots #dsmp tag #bitch boy #tommy innit #tommyinnit #c!tommy #long post #embroidery hcs

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otaku553 · 4 years

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Dreamy Gear Waddle Dee and Dedede are here! I’ll do Daroach and Magolor next :D If you’re looking for Kirby and Meta Knight, they’re over here.

Design process under the cut again!

So with Dee, I knew I wanted them to be young, but still older than Kirby since they seem to explain stuff to Kirby. I settled on the age of 14, which would make them young but still old enough to work as a mechanic (sort of) and knowledgable enough about the world to explain things to Kirby (but still having the naivety of a child). You can see that I kept making Dee taller and taller in every iteration XD

I wanted to keep the bandana in there somewhere, so I made it a scarf under the collar of their shirt. Dee’s design was sort of difficult because I still wanted to keep a somewhat gender-neutral design. A lot of the fashions I saw either leaned towards masculine or feminine, and nothing much in between. I settled on more masculine clothes because it would make more sense for a mechanic at the time, but tried to keep some of the gender-neutral aspect through their coat.

The hair turned out shorter than I would usually draw their hair, but much longer than Kirby’s anyways, since short hair was much more popular at the time. I wanted it to fit nicely with the cap, and I’m pretty happy with it!

I think at first I was thinking that Waddle Dee would be sort of middle class, which is why I had that vest. It looked too formal though. Since they were a mechanic, but still young, I reconsidered. They were probably lower-middle class or so, especially considering the sewn in patch on their hat. I tried to include the sewn patch motif in several places, since it would really drive home that they didn’t really have the money to replace their coat. I like to think that they’re reasonable and would’ve saved up enough for one by now, but they also always buy food for Kirby, so they’re sort of giving up some luxuries to make sure Kirby is alright.

The discovery of overalls was amazing. It fits them so well! I was a bit worried that they wouldn’t maintain as much of their color pallette without the coat though, so I made the suspenders colored, to keep some of that orange. Overall, I’m pretty proud of this design!

Dedede’s design is where I realized I sort of screwed up?? Aviator hats didn’t become a thing until early 20th century which yeah is pretty close to what I had of like the 1890s, but not quite there. Oh well. Anyways, I saw this really nice image of a vintage pilot, and I thought that suited Dedede perfectly. Not only did it keep that nice formal looking suit that a president of a factory would have, it had fur!! which is a must in any Dedede design. So there wasn’t as much research into the styles for this. I ended up hiding the inner jacket layer so that the vest would be more visible. I also made the zigzag pattern a vest instead of a sash because I thought it made more sense that way. I wanted to keep it as close to the official render as possible so I kept the belt buckles on the vest, but I personally don’t think the buckles are really accurate for the time period-- I’m not sure though.

It’s subtle but there’s also pockets on the coat, which I think he stores his gloves in. Hmm, I thought I should maybe put the goggles on the aviator hat in one ref image, but the big ornate bulb thing at the front would probably impede that. There’s also the black fur on the coat! Just to give a more classy look. The collar can also be flipped up for a high collar to protect him from the wind. My priority with the coat was to make it practical while looking classy, so it can close all the way.

That’s most of it! Thanks for reading, if you did. I love seeing people appreciate the thought I put into these because I really try my best.

In other news, I started a fic! It’s just about cute interactions between Dreamy Gear Meta and Kirby, which is a dynamic I really want to see. It’s also got a summary of the Dreamy Gear novel in it, but I am not going to link it because my account is cringe. I’m not hard to find at all, so if you do go looking for it, you won’t really need any hints.

#kirby #kirby gijinka #king dedede #dedede gijinka #waddle dee #waddle dee gijinka #bandana dee gijinka #bandana waddle dee gijinka #bandana dee #bandana waddle dee #kirby dreamy gear

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widowsofchaos · 4 years

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Old Man Rogers

Steve Rogers dating a black punk rocker [HEADCANON]

(This is for my punk rock sisters, rock on my beautiful babes! And I hope you enjoy this semi-lengthy headcanon, okay I may have added more than I intended. This is my first headcanon, so bare with me! xoxo)

Steve is from the last century, a 40s boy, all he knew was jazz and blues from old New York.

So when he came freshly out of the ice, he had A LOT to learn about the evolved music scenes in the melting pot that is New York, from the old one he formerly knew.

Especially when he walks down the street in his disguise consisting of low hat and jacket, blending in the crowd. He would see various walks of life, one style that really stood out to him is punk rockers.

Steve would’ve never thought of this type of style existing back in his time. It’s outlandish, loud, it’s unruly.

IT’S VUGLAR.

LANGUAGE. LANGUAGE. LANGUAGE.

Lemme tell you ol’ boy, Steve be cringing at the profanity being caressly thrown around especially by teenagers.

He didn’t warm up to the outfits. Unkempt colorful hair, dirty denim, pants covered in patches, chains attached to jackets and jeans. It was definitely not his style.

He may be in the 21st century, but he was still a classic 40s boy at heart. He preferred simplicity.

Steve would see young girls have their faces littered with piercings, he would think to himself, ‘why would they ruin their pretty faces? Women back in my day didn’t need to sabotage their beauty.’

Don’t even get him started on the music, it’s too loud, too fast, and brash. To be honest, it gave him a headache at times.

His dislike stemmed from his refusal to accept the world he now lived in. It was just too much, he felt rushed into it.

Steve truly started feeling his age, he felt like a crabby old man, that didn’t fit in the new world. He would start lamenting about his old days.

Don’t get him started on moshing.

He just doesn’t get it, he doesn’t see it as a form of dancing, he thinks it silly and unnecessarily violent.

‘Why would anyone want to cause bodily harm to themselves — on PURPOSE?!’

Then he saw you.

Within a crowd of lively and extreme scene, you stood out uniquely. Your beauty was one in a million. Steve always told you it was love at first sight.

You didn’t have much piercings, just one on the left side of your nose. But Steve actually liked it on you.

Steve first saw you at a record store.

Yes dammit, a record store. In Steve’s time, New York was flooded with record stores. Get a good tune and pop it on the record player.

But now, with technology at its most advanced, from records to cds to iPods to iPhones. Digital streaming was at the touch of your fingertip, and it can go anywhere with you.

And record shops is a dying tradition.

That didn’t stop Steve’s love for vinyls. It made him think of home back in Brooklyn.

As Steve was lingering in the jazz section, he spotted your red dyed hair from his peripheral vision. The red hair made your smooth brown complexion stand out.

He would have never thought a punk would be searching throughout the soul/jazz/blues section.

Steve peeked from under his cap, seeing your slender brown finger tips glide gently through the records.

You fished out a Billie Holliday record, a Mahalia Jackson record, and a Sister Rosetta Tharpe record.

Your eyes caught his, and you flashed him a quick smile.

Ugh this soft boy loves your smile. He melted right there.

You were wearing a black tank top that had the word ‘punk’ in pink, with low-waisted army pants that had patches sewn into the fabric.

Steve finally got the nerve to stroll towards you, and pick up a conversation.

He came to you softly. He didn’t want to scare you off.

You reciprocated back, you instantly found him so damn attractive.

You both discussed how classic and timeless soulful blues are, and he saw the glimmer in your eyes especially when you talk about black and brown musicians.

He loved how soft-spoken you were, and not every other word you uttered was a cuss.

He thought back when he saw Louis Armstrong live as a youngster, but he didn’t mention that to you.

He didn’t want his icebreaker to be “hey I’m hundred years old, wanna go out on a date?”

Soon enough, you exchanged numbers. He was excited. He felt like a teenager again.

At the Avengers tower, he sped to his room and quickly dialed your number.

After a few months of dating, you’ve learned that your elderly, enough to be your great grandpa boyfriend wasn’t so keen on the type of music you so fondly love.

So you decided to take it upon yourself to show him the greatness that is punk rock.

This anti-capitalistic lifestyle, the message it portrays spits in the face of authority, but yet he came to respect it because he would see how passionate you speak on justice for all, and fight against the machine. Especially how it helped you channel your rage and problems with racism growing up as a black girl.

You showed him documentaries on the history of punk, he definitely loves the riot grrl movement. He loves to see women stand up for themselves, and revolt for what is right.

Ya know our baby boy Steve is a feminist. A true gentleman.

Finally you got him to listen to some punk music, although he still isn’t the biggest fan, you catch him from time to time scouring through your collection of records to listen to.

You even found him humming and mumbling under his breath, “hey ho, let’s go”.

You’re apart of an all-girls band, and he’s so damn supportive, he goes to see all your shows, and even sports the merch you both work hard on at home.

A DIY queen needs a DIY king.

Steve would not partake in the moshing, hell no. He would be either in the back of the crowd, standing in the corner to have a full view of his love performing or in backstage, watching you.

He does get worried when you stage dive, his instincts go in full turbo-mode, but he has to remember that you’re having fun.

But that won’t stop him from beating on anybody who gets too handsy with you in the pit.

He loves you very much, and actually gotten use to punk rock. He’s now seen the posivity it can be for the youth, sometimes he sings along with you in the car to some punk music.

He may be a old man, but he’s not entirely out of touch, being able to enough his new life, especially now with you by his side.

#steve rogers fanfic #steve rogers headcanons #steve rogers imagine #marvel fanfic #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers x black!reader #buckybarnesplumwhore wrote this #headcanon

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rustbeltjessie · 4 years

Text

Belmont and Clark

I clicked the link Meg sent me, and saw the headline I’d dreaded for years: Demolition Underway at Corner of Belmont and Clark. I read the article, and read another, earlier article on the same topic. I’ll spare you the dull details, but the gist is this—all the buildings on the corner of Belmont and Clark are being bulldozed to make space for some hulking monstrosity of glass and steel, yet another ugly, shiny building where rich people can live, park, eat, and shop. (Just think! One day rich people might be able to live in a completely encapsulated world and not have to breathe the same air as us riffraff!)

I cried a little, and then I got angry. Later that night, I drank whiskey and tried to explain to my partner why I was so upset. My partner attempted to placate me by telling me that it didn’t matter if they tore those buildings down or covered up that parking lot (don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone—they’re building over my favorite parking lot), because the memories will live on in my heart. “No!” I shouted. “You don’t fucking get it!” “I don’t want the memories! I want my Punkin’ Donuts!”

* * *

I’m not drunk, or as emotional as I was that night, but to tell you the truth I don’t know if I can explain anything. I can’t explain why I loved that street and that corner so much. I can’t explain why I’m so fucking pissed that they’re erecting this new building. I know I shouldn’t be this upset. Like I said, I dreaded that headline for years; part of me knew it was coming. My favorite cafe—which had been across the street from Egor’s Dungeon—shut down in 2001 and by 2002 was a trendy shoe boutique (now, it’s a gyro place). Punkin’ Donuts became a combined Dunkin’ Donuts and Baskin Robbins in 2003, and at the same time they started having attendants patrol the parking lot (not that that did much to dissuade either teenage loiterers or drunken brawlers)—and I was mad about that. I wrote about it in the final issue of Safety Pin Girl. I called it the “Death March of Progress.” Less than a year later, Clarke’s remodeled and tried to make themselves seem fancier by doing things like having Daily Specials (but a diner where drunks and weirdos congregate that has Daily Specials is still a diner where drunks and weirdos congregate). Condos and other signs of gentrification started appearing on Belmont a decade ago, and I wrote about that, too: I kicked at the walls of condominiums that now rise to great and ugly heights on the spots where there were once little stores, cozy walkups, and greasy spoons.

So I sorta saw it coming. Not to mention, I never lived in the Belmont/Clark neighborhood, and I haven’t really hung out there since early 2009. Why, then, does this feel like a great personal loss? Why do a few overpriced and overrated “punk rock” shops and a shitty parking lot in front of a crappy chain donut joint still feel so much like home?

* * *

The closest I got to living in the neighborhood of Belmont and Clark was the apartment I lived in during the first half of 2004. It was just off Belmont, but about two miles farther west, much closer to Western than to Clark. That was close enough. On chill winter days, I hopped on the bus (the Belmont bus!) and rode east, disembarked across from Clarke’s. That was around the time they were trying to make the place a little more upscale, and Maggie and I bitched about it. “Clarke’s sucks now,” we said. “Why do we still go there?” One night, we went to Clarke’s for fries and coffee ‘cause we had nothing better to do, and we ran into a group of old friends and new friends and realized that was why we still went there. Because everyone in town went to Clarke’s. Because none of them had anything better to do, either.

On warm spring days, I took a travel mug full of iced coffee and wandered on foot, no hurry. Sometimes I’d stop to roll a cigarette or browse in a record or bookstore—to drool over all the things I’d’ve bought if I had money to spare. I’d stop and talk to strangers, maybe stop for a bite to eat if I’d scrounged up enough change from my coin jar. Mostly, I just wandered—I had no money to spare but all the free time in the world. I was young and broke and unemployed, and something about swaggering down Belmont in the springtime sunlight made me feel good about being young and broke and unemployed.

And on warm spring nights, Maggie and I hopped astride our bikes and headed east. We sang along to the songs that blared through the shitty handheld tape player she’d duct-taped to her handlebars, and flipped off pedestrians who told us to get off the sidewalk, or flipped off drivers who almost hit us when we rode in the street. Sometimes we stopped at Clarke’s, other times we kept going, and I swear if Lake Michigan weren’t there we could’ve ridden forever.

* * *

See, my love runs the length of Belmont, from California Avenue east to the lake. It runs from the corner of Belmont and Clark northwest to Cabaret Metro, despite the existence of Wrigley Field and its attendant Cubs fans. And that one little area, from the Belmont Red/Brown/Purple Line stop to the corner, and around the corner to The Alley, is the nexus. It is where my love is at its highest proof.

My love for those streets and the place where they intersect is a swig of cheap vodka. It’s a gut feeling, a flutter and a punch. It is something I’ve been trying to explain for years, which is why I write about it so often. In a piece I wrote years ago, I said: Belmont Avenue is my favorite fucking street in the whole world. I read it at a zine reading, and some people teased me, told me that Belmont was cheesy and overrated. One friend said: “I used to love Belmont, but after I got a citation for smoking cigarettes on the Red Line platform, my enthusiasm waned.” I only smiled and nodded, because those people obviously didn’t get it. I knew Belmont was cheesy and overrated. I loved it anyway. And no matter what fucked-up shit happened to me in that neighborhood, I continued to love it. I continued to love it because…and here, wait, could it be? I finally have an explanation:

It was the first place where I felt comfortable in my skin, accepted and celebrated as a weird artsy kid and as a punk. You know, I could sit on the filthy sidewalk for hours, chain-smoking and writing in my journal, and no one thought I was pretentious or a nerd. I could wear my blue hoodie covered in shoddily sewn-on patches and more often than not, someone would say to me: “Hey, I love that band,” and I’d make a new friend. And it was the first place where I felt accepted not only as a weird artsy punk, but as a queer person. Because there were gay bars, there were same-gender couples kissing and holding hands, there were boys in lipstick and high heels and girls with shaved heads and hairy armpits. So the story of my love for those streets is also a queer coming-of-age story. And it is the story of the girls I knew.

When I think of my days and nights on Belmont and Clark, I remember the girls. Oh, there were boys, boys I dated and slept with and had crushes on; boys I met on Belmont Avenue or hung out with there—but the girls are the ones that stand out in my mind. Girls who were my friends, girls who were my lovers and significant others, girls I only saw once.

There was Annie, my first real-life girlfriend, the person who first took me to Belmont. We walked around holding hands. We went to thriftshops and punk clothing shops; we modeled clothing for each other, bought jars of our favorite Manic Panic hair color—hers Carnation Pink, mine Pillarbox Red. We got coffee from the Punkin’ Donuts to warm our hands against the raw-wet late-winter wind. When I was brave enough, I kissed her and felt a warmth tingle my veins, a warmth greater than any that coffee could produce.

There were the older punk rock girls I met in the Dunkin’ Donuts parking lot that first time I was in Chicago all on my own. They were glorious in their spiky, neon-colored hair, their tight jeans and short skirts, their high-top Chucks. We walked together to the MTX/Queers show; they gave me sips of their booze and shouted down catcalling Cubby Bros.

There was Beagan, who sat with me on the summer sidewalks, smoking cigarettes; who walked with me in the soft snow flurries of two-days-before-Christmas. We kissed and giggled. We pointed out the passersby we thought were cute, and assured one another we’d always think the other was the cutest one of all.

There were the girls of my Kokomo Caffe days: Schuyler, who I encountered my first time there. She charmed me with her stick ’n’ poke tattoos and her messed-up hair and her brash attitude. I played “Rebel Rebel” on the jukebox, she knew all the words, and I was in a whirl. Polly, the gorgeous old-school gothpunk. She had flawless Cleopatra eyeliner, her favorite bands were The Slits and The Damned, and she always offered me one of her clove cigarettes (which she kept in a silver case, shaped like a coffin). Winnie, with her shock of red hair and a smile like a match-flare. She gave the best hugs, they were one of the things that helped pull me through that hellish time in my life. Parker—we were both white girls with Chelsea haircuts and steel-toed boots. We bonded over trying to find ways to show the world that, though we looked like skin byrds, we definitely weren’t byrds of the Nazi variety. The girl whose name I never knew—I thought for sure she was gay or bi. She always made eyes at me. She had a leather jacket and a fucking rainbow mohawk. Then I found out she was not a queer punk, she was a Christian punk; she wasn’t trying to flirt with me, she was trying to convert me.

There was Latisha. Though we were on-again/off-again as a couple, there was never any bad blood between us. The night we met, we hung out on Belmont. We went into sex shops where we annoyed the employees by tickling each other with feather dusters and trying out various floggers and whips. We went into clothing stores; I bought a purple plaid dress that I wish I’d held on to, though I’m sure it wouldn’t fit me—it was too tight and too short even then. We parted ways, that night, at the El station—she had to get on the southbound Red Line, I had to board the northbound Brown Line. As we stood on opposite platforms, waiting for our trains, we blew kisses to each other and waved at one another with imaginary perfume-scented handkerchiefs. Over the next four years, much of our time together was spent on that street. We yelled at cops who harassed the homeless who gathered on bus benches and in the Dunkin’ parking lot. Some nights, we got coffee at Clarke’s after queer punk shows. This was when I was young and brazen enough to consider a second-hand slip and torn-up fishnets appropriate show attire, and I know all eyes were on us when we spilled into the diner on those nights—scruffy punk girl me, falling out of my slip, high femme Latisha with her high high heels and her pin-up girl dresses, both of us half-drunk, with make-up smeared by pogo-sweat. Other nights, we danced at the Belmont gay bars. Our favorite nights were ‘80s nights, when we could writhe, melodramatic and strange, to new wave and New Romance. Sometimes we did shots with drag queens. Sometimes one or the other of us picked up a hot butch and left with them, or let them fuck us in the bathroom. Usually, we just danced; usually, we went home together.

Once, walking down Belmont with a friend of mine, a punk girl looked me up and down, from the top of my short black hair to the booted toes of my red and black striped tights. She gave me such a lustful look that my friend turned to me and said: “Damn. That girl looked at you the way a Gossip song sounds.”

There was Filia—every time she visited my neck of the woods, we bummed around Belmont and Clark. Usually, it was summer. We drank iced coffees until we thought we might puke. We smoked endless cigarettes, though the sodden summer air was so thick in our lungs we choked on it. We ogled skinheads and picked up bottle caps we found on the ground. We sang “Summer in the City” at the top of our lungs, convinced that a Chicago punk band should cover it because it was the anthem of Belmont in the summer, and the backs of our necks were dirty and gritty. Babe, don’t you know it’s a pity…

There was Maggie, who I mentioned above, my long-time partner-in-crime from the moment we met. Maggie and I on the bus, on our bikes, on foot. Maggie and I headed east on Belmont. Maggie and I stopping into Schuba’s to drink afternoon beers and take silly photobooth pictures. Maggie and I staying up all night at Clarke’s, or loitering in the parking lot of the Punkin’ Donuts. Maggie and I stopping into Blue Havana to buy Bali Shag; Blue Havana which we referred to as HomoSmoke, because everyone who worked there was gay as hell. There was a cute butch gal who worked there, she had a tiny ‘hawk and a face full of piercings and we both awkwardly attempted to flirt with her. Maggie and I—I’ll stop now, because I have so many Maggie/Belmont memories that I could fill up a whole fuckin’ book with those.

And there were others. Other girl friends and girlfriends, other girls I flirted with, other girls I was too nervous to even talk to. Out-of-town pals I took to Belmont when they came to visit, and in-town friends who loved that neighborhood almost as much as I did. Zine-writing girls and rock’n’roll girls. Goth girls and punk girls. Girls with mohawks and girls with dreadlocks and fuzzy-headed baby dykes. Tattoo artists and hairstylists and baristas and diner waitresses. I love(d) them all.

* * *

After I read the articles, I read the comments. The commenters fell into three different categories. 1. The balanced, rational people. They said they were ambivalent about the proposed building but thought that progress was good for the neighborhood. 2. Those who said: “Good riddance! There are muggings in that neighborhood that are probably perpetrated by the teenagers who loiter in that parking lot!” Those who said: adios crappy Dunkin' Donuts and nasty Ally [sic] building. That corner has been nothing but a hangout for hookers and troublemakers for years. 3. The nostalgia-keepers, who shared stories of hanging out there before and after punk shows or raves. They said: “Yeah, there were problems, but the place had character.” Someone responded to one of the nostalgia-keepers, and said: are you saying you are sad to see a dunkin donuts [sic] and its parking lot go? If so, that’s fucking weird.

Well, then I’m fucking weird, too. I could try and give you some arguments against gentrification, some reasoning behind why I think it’s important to leave a space for the wacky teenagers and their crime, for the troublemakers and the hookers, because that’s part of what’s making me angry. What I’m even angrier about is that they’re destroying a piece of my history, and I don’t like change. I like change when it means gaining new experiences and interests and friends, but when it means losing people and places? Fuck that. I get grumpy when places I love get remodeled, and I get downright livid when they’re torn down. I can’t remember the last time a girl looked at me the way a Gossip song sounds, and most of the girls I mentioned above are no longer part of my life. I’m fucking selfish, and if I can’t have the girls and the moments back, well—I would rather see those buildings and businesses vacant and crumbling than see them razed. That way, at least, they would stand as a monument to my past. That way, I could visit them and see the ghost of my old self peering out from the empty windows, my old self with her slip-dress and her smeared make-up, her endless cigarettes and scribbled notebooks, gazing out the windows, waiting for the girl(s) she loved to pass by.

My partner was right, in a sense. The memories do live on in my heart. All the girls, all the people I encountered near that corner, will live in the Belmont and Clark of my heart forever. All the people and a hundred moments and a thousand small things. The cracked sidewalks covered in broken glass, the secret graffiti, the heavy silver-green trees of Chicago in the summer. The stench of car fumes and donut grease and diner grease, cigarette smoke and beer and that weedy lake-smell when the wind is blowing in from the east. The abrasive honking of taxis, drunks singing their favorite songs, “Belmont is next. Doors open on the left at Belmont.” Sometimes, I think I’m okay with everything going away from me forever—girls, places, everything—but right now, I’m not. It’s all tattooed on my fucking heart, but that’s not good enough.

I want a tattoo of the CTA map, with the Belmont stop blown up bigger than the rest. I want a brick from the rubble of Blue Havana and Architectural Revolution. I want to stand on the corner and chug a 40 oz. of Old Style; I want to pour the dregs onto the cracked hot sidewalk. I want to scream: “Fuck Building a New Chicago! I want the old one back!” I want to sing, with Chain and the Gang backing me up: “Devitalize!” I want to save that brick from the rubble of my past, and when they build that hideous new building, I want to send it hurtling through the shiny windows. Attached will be a note that reads: “Fuck you. You’ll never fucking get it.”

—Jessie Lynn McMains [originally published as a mini-zine in early 2015; also appears in the collection What We Talk About When We Talk About Punk]

#jessie lynn mcmains #chicago #lakeview #writers on tumblr #essay #memory #clark and belmont #my writing #queer stuff #girls #love #loss #what we talk about when we talk about punk

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lovelyirony · 5 years

Note

Ironwidow fake dating and cousin Sharon matchmaking

Nat and Tony have been friends since seventh grade, when Tony made fun of her drawing and in retaliation, Nat stuck a pencil in his thigh.

He grinned at her after sneakily getting a tissue from the front desk.

“You’re pretty good, Nat.”

“My name is Natasha.”

“Not to me, it’s not.”

So it becomes Nat and Tony. Tony and Nat. They do everything together, from attend the eighth grade pool parties and hate all of them to the freshman orientation in high school where they make fun of the senior leaders and sneak into the admissions office to make sure they have at least one class together. (And then change the schedule when they don’t.)

Tony has been in love with Natasha Romanoff since the first eighth grade pool party, when she showed up in a full wet suit because she didn’t like the way that their classmate Ivan liked her.

But, he hasn’t done anything about it. Why is that, everyone asks? Just ask her out!

Well, Tony has a special talent that is medically known as “anxiety,” but he also has common sense.

Natasha Romanoff is beautiful. She has gorgeous red hair, eyes that know everything about you before you even think they do, a wicked sense of humor, and a sense of self that is beyond anything Tony’s ever encountered.

Tony stays up until three a.m., doesn’t give a shit about his appearance so he is frequently rushing to school with the worst bed hair imaginable, and also wears possibly the most out-of-style clothing ever.

Like right now. A pair of jeans that’s too short and he cuffed only on one leg, a shirt that’s advertising some college Howard made him visit, and he’s pretty sure that the plaid he layered it with has a coffee stain down the back.

He’s proven right when Sharon wrinkles her nose.

“Dude, you seriously haven’t done laundry since two weeks ago, have you?”

“Do I smell bad? Do I?”

She leans in.

“No, just like old coffee. So regular. We’ll see when Nat comes. Or you could confess your love to have her not roast your choice of apparel.”

Tony scowls, adjusting his backpack.

“Do you have another topic, or are you just that boring?”

“I could also tell you about World War One,” Sharon adds. “I just read about it in one of those stupid textbooks I have to carry around. Did you know that the French are actually the worst at war?”

“Yes, everyone knows that. I think they know that too.”

Nat’s already at her locker. She looks gorgeous with her jean jacket, the new patches sewn on.

“Looking cute,” Sharon says appreciatively. “Do you think you’re gonna get dress-coded for the ‘fuck men’ patch?”

“Not if they want me to write an article on how the club fund got cut but the football team got another new field within four years,” Nat says.

“Still a good article,” Tony says. “If you could still get into a college without a reputation ruined. You know how much schools care about sports.”

“More than education at times!” Sharon cheers.

Nat snorts, bringing Tony into a hug.

“Nice to see you, dude. Ready for history?”

“Not in the slightest. We’re probably talking about government procedure again while our teacher waxes poetic about the justice system. I think I might try to change the FDA’s home screen again.”

“You know, they might catch on after the fourth time of you inserting random YouTube videos to different links.”

“It’s the Federal Department of Agriculture, I highly doubt they care,” Tony says, rolling his eyes. “Besides, I’ve already proven that I’m probably better with technology than the government itself.”

This was true; Tony had hacked into the official website of the White House with shitty hotel Wi-Fi and half his sanity. (It was flu season, he’d had way too much Ny-Quil.)

School passes by with little incident, all things considered. A classic Monday, with the only real excitement being an announcement of no school the following Monday for a staff meeting.

It isn’t until Tony gets home to find both of his parents home and in the same room, waiting for him, that he starts to panic.

“Is this an intervention?” Tony asks. “Did I do something bad?”

“Not yet,” Howard says. “Although I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“Dear,” Maria reprimands. “No, there’s an event that we want you to attend.”

“Want or need?” Tony asks. “I was supposed to hang out with my friend Bruce to work on his genetics lab.”

“I’m sure the lab can wait,” Howard scoffs. “You’re in high school, for god’s sake.”

“Bruce is doing lab work for Culver,” Tony says. “He got early acceptance, so he’s doing a weird deal so he gets college credit and a year off early.”

“Impressive, dear,” mom says, smiling. “But this event is something that you can’t miss.”

It’s a goddamn family reunion. Maria’s side, but still. At least Peggy and Sharon would come.

Family reunions on the Carter/Carbonell side are…interesting. A lot of loud people, aunts that couldn’t stop cooking, and at least one uncle that would say something marginally horrible and cause a rift for at least six hours where everything was tense.

Sharon had to take this advantage carefully.

So she got her own email into the family chain of them–a mistake by all accounts, but one that should be committed sooner rather than later–and tells the family that Tony is bringing his girlfriend, Natasha.

They both love each other, she knows that much. Tony looks at Nat like he could give her anything in the world, and Nat looks at him with so much vulnerability that she always says she doesn’t have.

They’ve liked each other for a while now. Sharon wishes that it wasn’t at her family reunion that she was doing this, but it was either that or a dance for high school, and that’s far too much work.

Tony, understandably, is stressed.

“Does she even know she’s going?!” Tony yells. “Holy shit Sharon, she’s going to meet like eighty of us!”

“Yeah,” Sharon says. “She just doesn’t know that she’s supposed to be your girlfriend.”

“Sharon.”

“Yes?”

“Run.”

Sharon squeals as she skids out of the room, Tony chasing after her. He’s not really going to do anything about it, but he still has to text Nat.

i am. so sorry

lmao it’s fine. sharon just said i’m going to the reunion. why?

funny story…

fuck what’d she do

she emailed everyone that i was bringing you as a girlfriend. and i’m not really going to spend the whole weekend correcting it.

gotcha. operation: fake dating commence!

thank you nat. seriously love you

Nat reads the message, but doesn’t respond. Of course Sharon would pull something like this. She knew that Nat liked her cousin, probably since they were kids.

And now she had to pretend to be his girlfriend, something she actually wanted very much to do.

She gets a text from Sharon.

Please don’t wear your jean jacket with all the patches. It’s very cool, but you will start a fight in my family and win. But then you aren’t allowed to come back :(

Natasha sends her back the middle finger, but then promises not to bring it.

This brings up the subject; what do you wear to a family reunion?

Tony’s fidgeting in the car as he goes to pick up Nat. His mother was very surprised.

“You got your father’s distinct habit of not shutting your mouth,” she says with a chuckle. “But I do suppose the gazes say it all. Every Carbonell man looks like he’s in love before he says it, so–”

“Mama, not now!” Tony hisses. Natasha’s making her way to the car, backpack slung around her shoulder and an elegant handbag in the crook of her arm.

“Hey Ms. Carbonell,” Natasha says. “How are you?”

“Doing good, better now that I get to have you with us,” she teases. “Anthony over here never told me that he was going to have you on as a special guest.” Natasha sends a raised eyebrow over to Tony.

“Oh?”

“I forgot,” Tony lied smoothly. “You know how I get in the labs. Just completely forget everything I’m supposed to remember.”

The conversation is easy after that: just a few little anecdotes that Nat and Tony have gone over last night over the phone. They had confessed that they liked each other a year ago, had kept it extremely low-key since both didn’t want to fuss with it, and that was that.

“How come Sharon knew but I didn’t?” Mom pouts.

“She’s an imp,” Tony answers. “An imp who doesn’t know how to keep business to herself.”

Their family fills up a small inn out of the way, and Tony sighs as he sees three of his aunts already conspiring at the bar.

“Be prepared for a barrage of questions.”

“Roger that.”

Natasha is whisked away by the ladies with a few compliments to the cute flats she’s wearing and her favorite type of perfume. Tony gets led over to Sharon, who is playing darts with Trip and their kind-of-but-not-really-cousin, Ricardo.

“What have I missed out on?” Trip asks, grinning. “Heard some girl was crazy enough to come and date you. She’s a looker, Tony.”

“Thanks,” Tony says. “But yes, crazy enough to date me. Sharon knows how crazy it is, I practically get the same gene from her.”

Sharon rolls her eyes, landing another bullseye. Ricardo curses.

“How do you always manage to do this?”

“Practice for this exact moment,” Sharon says with a grin. “Go get me a drink. One of the good ones.”

“You seriously get him to do your bidding every single time,” Tony says with a laugh. Trip excuses him to see Uncle Erik, leaving Sharon and Tony alone.

“So. You liking your new status of boyfriend?”

“You seriously need to stop meddling,” Tony scowls. “Just because I like her doesn’t mean she should be in on this.”

“She doesn’t mind,” Sharon scoffs. “Besides, I think Aunt Angie is going to tell her about the cardboard incident.”

“Oh my god–”

Natasha saunters over, grinning devilishly.

“So. Naked and a cardboard box for modesty? Why am I not surprised at the innovation, Tony?”

“Dammit,” Tony swears. “I’m going to learn something embarrassing about you. I’ll ask Clint.”

“Like he’ll tell.”

The reunion goes about as well as expected. Uncle Daniel finally spills the beans and says that his son who couldn’t make it was going to bring his girlfriend that no one likes, but they canceled at the last minute.

“They’re horrible,” Tony says. “I’m serious. They’re the kind of people that take advantage of old people.”

“Gross.”

They gravitate closer to each other. While Natasha doesn’t have a problem with this, it’s bittersweet. Every time Tony casually puts his arm around her and tells another story about how they snuck into the office to match schedules and his family coos and says it’s so cute, and Sharon smiles at them.

It stings, to be this close and yet knowing that it isn’t at all real.

Tony lies awake at night. Becuase this is nice. All of his family loves Nat, so does he, and it seems…possible almost. To have her this close, smiling at him like she has.

So it’s not a good idea, but he goes to her room at three a.m. She’s still awake.

“Why are you still awake?”

“Watching funny videos. Why are you awake?”

“That’s why I’m here. Follow me.”

They go into the courtyard. It feels…nice outside. Tony’s wringing his hands.

“What’s got you so nervous?” Natasha asks. “And why at three in the morning?”

“I think this is literally the only way I could do it,” Tony says. “Only time my family shuts up.”

“Go for it then,” Natasha says. “You have until four, when your baby cousin wakes up. Lorenzo?”

“Got it,” Tony says, smiling. “Um, well, I–”

“What?”

“Oh fuck,” Tony curses. “Listen, I’m just going to say it. I’m just going to say it.”

“You’ve said that twice.”

“Iloveyou.”

“What?”

“I…I love you,” Tony says, sighing. “I’ve loved you I think since eighth grade, and I’m now telling you because I don’t think I can just go on with life without telling you. I also realize that you’re stuck at the family reunion until this is over, so now I realize I’ve put stress on you and I’m sorry, I can fake my death if you really want me to, so–”

Natasha envelops him in a hug. She kisses his cheek, looking at him in the dim light of the lanterns.

“You absolute fool. I love you too.”

It’s the first of many “I love you’s.”

Sharon takes credit for the relationship, and Tony and Nat let her. She’s also the maid of honor and meets her future wife, Maria.

Tony and Natasha don’t go to the same college, but compete against each other in the trivia clubs that both schools have, and so they spend other time together. Natasha shows him her favorite tea shop downtown, and Tony shows her all of the hideaway spots he uses for studies.

(And to hide her away from Rhodey, who will tell her anything and everything that’s embarrassing about Tony.)

Right after college, Tony and Nat move into an apartment.

About a year later, Natasha holds out a gold ring for him to put on, asks if they really have to get married in a fancy church, and watches as Tony tears up and hugs her.

“I told you!” Sharon crows when they reveal the rings. “I told you that you would get married!”

“Okay loser,” Natasha says. “Then you’re the maid-of-honor. Congrats on throwing my bachelorette party.”

“I’m making us go paint-balling.”

Tony rolls his eyes, but looks at his now-fiancee.

Things will be good. Aren’t they always?

#holy FUCK this is long and it's not showing me my read more link #oh well!#lovelyirony writes #long post #this is long as fuck #ironwidow #sharon carter #iron man #black widow #natasha romanoff #tony stark #i love them okay #so much #i did this instead of read about the protestant reformation but all you need to know about that is martin luther hated the church #and everyone else hated martin luther #so that was fun #fake dating au #i love how i search up teh characters name to find this nad i can't #that's so sexy ;)

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clarketomylexa · 5 years

Text

That’s What Best Friends Do

“I love you,” she tells Lexa in earnest.

Lexa cocks her head, nose scrunched and finger curled into the spine of her book, marking the page. “Why.”

Clarke is taken back. Her and Octavia have been exchanging cheesy ‘I love yous’ since the second grade and there isn’t any real reason for it other than ‘that’s just what friends do’. She shrugs and purses her lips. “I don’t know,” she says plainly, and amends the words Octavia tells her, “that’s just what best friends do.”

read on ao3

They meet in the first grade.

Lexa is sweet and Clarke thinks she is cool in her own quirky way.

She moves in on a Sunday and she stands on the other side of the picket fence as they talk, in a green sweatshirt with tiny, little pugs on it and one leg of her denim overalls rolled an inch higher than the other, rainbow piñata socks on show underneath scuffed up sneakers. Her hair is braided into a crown around her head—a style that Clarke files away among what Octavia likes to call a ‘fishtail braid’ and how to tie her shoelaces for later—and she has a scar above her top lip that Clarke imagines she got doing something exotic.

She’s so much cooler than the kids in her grade that Clarke almost wants to yell out how unfair it is that she won’t be going to her school in the Spring.

“But Oakside is so far away,” she laments, hands fidgeting with the Barbie doll tucked beneath her arm. Most of the kids her age in their cul-de-sac go to Ridgeview. Privately Clarke thinks Octavia is the only one worth talking to though, because she has it on good authority that Miller picks his nose and Bellamy just tries too hard.

She isn’t allowed to tell people that though so she watches Lexa shrug.

“My cousin goes there.”

Abby calls her from the porch a moment later and Clarke is forced to say goodbye to her new friend to wash up for sinner. She thrusts the topless Barbie over the fence in a form of peace offering—Lexa’s eyes bulge out of her head and Clarke wonders if she’s never seen a Barbie before so she makes a mental note to invite Lexa over to play with them—and tells Lexa with the utmost importance that she will talk to her tomorrow.

“I made a new friend today,” she tells Abby and Jake from her stool by the kitchen sink as she methodically washes her hands like the chart tacked to the wall tells her to. Jake says she’s a ‘sociable child’ which Clarke thinks is adult speak for ‘will talk to anything that moves’ because once she made friends with a duck in the park that had one leg and an eye that didn’t open. But if being ‘sociable’ means she can talk to Lexa again Clarke will accept the title gladly.

When she closes her eyes she can see Lexa’s pretty braid and the way her eyes aren’t quite one colour but not two either. Like what would happen in art class when Clarke mixed turquoise and forest green together on her plastic pallet because she was using what Miss Henry called ‘artistic license’. Maybe God or whatever Bellamy’s new theory on who created the universe used their ‘artistic license’ when they were making Lexa too.

It makes an awful lot of sense when she thinks about it.

“Clarke you’re wasting water,” Abby reminds her, ferrying pasta bake and green salad from the island to the table and Clarke dries her hands obediently and tucks her stool into the scullery to claim her chair.

“Her name is Lexa,” she continues. “She has piñatas on her socks. She lives next door.”

“The Shepard house sold?” Jake asks.

Abby nods. “I met the new owners at the open house last month. She’s a lawyer,” she looks at Jake in the way Clarke has noticed her parents do when they are talking about ‘parent things’. “I don’t think he’s in the picture anymore.”

“What picture?” Clarke pipes up, distracted as she uses the spoon to scrape the cheesy, bread crumb topping from the side of the dish. She likes drawing. Her favourite is when they finish their worksheets quickly on Friday afternoons and her teacher tells them to bring a piece of paper and a book to lean on, and takes them to the playground to draw the plants and the bugs. The boys in her class spend the time throwing sticks at each other but Clarke always finds a corner to tuck herself into and a lady bug to examine.

She likes the colours.

“Your Mom means that Lexa’s Dad doesn’t live with her anymore,” Jake explains. He takes the spoon from Clarke and scoops the stuck piece of pasta bake onto her plate before topping it up with salad and ignoring the way she frowns at the limp lettuce leaves.

Thinking on it, Clarke nods without ceremony. “If Lexa’s Mom’s a lawyer,” she posits, “can she arrest Nate for stealing my gel pens?”

Nate sits across from her in art class and has a habit of stealing her stationary when he thinks she isn’t looking because he likes colouring his notebooks with sparkles. It’s annoying because she refuses to tell on him and Abby says she doesn’t want to buy her more if they are going to continue to go missing so she has to resort to using Octavia’s ones without the good smelling scents.

“I don’t think that’s how it works, honey,” Abby laughs.

“That’s prob’ly for the best,” Clarke smacks her lips in thought, “he sticks them up his nose.”

Clarke invites Lexa over two days later to play with her Barbies and Lexa sits on her lawn in a bright pink long-sleeve with patches shaped like fried eggs on the elbows and socks that have milk and cookies on them.

When she jokes that Lexa is wearing her breakfast, Lexa smiles so wide Clarke thinks the world will split in two.

She invites Lexa to the lake three months later.

It’s a five hour drive to the house that has been in Jake’s family since he was Clarke’s age but it’s one that they take every twenty-second of June when Abby has cover at the surgery. The house is big and old, with a deck and a new paint job and big windows that overlook the lake. If you squint on a clear day, you can see the proud, white facades of the houses on the other side with their boat sheds, trellises and peaked roofs.

A jetty sits in the water and a tree clings to the bank with a tire-swing Jake had fastened to the middle-most branch—against Abby’s better judgement but she never can stop her husband when he has one of his ideas—so that when you stand as far as you can up the bank and let go you can fly out far enough not to touch the bottom of the lake. It’s Clarke’s favourite thing since she learnt how to do a handstand on the side of the garage.

Not that Clarke has to sell it really, because after three months of Barbie Dream house in the front yard Lexa is nodding as soon as she mentions it would mean spending the summer with her. She explains diligently that there is a double bed in the room Clarke usually stays in—because Abby said that sometimes people don’t like sleeping in the same bed as other people—but that they can sleep in the bunk room instead, or Jake can pull the trundle bed out.

Lexa just nods.

She is fairly sure that is she asked Lexa to jump off a cliff, she would walk straight off it, piñata socks and all but then Clarke would miss her too much.

She stands on the Griffin’s porch on the morning of the twenty-second, in cactus socks and second-hand short-alls—the pants cut down to her size—with funky patches sewn into the bib, thumbs working their way under the straps of her backpack as her mom thanks Abby profusely.

She’s a pretty lady, with Lexa’s smile and round glasses who looks both flustered and relieved as she sweeps a hand over her daughter’s forehead and admits in a way Clarke knows she is supposed to pretend not to listen to that Lexa is having trouble making friends. Which Clarke thinks is ridiculous because Lexa is sweet and funny. She wears her hair like a crown and has been rolling the legs of her pants up at different lengths for three months because Clarke said she thought it was cool.

Clarke’s chest aches when Lexa won’t look up from the tips of her shoes and she thinks that Lexa’s mom mustn’t know what she’s talking about.

Clarke has been doing multiplication in math.

She knows that two and two is four, and three and three is six.

And if that’s true then she thinks Lexa and summer must equal something like ‘better than good’—but not ‘bestest’ because Lexa says ‘best’ is already a superlative.

Clarke doesn’t know what a superlative is, but Lexa can define words like ‘diversification’ so she thinks Lexa must be right.

They swim until water rattles in their ears and Jake teaches them to fish off the jetty after they stand on stools to help him pull the rods down from a shelf in the boat house, carefully showing them how to thread the bait onto the hook and cast the line into the water. When Lexa can’t get her hands around the line, face contorting unhappily, Jake heaves her onto his lap and repeats the process patiently until her frumpy frown straightens out.

They go out on the boat on hot days; Jake makes the boat corkscrew so that the water froths out in a V behind them, and when Clarke begs, he flings them writhing and giggling into the water by the strap of their life-jackets and fishes them out again while Abby rolls her eyes.

It’s in the quiet moments though, when the lie on the grass in damp swim suits and sunscreen-sticky skin, that Clarke discovers two very important things.

The first: Lexa does this thing when she is happy where she scrunches her eyes and throws her head back to laugh and it’s so ‘positively lovely’—which is another thing that Lexa says a lot—that Clarke makes it her mission to make her happy every day of her life.

The second: every time Lexa is happy, it makes Clarke feel ten feet tall. It’s a feeling that starts in her toes, ticking the soles of her feet and shooting like growing pains up her legs until her stomach is hot and her cheeks are pink and she feels stronger than before. She is pretty sure that if she were to climb the tallest tree on the bank and let go, she would fly and not fall.

She thinks about it as she sits, chin sticky with lemonade popsicle on the jetty.

Lexa lays sprawled on her back, legs akimbo and arms stretched out into the sky. Her fingers are splayed and her whole face is contorted so that she can squint up at the sky and trap the sun in the circle of her fingers. She has freckles peeking out shyly from the bridge of her nose and when she notices Clarke staring, she drops her hand and smiles. It’s lopsided—like her pant legs and her socks—but it’s whole in a way that makes Clarke’s stomach flip-flop.

“Want to see something cool?” she pokes Lexa in the soft of her ribs with her pointer finger.

Lexa nods, pushing herself up onto her elbows, intrigued, “uh huh.”

She folds her legs and cocks her head. Clarke makes sure she is watching before she picks her way up the jetty, where the grassy verge tangles with the roots and rocks.

The tire swing is tucked over a low branch—at her mom’s request because technically Clarke isn’t supposed to use it without ‘adult supervision’ but Lexa talks like an adult sometimes with her ‘therefore’ and ‘henceforth’, so she thinks it will be okay—and stands on a rock that juts out into the water with one leg, reaching out with the other until she can feel the tire under her fingers. Grinning, she pulls it into her hands and hooks a leg over the rope, taking three steps back and launching herself off the bank.

She lets go when the tire is just about to swing back like Jake taught her and surfaces just out of the shallows, hair in her eyes and heart thumping against the cage of her chest. When her ears unclog, Lexa is whooping and the jetty bends and gives beneath her uncoordinated victory dance.

“I can go higher,” Clarke garbles, mouth full of water.

Lexa’s whole face shoots upwards in disbelief. “Cannot,” she says.

“Can to,” Clarke insists, arms flailing as she doggy-paddles inelegantly to the shore.

Their life jackets are hooked over the railing of the deck and it crosses Clarke’s mind that maybe she should go and get hers, but if she does Abby will see her through the kitchen window and she gave them instructions not to go in the water when she went in to put lunch together.

She fishes the tire swing towards her and steps back as far as the rope will go this time, rooting her toes firmly in the soggy grass. Lexa is staring at her in wide-eyed apprehension but Clarke sets her brow until it furrows above her eyes and her stomach whooshes out from under her as she kicks off the bank, mud stuck between her toes.

It dawns on her when the air is whining in her ears that maybe this isn’t such a good idea.

Her foot catches and before she understand what is happening she is careening back towards the bank, heart stuck in her mouth.

Lexa lets out a sharp yelp, as Clarke’s hand slips. She lands face down in the dirt, the air punched out of her chest, still for a moment until pain blooms across her right cheek and a cry escapes her mouth before she can recognise it as hers. She hears a shout when her ears stop ringing, and rolls with a hard gasp onto her back as Lexa’s head and shoulders swim into her vision, awful worry crunching her face. She pets Clarke’s hair as Clarke blinks up at the sky, voice trembling as she coos ‘it’s okay, Clarke’ and ‘I’m here, Clarke’ in a high, thin voice that Clarke can’t help but think is less soothing and more unsettling, until the thick goo that seems to be sitting on her lungs seeps away and she can breathe.

But then her mom appears—all grumpy line in the place of her mouth—wiping her hands on her pants as she squats on the grass and Clarke thinks she is going to puke all over again.

“Mom,” she squeaks, whining as the right side of her face throbs hotly.

Abby takes one look at her—wet swimsuit and lank hair, blood pooling beneath her eye and Lexa’s hand squeezed tightly in a balled fist—and tsks, tucking a hand under her to sit her up and Clarke sways before falling into her chest, whining ‘it hurts’ into the soft neckline of her shirt.

The first-aid kit is found and Abby asserts that it won’t need stitches.

She gets a talking to about not doing what she’s told—which Lexa stands through too, fingers wound through Clarke’s in a way that makes it hard to focus on why ‘insubordination’ is a bad thing—and she wears a hulk band-aid on the bony jut of her cheek for a week.

Lexa traces it with a feather-light finger as the lie, side-by-side in the double bed beneath the lazy turn of the ceiling fan in the room that has been Clarke’s since she was three years old. She wears llama pyjamas and is unapologetic about not wanting to sleep on the trundle bed Jake offers to make up for her, instead, pressing herself into Clarke to feel for the bump of the scab forming under the band-aid with a frown in the way that makes warmth curl under Clarke’s ribs.

“I did it on purpose,” Clarke says, eager for anything to get rid of the crunch between Lexa’s eyebrows. She wants to reach out and touch it but her hands shake so she doesn’t.

Lexa blinks slowly, “nuh uh,” she says without heat.

“Did to,” Clarke fists her hand under her chin and nudges Lexa’s nose with her own. She smells like bubble-gum toothpaste and the Griffin’s shower-gel and the wonderful notion that Lexa is hers wafts in her mind until she can’t help but smile. “Now I match you.”

Lexa reaches up to touch the shallow half-circle above her top lip like she’s forgotten about it, fingers tapping her teeth for a minute before she shakes her head. “Yours is cooler,” she says definitively, “I got mine falling off my bike,” she explains, “you got yours flying.”

Lexa smiles her world-splitting smile and Clarke thinks that while swimming and the fireworks Jake sets off for the Fourth of July are all well and good, bedtime might be better. It’s a secret she will take to the grave along with how she only pretends not to like broccoli but the stripy wallpaper and floral sheets of the room feel impenetrable and Clarke builds them a fortress out of cotton sheets and shadows cast from soft lamp-light; a place where Lexa is hers.

She wraps her fist around the top of the sheet and pull sit over their heads until they are breathing the same hot air.

“You’re my best friend,” she says wondering why her throat gets hot and tight as she does so. The words have been sitting on her chest since the day they met—a secret locked tight like the acorns she keeps in the sticker decorated box beneath her bed that is so true she feels it in her bones every time Lexa talks.

Lexa’s eyes go big. For a horrible second, Clarke thinks that it was the wrong thing to say and her stomach flip-flops but not in the way she has come accustomed to it doing when she is around Lexa—this flip-flop feels like the warning kind that comes before Clarke has to go in search for her mom in the middle of the night because she ate too much ice-cream in one go and it winds itself into a knot so tight the only way out is up. But then, Lexa mumbles ‘best friend’ under her breath like she wants to taste it and nods, smiling so warmly Clarke wants to wrap herself up in it like a blanket and never crawl out.

“I’ve never had a best friend,” she admits, cowering behind the words like they will change Clarke’s mind. When Clarke doesn’t reply, she peers at her intently and Clarke recognises the look that she gets when she is helping Clarke with her addition and subtraction worksheets. “Is it different from just being a friend?”

Clarke thinks about it for a moment.

“Yes,” she eventually lands on, “and no.” Lexa nods. “It just means more,” Clarke whispers, “it just makes it more special.”

“Okay, then,” Lexa decides. “You’re my best friend too.”

Lexa is soft when she sleeps. With her admission she goes limp like pasta when you put it in the pot and Clarke manoeuvres her happily, all gangly limbs and knobbly joints, until she can tangle them together like a puzzle—the kind that isn’t meant to unravel—and when Abby comes to check on them, if it weren’t for the different colours of their pyjamas, she wouldn’t know where one started and the other ended.

They talk during the year but it isn’t the same.

Lexa gives Clarke a pair of socks for her birthday with tiny little sloths embroidered into them—Clarke knows they cost her whole allowance and for that it means the world. She presents them with as much importance as when she knighted Clarke in the woods behind the lake house with an old plank of timber they found in the shed and she hangs over the fence every day after school with her lopsided smile and embroidered overalls, telling Clarke about the books she reads and her nine-year-old cousins shenanigans until her mom calls her in.

Sometimes, when Lexa’s mom is working she stays at Clarke’s on Saturday nights and on those days, Clarke can almost pretend it’s summer. They stand on stools in the kitchen side-by-side as Jake stirs the pasta sauce and lie in Clarke’s twin bed at night, watching the glow-in-the-dark stars. But Lexa is all angles unfortunately—she looks forlorn whenever someone mentions it to her, but Abby insists that she will grow into her lankiness—and while in summer it provides places for Clarke to tuck herself into comfortably, during the year, the positions she has to contort them into to make them fit clench at her chest.

She presses sloppy kisses to Lexa’s forehead to tries and convince herself otherwise, but Clarke comes to the conclusion that Lexa isn’t hers during the year when Lexa regretfully turns down an invitation to go bowling when Jake offers to take her, Octavia and Bellamy one Friday night.

She stares at her toes when she tells Clarke that her mom said no and she looks so much like the snail that Clarke found on the back path without its shell one morning that she pester her for more information.

Two weeks later, Clarke has to say no to backyard pizza with Lexa and her mom because of Octavia’s seventh birthday party—a slumber party that ends at eight when they all inevitably fall from their sugar highs that Lexa isn’t invited to despite Clarke’s best efforts.

Octavia doesn’t like Lexa. She says she’s ‘too colourful’ with her stripy shirts and rainbow patches even after Clarke explains her theory about ‘artistic license’ and Clarke thinks it’s a horrible reason not to like someone. When she asks her mom Abby tells her that Octavia is probably feeling left out and Clarke thinks that maybe, she isn’t Lexa’s during the year either.

The thought is so distressing, she lies awake with it at night, raggedy Ann doll squeezed under her armpit as she stares at the spot where the wall meets the ceiling. She twists her finger over the woollen curls.

Summer is four months away but suddenly, it becomes the center of her universe.

Clarke is nine years old and Abby has set them loose to play in the thatch of trees beside the house.

They pick through the leaves in shorts and t-shirts while their bathing suits dry over the railing and play catch with the neighbour kids until they are flush faced and breathless. Lexa wears popcorn socks beneath her sneakers and Clarke slips a hand, fingers splayed, over her mouth to mask the sound of her heavy breathing as they crouch in a heavy crush of limbs behind a tree. They are pressed so close together Clarke can feel the rapid pat-pat of her heart and when the Monty and Jasper run past in a flurry of kicked-up leaves and pine needles, Lexa licks a wet stripe across Clarke’s cupped palm with a fierce brand of mischief in her eyes until Clarke squeals away.

They spend the rest of the afternoon as the taggers but Clarke can’t find it in herself to complain.

The next day tag becomes boring and they think of a new game.

Clarke remembers the story book that she packed in preparation for the lazy hours her and Lexa were sure to spend lounging on the grass—a thick tome her grandmother gifted her for Christmas completed with the words ‘For Clarke’ scrawled inside the front cover in her thin, looped writing that Clarke equated to the threads of the spiderwebs that hung from the beams in the shed. It contains everything from fairy tales to folklore.

She lays it on the picnic table and points to the characters illustrated in battle garb, assigning one to each of them.

Clarke is the sky princess, thrust from her cloud-top home—Olympus, Lexa corrects her quietly, pointing to the illustration of a tall, columned building gleaming atop the point of a high mountain. Her inspiration comes from a short story about a boy named Hercules that Clarke knows nothing about except for the fact that she dimly remembers watching a Disney movie about a boy who was half-god and half-human and had an angry goat instead of parents. She drapes a strip of gauzy fabric over her shoulders rummaged from the depths of the house, a dress-up left over from her aunts’ childhood summers, and threads flowers through her hair, feeling suitably wispy and ‘effervescent’, which Lexa tells her means ‘like air’.

Lexa is the warrior queen whose territory Clarke falls unwittingly into. Clarke thinks it suits her—she peers at the illustration of the woman with braids and leather armour, riding a horse with a sword in her hand and battle-paint on her skin and the slight downward turn in the corner of her lips is so similar to the way Lexa’s face contorts sometimes and she congratulates herself for putting two and two together. Ignoring the short yelps when she mistakenly tugs a stray curl, she clumsily threads Lexa’s hair into a braid the way Octavia taught her at recess. The outcome is less than good. Lexa bears more resemblance to the mangy cat that stalks the neighbourhood begging from scraps than a warrior-queen but she smudges wads of dirt over her eyes to fix it ignoring the way everything inside her goes warm and melty when she smiles—like the s’mores the make in the fire-pit at night in when Lexa is in pyjamas that smell like the Griffin’s detergent and socked feet.

Jasper and Monty grow restless, encroaching on the bubble Clarke has built for them with bored whines and Clarke thinks it’s lucky that Santa Claus never gave her a baby brother for Christmas two years ago because she got Lexa instead and Lexa smells much better than a boy. She assigns them characters anyway; the palace guards, and they search the ground for suitable ‘spears’ wielding gnarled sticks with as much menace as nine-year-olds can.

She kneels before Lexa’s throne—a fork in the twisted branches of a tree—with a circlet made from daisy chains in her hair, head bowed and launching into a wistful monologue of her harrowing journey to the ground, complete with fierce dragons, and a sea-witch who tried to barter unsuccessfully for her voice, while Monty and Jasper level their sticks at her in mock-fighting stances.

Back straight, Lexa blinks at her behind her crude war paint and Clarke thinks time stops.

Later—after they are called into lunch by Abby—they lie, sprawled out in the grass in the sticky heat of the day. Lexa has her bathing suit on beneath her shortalls instead of a t-shirt and her hair has dried in soft corkscrew curls around her hairline so that if she wasn’t peering so intently down at the book she has spread out before her, Clarke would reach out and wind one around her finger.

Instead, she feels like her body is humming with energy she doesn’t know what to do with.

Jake always likes to explain his work to her, he sits her on his lap and draws out maps of electrical circuits, explaining the mechanics of them and Clarke feels oddly similar to an overloaded circuit right now. Like she is plugged in to too many things and it’s making her unable to sit still.

Fingers splayed on the grass, she kicks up into a handstand, grinning at how Lexa looks upside down and the way she mouths the words she’s reading like it will help her remember them better. When she stands back up, the blood rushes back to her head and she peers over Lexa’s shoulder.

“What does ‘fealty’ mean?”

The word sits on the top line of the page in neat, Times New Roman font and it tastes so elegant rolling over Clarke’s tongue she can’t help but ask.

Lexa cranes her neck to look up at her, squinting one eye against the glare of the sun. A swathe of sunburn tints her cheeks red. “It’s like a promise,” she poses like a question, grappling for the right explanation, “or a vow.” Clarke cocks her head. “It’s like when you make a promise to someone,” she tries again, pushing herself up onto her knees so that from her angle, Clarke blocks the sun, “like, ‘I’ll love you ‘till the end of time’.”

Clarke has to rally herself against the sudden burst of dizziness that hits her in the chest with the force of the tee-ball bat in gym class. Lexa kneels in front of her, freckled-nose and braided hair, and if Clarke thought time had stopped before, now it ceases to exist entirely. The world has become just them; this sticky-sweet moment that has wound itself so eagerly around her chest.

Fourth grade science class has brought rudimentary explanations of the universe—how everything they touch is made up of things called ‘atoms’ and how when she looks up at the sky, she has to imagine the biggest thing she can possibly comprehend and then quadruple it and it won’t be nearly a one billionth of what is really out there. To Clarke it doesn’t make an awful lot of sense, the vastness of it all makes her head spin but the one thing she does understand is how the earth rotates around the sun because it’s similar to the way she thinks she rotates around Lexa.

“I love you,” she tells Lexa in earnest.

Lexa cocks her head, nose scrunched and finger curled into the spine of her book, marking the page. “Why.”

Lexa doesn’t come with them in the summer between sixth and seventh grade.

With help from a contact at work her mom gets her to the top of the waiting list for a sleep away camp in the Maine and Lexa pulls up the website on the Griffin’s computer in the kitchen on Saturday night, scrolling through page after page of girls in tennis whites and soffe shorts, playing field hockey and toasting marshmallows around a campfire.

“I don’t really want to go,” Lexa says quietly, nose wrinkling at Clarke’s silence. Behind them Jake dices vegetables for tacos and a bespectacled Abby checks through Clarke’s book report for spelling eras but the comforting familiarity does nothing to stop Clarke souring at the blindside. “My mom thinks it will be good for me.”

Clarke is getting tired of what Lexa’s mom thinks will be good for her.

The woman is sweet and kind. She has heard her parents talking about how she ‘does her best’ for Lexa which she knows is what adults say when they are commiserating the hardships of single-parenthood but in her worst moments Clarke wants to shake the woman until she understands that Lexa’s quirks don’t make her ‘unique’ in the way that people talk about people who are different, they make her special.

So what if Lexa likes books better than people? Clarke likes girls better than boys and nobody is up in arms about it.

Sometimes it feels like Lexa’s mom aches for her to fit in more than Lexa does.

She can’t stop Lexa from going though, and the morning before they would usually leave for the lake sees her standing on Lexa’s front porch instead, with a horribly permanent pout on her mouth that she can’t shake. Lexa stands before her in sneakers, navy shorts and a tee with her camps logo printed on the front in bold white letters, her hair in two, tight braids and she looks so startlingly un Lexa-like stripped of her embroidered socks and circle of braids that when Clarke winds her arms around her neck in a dramatic goodbye, she finds herself mouthing a silent prayer to whomever is watching to put her best-friend back together again.

Hooking her chin over Lexa’s shoulder Clarke makes her promise to write weekly, hating the tears that seem to be squeezing their way out from beneath her eye-lids, and Lexa swears a solemn vow to do so, nose tucked into the crook of Clarke’s neck.

When it’s time to let go Clarke reluctantly untangles herself and retreats back to her own front yard, pressing herself against the white fence and waving vigorously as Lexa’s mom loads her and her trunk into the car and the Sedan inches its way out of the driveway.

“You’ll see her in August,” Abby reminds her, arms tucked over her daughter’s shoulders, “we can buy some stamps and you can write to her whenever you like.”

Clarke nods dumbly, trying not to let the whole affair feel like an awful betrayal.

When they make it to the lake two days later after a near silent five hour drive, it rains for the first time in as long as Clarke can remember.

In lieu of her best-friend, Abby has extended the invitation to her sister-in-law and her kids and Clarke stares at her cousins—five-year-old twins and a nineteen-year-old who is more interested in her boyfriend who insists on calling Clarke ‘squirt’ at age twelve-and-a-half than she is in Clarke—wondering how she is supposed to bestow the honour of her summers on people who are so clearly unqualified.

She wallows in the absurdity of it all as she is relegated to the bunk-room, watching with her stomach churning and a hot, angry thing she doesn’t care to understand clawing at her ribs as her Eden is invaded by her cousin and her Air Jordan wearing boyfriend with his stupid, unbrushed mop of hair. And even though Clarke is relatively sure a five story drop onto concrete wouldn’t do any damage to the twins—they’re dim-witted at the best of times and they paw at the t shirt Lexa bought her for her birthday like it’s something they are allowed to touch—her aunt decides it’s best if Clarke takes the top bunk, despite the fact that puberty is beginning to bring her her promised growth spurt and folding herself into the top bunk is a feat worthy of a contortionist.

The bout of water-logged days mean the boat stays in the shed and the twins grow restless in the sticky-wet heat. Clarke takes it upon herself to commandeer the role of ‘moody teenager’ two years too early and sprawls out on the wooden floors near the closed glass doors and punches the buttons of her Nintendo DS until Mario stops obeying her commands as the rain beats at the window panes. She thinks it’s pathetic fallacy, or whatever her English teacher had said when she explained the way authors use the ‘external environment’ to show a characters ‘internal emotions’, because if she could peel back a layer of herself and peer into her soul, she is sure the unhappy, slate-grey of the lake is what it would look like.

She hopes it isn’t raining on Lexa too.

They cut their trip short and Clarke is sitting with her chin in her hands when Lexa returns.

Her ponytail sticks to the nape of her neck where it is secured with an elastic, remaining stubbornly in her t-shirt and shorts even though Aurora invited them around for pizza and too cool off in the Blake’s pool—even the promise of seeing their newly acquired black Labrador puppy wasn’t enough of a bribe to get her to give up her post.

Her and Lexa have been exchanging letters once a week without fail over the eight weeks of Lexa’s session, detailing each other in on the smallest things. So much so that Clarke thinks she is the one who has been rotating through six activities a day and sounded off to sleep by Taps at precisely nine-twenty but it hasn’t been nearly enough. It’s stupid, but she needs to see Lexa again with her own eyes, as if to make sure she hasn’t disappeared into thin-air like a product of her imagination.

“Clarke!”

When she looks up, Lexa is standing three feet away from her, tanned and slightly breathless. Her mom’s Sedan is still inching its way into the drive, which means Lexa took a flying jump from the passenger door while the car was still in gear to find her. She’s wearing tiny, navy running shorts and her camp tee—slightly faded from almost daily washing and eight-weeks’ worth of sun—hangs off her teenage frame, knotted at her hip so that the hem rides up to reveal a long triangle of skin that makes a hot, aching thing build in the pit of Clarke’s stomach. Instead of deciphering it, she propels herself from her crouch on the porch to fling her arms around her best-friend’s neck, instantly recognising the way Lexa seems imperceptibly broader and stronger in her arms. Her shoulder blades flex beneath the press of Clarke’s hands as she draws her desperately closer and when Clarke prods a finger at the offending strip of skin at her waistband—teasing her mercilessly about her bare midriff—gone is the softness Clarke usually finds there when she curls into her in their shared bed at night.

Instead she is long limbs and lean muscle, her cheeks are dusted with sunburn and her hair is lighter, but the worst? Her freckles are on show and this time it isn’t Clarke who has put them there, but a girl by the name of Costia who’s neatly printed name is in the center of those scrawled on the back of Lexa’s shirt in permanent marker.

They lie on the mesh of Clarke’s trampoline after Lexa has hauled her trunk up to her room—her mom gave her four hours before she had to return next door and sort out her laundry—with cans of diet coke sweating in their palms as Clarke recounts the story of walking in on her cousin and her boyfriend being more intimate than strictly necessary on a family-friendly vacation.

“I almost barfed,” she giggles heartily, “I wanted to end it all right there but my mom talked me down from the ledge.”

“Oh, the dramatics,” Lexa sighs, grinning. She takes a sip then looks at Clarke seriously. “Was it really that bad without me?”

“I think you know the answer to that,” Clarke says softly. It wasn’t bad so much as it was empty, completely void of all of the things that made summer summer and Clarke has been left with the odd feeling that she is returning to school having not had a holiday at all.

Lexa screws her nose up and nods, “if it makes you feel better camp sucked too.”

“No it didn’t,” Clarke laughs, curling onto her side, “but thank you for making me feel better.”

Lexa piques a brow. “Are you call me a liar?” she accuses, feigning a hurt look. When Clarke shrugs, she flings a leg over her hips and pins her to the taut mesh of the trampoline with her arms by her ears and Clarke tries not to gasp at the electric shocks that skitter across her skin when they touch. Instead, she collapses into laughter, tipping her head to the side as Lexa knees her beneath the ribs, demanding ‘take it back, take it back’ in a low, teasing voice.

“Fine!” Clarke gaps, writhing against the assault, “fine!” She paws at the smooth length of Lexa’s thighs where they sit nestled against her waist. “I believe you.”

Clarke has a hard time pinpointing exactly what happens next.

Somehow she raises her head and simultaneously, Lexa goes to lower hers. The result is a cacophonous collision of foreheads and noses; Clarke opens her mouth to whine in pain and finds a mouthful of Lexa’s bottom lip instead, eyes bulging as her pulse skyrockets to a speed she thinks surely signals a cardiac arrest.

Lexa makes a noise that resembles something close to an ‘oof’ then her fingers come to Clarke’s cheek in concern. “I’m sorry,” she smiles ruefully—it’s the same lopsided, word splitting smile she has always had and it does something to quell the stagnant uneasiness that has taken root in Clarke’s spine, if not the smouldering build up of who knows what in the pit of her stomach—and runs her thumb in a practiced motion over the short, white scar beneath Clarke’s eye.

“It’s okay,” Clarke whispers. She fiddles with the edge of the tie-dyed bandana that is wrapped and knotted around Lexa’s wrist, trying not to focus on the impending sense of doom she feels as her body betrays her.

#clexaweek2019 #day 3 #only one bed #clexa fic #childhood friends #clarke griffin #lexa

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virgilmydarkstrangeson · 5 years

Text

Trying to Survive: Chapter 30

A/N: Thirty parts and we’re so close to the end now! Also, this is the longest chapter and I mean can you really blame me when you read this?

Summary: Virgil just wants to live as himself. There are bumps in the road, but hey, life isn’t easy. Pairing: Analogical Trigger Warnings: Anxiety, panic attacks, transphobia, a lot of blushing, some happy crying, this is like pure fluff w h o o p s, if you see anything else tell me! Word Count: 1,763

~~~

Virgil awoke to silence, which was uncommon but not out of the ordinary for him, as he had several soothing music radios that he cycled through for sleeping and they would occasionally stop during the middle of the night. After a minute of revelling in the warmth of his bed, equipped with a new, thicker sheet and softer pillows, he forced himself to sit up and properly wake up, blinking for a moment at the bright sunlight filtering in through the window.

It was at this moment that Virgil’s phone began to ring, and with a groan, he picked his phone up and answered the call, not checking who was calling before doing so.

“Happy birthday, bud!” It was Virgil’s dad, and Virgil couldn’t find it in himself to be annoyed at being called this early in the morning.

“Thanks, dad,” Virgil replied as he slowly climbed out of bed to make some coffee, feeling the chill of his apartment as he walked to his kitchen.

“Your present should be arriving today, I found something online I knew you’d like so I had it sent straight to your apartment.” Virgil nearly groaned as he clicked the button on his coffee maker, which was an early Christmas present from Patton.

“Dad, you know you didn’t have to do that…” Virgil’s dad simply chuckled.

“I know, but I want to spoil my son once in a while, even if you’re an adult now.”

“Thanks.”

“You know I’ll do anything for you, son. Now, you enjoy the rest of your birthday, okay?”

“I will dad. I love you.”

“Love you too, Virg.” Virgil then hung up the phone and, coffee mug in hand, settled down on his couch to scroll through the various notifications on his phone. He had a few arbitrary happy birthday messages from old friends on Facebook, and some new tweets from the multiple band Twitters he followed, but nothing too special. He hadn’t even received a text from Logan or Patton, which he thought to be slightly odd, as with it being nearly 11:30 am both of them would no doubt be awake. Virgil decided to send a simple ‘you busy?’ text to Logan anyway, not really upset at the thought of his birthday being forgotten, and downed the rest of his coffee to get ready in case Logan was okay with him coming round. It was almost strange, how much Virgil liked just hanging around Logan’s apartment.

Virgil was brushing his teeth when his phone buzzed again, this time with a reply text from Logan. [I’m grading a few papers, but you are more than welcome to come over.] Virgil smiled to himself and replied to say he’d be there in around ten minutes, before finishing up his morning routine with this new skin cream his dad had sent over - just because he was a guy didn’t mean he couldn’t look after his skin, after all - and then, Virgil was out the door and at Logan’s apartment within five minutes. He was early, oh well. Luckily, he was used to just walking into Logan’s apartment at this point, so he opened the door and walked straight in.

“Happy birthday!!!” was the shout that caused Virgil to jump back several feet, back hitting the door he had just closed. Standing in front of him was a grinning Patton holding a large, purple cake, an equally smiling Roman who was holding a stack of presents, and after a second, Logan came into view, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Patton I thought I told you to wait so we don’t scare him?” Logan chastised, giving Virgil a sympathetic glance.

“Sorry, I’m just so excited!” Patton’s grin turned slightly sheepish before he put down the cake and looked at Virgil again. “We didn’t mean to scare you, kiddo, we just wanted to give you an awesome birthday party!” Virgil took a deep breath, recovering from the shock before he spoke.

“You guys actually set something up for me? I thought you’d forgotten.” Virgil admitted, to which Patton let out an almost horrified gasp.

“We would never forget your birthday, Virg! We just didn’t want you to figure out the surprise because we wanted it to be special!” Patton then pulled Virgil into a hug, while Roman spoke.

“We knew you’d be sceptical if we told you to go to some random location, so Specs here thought it would be less conspicuous if you came to us of your own free will, so we’re celebrating here instead of a bigger place!” Virgil caught a glimpse of Logan’s face turning red from the corner of his eye before Patton pulled him into the living room and sat him down on the couch.

“Okay, present time! You’ve gotta open mine first!” Patton grabbed the first present off of the pile Roman was holding and nearly thrust it into Virgil’s arms, bouncing on his feet as if he was the one receiving a gift. Virgil carefully opened the black and silver wrapping paper that was surprisingly not Christmas themed, to reveal a black lump of fabric, which, when Virgil pulled it fully out of the wrapping, was, in fact, a pullover hoodie. And, on further inspection, the hood had a pair of stuffed cat ears sewn on.

“Do you like it? Now we can really be hoodie buddies! And you’re totally welcome to put patches on it like your other one!” Patton seemed to almost be bursting at the seams from excitement and anticipation for what Virgil’s reaction would be, and Virgil smiled, both from the present itself and by how happy Patton was, before slipping off his hoodie and pulling the new one over his head. It was large, large enough to sink into, and incredibly soft. The sleeves were even a very comfortable length to have sweater paws, so Virgil’s smile grew without him even realising it.

“I love it, Pat, thanks.” Patton squealed in delight before hugging Virgil again, even tighter than before, before pulling away and going to the kitchen, presumably to grab the cake.

“Me next!” Roman exclaimed, dropping himself next to Virgil and handing him a smaller, neatly wrapped present in the same wrapping paper. Virgil took it and, again carefully, unwrapped it, uncovering a shiny, silver-covered notebook. “I noticed that you tend to doodle when you’re stressed, so I thought you could do with something to keep them all in one place. I know it’s not much, but-”

“It’s great,” Virgil cut Roman off, flicking through the pages to find a mix of lined and blank paper throughout the book. “Thanks, Princey.” Roman smiled and patted Virgil’s shoulder.

“No problem, Storm Cloud. And now it’s Logan’s turn!” Roman picked up the last two presents, both of them small, and gave them to Virgil, while Logan spoke.

“I knew you wouldn’t care for anything ridiculously expensive, so I,” Logan cleared his throat, and his face was turning a light shade of pink again. “I went for something more personal.” Virgil opened the smaller present first, revealing a long silver chain at the end of which was a very familiar looking design.

“This looks just like my lucky pin,” Virgil breathed out, examining the thundercloud design and noticing that it was even engraved with his name, exactly like his pin, which his dad had gotten him back when they had started their life away from Virgil’s mother, and Virgil started living as a boy. It was one of Virgil’s fondest memories from that long ago, and it caused his eyes to water ever so slightly before he blinked it away and moved onto the next present. It had a fair amount of weight to it and was a similar shape as the notebook, only slightly larger, and when he opened it he felt his face burn a bright red.

“What is it?” Patton spoke, moving from where he was setting up the candles on the cake when he noticed how red Virgil’s face had gotten. Virgil, however, quickly manoeuvred the gift so neither Patton nor Roman, who was still sat at his side, could see what it was. Not that it was anything particularly bad or embarrassing; the present was a solid, oak wood photo frame with the selfie Virgil and Logan had taken together on one of their earlier dates together, and if Virgil didn’t have a surge of emotion hit him when he saw the photo, then he was soulless and also lying.

“Just a picture, Pat,” Virgil finally spoke, hoping his slightly shaking voice and glassy eyes didn’t give away just how much the presents meant to him. “Now, you’re not going to sing happy birthday before I blow out those candles, are you?”

They did, in fact, sing for him, led mainly by Roman, whose voice carried the loudest out of the three, before digging into the cake Patton had made, which was a multilayer consisting of coffee and chocolate sponge and some of the best almond icing Virgil had ever tasted, before spending the rest of day just talking among themselves. At one point, Flora came over and sat squarely in Virgil’s lap, refusing to move until Roman and Patton had left to avoid travelling in the dark, and she finally got up when Logan got out the cat food. After a few more hours of a lot more mellow conversation, Virgil went to sleep, using Logan’s spare room as he couldn’t bring himself to trudge back up to his apartment.

It was after Virgil went to sleep that Logan began cleaning up his apartment, storing the leftover cake in a few airtight containers to stop it from going stale and to keep it safe from Flora. Then, while collecting the wrapping paper, Logan noticed Virgil’s patchwork hoodie was still on the couch, he had gone to sleep still wearing the one Patton had gifted him. Curious, Logan picked up the garment, and sure enough, there was a pair of pins attached to the jacket, the storm cloud and the black cat. Carefully, Logan removed the cat pin, making a note of where it was positioned before turning it over. Neither Roman nor Virgil had ever revealed what was so special about the other side, and Logan figured there would be no harm in taking a look, so long as he didn’t break it. Logan paused, looking at the silvery back of the pin, and then his cheeks were warm once again. Staring back at him was an engraving of his own name in an elegant font.

~~~

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#thomas sanders #virgil sanders #logan sanders #patton sanders #roman sanders #trans!virgil #Analogical

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